1. Your entire life fits into two or three suitcases. Easy.
2. You have trouble filling out the current and previous residence sections on a credit application. “Well, I’m living in a guest house right now, and before that I lived with a friend, and before that I rented a room from a girl on Craigslist for a few months, and then before that I lived with someone I was dating, and then there was that one sketchy apartment with the cockroaches…”
3. The post office mail forwarding can’t keep up with you, and you get calls from lots of people saying they have bits and pieces of your mail.
4. You’re not sure which zipcode all of your different credit cards are connected to and sometimes can’t validate them at the gas station.
5. You’re an expert at throwing things away so you don’t have to pack them.
6. You’ve never lived near a bar/coffee shop/restaurant long enough for the servers to know your name.
7. You’ve never been able to order those cute little return address labels because they only come in rolls of 250+
Phew. You know what? I never thought I’d say this, but I’m tired of moving. Tired of packing up every 6-8 months and going from one place to another. Not having a local group of friends and a stable life is exhausting, and I realized that the only reason I’ve been moving so much is because I’ve been too terrified to commit to one single place.
Because committing would mean that, gasp, I’d actually have to try to make it work there, instead of just falling back on “oh, it’s okay that I don’t know too many people here, I’m leaving soon anyway.”
I guess I’ve just always associated moving with spontaneity and travel, two things I adore. But I realized that I can be even more spontaneous and travel just as often if I put roots down and have a home base for all of my shenanigans. And I can throw dinner parties! And cocktail parties! And costume parties! The entertaining possibilities are literally endless.
So after the huge wow-I-need-to-stop-moving-every-other-day epiphany, the next question was: where do I settle down? I thought about Florida, about Washington D.C, about possibly back to New York (all for different reasons), until I realized “wait, I love California! I just don’t love living in Thousand Oaks, because as safe and bubble-like as it may be, and as nice and easy of a place as it is to raise kids, I, um, DON’T HAVE KIDS. And am BORED out of my MIND.”
Enter the Nicole Moves to Santa Monica Plan. Gorgeous weather, beaches, shopping, restaurants, night life, the ability to do things without getting in the car? Perfection. I now have constant images of getting up early and running on the beach (which, although I won’t be able to afford to live too near the beach, are still comforting images). And running on the beach means needing great music to run to, and great music to run to means needing an iPod shuffle. 
Wait, I already have an iPod shuffle! But maybe you don’t? Enter now to win today’s prize: an iPod shuffle (your choice of color!) by telling me your best or worst moving related story, or by giving me a tip for life in Santa Monica. Ooo, or by promising to visit me and attend my costume wearing, cocktail drinking, dinner parties!
{ 49 comments… read them below or add one }
ooooh! have fun in Santa Monica!
My worst moving related story: in 2007/2008, I spent a wonderful year living in Scotland. At the end of my time there, I packed most of my stuff in boxes to ship back to the states, and packed two suitcases to take with me. However, on my way home, I flew through Heathrow and they lost my suitcases for 2 whole weeks. Thus, when I landed, I had only the clothes I was wearing. And, my cousin’s wedding was in 2 days. The dress I had planned to wear was, naturally, lost with my bags.
In the end, it all worked out. British Airways reimbursed me for the money I spent buying some basic clothing (and another dress) and my luggage eventually arrived unharmed, if slightly musty smelling.
Also, I already have an iPod as well, so don’t need to be put in the mix for a shuffle.
Why do you move so often? Your finished school, right? I’m happy that you are going to settle! I’ve never really moved. Just once to college, and back 4 months later because I hated living there!
My moving experiences pale in comparison to yours, though I did move from MA to NC for no real reason, back in my 20s. And then I moved back! I know, wow huh? So I think I’ll go for the tip.
It can be easy to feel like you’re never going to fit in to a certain place. Figure out what your comfort level is, what challenges you about a new place, and set a goal to do whatever it is. Whether it’s exploring new areas, talking to people in parks, trying new restaurants on your own, tell yourself that you’ll do whatever it is twice a week, or ten times a month, or every full moon, or something.
