I Like to Move it, Move it (But I did not like this move 😂) (Patreon)

Let me just say, I am not a superstitious person, but prior to the move, my visit to Vancouver to find an apartment was the worst travel experience I have ever had in my life. And now that the move went so poorly, it feels like it was an omen 😅💀

Everything I didn't even know could go wrong, did.

BUT I MADE IT AND I AM ALIVE AND I AM LOVING THE MOUNTAINS, SO SUCK IT, UNIVERSE! You can rain on my parade, BUT YOU WILL NEVER SNUFF OUT MY SPIRIT! 😤

So anyway...without further ado...


DAY 1. Prep day; 1 day before the move

My plan was to have enough packed and ready that I could pretty much just take it easy the week of the move...shockingly, that did not go to plan 😂 But I did genuinely rest more in that week than I had the weeks prior, so that's something probably 👈😎👈 Although Wednesday, literally the day before we left, ended up being a very full day: getting everything out of my storage locker, last minute meetups with friends, and taking apart my bedframe 🫣

More importantly, though, I wanted to get to sleep early on Wednesday evening so I was well rested for the start of the drive. And on Wednesday afternoon, my friend who was taking my old bed called and asked if she could pick it up in the morning instead of the evening when I had the elevator booked. So getting to bed early became extra important as I'd need to be up and moving earlier than I thought.

Well...I got to bed early (for me), but I could not sleep 😅 And it almost definitely wasn't even because I'd decided to take apart the bedframe in advance of my friend picking it up in the morning, so I was sleeping on a foam mattress on the floor 😂 And then around 12:30-1:00am, I suddenly got overwhelmingly dizzy and nauseated 🫠 But I did eventually sleep!


DAY 2. Moving day

Much to my displeasure, despite a rough sleep, I woke at 8am 🙄 So I tried to go back to sleep, but I was rudely interrupted by UHAUL asking if we could pickup the truck before noon so we could do an in-person pickup instead of our arranged mobile pickup at 2:30pm. So I had to coordinate with BrotherUnmuted to see if he could go early. Which ruined both our plans 😅

I then asked my friend if there was any way she could pick up the bed a little earlier so I could meet my brother to pay for the truck...she then arrived 1.5 hours late 👍 But don't worry; that gave me enough time to consider napping, try to nap, and get interrupted by BrotherUnmuted calling from UHAUL for my card info 🙌

I would also like to note that because my friend decided to come outside the time I had booked for the elevator, we did in fact get in trouble for moving bulk items without an elevator booking and I had to call management to get the OK to move out the mattresses 🫠

I am too many little paragraphs in to not even be at my elevator booking time (4:30pm Thursday), but here we are 😅 BUT we're getting there. Around 3:45pm, I decided to see if we could get the elevator a bit early; we were supposed to go down at 4:15, so that would give us an extra half hour on the road - or so we thought 💀

So I went down and they were like, "Sure thing! I just need your deposit cheque"...I was going to make the deposit online? "No, we need a physical cheque" Please note that the elevator booking form specifically states that paying the deposit online via credit card is a valid alternative option 🤦‍♀️ Turns out, the form, much like the cake, is a lie. And they suggested I walk to the bank to get a cheque book 🫠

So anyway, I asked SisterUnmuted to give me one of her cheques, and she has to be the one to hand it over...only when we got back down literally two minutes later, the concierge was nowhere to be found...even though they knew I was coming back and they had told me they would get me going 🙄 And when they got back, they of course spent 5 full minutes going back and forth between the two parcel rooms looking for a package that was literally in the cupboard behind them 👍

We finally got the elevator booking going. On time... So BrotherUnmuted went to get the truck – since we had to get it early, we had to park it at a lot down the road, maybe half a block from the building... Thank you Toronto traffic! It took him 30 minutes to get the truck around 💀 AND guess who wasn't at the desk to open the loading bay? You guessed it! The concierge. Who specifically told us he would be there to let us in 🤦‍♀️

Don't worry, there couldn't possibly be more on this one day, could there? ...COULD THERE?!

Once we finally loaded up the truck, the concierge came out to tell us we could not leave the two bags of garbage with the pile of garbage in the loading bay, but we instead needed to bring them across the building to a room I no longer had access to because I'd returned my keys already ✨ So he gave me elevator access to that room...one of the bags broke as I got to the door of the other garbage room (which is in fact a recycling room, not a garbage room...so I never should have been bringing the bags there anyway 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️) and a glass bottle shattered and cut my finger 👍

The concierge also said he gave us an extra half an hour, but like...he in fact gave us precisely the allotted two hours from when we actually got the elevator. It just wasn't my booking time 😅🤷‍♀️

Thankfully, after I realized I could not get back into the elevator to get back to the loading bay without a key and took the stairs and called my siblings to pick me up outside the loading bay... That was in fact the last thing that went wrong that day! 🙌 For me personally, at least. My sister-in-law did get a parking ticket 😬


DAY 3. First full day of driving

Thankfully, not much actually went wrong this day! This was our good day. This day was full of promise and false hope. 😂

Because we got on the road so late the night before (about 8pm), we didn't stop until about 2am. So we only slept about 4-4.5 hours that night 🫠 And breakfast at the hotel was...crappy drip coffee and...I think there was some dry cereal? So, um...it was not, in fact, breakfast, and we went to a restaurant close by.

