Tuesday - the finally getting on with it day
Up bright and early, hoping that Chappie had found the key to the storage - and although it turned out that he hadn't (because apparently they were down in Another State with my friend - doh!), it also turned out that the lock could be cut off, the storage unit opened, and another lock bought to put on - and the key given to me so that I could get sorting! So - first things first, Chappie gave me a lift to the airport (just cos he's a lovely guy!) so that I could collect my spaceship...
...I mean car. But honestly - there's no key! There's a power button to turn it on! There's... there's... well, and it's automatic obvs., cos I'm in the US! So that took a wee few moments to get used to, but then I was on my way to the storage unit.
Eeep.
Definitely more boxes than I'd been expecting - or hoping for!
On the bright side (well...), one of them turned out to be a box of food, that had been waiting patiently for me to get back! So that had to go. I mean, it might still have been okay, because it was mostly spices and tins, but probably not worth testing it out after sixteen years! And there was some water damage, including to my osteology textbook... :(
A fairly large proportion of boxes were anthropology and Alaska books, and also copies of articles. I managed to contact the current Chair of Anthropology who said they accept donations of books. I'm not sure she really understands the scale of this donation, but we'll see! She also said that students could probably get the articles more easily as pdfs, which assumes that they're not going to want to print off those pdfs to read and annotate, but hey-ho - although its a bit heartbreaking that I spent so much time and effort printing and copying the articles just for them to be recycled... But again, hey-ho...
By the end of the day the storage unit looked like this. The big pile of boxes on the right is a big pile of empty boxes, and is surrounded by recycling and rubbish. I've a big bag of clothes for donating somewhere, a pile of stuff for the transfer station (where you can leave things you don't want, and other people can take stuff they can use - eventually stuff left is taken away as rubbish, I guess), and the car boot is full of household-y type things that the hostel I'm staying in might be able to use. There's still some stuff to go through, but not too much now.
I do also have what I'm pretty sure is more than two suitcases worth of stuff I want to bring back, however, and a few things that I'm still in denial about, but we'll see... And I have tonight, for instance, spent some time taking photos out of photo albums... *g*
And it's about bedtime again, which will be disturbed a bit by my roommate leaving for his job (mining engineer) around 2am - eep again! But then I should have the room to myself for a bit, and I'm crossing fingers it might be a couple of days... *g*
...I mean car. But honestly - there's no key! There's a power button to turn it on! There's... there's... well, and it's automatic obvs., cos I'm in the US! So that took a wee few moments to get used to, but then I was on my way to the storage unit.
Eeep.
Definitely more boxes than I'd been expecting - or hoping for!
On the bright side (well...), one of them turned out to be a box of food, that had been waiting patiently for me to get back! So that had to go. I mean, it might still have been okay, because it was mostly spices and tins, but probably not worth testing it out after sixteen years! And there was some water damage, including to my osteology textbook... :(
A fairly large proportion of boxes were anthropology and Alaska books, and also copies of articles. I managed to contact the current Chair of Anthropology who said they accept donations of books. I'm not sure she really understands the scale of this donation, but we'll see! She also said that students could probably get the articles more easily as pdfs, which assumes that they're not going to want to print off those pdfs to read and annotate, but hey-ho - although its a bit heartbreaking that I spent so much time and effort printing and copying the articles just for them to be recycled... But again, hey-ho...
By the end of the day the storage unit looked like this. The big pile of boxes on the right is a big pile of empty boxes, and is surrounded by recycling and rubbish. I've a big bag of clothes for donating somewhere, a pile of stuff for the transfer station (where you can leave things you don't want, and other people can take stuff they can use - eventually stuff left is taken away as rubbish, I guess), and the car boot is full of household-y type things that the hostel I'm staying in might be able to use. There's still some stuff to go through, but not too much now.
I do also have what I'm pretty sure is more than two suitcases worth of stuff I want to bring back, however, and a few things that I'm still in denial about, but we'll see... And I have tonight, for instance, spent some time taking photos out of photo albums... *g*
And it's about bedtime again, which will be disturbed a bit by my roommate leaving for his job (mining engineer) around 2am - eep again! But then I should have the room to myself for a bit, and I'm crossing fingers it might be a couple of days... *g*