The things you do for your friends…
The last week of March was a killer for us. Every evening presented us with something that kept us up until after 11PM. Valdemar has to get up at 5:30AM for work, and I’m usually short of sleep. So when Thursday rolled around we were looking forward to konking out at 8 or 9. :::::Ahhh:::::
Then the phone rang. Some friends of ours had been in the process of moving out of their house, having been told by their landlord to be out by the end of the week. They knew this was coming for months, but hadn't started packing until a week or two before. Two floors plus a basement full of enough stuff for a family of six. Ten years. Two dogs. No vacuum cleaner. Yeeesh.
But it’s not the kind of call that we’d allow ourselves to refuse. They’d do the same for us. Besides, we’d enjoyed many fine and creative parties and much hospitality. So looking at each other in weary resignation, we headed over. At least they had a rental truck, so they didn’t need to use ours. This would be the eighth move I’d assisted with in the past twelve months.
We arrived to find heaps of garbage and junk in the side driveway and all over both levels of the back deck, and one of the former roommates standing by the curb chain smoking and looking dazed and confused. They’d started moving stuff and carting away several truckloads of garbage the previous weekend and they weren’t even half done. There was a stack of very small boxes that a friend had brought over from the textbook store where he works. Valdemar can get some great boxes from his work, but had been told that they weren’t needed. Au contraire.
The smaller boxes turned out to be a good thing in the long run, since we probably would have put ourselves in traction hauling the bigger boxes. They had a ton of books. Next to nothing of the tons of stuff that remained in the house was packed. Every room was its own special catastrophe. Every door held more stuff and every door after that held stuff even more manky and gruesome. A sound bite:
“Oh God…..Awwwww ecchh!.... Oh GOD. Awwww JEEZ…. Awwwwww.. Oh God….....DAMN....”
Being a “frail” woman, (*snort*) I was sent down to the basement to help pack (feel free to re-run the previous sound bite). I won’t go into a description of the flotsam and jetsam. It would take too long. It took me several minutes to get over the Helplessly Looking Around in Horror stage, then I finally worked out what to do. Just pack the boxes and never mind what goes in with what.
There was a fridge in the basement which was normally used to hold the party beverages. I didn’t want to look inside, but I knew I’d have to eventually. I opened the door. The motion dislodged something that was stuck to the inside top of the fridge. Out of the corner of my eye it looked for all the world like a squid and made a disgusting wet “splat" when it hit the bottom of the fridge. I didn’t get a close look at it, and people, I’m grateful for that.
Around 10:30, we had the truck packed to the roof. There was still a ton of stuff in the house. The kitchen was heaped high with dirty dishes and food and garbage that had been sitting out for days. Even knowing that we still had to unload the stuff from the truck into their storage shed, we were happy to escape from the house.
Four of us unloaded the 15-foot box truck into two sheds to the accompaniment of a garage band practicing in one of the nearby sheds. They sounded pretty good if you like hearing the same decent riff over and over. We stayed and talked for a while afterward; it was nice to spend some time with them and get caught up on what people were up to.
We came away with aching backs and a firm resolve to go through our stuff and get rid of a bunch of it. Either sell it, give it away, take it to the thrift store or just chuck it out. Our house is pretty dang tidy compared to many that we've seen, but we still have way too much stuff that's just being useless and taking up space. We made it home by 11:30, and exhausted as we were, we each took a long hot shower.
Then the phone rang. Some friends of ours had been in the process of moving out of their house, having been told by their landlord to be out by the end of the week. They knew this was coming for months, but hadn't started packing until a week or two before. Two floors plus a basement full of enough stuff for a family of six. Ten years. Two dogs. No vacuum cleaner. Yeeesh.
But it’s not the kind of call that we’d allow ourselves to refuse. They’d do the same for us. Besides, we’d enjoyed many fine and creative parties and much hospitality. So looking at each other in weary resignation, we headed over. At least they had a rental truck, so they didn’t need to use ours. This would be the eighth move I’d assisted with in the past twelve months.
We arrived to find heaps of garbage and junk in the side driveway and all over both levels of the back deck, and one of the former roommates standing by the curb chain smoking and looking dazed and confused. They’d started moving stuff and carting away several truckloads of garbage the previous weekend and they weren’t even half done. There was a stack of very small boxes that a friend had brought over from the textbook store where he works. Valdemar can get some great boxes from his work, but had been told that they weren’t needed. Au contraire.
The smaller boxes turned out to be a good thing in the long run, since we probably would have put ourselves in traction hauling the bigger boxes. They had a ton of books. Next to nothing of the tons of stuff that remained in the house was packed. Every room was its own special catastrophe. Every door held more stuff and every door after that held stuff even more manky and gruesome. A sound bite:
“Oh God…..Awwwww ecchh!.... Oh GOD. Awwww JEEZ…. Awwwwww.. Oh God….....DAMN....”
Being a “frail” woman, (*snort*) I was sent down to the basement to help pack (feel free to re-run the previous sound bite). I won’t go into a description of the flotsam and jetsam. It would take too long. It took me several minutes to get over the Helplessly Looking Around in Horror stage, then I finally worked out what to do. Just pack the boxes and never mind what goes in with what.
There was a fridge in the basement which was normally used to hold the party beverages. I didn’t want to look inside, but I knew I’d have to eventually. I opened the door. The motion dislodged something that was stuck to the inside top of the fridge. Out of the corner of my eye it looked for all the world like a squid and made a disgusting wet “splat" when it hit the bottom of the fridge. I didn’t get a close look at it, and people, I’m grateful for that.
Around 10:30, we had the truck packed to the roof. There was still a ton of stuff in the house. The kitchen was heaped high with dirty dishes and food and garbage that had been sitting out for days. Even knowing that we still had to unload the stuff from the truck into their storage shed, we were happy to escape from the house.
Four of us unloaded the 15-foot box truck into two sheds to the accompaniment of a garage band practicing in one of the nearby sheds. They sounded pretty good if you like hearing the same decent riff over and over. We stayed and talked for a while afterward; it was nice to spend some time with them and get caught up on what people were up to.
We came away with aching backs and a firm resolve to go through our stuff and get rid of a bunch of it. Either sell it, give it away, take it to the thrift store or just chuck it out. Our house is pretty dang tidy compared to many that we've seen, but we still have way too much stuff that's just being useless and taking up space. We made it home by 11:30, and exhausted as we were, we each took a long hot shower.