The restaurant we stopped at for breakfast was honestly pretty decent! But the water tasted so bad...I did not know water could taste like that...we got tea as well, and I honestly could not bring myself to drink more than a sip every...15-20 minutes? It was...not good...there was a lot of mineral deposit buildup in those teapots... Is everyone in Michigan okay? 😳

THAT'S IT. The rest of the day, we were somehow in high spirits! 🥳 That is, until...


DAY 4. Second full day of driving

This day started out so much better than the days previous. The hotel was a lot nicer and had an actually decent breakfast with acceptable tea! Plus we had slept closer to 6-7 hours!

But it all went downhill. Very quickly.

Probably 10 minutes into the day's driving, someone was honking up a storm, and we were all very confused. I genuinely said "Who is he honking at??" Turns out: us.

As you have probably heard, apparently, when we left the hotel, no one checked the latch on the door after we put our overnight bags back in 🫠 So we pulled over and BrotherUnmuted gave it a quick once-over, made sure our overnight bags were still there, and closed the back. He asked if I wanted to check to see if I noticed anything missing, but I was like... We don't really have time to go back, so... 🤷‍♀️

An hour later, I got a call from an unknown number, but we were in The Middle of Nowhere, Montana, so my phone didn't even ring. But I did get a voicemail! So I was able to call back and figure out that I did in fact lose a pillow - thankfully I had left it in the box, which just so happened to have my phone number on it 🙌

Seemingly, the only other things we lost were the jerrycan of extra gas for emergencies and the extra windshield washer fluid. So nothing too bad as long as we didn't run out of gas...in the middle of nowhere Montana where there aren't even very many exits to even get off at, much less ones with gas nearby... No worries 😅👍

Don't worry, we did find gas. With about 20 miles to go on the tank 😂 The stress of not having the jerrycan if we needed it during that part of the drive...not my favourite 😅 But we honestly did a good job keeping each other in check and keeping in generally good spirits!

When we finally were able to stop for gas, we also stopped for lunch at Burger King...I don't usually eat Burger King because my body doesn't like it very much, but when you're in the middle of nowhere, you take what you can get 😅 So we grabbed food and switched drivers.

Getting into the car with our food, BrotherUnmuted put his drink on the cup holder tray - there were 2 cup holders and a tray bit and the passenger side was the one with just the tray. So I said "I wouldn't trust that there", but he was just putting it there to get into the truck and was planning to hold it for the drive, so all good...

Except we forgot and we started driving and the drink immediately tipped and flipped upside down, pouring almost exclusively into my legs and feet 👍 Thankfully I managed to "catch" it and just hold the lid to the cup (still upsidedown) until BrotherUnmuted could properly grab it, and only about 1/3 of the drink had spilled...directly onto me 🫠

It did clean up pretty easily, so that was a relief. And I was wearing thin pants, so they dried quickly 😅 But I then immediately spilled mustard on my shirt 🤦‍♀️ Anyway... I've just now decided to take that all as a sign to continue to avoid Burger King 😂

By the evening, my pain levels were getting real high. I'd been in pain all day, but in the evening, it started to get progressively worse. BrotherUnmuted was determined to get us all the way to where we wanted to be in the morning, but that had us stopping at about 1am and by 10pm I was...very unwell. So I told him we didn't need to make it all the way and we'd have time in the morning...

By about 11:30 I just looked at BrotherUnmuted and said "I would like to stop as close to midnight as possible. I am very unwell". So we pulled off at the next exit with lodging advertised...except it only had motels that couldn't accommodate the truck...so we got back on the highway. And there weren't any signs of lodging for another 20 minutes. And then it was some obscure place we didn't feel like trying to find.

Then, a long came Auburn! There were so many hotels to choose from! So we stopped at the closest one...they didn't have any space. So we meandered our way to the next one...no space. So I asked if they had any idea where might, and they directed us to a smaller hotel a bit out of the way. Sure! No problem!

They also...had no vacancy. And when we walked in and I asked if they had any idea where might have a room available, they said "not in Auburn 😬". But they let me use their bathroom...so that was something 🤷‍♀️

So we started calling hotels. And ended up staying in the town BrotherUnmuted had been trying to get us to anyway, just an hour later 🫠So, if I had said something earlier or not at all, we'd have been fiiiiiine.

But I was in so much pain, and it was just like...with everything that's already gone wrong today, of course the day we can't find accommodations is the day I am in agony. Should have expected as much 🙄


DAY 5: Final leg of driving; Day of arrival! 🥳

I woke up actively having a panic attack. Because we had stopped at a pretty shady motel. And I didn't remember locking the back of the truck. Because I didn't. BrotherUnmuted did. But I didn't see it, so I didn't know 🙈 So on the one day we had time to sleep in, I got up and out of bed at about 6:45am to check the back of the truck 🫣

I could tell the vibes were off from the beginning. My sister-in-law was very much feeling the long road trip gloomies... So I let them chill while I went out to the truck to make space for the couch that we would be picking up from BurgerBoi (huge thank you to BugrerBoi and momma_hk for letting me ship furniture to them).

