Moving, Part 2
It really is amazing that I am able to type with no head.
Anyway, when I left you last, we were moving toward the actual moving day. Now, your fearless leader (that's me, numbnuts) has some organizational issues. When I say "issues", that doesn't mean, "hey, it would be nice if everything worked out nice and smooth". When I say "issues", I mean that, if I think there will be even the slightest bump in the road, I need to take a bottle of Tums with a bottle of Pepto Bismol chaser.
Let's back up to the week before we were actually moving. The house was ours and we were shuttling boxes between our apartment (let's call this place Safeville) and the town where our house is. Considering where we will be in a few short months, for clarification purposes, let's call this place Povertytown).
The Saturday before our move, we decided to have both sets of parents over to see the house for the first time in person. Granted, there wasn't a lot of stuff in it, but they had only seen pictures, so they were pretty psyched. My folks live about an hour and fifteen minutes away from Povertytown and Xteen's live on Long Island, so they made the trip up.
While we were in the house, we decided to coordinate the delivery of our new washer and dryer (since the owners of the house took their total kick-ass duo with them...bastards!!). Seemed easy enough. The day before, the delivery company called and because there was .08 millimeters of snow on the ground that morning, they wanted to let me know that they might be backed up for the next day. Of course.
Well, Saturday arrives, as do we and our folks. We're hanging in the house and we get a call from the washer/dryer delivery people. For clarification, let's call these people "Dumb-asses". They're on their way. Excellent.
A delivery truck shows up and I see them back into the driveway. Then I hear it.
"CRRRRRRUUUNNNNNNNNNNCCCCCCCCCHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"
I say, "Did those dumb-asses just hit the fucking house?!?!"
I run out to the driveway and, lo, I see Tweedle Dum standing in the middle of it. He has on a navy blue jumpsuit, not unlike someone out on work release. He's probably about 50 years old, but he looks twice that. His face has more mileage on it than a '75 Dodge Dart. On top of that, he has so many wrinkles and gin blossoms, he looks like a cross between Ted Kennedy and a Shar Pei. The rest of his features are such that I have seen artists' renderings of The Missing Link and they have appeared less simian than this dude. He smokes more than Andrew "Dice" Clay and has a nicotine-ravaged voice that makes Bea Arthur's sound like Beaker from the Muppet Show.
He rasps, "I thought he had it".
I look in the driveway and see two cables, snapped from the frame of the house, and lying in the driveway, limp and lifeless like a garter snake that had the misfourtune of running into a youth named Jeffrey Dahmer.
I look incredulously and Tweedle Dum, while surveying the situation and seeing that the cables were coming from a nearby post in front of the next door neighbor's yard. Luckily, this was not the electricity. This was merely the phone, cable, and internet. Sweet.
Tweedle Dumber hops out of the truck, Marlboro Light dangling from his lips (natch), and mumbles to me:
"I didn't think I had it, but my guy kept telling me I was OK. So..."
I guess Masters of Science degrees in Geometric Spacial Relations from Wossamotta U. just aren't what they used to be.
They install the washer and dryer, miraculously, without burning the house down and go on their way.
Fast forward a few days. Xteen and I take the Friday before the big move off to do some runs between Safeville and Povertytown. Also, we managed to schedule the locksmith, delivery of our bedroom set (sans bed), and the installation of our phone, cable, and internet (along with a new fucking cable thanks to the dumb-asses). This is too good to be true.
Thursday, we call for confirmation on a ton of stuff. OK. First step. Confirming our reservation with the truck rental place. For clarification, let's call this place U-Suck. We set up a reservation weeks ahead of time. For those unfamiliar with this process, you make a "reservation" with U-Suck, in which you tell them your name, address, billing information, as well as the date you want to pick the jalopy up, from where you want to pick it up and where you want to drop it off. All that stuff.
They enter all of that information into a computer. The "reservation" basically means that they, in no way, shape, or form, guarantee ANYTHING you told them and, you're lucky if they even entered in the correct YEAR you need the shitbox.
