Today was one of the few sunny days in Seattle, which meant one thing for me: I could put my top down on my Camaro. Which meant that I could finally go and pick up a loft bed from someone on Craigslist. Now, I need a loft bed because I have oodles of stuff and more will be coming in a couple months. I needed to use Craigslist because due to some unexpected medical and car insurance expenses, I am dirt broke. (Seriously. If someone wants to send me a care package of tea, gum and pickles I would be so excited).
So I tracked down someone online who was selling a loft bed (and mattress!) for cheap, corralled some help and set off for West Seattle. Unfortunately once I got there I ran into the same problem I always do. Namely getting all of this:
Into something like this:
Now, I’m broke. And West Seattle is kind of a ways off from me, especially when on-ramps are closed for construction and you have to wander around SoDo for half an hour trying to figure out how to get back on the blasted freeway so you can cross the water (argh). So there was no way I was going to waste the gas making two trips. No. I was going to do it all in one go.
For the record, it is currently 38 degrees outside. Oh, and this is what most of West Seattle looks like:
And this is what the bridge going across looks like:
That’s essentially a freeway, by the by. Still with me?
Well, as you can guess, everything doesn’t fit that well in a space like that. Sure, it technically is sitting inside of your vehicle, but only the front-most section. The rest is kind of flapping out there in the wind, especially when you are bound and determined to take it all at once. Thankfully it fit (and I had rope in my car) but there was still the issue of driving a manual transmission down really steep hills in fast moving traffic with most of a carload balanced precariously directly behind our heads.
But damnit if we were going to give up that easily. So with Tom manning the load (an experience I can only relate to someone popping corn with the top off a pot and desperately trying to keep it contained) down the hills and through the woods we went, much to the amusement of our fellow highway denizens. And since even the knowledge that if you have to brake suddenly the back of your head is going to get up close and personal with a large amount of wood gets boring after awhile, we did it while singing Americano at the top of our lungs.
And screaming. Pretty much every time we crested a hill. There was lots and lots of screaming.