Pain.
Pain.
Pain!
And Frustration! OMG the frustration!!!!
The day itself went swimmingly, if such an adverb can be applied to lightly cool, mostly sunny weather. Our crew was a tiny bit late, but made up for it in speed. I’d been afraid it would take hours longer. After all, it took two days just to pack the PODS. We needed to have them unload it into a U Haul, then I’d drive to the house, and they’d unload everything and bring it inside. So, unload, reload, unload.We had one day, the only day several of the crew could get off work. As I type this, the PODS is now on its way to its new user. I know it’s not being stored because the driver of the rig which hauls those was on the phone to the next customer, both to tell them his ETA, and ask which way they wanted its door to face, the house or the street? Once it’s dropped off, it doesn’t move except to leave. The wheels stay with the truck.
I’m back home again… and still aching. It starts at the shoulders, not just the “bad” one, and runs down both arms past the elbows.
How much stuff did I carry in yesterday, you ask? Two pillows! Oh yeah, a comforter too. I let the crew do the heavy stuff. They were getting paid. But there was other stuff to do, and it occasionally included opening a box, or lifting it to a different location once inside. There was a bit of packing at my son’s house before we drove out, but most of that was carried by him to the cars. Yes, plural: jockeying vehicles all day meant two were needed. for everything. We both drove to the new house to drop off stuff plus Steve, leaving my car there. Then my son drove me to the U Haul rental. I drove the truck, followed by Paul, to the storage facility to meet the PODS, and once the crew showed up and got their instructions, my son drove me back to where Steve was and returned to his own house to do some cooking for us all. Later I’d need to drive to the PODS when it had been unloaded, give my car keys to one of the crew to bring my car back while the crew’s other two vehicles left and I brought the truck over to the new house. One of the crew's cars then went to my son’s house to load a few pieces of furniture from there still needing to come over, while the rest of us went straight to the new place. There was quite a bit of jockeying vehicles there, given narrow streets and a huge truck. Later my son showed up with some dessert for everybody after pizza, then followed me taking the U-Haul back, and bringing me back to the new place.
Are you dizzy yet? I had to organize all of that! Insurance dictated only I could drive the big truck. As huge as it was, my arms started aching with the first crank of the steering wheel. It was so tall I almost didn’t get in the first time. But after taking a good look at the thing from the other side once I'd climbed out, I noticed there were extra, lower steps up on the passenger side, so after that I just climbed up that way and scooted across the seats. Apparently whoever designed those things believes all the drivers are tall burly folks (men) and passengers are petite or even children.
Note to self: it’s good to be young and strong. At least it was back when I was younger anyway, but that was a bit ago.
Some stuff brought to the new house first thing had to be tended to right away. Things like medicines needing to be taken at bedtime had to be sorted from the chaos and set where they’d stay sorted from the chaos. Mostly that worked, sometimes it was an extended guessing game. Did I put those …..? Or…..? Even things that got packed at the very last minute got buried by the chaos since the boxes came into the house first and the furniture afterwards, so there weren’t always places to put stuff needing their very own places. Kitchen counters were just an invitation to put boxes, appropriate or not, and nevermind I'd have to cook lateo. Next to the fridge I found a scanner and printer… just because the original use of that box was an air fryer, something I’ve never owned nor wanted. But we needed a box that size back when certain area dumpsters in Arizona had their box overloads sorted through, not for anything in particular but because the size would hold a bunch of stuff and still be something that somebody, somewhere, could pick up at point A and place at point B. I think I even managed to do so last night, once everybody had been fed, paid, and thanked, and we were looking for those buried necessary things.
Thirty pounds didn’t use to be so heavy! Uff da!
Because boxes were coming in before the furniture, I kept trying to get people to leave open space plus paths to various locations for a cabinet, or a table, or a bed, or dresser, or.., or…. Nobody listened. We had designated the "pantry room" for all the no-place-to-go-yet boxes, which somehow kept getting piled up in the big living room where furniture soon should be arriving and they'd have to be moved again. Steve and I could watch somebody pore over whatever was written on a box and try to figure out for themselves which room to block up with it. No! No! Just take the (cuss unvoiced) box or rug or tote down the hall and stack with the others down there! We need this space for (fill in the blank.)
I mentioned pills as things not to lose rack of. Another case in point is a small zip-loc bag of wooden knobs. Unfortunately I saw the bag before the pieces they were needed for made their appearance, so I set them down. The theory was that I'd remember where later when they were needed. You're laying odds right now on how well that worked out, aren't you?
So I knew they were here somewhere. On top of something. I knew exactly what they belonged to. I’ve owned those cabinets for over 30 years. Of all the wood tones and wood grains of any pieces of furniture in this house, those cabinets are the only things which match those knobs.Those knobs are not merely decorative. They are what opens the lower level of doors, behind which are two shelves per cabinet, very handy for putting stuff away and out of sight. But one has to screw in the knobs before they can pull any of the six doors open. Without those knobs, a lucky or very skilled person might insert a very thin knife between any two doors, push it just so to the side, and pry the door pairs open. Or try. And try again.
