Get "The Skinny" on The Move (or The Skinny Guy Moves)

At the end of July, I moved out of my apartment that I shared with Loban and I moved back in with Molyneaux. We're back in the same general area where we lived the first time we were roomies, which is cool. I'm closer to work, Mark & Laura's, Mom & Dad's, church, and vball.

However, the move was poorly planned, because I blindly told my old apartment complex that I'd be out on the 31st. Bad idea, because it turns out that the 31st was a Thursday, which means that I had to burn a vacation day at work to move. Plus, instead of using giving myself a full weekend, I had to do it all in one day and go back to work the next day, most likely sore and tired. Smooth move, ex-lax. It also meant that not many people could help out. Catie (Molyneaux's lady) chipped in HARDCORE by:

1) Also taking the day off.
2) Showing up way early in the morning to help move my shit around...
3) with my parents, who she doesn't exactly know too well.
4) She brought her parents' giant pickup truck, Bessie the Beast.

She (Catie) rules. I still owe her for all that, but I WILL make good.

Meanwhile, Mom and Dad also performed saintly amounts of cleaning and lifting (respectively) to help me move out of my North Hills apartment that hot Thursday. They also rule. While Dad and I hauled, lifted, cajoled and packed things into (family friend Sean's Chevy truck)Big Red and Bessie (a match made in heaven, by the way), Mom continued packing my things into boxes and cleaning things that Loban and I had never even thought about cleaning.

After one major shipment to the new place that included both mega-trucks and Dad's Caddy all shoved fulla my toys and furniture and Gluten-Free food, we were largely done. With a big, sweaty hug and an even bigger "Thank You", we cut Catie and Bessie loose and kept packing for one final trip.

Mom cleaned so much that day that she made me promise to be better at keeping up with cleaning in the future. "At least once a week" was what she suggested. I talked her down to "Once a month, with her help". It could actually happen, but again...that remains to be seen.

Once we got to the new place, they saw how scuzzy the previous tenants had left it, and were pretty disgusted. Turns out, they'd been living there for SEVEN YEARS. Do you know how much crud accumulates on walls, windows, ceiling, carpets and doors in that amount of time?

An uncleanable amount. That's how much.

Oh. And they had cats. And you should know how I feel about those creatures by now...

So, even after cleaning and lifting for the whole day, my parents and I set to purifying my room and parts of the kitchen in my new place. Dad and I wiped down the textured walls with Spic n Span, as well as all of the door and window frames, the vents, windows, and window sills. (Cue Leon Phelps voice:) Uh, yeah... that was nayasssty.

Once we felt I might be able to breathe a minimal amount of cat dander in my sleep, Dad and I threw in the towel. Meahwhile, Mom had wiped out a bunch of cabinets in the kitchen, cleaned up the stove, and de-crustified the kitchen windowsill.

Long day, and there's much more cleaning to be done, to this day. I only just got my furniture in my room arranged as I want it to be this past weekend. I also just got around to vacuuming up the clumps of cat hair in the carpet on the stairs in the basement that the pro carpet cleaners left behind for us. The place is finally starting to feel more like home, now, and less like a place where cats used to live.

Now, I've been lugging some...items around from apartment to apartment since college. Some of these things have been proudly displayed and used, while being notoriously hated on by various people. Others have gone undisplayed or unused for quite some time. And it is with a heavy, but more mature, heart that I must say that some of these things... didn't make the move with me this time. Below is a tribute to the shit that got left behind.

Alcohol Souvenirs from The Tauz's College days at IUP. A meager display, but remember how much it takes to get me hammered... (I'm pretty sure that the Bud Ice bottle was the first beer I drank at the S.H.I.T. House.)


Did you know that a yearlong subscription to Maxim forms a picture of a hot lady when the spines are all lined up in order?


An assload of Entertainment Weekly magazines that got donated to the Ronald McDonald House recycling program.


Frog toilet seat cover that was a gag gift to me from Elana M., a friend, neighbor, and Retreat-goer.


A water-damaged old shoe rack that had acted as our magazine rack in the bathroom.


The beanbag chair that I got in high school because Wal*Mart sold them for cheap, and because Molyneaux had one, and I liked tie-dyed stuff. Also, this is one of the rainbow-colored items around my dorm room that, upon seeing them before he met me, caused Eep to think that the roommate he was about to move in with was gay.


DVD player/reciever that I bought with my Carrabba's cash-money. It busted after I'd owned it for less than 4 years. If you look closely, you can see a reflection of me bidding it a fond farewell.


This is my first toolbox. I got it as a gift from Mom and Dad in 2000. I almost tossed this thing, but then realized that it is only missing a functioning hammer and screwdriver. I ended up keeping it.


A friend gave me this as a Christmas gift in college, when I was going through my "I love everything Scooby-Doo" phase. This was a cookie jar that was actually pretty cool, for a while. It never actually housed any cookies, though. And it had Scrappy-Doo on it, so that kinda sucked. A nice gesture, but I probably should've gotten rid of this long ago.


Here are more things that I got as gifts during the aforementioned phase... sooo much Scooby stuff...




These are the rollerblades I found in the room that was to be mine at The S.H.I.T. House when we moved in. The dudes who'd lived there previously had been on the IUP ice hockey team, and apparently didn't want these anymore. Rick and I both used them a few times while we lived in Indiana. Also, during "The Night We Got Bored and Glued Shit Together Using a Leftover Tube of Caulk," I glued Yuengling caps to these babies. (I removed the caps before I got rid of them.)


An old printer and a slightly embarrassing collection of VHS tapes


This was the first lava lamp globe I ever owned, and I'm pretty sure Molyneaux gave it to me cuz he didn't want it, and I found them fascinating.


Another lava lamp that was gifted to me, this time from Mom and Dad.


This be-stickered item was my first stereo system. It was also the first big thing that I actually ever purchased with my own money. Sad to see it go, actually, but the CD player stopped working reliably years ago. Tape deck still works fine, though.


And finally, last, but in no way least: The Comfy Chair


This was a tough one, as you can tell from my expression below. Big Bro Jeff bought this at a yard sale for like, $5 in '97 or so. It was missing one back leg at the time of purchase. He brought it home and knocked off the other leg, so that it leaned waaaay back, but was solid and steady, and, luckily enough...ever so comfortable. I inherited it when Terry refused to let him move it into their place in Altoona. I loved this thing so much that I wrote my first radio script for my radio production class about it.


Many people openly hated The Comfy Chair, and for varied reasons. But they were all chicks, and they just didn't get it, I guess. The love between a man and his shitty possessions is a tough one to comprehend, and it is even harder to get over. But after one of the springs in its meager support system busted, and it had to be relegated to my room, it had never been the same character piece it once was. After saying that I'd fix it for more than two years, I never did. And so I decided that it was time to part ways. Below, is my last tender moment with my beloved Comfy Chair.


I'm seriously totally sad that I made this decision, but now it's gone. All this stuff is gone, but I'll always have the memories. (And now the Blaug entry about them.)