Moving

Our 4th England-versary

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Luggage Cart Full of Luggage

It does not really feel like a long time until you really start to think about it. Then it does start feeling like a long time. It is so misleading thinking 4 years is not a lot if you are in your 40’s. Looking at the photos of us getting ready to move and I realise how little the girls were compared to now. The cliche is true. So much has changed and yet so much is the same.

4 years ago we were scared and excited. We had so much to do. So much to explore even beyond the physically just getting here. Today there is still so much to explore. We are still excited to be living here. So much so that this year we bought the house we were renting. M called it perfectly 4 years ago when we were looking at houses on our Thanksgiving week scouting trip in 2017. Of the 12-15 we looked at she flagged what became ours as the one she was most interested in. In the end it was down to this house and one other. The location and school options on our house won out. It is why we initially inquired with the former owners to purchase it right around a year ago near our 3rd anniversary here. We were delighted they were interested in selling. We looked around our neighbourhood for other options earlier this year. There were a few possibilities however when it became clear we could have the house we were in we knew our choice.

Lockdown’s and pandemic’s have slowed our exploring. Just not our desire to continue to explore this new country and continent. We are still excited for 4 more and many more years to come…

A small story about the luggage cart pictured that can almost summarize a big difference between NY & London.

Those carts in JFK are like $5 a piece to rent. They are for going from the car drop off to the check in counter. A trip that is maybe 2 minutes.

At Gatwick or Heathrow (in this story we arrived in Gatwick) the same carts are free. On top of that there are little kid carts throughout arrivals for one or even two kids for you to put your kids in for the very long walk to customs. Once you get through customs to get your luggage you can get a free cart for the much longer walk than in JFK for your luggage.

A Test of The HorcruxNet

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When explaining my Resilio personal cloud setup to someone at work they replied that i have my own personal Horcrux minus the killing.  I liked the idea so I think i am naming my Resilio backup setup HorcruxNet.

The network is having its biggest test this week in its 3 or so years of existance.  I am moving.  Movers are packing up our stuff tomorrow.  That means i am putting my electronics into “Cleaning Lady Safe Mode”.  it is what i used to have to do when our cleaning lady showed up.  I would unplug everything so she didn’t mess stuff up.  She did a few times.

I have expanded my network to have replica or partial replica copies on my laptop.  I also have 3 working remote sites thanks to friends and family hosting some nodes.  While we move and my two primary full nodes (my Synology) and mac mini) will be offline for about 4-5 weeks.  During that time my remote hosts will hopefully keep humming along.  With my home network offline i doubt there will be much changes however since my laptop has a partial replica if i do make changes it will propagate out.

I love a nice well configured computer system if I do say so myself.

What of Our Stuff Gets to See England?

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For a few months we were not sure if this move was can actually happen. The waiting turned into now let’s hurry up and getting stuff done. One of the big things is figuring out how we are getting all of our stuff across the Atlantic. MC’s been doing a lot of purging as we are decluttering the apartment. That obviously will only go so far. Once we decide what we do want to take with us we need to find movers in the US and the UK as well as shipping container options.

This is one of the areas that still unknown to us. I need to find a company that I want to work with that is reasonably priced. I know it takes several weeks for stuff to move so we need to get a better understanding of our timeline before we sign any firm commitments. I foresee some more research in my near future on this topic.

The purging of stuff has been easy and difficult both at the same time. There are some things that were just not sure if we want to part with. Or one of us is not sure. Then there’s stuff that we both looked at go yeah that’s being donated somewhere. Then there’s things that we probably shouldn’t move but we kind of want to.

The kids beds for example a really nice and my mom got them for us. On the other hand it’s the perfect opportunity to upgrade the girls to bunkbeds that they want. Other furniture in the girls room is in decent condition and it probably will last so working to take it with us. Our dressers on the other hand are from IKEA. They are in great shape however I believe they were the ones that were recalled for safety hazards so I don’t think they’re going to make the cut on what we take with us. Our Tempur-Pedic bed, yes it’s coming with us. Man I like that bed.

Items like our coffee table I have waffled a lot about. It’s a fantastic table that I got when I was single. It’s got a hydraulic under it that lifts it to turn it into a dining room table. The challenge with it is its glass so the kids and scratched it a little. It also has sharp glass edges at the corners that I’ve cut myself on. Since T was born we have wrapped it in childproof patting. For that reason I thought we should probably not take it with us. After some back-and-forth we agreed that we will see us we can use it as a dining room table at least initially. It’s always good as a backup in case we have company as well. We do not plan on taking our dining room table even know it’s been an MC’s family while. The problem is since it’s been in her family while it’s pretty old. It barely made the move into our current apartment so shipping it halfway across the world isn’t going to really happen.

