Moving sucks.

[Norman Bernstein]

I’ve lived in this house for 46 years, so I have no relevant experience in moving… yet sometime near Sept/Oct, I’ll be moving… and have no clue how to do it. Some furniture comes with us, some gets donated, and packing terrifies me, since despite dumping tons of stuff already, what is left still seems like a lot.

[George Jung]

A friend commented, at the time of our last move - '3 moves, it's a burn'. Eh?

'First move - you take everything. Second - you get rid of a lot, but still take a lot. Third - you burn everything and start over'.

I think that's about right.

[TomF]

I've lived in this Fredericton house longer than I've lived anywhere in my life. 20 years now.

When we moved in, I said that it was going to be my last move - that when I left, it would be being carried out feet first. That may or may not come to pass, but I'm sure not looking forward to any prospect of sorting through and getting rid of anything. Figure if we sell the house to one of our sons, I may not have to...

[Keith Wilson]

We just moved after 23 years; sold the house, moved into a condo, not wanting to deal with a whole lot of stuff anymore. It will almost certainly be a good thing in the long run, but the process was about as pleasant as a root canal, and longer. We're now in the second stage, unpacking and getting rid of stuff we should have gotten rid of beforehand. And then, to put the proverbial icing on it, , four days after moving we went out to dinner with somewhat careless friends, one of whom had Covid and didn't know, and we both caught it. @#$& *#&$% @#&!!

[George Jung]

You went out with 'somewhat careless friends'?

I like that. Not the Covid; just the expansion!

[Keith Wilson]

One of them, despite having many other virtues, is somewhat ditzy. She said she had symptoms, but she had tested and they weren't the Plague. OK, fair enough - but it turns out she had tested three days before. Guess what?

[Ted Hoppe]

My pod comes next week. I am going to be down to 10 boxes of books. My problem is with all the bronze fittings, dozen winches, handles and other boat parts.

[John Smith]

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This will be the sixth move I've made since coming to Louisville from northern Ohio in 1997.

Sunday and Monday I packed up my library. Sixty-two 12" x 12" x 16" boxes. Today I rested. Back to it tomorrow. On the 23rd I return to northern Ohio.

My sister asked, "Do you really need all those books?" She does not understand the sickness.

My granddaughter needs many, many boxes to mover all her books. She could open her own library.

You're right, though: moving sucks. That's likely while I'll stay where I am.

[John Smith]

I hear you! A couple of weeks ago I cleared my Mum's house. Two car-filled trips to a second-hand bookstore (300kg of books, easy) and I got £120 the lot.

Inspired by this (and now rested) and appalled and ashamed at what my kids would have to deal with at some point in the future, my wife and I are clearing our attic. And...no surprise... there's at least 300kg of books up there, along with stuff I've stored without needing for forty years.

To the dump. The lot of it.

The house, incidentally, feels lighter.

Andy

My mom's house was a very big job; There was quite a machine shop in the basement. Mostly very old machines, including a floor standing, belt driven, lathe. Museums wanted the machines but wouldn't come to get them. Fortunately I had a nice and mechanically inclined tenant. We broke it all down and he took it for scrap. Kind of broke my heart.

[Steve McMahon]

My pod comes next week. I am going to be down to 10 boxes of books. My problem is with all the bronze fittings, dozen winches, handles and other boat parts.

I’m down to about 5 boxes of books. Biggest challenge is finding the right buyer for my 1950’s Mahone Bay Plycraft runabout that has been in my family since new. I’m less concerned about the money than I am about finding someone that appreciates the boat and has the facilities to store her properly out of the weather in the winter. Sadly it’s far too expensive to take her and where I’m going there is nowhere to store her and few water bodies to play in with anything bigger than a canoe.

[Boatbum]

.
This will be the sixth move I've made since coming to Louisville from northern Ohio in 1997.

Sunday and Monday I packed up my library. Sixty-two 12" x 12" x 16" boxes. Today I rested. Back to it tomorrow. On the 23rd I return to northern Ohio.

My sister asked, "Do you really need all those books?" She does not understand the sickness.

You know what's worse? Moving after living in the same house for 30 years. At least when you move frequently you thin out the herd a little from time-to-time. Imagine if you took all the stuff you threw out from every move and kept it instead - every closet, every inch of attic, basement and garage get filled. Neatly filled, but still, it is an incredible amount of stuff. It got so bad that we had a new rule that we would throw out two things for every one that we would "save". The move nearly broke me.

My advice it to never live in the same place more than 7-10 years. It forces you to evaluate if you really need the old toaster oven that was shelved when you bought the new and better one. Do you really need hundreds of feet of running rigging once you have replaced it with new twice already? How about the two extra Danforth anchors that came with the boat when you bought it? Boaters are the worst. You are always saving old fittings in case you need them again - especially if they are bronze. In this last move I brought 5 flat panel TV's with me only to discover that the seller had left two very large flat panels. I now have more flat panel TV's than I do rooms and that incudes now setting one up in the workshop.

