Moving Woes....
So, next weekend I'm moving to a new apartment.
Those of you who have been reading my journal for a while know that I have had serious roommate issues ever since I moved to California, and that is part of what is prompting the move: where I am moving to, I will not have a roommate and therefore will not have to deal with the stress of yet another Spoiled Princess of a Bitca taking advantage of my hospitality and moral approach to the world.
In otherwords, Paradise.
Originally, my parents, and *possibly* my brothers, were going to come down to help me move. At that time, my father was unemployed and prospects before, say, Halloween, were looking slim, so he would have had the time. My brothers were going to take summer classes and were therefore probably unavailable, but there was a slim chance.
Then, out of the blue, my dad got a couple of job offers and he got hired on at a new company that has him flying all over the globe for weeks at a time. It's official: There is no way he can come all the way down here. My mother would probably only come if my father did; she does not travel alone very well. Though I adore seeing her, her health condition prevents her from being particularly useful in this endeavour. At about the same time, it sounded like my brothers would not be available due to girlfriend-scheduling issues (as well as school-scheduling).
So, I started investigating moving companies and finally hired someone to do the heavy lifting and big boxes. I have no car, do not have a license (therefore cannot rent a U-Haul or something), and all my college friends have either just graduated and moved to Timbuktu or are extremely busy themselves. Therefore, it was necessary to either have family help or hire someone.
Which is hilarious because I'm only moving a few blocks. If it weren't for the furniture, and that the new apartment is a few storeys up, I could move most of it on the back of my bicycle. It would take a million trips, but it could happen.
Then, my brothers announced that the scheduling stuff had been worked out and they *are* definitely coming down to see me (and, as a result, help me move). With my father's big pickup truck. They'll be here a week. We'll take a day in San Francisco. They'll help me clean. I'll still keep the movers for the heavy furniture, because I don't want my brothers ruining their backs or breaking bones trying to lug stuff up stairs, but they can move boxes. And help me unpack.
Perfect, I thought. Perfect, I said. You can protect me from the Evil!Roommate while she moves out, in addition to everything else. And if she puts up a fuss about them being here ('cause at this late date, I'm not bothering to warn her about the impending visit), well, she's moving out within 48 hours of them being here anyway.
Cool, they said. See ya then.
About a week passed.
Then, at 3.30pm today, the elder of my two brothers emails me, my other brother and my father and says, Guess what! LJ, you'll love this because this is going to be wonderful for helping you move:
My girlfriend's mom, girlfriend's sister and girlfriend's brother have decided that they want to visit girlfriend at this time, too, so they're coming along on this road trip and they can stay with us at your apartment!
(His girlfriend is doing a summer program within driving distance of here, so he was intending to visit her while they were down here anyway.)
And then heads up and down the West Coast exploded.
See, this is the first time ANYONE in our family (except my brother) even had an inkling of this possibility. Including me, and suddenly I'm expected to play hostess.
Even my father's head exploded - and this is the sort of my-relatives-are-visiting-in-an-hour-and-they're-staying-the-week sort of crap he used to pull with my mom a decade or two ago.
So, suddenly, I have five people sleeping over for about a week (two nights in the old apartment and the rest in the new) and people I've only met once helping me move. They're decent people, but it's bad enough having my brothers go through my stuff in helping me finish packing, move and unpack, but people I'm barely acquainted to but might be related to by marriage in, say, five years?
The Evil!Roommate's head will explode. I wasn't going to tell her about my brothers visiting at all, and if I'm lucky and she's blind, she still doesn't know I'm moving out (which is none of her business anyway). With just my brothers, it's easy to excuse and say, Oh, I didn't know they were coming - they came to surprise me and help me out and I had no idea. But four or five people suddenly showing up on my doorstep? Not quite as easy.
And I can't get into a shouting match with the Evil!Roommate if she throws verbal crap in my face because one of the things I was going to say to her is that she's been insulting, etc, my religion and culture all year (which she effectively has been doing) (and my brothers would go along with this just for the joy of pissing her off and the shock value) because while the girlfriend's family is very open-minded and liberal, I don't know their attitude re: religion and I don't want to say something that will scare them away from my brother, who is a great guy. (My mother also had a suggestion that if need be, the brothers and I would converse in a mixture of Gaelic, German, Klingon and gibberish to elude the Evil!Roommate. My mother is very devious.)
Ach. All sorts of confusion.
Must sleep now. Maybe it will be all a dream in the morning. And if it isn't, well, my mother has already assured me that I won't be expected to feed all these people - because, thank the Gods, I'm going to be living penny-to-penny as it is with the new apartment.
