It may have been Canada’s Day, but it sure wasn’t mine.

My wife, two children and I moved to a new house with a nice view of Vancouver.

Uprooting all your belongings placing them in boxes, taping them up, shoving clothes in garbage bags, placing the dishes into the boxes they came in. It gets incrementally harder and harder to feel comfortable with all your belongings slowly disappearing. Then at the end of the month you move, and reverse the process, slowly becoming more comfortable in your new surroundings. Or you would think so.

That is how it happened. We packed, and now we are unpacking. The real story lies between. The move. It was an absolute nightmare. We found the movers in the Yellow pages, and checked them out online. 20 years in the business, insured, and members of the Better Business Bureau (BBB). They’re to arrive around 3:00 pm with 3 big guys and a 5 tonne truck on the 30th of June. After a half day of phone calls and delay tactics the move is postponed.

We find a box labeled Kids Blankets, cut it open and find some comforters. We rustle up a few pillows and crawl onto our bare mattress. We both have intermittent sleep, wake up early and take some much needed coffee.

July 1st 2006 Canada Day at 6:30 am 3 guys show up with a 3 tonne truck. In 1 hour 1 mover leaves due to exhaustion because he only slept 2 hours since the last job. The remaining boxes are loaded into the truck by the 2 remaining workers, as my wife and I load our van and assist them. Not 1 piece of furniture other than our mattresses for the beds, the TV stand and a book shelf are in the 1st load.

We drive with our van loaded with our computers and electronics and plan to meet them at the new house. 1 and 1/2 hours later they arrive and 15 minutes later than a 2nd worker leaves. This guy just plain vanishes. Apparently he is still unaccounted for. The remaining worker and I pry open the busted back door of the truck and unload a few things. After a short while he decides to try and muster up some more workers, makes a few fruitless phone calls, drives off and disappears looking for more help.

Meanwhile we are supposed to be out of the old house. Our piano, washer, dryer and every piece of furniture a little too heavy for my wife and I to deal with or too big for our van still needing to be moved. We borrowed my Mom’s cell phone without the charger so battery life became an issue during this whole event. Our previous landlord calls the cell and I apologize for there being nothing I can do. My wife calls to tell me that the owner of the Moving Company was just arrested for Parking Tickets and would be going to jail. She had phoned the police station to verify this and they confirmed he was indeed being arrested.

Dark clouds of doom had now surrounded my head. How could it get so bad! I heard my mom say moving was stressful but this was insanity. Many of my friends offered to help me move and then realized they would be in Seattle or working out of town. I told them all not to worry, We hired movers. Dark, dark clouds.

Then the clouds lifted a bit. My Dad and Mom joined us with our kids and the cell phone charger.

My wife called and apparently the people moving into our old house were not only moving that day, but were actually movers! They offered to finish off our move with their truck after they were done moving themselves.

Shortly I saw the big initials sandwiching the ampersand on the front of the truck that had all our stuff. The same mover had returned alone after catching a few winks, stepping in dog poop and loosing his shoe. My Dad and I started unloading the boxes as he fell asleep on a pile of moving blankets. My Dad bought us pizza and the mover woke up to eat and told us a story about his afternoon as we informed him about his boss getting arrested. He had no idea, or at least acted that way. My Dad and I finished unloading the truck gave the guy the 30 dollars he was begging for to get gas to get home.

Dad and I drove over to the old house where we met some serious heroes. They helped us load a piano with a piano skid left behind from the previous movers. We carted the washer and dryer from the house with a dolly left behind by the other movers, my kids beds, my bike, a couple futons and a couple desks. My ancient 110 pound laser printer. 3 hours later we had unloaded it all into the new garage and were off to bed after popping a couple pain killers. It was an unbelievably Smoother move.

So it sounds like everything is as it should be? Happily ever after? We got everything moved right? It’s not. They still wanted us to pay them after all that. We still had they’re piano skid under our piano. The BBB tells us that they aren’t actually members and they falsely advertised. Our previous phone service is holding our old number for no apparent reason so we have to wait another week until our phone number works. Our daughters ankles just swelled up and she’s had to be taken to the emergency room for all sorts of x-rays and blood tests. So here I am waiting to find out what’s going on with my girl and a good friend comes over to borrow some moving boxes so she can toss her cheating boyfriend (also a good friend) out of their house.

Maybe I’ll post a Superflat Single in celebration of all this insanity.
Something from Groundhogs Day I should think…