Moving
Jennifer Flaten

I hate cardboard. In fact, I hate all forms of paper in general. Wrapping paper, tied around a really nice housewarming gift is the exception.

It is official; we’ve moved into our new home and I have already christened it by scorching a pizza in the new oven, similar to launching a ship with a champagne bottle but you know, dorkier.

I am a good cook, I swear, it is just I have to get used to the new oven, but enough of my failings in the kitchen.

We are missing several key items. I still can’t find the remote for the DVD player, yes, this is a key item in our home, and no one has actually seen a cat since we opened their travel carrier and we have three.

Don’t worry they are here. The food bowls are empty each morning, so I know they are here somewhere plotting their revenge, no doubt. 

They did not, strong emphasis on the not, enjoy the ride. For the record, you can cram two chubby cats into one medium sized container. Although, they will exceed the stated weight limit--I won’t tell if you don’t.

There is a certain progression of unpacking; the first boxes unpacked, I carefully flattened and stacked neatly along with the paper used to wrap the breakable in a “to be recycled pile.” By the last boxes, I was stomping them into odd shapes. I was tossing them in the general vicinity of the recycling bin.

On the plus side, I am done with unpacking. That is, if you disregard the rather large teetering stack of unopened mystery boxes, which I am doing with a vengeance.

I figure everyone has plates and utensils for food and clean clothes, what more do they need? So what, if I can’t find any of the kids toys they can just play in a big pile of cardboard.

We were able to cram everything we owned, with the exception of the animals and the kids, into a huge moving van. Once stuffed with our precious belongings, our stuff, our crap, didn’t look so huge at all. In fact, it seemed to have shrunk to the size of a mini cooper.

Even then we still had to cram stuff in the car…for a while there I thought it was going to be a toss-up between the aquarium and the kids. You will be happy to know both fish and children fit; please don’t try this at home. Let’s just say the fish didn’t appreciate his taste of freedom.

Back to the mystery boxes, I have no idea what is in some of them and it isn’t because I didn’t label them I did, but, and this is embarrassing, we had so much cra…, err, stuff that I needed to reuse some of the boxes on a second trip.

The box labeled dishes doesn’t contain dishes. No, I have put all the dishes away--and what possessed me to buy a service for eight? Do you know how many total dishes that is?  The box contains, well that it is anybody’s guess. I think I will just leave them until someone complains they are missing something then I will open up a mystery box and see if it is in there.