March 10, 2005
Dear Everyone:
Moving! One of my favorite pastimes. I put it right up there with getting a root canal.
This weekend is the one where we finally move into our new “space standards” office cubicles. We were advised to pack everything in the special moving boxes, supplied by the company that won the contract for all this. Some people were even told exactly how many boxes they were allowed to use.
In other cases, we were simply “advised” as to the number of boxes. If you were moving into an 8X8 cubicle, configuration B, the most you could expect to store away would fill about 8 boxes. That’s one overhead cabinet, three file drawers and two smaller “desk” drawers. Any more than that and you wouldn’t have room for it anyway, so now might be the time to cull through your stuff.
There have been many “cleanup days” in the building that “Jeannie” calls “Big Rabbit 3”. Nevertheless, it was only this week that some people really started to take in the fact that we are moving seriously. Suddenly they were dumping everything but the kitchen sink into the big dumpsters.
And just as quickly, someone else was pulling things out to be salvaged. “Look at this great frame! Who threw this out?” (I saw the very same person this afternoon dragging a huge cardboard-box-on-wheels out to her car to fill it with “treasures”.)
My situation was a little bit different. For the past several months, my office has been in “Pleasant Hill” while my job has been in “Pleasanton”. I have been a “dual-office person.” So I had two offices to box up. In “Big Rabbit 3”, I filled one box with books that actually belong to the Mt Diablo chapter of ARMA. (We haven’t had a chapter librarian in years. I stored the books in “Livermore” until they threatened to charge me “rent”. Then I moved them to “Big Rabbit 3.” If necessary, I can dump the whole box on the chapter president. She has a large garage in “Pinole”.)
I filled another box with more books, some of which might be duplicates of ones I had in “Pleasant Hill”. The duplicates, if any, can be tossed or donated to the company library.
I filled another box with the box of CD’s that I had brought to “Big Rabbit 3” from the “Pleasant Hill” office, since I was never there to listen to them. Likewise the “boom box” that I used to play them. Of course, there will be no playing of CD’s, or radios, unless you use headphones, in the new “space standards”. I plan to bring the “boom box” home, but it was easier at the time to just put it in a box and let the movers take care of it for now. I already have a portable CD player, with specialized ear-phones, ready for the new space.
In all, I had six boxes filled and ready to go by
nearly
I also brought home two moving boxes filled with stuff I either meant to keep at home or didn’t trust the movers to handle. Plus one antique tea trolley. Did I mention it was about 80 degrees in “Big Rabbit 3” yesterday? The last things I packed were two electric fans.
This morning, I packed my “Pleasant Hill” office.
I already had three boxes packed from our single “cleanup day” a
couple of weeks ago. This
time I kept the tape dispenser out until the last minute, but still had
to borrow scissors and a pen.
I was expected at a 25th Service Anniversary luncheon
at
So when I get to the new space on Monday, there will be 13 boxes waiting for me. Plus the stuff I brought home to bring in to the new cubicle.
Murphy’s Law of Moving: “What you lost in the first move, you find in the second move.”
Love, as always,
Pete
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