Ren and Dottie

Nancy's parents, Ren and Dottie, 92 and 89 years old, had decided some months earlier to move into a senior citizen's facility in Downeytown, PA, in order to have meals provided, a safer bathroom, and 24-hour front desk availability in case of emergency.  Nancy and I wanted to help them move.  A couple of weeks ago, in a previous episode of this blog, we did some preliminary assistance, though to be honest we did more visiting than packing at that time.

From Massachusetts we headed toward Pennsylvania, but stopped off at a motorhome repair facility in Sewell, New Jersey, to take care of the mechanical issues that had arisen in our coach.  While they worked on our unit, Nancy and I and the dogs drove the pickup truck to Atlantic City.  When Nancy was a child, she and her family went there on vacation, and one of her favorite memories was watching the famous diving horses, ridden by young women, who leaped from a high platform into a relatively shallow pool beside the boardwalk. 

Our first stop was the Borgata Hotel, supposedly the newest and fanciest casino in Atlantic City.  We parked in their garage, intending to leave Tammy Faye and Sophia in our pickup while we explored the hotel and its restaurants and gaming rooms for a little while.  As we were walking toward the entrance, a security guard drove up and informed us that the hotel did not allow dogs to be left in vehicles.  So we left.  Our critters may well have saved us a fair amount of coin.

We ended up strolling the boardwalk on a rainy afternoon.  It's lined by casinos, gift shops, restaurants, and every kind of tourist trap you can imagine.  This was offseason and many of the booths and stores were closed.  But it was fun, especially since one of our favorite TV shows is Boardwalk Empire.

Upon returning to the repair shop, the malfunctioning furnace turned out to be due to spider webs, we were told.  The steps were repaired, so that we no longer had to physically pull ourselves up to floor level.  The biggest problem they worked on was the leveling mechanism, and they appeared to fix that as well, by replacing the front leveling jacks.  So as we drove away we felt that we had a new motorhome again.

Once again we stayed in the Walmart parking lot near both Ren and Dottie's old apartment and their new one.  This time we - Nancy's brother Rennie, his daughter Melissa, Nancy's sister Julie, Nancy, and I - worked hard, packing and transporting boxes to the new place and preparing things for the moving company that was scheduled to transport the furniture. 

Ren, a former engineer, drew a detailed floor plan of the new apartment and placed numbered furniture diagrams where each would go.  He attached a numbered label - 1 to 52 - to each piece of furniture so that the movers would know where to place it. Those pieces which didn't fit in the new apartment got a "B" label so that the movers would put them in basement storage.   According to the movers, this was a unique plan - but a good one.  And it worked well.

We the grunts spent several more days carrying over the remaining items and helping to arrange things in Ren and Dottie's new home - unpacking the boxes and putting their contents away.  I hung pictures and tried to make sure that all the pathways were as clear as possible, for safety's sake.  Nancy did a great job of organizing her mother's clothing and supplies.  Melissa cleaned the old apartment so that the security deposit would be returned.  Moving to a new place is always exhausting, but all in all, not a bad job.  We're glad we could help.

After an emotional farewell, Nancy and I returned to our motorhome and made plans to head south, toward the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia.