We met up with the sister in law for dinner and then headed to her home.  Walking thru the garage and two steps into the door I found what I expected.  It was a house nearly completely unprepared to move.  She’s a teacher… she’s had the summer off (except weekends when she plays in a band)… she’s not ready.  School starts in 5 days.

The good news was that she hadn’t actually sold her first home yet.  So the fact that there was absolutely no way we were going to get all this stuff moved in the time we wasn’t the end of the world.  Of course that fact brings with it a fair amount of foreboding.  I mean if she’s not prepared here . . . what else isn’t ready.

The next day we got the keys to the new place and filled our two vehicles with some randomly selected boxes and small furniture and headed over for a tour.  Upon entering the house I knew something was … naw I just knew anyway.  The house was warm, no lights were on.  Yeah you can guess.

So I flipped a switch and found that there was no power.  Next step check the water.  Nope none.  Well my real estate agent said I could just call the day I moved and they’d turn it on.  said the sister in law.

Now we got different opinions from other people over the next few days, but I had always heard you should call the utilities at least a week ahead to make sure everything is turned on and billing properly setup.  Granted I’ve never moved into a place where that stuff was turned off but considering the number of vacant homes in this country these days I can see why some utilities might just turn stuff off if the owners called to cancel and nobody called to hook it up. 

About that realtor & house buying

But the realtor told her...  Yeah well that was just another score for this realtor in my book.  I never met him but the sister in law thinks the world of this guy.  The most positive story about this guy I heard was that he had finally learned to use voice mail on his cell phone . . . yeah before that you had to call his office and leave a message with someone at his office if he didn’t answer his cell.  Of course when the sister in law did call him and leave a VM and she didn’t hear back she reported Well he’s still having problems with this voice mail thing.  Voice Mail, realtor, shouldn’t those be synonymous?

The worst story about this guy was the part where a few weeks before closing the father in law (who is helping his daughter buy this house) had someone evaluate the house.  Report back, the house was grossly overpriced.  Fortunately the agreement had several caveats one being that the evaluation be reasonably close to the agreed price.  I guess the sellers got all upset when the father in law came back with yet another offer after they thought things were agreed to. 

Of course any realtor has absolutely no interest in selling a home for less, but the amount that this house was overpriced was insane.  IMO that realtor stepped into a whole new level of suck if he was going to go thru with that price.  The father in law threatened to pull out of the deal (it was in the dang purchase agreement to have the house appraised) if they didn’t go for the new offer.  Only then did the oh so amazing realtor get his bum going and get the other realtor explain to the sellers what the actual deal was and that they had signed an agreement that noted the appraisal.

Oh this realtor, yeah he’s selling the sister in law’s current house.  Many visitors in the past four months?  Oh three visits….  sigh  I sure hope the sister in law marries a guy responsible with money.  I’ve already warned the wife that we’re not helping out the sister in law if / when she gets in money trouble and daddy isn’t there to help. 

Back to the story

Anyway that is not to say I blame the realtor for the missing power and water.  Foolish advice as it was the sister in law should have done SOME research about buying homes or done ANYTHING proactive during whole process.  How hard is it to call the utilities ahead of time so you don’t have to do that while you move?

Moving the boxes into the house the sister in law notes You know I don’t have many boxes.  I think we’re going to need those.  The wife and I dump the misc contents on the floor in piles and toss the boxes in our cars.

So the sister in law calls the power company.  The power will be on next week.  The wife and I end up calling the water company later that day as the sister in law had to go perform with her band.  Later we went to watch the band.  When they were packing things up and the sister in law was leaving and few of them shouted to the sister in law Hey when are we helping you move? This weekend?  The sister in law shouted back I sent you an e-mail!  Read your e-mail! while she walked back to her car.

We wouldn’t want to clarify with the only other help we’re going to get exactly when and where we NEED some of these people to be?  No no.  We’ll just shout back while walking away for them to read their e-mail.  Hopefully they’ll show up during that short afternoon that we have the truck.      Great.

