The Move From Hell.
The following is a brief (yeah, right) synopsis of the trials and tribulations of the past several days. If you didnt know, Mister and I moved. You can read a bit of the back-story here and here shameless self-linking done.
If you have any sort of allergic reaction to lists or bulleted points used as a lame ass version for an entry Please skip this entry and go read some snarky brilliance from Amalah, view some cute pictures taken by Sundry, bow to The Girlfriends' Guide to Fabulousness and Fantasticity over at the random muse and um MONKEY!
Ok then, onward.
Wednesday, June 23rd, 2004
5:45 am start period. Nice.
8 am 4:30 pm Work Work Work Work Work get call from Mister who is standing inside our new home hes so excited! Work Work Work Work Work Work Work nervously peel fingernails and chew on bottom lip Work Work Work Work get email from Clarice offering the use of her Tahoe greedily accept the offer Work Work receive confirmation call from Gecko (from the day before call to make sure they are really coming to pack/move us on Thursday) Work Work Work cancel Alliance Apartment Movers Work Work Work Work Work Work Work Work Work schedule move out cleaners for Friday drive home.
5:00 pm 5:30 pm pick up Tahoe (land yacht) from Clarice and thank her profusely.
6:00 pm 7:00 pm plan move over sizzling rice soup from Chopsticks
7:00 pm 10:45 pm pack crap
10:45 pm 12:30 am cough/hack/wheeze annnnnd sleep
Thursday, June 24th, 2004 also now known as D-Day
6:00 am alarm goes off
6:07 am alarm goes off
6:14 am alarm goes off
6:21 am Shit! The movers/packers are going to be here in 2 hours!
6:27 am alarm goes off crawl out of bed, dress and begin to pack more stuff.
6:30 am 8:00 am pack furiously
8:01 am movers show up.
8:02 am 8:15 am walk the two-man team of movers/packers around the apartment and show them the stuff in the garage. All to a chorus of, Damn, Oh Man! and low whistles of disbelief. Raise eyebrows at Mister behind movers/packers backs.
8:15 am 11:30 am pack and haul boxes, pack and haul boxes annnnnd repeat. Oh, and listen to one of the packers say, Fuckin Mexicans, undercutting our rates, takin our business. Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice.
11:34 am Watch through the sliding glass doors to our patio as the bigger of the two movers/packers drop a $400 lawn chair over the second floor balcony to the smaller one down below. Hear CLANGGGG Yep, they broke it Mister asks calmly, Why would you throw a chair over the balcony? The big one (mover) replies, Thats the way we do it man. Mister says, The last company we hired to move us carried the chairs down the stairs. Mover/packer guy replies, Well, thats Mexicans for ya.
11:38 am 12:20 pm look around at what is left in the apartment. Check out the truck. It is full. Ask if they will make a second load. They say that they will.
12:20 pm 12:33 pm Gecko manager/owner, Chet, shows up to put the patio table and two gas grills into his truck. He listens stoically as Mister tells him about the dropping the patio chair off of the balcony, the breaking of said chair. Chet apparently thinks this is standard policy.
12:34 pm the packer/movers grab my beautiful, freestanding jewelry box, open the lid, open the doors, open the bottom drawer, shake the legs, put a blanket over the top of it, and just as Mister says, Do not turn that upside down. They turn it upside down. The clink-clank-tink! Of jewelry and glass and crystal is echoed throughout the apartment complex.
12:35 pm Mister loses his shit completely.
12:37 pm the larger of the two movers/packers actually says to Mister, Who do you think we are, man? Jesus? We aint perfect!
12:35 pm 12:40 pm Chet stands by like a fucking deaf mute.
12:35 pm 12:40 pm I put all (or most of it anyway) of my jewelry back into the jewelry box, noting a few broken pieces.
12:41 pm the packer/movers and Chet leave for lunch with all of our stuff in their truck.
12:41:30 pm I pull out behind them onto the main street to watch as their furniture dolly liberates itself from the back of their pickup truck and sails into the intersection during their left turn.
12:42 pm they stop in the intersection as the smaller of the packer/movers runs out to retrieve said dolly.
