Yesterday was my pack-out, which while exhausting, went amazingly smooth. The packers arrived at around 9:30am and the 4-person crew was finished by about 4:30pm. The hardest part for me is that I had nowhere to sit and had nothing to do besides supervise their work.
The first part of the pack-out was my UAB (unaccompanied air baggage) which is a 250 pound shipment that arrives at post in a matter of days/weeks rather than months. When the surveyor came about a month ago, I showed him the small closet where I was gathering my UAB items and somehow he came out with the estimate of 1000 pounds. Now, I knew that 5 suits, some shoes, and a comforter were not half a ton, but I still leaned on the conservative side when building my pile and ended up 120 pounds under my allowed weight. This meant that I was scrambling around my apartment grabbing bedding, rugs, clothes, etc. to throw in at the last minute and managed to forget two things I had in mind as possible additional adds - cat food and litter box. So I will have my curtains but Ruby is out of luck I guess.
 |
| This was only about 110 pounds, not the 1000 that the survey person had told me. So my actual UAB was about double this amount. |
Speaking of Ruby, where was she all day? I'm lucky that my old apartment has several large closets including one that has been described as a Hong Kong condo and easily accommodates a bookshelf and an ikea lounge chair. So I moved her food, carrier, box and some toys into their and clearly labeled the door as the cat's room (aka "kitty panic room"). I also discovered during the chaos of the move that the kitty panic room was also a good spot for me to get out of the way of the movers and relax for a few minutes between walking around to supervise. The movers must have thought I was crazy, escaping into a closet to hang out with my cat, but it was pretty warm and serene in there, so I plan on having this kind of safe space during future moves as well.
The other hiccup during the move was getting my Vespa ready to go. The movers requested that the vehicle be on empty on moving day, but with super crappy weather all week, I was left scrambling on Sunday to empty my tank. Unfortunately (or normally awesomely), Bella sips gas and despite riding around all over Rock Creek, I couldn't get her below 1/2 by the time it got dark. Next step was to try and siphon, but that was also disastrous and left us using all sorts of kitchen utensils to get the gas out, most of which just ended up on my hands. This next morning (moving day), I woke up early to let the scooter run a bit, but somehow I ended up flooding the carburetor and then killing the battery, so I just kept my fingers crossed that they would crate her and send her off anyways. The good news is that at the end of the day they didn't ask about the gas tank and rolled her up on the moving truck with no problems, so now I just have to find a Vespa repair shop in Oslo to have on call in case the battery is completely dead when I get there (in theory I could kickstart it, but I've never been able to figure that out).
 |
| Everything I own, wrapped in brown paper. |
After the truck and all my worldly possessions pulled away, I went to work cleaning. I spent 2+ hours doing that before finally calling it quits, grabbing my suitcases, passport, and the cat, and heading to my hotel for the next few days. So that is where we sit now, relaxing after the last week of language test and moving stress. The Crowne Plaza Hamilton has been amazing, with free snacks and aromatherapy on my pillow. Now I'm finding it hard to leave, but am looking forward to seeing friends this evening for my send-off happy hour!
 |
| "i can haz breakfast in bed" - LolRuby |
http://servicecentered.blogspot.com/
