Most of yesterday is now a blur. We moved Kris's things in the morning. "We" being me, Kris, and his friend Julie. He was supposed to have two other friends there, but in the grand tradition of racking up bad moving Karma, they overslept and bailed on us. So once again, we got the unpleasant reminder that living in a five floor walk up with narrow staircases was maybe not such a good idea. But everything made it into the van safe and sound.

I spent the remainder of the afternoon waiting for Liz to show up. Becky, Jason and Kym were to meet us for lunch once Liz got there. I packed trash and argued with Chuck as the hours passed. When Liz finally made it to the apartment, Chuck and I were screaming at each other and I was crying. Neat.

Things started to get almost surreal as Kym rang the buzzer at the apartment a few moments after Liz got there. She had made me a going away present - a scrapbook from our first year in college. Pictures of old friends, old and almost forgotten inside jokes, and notes from that time - Kym saves everything. As I read it, the idea of going away really hit, and that's when it started to hurt.

We arranged dinner, we drove Chuck's boxes of things he had never retrieved from the apartment to his place uptown. I hadn't seen his new apartment. It was sparse and really, really needs some decoration - but seeing it made me feel a sense of relief - it's funny, but at least I know for sure that he has somewhere to go that isn't my apartment. We had finally stopped arguing, for the most part. That almost made it worse - at least being angry had kept my mind off of almost everything else.

Lunch quickly became dinner - at Yaffa, with Becky, Jason, Chuck and Liz. Becky brought gifts - including a list of phone numbers of her friends in Boston, most of whom I know relatively well. We laughed a lot, as we always do when we're together. It was probably the fastest we've ever gotten out of Yaffa - an hour and a half or so. It was already 8:30 by the time we left, and Liz and I still had the drive to Boston ahead of us.

Becky and Jay helped clean out the rest of the apartment. Chuck left about halfway through that process. That was really strange. I had pretty much been crying all day, but once the goodbyes started, I lost all hope of maintaining any sense of composure.

I tried to take a moment and look over the apartment before I really left, but I found it really difficult. Since Carrie moved in before any of us, I had never seen the place completely empty. My room looked so sterile. I ended up leaving quickly. Kris wanted to say goodbye to the cat, so he came down last, with her in her carrier. Lots of hugs, crying and pictures later, we were set to go. Of course, it wasn't the most graceful exit - Becky's eyeglasses got stuck in my hair - twice. At least we all left laughing!

As we drove away, Liz kept telling me it was okay to cry. Not that I needed permission, I hadn't reallly stopped crying the whole evening. I tried to convey to her that I was sad, but excited. I think she understood.

Today I woke up in the new apartment, feeling more excited than sad. Ludo has been pacing the place all morning - I think she approves. We're both a little out of our element here. I have to get used to people saying "hello" as you pass them on the street. That's definitely a new experience.

I went to the supermarket just to get out and do something. I had to leave after ten minutes - the supermarkets I'm used to in New York are essentially glorified delis. Liz had warned me that I might be a bit overwhelmed by Star Market, and she wasn't kidding. I did, however, find the health food section, which was a more manageable size and had everything I needed just then anyway.

I actually went online just now to work on a page design for someone - it's long overdue. I finally got an idea for the design this morning as I was waking up - I've been stuck on it for about two weeks. But now I'm feeling like I should really do something in the apartment, not online. It's a bit chaotic here, and at the very least the cat could use some quality chase the string time. Back soon.