12:50 pm My sister calls and says that she is bringing lunch to our new house.
1:00 pm Reb shows up with yummy lunch of chicken salad, honey Dijon potato chips, kiwi and strawberry slices and croissants with cheese.
1:00 pm 1:15 pm give Reb the grand tour. Much love for Reb. Thanks for the lunch!
1:15 pm the movers/packers show up. We show them where stuff goes.
1:30 pm 4:00 pm they haul stuff in and put it in random places.
4:00 pm they hand us a bill for $200 over what we were quoted. Second load? Nope. Broken chair? Mister takes $100 off their final bill to have the chair fixed. And what of the rest of the stuff at the apartment? Helloooo Tahoe and manual labor.
4:05 pm Swear only to use Mexicans or people of Hispanic origin for the next move.
4:00 pm 9:30 pm make several trips back to the apartment to haul stuff back to the house. See a pattern forming. Silently scream inside my own head.
9:00 pm lukewarm shower
9:20 pm 9:55 pm dinner
10:00 pm pass smooth out.
Friday, June 25th, 2004
6:45 am wake up unbelievably sore, crawl out of bed and put clothes on
7:00 am 7:15 am breakfast at Grandys yum!
7:15 am the rest of the friggin day . Its Raining!
7:15 am 11:45 pm pack and move boxes from upstairs to the garage, from the garage to the truck, from the truck to our new garage. Work like ants or bees or something that is small and communal and brainless also that has to do lots of heavy lifting and stuff.
11:45 pm listen to Misters knees as they creak when he goes up the stairs. Yeeeouch!
12:00 pm wait for cleaning staff to come, realize that we have a bunch still left to do, call cleaning company, ask if the cleaning ladies can come closer to the 3 oclock time as we were given a noon to three window. Affirmative on the three oclock time slot. Word.
12:05 pm 3:00 pm still with the packing and moving and lifting and the creaking of Misters knees.
2:30 pm during one of our runs to the new house, it is discovered that our garage door is broken. Sweet. During each consecutive runs thereafter, Mister and I push the button on the inside of the garage to engage the motor and manually push the door up. Heavy ass door. Mister calls the property management company. Rocky is contacted. Rocky the garage door guy. Hell be at our house Saturday at 8 am.
3:00 pm no cleaning ladies.
4:00 pm still no cleaning ladies.
4:15 pm call the cleaning company yes, we still want the cleaning ladies, please send them. Not today? Tomorrow at a premium? Whatever. Just please call me back after your scheduling meeting to let me know what time they can come tomorrow.
5:05 pm still no call. Perfect.
5:15 pm call the cleaning place hear, Thank you for calling ____, our office hours are Monday through Friday 8 am top 5 pm. Please leave a message. Arrrrgh! I leave a message.
3:00 pm 6:20 pm still with the moving and lifting and bending and packing and sweating. Did I mention the sweating?
6:45 pm return Tahoe to Clarice so she can take her kids to their grandma & grandpas house for the weekend. Thank her profusely again. And again. Promise to call not too early in the morning on Saturday. Yes, we still have a bunch more to haul. Nah, we appreciate the offer for the help, but your lending us the Tahoe is more than enough. Really. Thank you. (Psst Clarice... you guys rock out! Thanks again!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
7:00 pm 8:30 pm move more stuff around.
8:35 pm call on my cell phone from some woman who does not speak English. Glean from her broken syllables that someone at _____ cleaning service gave her my number because I had cancelled my appointment with the cleaning people. Huh? What the fu ?
8:40 pm cold ass shower, lots of bitching and moaning. [Why is the water cold? No idea. Well check the water heater tomorrow when we get done with moving. We need to get a flashlight, because I dont know where I packed our good one. Alrighty.]
9:15 pm 10:20 pm dinner at cute little Mexican food restaurant.
10:30 pm 11:15 pm watch something benign on TV a movie as we dont have cable yet.
11:30 pm pass out.
Saturday, June 26th, 2004
6:45 am wake up unbelievably sore, crawl out of bed and put clothes on
7:00 am 7:15 am Mister goes to the local bakery and brings back kolaches for breakfast. mmmmm
6:45 am the rest of the friggin day . Its Raining!
