Simple concepts are the limit of our mental processing abilities at the moment. Packing is one thing, but the physical act of moving all one's worldly possessions from one place to another all in one go is, well, insane. I've lived a lot of places, traveled, and moved around, but never before with every, single, blasted thing I own. A teacher once told me that having books is a wonderful thing but a real impediment when one moves. It's true. Also on the list of impediments, I will add underpowered equipment. The 24-foot truck we rented drove like a kitten pulling a tractor. Ross, who drove the thing, bless him, said it was like captaining a ship: if you want to accelerate you have to send a message down to the steam room to tell them to throw more coal on. Thus, a three-and-a-half hour journey took about five. Mountains are big.
Our arrival at the farm was met with massive logistics; logistic gymnastics, really.
- Find a place to park the truck so that the 2,000 lb. car trailer can come off and be re-attached later
- Detach the trailer
- Stop half way through step 2 to remove the car
- Let the 2,000 lb. car trailer, that is no longer held firmly down by the truck, flip up as you remove the car
- Remove car
- Take cat to the farmhouse
- Build cat cage
- Discover the tool to build the cat cage is a piece of crap, find a different tool that will work
- Put cat in cat cage and make sure she has water
- Unload plants from truck
- Drive to storage unit
- Forget to borrow new employer's appliance dolly
- Rent appliance dolly from Budget truck place, which is two doors down behind The Trophy Club Gentleman's Establishment
- Arrive at storage unit, and back truck into loading dock
- Forget what our storage unit number is. Discover all paperwork is in a box. Somewhere.
- Call storage facility manager to get the unit number
- Find out we are in the wrong building of the facility and drive truck to other side
- Find correct unit and bring down truck ramp
- Align truck ramp with sidewalk
- Get large dolly onto truck
- Unload truck into storage unit
- Unload truck into storage unit
- Unload truck into storage unit
- Unload truck into storage unit
- Unload truck into storage unit
- Unload truck into storage unit
- Unload truck into storage unit
- Give friend directions to storage unit to help, tell him to bring lots of water
- Order pizza
- Eat pizza, drink water
- Repeat steps 21-27
- Organise contents of storage unit, maximise use of vertical space
- Organise contents of storage unit, maximise use of vertical space
- Panic that not everything will fit
- Take a deep breath and repeat steps 26-27
- Finish unpacking truck! Cheer loudly.
- Repack things that have to come back to the farm
- Clean up
- Take the amazing kid who helped (David) home and pay him
- Drive truck back to farm
- Unload things that need to stay at the farm into cars
- Align truck with 2,000 lb. car trailer. In the dark. On a hill. Twelve inches away from your new boss's truck.
- Attach car trailer and secure oh-shit brakes
- Discover that hi-quality trailer light connection panel is courtesy of Rent-a-Truck Nigeria
- Decide how we will get back to the farm after the truck is dropped off
- Drive to rental truck drop-off point
- Fill out paperwork
- Drive back to farm
- Find things we will need for the night
- Shower
- Sleep
You've no idea the sub-steps that are in-between. Fire bad. Tree pretty.