So, we check U-Suck's website on Thursday and find that we are picking up our truck in a town that is roughly 30 miles away from Safeville, the place we requested. We call them and they assure us that this is the popular "computer error" problem that so many places experience. We are assured of our pickup in Safeville and a return to the town next to Povertytown (since Povertytown is so podunk, we don't even have a U-Suck depot). But hey, we have town sewer!
Friday, we get a call from U-Suck, who tells us that our mobile rust shack will now have to be picked up in a town directly between Safeville and Povertytown. Whatever.
We call the bedroom (sans bed) delivery folk and they confirm their time. Between 10:30 and 12:30. OK. Sounds good. The phone, cable and intenet people are coming between 2 and 5 and the locksmith at 2:30. Things are shaping up nicely.
Thursday night, we get a phone call from the phone, cable, internet folks confirming that they will be there between 9 and 12. Huh? "But you told us '2 and 5'".
"That's not what we have in the computer."
"Well, I certainly wouldn't have made it up myself! If I had, I would have requested you show up at 12:18 on the nose and bring a naked Poppy Montgomery for the love of Christ. And some beer!"
"Well, we can change it to 2-5."
"Fine. Thanks."
So, everything is back to normal.
At this point, U-Suck calls us back (after we pack up all of our clothes and decide to spend Friday night in Povertytown so we are in line to pick up the truck) and tells us that the truck actually is in Safeville after all.
At this point, I really don't give a shit where the truck is. I'm more worried about surviving Friday.
Xteen and I leave Safeville at like 9:20 AM Friday morning, which would get us to Povertytown in about 25 minutes...in plenty of time to beat the bedless bedroom set deliverers, who are due anytime between 10:30 and 12:30. I need to stop for gas at a place right outside our apartment. Xteen goes on ahead.
I finish filling up and notice that my cell phone is making a strange noise. I have a message! It was sent at 9:15! Who's calling me, I wonder with excitement!
It's the bedless bedroom place. For clarification, let's call this place Boob's. (I'm desperately trying to get more hits on this blog, if you couldn't tell.)
"Uh, Mr. Dim, this is Dumbette from Boob's. Our delivery truck is at your home and no one is there. Please call us."
What.
The.
Fuck.
Must have been my fault for not knowing they were talking about 10:30 - 12:30 Greenwich Mean Time.
We iron it out, but they have another delivery they need to take care of and then they will come back. So, Xteen and I arrive at the house and we literally have no idea who or when anyone is coming by. The cable guy might decide, "fuck it, I'm going at midnight!" A Jehovah's Witness could swing by at 11:30. Hell, a naked Poppy Montgomery could come over at lunchtime, for all I know. But, of course, I would be on one of my many runs between the two residences, picking up and dropping off boxes.
I do about two of these runs and no has arrived. Finally, I am coming back to the house around 1:00 and see about 17 cars in front of the house. Everyone showed up at the same time, except for the locksmith, who could be in Wyoming, or thought we wanted him to come at 2:20 back in 1996. Who knows.
The furniture delivery guys are actually pretty cool. They do a good job and are very careful not to mess anything up. In fact, they are so careful, that here I am, three weeks later, and I'm still finding little bits of environmentally hostile styrofoam in every corner of the house.
To my surprise, the cable guy doesn't need to fix the cable to get things working. After awhile, we finally have cable, internet, and phone (but we forgot to charge the new phones...nice!) Cable dude says someone will have to come out in a few weeks to fix the cable. Meanwhile, he haphazardly and partially hung it back up, like a droopy limbo stick, begging to be knocked down again by the next moron who stops by.
Probably the locksmith.
Speaking of which. Where the hell is that guy??
Coming up soon...part three. Moving Day.
- Dim.
Anyway, when I left you last, we were moving toward the actual moving day. Now, your fearless leader (that's me, numbnuts) has some organizational issues. When I say "issues", that doesn't mean, "hey, it would be nice if everything worked out nice and smooth". When I say "issues", I mean that, if I think there will be even the slightest bump in the road, I need to take a bottle of Tums with a bottle of Pepto Bismol chaser.
Let's back up to the week before we were actually moving. The house was ours and we were shuttling boxes between our apartment (let's call this place Safeville) and the town where our house is. Considering where we will be in a few short months, for clarification purposes, let's call this place Povertytown).