Later we went shopping for furniture for the new home.  The sister in law picked some stuff.  My advice was heavily influenced by the “what weighs less” factor nearly as much as it was the aesthetics.  The sister in law found out that they can’t deliver for a good month because they’re so busy.  No problem, we’ll just pick it up when we have the truck tomorrow morning.  Yay let’s shrink the amount of time we have to move actual things from the old house to the new even more.

It’s like a country song at this point, except it is about moving.

The big day

So moving day rolls around and the sister in law and I go to the truck rental place.  We get the truck and are outside.

So can you drive the van to where we’re going.

Me?  I’ve no idea where we’re going.

But I need to take my car home.

Why?  We’re not going to use it.  We need to have a car here for when we bring the truck back.

But there’s no place to park.

I pointed out a place to park and we drove on to the furniture store.  I had to remind the sister in law a few times that the neighborhoods with insanely low cut trees, train bridges built before 1800, and other thin roads were a bit difficult to navigate in the truck.  We got the furniture to the new house with help from the wife and sister in law.  Thankfully the furniture was wrapped in plastic as there wasn’t a lot of lifting from the sister in law and wife.

While there the sister in law discussed her plans for after moving.  You see she planed to grill dinner while everyone moves the stuff, and then she could feed everyone after it was all done.  Also she planned to have beer in a cooler for everyone helping move.  Things the sister in law hasn’t gotten around to buying: Grill, food, beer, cooler.

I suggest that even if we could grill at the new house that we’re not going to be comfortable in a hot house with no power or AC.   Perhaps we should all just go out to eat?  The sister in law relents, but she wants the cooler and drinks. 

The wife and I agree to drive and get a cooler, ice, beer and such.  The sister in law would head back to the house, pack and wait for the band.  Screw that it wasn’t the best use of our time, it was a nice break as after a day in the sister in law’s dusty house I was getting some wicked sinus thing.  Sinus issues and moving doesn’t go well.

Don’t take this exit.”

Why not?

If you don’t we can drive home, let’s just go.  Freeeeedoooooommmmmm.

What about our stuff?

Screw our stuff, she can have it.  We can buy new clothing.

It took us longer than expected as of course the directions, provided by the sister in law, to a place we could accomplish our tasks quickly lead us nowhere.  This was not a surprise as the day before we had received directions from the sister in law that included turning from one street to another, never mind that those streets never meet and are parallel. 

We get back to the house and who is there?  Yeah just the sister in law.  45 min has passed since “the band” was supposed to be there to help move.  The sister in law notes.

I’m disappointed the band isn’t here.  I sent them an e-mail.

Well, they’re a band…

I walked inside and started moving stuff I could lift.  The wife and sister in law ran around packing stuff.  A new surprise.

I grab a dresser to see how heavy it is and realize that all the drawers are full of stuff.  Every drawer in her house is full of stuff.  A discussion ensues about what should be done.  The sister in law thought it silly to make more boxes of stuff and thought we could move things with stuff in the drawers.  That is quickly deemed impossible.  Way too many insanely heavy things with drawers are on the second floor and go to the second floor of the new house.  While the wife and sister in law argue I just moved stuff, without drawers.

About 45 min later the band starts to trickle in.  Well the sound guy, bass drummer, and the lead singer show up.  Screw that they’re late, they’re here.  Thankfully they’re fairly fast movers and another command decision is made that the priority is the “big stuff” with the little stuff and few boxes packed around it.  Screw anything else left that can fit in a car, the sister in law can worry about that later.

Unloading at the house was done in a similar bare bones manner where the truck contents were quickly dumped into the garage and only large items moved into the house. 

The day was over, beers were opened.  We went to dinner at a Mongolian stir fry place.  I was too ill to eat more than one serving.  Good for my health, but disappointing as I like the food there.

Epilogue

The last report from the sister in law was that she was in the new house, power, water, and all.   She tried mowing the lawn for the first time and broke her new lawn mower…