Adventures in moving

There are some of you out there who resonate with this statement: I love my bed. If you, like many military families, have had the opportunity to move a lot, it’s quite a joyous occasion when the movers come with all your stuff and you get to resume sleeping on your bed. Since February 17 (the day we packed out), I’ve slept on one pull-out couch, one hotel bed, 3 friends mattresses, and a lovely air mattress. While I’m very thankful for the people who gave me places to lay my head, let’s just say I’m thankful to be back on my own bed.

When the packers come there are two other statements that go through your head: ‘This is like Christmas (as you unpack something great you forgot you had)!’ and ‘I didn’t think I had this much stuff.’ Moving brings on our natural urge to purge things as everything is out of the cabinets, drawers, closets staring you in the face. We’re making our pile.

The last bit of news from this move are the other ‘tenants’ of this house. On our first night in the house (since our stuff didn’t come till Saturday), we went ahead and moved our bags and air mattress into the house. 11pm, going to sleep, and suddenly TONS of racket happening on what seemed like inside and outside our house (things falling, breaking, shaking)–we both seriously thought someone was breaking into our house (ON OUR FIRST NIGHT!). Aaron jumped up and grabbed the nearest weapon and headed towards the source of the noise…I just stayed in bed unsure what to do. A few minutes later, the culprit–an opossum–was found and Aaron tried to catch it with his hands (this was not the smartest move since they bite). The failed attempt lead to the creature to crawl back under the crawlspace. The house came with a possum trap as our neighbors all told us ‘You’ll need this eventually.’ So, at 11:15 Aaron was setting the trap with apples and peanut butter. It took him a while to simmer down after all the excitement.

Fast forward to Saturday morning. The first night yielded no possum but the bait was gone, so the plan changed to tying the bait into the trap so it wouldn’t disappear without a culprit. We were up early Saturday going to pick up my parents at the airport and the movers were to come around 8:30…Aaron went to check his trap and there she was–a huge mama possum with babies in her marsupial pouch. Sick. I have officially traded Micronesian shrews (small, blind, shameful) for Texan possums (nasty, ugly, much bigger). Aaron waited for my father to arrive and they ‘disposed’ of the animal in some fashion not to be mentioned. Two nights later, we got another opossum and we called animal control this time (but they failed to pick the critter up). I’m glad Aaron is getting his ‘hunting’ fix…..well, kinda.

I’m sure this is making everyone want to jump and come see us right away. If you come, I promise you won’t have to bait, touch, or dispose of nasty critters. Hopefully the population will have decreased by then.