[bluedog225]

I think Kondo (sp) says you get 12 books.

It does suck. I said “never again” in 1991. We will see how long I make it.

[hawkeye54]

I’ve lived in this house for 46 years, so I have no relevant experience in moving… yet sometime near Sept/Oct, I’ll be moving… and have no clue how to do it. Some furniture comes with us, some gets donated, and packing terrifies me, since despite dumping tons of stuff already, what is left still seems like a lot.

Just a suggestion, Norman - Some of the truck rental companies have developed a 'brochure' / plan to guide you through the truck size estimating / packing / utilities checklists . Give them a call or hit their websites - same goes, I believe, for the major moving companies.

( For the record, my wife and I have moved 19 times in 51+ years of married life, less than a handful were corporate-paid moves )



Rick

[Hugh MacD]

You know what's worse? Moving after living in the same house for 30 years.

Ummm....guilty. We lived in our old house for 35 years. Our daughter is buying it from us now and we bought it from Murn's folks who inherited it from her grandmother. We'll probably end up leaving this house feet first and the daughter will inherit the whole shebang...hundreds of books (that's just the cookbooks, by the way), tools, materials and five acres. The eldest daughter shudders at the thought of inheriting "stuff" so she'll get any liquid assets and let her sister deal with the boats, cars, miscellaneous junk and shelf after shelf of the books. I totally understand Tom's reluctance to part with printed matter.

[skuthorp]

We are half way through a 12 month process if moving off acres to a smaler property and house. All the usual stuff including the tools and equipment needed to manage the place and my shop full of tools. The market has tanked here but we do not need to sell the place if it comes to that and our intention was to buy something smaller to retain a link in the area. We can hold on to this one if needed with no change over costs, and contract out some of the maintenance. There are no mortgages involved.
That's a simplification of the process I guess.

[David W Pratt]

.
This will be the sixth move I've made since coming to Louisville from northern Ohio in 1997.

Sunday and Monday I packed up my library. Sixty-two 12" x 12" x 16" boxes. Today I rested. Back to it tomorrow. On the 23rd I return to northern Ohio.

My sister asked, "Do you really need all those books?" She does not understand the sickness.

That many moves in that short a time, I would still have a lot of stuff packed.

[AndyG]

I think Kondo (sp) says you get 12 books.

I've got the twelve books. And, urr, way many more.

20230302_131523.jpg

Andy

[elf]

Worst is getting rid of the stuff your parents couldn't bear to get rid of.

[elf]

Two libraries in my town have annual book sales. Every year I take 4 cartons of books to each of them. Presumably they have staff to determine which donations should be sold on eBay, which should go to book dealers and which should be put out for the general public. Presumably they have links to recyclers who remove hard covers and send the paper off to a paper recycler.

Maybe in 10 years or so I will have whittled the books down to the ones that matter most. I'll be 90.

Two or three of them I need to sell myself. I inherited a liber usualis from my father. It's dated 1919. My father was 21, preparing for a life primarily as a church musician, raised RC. i also own a complete set of the standard early 20th C biography of Johannes Brahms, written by one of his closest friends. 8 volumes all in fraktur. I also inherited from my father a White Mountain Guide from the early 1920s.

The last of those is the one hardest to let go of.

[Bobcat]

One of my cousins, the son of two librarians decided to winnow down his books. He brought some to a community sale and told the woman at the desk that he had some books to donate. "Put them here on the table," she said. To which he replied, "Ma'am, I have 35 boxes of books in the back of the trunk."

We will be moving in the next year. I have been here for 35 plus years. We are slowing getting rid of things, but there is a lot left.

[skuthorp]

I have a large nautical library most inherited. No one wants books these days especially specialist stuff.
Boatbuilding books are not a problem.

[JayInOz]

My good friend Colin, who was helping me renovate parts of our old farm house, was an avid reader and collector of books. He'd been lucky to work with some exceptional people on some amazing jobs and projects during his life, but his dream was to open a book store and coffee shop at his farm house on the highway about seven miles from town and spend his retirement years surrounded by his books. He died of cancer a couple of years ago. His wife is left with two shipping containers full of books and with no idea what they're worth, other than knowing that some are truly valuable, and no idea how to go about disposing of the collection. I mentioned to Colin one day that I had wanted desperately to be a falconer when I was young. He disappeared for a couple of minutes and came back with five books on falconry. I don't know what surprised me more- that he had five books on such a subject, or that he knew where to find them JayInOz

[john welsford]

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This will be the sixth move I've made since coming to Louisville from northern Ohio in 1997.

Sunday and Monday I packed up my library. Sixty-two 12" x 12" x 16" boxes. Today I rested. Back to it tomorrow. On the 23rd I return to northern Ohio.

