For dinner tonight we indulged in my sentimentality and went to The Red Grape, the place where all of this began.  Where, on our very first date we talked so long they started to put the chairs up all around us. The Red Grape, on First St West in Sonoma, a local’s spot for casual pizza and pasta, just down the very same street where we found our first home together.

We actually drove those three blocks the night we moved in, because we were too exhausted from unpacking to walk. Tonight we strolled slowly down the now-familiar street, bodies tired from all our toil, and devoured our last meal in Sonoma. I’m a sucker for nice closed circles like that.

We moved to our home here on First Street just over a year ago. Over the past four days we’ve packed, cleaned and dismantled, playing Tetris with our furniture in order to fit it into our delivery POD (it really is the best idea ever) and packing the Minnie with all we’ll need on the road.

Taking this:

to this:

…is just one small example.  We’ve jammed everything from our full 1,800 sq ft townhouse into a 16 x 8 POD and a Winnebago.  As Patrick says, one house is packed, the other is gassed.  We hit the road tomorrow.