Update
Still here. Still unpacking.
Still?! We've barely started.
A few weeks ago, back when I was in the maelstrom of packing and getting ready to move, I thought wistfully of the peaceful time I would have unpacking and unwrapping and setting everything in its rightful place. Iimagined it as a lovely holiday where everything we owned already becomes a present we get to open. No stress! No time pressure! No agonizing decisions to make!
No common sense, either. Apparently I'd forgotten about how RW and I almost came to blows, back when I first moved in with her, over the burning issue of Where Do Plates Rightfully Go in the Kitchen?
Unpacking, I recall now, is full of agonizing decisions. Because of course the space we've moved into is not at all like the space we moved out of (fewer bedrooms, more hallways, for one thing;) so the categories we had things in before don't necessarily work now. And the stuff...the stuff...well, there's just SO MUCH of it. And the things I packed carefully in special places so I'd be able to find them? Are the things that are hardest to find.
I was all smug about how we were numbering and labeling and inventorying our boxes. I had this idea that this would make things a snap to find at the other end. Because, you know, all the boxes were NUMBERED. And I made a Word document listing all the things in all the boxes. So, you know, if I needed something, I could just "search all" in the Word document, find the box, open it, and--pronto--find the thing!
Which would be fine if all the boxes were neatly lined up in order. Also, if they were all in one layer so we could see their numbers and labels at all times. But of course this is not so; they are piled in layers and behind furniture and some of them are only labeled on one side and that's the side against the wall. Of course it would have made sense to unload the boxes right into the rooms where they're going, but except for a few obvious cases (like MG's stuff, which all (or almost all) ended up in her room) we didn't necessarily know what room they were going in. So the kitchen stuff and my books and RW's papers are all nicely jumbled together, adding to the fun.
Next time we move (oh dear God, there is going to be a next time, so I'd better remember this): no thinking. No deciding. Just pack things that are near each other in the same boxes, because that's how I'll remember where they are.
Still?! We've barely started.
A few weeks ago, back when I was in the maelstrom of packing and getting ready to move, I thought wistfully of the peaceful time I would have unpacking and unwrapping and setting everything in its rightful place. Iimagined it as a lovely holiday where everything we owned already becomes a present we get to open. No stress! No time pressure! No agonizing decisions to make!
No common sense, either. Apparently I'd forgotten about how RW and I almost came to blows, back when I first moved in with her, over the burning issue of Where Do Plates Rightfully Go in the Kitchen?
Unpacking, I recall now, is full of agonizing decisions. Because of course the space we've moved into is not at all like the space we moved out of (fewer bedrooms, more hallways, for one thing;) so the categories we had things in before don't necessarily work now. And the stuff...the stuff...well, there's just SO MUCH of it. And the things I packed carefully in special places so I'd be able to find them? Are the things that are hardest to find.
I was all smug about how we were numbering and labeling and inventorying our boxes. I had this idea that this would make things a snap to find at the other end. Because, you know, all the boxes were NUMBERED. And I made a Word document listing all the things in all the boxes. So, you know, if I needed something, I could just "search all" in the Word document, find the box, open it, and--pronto--find the thing!
Which would be fine if all the boxes were neatly lined up in order. Also, if they were all in one layer so we could see their numbers and labels at all times. But of course this is not so; they are piled in layers and behind furniture and some of them are only labeled on one side and that's the side against the wall. Of course it would have made sense to unload the boxes right into the rooms where they're going, but except for a few obvious cases (like MG's stuff, which all (or almost all) ended up in her room) we didn't necessarily know what room they were going in. So the kitchen stuff and my books and RW's papers are all nicely jumbled together, adding to the fun.
Next time we move (oh dear God, there is going to be a next time, so I'd better remember this): no thinking. No deciding. Just pack things that are near each other in the same boxes, because that's how I'll remember where they are.
posted by elswhere | 1:27 AM
6 Comments:
Oh. My. Makes me not want to ever move(although I do sort of enjoy unpacking....I just hate packing so much that anything after that looks good.)
That's my moving strategy: Things that were near each other in the old place get put in one box. Of course, that method assumes that things were near one another for some kind of reason, instead of just randomly there. (Pens with pencils? Yes. Business cards with gardening supplies? I'm not sure why that happened.)
We moved 3 months ago and I still have a box half-filled with debris that doesn't seem to belong anywhere now.
I hate moving.
I am amazed that you managed to be that archival in your moving, and I think you've helped yourself more than you're crediting. After all, you don't have to dump a box to see what's in the bottom.
Are you househunting right off the bat, though, or are you giving yourselves a few months to breathe?
Oh, definitely not househunting yet, Rachel. We need decent incomes first, for one thing. Plus we have a year's lease and so do our tenants back in the States.
If something perfect and affordable jumped out in front of us and waved, that would be another story. But this being the Vancouver area, I think we're safe from that possibility. Whew! Thanks, crazy housing market!
Plague, famine, drought, earthquakes, flooding, shingles, duststorms and moving.
I'd say they're all on about same level of cursedness.
Stay strong as you settle the dishes questions.
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