I'm gonna break my rusty cage and run

[ase]

I did not expect to be moving at the beginning of May, but here I am: by the end of June 1st, I'll be out of my old place.

Today I got four people to help me move 95% of my stuff, and I am 95% less crazy than I've been. My 25-odd boxes, large and small bookcases, TVs (now I have two TVs I can never watch!), overstuffed chair, and random stuff are all in heaps in my sunny third-bedroom three story walkup. (Three? Three half-flights? Who cares, it's not a basement!)

So yesterday I called the Budget office, in that way you do when you've rented a ruck and want to quickly confirm your 8:30 AM pickup, or maybe even push it up to 9 AM, and instead got an "um, can we call you back in half an hour?" and got the callback in the middle of dinner, rather than the middle of the afternoon. Also, a 15 foot truck instead of the 10 footer I couldn't fill, and could I pick it up at 8 AM please.

Not on, Budget trucks. Seriously not on.

After early morning adventures with an unlocked door and a cat getting into the basement, I got the keys at 8:20 AM. Assembling the moving crew - hourglasscreate's husband JM, cathydalek, scifantasy, and neighbor T-Mac - getting breakfast, discovering the truck wasn't stocked with the two handtrucks and dozen furniture pads I'd very deliberately ordered, and moving everything into the truck - took until about 11 AM on the first properly sunny, humid and warm-to-hot day of the year. The drive over was uneventful until the sun disappeared and summery thunderclouds sputtered rain, to my instant dismay. (By then it may have been hard to tell. Highway driving tends to make me curse a lot when it's just sunny and hey, I'm going 60 MPH like a reckless person and everyone is passing me. Highway driving is not fun!) We unloaded under shelter with reckless disregard for parking conventions and beat the next spitty shower. Then my awesome moving people got everything up the stairs and we went for lunch at Baja California. We ate, the skies opened up like a judgment on afternoon outdoor plans, and the moving party broke up. Guys, you were awesome, and thank you so, so much.

Then I got to drive back in pouring rain and heavy traffic. My head did not explode. The truck got dropped off, the Maryland-side moving crew got dropped off, I organized the last car-load of stuff, vacuumed, and called it a day. I dropped off a few things JM had wanted and left in the car trunk, and wound up having Rita's instead of dinner with JM and daughter. I hadn't ever been to Rita's before this month, and I'm rapidly becoming a convert. My first order of business on getting home was business - cats and mail - but my second was a hot scrub and hotter soak with Phyllida and the Brotherhood of Philander (which, so far, whoa) to get rid of the dust, sweat, sunblock, sweat, and more dust of the day.

I'm really relieved that this worked smoothly, and that we didn't get caught in the rain, and that I put the truck on a Visa, so I can challenge the charges if (ha! when) Budget messes up the bill.

Comments

[norabombay.livejournal.com]

dude. Moving. Done.

And everyone has to live in a 3rd floor walkup. Once.

Which is why I'm now on the first floor of the 3rd floor walkup building. First.

[ase.livejournal.com]

I'm done moving out, but I still have to unpack, and do a Goodwill / Linens 'n Things / Container Store run. I have umpteen small things like a shoe organizer to take care of. (I need a shoe organizer! When did that happen?)

There's a reason I had other people to lift the furniture. Yay 3rd story walkups!