Okay so this is my long overdue and just plain long post about this last weekend, in all its gory details. Ready? Ready.
Because of logistics, I broke down all tech Thursday night. Friday our internet and cable were being put into the new house. We get a call from the painters that they were running late, so they and the cable guys would be in each other's ways, but they'd work it out. Meanwhile, the carpet guys said that they couldn't make it and they would have to do the job on Monday...after...the move...But rest assured, they said, they'd be moving everything, doing the carpets, then moving everything back.
Painter: Did an awesome job. Finished early. Was gone. One thing he DID do, however, was because he knew the carpets were all being replaced, he brought in a cabinet set he needed to paint for a DIFFERENT client, set them on the carpets, then painted them, which of course left huge box-shaped paint marks all over everything. Luckily they were dry by the time we did move in.
Cable guy: Not sure what this dud was thinking, but he ran a cable through the neighbor's fence (sound familiar? That's what they did at the other house as well, which says to me this is CenturyLink's SOP) and ran in ACROSS THE YARD to the house. Like, it's either just hanging there about a foot off of the ground or it's on the ground. They can't bury it because of a sidewalk so I have no idea what the hell they are planning on doing with it. And since we share a back yard with our neighbor's, I hope this doesn't become an issue before CL resolves it.
Friday was a packing day and not much happened there. Remember that a lot of our stuff was still in boxes since we never unpacked - the INCIDENT happened so soon after we moved there that we never really bothered. We got everything ready to go and slept there for the last time. Kerri took a bath in the HUGE WHIRLPOOL TUB because we knew it was going to be the last time we had anything like this. I did have a friend come over to grab my sound equipment as we had a gig out of town Saturday night. More foreshadowing to the future.
Saturday comes bright & early, we get up at 6, I run & get donuts and coffee for people. I have to pick up the U-Haul at 7:30, the movers are coming between 8:30 - 9:00. I told our helpers to get there about 8. We tear down the beds and I leave to get the truck.
When I got back with the truck only 1 person had shown up to help. Not too much of an issue, we started and soon after about 5 more people showed. So we had a pretty good crew. The problem is, they were very exuberant and didn't follow directions about what to take and what to leave, so I ended up with some of Nick's (the former boyfriend who was kicking us out) stuff. This will come into play later. The effect that this had was that we had no clue where anything was and was not able to coordinate what went where. We took that load to the new house and loaded it all in the garage (not wanting to put anything in the house itself thanks to the carpet guys screwing us over). Again, though, people piled things in very indiscriminately so it was a royal mess.
By then the movers were at the house, and my wife was there to direct them as to what they were taking. Note that 5 months earlier we used the SAME COMPANY to move the SAME ITEMS. This also comes into play.
The movers were fucking clown shoes. Slow as fuck and they had no idea what the fuck they were doing. It took them 2 hours to get the stuff out of the house and into their truck. For comparison, the crew we had in December took two hours to load our stuff, take it to the new place, and get it inside and placed. So the first crew was done in the time it took these idiots to load the truck in the first place.
But what their slow as shit selves did was throw everything else behind. We couldn't load the U-Haul because they were the way. So everyone just kind of stood around. And the clock kept ticking.
So the movers get finished and start for the other house, we pull the U-Haul in and we go to town. We finish filling it - as always just a clusterfuck of boxes in no particular order - and head to the new house. The movers are there and have loaded in 1 item. So we wait. When they are finally done - 2 hours later - they give me the bill which I do sign, because by then I'm out of time and just didn't have time to argue. I have to take it up with the office later. They leave, we pull in the U-Haul and we go nuts. During this time, there are a number of people at the old house who are loading stuff into regular trucks. They get to the new house about the time we are unloading the U-Haul. But now it's 1:30 and the U-Haul is due BACK so I have to leave. I take the U-Haul back, find out that I've overpaid $40 and I'll get that back, then I head back to the new house. My partner in comedy for the night is there and we have to leave to drive to a gig 3 hours outside of town. Which means I'm leaving after about 3/4 of the move is done. Great.
Get to the gig and find out that there was a charity event for a local person in that town who has brain cancer. The charity event was actually scheduled for 2 weeks prior, but that last freak snowstorm postponed it...to Saturday night. We had an audience of 3 people at our comedy show. The owner, the cook, and the waitress. NOBODY came to see it. But they all got food and entertainment for the cancer lady. Fuck cancer. We each did 20 minutes anyway, filmed it, and did Facebook live. We had 15 people or so watching on Facebook Live. Found out they were all minors, but they loved the show! So...score?
Get home Saturday night about midnight and go to bed. Sunday was spent taking it rather easy, but we did hook up the washer/dryer, fridge (we have 3 fridges in this place as it came with 2 already), and getting our stove in. It's a gas range and we were having issues with the gas seal. I ran to the hardware store at least 4 times Sunday getting things we needed. I get a phone call from the carpet place at 10:11 to confirm the carpet guys coming over, but I had the phone on vibrate and missed it. I caught it right away, though, and called them back at 10:14 only to get a message saying they were closed and to call back later. The fuck?
Also Sunday I had to run some stuff back to the other house that got moved by mistake. The sister was already moved in and everything was set up. I wanted to tell them all to go suck a bag of dicks but I stayed nice. It was hard seeing their stuff in our dream house. I hope they get drunk and drive and fuck up their dream house. It would only be fair. Which is really fucked up. I don't even fucking drink and drunk drivers fucked up my fucking life. But I digress.
Monday comes and I've taken the day off. The plan is that while the carpet guys are moving shit and getting the carpet in, my son and I will get all of the boxes out of the garage into the basement, putting them into stacks based on their desired location - living room, kitchen, bedroom #1, etc. The carpet guys are supposed to be here at 8...9 rolls around and nothing. I call the carpet place and they say that someone will call us between 8 - 9:30 to let us know they are on the way. We get the call at about 9:28 and the guys says they are almost here. At 10 am the van rolls in...and there's only 1 guy. And he doesn't know anything about the promises that they'll move everything. So my son and I have to move everything out ourselves. That's 2 beds, 2 loveseats, an entertainment center, an armoire, a kitchen table, several bookcases, and a few other side tables and stuff. It was nuts. And a good thing I stayed home from work.
The carpet guy got done about 4 in the afternoon, then we had to put everything back in and get everything set up. We finished but had to run to the store to get a few things. The kid and I were able to get almost all of the boxes to the basement and it's great being able to know where everything is. Then we came back and collapsed.
I got a couple emails this morning. 1 from the movers and 1 from the carpet place. They were "How did we do?" surveys. I am going to have a LOT of fun filling these fucking things out...
