I like to move it, move it...
Big news in the Johnson-Magner household, and that is that we are moving our household. Yes, again. HOWEVER, lest ye despair, this move should be the last one for a good long time. Because we have found a rental house that is plenty big enough for us to stay in for yea, possibly as long as we shall have enough income, anyway.
The house is in the Cedar Heights neighborhood of Seattle, which is just east of Lake City Way near NE 130th St. It's on a semi-busy street, but the house itself is up a private drive that has three or four houses on it, and ours is the last one at the top of the hill. It's a very pretty, most likely 1980s built 2 story house with a 2 car garage, 4 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms (I KNOW!) and a decent sized yard, although it's not fenced all the way around. When I told Mom about the number of rooms, she mentioned right off that it was *plenty* big enough for her and Dad to stay with us when they come visit from now on, and save them money. . . . I was forced to agree. After all, we even have a guest bathroom. Honestly, we could probably host my entire family for xmas and not be quite cheek-by-jowl. Er, hi honey. That OK? Needless to say, there will be a guest bedroom (with books in it, because who are we again?) and room for visitors. We won't even force you to cook or clean. (We won't object, either. We're egalitarian that way.)
We've signed the lease, and we'll move in at the end of July. That gives us a good amount of time for packing. This coming weekend we're going to spend some time going through some of the stuff we definitely don't want to keep, and making arrangements to get it gone. And from then on if we can spend a few hours packing a week, it shouldn't be too horribly insane by the end of next month. Why are all of you laughing at me like that? No, really, it should be fine. We're looking into renting a POD for the boxes and general mayhem, and we'll have movers come deal with the furniture. The worst part of all of it will be paperwork and logistics of all the agencies that need to be called and dealt with and meters read and so on until our ears bleed. I have a list of all the lists that I need to create. And I have the beginnings of a timeline, because I'm weird like that and it will make me feel like I know what I'm doing. It will all be a big lie (like the cake) but I will feel better. That's really all that matters here, right?
Mostly this means that I'm going to be crazier than usual, busier than usual, and for y'all not to be too surprised when I answer with "The who with the what now?" when asked simple questions, like my name. It also means that we might ask for help for packing or moving of boxes once or twice, and maybe to empty the POD into the new house. But I think we should have most of it under control. Really, why do you people keep laughing at me? So rude. Anyhoo, if I do need help, I'll send out a call (or email, or whatever) as it happens, and anyone local who's up for the general mayhem is welcome.
After the move, sometime in mid to late August we'll have a big "Lookee the new house/Hey I'm a year older" party, to celebrate both things and also as an excuse to annoy our new neighbors. Really, it's best to do that up front. That doesn't give us lots of time to finish unpacking, but I think it will be enough time deal with the basics, and plus we have extra rooms to hold things like boxes we haven't looked at yet. So helpful.
Our cats are going to be plenty freaked out, but we're working on ways to minimize that. Poor Millie may give up eating all together. I think maybe kitty Valium is going to be on tap for awhile. She's been pretty skittish for the last few weeks just from us rearranging some furniture, which trauma has been apparently severe. Medea adjusts within a couple of hours, but Millie is fairly certain that everything we do means death and destruction for cats. She's been spending time huddled under the bed or in a closet, or in some other place which we so far haven't found but which means we wander around looking for her sometimes, sure she's somehow gotten outside, until she ninjas herself into another room where we've just looked, and stares at us like "Any second you could murder me in my sleep, and you expect me to come when you call? What kind of monsters ARE you?!" Then she looks for Medea and demands to be groomed. (I think it's a really good thing we got them together: Millie would never have survived as an only cat.) The move will only make all of this worse.
On the up side, once they settle down, or Millie does, I think they will LOVE the bigger space, and will race up and down the stairs like deranged hippos at 3 in the morning, just because they can. Oddly, I look forward to this.
