Things you cannot put on a moving truck: Detergents, aerosols, propane, live animals.
Things I can stuff into Otto’s car, should I so desire: Detergents and aerosols.
Things I would like to take to Georgia with me, because I PAID MONEY FOR THAT, DAMMIT, which are rather large to take in the car given everything else we have: The propane tank on my grill.
Solution: The propane tank has got to be nearly empty… let’s just leave the grill running until it’s empty, and then the movers will be willing to put it on the truck!
Hey, guess what! I think I must’ve had the propane tank filled at some point and forgot about it, because the grill has been running for… *checking watch* nine hours. Huh.
We love Otto, because Otto hasn’t EVEN ONCE turned to me and asked how I could think that a nearly-full propane tank was almost empty.
We also love Otto, because here are the things he’s done today:
1) Walked the kids to the bus stop and took pictures not only of them, but key landmarks along our walk so that the kids will have them to refer to after we move.
2) Broken down a garage worth of boxes from places like Amazon and Zappos and I DO NOT HAVE A PROBLEM, I CAN STOP ANY TIME I WANT TO.
3) Filled up his brother’s big-ass truck with all that cardboard, plus a bunch of other crap.
4) Came over and hugged and kissed me when I was standing in the middle of my garage going WE’LL NEVER GET IT ALL DONE! I’M FREAKING OUT!
5) Drove to the dump, unloaded the big-ass truck.
6) Came back and sorted through the entire contents of my shed, which included all the containers I used during the Basement Flood of ’06 and never washed, which now smell like things died in them because in several cases, THINGS DIED IN THEM.
7) Described a dead animal discovered on a previous mission to said containers in such a way that the phrase “the skin slid right off the bones” was involved, and then didn’t mock me when I gagged.
8) Helped me mop up the lake created by defrosting the deep freezer, because I have owned that stupid thing for about 8 years and I still have no idea how one defrosts it without drowning.
9) Loaded the dishwasher, which is a total novelty for me because DUDE, no one has loaded my dishwasher in years. I am getting all hot and bothered just telling you about it, in fact.
10) Declared the Chi-Chi’s Lemon Drop concoction (which Chris and I bought a couple of weekends ago) to taste like the Battleship Massachusetts. Alas, I was not drunk and therefore didn’t think to ask him what the hell he was doing TASTING a battleship, but my interested blinking led him to attempt to explain something about unrecirculated air and I said okay, that’s nice honey.
11) Also, when I went to shake up the Lemon Drop container and it turned out that the top had cracked, so when I shook, I ended up spraying it all over the kitchen table. The first thing he did was get me some paper towels, and the second thing he did was suggest that I blog about it. (Because that’s entertainment, right there, making your kitchen table smell like a crowded hotel bar, by accident.)
12) Aaaaaand I managed to rip the screen door off the track today and all he said was “Okay, I can fix that.”
I am totally going to keep him.
(Everything that’s not packed yet, though, I may have to throw away. I’m really just kind of OVER packing, at this point.)
(But! We just dropped the price on the house to about a buck fifty, so I should probably get my crap out of here before someone swoops in to buy it at this extremely bargain price of This Market Sucks And We Are Screwed And No Longer Care.)
The movers are coming in the morning to do their portion of the packing, which is all the breakable stuff I don’t want to, ummm, break. That will be the end of cooking here, which is too bad because I think the grill will probably still be going and I thought it might be nice to toss some bacon on there for brunch. Oh well.
I’ll probably just rip the screen door off the track again and give the kids pop-tarts, instead.
After tomorrow get some paper plates, Mir! In a small package.
Otto sounds very patient…..extreme kudos.
Glad you are all fired up about moving.
Loaded your dishwasher? WHAT?
Otto, meet Daren. Make him your grasshoppah.
Good luck with the move. It sounds very exciting! I think Otto is amazing.
You two are so cute. I really wish I could have you over for dinner (and Chickadee and Monkey, too).
Just don’t forget to pack a deck of cards to play in the gazebo/casino when you arrive. ;)
Sending lots of {{{ empty propane tank }}} vibes your way!
Hang in there, you guys are doing great! :) :) :)
almost there!
oh, and mmmmm, bacon.
He loaded the dishwasher? Is that what they’re calling it these days? ;)
Ok, that might be fun though, ’cause…well, I’m the dishwasher and I’m always ready to be loaded.
Oh, don’t you just hate the last little things that need to be packed. I’m right there with you thinking about just throwing it away. Have a safe trip and hopefully that propane tank will run out in time to be loaded last on the truck.
Otto sounds like a keeper!!!!!!!!!
Definitely a keeper,that one!
I am totally mind boggled at what they will not take on a moving van. But who am I to ask the last time I moved was 26 years ago and it took three small truck loads. Now I fear the thought.
I’m thinking that you guys are going to be just fine. Have a great time.
Kris, how naughty!
Did the moving guys SAY they’d take the propane tank if it was empty? If their list of verboten items just says “propane tanks”, they might still refuse to take it.
But why detergent? I can’t figure that one out.
And . . . maybe Otto should have just torched that shed. I have to go gag now.
I had forgotten all the “DO NOT TAKE” on the moving vans.
One of our movers had 4 bottles of potpourrie he kept out. I told him he took them and he said no, he didn’t think so, but I couldn’t tell he was squinting at the words trying to figure out what it was. Well… it had words like “ocean breeze” and “vanilla” on them but he didn’t have a clue what they were.
