One Way Road Trip to Awesomeville

So, here we are. We made it safely to Pennsylvania. Actually arrived about a week ago, but my laptop was carefully packed away this whole time and I’ve been frantically trying to unpack and get everything from our house to fit into our new apartment. I didn’t realize that I own more dishes and glassware than a woman in her late 80’s. How in the hell did I end up with so much?!? And I even donated and sold a bunch of stuff before we moved.

UGH.

I can’t even begin to explain how much UGHness is going on with unpacking. But I am making great progress. Most people say “Oh, you’ll be unpacking for weeks” when I explain we just moved. First of all, assholes, it does not help anyone’s morale who is involved in the unfortunate task of unpacking when you say its going to be weeks before things return to normal. And, second of all, I have already unpacked all boxes (except for two marked “Katie Desk”) in the last two days.

Two.
Days.

Bam. Take that.

Granted, I am beyond exhausted. My allergies are causing explosive snot, sneezing and coughing from all the dust and mess I’ve encountered. And don’t even get me started on my bruises. I look like I had a major disaster riding a mechanical bull. (Anyone who has ever had the pleasure of being thrown from a mechanical bull and finding random bruises days later will understand my point here.)

So, yeah, lets just say all the boxes are unpacked. I still need to finish putting some things away. And organizing. Like, really really organizing. And then the fun part of hanging art work and decor. I’m excited for that. I’m also very excited to start exploring the area.

Brad Pitt and I managed to check out a few local places in our first days here:

• Bethlehem Brew Works – Our first night in the area we arrived late and stayed in a hotel. A growler of beer and food to-go made up for the late arrival and was the perfect way to welcome ourselves to town.
• The Trapp Door – Thank you Sweet Baby Jesus for having a great restaurant with a great beer list in this small town!!!
• Armetta’s – An Italian restaurant that has taco salads on their menu. Um, okay. Under normal circumstances I would avoid such a place, but the options were slim and we were hungry for lunch. And I was pleasantly surprised. Their sandwiches were pretty damn good. I’ll share more on Sandwich Saturday.
• Thai Thai House – While this place lacks a website, they still have some serious potential. The food and service were great. And I caught a glimpse of one of those electronic disco balls in the bar area. We went on a Sunday evening so the disco ball was not in action. I hope to return on a more exciting night to witness all that could be awesome.
• McDonalds – All I can say is: I was desperate. And: Did you know you can get TWENTY McNuggets for $5?!?

Enough about that. Let me share with you some of the interesting things I’ve encountered thus far in my One Way Road Trip. So interesting that I couldn’t have made them up myself, even if I tried. Without further ado, in no particular order …..

Things I Can Not Make Up:

1. There is a small takeout Philly Cheesesteak restaurant attached to the Home Depot closest to our apartment. I’m not kidding. I plan to investigate other Home Depots to see if this is a recurring trend in our area.

2. There was a bat-shit-crazy neighbor. As in “break out the DSM-5 and figure out all of his diagnoses because this dude is seriously fucked up in the head crazy.” In our first meet and greet he made it a point to bring out two of his assault weapons … loaded … and show them off to us. And in a very casual manner, he said to Princess and The P, “You guys better not bark or I will shoot you.”

——– Let’s take a moment to reflect on this situation. Up until that point, I had spent the majority of the day dealing with our our movers squeezing all of the items that we used to have in an entire house into our new apartment. Running up and down two flights of stairs. Carrying things up and down said stairs. I felt so guilty about all the stairs that I pitched in and helped. (Which is ridiculous because we were paying them, but, still, I have manners. And a conscience.) And when they were done I immediately began unpacking and arranging things nicely. (See paragraph above about assholes telling me it would take weeks to unpack and understand I do not mess around with unpacking.) Brad Pitt and I were feeling pretty damn good about our move, the progress we had made with unpacking and then WHAM we were hit with complete crazy. When we finally managed to break away from the conversation, we quietly looked at each other, walked up our entry stairs, turned off Pandora, sat down in the living room and just stared at each other until Brad Pitt said “Well that’s it. We have to move. That gun can blast through a tank, let alone our bedroom wall. We are not staying here.” And that is when I began crying. The idea of having to move an entire house up and down multiple flights of stairs for the second time in less than 48 hours was beyond overwhelming. But at the ripe age of 35 we realized when you are given a red flag you do not ignore it. So we moved into a different unit. So far no bat shit crazy neighbors have introduced themselves.——–

3. There was a need to move twice in 48 hours. Twice. 48 Hours. I know I just shared the story about the crazy neighbor but the entire fact that we moved everything we own twice in two days blows my mind into pieces. I spent our entire 18-hour road trip to Pennsylvania stating over and over that I was never going to move again. Even when our short-term lease is up in 6 months, I insisted that we should stay put to avoid the hassle of moving. And then we moved immediately after we got into our first place. Mind = Blown.

4. There were Amish people shopping at IKEA. When I told people we were moving to Pennsylvania, a common response was “Oh, you’ll see a lot of Amish people.” Well, I haven’t seen any. Except for the Amish ladies at IKEA. Now I know where all their “homemade furniture” really comes from.

And last, but not least ….
There is a town called Shartlesville. Need I say more? I didn’t think so. (And if you require further explanation on why I find the name of this town insanely hilarious, you probably shouldn’t be reading my blog.)

This One Way Road Trip is awesome.