We Trashed-Out
This is a long-form response to this discussion on Metafilter (since I don’t want to sign in to yet another website this AM)
At 5:30AM August 22nd 2007, after a couple weeks of selling and giving away our stuff, and loading a trailer over the past two days we thought that it would take us about 2 hours to finish getting rid of the stuff in our house. Over the next 6 hours we would struggle to get the last remains of our lives out of the town house we had lived in the entire time we live in the United States. Hopelessly in debt and under the schedule gun, we had left the house empty but dirty. We had filled entire dumpster with what we couldn’t give away along with the area around it (with beds and furniture) and a trailer incorrectly filled with the most precious things we could bring with us. We had sweated through the last remaining bits of our home and still had several hundred miles of driving ahead of us, after my last “day” at the office.
When we did the same in Canada march 1st 2002, we had used the 14 foot long truck from U-Haul and had still left most of our furniture behind to be taken by a nice polish family, along with several computers, a whole kitchen and a whole hall closet full of “stuff”. When we finally arrived in the United States, we had only what we could carry in our luggage with us. It had taken us 8 hours to clean out our house and the friend I had promised to pay for coming to help us showed up after 7 of them. We had needed his help badly and he expected to be paid the full amount for his minimal work. I was too tired to disagree and he happily took his money after doing almost nothing. He was unemployed at the time, having lost his job in the same downsize that had taken my entire office out.
When we moved into the Apartment we would eventually leave in 2002, we had the contents of one room. It was all we had in the world. Enough “stuff” to fill one room. My old roommate cleaned out the bits we had left behind and gave it to me in March of 1998. We sat in a restaurant and shared the last meal we ever would, I haven’t seen that roommate again, and neither have most of the people we both knew. In this case, Jen and I trashed out a friendship.
When I left my first apartment in 1996, I left behind all of the goods that my parent’s had gifted to me to make apartment life better, my desk, my furniture, cutlery, a vacuum cleaner, dishes, a microwave and random things. All left, all listed with prices and resale vales to cover a bill my old landlord had given me for a backed up toilet. 80 dollars. The landlord had rejected the notion that I be allowed to have Jen stay overnight or on the weekends, she was living with me, but the landlord had wanted her to pay rent while sleeping in my one room. She moved into her own place, but visited frequently, the landlord felt she was over enough to pay rent (how many times have you heard that line from a parent) and so he actually called the police over it. The police asked me if I wanted to charge the landlord with harassment and urged me to move. I moved.
When we move on, we leave some of our stuff behind, its inevitable. We live anywhere long enough and we leave an indellible mark, beyond the stains, on a place. That townhome in Eugene might not have the pencil marks on the underside of the counters anymore, but it probably still feels like a home that as loved. When I leave the condo i live in now, it will probably feel like leaving home again. Sometimes a trash-out is the only way to say goodbye to home.
I know the pain of a Gizmodo Editor
How my wife castrated my DVD collection
I know Mark feels. When we moved down to the states, I had to save space so I moved all of my DVDs into big CD wallets and threw out a number of VHS tapes (but put some into storage at my ‘rents).
When we were moving back we decided to sell the DVDs that we weren’t going to watch again and still ended up with three boxes of DVDs.
I don’t think I could part with the cases now though, I like the idea of displaying all of my DVDs on big shelves where we can easily pull them and watch at our leisure. Add to that my 5 disc platter player and you get nice easy viewing of whole DVD sets and so on.
I guess what separates me from Mark is that it was my decision to castrate my collection.
Garage Sale Post-Script
Hippies Suck.
Rain Sucks.
The DVD Store ripped us off
The Book Store Loves my Graphic Novels
I am still about 200 dollars short.That is all.
Yep, rain. As predicted.
I nearly called off even going out there (I wish I did, as it would have saved us a ton of effort moving all that crap around)
It started raining before we went out, I asked them to move the damn sale into the gym. Everyone’s stuff got wet.
I sold all the DVDs and Books, and m,ade around 300 bucks for it. I should have made 500, but I couldn’t get a fair price for my dvds.
Jen and I fought a bit over her driving, but I think I was just frustrated and lashing out.
Oh well.
More Moving Stuff
I’m apparently half-way sight-challenged.
I’ve been using Craigslist to look for a new apartment in Toronto (and BC) but not for jobs.
I ended up applying for a few jobs via craigslist today.
d’Oh.
Moving Blues Part Two
I spent some time today stacking up Books (Graphic Novels Really) for sale. About 20-25 of them I think, maybe 30. I hate doing this stuff, it’s like giving away bits of me. I know they are just things, and that my memories matter; but I spent time and energy getting these things, I don’t want that to be wasted.
Due to the changes around the office, everything I’ve worked for over there is starting to slip into pointlessness. I don’t train any more, I don’t really contribute to the whole pie, except through the strenuous document writing process. Don’t get me started on All Times Garbage. I can’t imagine someone spent money on that crap.
Ah, what a gripe fest.
The weather looks nice for this weekend, that should be great.
I’m looking for work in Burlington, Ontario right now. I hope I get a good job.
LifeStream
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
Full Day over, stumped by a copy/paste error in the afternoon
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
New blog post: For Rememberance Sake and SSH in the Future http://tinyurl.com/6g2zbm
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
HTOP is the Shizz, that is all.
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
New blog post: Racist of the Week: Sad Bastard BNP Member http://tinyurl.com/5kcsdt
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
I had to use a MAN page to resolve a question and consult Kernel notes to verify something, truly this is a golden nerdy age.
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
Good Morning, took ages to get going today, hopefully the flywheel is up to speed now.
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
On the phone praying to the Insurance Gods and listening to the same 4 songs over and over again...and again
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
On the phone praying to the Insurane Gods and listening to the same 4 songs over and over again...
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
My Question is: Will Jello Biafra be okay with Obama "Not" walking to his inauguration? The constant threats hove got to considered.
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Posted a tweet on Twitter.
Tragic and Entertaining - Tradgetaining http://tinyurl.com/5l75gl
