Moving

I have helped two friends move into the city, and it NEVER goes as planned. Last time we thought it was going to take 5-6 hours and it took 13!! One of hour of that was spent in the same area around K street driving in circles while we tried to navigate round-a-bouts and one-way streets.

Well, yesterday we were just trying to pick up one bed from one location but it somehow ended up lasting four hours. First we had to get to UHaul, where apparently they PRETEND it's only $30 and then tack on enough extras to make it $70. Granted, we didn't travel 50 miles so it ended up costing closer to $40, BUT STILL. On top of that, they wanted a local number in case we got lost (??). We thought ok, and gave them a number, which she then proceeded to call without warning us ahead of time!! So the person we listed got a lovely call from UHaul at 9am on a Saturday. Then at one point, the woman said, "And sign here for the contract please." My friend said, "I don't know what the contract says yet" (she hadn't had time to read it), and the woman looked at us like, why would you read the contract? and then said "sign here on the dotted line", as if we were causing trouble. Last time I checked, making sure your legal rights are protected was a good idea.

We finally get into the van and realize that we have an address but no directions and no map! So we end up navigating ourselves in a massive van through Washington DC based solely on where we think streets are laid out. Miraculously making it to our location, we then had to navigate a bed from one end of a long housing structure to the other end and down six floors and into our slightly-illegally-parked van. Then we have to again navigate ourselves to her new apartment.

Recapping the situation, the fact that it took four hours is not surprising, but seeing only a bed and a small lamp at the end of it made us wonder what we did during that whole time...next time my friends move I'm hiring someone to help them.