Another day in paradise...

Brian and my Mom left for Grand Rapids last Friday so they could get B settled into his new house, see the campus and get acquainted with his new town. The trip up to Michigan was rather uneventful even while pulling a U-Haul trailer, with the exception of my Mom feeling car sick because she thought B was driving too fast and thought he was as big as the semis.

Friday night they moved Brian's belongings into his house and realized that the house does not have central air and the interstate exit ramp is 500 feet from his driveway. Lovely. After all it is Michigan and the winters are cold, but summer time can get a little toasty. After they unloaded the U-Haul, they hopped back in the truck and headed 50 miles southwest to Lansing. Brian had orientation both Friday and Saturday on the Lansing campus which lasted all day. My Mom had a parent's orientation on Saturday which provided a lot of helpful information and answered many questions she had about first year law school students.

Sunday they headed back to Grand Rapids and got settled into their hotel. Monday was a "vacation day" so they took a trip to the beach at Lake Michigan. They both enjoyed a relaxing day by the water especially since the past couple of days had been hectic with a lot of driving.

Tuesday was my Mom's last day with Brian so they had many errands to run and sites to see. The day took a turn for the worst when Brian's truck started to die as they were cruising down the road. He had enough juice to roll into a McDonald's parking lot so he could see what was going on. He realized that his truck was out of oil but wondered how that could be since he got an oil change the week before he left for Michigan. Low and behold with the help of a mechanic at an oil change center, his rear oil seal had busted. The oil change facility did not have the tools to take out his transmission to repair the seal so they called around to local Ford dealerships to see if anyone could fit Brian in the same day. Luckily, a dealership down the road was able to see the truck so they filled it with oil and managed to drive it down the street. A very nice gentleman gave Brian a rental truck so he could get to and from.

After that debacle, the two happy campers made their way back to Brian's new house and over to see Cooley University. My Mom snapped some photos, ate lunch at Red Lobster and off to the airport she went. Her flight was delayed leaving Grand Rapids so she had ten minutes to catch her connecting flight in Detroit. She had to run through the airport (from one end to the other), pulling her luggage and listening to the intercom paging "Kathy A-bell." The plane was waiting for her to board as she was the last passenger on. She was a nervous wreck to say the least.

Yesterday was a day full of goodbyes and as we all know, my Mom is not good at that. We hope to see Brian at Thanksgiving as long as law school studying doesn't gridlock his travels.

Best wishes to Brian as he embarks on this tough new adventure. I am confident he will succeed and become the best lawyer he can be. Classes begin Tuesday, with two additional days of orientation today and tomorrow.