So that's the gnews. (Gary Gnu not included.) We're moving in a month, we'll still be in Seattle, we'll celebrate all of this with food and cake after the fact. That cake is not a lie. No really.
The house is in the Cedar Heights neighborhood of Seattle, which is just east of Lake City Way near NE 130th St. It's on a semi-busy street, but the house itself is up a private drive that has three or four houses on it, and ours is the last one at the top of the hill. It's a very pretty, most likely 1980s built 2 story house with a 2 car garage, 4 bedrooms, 2.5 bathrooms (I KNOW!) and a decent sized yard, although it's not fenced all the way around. When I told Mom about the number of rooms, she mentioned right off that it was *plenty* big enough for her and Dad to stay with us when they come visit from now on, and save them money. . . . I was forced to agree. After all, we even have a guest bathroom. Honestly, we could probably host my entire family for xmas and not be quite cheek-by-jowl. Er, hi honey. That OK? Needless to say, there will be a guest bedroom (with books in it, because who are we again?) and room for visitors. We won't even force you to cook or clean. (We won't object, either. We're egalitarian that way.)
We've signed the lease, and we'll move in at the end of July. That gives us a good amount of time for packing. This coming weekend we're going to spend some time going through some of the stuff we definitely don't want to keep, and making arrangements to get it gone. And from then on if we can spend a few hours packing a week, it shouldn't be too horribly insane by the end of next month. Why are all of you laughing at me like that? No, really, it should be fine. We're looking into renting a POD for the boxes and general mayhem, and we'll have movers come deal with the furniture. The worst part of all of it will be paperwork and logistics of all the agencies that need to be called and dealt with and meters read and so on until our ears bleed. I have a list of all the lists that I need to create. And I have the beginnings of a timeline, because I'm weird like that and it will make me feel like I know what I'm doing. It will all be a big lie (like the cake) but I will feel better. That's really all that matters here, right?
Mostly this means that I'm going to be crazier than usual, busier than usual, and for y'all not to be too surprised when I answer with "The who with the what now?" when asked simple questions, like my name. It also means that we might ask for help for packing or moving of boxes once or twice, and maybe to empty the POD into the new house. But I think we should have most of it under control. Really, why do you people keep laughing at me? So rude. Anyhoo, if I do need help, I'll send out a call (or email, or whatever) as it happens, and anyone local who's up for the general mayhem is welcome.
After the move, sometime in mid to late August we'll have a big "Lookee the new house/Hey I'm a year older" party, to celebrate both things and also as an excuse to annoy our new neighbors. Really, it's best to do that up front. That doesn't give us lots of time to finish unpacking, but I think it will be enough time deal with the basics, and plus we have extra rooms to hold things like boxes we haven't looked at yet. So helpful.
Our cats are going to be plenty freaked out, but we're working on ways to minimize that. Poor Millie may give up eating all together. I think maybe kitty Valium is going to be on tap for awhile. She's been pretty skittish for the last few weeks just from us rearranging some furniture, which trauma has been apparently severe. Medea adjusts within a couple of hours, but Millie is fairly certain that everything we do means death and destruction for cats. She's been spending time huddled under the bed or in a closet, or in some other place which we so far haven't found but which means we wander around looking for her sometimes, sure she's somehow gotten outside, until she ninjas herself into another room where we've just looked, and stares at us like "Any second you could murder me in my sleep, and you expect me to come when you call? What kind of monsters ARE you?!" Then she looks for Medea and demands to be groomed. (I think it's a really good thing we got them together: Millie would never have survived as an only cat.) The move will only make all of this worse.
On the up side, once they settle down, or Millie does, I think they will LOVE the bigger space, and will race up and down the stairs like deranged hippos at 3 in the morning, just because they can. Oddly, I look forward to this.
So that's the gnews. (Gary Gnu not included.) We're moving in a month, we'll still be in Seattle, we'll celebrate all of this with food and cake after the fact. That cake is not a lie. No really.