We go offline tomorrow, as our phone line is being transferred to the new place. I may be able to set up the computer tomorrow afternoon, I may not; either way, you may not hear from us till Sunday at the latest. Don’t e-mail us with anything urgent. Also, please don’t break the internet before I get back to announce our triumphant relocation. We thank you for your consideration.

The boy was home today with a fever. He was tired yesterday at preschool, then went right to bed by choice and refused dinner when he got home. These coupled with his progressive incoherence led me to take his temperature, and he’d developed a high fever. It was a bit lower this morning, and gone by this afternoon. He had a two and a half hour nap, a sure indicator he was ill, and he only woke up because I went in to shake him gently. But he’s fine now and will be going to school tomorrow as usual, leaving HRH and I free to do a final packing blitz and take all the fragile stuff over to the house.

I’m so tired. So is HRH, as he’s been spending every day and night over at the house, painting. His dad has been with him every day as well, doing reno work (some of which was unplanned by us, but we’re grateful for his time and energy in taking them on; they’re definite improvements). The only dark spot on the whole experience so far is the fiasco at the store tonight when HRH and his parents arrived to buy our new laundry set. Our real estate agent’s company had issued us a certificate for this store giving us preferred pricing on our purchases in all departments when made through a commercial sales associate by appointment. Well, after all my careful research and choosing of a set, at the appointment HRH attended tonight he was told that the set we want isn’t available for this preferred pricing scheme, the preferred pricing varies depending on what you buy, and quite apart from all of that the set we chose is out of stock until at least halfway through September, despite the website claiming a delivery date of August 22. I’m livid. Especially so because my in-laws called me from another store two days ago saying they’d buy us another set on sale that had free delivery, and I declined, saying that the set we wanted from the store to which we had the certificate was pretty much the same price and we’d get a discount of some kind thanks to the certificate, so we’d wait for our appointment. What a mistake. It’s a good thing I wasn’t there at the appointment tonight, because I’d have told the salesman exactly what I thought of this whole vague and ill-defined preferred pricing scheme (promising ‘preferred pricing in all departments’ when you really mean ‘preferred pricing on only some of what we sell and we won’t tell you what until you get to your appointment’ is shady enough to qualify as false advertising in my book), as well as my opinion of the website that tells me things would be available to my postal code zone in three days when they’re actually out of stock across the entire island of Montreal for a month.

Anywhats; we’ll figure something out. We need a laundry set by the middle of next week at the very latest, but I’ll research what I can (all the more reason to hook up the internet ASAP at the new place tomorrow) and we can go out on Sunday to shop for a set in our price range that’s in stock now. And I certainly won’t be buying them from that branch, if that store at all.

Tomorrow morning the boys head out and I pack the pantry, the last of the dishes, the pots and pans, and disconnect the computer. And then that’s that; the last phase of the move begins. I’m truly awed by how much HRH has been able to move over to the house by doing two or three carloads a day while painting as much as he has, I really am. He’s been heroic.

See you on the flip side, world. Have a lovely Friday and Saturday. Think good moving thoughts for us tomorrow, but especially Saturday morning and early afternoon!