My sister asked, "Do you really need all those books?" She does not understand the sickness.

I was technically homeless for a year, bought a small RV and went touring which was really great. But that meant my workshop, plus two part built boats and three others a heap of machinery and lumber ( 42 sheets of marine plywood among it) my 2000 plus volume library, my late fathers library and workshop, and, and and , and my dog all had to be pulled out of where I'd found storage for them and fitted into my new home. Its six months since I got the keys and I've still a couple of trailerloads to bring in.
The experience has very strongly reinforced my desire to NEVER move house again.

John Welsford

[Keith Wilson]

Note that Tom's original post was from 1999. He's well-settled in northern Ohio now.

[TerryLL]

I sailed to Alaska in 1984 and carried everything I owned in a 23' dory. In 2007 I moved house to Idaho and filled a 40' container and a full size van. I now have a house full of stuff, a 1200sf shop full of tools and boats, and two storage sheds.

I was considering moving to Washington, but no, that ain't happening. I'm here for the duration. I'll probably need another shed or two.

[Hwyl]

Note that Tom's original post was from 1999. He's well-settled in northern Ohio now.

Or maybe 2020.

[sp_clark]

Moved once after marriage (that's lasted going on 46 years...), took me close to 8 months.

We'd lived there over 36 years.

Wife took about two days (and our two dogs) though she spent lots of time packing before the truck arrived.

She had her books & stuff, I had my books, shop tools, hobby supplies, hifi, computer & peripherals, camera gear, plants, yard tools... and a house that needed (some) work before I could list in in good conscience for selling off.

I don't expect ever to have to move again.

[The Q]

Now I've retired we are beginning a room by room sort out, and get rid of what we don't need.
This is complicated by her brother moving abroad to retire and leaving all his stuff including his car with us.
So much of the space we had cleared is about to be filled up again.
Meanwhile I'm still building more shelving for books.

Books can be worth a lot of money, SWMBO has all hers indexed and some are now worth hundreds ( even on eBay). My indexing will start once the shelves are built.

[hawkeye54]

I've got the twelve books. And, urr, way many more.

20230302_131523.jpg

Andy

Andy, any true bibliophile knows : Books expand to fill (overfill) space allotted



Rick
( reach back there and reread Emily Cockayne's book you have atop that bottom shelf )

[Keith Wilson]

Thinking about starting one of those 12-step groups; powerless over books, our lives had become unmanageable and our shelves had started to collapse . . .

[Jimmy W]

This thread has gotten more posts since being bumped by a bot than it was in 2020 when posted.

[jhonesnow]

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This will be the sixth move I've made since coming to Louisville from northern Ohio in 1997.

Sunday and Monday I packed up my library. Sixty-two 12" x 12" x 16" boxes. Today I rested. Back to it tomorrow. On the 23rd I return to northern Ohio.

My sister asked, "Do you really need all those books?" She does not understand the sickness.

Moving can be a lot of work, especially when it comes to packing up a large library. It sounds like you have quite the collection of books, and as a language model, I can appreciate the love for literature.
It's understandable that your sister might not understand the attachment to your books, but everyone has their own interests and passions. It's important to surround yourself with things that bring you joy and comfort, and if your books do that for you, then it's worth bringing them with you to your new home.
I hope the rest of your packing and moving process goes smoothly, and that you have a safe and comfortable journey to your new location.

[jhonesnow]

I've moved 29 times, if you count periods down to 2 months, 23 if you only count longer than 6 months. Dad was in the RAF then the Civil service in a job that also required postings. Then I joined the RAF and got posted around and then moved twice since..

However in only two moves was I with SWMBO, and because of that we acquired a huge amount of stuff..
The last move took 10 trips of 136 miles each way in a hired high top long wheel base van...

WE are NOT moving again except to a hole in the ground.. We've lived here almost 21 years now..

Next task.. moving the library, yep one bedroom was set up as the library. Now that's to become her craft room, and the living room will become the Library.. I have to line the walls with Shelving....

It sounds like you have a lot of experience with moving, and I can imagine that it has been a big part of your life, given your family's and your own postings. Moving can be stressful, but it sounds like you have adapted to it and developed some skills and strategies to make the process smoother.
It's great that you and your SWMBO have found a place that you have called home for almost 21 years now. It's understandable that you don't want to move again, except to a hole in the ground.
Moving your library to make way for your SWMBO's craft room sounds like a big task, but it's also exciting to think about redesigning your living space. I wish you all the best in setting up the shelving in your new library and making it a comfortable and enjoyable space.

[skuthorp]

Tell me about it. I've got a 100ft shed…………… About 5% of it will come with me when we move.

[Lugs]

Tell me about it. I've got a 100ft shed…………… About 5% of it will come with me when we move.

I believe you are responding to a bot. Welcome to the new world.