Exodus

No, this has nothing to do with the Bible, I simply wanted to explain my disappearance from blogging over the weekend. I spent the time usefully carrying all my material possessions down three flights of stairs, loading them into various modes of transportation, and driving them to my friend Adam’s house, where I then unloaded them.

Adam did most of the hard work, carrying the furniture and so forth. I tried to help, but I think I was more in the way than anything. When he carried the dresser downstairs a homeless (I believe, I didn’t ask) man approached and offered to assist us. He introduced himself, he seemed friendly and willing to help, not to mention sober, so we let him help us with the heavy furniture and the move went a lot more quickly than it would have otherwise. I detest panhandlers but if someone wants to work I have no problem paying for the service, so I gave him ten dollars.

Adam told me later that he wasn’t too worried. He’s been studying European martial arts, including various types of wrestling and German-style long sword. While he really wasn’t looking forward to the idea of testing these new skills out, if push came to shove he was confident in his ability to handle the situation.

They actually made me sit by the truck while they brought the furniture down because a rather suspicious man was walking up and down the street watching our efforts. The consensus was that he was waiting for us to bring down something worth stealing. There’s a good chance that he was another urban outdoorsman.

I couldn’t help but notice that one of these men was black, and the other was white. (It was pretty obvious.) Guess which was which. Now, if I were a liberal, I’d sneeringly expect people to guess that the helpful gentleman was the white one—he was not—and deliver a diatribe about racism and prejudice, etc. Being an Objectivist, I would be honestly surprised that anyone could presume to draw some sort of broad generalization of any kind from this particular happenstance. In fact, if there are any other Objectivists reading this, I imagine they were a little surprised that I even bothered to mention it. Well, I was illustrating a point, but just not the one you thought.

The truck was another novel experience for me. (You thought this was going to be a short entry, didn't you? Along the lines of "I moved it was hard my back hurts ow ow", huh? WELL YOU WERE WRONG!!!) Unusually for me I did not have a panic attack when confronted with the rental (especially the rental agreement), even though I went to the wrong place and they didn't have my reservation. Then I had to drive the truck, which was even more interesting, since the largest vehicle I've ever driven was a Jeep Grande Cherokee, an experience which terminated abruptly when I misjudged both how fast I was going and the weight of the SUV, causing me to stop in the middle of an intersection instead of before it as is more traditional. I was like 17, these things happen. My dad made me turn the driver's seat over to him, though.

But it was not so difficult to drive. And I didn't hit anything. Other than that, there were just some irritating issues with getting my computer set up again. Fortunately, Adam works in IT so I just made him do it. Oh, and it was hard work and now my back hurts. Ow. Ow.