Sunday Morning 7/31/2022: Hasta Luego, Mexico!

Tomorrow will be our last full day in San Miguel de Allende. We’ll finish up packing later today and tomorrow, and enjoy a farewell seafood dinner at Mario’s Mariscos this evening. We cleaned out the refrigerator and pantry this past week and will take the pantry leftovers to our neighbor Jenny tomorrow. We leave for the airport at 8:00 am Tuesday morning, and depart later in the morning for Dallas where we’ll have a several-hour layover (and a trip through U.S. immigration and customs) before heading up to Boston. We’re flying first class on both legs of the trip, made possible by the refund we received from British Air and surprising low prices from the airline. We plan to wear our masks the whole way, and hopefully won’t have to worry too much about others either next to or around us. We’ll be fed on both legs of the trip too so maybe we can skip having to buy anything other than a cup of coffee at the Dallas airport. WenYu and her partner will meet us in Boston, no matter what time we get in, and bring us back up to their place.

We will mostly be spending our time in Massachusetts getting ourselves ready for the drive to Nashville. We’ve rented a cargo van and will be loading that up with all the things we sent from Hawaii as well as the items we ordered from Amazon. Meiling will be joining us while we’re at WenYu’s, and we’re planning to go out to dinner one evening with WenYu’s partner’s parents, and will also visit WenYu’s workplace as well as her partner’s business. He is the owner of a multi-million dollar niche firm he started when he was nine years old!

Can’t wait to see these two next week as well as our DIL! Our son and K took our grandson, C, to a two-week outdoor camp in Wyoming and then visited Grand Teton NP while they were there (C will finish camp and be back in Tennessee for a few days a week after we arrive). K discovered air dryers on their trip (they shut them down in Japan when the pandemic started), and apparently they’re now her favorite thing about the U.S.

This time next week though we’ll be in Tennessee! We’ll be having Sunday morning breakfast in Knoxville and then dinner with our son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter in Franklin that evening (our grandson will still be at camp in Wyoming). After getting the keys to our apartment on Monday morning and unloading all our stuff from the van we’ll head over and pick up our new car then go to Costco to purchase a mattress and a TV. On Tuesday we’ll visit Aldi, Trader Joe’s, and Costco for groceries. Otherwise the rest of the week we’ll be unpacking, getting some furniture delivered, and spending time with the family.

This morning I am thinking about:

• A troubling/weird thing that happened: Last Wednesday evening I realized Brett had given me the wrong street number for our address in Tennessee when I placed our delivery orders with IKEA, so I went into my account to see if I could correct the mistake. We had placed two separate orders for our furniture, but the site informed me that in order to make any changes to the address I would have to cancel and reorder everything. This was problematic because a few items were no longer available for delivery to our address. However, when I was looking at one of the orders I noticed the delivery address had been changed from Nashville to one near Baltimore! What??? I went back and checked the the other order again, and the delivery address was changed to the Maryland address while I was on that page! YIKES! I cancelled both orders immediately, and changed my IKEA password. I have no idea if the switch was done by a hacker outside of IKEA who got into my account or by someone working for IKEA who was arranging to get a whole houseful of furniture for themselves but I am so thankful I caught it and was able to stop it. I contacted IKEA and let them know what had happened but they didn’t seem too concerned which was very disappointing. IKEA refunded us immediately, but that left us with no furniture and a decision about what we were going to do. We’ve been monitoring our credit card a couple of times a day ever since to be sure it wasn’t hacked as well but so far all seems to be OK there.

• What we accomplished this past week: 1) Things this past week went in a couple of directions: getting ready to pack and starting to pack as well as using up as much of the food we purchased as possible. We’ve done a good job with both and will be ready to go on Tuesday morning. We have just a couple more things left to pack. 2) Brett got our utility accounts in Tennessee set up. The only one left to take care of is the Internet, but that’s done through the apartment complex when we get our keys. 3) We found a nice furniture store near our apartment, and after our money was returned from IKEA we bought a sleeper sofa, loveseat, and dining table and chairs from them. Everything will be delivered two days after we move in, so along with a mattress we’ll be OK to start out. We also found a cabinet we liked for our TV and ordered it as well; it will be delivered right after we move in. We still need a coffee table, possibly an end table, a bed frame, dresser, and nightstands, but they can wait until we get into the apartment and take some measurements.

• What we’re looking forward to this coming week: 1) We’re very excited about seeing Meiling and YaYu and getting to spend a couple of days with them. 2) We leave for Nashville early Friday morning; it will take us two and a half days of driving to get there but we know there’ll be some interesting things to see along the way. 3) We’re planning to have dinner with an old friend from our navy days during our time in Knoxville.

• What we saved: 1) All we’ll be giving to our neighbor is a can of vegetable oil spray, some vegetable oil and olive oil, two bottles of vinegar, a can of tuna, and half a package of pasta. Otherwise we used up everything. 2) We stayed away from City Market this week except to pick up a bottle of Tums and several bags of the absolutely delicious dark roast cinnamon coffee we discovered there and want to take back with us to the U.S. We usually don’t care for flavored coffee but this stuff is very good and will save us from having to buy coffee right away when we arrive in TN. 3) One reason we chose the TV cabinet above is because the company offered free shipping. However, they also surprised us with a $90 discount (!) because it was our first order from them. So far we have stayed under budget with the furniture we’ve bought, and think once we’re done we’ll be right at our limit or maybe only very slightly over.

It wasn’t all leftovers and odds and ends this past week. The restaurants (and their low prices) have been our favorite thing about SMA.

• Good things that happened: We returned to some of our favorite eateries for our last week here. For our Wednesday lunch date we went back to Turk for Mediterranean food (a beef & lamb burger for Brett, a mezze platter for me); had tasty beefsteak tacos at Tacos Mario again on Thursday; and went to Rustica one last time for our last Friday brunch (frittata for Brett, chilaquiles for me). Both of us are looking forward to having seafood for dinner tonight at Mario’s Mariscos.

The big unknown for me leaving SMA is not did I gain weight? but how much? We have not walked/hiked as much as we did back on Kaua’i (we both agree that walking here has been a real pain, sometimes literally) nor have we been as careful about our eating. We definitely fell under the spell of the local bakeries too. My clothes haven’t gotten tight though, and Brett says I look the same, but overall I definitely feel heavier than I did when we arrived. Oh well, we’ll be back on the wagon once we arrive in Tennessee (and are looking forward to it). One of our first tasks will be to locate the gym at the apartment complex – we’ll use their treadmills on hot or rainy days – and we also want to find other nearby walking venues and get back to regular exercise.

I won’t be posting this coming week, nor next Sunday but will be back as soon as we get moved in and connected to the Internet in our apartment. I’ve also got a giveaway planned once I get organized. Thank you to all for staying with me while we make this transition from Mexico to Tennessee – I’ll be back in a little while.