All Moved In

By Shamus Posted Thursday Mar 7, 2013

Filed under: Personal 95 comments

moving_boxes.jpg

January 1st 2001 to March 5th 2013. That’s the longest I’ve ever lived in one place. I will say that I am curiously just as able-bodied at 41 as I was at 29, although I find that the after-action muscle pains are much more crippling. I spent yesterday dragging my carcass around the house and wondering if I’d seriously damaged my knees. “Lift with your legs, not your back” people tell you. That’s all well and good, but once my legs are spent, what do I lift with then, huh? Tell me that, Mr. Smugface chair-sitter, with your healthy back and your intact knees. I don’t see YOU dragging YOUR worldly possessions up a flight of stairs in the snow.

Yesterday morning was The Trial of No Internet while we waited for the cable company to show up and turn the valve that controlled the internet pump. He had to run new wire from the telephone pole, because the existing line was only good for television but was too old to contain the precious internet juice. That means this house has never been graced by the blessed electrical impulses of broadband internet, which is a radical thought.

I spent the dark hours of savage non-internet anarchy writing a massive 8k word account of our experience in the previous house. It’s strangely personal and not the kind of thing I’d normally post here. Doing so would dispel the highly beneficial misconception that I’m a smart person. But whatever. I wrote it mostly for my own benefit, as a means of putting the events in order and understanding how we got to where we are now. I might post it. I might chicken out. We’ll see.

We’re living in town now. I always tell people I’m “from Pittsburgh”, but we actually live in one of the many satellite cities around it. It’s an unremarkable little town, but my family lives here so my heart is here.

I took a picture out of the kitchen window to add to this post. One of the major streets runs nearby and there’s a fire hall visible. Second-guessing myself, I typed the name of the place into Google and clicked on street-level view. Boom. Picture of the window I had been looking out of.

Does this sort of thing matter? I suspect it doesn’t. We have this attitude that we should keep our locations secret online, but my parents spent a lifetime listing everyone in a public telephone book and thought nothing of it. The internet just makes that phone book bigger and accessible from further away. It’s kind of strange that we’re worried about being found by people thousands of miles away, but we’re comfortable being found by people six blocks away. The latter is more likely to have both motive and opportunity to hassle you.

I can’t post this picture! Some crazed FTL fan might read my review, see this picture, do the detective work, drive a thousand miles, then stand around in the bone-cracking cold waiting for me to open the door so he could ambush me in a public place and assault me in front of many witnesses! Someone said that they read about it happening one time and that Snopes wasn’t able to conclusively disprove it!

Having said all that… I still didn’t feel right uploading the picture. I guess I’m just as irrationally paranoid as everyone else.

For the last month, the most common phrase around the house was, “once we’re done moving”. Half of everything we said either began or ended with that phrase, and in the other half it was implied. As the day drew close it gradually became a sort of paralysis where there was no sense in doing anything because it will just be un-done by the move. I sure am thirsty, but I don’t want to refill my mug because I’m just going to move it tomorrow and who wants to move a cup filled with tea? Do we have a box for that yet?

Now the day is passed and we’re way too tired to do the stuff we’ve been waiting to do. I’ve spent all morning picking up random clutter from my desk, realizing I don’t know where it might go or should go, and putting it back down again six inches away. The result is a lot of activity with very little productivity.

I have the usual scrapes, bruises, exhaustion, and muscle aches associated with being out-of-shape and moving, but what hurts most is my pride. Heather is much more active than I am, and she’s been running circles around me for days. I spent yesterday whimpering and taking pain pills while she made more trips to the old place. Then she went to work for the evening while I went to bed. Then she twisted the knife by not mentioning or even noticing my lack of help. The least she could do is act like she expected me to help. Heartless woman.

I kid. She actually chased me away from helping last night. All the heavy stuff is moved, and now we’re just sorting crap into “throw away now” and “maybe throw away later”. I do envy her energy, though.

 


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95 thoughts on “All Moved In

  1. krellen says:

    At my old job, we did a lot of “wait until we get the new manager” planning. Mostly because no one wanted to take responsibility for things.