You don't see the problem? So... out and around, scattered all over in different parts of this house, are boxes containing stuff needing to get put away in those cabinets out of sight, but are still in everybody’s way (meaning Steve’s and mine) which could have gotten pulled out of this chaos and organized. Instead they get moved over here to get to something behind or under them, then wind up having to get moved again, or blocking our view of that next important thing we are looking for. Night lights haven’t shown up yet either, including the two I pulled from the bedroom our last morning. It gets surprisingly dark here.
There has also been some hunting for my pacemaker monitoring system. It’s supposed to be plugged in within ten feet of where I sleep. Everything is set up for it in the new bedroom. Except, of course, for the part where it has actually been located and plugged into an outlet. There aren’t too many places where it could be. There’s only so much that got removed from the house in the morning for our first trek over. Luckily, when I first got it I mentioned that we were snowbirds back then, and sometimes our trips had side trips and we’d play tourist. They weren’t concerned about “a few days”. The monitor would still download the information. Still, it could take us till August, the way we figure it, to totally unpack this mess and go through every place it could have wound up, which in turn got relocated or packed on top of or behind 8 other heavy things until I finally located it and plugged it in.
But I did manage to find the peanut butter for Steve! No, it wasn't in that crate either. Nor were those knobs.
Have I mentioned yet that I slept on my new mattress? It was exactly that, slept on the mattress. Not on top of the mattress protector, sitting in the bedroom window ledge. Nor on the sheets set aside next to the mattress protector. Nor under, or even over the bedspread for that bed, since it does get cool here most nights, apparently. This is not because I couldn’t find any of those things. All were in the bedroom, in plain view, exactly where they were supposed to be. EXCEPT… “supposed to be” was on the bed, layered in the usual order as one does when making a bed. Just… nobody had done that. Everybody had gone home. Steve’s bed was made. I’d been searching through boxes for pills. And knobs. And occasionally emptying out something which prevented me from getting close to one side of the bed and which, when emptied, no longer weighed weighed 50 pounds. So I could get to that window ledge holding stuff, and the bed which needed the stuff being held put on it. Except… by then I was dead tired. I don’t care it was only 7 PM and I had stopped for supper. I put half of my supper back in the fridge, dug out something that could pass for pajamas, located a pillow and a light afghan to cover myself with, took those finally located bedtime pills, and went and slept on my mattress.
I’d had three and a half hours sleep the night before, for one simple reason. Usually the night before something big happening, I get little sleep. Oddly, that wasn’t it this time. I had to wake up to use the bathroom. We were still in my son’s house, where that trip means walking around the bed, opening a door, going up three stairs, going through another door, crossing the living room, turning down the hall, into the bathroom, crossing the bathroom…. Well you get the idea. It wakes me up, and if that didn’t for some reason, by the time I do it all in reverse and crawl into bed and under the covers again, I find myself thoroughly awake and starting to go through whatever needs to be done that day. Or something. The brain... is... awake!
I expect yours would be too. In the new house, both beds are mere steps away from the necessary plumbing. We are already sleeping better, if one can extrapolate from one night. I put in ten hours on the mattress under an unruly afghan.
Unfortunately Steve is having to catch up on his sleep now. Turns out I went to bed so early that he expected me to wake up after a nap. I didn’t. He decided to worry about whether I was OK or not. So he’d go to bed, then get up to check on me - zonked - go back to bed, get up and check on me - yep, still zonked. He didn’t get much sleep.
Once up, I had to get dressed and out of there. We have no wi-fi in the house yet. It was supposed to be installed yesterday. A valiant effort was made. The little thing plugged in the wall which is supposed to give a steady light is still blinking all these hours later. Without wifi I had to head back to my son’s house. Not only did I have a pair of chairs for him for his screen house, packed way back when we didn’t know we wouldn’t have a porch or patio. (We’re keeping the table they went with, since there’s both place and use for it. But the chairs were in my car.) I also needed the wi-fi because the PODS people would be sending me an email with a window when I could expect to meet them to turn over the pods to them. I needed to run errands too, and couldn’t be 15 miles away in a store aisle loading a cart when the call came. Once there I did a couple other things as well, like cleaning up a mess left in yesterday's rush. After that bit of activity I totally spaced what errands I need to run. I returned home to await my call from the driver.
Did you read that? “HOME!” This place is home now! I can’t post this until I’m in range of wi-fi again, but I can write it. Meanwhile there’s coffee, breakfast, a warmer shirt somewhere that I can verify as "clean enough," and stacks of more boxes in more places to start going through to find more necessary stuff, like 6 wooden knobs so I can get more places to put more stuff so I can get to more boxes sitting there laughing at us because they’re still hiding their contents because I can’t, simply can not recall where I put that little bag of cotton picking wooden cabinet knobs!!!
And to think my shoulders ache now!
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Internet! Posting in 1... 2....
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