When we stopped for breakfast, I told them we had about 20 minutes until we were meant to be arriving to pick up the furniture...no response. No biggie. 2 minutes later I told them my friend found a good spot for dinner in Vancouver - "Yay!" Okay, so...they are listening. That's good 👍

15 minutes later, I watched my sister-in-law start a new chapter in her ebook... Ma'am...what? 😅 Like, that's fine if you want to keep reading; we have time and don't need to be there that early, but like...someone is waiting on us, so if you could communicate, that would be helpful? 😅🫣 Anyway, it worked out. I just told her when it was 9:30 and she decided the rest of her chapter was too long to reasonably ask us to wait 👍

Anyway, we picked up the couch without a hitch and made it to Vancouver about an hour and a half early for my elevator booking! So we parked the truck and found a local cafe to sit at for a bit 🥰

When the time came for the elevator booking, there was some concern that we didn't have enough clearance for the loading dock, but we made it 🙌

Yes, we did drive 46 hours in less than 72.

Once we got everything off the truck and parked it again, BrotherUnmuted and my sister-in-law needed a well-deserved break. So I got started unpacking things and they just chilled in a corner. We were meeting a friend for dinner, so I told them the timing of when we should start heading over...and they then started building my couch (I had originally asked if we wanted to go to dinner without my friend or we could put the couch together while we waited for them to be ready)...10 minutes before we were supposed to be leaving 🤦‍♀️ So I told my friend we'd be leaving in 15, and told my siblings to just get the part they were working on done and just leave it for now 🤷‍♀️

As a side note, when they started on the couch, I had said "I want to help, but it seems like I would just be in the way and we'd have too many cooks in the kitchen, so to speak, but let me know if I'm wrong" and I continued unpacking things...and then 5 minutes later, my sister-in-law said "If you're looking for something to do, you can take the cushions out of the bags"... ma'am...I know you are just trying to communicate how I can help with the thing I said I would help with, but did you need to say it like that while I am actively doing things? 😅 It's not like I've just been sitting around twiddling my thumbs. The only time I've been doing nothing all day today was while we were having tea and waiting for the elevator 😤 Anyway...I didn't say anything, but it was frustrating 😅

After dinner, we discussed whether we were sticking with the plan of all staying at my apartment - I would take the couch, and they could sleep on my mattress on the floor. And that way I could see them off before their early flight!

They both decided they didn't really care, but I pressed and my sister-in-law said she'd actually been feeling really cranky and would like some space (hadn't noticed at all... 😅😬). So I got a hotel room for my siblings. And we said our goodbyes that evening. Don't worry, though, their one-night hotel stay in Vancouver only cost as much as one of their flights home 😂👍


But don't worry, there's more that went wrong with the move than just the physical moving of me and my things across the country 😂

So as succinctly as I can muster:


Furniture wars

- The couch I fought so hard to get and literally shipped to someone else to get...wrong couch. Thanks so much, Amazon 👍

- Since I have the wrong couch, the side table I already ordered no longer makes sense 🤦‍♀️ Because the storage in the arms of the couch was supposed to be basically like a deep top-down pocket, but is instead shallow shelves in the sides...so putting a table beside them would block them 🫠

- We already know, but the breakfast bar did not go together easily...the screw to connect the flimsy front piece to the top of the breakfast bar, you know, to support the whole thing...too short. 🤦‍♀️ They don't even come close to connecting the pieces. Thankfully, I had some screws that worked. Thank you to my hoarding 😂

- The bolt and nut to connect the two supporting back pieces of my hanging egg chair...did not fit together. So...I had to return it 😭 The egg chair was not meant to be 🥺

- I got rid of my old TV stand because I finally put it back together and got felt pads on the feet... Only to take off the masking tape that was holding the doors closed and take off the wood grain pattern with it 🫠

- SisterUnmuted arrived on time, but the bed frame did not... 🤦‍♀️

- The desk was a lot deeper than expected, so...we had to figure out a way to maneuver it to the other wall...we may have dented the walls...no one can say for sure that it was us & the desk... 🫣

- I didn't order enough tape to put up the acoustic panels...and then I forgot to consider the sprinkler system...and then the panels didn't line up 🤦‍♀️ Also they gave me boo-boos 🥺

- The Amazon package containing my shower curtain hooks and the laundry hamper for my towels is...lost? Delayed, allegedly...

BUT

I'm here. I can see mountains whenever I want to. I managed to fit all my things into this apartment. I've ordered a new chair for the solarium (it's not an egg chair...but hopefully it's at least comfortable) and a new TV stand for the living room...I don't have a TV, but that's beside the point 😅

AND

I'm still alive. And this somehow already feels like home 🥰

I am, however, still in a lot of pain and very tired 😅 and possibly sick...? Who knows 🙈

Also, it took me like...5 times coming back into this post before I actually managed to finish it, so I am so sorry for the length 😬❤️