  2. Hoping you feel better soon and your affairs get in order! :)

  3. anaphysik says:

    “turn the valve that controlled the internet pump”

    I thought for sure it’d be Google that would rule the internet, but I guess Valve pulled through right at the end.

    1. Wedge says:

      Now I’m imagining this guy coming into your house to install the internet.

      1. milos says:

        He just gapes and the internet pours out of his open mouth.

  4. Ithilanor says:

    I hope the move-in and post-move unpacking goes well!
    Also, TIL the term “fire hall”. I’ve never heard them called anything but fire stations.

    1. BeardedDork says:

      Whipper-snapper.

      1. anaphysik says:

        Wait, you mean they’re NOT called “WEEEYUUUUUWEEEEEYUUUUU houses”?

      2. Ithilanor says:

        Yup! Which is (part of) why I keep an eye out to learn things. Is the term “fire hall” just an older term that’s not used much any more?

        1. Shamus says:

          You know, I never questioned the term until now.

          As I’ve always understood the term, a fire hall is a big building that can be used for public functions. I’ve seen them used for voting booths, wedding receptions, and for just-getting-started churches. They’re usually a big place attached to a fire station, but I can think of a couple that don’t have fire stations – they’re just halls. But now that I’m thinking about it, I’ve never heard “fire hall” used outside of this area.

          Conjecture: Since our fire departments are generally volunteer, I imagine the stations are donated by someone. Perhaps when securing a lot and paying to have the place built, the owner also has this hall added on to pay the bill, or just cover property taxes, or whatever.

          1. Where I’m from, it’s not unusual to just call the fire station itself a fire hall or firehall even though there generally isn’t a meeting place attached. Plus we have a place called the “Firehall Theatre” which has people doing plays on shoestring budgets.

          2. Ithilanor says:

            Interesting, thanks for the info!

          3. Guvnorium says:

            Fire halls are very much a thing where I live, in a slightly rural area of Western New York. I don’t know if that counts as ‘this area’ or not, though, since in the grand scheme of things Pittsburgh is not that far from here.

            On a side note, all of the ones I’ve been in (four total) run Bingo, I assume as a fundraiser. The fire company my dad was with back in the day as an explorer scout/volunteer firemen ran a firemen’s carnival to raise money. So they do some of their own fundraising.

          4. Andyy. says:

            As a dirty European, it always twinges me when I read that you have volunteer fire services. Instead of trained professionals, I picture my nan.

            It does sound like a gloriously cheap option however.

            1. Shamus says:

              To be fair, they have funding, high-tech equipment, training, are hooked into the emergency response system, etc. It’s not like a bunch of guys drink some beers and decide they’re a fire department. I THINK a couple of positions are salaried, and the rest are volunteer, but I’m not sure.

              I’m sure it’s at least partly related to population density. There just aren’t enough fires in a small town to justify keeping a full team on salary. Heck, in a REALLY small town a proper fire team would bankrupt them, and calling from help from a larger town would take too long.

              1. Lazlo says:

                I was talking to someone from our local VFD a couple weeks ago, and one of the things he mentioned was that when you volunteer for the fire department, you also volunteer for two years of fairly heavy training, and then continuing training from then on.

                1. Guvnorium says:

                  At least two of the local ones have bars/lounges for the firefighters to hang out in, so there is still sitting around and drinking beer. From what I understand, it is one of the perks.

            2. Zukhramm says:

              As a dirty European (and a person with access to Wikipedia) it does not at all seem that uncommon with volunteer over here either actually.

            3. Zak McKracken says:

              Germany also has a long tradition of volunteer fire services. In some of the smaller towns it’s the only thing that holds together the community (what with every male serving in the fire brigade for some time in their later school years). It’s like the boyscouts in some parts. They don’t pay for the gear and stuff, but their time is donated. Which is recognized by the town by letting them trow a huge party once a year. Also, most people I know are or were active as voluntary firefighters could (and did) drink a bit more than others…

            4. Alphadrop says:

              Sounds like the retained service we have in the UK but less official sounding. Probably tied up with less red tape as well.