Our bar, yes it’s coming with us. I don’t know why I need to even talk about it. I did read somewhere that you can’t ship alcohol so at some point I will need to have a bunch of friends over and drink everything that we have. Refilling that with liquor in England feels like it’s going to be expensive.

My computer table. I awesome, awesome computer table. I wanted to go with us. MC made it clear in the past she just wanted to go. Final ruling is still unknown.

I thought a lot of the electronics could just get an adapter and work however one of my friends at the office said I need to be careful and check. My TV that is in perfect condition even though it’s four years old is TBD on if he can come with us. My computers should be fine with an adapter. Apparently our vacuum cannot come and likely our appliances too. I probably have about $300 in power strips that will also need to be given away since no be useless when we get there.

Now that I’m thinking about what stays and what goes not really sure about our couch. MC and I have actually had a conversation about it however I can’t remember what we said we were going to do. On one hand the couch a nemesis of mine. When it’s hot out and I sit on it some of the leather top layer has been known to come off on my clothing when I stand up. You would think I would have learned by now. You would think, but I haven’t. I personally do not want that couch to ruin clothing on two continents so I have the check if were taking it. The big easy chair that goes along with it is in better condition so we might take it however I don’t want the color of the chair to dictate what color the new couch is.

As I’m writing this I realize I need to make a list of big-ticket items that stay versus go.

I am Engaged

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Today was a huge day for me. It was the day I moved into M’s apartment. We had been planning to move in together since mid April but with our planned vacations in May it really wasn’t feasible to plan a move until June. i had been packing for weeks. I was very excited for the move but also a bit nervous since it was my first time moving in with someone since college. That wasn’t the only reason for being nervous. With all the moving craziness aside (and there was a decent amount of it) I also proposed to M.

She knew I was thinking about it. We had talked about it. We went to do some research at a jeweler while we were in DC. She also knew i went with my mom to the jeweler last weekend to look for a ring. I dropped a little mis-direction earlier in the week when I told M that i didn’t find anything I liked when in fact I found the perfect ring. I was originally going to propose one weekend in July if we went away. My sister gave me the idea of doing it when we moved in, since she wouldn’t be expecting it. i thought about it a lot and had a great idea on how to do it, so all I needed was the ring.

My mom brought that to me yesterday since I couldn’t get back to the jeweler before the weekend.

The proposal was very simple. I was only really nervous when i tried to run through what i wanted to say in my head before hand. Otherwise i was surprised that i wasn’t totally going crazy.

Once the apartment was in decent shape we got dressed to go out to dinner and celebrate our finishing the move. Before we went I gave her a huge hug and said there was only one way for this day to be any better. At that point I went to go down on one knee. What was funny was M wouldn’t let me go from the hug so I brought her down halfway to the ground before i got her to let go and then I pulled out the ring to propose. She said yes obviously or else I wouldn’t be writing about it now. My mission was a success and she was totally caught by surprise.

We then went out to celebrate our moving in and the engagement at the great sushi place by the apartment.

The Waiting For Approval

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Friday I went looking for an apartment again, and I found something I loved. It was in my price range. Near the subway, had a doorman, and even had a health club and pool in the complex. Basically everything I wanted and more. I was surprised to find I could afford what I got, in Manhattan. I didn’t think it was possible.

I signed papers last friday. I brought my deposit of a first month’s rent and the security deposit. I now await final approval. The building needs to finish running my credit check. I am not worried about that, but I still don’t have a definitive yes or no yet. That is what drives me crazy.

I am ending up eating the cost of a deposit I put down on a place on Tuesday. I am not happy about that, but if I ate the $400 deposit, I can goto the nicer place. The original apartment I tried to get had a small bedroom, and the building was not as nice. I think I am definitely upgrading in my choose.

I am very excited. I heard good things about the location and the building. It is a small world since Mark from work also lives in the same building, and Molly who used to work with us also lives there. So far I have heard only positive things from people that have lived there.

The commute will be about 20-30 minutes. On the long end of what I wanted to do, but it is all one train. And the train stops close to work and to the new apartment. It looks like there is places to eat and buy stuff nearby also.

My issue is that I have to wait till July 15 to move in. It saves me from paying a full month of double rent, and I am happy about that, but I want to get the move over with already. I have been wanting to do this since late April. I like to move fast on stuff like this. Oh well. For now I can just plan and prepare for the move.