Even more terrifying than ‘North Shore style’ is this local amenity. At least they don’t use Comic Sans…
WARNING: This post will be completely boring to most people.
I moved house yesterday. It is not my favourite pastime, but I think I made it worse by procrastinating so badly that I didn’t finish packing until the early hours of the morning before the move. Should you be moving house in the near future, I recommend you try the following:
- Disconnect the internet and put away your television several weeks before the move. These things are not your friends and even the lamest of lolcats will suddenly be more attractive than going through your accumulated stuff and (shudder) packing.
- Work out how many boxes you need and double it.
- Do a wardrobe cull before you move – and don’t hold on to the clothes thinking you’ll ever get to the recycle boutique to sell them or find someone exactly your size who loves receiving cast offs – dispose of them in the nearest clothing bin as soon as possible and enjoy the warm glow of satisfaction that being charitible brings.
- Make sure you know all the things you have to do on your old lease (carpet cleaning etc). Make sure you do everything so you don’t lose some of your bond or have to go back to clean behind the oven.
- If you have time, get up early on moving day and wash and dry your sheets and towels so you don’t have to take dirty laundry with you (especially helpful if your new washing machine isn’t arriving for a few days).
- If your friends offer to help, take them up on their offer – expecially in the packing, cleaning and unpacking arenas – I still think that getting professional movers is unbeatable when it comes to keeping the stress low and ensuring friends don’t hurt their backs or accidentally break your stuff, forcing you to pretend that you never liked it anyway.
- Ask locals from your new area for advice and hit up the most recommended eaterie on your first night – eat in so that you don’t have to do dishes and so that you can see what kind of people live in your new hood. For example, I didn’t see anyone wearing white pants last night, even though I was on the North Shore.
- Make sure you have lifes neccessities available immediately – bread, milk, toilet paper, tea, vodka etc.
- When you start unpacking, make your bed first – you’ll collapse into it at some stage and it is really nice not to have to sort this when you are several hours past exhausted.
- Play energetic, happy music. This this will help you forget how tired you are.
- Eat, drink and snack to keep your energy up and avoid unwelcome hunger induced emotion.
- Finally, and most importantly, if you are moving in with flatmates make sure they’re not dicks and/or love ugly things. Ideally, you’ll have similar tastes and the ability to have honest conversations about important things like art (where it should go – ie ‘why don’t you put that in YOUR room’), wine (‘sure I’d love some’) and culture (‘I love that programme too!”).
PS My new house is rad and so is my flatmate. Hurrah!