          5. Supahewok says:

            Huh. Down here in Texas, I’ve never heard of a “firehall.” Fire stations are just fire stations, you don’t go in them unless you’re on an elementary school field trip.

            Then again, I’ve always lived in a suburb that, although it’s been around for a while, didn’t really explode into development until about 40 years ago I’d guess.

            I guess its either a New England thing or a small town thing. It makes since for older towns to have this sort of public gathering place that’s multi-functional. And New England is the oldest part of the country.

          6. Zak McKracken says:

            foreword: Posting works fine, but I just forgot to enter my name, got an error message and no way to go back to the already typed comment, so weriting it all over again:

            “Fire hall” is sounds the same as a German would pronounce “Feierhalle”. “Halle” means “hall”, but “Feier” means “Celebration” — so maybe part of that place’s denomination has diffused into English from German?

  5. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Hey,theres nothing irrational about being afraid of FTL fans.After all,we are known for our incredible endurance in doing a senseless thing over,and over,and over again,for days on end,just so we could look at those past events with pride and say “Yeah,I did that”.

    1. Factoid says:

      You mean like the time I beat the game using nothing but fire weapons and boarding parties?

      1. Chris Robertson says:

        The no-shield victories are the ones that really get me. I tried to do it (several times) with the Zoltan B variant (so I at least had *some* shields)… The second stage of the Rebel Flagship just tears me to pieces.

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          Droids plus stealth should do the trick.Either get a bunch of defense ones,or repair ones.

          I dont think I could manage it though.

  6. Mike S. says:

    Mightn’t the previous occupants have had DSL rather than cable broadband?

    (Though given that I have a co-worker who’s still on dialup– dialup— I grant that it’s entirely possible they were broadband-free.)

    Apropos the picture: a year or three ago, someone passed me some advice that had apparently been going around, that you shouldn’t put your address in the “Home” entry of a GPS. Because if you park at the movies, say, then someone who steals your car could go straight to your house and rob you, knowing you’re not home. (And that no one else is, I guess, because…?)

    “You don’t have your car registration, which lists your home address, in the glove compartment?”

    “…”

    (I don’t leave my portable GPS in the car anyway, because I had my window broken three times in a short period obviously looking for easily carried off items like that, but that’s a side issue.)

    1. Viktor says:

      Depends on the state. Texas, for example, only requires you have license and proof of insurance, and most people keep insurance cards in their wallets.

      1. Mike S. says:

        Fair enough. In this case, it was a state I’d lived in, so unless things had changed in the intervening years I knew I was on pretty safe ground.

    2. ehlijen says:

      Aren’t you advised to keep those registration documents on your person rather than in your car to help prove to the police that it’s actually your own car you’re asking them to find again if it gets stolen?

      1. Mike S. says:

        It’s not wallet-sized, so I don’t think the state has any expectation that owners will routinely carry it on their person rather than the car. (I can only imagine what a pain that would be for families who share a car.)

        And if I’m reporting a car stolen, why would I need the registration? The cops have a license plate database. As long as I can identify myself, they can be satisfied that I’m the owner of the car with the license plate XYZ-1234, and pull up all data that would be on the card.

        Which, admittedly, raises the question of why I’m required to keep the registration in the glove compartment and show it at a traffic stop in the first place.

        At least one lawyer suggests that it’s basically a pretext: cops (at least in his state) can’t extend a traffic stop longer than it takes to complete the stop, but can ask questions about unrelated matters (e.g., drugs) during “unavoidable lulls”. Shuffling around getting your registration creates such a lull:

        http://mpdtrainer.wordpress.com/2011/07/14/during-traffic-stops-why-do-the-police-ask-for-your-vehicle-registration-and-insurance/

  7. anaphysik says:

    I can't post this picture! Some crazed FTL fan might read my review, see this picture, do the detective work, drive a thousand miles, then stand around in the bone-cracking cold waiting for me to open the door so he could ambush me in a public place and assault me in front of many witnesses! Someone said that they read about it happening one time and that Snopes wasn't able to conclusively disprove it!

