Observations from Moving.

With all due respect to war, MOVING is HELL.  Nothing ratchets up the stress level of even the most Namaste Nancy quite like packing up every single solitary thing you own, putting it all on a truck and driving it to your new place.  Your reward for all this work?  UNLOADING a zillion boxes and then UNPACKING every single solitary thing you own.  It's like winning the lottery.  Except not at all.  And then someone suckerpunching you in the gut just to top it off.

Moving may be one of those great equalizers -- we have all had to do it at least once  Short, tall, old, young, man, woman....at some point we have all found ourselves on our hands and knees dragging boxes out of the dark corners of our closets and then having an anxiety attack deciding whether you should keep that "Peter Pan" cast t-shirt from high school or if donating it to Goodwill negates your stunning performance as an Ostrich and killer moves as Senior Dance Captain.  Ok, that last one may be hyper specific to me, but you know what I mean.

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So I am on the other side of our big move from DC to Philly, looking at all the boxes and bags and random things in odd places and reflecting on this latest move.

• Paying movers is worth every-single-penny.  Going one better and paying people to also pack up all our sh*t may be the closest I will ever feel to being Beyonce in my whole damn life.  I left for work last Friday a frazzled, on-edge mess.  I came home 9 hours later and our entire apartment was packed up and ready to go.  
• If you are moving as a couple, one of you needs to be the organized one.  Not saying if this organized moving partner was me or MVP, but it was super helpful to have a portable file full of birth/marriage certificates, parking permits, moving receipts, Comcast account details and other paperwork organized and tucked safely into a monogrammed tote.  
• If you can, take pictures of the place you will be moving in to and then develop a plan for where everything will go when you move in.  This will help surface any places where you may be deficient.  As in, if you have a huge hall closet that stores a crap-ton of your stuff and your new place has no hall closet (and is sadly a little light on in-unit storage) you can spend some time pre-move devising a plan or where all the things will go.  Or if you need to buy new storage pieces to store all the things.  Otherwise you will be looking at a bunch of boxes in your dining room and cursing to yourself. 
• In addition to packing an "overnight" bag with those items you will need quick/immediate access to (change of clothes, sheets for the bed, toiletries), keep an easy to find box of cleaning and laundry supplies.  Because you may need to do a little extra cleaning on some rooms/items before unpacking and because if you move in the middle of a heat wave you will sweat through your clothes and go through more outfit changes in one day than someone hosting the Oscars.
• Thank GOD for all the apps that let you know what's close by, who delivers what kind of food and all that jazz.  Because until you get some groceries, you will be eating quite a bit of take-out/delivery.  

We have also quickly become HUGE fans of the corner deli.  It is an actual 2 min (if that) walk from our place and they have WAAAAAAAATTTTTTTERRRRRRR IIIIIIIIIIICCCCCEEEEE.  For those unfamiliar, water ice (pronounced wooder ice here in the PHL) is like italian ice.  But a bajillion times better. 

Even more exciting?  It is cheap as all get out.  

That one on the right is $1 and the one on the left is ONLY TWO FREAKING DOLLARS.  We've only had it twice this week, but I can see mannnnnnnnnnnnny water ice trips in our future!