Nathaniel

Shockey

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July 29, 2009

Six Cups of Coffee, and the Three-Hour Move

The day started as scheduled – wake up early after a reasonable amount of sleep, drink a few cups of coffee (six), eat a snack (coffee) and finish packing the final few items that kept getting swept aside. Then I sat in the apartment and waited for the movers to arrive.

Movers charge by the hour, with a three-hour minimum. The salesperson on the phone explained that if time of travel was less than 15 minutes, it would not be added to the total time. And so my wife and I planned this move down to the last second and penny. We had made the drive several times already, and it took a healthy eight minutes, so that wasn’t going to be a problem. And we boxed everything – books, appliances, games, family heirlooms, family pets, we even boxed boxes. This was going to be the easiest money these movers ever made – just a few thousand large boxes and some furniture. One way or another, we were getting this thing done in under three hours if it meant lugging a blue whale-sized upright piano down two flights of stairs by myself.

When the movers showed up, I looked at my phone and exclaimed, “8:48! And by the way, thanks for being here.”

There were three guys – two huge Mexicans and one well-built European guy whose accent I couldn’t place. He was a little arrogant and dismissive, so had I not taken five years of French in high school, I would have assumed he was from Quebec or something. His accent was thick, and with it, he’d strategically try to slip in things like, “Two rolls of tape are free, and the rest are extra,” or “time of travel is rounded up.” In other words, 13 minutes would be rounded to half an hour. That was not what the lady on the phone had said, and she never said anything about $4 rolls of packing tape. I kindly explained this to him, and he kindly explained to me with his large arms bulging out of his muscle shirt that what I said had no bearing on the situation. Sign here or I will crush you.

It should be fine, I thought to myself. How much packing tape would they need? We already boxed everything. As it turned out, these guys put tape on everything – layers upon layers of packing tape. I couldn’t tell my piano from my couch. They were all just huge lumps of packing tape.

The move was going smoothly until they got to the piano. All three of them nearly lost their lives. But after about 25 minutes of expletives and scratches to various movers and piano legs, they got my piano down the stairs and into the truck. We were ready to head to our new home, and the first half of the move had taken less than half of the three hour minimum. Excellent.

“10:07! Follow us and we’ll see you there.” He explained he’d have to drive slowly with all our stuff in the truck. Forget our stuff, was my thought. We’re getting there in less than 15 minutes. Let’s haul ass. The guy drove like John McCain on Ritalin. He was going about 50 miles per hour on the highway and about 20 in the neighborhood. Even still, we got there at 10:20.

“13 minutes. We made it.”

“No, it was 15.”

I nearly lost it.

“I checked the time as we started driving, and there’s no way that was a second over 13 minutes.”

It was also at this point that he told me they had used six rolls of packing tape. Despite his superior size and the fact that he was responsible for transporting everything I owned, I caught myself yelling at him. I’m reasonably sure my wife was impressed, and probably a bit concerned.

“I’ll sign this thing so you can quit talking to me and finish the job in less than three hours, and then I’m calling your boss. Here’s some freakin’ orange juice!” He never drank the 100 percent, not-from-concentrate juice, probably because he figured I’d poisoned, or at least spat in it. So I drank his orange juice and gave the tip to the Mexican guys to do with as they pleased. They were the ones who had broken their backs for us, not this non-French guy who was trying to break our bank.

I called his boss, who was not a moron, explained the situation, got the price I wanted, and in honor of the two movers we liked, was out to a delicious Mexican dinner that night with my wife and her parents.

It was the easiest move my wife and I had ever made together. Perhaps the next time – which will be our second – will be slightly less dramatic.

© 2009 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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