Moving Day

Drove down to Eugene today to help my daughter move out of her apartment. At first I was planning on renting a truck because I thought there was going to be more furniture than I could fit in my truck, and trailers are a big pain. Then I realized I could probably do it with a trailer and save myself a couple of hundred bucks, so I reserved a trailer. Then my truck developed this weird vibration, kind of a rumble. It felt like it was coming from the tires, but much faster than the whump, whump, whump you get when you have just one lumpy spot. To make it worse, it was intermittent. So all week long I'm telling myself that maybe it's just the tires are just cold, or just low on air, of there's rust spots on the brakes. Then last night, I finally admitted I don't know what the problem is, and it could be something serious, like a u-joint getting ready to fail, and towing a trailer load of stuff would be just the thing to aggravate it to the point of failure, and there I would be, stuck on the side of the interstate with a broken truck, looking at a $300 towing bill because I was too cheap to rent a truck. So this morning we rented a small U-Haul truck instead of the trailer and drove to Eugene.

Daughter with the U-Haul Truck in Eugene

We get to Beaverton and as we turn off of the Sunset onto 217 we see a car being driven erratically. Green import station wagon of some sort. Driving onto the shoulder, swerving. Is the driver drunk? Maybe it's a kid, or somebody having a heart attack. We gave him a wide berth. If I had been in my truck I might have tried getting close enough to get his license number, but being in an unfamiliar vehicle I didn't think that was such a good idea. Better just pay attention to my own driving. The car left 217 in downtown Beaverton, about two blocks from the cop shop, and we went on our merry way, wondering whether we should have called the cops.

We got to Eugene, loaded up, daughter did a finally swipe at cleaning the place and we headed back home. The truck was stuffed to the gills. We get a few miles up the road and traffic slows to a crawl. After a bit we see flashing red and blue lights up ahead. There's been an accident on the other side of freeway. The emergency services are there in full force. There are at least six emergency vehicles and a helicopter. The helicopter leaves just as we get to the site. There is a broken looking motorcycle in the median. This is bad.

Helicopter flying over accident scene

Weather is erractic, downpoors alternating with rainbows the rest of the way home.

Rainbow

All the way down and all the way back I thought the truck we were driving was a Ford. Finally get home and I walk around the front and see the grill and realize it's a GMC. Boy, I've really lost touch with the automotive world, haven't I?

Update October 2016 replace missing pictures.