Have you ever received a request that you could not say no to, even if you wanted to? 

“Sweetie, what do you think about getting a little breakfast and then going to Nickole and Josh’s to help them move,” said Bob of his daughter and son-in-law. 

Lisa, “That sounds wonderful. Let’s do it.” 

The sugary tone of that question is one I cannot convey to you just by repeating the question. His use of the word ‘sweetie’ probably helps. Yes, he calls me sweetie. To your second question, “No, you are not allowed to call me sweetie.” Let’s move on. 

As I sit here today, almost two weeks out, I’m convinced my response would have remained unchanged if he had said, “Sweetie, what do you think about getting a little breakfast and then, pour a bucket of honey on our heads and walking through active beehives.”

We had a good day. If you can have fun helping someone relocate absolutely everything they own from one location to another, we did. From about 10:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., we loaded two trucks and two trailers. 

Bob missed his calling. He could have run a very successful and professional moving service. He painstakingly coordinated everything to get as many items onto the trailers as possible. 

He has a ‘type A’ personality. Traits: organized, ambitious, competitive, self-critical, tendency to multitask, dislikes wasting time, feels impatient or irritated when delayed, highly focused on goals, and spends way too much time focused on work. 

He was focused on the task and not the time.

“Hey, babe. I think we need to stop now,” I said.

Bob, “We need to move as much as we can in one load.”

“I agree, but this is only half the process,” I said. “We still have to travel to the new house, unload everything and set the beds up so they’ll have some place to sleep tonight. That will take time, too, and everyone is getting tired.”   

He wanted one more item: the outdoor gas grill. There was no space – not even an inch  – left on the trailers. So, this very determined man screwed two wood planks onto the end of his trailer, placed the grill onto the planks and used straps to secure the grill to the steel ramps of the trailer.

Nickole and I giggled from the porch as the business went from professional to “Redneck Movers” with a motto of “We’ll get it there by any means necessary.” 

We were done, both mentally and physically, by 5 p.m. Dinner was Mexican and drinks all around, except for the pregnant Nickole and underage J.T. Afterwards we freshened up a bit, we went to Cedar Grove Fire Department’s Haunted Trail. If you haven’t been, go. It’s one of my favorite haunted attractions in October. 

We had a good day.

Standard reporter Lisa Hobbs can be reached at 473-2191.