The Saturday before our move, we decided to have both sets of parents over to see the house for the first time in person. Granted, there wasn't a lot of stuff in it, but they had only seen pictures, so they were pretty psyched. My folks live about an hour and fifteen minutes away from Povertytown and Xteen's live on Long Island, so they made the trip up.
While we were in the house, we decided to coordinate the delivery of our new washer and dryer (since the owners of the house took their total kick-ass duo with them...bastards!!). Seemed easy enough. The day before, the delivery company called and because there was .08 millimeters of snow on the ground that morning, they wanted to let me know that they might be backed up for the next day. Of course.
Well, Saturday arrives, as do we and our folks. We're hanging in the house and we get a call from the washer/dryer delivery people. For clarification, let's call these people "Dumb-asses". They're on their way. Excellent.
A delivery truck shows up and I see them back into the driveway. Then I hear it.
"CRRRRRRUUUNNNNNNNNNNCCCCCCCCCHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"
I say, "Did those dumb-asses just hit the fucking house?!?!"
I run out to the driveway and, lo, I see Tweedle Dum standing in the middle of it. He has on a navy blue jumpsuit, not unlike someone out on work release. He's probably about 50 years old, but he looks twice that. His face has more mileage on it than a '75 Dodge Dart. On top of that, he has so many wrinkles and gin blossoms, he looks like a cross between Ted Kennedy and a Shar Pei. The rest of his features are such that I have seen artists' renderings of The Missing Link and they have appeared less simian than this dude. He smokes more than Andrew "Dice" Clay and has a nicotine-ravaged voice that makes Bea Arthur's sound like Beaker from the Muppet Show.
He rasps, "I thought he had it".
I look in the driveway and see two cables, snapped from the frame of the house, and lying in the driveway, limp and lifeless like a garter snake that had the misfourtune of running into a youth named Jeffrey Dahmer.
I look incredulously and Tweedle Dum, while surveying the situation and seeing that the cables were coming from a nearby post in front of the next door neighbor's yard. Luckily, this was not the electricity. This was merely the phone, cable, and internet. Sweet.
Tweedle Dumber hops out of the truck, Marlboro Light dangling from his lips (natch), and mumbles to me:
"I didn't think I had it, but my guy kept telling me I was OK. So..."
I guess Masters of Science degrees in Geometric Spacial Relations from Wossamotta U. just aren't what they used to be.
They install the washer and dryer, miraculously, without burning the house down and go on their way.
Fast forward a few days. Xteen and I take the Friday before the big move off to do some runs between Safeville and Povertytown. Also, we managed to schedule the locksmith, delivery of our bedroom set (sans bed), and the installation of our phone, cable, and internet (along with a new fucking cable thanks to the dumb-asses). This is too good to be true.
Thursday, we call for confirmation on a ton of stuff. OK. First step. Confirming our reservation with the truck rental place. For clarification, let's call this place U-Suck. We set up a reservation weeks ahead of time. For those unfamiliar with this process, you make a "reservation" with U-Suck, in which you tell them your name, address, billing information, as well as the date you want to pick the jalopy up, from where you want to pick it up and where you want to drop it off. All that stuff.
They enter all of that information into a computer. The "reservation" basically means that they, in no way, shape, or form, guarantee ANYTHING you told them and, you're lucky if they even entered in the correct YEAR you need the shitbox.
So, we check U-Suck's website on Thursday and find that we are picking up our truck in a town that is roughly 30 miles away from Safeville, the place we requested. We call them and they assure us that this is the popular "computer error" problem that so many places experience. We are assured of our pickup in Safeville and a return to the town next to Povertytown (since Povertytown is so podunk, we don't even have a U-Suck depot). But hey, we have town sewer!
Friday, we get a call from U-Suck, who tells us that our mobile rust shack will now have to be picked up in a town directly between Safeville and Povertytown. Whatever.
We call the bedroom (sans bed) delivery folk and they confirm their time. Between 10:30 and 12:30. OK. Sounds good. The phone, cable and intenet people are coming between 2 and 5 and the locksmith at 2:30. Things are shaping up nicely.
