I have another full day of transcription, so I didn’t start anything in the rig today that I couldn’t finish in a few hours. I woke up feeling ambitious and was going to put on a coat of yellow in the front room and loft, but the amount of transcription ahead of me this week curtailed that enthusiasm. I will paint one wall that is getting on my nerves, but that is all.

So today I redid the entrance stairwell. I cannot believe what a difficult project it is to make it look nice and still be water tight. It’s much, much better than the last attempt to improve it, but still not particularly photogenic.

I also brought down a couple of loads, including some food! Having food back in the rig is really starting to make departure day feel very real. I started the fridge on AC yesterday, and it’s already nice and cold, but I won’t be putting anything into it until I fill up the propane.

With all that needs to be done with the rig, it’s easy to forget other issues I need to tend to before departure. The biggest priority are my taxes and end of this invoicing period’s bookkeeping. I did remember to call the credit card company today to inform them that I’ll be traveling through the US, but declined to purchase my travel medical insurance until I know for sure what date I’ll be attempting a border crossing (it looks like Monday, not Tuesday, at this point!).

Jody has decided that I don’t need her help to get my mattress back in the rig and the borrowed furniture out of The Apartment, so departure will really depend on Gary’s schedule. I asked him for help the last time I went for dinner and he was amenable, so it’s just a matter of finding a matching free time slot. I would really rather do it earlier in the day so that I still have a few hours to square away The Apartment so I can spend just one night in the parking lot here, but if it ends up being a couple of nights, that’s fine.

A week from today, I will most definitely be back home, on the road. This winter, the best of my life, has been an incredible personal and professional journey, but I am more than ready to see what comes next.