I finally said; “PRETTY SMELLING WATER”
Oh.
He took them. LOL.
Otto = Mir is a lucky woman.
Mir = Otto is a lucky man.
All of you are so durn cute. :D It’s a wonderful, beautiful thing. :D
I heart Otto. He’s the kind of man to keep around, for sure! Yea… pretty soon you’ll be on the way here from there. And then the fun can start in reverse… lol.
Unpacking never seems to be the chore for me that packing is, though. I guess because of the excitement of making the new house yours.
Keep him. Definitely.
Well, at least it is just your grill running forever. I went out to start my Explorer this morning to go to work and found it running!! My dear husband had put it away for me last night when we thought it might storm and he left it running. A full tank of gas gone – and gas is so cheap these days – not!! I had to drive 8 miles to the nearest gas station with a reading on my dash saying “0 miles to empty”. Whew, I made it!! Otto sure sounds like a “keeper” – don’t throw him back!! Good luck with the move and best wishes for a wonderful life!!
When we moved once as a kid (Army Brat) the movers packed up everything and wrote “Alcohol” on one box that contained alcohol. The inspector showed up and said, “No, no, no, we can’t move alcohol across state lines!” (this was 1977 and ARMY mind you), and grabbed a marker, crossed it out and wrote “Kitchen supplies” on the outside!
As for Otto — yes, he is a keeper!
Yeah, our movers refused the detergent, etc , but then packed and moved one of those plastic automotive oil container thingies THAT WAS FULL OF USED OIL. We had planned to take it to a recycling center and lo and behold, it had disappeared! Gotta love those random rules!
I was with OTTO on a special tour of the Battleship Massachusetts. I can attest that without actually licking the hull from the inside, the smells were enough to coat your pallet and give you the sensation of munching on some metal. Took 3 days of showers to get the bunker fuel smell off… VERY SWEET, and totally worth it.
Battleship Massachusetts? So I gather he didn’t like the lemon drops as much as we did?
We tried to let our propane tank run out so that we could refill it before we had company. We were certain it had nothing left in it. 8 hurs later it was still running. But we knew as soon as we decided to cook on it… it would run out.
Moving puts everything RAPIDLY in perspective, doesn’t it? Suddenly it is so easy to get rid of all those boxes and other detritus you’ve been saving for some reason…suddenly hanging on to things doesn’t seem as important as letting them go so you can truly “move on.”
The bit about the skin sliding off is going to haunt me all day. Thankssomuch.
Do they make propane tanks out of rare metal up there? Cuz here, you just go swap it for another one when you want a refill. You can do that at most grocery stores.
In other words, it’s hard to get attached.
(says the man who owns a charcoal grill, and OMG I won’t part with it even though it is falling apart, so don’t even ask)
Good luck…
Otto is DA MAN.
And you are nearly there.
OK — here is my one and only piece of advice on moving. (This comes from my mother so you know it’s good.) When you get to the new house, the first thing you do is get the beds set up and made. Makes the end of that first, incredibly stressful day much easier when you can just fall into bed.
Come for the post, stay for the comments. I think I’ll stay in my house until death do us part. As long as there’s coffee, that is.
It’s been quite an adventure reading you the past few months. I can only imagine the stories you’ll have to share after the move…heat, bugs, swamps, hot swampy bugs…Are there other things in the south? As I’m from MI, I really have no idea, but I’m sure it’ll give you plenty of blog fodder. All the best on the move!
Whew… I’m very glad that Otto and Nearly Nickless were not actually LICKING the Battleship Massachusetts. That would just be weird.
I think you did good with this one!
Am I the only one laughing that all your google ads today are for …. Propane Tanks?
Heh.
What an amazing husband (tee hee) you have, Mir!!!
Whoa, Otto has earned the official seal of approval from Dad. Woot! And the mention of Nearly Nickless has me chuckling all over again…
I think you summed up the whole moving experience in one post (and we all owe Otto much gratitude that he suggested it!) It hadn’t even occurred to me that you haven’t yet experienced the whole “living together again with an adult” and that you’ve been doing all of the adult work all this time. To suddenly have a partner again–man, it’s like going to another –REALLY GOOD– planet. Planet Co-habitation. When my husband and I first got to Planet Co-habitation, I remember he was so touched that when I got out MY coffee mug, I got one out for HIM, too. His wonderment almost made up for the downside of Planet Co-habitation, which is the side trip to “Someone Used My Towel– Ick!” orbit.
Yep, definitely a keeper. May you have many, many fabulous nights of loading the dishwasher ;)
A good start to a good move!
I will think of this post when we finally have to get all our stuff out of here in a month or so.
Marriage is so great, I love it for all the reasons you just posted and many others.
*reads about Otto’s activities*
*SWOONS!*
*investigates cloning*
Your Otto sounds like a great guy. When my Jim came into our life, the first thing he did was mow the lawn. My girls sat watching with their mouths hanging open, in awe that a MAN would actually do something other than sit on the sofa watching TV.
We sold all our stuff and our house and now live fulltime in an RV. Now every time I move, my stuff is in the same place when I arrive, no packing necessary.
I found your blog through a link on another one I read. I will be back, I like your style.
FabGrandma
Reading about all the stuff Otto is doing around the house is almost like reading porn.
Have a good move. Breathe. :)