8:00 am 9:15 am Hello Rocky. Thank you for coming to fix our garage door.
8:15 am 9:45 am see two Mexican guys doing the lawn of our neighbor. Go speak to them and find out if they can add us to their roster of houses. We negotiate on price and they mow, edge and clean up our lawn. Perfect. Tip them generously and settle on a day and concrete price. The lawn looks gorgeous!
9:15 am 10:00 am Mister has an appointment
10:30 am call Calrice wake her up Ooops!
10:45 am pick up the Tahoe from Calrices husband. Sweet, sweet man. Thank you kind sir!
11:00 am 2:15 pm pack and move and clean and vacuum and curse and sweat and What is with the friggin rain already!?
2:15 pm Betty R. from ______ cleaning service calls me. She is about 5 minutes away, do I still want her to come clean the apartment? Oh dear sweet Jesus . YES!
2:16 pm Betty arrives with her little back-pack vacuum and her cleaning supplies with reassuring words of, Yes, Si, Si now, dont you worry Sir, dont you worry maam, we will clean it all up. , The blinds, Si., The refrigerator, Si. The oven, Si. It will all be ok. . Oh how I love Betty R.
2:16 pm 4:15 pm Betty and her co-worker work and scrub and clean.
2:16 pm 4:15 pm Mister and I get the last of the stuff into the garage. The apartment is completely empty. Thank goodness! We make a round of the apartment and it is spotless. Be-A-Utiful! We pay Betty and her co-worker get her cell phone number and wave farewell to them.
4:15 pm 6:00 pm pack boxes, pack the Tahoe, make several runs. Open the garage with our new snazzy garage door opener. Thank you again Rocky!
6:00 pm back at the new house, put things away, and go in search of the water heater.
6:25 pm find water heater in attic over the garage.
6:40 pm Shit. It is a gas heater. Do we have gas hooked up? Nope.
6:40 pm 6:43 pm Shit. Shit. Shit.
6:44 pm Mister calls the Property management company. They say, Did you ask us if the water heater was gas or electric? Mister says, No, what other questions was I supposed to know to ask you? You couldnt even answer me with the information on if the house had a sprinkler system or not. You didnt know the code to the garage door.
6:46 pm I call TXU gas company and schedule their people to hook up our gas at the EARLIEST time possible. Monday, June 28, 2004 from 8 am to 5 pm. Thanks.
6:50 pm 8:45 pm Load and haul the last two loads of our stuff into the Tahoe, drive through the (frickin) rain to the new garage, unload the stuff and drive to the gas station.
8:45 pm deliver the Tahoe back to Clarice and family with full tank of gas. Offer first born and buckets of money. When both are rejected, offer to take them to dinner sometime. Their graciousness knows NO bounds. Truly.
9:00 pm 11:00 pm Scrounge around for food and stare listlessly at the television.
11:01 pm Mister declares that he is going to start a company called the Mexican Connection. It will be a referral company that sends over people to do whatever job you need done. Moving? Mexicans. Cleaning? Mexicans. Lawn Care? Mexicans. Because clearly they take pride in all they do, and they do it better than our white, honky asses. Those mover guys yep, white and cocky. Pricks. We should have gone with Alliance.
11:03 pm pass out laughing
Sunday, June 26th, 2004
7:00 am wake up, play hooky from church, get struck by lightning (not really so much with the lightning part)
10:00 am wake up again . Why? Because my ass is TIRED yall.
10:10 am 10:00 pm move various boxes to the rooms that they should be in. Unpack some of the kitchen stuff. Listen as Mister hooks up and curses (with Feeling!) the washer and dryer. Watch the cat fully relax and take advantage of the room he has now to run around in, careening around the corner to slide through the kitchen on the linoleum. Deep breath, and sigh.
10:30 pm fall asleep in our humongous bedroom with a smile.
Monday, June 27th, 2004
5:45 am 6:15 am wake up, crawl out of bed and warm up water on the stove so I can take a bath in the kitchen sink. What? We have no hot water member?
Dont look at me like that.