Worst. Move. Ever.

This is a sort of "Part 2" of my earlier saga, Moving with Pets.

If that was a cautionary tale, this is simply a tragedy with comedic overtones, at least to anyone who didn't actually live through it, ie, you lucky people just reading about it.

It all began the night before I was supposed to move. Well, really it all began in May, when I was putting my house on the market, and movers came to take a bunch of my furniture to storage so I could stage my house and fool prospective buyers into thinking it had all this space and plenty of storage for the needs of a family of six hyperactive children and a Golden Retriever.

So I was living in a house without a lot of my most important stuff, but I was fine, really, even though I had to keep it perfectly clean at all times and leave at a moment's notice when someone wanted to show it and seriously, it's not stressful like having a brain tumor or anything but it does eventually get to you.

Then someone was buying the house and I'd found a new house and I was all set to move and 8 days before the movers were coming, the buyers had a panic attack and canceled the deal.

The house went back on the market and I lost the place I wanted to buy and started over.

Got in contract again with some people who wanted to use it as a vacation home, but after a few days they decided to not do that and we're back on the market again.

Just as well, the guy was allergic to dogs and I've always seen that as a cross between stigmata and a 666 mark. I'm just saying.

A few weeks went by without much in the way of offers but still with the keeping the house clean and leaving so it could be shown. Then I got another offer on the house, this time from a guy who seemed like the perfect person to buy it, and he did, but given the history I spent pretty much the entire time expecting the deal to fall through.

Anyway, I was in San Francisco with a friend. My mom, who was staying at my house in the country taking care of my dogs, kept calling on my cell phone and nagging me to go see this house, which was being held open that day, and I kept saying, excuse me, I have a hot blonde with tattoos and stuff here and really, I'd like to just forget for the weekend that I'm, you know, going to be homeless soon.

But my friend, who is an adventurous lass to put it mildly, smiled prettily at me and said, "You know, I wouldn't mind looking at houses with you," so we went out and looked at two in the same neighborhood.

The first one was very pretty but not right. The second one was very pretty and just right.

So, to fast forward through a lot of boring shit, last Tuesday arrived. I was half-packed, I was working on being fully-packed, I was online way too much and trying to distract myself from my anxiety but still get everything done, and not doing the greatest job in the world but good enough.

When it happened. The bad thing that seems to inevitably happen to me just when I finally decide it's not going to.

There was some kind of paperwork snag by the mortgage company doing the loan for the guy buying my house, and they needed 24, no make that 48, no, 24, no, 48, more hours. I'm going to skip the long boring explanation of what that was about and just say: Not possible. I lived in the middle of nowhere and getting movers was not easy and rescheduling this move plus the escrow on the house I was buying was also not easy, in fact, pretty much it wasn't possible, plus I was having everything turned off... phones, internet, satellite TV, power. And I had appointments to turn those things on at the new house. Plus ummmm, you know, I have to work for a living and this was seriously interfering with that.

So the agents and I ranted and raved and for a while it looked like everything would be OK, then it wasn't, and I spent about five hours on the phone when I should have been packing, and at the last minute decided to go ahead with the move, largely due to the impossibility of getting movers on any other date in the near future, as in, before, you know, Halloween.

Do you notice how this already sucks and I haven't even moved yet? It gets worse.

The movers screwed up, didn't realize they were supposed to be doing a lot of packing, had somehow not taken the stuff out in my barn into account despite my personally having shown it to them, had to send for a second truck, had too few guys, and a move that was supposed to be over by 1 PM took until after 6 PM and we were still at the old house.

My poor dogs spent the entire day in the car, and my old dog Rosie, who can't get up on her own, was really stiff and miserable from lying in one position all day long, and fell three times when I got her out to potty her before we left, including once while she was pooping, which meant she fell in her poop. And while I still had hot water and a hose hooked up to it, I had no shampoo or soap and no towels. So I hosed her off and dried her with paper towels and just cried because I was exhausted and miserable of my allergies.

Now, we still haven't closed escrow so I don't have a new house yet, and the relocation company in charge of selling the new house won't let us in one minute before we close, even though they have my money already and I have insurance. The agents tried, I cried, and the answer was still no. So I'm at my brother's house with my three dogs and their backyard that's really more of an alley at the bottom of the stairs and my dogs are used to having six acres. And I'm stressed and exhausted and they're stressed and exhausted and I didn't sleep more than a couple of hours the night before and then that first night at my brother's my dogs get me up six or seven times during the night and did you notice I said "that first night"?

