Tuesday, December 25, 2007

Dust Bunnies

So how's the move going?

Shaddap.

It's not. Or, rather, it is, sort of. On Thursday, I'll meet at noon with the heating people to figure out how to make the gas radiators work (and maybe have them check the stove to make sure it's okay), and then a truck should appear with a couple of students with a moving firm carrying two sofas I inherited from the sad closing of the McClatchey Papers' European bureau. So I'll have two couches in the apartment, and nothing else.

Yet. Clearly I have to get stuff out of here, but I made a couple of disheartening discoveries along the way. One, I didn't have as many boxes as I'd thought. And, with the current five-day holiday weekend in full roar, no way to get more. Two, once I did get some stuff in boxes, I didn't really have any place to put the boxes. So filling more of them doesn't make sense yet.

The phone gets transferred on the 2nd, probably (I'm waiting for confirmation from Deutsche Telekom...stop laughing), so it'll make sense to have moved in at least partially by then. I won't need most of the books and CDs yet, so I'm thinking a partial move over this coming weekend, followed by a fuller one later.

But today, I'm going to do next to nothing about any of this and relax and blog and try to digest this deep-fried Hungarian thing I got at the Weinachtsmarkt over by the nearly-destroyed Palast der Republik. That alone should take most of the rest of the day. Oh, and maybe throw a few more things into boxes. I can't not do that, as long as I actually have boxes to throw stuff in. Where they go, well, I haven't figured that out yet. The bathroom is full of boxes, and I have to get rid of them before I can put more in there. There's no room for more.

It's like working out a puzzle, only with some handicaps built in. For one thing, I've developed arthritis in my right knee as the weather got colder. For another, after hoisting heavy boxes, I discovered something: I'm almost 60, and I'm not as capable of sustained exercise as I once was. It was eleven years ago that I moved in here, and I've acquired a lot of stuff -- mostly books and records -- in the meanwhile. Getting them in was easy. Getting them out will be far less so. And figuring out where to put them, even in an apartment with one extra small room and an overall ten-square-meter gain on this one, won't be easy.

I wish I could push a button and have it done. But I can't. Stay tuned.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ed, good luck on the move. I've been in Berlin 2.5 years and this is our first Christmas here. Tried to go out for an afternoon Christmas Eve pint and everything was shut! Anyway, makes a change from UK.

As for moving, done it once and wouldn't again. It's not just the move and the unending hassle with T-com. It's the trickle costs afterwards that come all sorts of weird government bureaus. Enjoy Christmas and keep blogging.

Marie Javins said...

I moved in April, and I'm still unpacking, and still stunned at the amount of crap I've acquired over the years.

Anonymous said...

Ed
Thanks for another year of extraordinary blogs, revealing not only the nooks and crannies of Berlin but the unvarnished details of your personal life. Sometimes I think I’m reading Henry Miller or Jack London, other times vintage Egon Ronay. I’m hoping that, during the coming year, we see a reversal of global warming, peace breaking out all over the world, a cool President in the White House, the development of a car which runs on water, the invention of a lose-weight-overnight pill, and that you find yourself happily ensconced in the south of France. Well, at least the last one might come true – let’s hope so.

Anonymous said...

I'll echo anonymous & also thanks for the inadvertent travel/food tips (visited the park at Moabit this past trip based on your comments a few months back)...maybe next visit I'll have to bring you some real corn husks from my local mexican market for your tamales.

don't envy your move however...when I last moved 4 years ago my first words upon completion were "I'm never doing this again...I'll die in situ before I move again"

Anonymous said...

Hope you moved beyond the sofas in the meantime and will be back on line soon - can't cut you off forever...
claudia (who had a slightly bigger place to empty, remember?)

Anonymous said...

Gosh, Ed, that's the nicest anonymous comment I've ever seen. I too hope 2008 works out brilliantly and, significantly, at least a billion times better for you than 2007. I like your idea of killing ghosts. Hope they're all now resting in an uncomfortable peace.

ANYWAY, when are we due over to help you lug things in, around and out of boxes?