Thursday night, we get a phone call from the phone, cable, internet folks confirming that they will be there between 9 and 12. Huh? "But you told us '2 and 5'".
"That's not what we have in the computer."
"Well, I certainly wouldn't have made it up myself! If I had, I would have requested you show up at 12:18 on the nose and bring a naked Poppy Montgomery for the love of Christ. And some beer!"
"Well, we can change it to 2-5."
"Fine. Thanks."
So, everything is back to normal.
At this point, U-Suck calls us back (after we pack up all of our clothes and decide to spend Friday night in Povertytown so we are in line to pick up the truck) and tells us that the truck actually is in Safeville after all.
At this point, I really don't give a shit where the truck is. I'm more worried about surviving Friday.
Xteen and I leave Safeville at like 9:20 AM Friday morning, which would get us to Povertytown in about 25 minutes...in plenty of time to beat the bedless bedroom set deliverers, who are due anytime between 10:30 and 12:30. I need to stop for gas at a place right outside our apartment. Xteen goes on ahead.
I finish filling up and notice that my cell phone is making a strange noise. I have a message! It was sent at 9:15! Who's calling me, I wonder with excitement!
It's the bedless bedroom place. For clarification, let's call this place Boob's. (I'm desperately trying to get more hits on this blog, if you couldn't tell.)
"Uh, Mr. Dim, this is Dumbette from Boob's. Our delivery truck is at your home and no one is there. Please call us."
What.
The.
Fuck.
Must have been my fault for not knowing they were talking about 10:30 - 12:30 Greenwich Mean Time.
We iron it out, but they have another delivery they need to take care of and then they will come back. So, Xteen and I arrive at the house and we literally have no idea who or when anyone is coming by. The cable guy might decide, "fuck it, I'm going at midnight!" A Jehovah's Witness could swing by at 11:30. Hell, a naked Poppy Montgomery could come over at lunchtime, for all I know. But, of course, I would be on one of my many runs between the two residences, picking up and dropping off boxes.
I do about two of these runs and no has arrived. Finally, I am coming back to the house around 1:00 and see about 17 cars in front of the house. Everyone showed up at the same time, except for the locksmith, who could be in Wyoming, or thought we wanted him to come at 2:20 back in 1996. Who knows.
The furniture delivery guys are actually pretty cool. They do a good job and are very careful not to mess anything up. In fact, they are so careful, that here I am, three weeks later, and I'm still finding little bits of environmentally hostile styrofoam in every corner of the house.
To my surprise, the cable guy doesn't need to fix the cable to get things working. After awhile, we finally have cable, internet, and phone (but we forgot to charge the new phones...nice!) Cable dude says someone will have to come out in a few weeks to fix the cable. Meanwhile, he haphazardly and partially hung it back up, like a droopy limbo stick, begging to be knocked down again by the next moron who stops by.
Probably the locksmith.
Speaking of which. Where the hell is that guy??
Coming up soon...part three. Moving Day.
- Dim.
posted by Dim at 3/29/2007 10:03:00 AM
13 Comments:
They hit the house? That's really bad.
No, actually, they knocked down the cable. The crunch was the sound of the cable being ripped off the house.
When I moved out of my parents' house I reserved a U-Suck online and called a few days before moving day to confirm and they had no record of my reservation even though I had a confirmation number. The next time we moved we hired movers. More expensive, but well worth it.
Sheesh! It doesn't sound like much else could go wrong with your move...I guess we'll just have to wait for part 3 for all the rest of the crap that happened!
"The rest of his features are such that I have seen artists' renderings of The Missing Link "
another classic line!
Nice. I can't wait to hear about the locksmith!
OMG!
First off, you have the worst luck of anyone I know, and second, I'm with Hotwire. Your lines are classic.
You rock, even if your luck doesn't;))
I had issues with U-Suck as well.
Did you get some sort of discount after Tweedledipshit hit the house?
Hope you've settled in.
Holy Shit.
I never want to have to move again. Ever.
So where's part three? I'm waiting;)
yeah wtf man..where is part 3.
Yeah, hello, did they not hook up your cable yet? Get online and share part 3 you dimwit! (ha, couldn't resist, cuz that's what you call yourself, right?)
Post a Comment
<< Home