Because there's more.

The escrow was supposed to close Thursday morning, but it didn't.

Well, it did, but somehow no one knew until after 4 PM at which point it was far too late to move in. Fortunately the listing agent took pity on me and let me meet the guy from the cable company to set up my Internet access, and then we found out while that was happening that I did own the house after all, so she gave me the keys and let me leave my computer there and well, at least that was done.

The next morning the movers brought my stuff from storage, oh, did I mention I had to put everything in storage and get completely different movers to bring my stuff to me as the original movers weren't available? Yeah.

So three of the guys who show up are drunk... at 8 am... so they get sent away and new guys come and we move in and it's horrible and endless and loud and stressful and at least the dogs are at my brother's and not in the car all day, but still. It completely sucks, although not as badly as the first two days sucked.

I'm in the house, I'm so tired I could die, I go to get my dogs.

While jumping out of the car, my dog Rebel gets his leg caught in the seatbelt strap, and I back him up to untangle it, thus making my Borzoi, Kyrie's, collar slacken, and she slips out of it and takes off into a nearby park, which about five blocks east is bordered by an extremely busy street, and also about a half mile or so to the south.

Which seems like a long way away if you're not a sighthound who can run, you know, 30 miles per hour.

And does, with me tearing behind screaming, but she's so scared and freaked out at this point she just keeps running. No collar, no ID tags. No brakes.

I'm crying and sure she's going to be killed, but fortunately she circles around, runs right past me, and goes back to where my car is parked, where my mother is standing, and my mother herds her into the garage and shuts the door, and I get back up there and ok, it's over.

Except that I have now officially borrowed stamina from my next life to chase her over some very rough and hilly terrain, I'm shaking and sobbing and I'm just  done. I have nothing.

I crawl upstairs, send a few pathetic emails, and go to bed, with mountains of boxes all around me and my Kyrie curled up next to me on the pillows.

Things were looking up and now I have this shitty cold, I'm awash in self-pity, my feet and back hurt like hell, and oh yeah, I forgot to mention that the day I moved out of my old house, I got my period.

Like I said. Worst. Move. Ever.

/pathetic personal whinefest

Comments

[Mystery Maiden]

Wow, what a hellish move! Hope you're taking some R&R time after all that. I loved this:
"Just as well, the guy was allergic to dogs and I've always seen that as a cross between stigmata and a 666 mark. I'm just saying."
No kidding, eh?
:0
Mystery
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[Travis]

(((Christie)))

Travis

[Gina]

Yep, that's pretty bad. You deserve your whinefest. But now it'll all start sorting itself out and you'll soon be settled in your great new houw.

[Gina]

um ... house, I meant.

[Sharyn]

Wow! Just change a few minor details (closing went smoothly and only one dog), and that could be the story of my move five weeks ago.

I'm NEVER moving again. I will die in this house and be carried out feet first. Better yet, cremate me here and spread my ashes in the saw palmettos.

Sharyn & Cedar the Golden nudge

[Judi]

I am sorry it sucked so bad. Your moved did suck - Bad. But it's over now, so unpack, and be happy. Take the dogs to the park and have fun in SF.

[Therese]

What a mess! Hopefully you got enough shit out of the way to last a long...long...long time and will be able to enjoy your new home.

[Great Dane Addict]

OMG. When Kyrie jumped out of the car, I stopped breathing. My worst. fear. ever. Then I cried.

I'm glad you are finally in your new house and hopefully all you have to do now is unpack.

[kim]

Yikes. I've moved more times than I've had birthdays, with half of those moves involving at least a half dozen pets... and while many of my moves have gone *almost* that bad, I'm afraid your story gets the gold.

However, I can't officially award you the medal of honour until August of 2010. That's when our mortgage is up here in Ontario, and we pack up everything (including five dogs, seven cats, a ball python and whatever else we manage to pick up between now and then), buy a motor home and move clear across the country to Alberta.

Two people. Five dogs. Seven cats. One snake. One motorhome. Seven days.

Oh, and did I mention we're going to live in our motorhome until we find our perfect house with lots of dog-yard?

I have to admit, I was feeling fairly confident until reading your story... now I just feel... queasy.

[KathyF]

Hey, I'll go one on one with you. There was the time we moved from Ohio and the moving van was still there at 10:30 p.m., with all my stuff outside, and it started snowing. And the driver kept asking me how to spell things for the inventory because he was illiterate.

Moving sucks.