Simple Really

Eight years.

Eight years and probably a couple of weeks, in actual fact. That's how long I've been here in this flat. Seven with d. And today we handed in our notice to quit the place. Strange feeling, really - a combination of exhileration at the new adventure, pin-your-ears-back realisation at the notion that over the time I've been here, I've paid something like £67000 in rent, and yet take nothing of the place with me but its memories, and a kind of stirring sadness that comes naturally with any ending, even one as positively charged as this.

Today was going to be all about breaking open the Basement and clearing out the yearsworth of accumulated Stuff that it's been keeping conveniently out of sight till now.

As it turned out, there was a full day of prepwork to be done before we could even get the door open. Bookcase emptying, bookcase shifting, grocery relocation, vacuuming walls and ceilings and patches of floor that haven't seen the light of day in years, because they've been underneath or behind or above bookcase after bookcase of accumulated knowledge.

Now all that knowledge is piled up in boxes, stacked ready to fill, and then probably refill, the van that Sian texted to say was booked today. And so d and I worked on the preparation for opening up the Basement, and finally, as darkness fell, and I got on the bike, d opened it up.

A few minutes later, while I whined and bitched and tried to hit Sheryl Crow high-notes, slowly slogging along on the wretched bike, d came in...slowly, painfully, but full of smiles.

"I think it'll be fine," she announced. "There's a lot of stuff down there we can either choose to take, or choose to throw out. Simple really."

So, with a hallway now clear of all obstruction, a living room full of empty bookcases, and a bedroom increasingly devoid of space to breathe, we have now crawled into our respective couches. I'm about to force-feed some pain meds and some sleep meds into my girl (I tried getting her to watch Troy, which is pretty good as far as anaesthetics are concerned, but she still appears to be vexingly conscious), and make us sleep. Tomorrow...Tomorrow, we see how 'simple really' the biggest challenge bar probably the kitchen of this move will be.

Oh, and one additional note. It's been pointed out to me that I leave for work on Monday morning, and don't come home again till, in all probability, Friday evening - I'm out at a conference for three days. That means there'll be no official weigh-in this week, unless I can do one Monday morning, and go from there. Also of course, three weeks from now, everything we own, bar this computer and an air mattress, will be gone ahead of me, while I stay here for a week, to finish the year's work. So - that'll be another weekly weigh-in that goes unrecorded as we head in to Christmas, and probably the greatest of the Disappearing Challenges of the year.

Simple really.