    Ok, fine, but could you please post exactly how far away you’ve moved (in internet distance, of course), and then ping the following IP at 1700GMT, so that we can run it through the triangulation algorithm along with the prior value and then ¡BAM! instant (geologically-speaking) revenge!

    I mean, I’ll have to actually get and play FTL first, but you know how you gotta plan these things out.

    (EDIT: Am I /reallllly/ not a spammer? I don’t even know anymore.)

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      I must say,you definitely should get FTL as soon as possible.Judging by this comment alone,its the perfect game for you.

    2. Paul Spooner says:

      Don’t worry about it. You can already find just about anyone on the internet. It’s a kind of hobby for some of us. Real life hacking or something. I found your old house (and confirmed it with Street View) frighteningly easily. All it takes is one slip and a bit of research. You can all find out where I live easily enough.
      EDIT: It’s ambiguous whether I’m talking about anaphysik or Shamus… let’s keep it that way.

      There’s something freeing about not caring who can find you, about “security” in general. We tend to think of “security” in terms of hiding things away, but there is another side to that. The more people who know where you are, the more people can be watching out for you. This goes for your neighbors more than internet people though… so maybe there is good sense to the local directory after all.

      1. Adam says:

        Truly, we live in a post-privacy world.

        1. Paul Spooner says:

          Well, that’s not entirely true either. “Privacy” is no worse now (and probably a bit better) than before. There have always been busybodies, talkative drinking buddies, and friends who say more than they should. If you perform all of your activities through aliases on the web (or off the web entirely), you can actually have a great deal more privacy than you used to.

          I have a friend who has successfully (to my knowledge) scrubbed all of his personal information from the internet. He uses a PO box number for all his domain registry, he doesn’t use any social networks, and he personally asks friends to not post pictures of him anywhere.
          That said, you can still find his address if you look hard enough. Just like the old days.

        2. Peter H. Coffin says:

          Gave up on it myself, years ago. Pretty much as soon as I got a domain name. There were aspirations of using it for a business purpose and I could either hide myself or look like I had nothing to hide. And since I don’t really… well, there it is. I post under my real name, my real address is on the domain record, use an email address that hasn’t changed in a decade, use the same user id pretty much everywhere, even my car is one that someone could probably pick out of a parking lot. The worst result is I get holiday cards from some pretty distant relatives and some other sundry odd sources. But it comes with the responsibility to be no more of a colossal dick online than I am in real life.

          1. Klay F. says:

            I post under my real name mostly just to keep myself on good behavior. When I was a young lad, I was quite a heathen. Its not something I’m proud of, and I’d like to think that even if I had a fake name to hide behind, I wouldn’t act like I used to. But I’m not going to ever take that chance.

  8. rayen says:

    Ugh, i’ve moved so many times and always into one year apartment leases… soon, maybe next febuary, my wife and i might actually get to the point where we buy a house and we’ll actually move in.
    whatever i don’t envy you. Moving is a pain. I hope your new house is nice though. Also i wouldn’t post that stuff. maybe the pictures but some things are best left private. might send a copy to the next people that live in the old house, show them some of the history of the place.

  9. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Also,its disappointing that instead of not posting the picture,you didnt post a picture from fallout 3.

  10. anaphysik says:

    Also, I wish there were more of this posted for you to catch up on post-move, Shamus (hey, I saw you follow @DisclosureAlert ;D), but unfortunately there are only /two/ Mumbles-filled Disclosure Alerts posted so far this week.

    1. Aldowyn says:

      And the third one should be up pretty soon, actually.

      Just keeping everyone posted.

  11. bickerdyke says:

    It's kind of strange that we're worried about being found by people thousands of miles away, but we're comfortable being found by people six blocks away. The later is more likely to have both motive and opportunity to hassle you.

    Yes, but if someone is willing to drive thousands of miles, he probably isn’t just being some minor hassle….

  12. Asimech says:

    “throw way now”

    Anyway. It’s different getting abusive e-mail spam from getting abusive mail-spam, even if the latter is a smaller pile. I think the only serious damage having info online is when it can be easily paired out with “not home” type stuff.

