Tonight's picture was taken in December of 2008. Mattie was home recovering from his second surgery. He was trying to re-learn to walk and moved very gingerly. Mattie was afraid of falling or injuring his arms and leg which were recovering from surgery. In all reality Mattie was very courageous and I really did admire his spirit for life, living, and for exploring the world around him.
Quote of the day: Today's coronavirus update from Johns Hopkins.
- Number of people diagnosed with the virus: 49,278,242
- Number of people who died from the virus: 789,742
Just when I think it can't get worse, today topped the cake. My mom's alarm went off at 4:45am today. It jolted me awake, as even though my parents are in the room next door, I can hear her alarm. My joy of the day is taking a hot shower to wake up. While showering this morning, I found that the water wasn't going down the drain. The shower looked like a bathtub, and naturally I had to take a quicker shower because I was afraid the water was going to spill all over the floor. This water backing up followed me to the kitchen. In fact the kitchen drains were spitting up water like a fountain. All I could think was..... what a way to say good-bye to this house!
In addition to dealing with water issues, I stripped the bed I was staying in and started a load of laundry. The packers arrived at 9am. Unfortunately when they arrived, there were only two people. TWO people for a large house filled with items. This wouldn't be a problem if they had a week to pack, but literally today was supposed to be the packing day and tomorrow the truck was supposed to be loaded on Tuesday and Wednesday. Keep in mind we are flying out of here on Thursday morning.
I questioned why we were assigned only two packers! So I called our moving consultant, Chris, who drew up our contract. In my opinion he is ticky! I felt this way about him when I called him from Virginia. Before I came to LA, I checked in with Chris about the move. He was irritated with me and said I should go back to the contract, it is all in writing. Franky I would never work with him, but my dad likes him because Chris oversaw two of their previous moves. Keep in mind that their last two moves, I packed everything and moved it myself, and the movers only managed the furniture. Now my parents are moving across the country and they have many things, including breakables. I have been advised that the company won't cover things that break in transportation, if I pack them. So naturally I am not packing breakables.
With all that said, I packed up about 3/4 of their home. Literally all drawers and closets are emptied. I couldn't have made it easier for the movers. But even with all the work I did, I know there is still more to do and it requires many hands. I could see the writing on the wall, and two packers today wasn't going to cut it.
So I confronted Chris on the phone. I assure you it did not go well. He told me I was rude and he has never met a person like me in his 13 years of work. Really? Given his poor estimation of the work load, I am surprised more customers haven't chewed him out. We had two awful conversations with each other throughout the day.
Ironically the two men packing us up, Daniel and Troy, voiced the same concerns as me. They felt we needed more people on-site packing. Honestly it did not take a rocket scientist to figure this out. Keep in mind that I packed about 40 boxes and I was told today that we will have a total of about 150 boxes. LOVELY! Those of you who don't know this, I HATE, HATE, HATE boxes. They upset me and make me anxious to see piles of things all around me. Perhaps it reminds me of the chaos Peter and I lived through when Mattie was sick.
In the midst of dealing with packers, we had my dad's caregiver with us, and their friends who came over to pick up their washer and dryer. As I did not want the machines. Moving a washer and dryer is a nightmare. We also gave my parent's caregiver their TV, so I helped her carry that out. By 3pm, I could see my parents fading, so I had the packers stop for the day.
After I took them out to eat, we checked into the hotel at around 5:30pm. I unloaded the very full car of luggage onto a luggage cart. While wheeling that thing, I ran over my toes. Seems fitting. I got my parents in their room, unpacked and settled them in. My mom then asked me... where is my woolite bottle? She likes this particular bottle that she got years ago in Nevada. Well this morning I asked her if I could throw things out on her bathroom counter. She said yes, so I threw out the bottle. She was besides herself tonight, so I literally got back into the car and drove back to the house. It was dark out, but I got out of the car and rummaged through the garbage cans until I found all the items she wanted. As I was doing this, I said to myself..... 'you are nuts for doing this.'
Meanwhile, I connected tonight with the lead mover, Bill, who is coming to their house at 7:30am on Tuesday. He says he has been doing this for 33 years, and when I told him today did not go well, he wanted to learn more. When I told him the problem which I wrote about above, he agreed with me. Either we needed more packers today or these two should have started on Saturday!
I am signing off, as I have to get up even earlier tomorrow, in order to leave the hotel by 7am. I can only hope that tomorrow goes better. My screaming generated 5-7 people coming to the house tomorrow. Finally! This should have happened today, without me having to expend more energy, energy which I don't have.
No comments:
Post a Comment