Hi y’all! We made it!

Hectic, frantic, stressful, and, at times, terrifying.

That is actually what it was like preparing to move to this whole other country of Texas, USA.

The past few weeks have been maniacally busy from preparing for the packers to come to take all our worldly goods to our final clear out from Woodcroft Gardens on Saturday 27 December.  I have hardly been able to breathe without remembering yet another important thing I had forgotten. There have been lists and more lists. Forms and more and more forms, and some.

And why did my contact lens order only arrive in Boots the day we were leaving, necessitating an unwanted trip into town (of all places) on the day after all the sales had started? And my pay-as-you-go SIM to replace my UK contract has not yet arrived, more than a month after ordering, despite the earnest promises of the lovely lad in India. So lots of last minute loose ends still hanging about.

Sister Sheila transported us to a hotel at the airport with our five bags and assorted hand luggage before farewells to her. Our final evening in the hotel at ABZ was spent with Maurice’s girls and their friends. A fitting last night with a small amount of wine and beer drunk and a few tears shed. I now felt that sensation of reality – up to now this had been so far in the future, something to imagine and plan for, but now it was actually happening.

We were up at 4.15am Sunday 28 December.

The flight was uneventful although our connection to Houston was pretty late leaving Amsterdam. One bag did not make the journey – we were left guessing which one – and it would be Maurice’s main one – with all his clothes and some precious items in it. We will worry until it arrives safely later today. His guitar, lovingly transported as hand luggage, had an overhead bin on its own from ABZ – much to the frustration of the other passengers on this very busy flight.

Did I mention we were flying Business Class? Oh yes! Maurice might be used to such luxury, but I took full advantage of the larger in flight entertainment screen, the flat bed seat and the tasty array of snacks. I have now seen the first 2 episodes of Game of Thrones so I will need to check when that’s on over here so I can catch up with everyone else on the planet. I could have consumed as much alcohol as I liked too, but didn’t want to arrive groggy and hung over (or still drunk) in Houston. So I was good. We both were.

We were met in Houston by the Chevron appointed re-location advisor some 10 hours later – 3.30pm Central US time, 9.30pm GMT. Jeanne Marie is very friendly and efficient, welcoming and extremely helpful. She took us to our apartment which is a one bedroom spacious temporary home for the next 6 weeks, until we find somewhere more permanent to rent. A lovely welcome pack of all sorts of goodies awaited us and the most enormous container of milk I have seen independent of a cow. And a bottle of red wine too.

We sat down for a briefing from Jeanne Marie. There was rather a lot to take in, most of which I didn’t. I am not sure either of us did really – but hey, we can phone her and ask again. Importantly she took us to a rather lovely local store where we bought some more essentials, I mean beer.

Forgot to mention the weather – actually dreich – really dismal, cold and raining. So we felt at home.

After she left, we freshened up and ventured to a local hotel for some refreshments and food, returning to bed around 11pm – 5am GMT so we had been awake for pretty much 24 hours.

Our first morning started early at 8am with our driving assessments. Chevron pay for a car rental for 2 weeks but only if we both pass a driving assessment. This took most of the morning – we did not collect our hire car until 1pm – we were thoroughly assessed. Debbie was our instructor and she took us all over Houston and on the Freeway too. I have finally driven on the 8 lane highways! We both passed our assessments – I have a ‘tendency to drift’ and Maurice isn’t quite correct with indicating timing but other than that we were not too bad. We can apply for Texas driver’s licences in 30 days time, once we have passed a written test and taken a few more practical lessons.

And so that has been our first 24 hours in Houston TX. Still no sign of Maurice’s bag – but it is on its way.

Time to relax before the next exciting brush with officialdom – our appointment with the Social Security Office tomorrow at 9.00am

Here’s hoping it is not a whole morning…

I can see blue sky now and the sun is out at 4.30pm – so I now know I am not in Aberdeen.