    1. Dev Null says:

      Certainly is. I still _read_ email.

    2. Isy says:

      People can get pretty creative when harassing via the internet. Someone might send Shamus twenty pizzas or something. And that would just be terrible.

      1. Moridin says:

        Or 40 cakes.

  13. Dev Null says:

    I kid. She actually chased me away from helping last night. All the heavy stuff is moved, and now we're just sorting crap into “throw way now” and “maybe throw away later”.

    Isn’t it funny how we do that? You think moving is going to be the perfect opportunity to purge junk, but then you inevitably run out of time to sort, throw everything in a box, lug it across town / the country… and then it sits in a box til the next time you move because now you’re exhausted and sick of it. (Pro tip: if you go to move, and you find a box that hasn’t been opened since last time you moved? Do NOT open it; just throw it away.)

    The only time I’ve ever managed to avoid this was the time we decided to move in January and then our landlord cancelled our lease at the end of October. We moved into a storage unit + a friends spare room for two months, and had plenty of time to purge crap before actually moving. Seemed like it was going to be a nightmare; actually, it was a blessing.

    1. Alex the Too Old says:

      (Pro tip: if you go to move, and you find a box that hasn't been opened since last time you moved? Do NOT open it; just throw it away.)

      My wife would murder me on the spot if I did that. (To be fair, a lot of her boxes were full of her paintings, or irreplaceable Beatles collectibles, or the like.)

  14. El Boba Fetto says:

    Post the thing you wrote.

    1. Mephane says:

      Well, I somehow concur. Now that Shamus has said it exists, I am eager to read it. On the other hand, I will completely understand if he decides not to publish the text because he finds it too personal.

      P.S.: Was that the proper use of if-clause with future tense? I see these so rarely that I am not sure whether the last sentence might appear weird to a native speaker.

  15. Thomas says:

    The internet is enough of a numbers thing that it’s probably not a good idea for some people in some places of the internet to give people hints as to where they live. There have been EVE players for example who’ve been stalked and threatened by people who tracked them down in real life.
    http://poeticstanziel.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/the-csm-it-aint-for-superheroes.html

    Admittedly EVE players make friends in the same way other people put live scorpions in their mouths so it might be a bit of an extreme case

  16. X2-Eliah says:

    Moving is generally an utterly terrible thing. I have one looming in the near future – very much not looking forward to it at all. So, uh, glad to hear that it is all over now.

  17. Didero says:

    Maybe I missed it, or maybe you didn’t mention it, or maybe I’m just overly curious. But why are you moving?

    1. anaphysik says:

      To get away from the last FTL fan that found him, obviously.

  18. Shamus – as a fellow “old fart” I absolutely feel your pain!

    There’s a reason why the “Bionic Woman” was my favorite TV show when I was kid. I want ALL of my limbs replaced with bionic parts.

    I’ve heard that if you make the distinctive “cheh cheh cheh” sound and pick up the box in slow-motion, that there is less pain involved.

    1. Mephane says:

      In that regard I agree with you and Sheldon Cooper. One day I want myself completely transferred into my own robot body. However I would prefer an “I, robot” style body, not a cheese-skin-sort-of-human like Data.

      1. Aldowyn says:

        What if it was a perfect facsimile, like (created by the same author as I, Robot) R. Daneel Olivaw?

        1. Mephane says:

          No way would I want my robot body to be as hideous as my biological one, heh. Not to speak of the risk of ending up in Uncanny Valley. I’ll just stick to metal and plastic, even for the outward appearance.

          1. Soylent Dave says:

            Exactly; what would be the point in having a robot body that didn’t have extraneous hydraulics and flashing lights and so on?

            Half the fun of being a cyborg is ejecting steam from your vents as you walk.

            (… I imagine.)

  19. Paul Spooner says:

    Having recently moved myself (at twelve years your junior) I can confirm that moving is a pain no matter how old you are. We had the benefit of not owning too much stuff (just one small U-Haul worth) but also moved twice, once into an apartment and then into a house eight months later. I’m guessing we’ll have a similar experience in about ten years, but who knows.

