Moving Stage 1: Complete
It’s been a hell of a week, and now it’s Monday and the start of a shiny new one. Wow. So, what have I done so far?
Last Monday, I picked up the keys to my new house. Measured up and ordered essential furniture, made sure the roof and walls were all still attached. On Tuesday, I went back to the house after work and went through the entry checklist, so that I won’t be blamed for all the broken/damaged stuff that was already there, when I leave.
Wednesday, collapse. Thursday, late night shopping, went down to the electronics store to order appliances. Sorted out TV (omg pretty), washing machine (omg grown up), microwave, coffee machine… all the essentials. Spent way more money than I was planning to (the sales guy made a joke about the TV being worth more than my car, and I looked him in the eye and said, “Actually, it is,” and then we all laughed), but I’m still skating within my budget. Just.
Friday, I worked from home so that I could get a head start on digging out my stuff from storage. Cleared off one desk in my room and got my furniture-type bits loaded onto my friend’s dad’s ute (nothing more valuable than knowing someone who has a ute). Loaded up all the boxes I hadn’t unpacked after emigrating from the UK – I managed to fill three cars and the rest of the ute’s bed, and that’s just the stuff I’m not actively using right now. Drove over to the house, vomited stuff from vehicles into the house, said thankyouthankyou to everyone, went home, collapsed.
Saturday, was back over at the new house to receive my furniture delivery. At 6:30am. Joy. On the plus side, they delivered my whole order, instead of just the parts they had in stock when I placed the order (I was expecting to wait another week or two for the rest). Spent the whole day assembling furniture, unpacking boxes, and shifting things towards where they should be living. My lovely helper friend cleaned the kitchen out for me, so that is nice and sparkly. Late in the afternoon, I decided to finally unwrap the sofas and discovered they needed to have their feet screwed on. Note: when you’re tired from a day full of wrangling heavy things, don’t try to screw sofa feet on. Gave up, went home, collapsed.
Sunday, took my folks over to the new house to fix all the crap that turned out to be broken the previous day. Dad fixed the feet on the couch (yes, I know now), attached the mirror to the new dresser (I really wasn’t going to touch that after the sofa incident), and removed the half-screw that was sticking out of one of the bed’s feet (which has put a bloody great scratch in the floor). Mum fixed the curtains that she had given me that turned out to be about a foot different in length, though she swears they came from the same packet. Figured out how to make the water come out of the rainwater tank. Went home, slept like log.
Today, bought my kitten a scratching post. Somehow have to figure out how I’m going to wrestle that all the way home. But I can’t forget the little fuzzy, now can I? She can has new things too.
So there we go. The first stage of the move is done. This week, I have the phone line being connected on Wednesday (which means I won’t get any internet service until next week), late night shopping for essentials on Thursday, and then back to the new house on Saturday to finish the bulk of the unpacking, organising, and cleaning. Also need to sort out a gardener at some point to tame the forest I have for a garden (preferably with a chainsaw, or possibly a herd of hungry, obedient goats). It’s possible I might get some sleep in there too.
Official moving-in looks like it’ll be on the first weekend in July. I’m hoping to have a housewarming the weekend after that, which will be nicely timed with the week I have booked off work. I can see a lot of sleeping and relaxing going on that week, and not a hell of a lot else.
I am looking forward to getting in there and getting on with things. Can’t wait until this shifting phase is over.
The good news is that I am keeping up with my writing, even with all of this going on. I managed to get enough Apocalypse Blog posts written last week to cover the weekend, which meant I didn’t have to worry about it (except for putting the posts up, which I almost forgot last night! Whoops). If I can keep doing that, my moving shenanigans (I just like that word) shouldn’t interfere with my daily posting record. I even managed to get the opening of my novel reworked recently, so that’s looking good.
Progress achieved. Colour me tired but happy.
Svenja says:
Wow, sounds like you’re busy! Kudos for making it this far, and good luck with the rest! 🙂
I loved today’s installment of the Apocalypse Blog. By the end of it I was smiling. It’s good to see the guys get some down time, something nice, and you did a great job balancing it so that it didn’t get sappy or over-the-top!
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:17 pm
Jenny says:
Pretty cool post. I just stumbled upon your blog and wanted to say
that I have really liked browsing your blog posts. Anyway
I’ll be subscribing to your blog and I hope you write again soon!
June 24th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
Mel says:
Thanks, Svenja! I’m glad you liked that post – it was fun to write, but hard to stop it getting too happy-sappy. Good to know it came out right. 🙂
I don’t do happy ones very often, but the poor Seekers deserve it every now and then. Then I can heap more on top of them! …wait, did I say that out loud?
June 24th, 2009 at 8:00 pm
Mel says:
Hi Jenny! Thanks for coming by, hope you enjoy the posting! 🙂
June 24th, 2009 at 8:01 pm