Slowing Down

Since I've left my job, I haven't really slowed down at all. I jumped into selling a house, packed up a house, tied up all the loose ends of living in a place, and moved to another state. In my new state I've been looking at houses on line every day, almost every day we go to look at houses, and I deal with establishing new affiliations to meet our personal needs, i.e. health care, DMV, where is the grocery store etc. and have enjoyed the family time. So I haven't really experience retirement per se, and I might have to earn some income to help with our new expenses so I'm not sure actual retirement is in my future. It's a good thing that I like to multi task. I'm enjoying the change of focus and really enjoying the grandkids. So maybe I'll slow down eventually...

Without a home

We now have no home. We've left our previous home and drove to our new destination. We're currently staying with relatives in the area we hope to purchase a new house. But in the meantime, we are homeless.
The trip here was uneventful, just a long time driving-10 hours. However when we got here, they had just experienced the biggest windstorm ever. It's a very green area with many trees that aren't used to high winds. So when the wind blows that hard, many trees fall, and there were many downed power lines. So we spent the first few days "camping" inside a town house where we are staying. We left the previous home "camping" inside-although we had power and hot water. Now we were still "camping" inside but had no power and no hot water. Good thing we brought camping gear. Two days later we had power. Dependent on technology tho, in order to charge cell phones we resorted to charging them with the car chargers while we drove somewhere.
The housing market is tight here and we knew that going into this adventure. There are lots of choices that disappear quickly. Finding a house that both of us like is also a challenge. But as this first week has passed, we are refining our objectives, learning to listen to each other better, getting a good feel for timing in this housing market, and working with a great realtor team.
In the meantime we have been taking care of many other issues, like health insurance, drivers licenses, and getting the car smogged.
Keep you all updated as to the house search.  We have currently looked at over 30 houses.

Will it all fit?

Moving pods are interesting things. Once I checked out the safety, reliability, costs, accessibility, and procedures, I chose the company I wanted to do business with and I was ready for my pod to come. Beyond navigating thru those issues, pods are also interesting because of the placing of the pod, what can actually fit in a pod, and removal of the pod.
My house has a slanted driveway and I was concerned about the placement of the pod. They told me that if I could keep my car door open by itself while parked in the driveway, that it would be fine. Only problem is not every car door works the same. So I was hoping it would work. And it did. We had an awesome driver. He backed it in thru a maze of cars parked on the street, placed it where he wanted it, chalked the wheels, and he was off.
We had help loading it. Mike G was a big help and within 3 1/2 hours we were 95% loaded. We spent the weekend finishing the job.
They say that the contents of a1500 square foot house can fit in this pod-minus the garage. My house was 1345 square feet. So I was hoping it would fit the house and the garage. I guess what one person deems acceptable for the possessions of a person's house is different from another's perception. Mr UAW and I have some hobbies that take up some space. And for some reason we have 6 dressers between the 2 of us. I never realized that before. It's not like we are clothes hounds because we use the dressers for things other than clothes, but 6! And we decided to leave some things here, such as the washer, dryer, fridge, huge oak desk and hutch, and 6 person glass picnic table and chairs, bar stools-thinking that it would free up some space for most of our things to fit into this pod. I think we planned pretty good. By the time we finished packing the pod with everything we could possibly fit into it, we were left with 2 truck loads of stuff. Those 2 trucks and their respective loads went to a nearby relatives house, they have room to store them for us until we find a house.
The removal of the pod was interesting too. The driver was pretty good. Our driveway has some uneven spots in it, so getting the loaded pod on the trailer was tricky. This driver knew what he was doing and handled it well. Then we watched our stuff leave.
I have a feeling that when we find a place, we will wonder why we took so many things with us. So maybe our load will lighten some more!