Book one, chapter one. "It was a dark and stormy...

So, it's been a couple of weeks since I've posted. How's everybody doing? I'm okay, aside from the fact that our brand-new bikes were stolen last night. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
A week and a half ago, we loaded up a rental truck with all of our junk, and headed west to our new home. My orientation started on Friday the 19th, so we left early the day before and just drove straight through. We almost made it to Eugene (we were about 40 miles away) when the truck became leprous and started dropping pieces everywhere. Luckily, we were in the middle of nowhere (about 30 miles from a town on either side), so we felt really good about just abandoning a broken-down truck containing all of our earthly possessions on the side of the road. Even though it was a huge hassle, everything worked out really well. Nothing was stolen (until now), we didn't have to worry about parking the big truck in the tiny motel parking lot, and Budget even gave us some money back. We got all moved in, have already made lots of friends, and are really excited about our new home (minus the theft). I'm sure this is only the first of many, many adventures that I like to call "The chronicles of the Rigby Family at grad school." I'm going to end this post with a list of the things that I learned about Budget trucks during our trek.

Our good 'ol, not so trusty rental truck in front of the lava fields on Santiam Pass, with the volcano Three Fingered Jack in the background.

• The volume of a Budget gas tank (including fumes) can be exactly defined as the distance between Layton and Boise, and/or the distance between Boise and Bend, Or.
• Good idea: Driving the Santiam Pass scenic byway. Bad Idea: Driving the Santiam pass in a truck that is as wide as the road itself.
• While baling twine is excellent at securing hay into bales, it is also pretty good at securing car seats into the cab of a truck that only has two seat belts.