    The thing I just love about moving is the sense of completion once it’s all done. It’s like packing a backpack for a hike. When you’ve got everything in there, you sit back and go “well, that’s everything” and deep down you know that it’s true. If there’s anything else you need… well you’ll just have to buy or beg it, because this is all you’ve got. I suppose this could be terrifying for some people. My optimism may go with a firm conviction of God’s providence. In any case, moving does have its brighter side.

  20. BeamSplashX says:

    Heather is in better shape than you? Don’t you care at all about America’s precious gender roles, Shamus?! If this continues, you’ll, why you’ll…

    …be moved in faster.

  21. Jokerman says:

    I am that FTL fan…im coming for you.

    1. anaphysik says:

      He is the Choker-Man here to make some funny chokes. If you have some dirty vindows, he can bring his friend, the Viper.

      1. Ardis Meade says:

        I wasn’t even alive when that aired. Why do I get that reference!?

  22. Fang says:

    I’m glad to hear you moved Shamus! At least you have a place for all of this stuff in your new house. Moving my uncle into my grandmothers house is going to be an extended nightmare as we clean out her junk to make way for my uncles junk.

  23. We’re around the same age and I’m here to tell you that once you get to our age it is a lot harder to get away with not exercising.
    Of course one problem is making time for it. And I mean it’s not that you don’t have time, exactly, but there’s always something else you’re doing that you don’t want to stop, whether it’s writing or playing a game or reading.
    To deal with this problem, a friend of mine has recently set up a thing where he basically has a piece of exercise bike at his computer. He sits at his keyboard and his legs are, very slowly, cycling. He’s pretty sure it’s helping.

    1. Ithilanor says:

      There’s also treadmill desks for this problem, though they have plenty of constraints and problems, from what I’ve seen/heard.

  24. Jace911 says:

    My Dad’s fifty and he swears by roadbiking. Apparently once you get over the whole “how do I not fall when I stop” bit it’s great exercise, as long as you don’t mind wearing spandex while riding down a road with dozens of witnesses on every block.

    Which may or may not be part of why I haven’t been able to bring myself to ride with him.

    1. I have these “commuter jeans”, Levis which look like normal jeans but have a bit of more spandex-ish fibre in them so they have enough give to cycle in. With them I can bike without looking stupid. Well, except for the helmet.

    2. ehlijen says:

      The spandex requirement is a lie. You can ride the bike in all sorts of clothes; basically anything you could also jog in works great, but even that’s not a strict requirement.

      1. Bryan says:

        Yeah, I ride back and forth to/from work every day in plain jeans. Plus a jacket if it’s cold, and plus another layer of waterproof pants if it’s rainy.

        (Of course, it’s only a couple miles…)

  25. Kevin C. says:

    My tricks on moving:

    1) Plan a house warming party for 1 month after the move. Nothing will make you unpack like knowing your friends and family will be coming soon.
    2) If it’s not unpacked by the party, stash it.
    2a) If the box stashed does not contain holiday decorations AND it isn’t opened in 1 year…throw it out.
    2b) If the box stashed does contain holiday decorations AND it isn’t opened in 2 years….throw it out.
    3) If the clothes no longer fit, donate them.

    Just my method, modify as needed.

  26. MichaelG says:

    My parents lived in three different places when we were growing up. Since leaving home, I’ve lived in 19 different apartments (I have a list!) I can’t stand a long commute, so whenever I’ve changed jobs, I’ve moved.

    I’d kind of like to move again, since Sacramento is so boring, but I don’t know if I can stand the boxing and unboxing drill again. It doesn’t get any easier.

    Good luck in the new place!

    1. Paul Spooner says:

      You don’t have to do the “drill” if you don’t want to. Just leave all your stuff in boxes and implement a searchable inventory system.

