Yesterday our house was empty so we did a bunch of shopping. You know you are buying a lot of stuff when your credit card company puts a hold on your card because they see multiple hundred dollar charges at Safeway, Target, Bed Bath and Beyond etc. - true story.
We discovered a downside of living in Boulder - it's tough to make a good cup of tea here. Because of the altitude, water boils at a lower temperature, and cools off faster. As a result, the tea you brew is weak, and cools off before you can drink it. On the other hand, the point at which water boils here (about 205 degrees vs. 212 at sea level) makes a PERFECT cup of coffee - actually better than at sea level because the slightly cooler temperature protects the essential oils and volatile flavor compounds in the coffee.
Then today, the movers brought 400 boxes of stuff into our house (I kid you not, they tag everything with a number, so we know how much stuff it was), and now we miss the days when the house was empty.
The day was fraught with drama. First, the moving truck couldn't actually make it to our house because our street is at a steep angle but flattens out where it crosses the next street, and the change in angle caused the truck to bottom out. So the movers had to go rent a u-haul (Oh, sweet irony) to shuttle our stuff up the hill from 2 blocks away. Then, we discovered that several of our pieces of furniture wouldn't fit down the stairway to our basement - leaving us with several pieces of large, expensive furniture that don't fit anywhere in our house. This means we'll have to sell a bunch of stuff which we just paid to ship here from L.A. Oh, even sweeter irony. Then, the painter who was painting our master bedroom ran into some scheduling delays and didn't finish in time, so our master bedroom furniture is now in the second child's bedroom upstairs and we'll have to move it over in a day or two.
For Jeanne and I this was a really tough day. For the kids, it was freakin' nirvana as Zach got to go on a playdate for a few hours at our friends Ryan and Stephanie's house, while Logan got to basically watch TV and play computer in my home office all day (literally all day). After his playdate, Zach napped for a while and then joined Logan in watching movies on Jeanne's laptop in my office.
Finally, once the movers were gone, we took the kids out to our local kid-friendly eatery called Noodles and Company. If you don't know it, it's a chain of casual dining restaurants where you can get a variety of, you guessed it, noodles, including fantastic macaroni and cheese for the kids (or just buttered noodles if they prefer) and a variety of Chinese, Thai, Italian, etc. noodle dishes for the adults.
As I type this, Jeanne is unpacking boxes in the kitchen and I'm sitting on my Grandmother Sally's easy chair perched in the middle of the living room, surrounded by boxes.
Tomorrow - 70% chance of snow and 100% chance we'll be sick of unpacking already...
Love to all,
Jason
Box mansions
11 years ago
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6 comments:
When Diana and I were Peace Corps volunteers in Peru many years ago we lived at an altitude of 10,000 feet for about a year. We had to boil water for an hour to sterilize it. We once made the mistake of trying to cook beans in an open pot and the result brings to mind a famous scene in Blazing Saddles which also involved beans. We quickly learned that a pressure cooker is a wonderful thing when you are at high altitude.
Herb
God, we miss you! Willem wanted his Tuesday playdate with Logan yesterday and we were all at a loss to figure out what to do instead. Jeanne - I'm signing up with Great Aupair tomorrow, so I'll email you the link. Can't wait to see you in April! Love, Christie
`I'll bet you're thinking "where did this stuff COME from?" and WHY did I move it? Oh well, it will all be over in a few days and you won't even remember unpacking! You might be able to sell the boxes - you live in a college town where lots of moving occurs in may and June! Sounds like the kids are still having fun, and that makes life a lot easier! love reading these blogs!
Barb
Isn't it wonderful having your own "things" around you? Now, if you can figure out which box the "thing" you really need is in, you will be in good shape. (Or is that one of the "things" you left behind in LA?)
Hope you have all the cooking details worked out by the time we come for our visit at the end of March or have found some good eateries for us to try.
Love to all
MiMi
A good plan to employ while unpacking is to have a Go-To spot, like the Garage, where you can park boxes while you decide what to do with the stuff.
If you open a box and can't make a decision, park it in the Garage. After a two week period, if you don't remember what's in the garage boxes, throw them out or give them away. You obviously don't need the stuff since you didn't miss it.
Buy a new one if you made a mistake.
In what I would consider the ultimate irony, it snowed here in Portland today.
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