We are ready. So ready. Ready to be back in civilization. Okay, it's not really that bad, but sometimes it feels like it.
We are still waiting on our official orders. The piece of paper that authorizes us to ship our household goods and vehicles. The piece of paper that allows us to cancel our cell phone service (more in a bit). The piece of paper that allows us to book our flights. We're anxious to get this piece of paper because we want our stuff packed up and on its way. We want to ship at least one vehicle in advance and have it waiting at our destination so we're not stuck with long rental fees. Tomorrow is the day that this piece of paper was promised to us from the Air Force. Is it going to happen? I highly doubt it! I pray and pray that it does because I can then stop stressing.
I've had a major headache for the past 4 days and it is not going away. Having a headache is enough, put some stress on top, add a few whines and screams from toddlers all. day. long, and I think I found the cherry? Dream on, I know.
Top three stressors?
1. Getting our households shipped soon. We'd rather be without our stuff here because the military will give us temporary furniture and a kitchen pack with all the basics. It'd be like living in a hotel, only in our home. Where the kids are comfortable. When we get to the states, we only get 3 days in a hotel authorized by the Air Force. Not a lot. So, it makes a little more sense to have our stuff shipped early, use the temporary stuff available here, and get our goods shortly after arrival (hopefully). Here's a time example with the shipment...we packed up our households in VA on June 23-25 in 2010. We received our unaccompanied baggage (the quick shipment, small, less than 1000 lbs) on Sept 10th (this actually was in country earlier, but we didn't have a place to stay yet). Our main shipment didn't get here until Sept 21st. It'd be pretty miserable in the states without any furniture.
2. Shipping one vehicle by the 15th to ensure it's ready and waiting at our new destination. This does not look like going to happen. It might if the orders arrive tomorrow, but again, I doubt it. Again, this will cut down on the expense from a rental vehicle.
3. Cell phone. Oh, the beloved cell phones here in Germany. We signed our contract July 30, 2010. It was a 2 year contract with an automatic renewal 3 months prior to ending. So, last year I went to cancel the service since we don't use the phones all that much. I was a few days too late. So here we are another year later, still with these beloved phones. I went to the service shop in March and spoke to the representative about our upcoming move. She'd told me that all we needed to do was to bring in our orders and our contract will end with the date on our orders. Or we could bring in our flight information and it would end on that day. But since we only leave a week before our orders date, we'll just leave it with the orders date. So, ours would be Jul 26. I thought all was good. Not so! I've actually been stressing over this for the past week thinking something was wrong. Sure enough, my friends that are leaving the same time as us found out it changed. Are you serious? Furious! So now our contract extended another year because when I went in in March the lady told me we didn't need to do anything but bring the orders in and it'd be taken care of. Supposedly all this changed Apr 1. No notice to anyone. If a notice would have been given, I could have went in before Apr 30th to give our 3 month notice. Fricking TKS/T-mobile in Germany sucks! Anyways, I went in today and spoke with the same lady and she said because we have our original contract, receipt, and boxes with accessories, they have to honor the contract. Which is it can be canceled with orders. Here's the tricky part. This company is known for scamming the military members lately. So, lets hope we get our orders soon to see which way this stressor is going to fall. Hoping we won't need to get legal involved. But we will because we will not pay for a year of service when we're not even here and being told 20 million different things. Frustrating!!!
What's the common link with all my stressors? Money! We're trying to make this move with as little funds from our own account. I guess the Air Force didn't get my memo.
What's positive of all this? We will get to the states this summer! No ifs, ands, or buts about it! I'm not going to stress over the flights because I know that even if we don't get the date they told us, we will get out of here. May not be stress free, but the stress will end eventually.
Have a great day!