      Start boxing stuff up. For each item make a log entry in a spreadsheet. Include the location (identify boxes, containers, etc. Numbers or short phrases work fine, something unique and hash-able), description, and a few categories for each item. Containers are items themselves, so the spreadsheet can be nested. You’ll never have to “unpack” again. Makes finding things (and moving) a dream. Just be sure to put things back where you got them, or update their location in the log.

      I don’t know about you, but I find I only use a handful of objects on a daily basis. These “everyday” items can left out. When you move, dump the “everyday” items into a few boxes and put all the boxes in the truck. When you arrive, log the location of the boxes and unpack the everyday items. The system takes a bit of discipline (and isn’t very impressive, since people can’t easily ogle at all your stuff) but works very well for both keeping track of things and easily re-locating.

      1. Zukhramm says:

        That’s what I did. Except without a to search my boxes. I just packed them, moved and never unpacked.

        1. MichaelG says:

          If I replaced all the paperbacks with ebooks, it would help a lot!

  27. Ravens Cry says:

    Recently helped a friend move and we found that there was no elevator at the new place, just stairs. Third floor apartment too! Went reasonably fast all things considered.

  28. Blackbird71 says:

    “Lift with your legs, not your back” people tell you. That's all well and good, but once my legs are spent, what do I lift with then, huh? Tell me that, Mr. Smugface chair-sitter, with your healthy back and your intact knees.

    Hey, at least when I tell people to lift with their legs, I do so from the position of having a persistent back injury, earned through five years of a part-time job lifting heavy and awkwardly-shaped objects. For once, I am the voice of experience!

    The worst part? I’m about seven years younger than Shamus. Take care of your back, people, or you’ll feel way older than you should!

  29. Clint Olson says:

    “The later is more likely to have both motive and opportunity to hassle you.”

    “The later” should presumably be “the latter”, as the sentence doesn’t make too much sense otherwise.

    1. ehlijen says:

      I dunno. If they’re driving there from further away, they’d obviously arrive later. And after that long a car trip, they’re going to hassle someone, or else!

      :P

  30. Retsam says:

    For the record, I really love that image. Feels like what my life will be whenever I move. I managed to find a blank version of it (just boxes, no labels), I wonder if Shamus labeled it himself, or found it somewhere else.

  31. Rick C says:

    If you can afford a couple of hundred dollars, hire a couple people to load and/or unload the moving truck. It’s what I did the last time I moved. Frequently you can find people in your local church or, oddly enough, fire department, because apparently a lot of off-duty firefighters do this as a sideline.

  32. Aelyn says:

    So… you mentioned Snopes and that made me think of my dad and that made me think of old people. So this is your fault.

    My dad believes absolutely nothing that comes through email. He’s got that going for him, at least. Until, of course, he gets the email that says Snopes is really controlled by government, and big bad people, and all their stuff is not to be trusted. Which he immediately buys and cannot be told any different.

    Am I doomed to be like this? Is there any hope that as we age we can retain some semblance of reasonable thought?

  33. Hal says:

    Congrats on the move. I know when my wife and I moved in together last year (oh, newly weds), I ended up doing a lot of the “throw away now” stuff. Once the kitchen and her own closet were unpacked, she pretty much called it a success. She had entire boxes of stuff in our “guest room” that I had to go through myself. A conversation we had frequently:

    “What should I do with this?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Do you want to keep it?”
    “I don’t know.”

    She has yet to miss any of that stuff.

  34. Kdansky says:

    If you are sorting the garbage from the real stuff *after* you moved, then you are doing this terribly wrong. Throwing out half your useless crap before you move saves you from moving a tons of items (in our case when we moved after 20 years in the same house it was 2.8 tons, we know because there was a big garbage bill afterwards). It’s the easiest and best way to get rid of old things. I mean, you have to pick up every single item in your house anyway, and decide in which box it goes. You only need to add big box labelled “garbage”, and drive all those boxes to another location at some point.

    You are making your own life much more miserable than it needs to be if you sort your stuff after the move, and you’ll never have the guts to throw out stuff that should go, but now that you’ve moved it you might as well keep them.

    1. Shamus says:

      Heh. The stuff we’re throwing out is still at the old place. Lucky for us, this was a short-distance move. (Like, less than 2 miles.) So we didn’t have to pack everything into a single truckload.

