Poor Jaquandor wrote at the end of May:
The move is done.
Well, at least the part that involves “taking all of our stuff from the old place and bringing it to the new place”. I can’t believe how long this process took. It seemed a good idea at the time: “Hey, we’ve got about two months, so we can just slowly nickel-and-dime our way over there! We can slowly pack and take a few things over every day and gradually it’ll get done!”Take it from me, folks: this approach sucks, and should never be adopted by anyone. Live and learn, I guess.
[Except for his books,] Moving it in little chunks was a stupid, stupid, stupid idea, and it may well rank with my dumbest ideas ever. What sounded like a way to make moving into a less-stressful, less-annoying, less-soul-crushing-of-a-day turned out to be “death by a thousand cuts”. The old place became this daunting monkey on our backs, always there, always in the back of our minds. Every day, thinking, “I’m almost off work, gonna go home and take a nap…oh wait, gotta go grab more stuff.” “Hey, it’s Sunday, I can read the paper and–oh wait, gotta go grab more stuff.” The phrase “Oh wait, gotta go grab more stuff” has become the most often-said thing around here.
Yes, this is almost invariably true. I have moved so often, north of 30 times, that I actually got rather good at it. But I never enjoyed it. Jaquandor’s way reminded me of getting a pair of pliers to remove a tooth, but you just yank it a little every day for three months.
I’ve been in my current abode for 14 years this past May, and the idea of moving STILL gives me the willies.
Jaquandor also wrote, and I am going to quote his entire post:
Really good friends help you move. Your best friends help you move twice
This is not necessarily true, in my experience. I’ve helped people I’ve known for two weeks.
I once wrote, and it’s still accurate:
Moving other people’s stuff I love. I love it for a number of reasons:
1) It’s good exercise
2) It becomes an interesting anthropological study
3) People are grateful that you’re moving their stuff
4) It’s not MY stuff
Whereas moving my OWN stuff, even efficiently, is all sorts of emotionally dreadful.
Here are my rules for moving other people’s stuff, having done so many times:
1) Pick a time. Stick to the time. I want to get there, do it, and leave.
2) The movee (or his/her designee) must be in charge of the move, especially the unloading. I don’t care if the movee picks up a single thing as long as that person can say: what goes and what stays when we’re in the old place; and where the things go when we’re in the new place.
One friend was physically incapable of helping the physical moving. That’s OK.
3) Have extra boxes. Inevitably, the movee thinks he/she is done packing, but forgot the stuff behind a piece of furniture or in a closet or in the refrigerator. Seldom have I been in a situation with too many boxes.
4) Don’t pack your books, records, and other dense items in large boxes. I may be, as one friend calls her roving moving crew, of “strong backs and small minds”, but we’re not looking to end up on the disabled list while doing one a favor.
5) Highly recommended: extra packing tape, and markers for labeling boxes (oh, PLEASE, label your boxes so that we don’t have to open the boxes and decide what’s in them). Bungee ropes can be useful.
6) If possible, contact the authorities about blocking off the moving spaces so we can load and unload at the actual addresses rather than from half a block away.