Starting home...with a couple detours

It was an early morning for Jim.  He had to get up and get breakfast, himself and the apartment ready to leave, take some things to the Corinth storage unit, and then hit the road.  His first stop is to hopefully get the plate compactor - the guy is holding it for him.  He's in eastern PA and has to be at work early this afternoon, so Jim has to get there and be able to look it over and get it loaded before he has to leave. 

Then he'll travel to Altoona PA.  Kind of a nice stop for him because that's where Gram's family is from.  We took the kids there once to see the Horseshoe Curve and see the house where she grew up.  Altoona is fairly close to his next stop which is to look at the forks for the Bobcat.  They are in a shop so they have normal business hours and he'll have to do that Tuesday morning.  So we took advantage of one of our free nights and I got him a room at the Courtyard in Altoona for tonight.  That will delay his coming home until Tuesday, but that's a lot of traveling in the truck and I'll feel better that he'll have a good night's sleep and not quite so far to come back tomorrow.

Last I heard from him, he already had about 120 miles behind him.  Hopefully he'll like the compactor when he gets there and all of that will go well.

Well...here's the first new toy...or tool, I mean!  This is the plate compactor.  Jim said it is a highly desirable model and he could easily sell it now and make money.  But he'll put it to good use meanwhile!  After he worked out this deal, he got back on the road and headed towards the next stop.

Plate compactor in the truck

Jim said the trip to where the Bobcat forks were was crazy.  He said the small, winding, steep mountains were really tough - but the truck did great.  He said one road was about a 12% grade for 2 miles!  Most of the afternoon, he didn't have cell service so we didn't talk too much.  But he made it to this place and spent about an hour and half with this guy and his son.  Jim said they had some good stuff and it might be worth a trip back.  But he got the forks and they are on the truck too.  That's good because as of this morning, this guy hadn't returned any emails or calls so Jim wasn't sure what he would find when he got there.

Bobcat forks

So after that, he headed to Altoona and the hotel.  He called me from there and said everything was good.  I know he's beat - hopefully he'll find somewhere good to eat and be able to relax knowing that he accomplished everything he wanted to today!  I'll be glad to see him tomorrow for sure!

Did get another house call - a realtor is bringing someone through on Wednesday night and Nicole called and confirmed that her and her husband would come tomorrow evening.  So fingers crossed!