      “Moving day” was just when we moved the crucial stuff: Food, beds, and computers. Now we’re going through the old place and seeing what’s left. :)

      1. Shamus says:

        Then again, I am finding objects once in a while and thinking, “Why did I bother to pack this?”

        Things like: The 5-inch VGA bridge cable for the graphics card I owned in ~2001.

        It really is HARD to throw away cables because I’ve been conditioned to think: “This item is expensive and therefore valuable.”

        1. Kevin says:

          Yes. I have many boxes of old cables and computer parts. I just keep ignoring them hoping they will move out on their own one day.

          1. Paul Spooner says:

            So, there’s a parallel between obsolete cables and adult children living at home? Wow, it works on so many levels! Why did I never see it before?

            1. Steve C says:

              I now have a mental image of a box of kids in a dumpster saying “Daddy, are you coming back?”

    2. Zak McKracken says:

      Your’re entirely right, yet a dozen of cardboard boxes in the apartment (whose contents haven’t seen the light in the last apartment) say that’s much easier said than done. I did throw away a bunch of stuff last time I moved, but then there’s the things you’re not really sure about, the things you may want to sell rather than throw away (or gift them to a charity or someone), and that takes time, and since the date for the move is set it often takes more time to decide on everything and (possibly) get rid of it before the move than to just bring it along and decide later.
      I think I’m getting better at this but I’ll need quite a few moves before said dozen of boxes will not be needed anymore.

  35. Zak McKracken says:

    I completely agree to not posting your new address here.
    Actually, I sometimes wonder why you use your real name and provide people with real photographs.
    Like … if I’d start a blog now, I’d have a problem with that because I don’t want to have my spare time ramblings to have a bearing on future employment. I would want to talk about the field I’m working on, but I would also talk about my opinions, and those are not something any prospective employer should care about, and that again is best achieved by not letting them know.
    Right now, a web search on my name turns up two people who are not me (except if you also type in my last employer, than there’s some job-related stuff), and I would like to keep it that way, but I would not want to have to keep my mouth shut on the internet for that purpose. I expect to have any type of weird conversation in a pub, but I do not expect it to go on record.
    And while some 20 years ago telephone books were not a threat to privacy, they could allow searched automated backwards searches and links to whatever else may be online about a person.
    Finally I think no one should have to justify not giving information because otherwise one might feel compelled to give all information except where one can come up with a good reason not to. And that just invites bad things.

  36. Bubble181 says:

    From a security standpoint, there IS good reason to try and not disclose your address. Mentioning your address once, anywhere, and mentioning a vacation or other time of absence (a con you’re visiting, family visit for a few days,…) can be the same as publicly saying “hey guys, this house is empty for the moment! Next week, nobody’ll be home!”. Nobody does that; quite on the contrary. Still, people who have the neighbours pull up/down the blinds and turn on lights with a timer to make it appear people are home, will still say on Facebook how happy they are going away for two weeks – not just to friends, but to friends-of-friends or even “everybody”.

    I know people don’t liek to think about it, but the internet is every burglar and stalker’s best friend. Trying to at least limit accessability to this kind of info is important, and I strongly believe it’s one of THE most important things we can teach our children. Teenagers and children these days are even more open about this sort of thing than adults, and most adults don’t even seem to realize the dangers.

    Privacy IS necessary for safety and security. Internet privacy WILL be one of the big battlegrounds in the coming decade(s). And we, the people, will probably lose.

    For those wondering: yes, there ARE statistics on how many homejackings, burglaries etc were by criminals who had “informed” themselves through other channels (also: “calling to see if you’re home” and such). It’s way, way higher than almost anyone not in the business thinks – well over half. Excluding non-digital ways reduces this number (because calling by phone is easier), but it’s quickly growing. Just wait for the first insurance company to take someone to court for it – I’m sure it’ll happen within the next few years. They’ll argue that publicly stating you’ren ot at home is similar to leaving valuable things visible in a parked car, and thus isn’t covered.

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