I Love To Go A Gardening
Growing Our Life in Northern Michigan
The Best Laid Plans….
Ok, the Plan is that EJ goes to the closing on Friday after work, then he and JJ go to the new house afterwards to drop off the boxes of painting and cleaning supplies, sleeping bags, pots, clothes, and other items that we packed last Sunday. Then he and JJ drive home. Saturday EJ drives the Xterra up with Danny and with additional supplies (food, towels, dishes, lamp, etc.) while JJ and I follow him with the HHR filled with seven cats in seven carriers (3 plastic and four cardboard). Two friends are to follow us, one driving our pickup filled with beds, a table and chairs, and maybe a lamp, and the other driving his own pickup filled with some of EJ’s tools. Then the one friend drives the other friend back home leaving our pickup at the new house.
That was the plan.
But as the saying goes, “the best laid plans of mice and men often go astray.”
The mortgage officer arranged for the closing to occur on Monday, June 1st, at 4 p.m. So this is what will happen:
EJ will drive home on Friday night with the Xterra still filled with the boxes that we packed last weekend in the expectation that he could have the closing by Friday and drop the boxes off at the house afterwards. (The mortgage officer had said she expected to have the closing this week.)
We will have to repack the Xterra with only the barest essential items since there will be no extra trips. We will have to choose carefully since we have limited room in the vehicle. So fewer clothes? Toiletries? A lamp? Food?
Our friends will not be able to take anything north for us this weekend since the house won’t be ours to move into. Since our big moving day is scheduled for June 6th, we will have a whole week of absolutely no furniture–no beds, no table, no chairs. We will sit and sleep on the floor. I find it almost impossible to sleep on the floor–and after two years of being unoccupied, I don’t know how clean the floor will be.
JJ and I will follow EJ up in the HHR with the seven cats in their carriers. Little else will fit. We will have to squeeze in kitty litter and pet food.
We will have to leave our old home early enough on Monday for EJ to get to the closing at 4 p.m. I will have to wait at the new house for EJ to return from the closing. He will go back to working second shift on that day so depending on how long the closing is, he might have just about enough time to hand me the keys before heading to work. Only then will the cats be able to be released from their carriers. I don’t know if EJ will have time to help me get the pets in the house or to unload the Xterra before he drives it to work. I will spend the next few hours alone in an empty new house. I don’t even know if there will be lights.
While EJ drives to the closing, I will have to take JJ to work. Since at that time I will not have the keys to the house, I will have to take the dog and seven cats with me. If I can get the dog to fit. Otherwise he will have to ride with EJ to the closing and wait –an hour? more?–in the vehicle after having already been in the vehicle for a long drive.
After dropping JJ off at work, I have to somehow find the new house which I have never been to located in an area I am totally unfamiliar with. I am severely directionally challenged, which means I get easily lost. I even get lost in movie theaters. I get so easily lost that my sister-in-law insisted on walking me to the bathroom at the hospital when JJ had his first cancer surgery because she didn’t trust me to make it back to the waiting area by myself. A couple of years ago I even went the wrong way when I drove out of a Boy Scout function at a place two blocks from my house. Yup, this is going to be a disaster and I’m scared I’m going to get totally lost in the Enchanted forest and never be seen again.
Assuming I make it to the house, I will then have to go pick up JJ when he gets off work at 10 p.m. It will be dark. I have trouble finding my way when it’s day and I get even loster at night. I don’t see well when darkness hides landmarks–and EJ says the night up there is the blackest black he’s ever seen. JJ will be fortunate indeed if I can find him and get him back home.
All this after a long journey and a tiring day.
Yeah, what could possibly go wrong?
I am so totally screwed.
My stress level has climbed to new heights.
Tonight I wrote an email to the mortgage officer–outwardly calm but inwardly desperate–asking if we could either:
1. Change the closing to Friday. This is the very best option. We could follow our original plan.
2. If that isn’t possible, change the time of the closing on Monday to earlier in the afternoon. The pets would still be cooped up for additional hours as we waited for EJ to return from the closing and we wouldn’t have any furniture and only limited supplies, but EJ wouldn’t have to rush off to work, and JJ could drive himself to work. Or, if he didn’t feel confident driving that way himself the first time, we could have a breather and get the pets settled before I dropped him off. I might do better if I didn’t have to rush him to work with a car filled with animals. Maybe.
3. Perhaps we could get the keys before the closing. If we could get them on Friday, we could carry out our original plan. If we were not allowed to move a few things in over the weekend, I still could drive directly to the house and get the cats out of their carriers.
Meanwhile, tomorrow the dumpster arrives at our old house and I will begin throwing in junk. Friday I have to cancel our Internet down here. I was going to also fill out the change of address cards at the post office, but I don’t know how that will work when we don’t close on the house until Monday. EJ’s sister, who used to be a realtor, said sometimes people back out of buying/selling a house even at the closing. So I would feel better if I could change our address on the day of closing–except I will be up north. Maybe I can post-date the change of address? Or something.
I really hope we can do option 1 and get the closing changed to Friday.
I Love To Go A Gardening 
Oh my!
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I talked to the mortgage officer this morning and there is no way the closing can be switched to Friday. She is trying to switch the time to 1 p.m. That would at least give JJ a chance to shower before work and maybe drive himself to and from work.
I was going to have JJ ride with me to keep the cats from distracting me if any escaped from the cardboard carriers. If we can’t close until 4 p.m., I think JJ will have to ride with EJ in the Xterra while I take all the pets with me since I expect it will get smelly in the car, JJ won’t have an opportunity to shower before work, and he can’t exactly go to work smelling of cat urine. I expect the drive to be a nightmare.
Right now I am exhausted and sort of feel like crying.
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You can do a change of address form after you’ve moved. I did it several times in college!
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I asked the sweet lady at the post office this morning and she said I could fill the form out today and put a “start date” on it…so I did. Then she gave me hugs for me, EJ, and JJ. She has been at our post office for years. She watched JJ grow up and she prayed for him when he had cancer. I’m going to miss her.
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Teri isn;t it possible to change the moving day and just forward that a week or so than you can follow your plan as you had figured it out and do the things you have to do over there and it is less stressful for the cats and yourself . Now the stress is terrible and not what you want also with your foot in pain. I think that is maybe a solution.
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Simone, we can’t really change anything at this point. We just have to get through this. It’s not really the moving day that’s the problem, but the closing day. However, I thought we could take folding lawn chairs and buy a couple of inflatable mattress to get us through the week.
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I do hope you will get through this I’m getting stressed only reading about it…. so that must an ordeal for you all…… ❤
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