And as I told my brother, he *so* owes me for this.
Those of you who have been reading my journal for a while know that I have had serious roommate issues ever since I moved to California, and that is part of what is prompting the move: where I am moving to, I will not have a roommate and therefore will not have to deal with the stress of yet another Spoiled Princess of a Bitca taking advantage of my hospitality and moral approach to the world.
In otherwords, Paradise.
Originally, my parents, and *possibly* my brothers, were going to come down to help me move. At that time, my father was unemployed and prospects before, say, Halloween, were looking slim, so he would have had the time. My brothers were going to take summer classes and were therefore probably unavailable, but there was a slim chance.
Then, out of the blue, my dad got a couple of job offers and he got hired on at a new company that has him flying all over the globe for weeks at a time. It's official: There is no way he can come all the way down here. My mother would probably only come if my father did; she does not travel alone very well. Though I adore seeing her, her health condition prevents her from being particularly useful in this endeavour. At about the same time, it sounded like my brothers would not be available due to girlfriend-scheduling issues (as well as school-scheduling).
So, I started investigating moving companies and finally hired someone to do the heavy lifting and big boxes. I have no car, do not have a license (therefore cannot rent a U-Haul or something), and all my college friends have either just graduated and moved to Timbuktu or are extremely busy themselves. Therefore, it was necessary to either have family help or hire someone.
Which is hilarious because I'm only moving a few blocks. If it weren't for the furniture, and that the new apartment is a few storeys up, I could move most of it on the back of my bicycle. It would take a million trips, but it could happen.
Then, my brothers announced that the scheduling stuff had been worked out and they *are* definitely coming down to see me (and, as a result, help me move). With my father's big pickup truck. They'll be here a week. We'll take a day in San Francisco. They'll help me clean. I'll still keep the movers for the heavy furniture, because I don't want my brothers ruining their backs or breaking bones trying to lug stuff up stairs, but they can move boxes. And help me unpack.
Perfect, I thought. Perfect, I said. You can protect me from the Evil!Roommate while she moves out, in addition to everything else. And if she puts up a fuss about them being here ('cause at this late date, I'm not bothering to warn her about the impending visit), well, she's moving out within 48 hours of them being here anyway.
Cool, they said. See ya then.
About a week passed.
Then, at 3.30pm today, the elder of my two brothers emails me, my other brother and my father and says, Guess what! LJ, you'll love this because this is going to be wonderful for helping you move:
My girlfriend's mom, girlfriend's sister and girlfriend's brother have decided that they want to visit girlfriend at this time, too, so they're coming along on this road trip and they can stay with us at your apartment!
(His girlfriend is doing a summer program within driving distance of here, so he was intending to visit her while they were down here anyway.)
And then heads up and down the West Coast exploded.
See, this is the first time ANYONE in our family (except my brother) even had an inkling of this possibility. Including me, and suddenly I'm expected to play hostess.
Even my father's head exploded - and this is the sort of my-relatives-are-visiting-in-an-hour-and-they're-staying-the-week sort of crap he used to pull with my mom a decade or two ago.
So, suddenly, I have five people sleeping over for about a week (two nights in the old apartment and the rest in the new) and people I've only met once helping me move. They're decent people, but it's bad enough having my brothers go through my stuff in helping me finish packing, move and unpack, but people I'm barely acquainted to but might be related to by marriage in, say, five years?
The Evil!Roommate's head will explode. I wasn't going to tell her about my brothers visiting at all, and if I'm lucky and she's blind, she still doesn't know I'm moving out (which is none of her business anyway). With just my brothers, it's easy to excuse and say, Oh, I didn't know they were coming - they came to surprise me and help me out and I had no idea. But four or five people suddenly showing up on my doorstep? Not quite as easy.
And I can't get into a shouting match with the Evil!Roommate if she throws verbal crap in my face because one of the things I was going to say to her is that she's been insulting, etc, my religion and culture all year (which she effectively has been doing) (and my brothers would go along with this just for the joy of pissing her off and the shock value) because while the girlfriend's family is very open-minded and liberal, I don't know their attitude re: religion and I don't want to say something that will scare them away from my brother, who is a great guy. (My mother also had a suggestion that if need be, the brothers and I would converse in a mixture of Gaelic, German, Klingon and gibberish to elude the Evil!Roommate. My mother is very devious.)
Ach. All sorts of confusion.
Must sleep now. Maybe it will be all a dream in the morning. And if it isn't, well, my mother has already assured me that I won't be expected to feed all these people - because, thank the Gods, I'm going to be living penny-to-penny as it is with the new apartment.
And as I told my brother, he *so* owes me for this.