And do blog about it! Even the worst stories make great blog entries … there’s always a silver lining!
Ooh! I don’t have a particularly horrible moving story, but when I moved in and out of my apartment in NYC, it was flat out awful because I lived on the 5th floor walkup. Enter lots of pain and suffering. Also, I love costume parties.
Best moving story? Hauling ass from across the ocean to the US when I was 10…Leaving behind basically EVERYTHING but two suitcases full of clothes…when I was 10.
Why do you move around so much?
Does it count if you’ve already heard the story?
I’ve got a bit of a combination of #2 (trouble with current/previous residence) and #4 (trouble with cards tied to old zip code). In high school, we decided to do the whole “we can’t afford to live here so let’s sell the house without having a place to move to” thing, which was actually kind of awesome. But this was at the same time that I got my driver’s license. Obviously this poses a problem for the whole “what is your address?” question. So, knowing neither of my technically current addresses would be relevant in a few weeks slash months, I did the only thing I could think of — post office box. And they let me. So now, eight or so years and five or so residences later, my license says that legally I live inside a post office box, and one 30 miles away to boot.
I suppose the irony is that last year in New York, I lived in a space roughly equivalent to that of a PO box.
worst moving idea: “Lets move back near our parents so they can see their grandchildren more often.” yeah, we hate it here and we don’t have kids. After 3 years of trying, we’re pretty much giving up. Talk about counting the chickens before they’re hatched…. plus our parents can visit. Its not like we were living halfway across the world (we were 6 hours away and are now 1 hour away… and we don’t see them any more often)!!
i wish i had ipod shuffles to give away, because that means i’d have one!
my worst moving story includes my whole life. house to house as a kid (literally, over 10), then off to college in grand rapids, then to iowa afterwards to live in a great apt for a year, then moved to a house (finally I could put 1 address down on everything and know i’ll be there for awhile! – but not) – because then we moved to alabama for a year. and now we’re back in iowa. and now we’re planning to move to switzerland or DC or Seattle, but we’re not staying here! so…i totally am picking up what you’re putting down. settling would be nice. 
(sorry for the book)
Have an amazing time!! I agree about frequently moving – it drains you more than it recharges you, at least eventually.
My worst moving story might be a little tame, but on the day I was moving into my first apartment instead of transferring my phone to the new apartment our phone/cable company disconnected all other phone/cell phone/TV/internet coming into my parent’s house other than my telephone! Everyone’s cell phones and everything died, and then the company tried to make me wait 3 weeks to have my home phone transferred to my new place.
I definitely left home with a bang.
Have an awesome adventure!
gah. i. hate. moving. i have moved 3 times in 4 years, but you know the really cool part? it’s been within a three block radius. wait, is that cool or totally lame? when i moved out of the dorms when i graduated from college, i moved in with my best friend from college and the gay boy she lived with already. we had a cute little 3 bedroom house at 944… let’s call our street name Oak. so i don’t get stalkers. then, cute gay boy decided to go live in a brand new condo with his cousin. couldn’t blame him, so my friend N moved in with us. that lasted all of a summer when she decided she couldn’t afford the $190 (yes.) rent she was paying. i know. insanity. so then bff and i moved one block over and one block up to a two bedroom (vowing that the only people we could ever live with until we were married were each other) at 1212… um… pine street. yes. pine. ok then. at this time, i decided i was going to move to nashville tn in the summer of 07 — two years after i graduated college, and that bff’s boyfriend’s sister would move in to my room. things happened, money got too tight, i didn’t move. so then there we are, stuck looking for a 3bedroom, when one of bff’s many cousins tells us his girlfriend wants to move to our town. soooo we start thinking about the possibility of a 4 bedroom. and we find one. at 1201 oak. totally not kidding. a block and a half from our two bedroom on pine, 2 blocks from our original 3 bedroom on oak.
so that’s where we live now. minus bff’s boyfriend’s sister, because she sorta went nuts.
the end.
I hate moving, too! The summer I graduated from college (and the year following), I moved SEVEN TIMES. It’s a long, sordid tale, that ends with the moral: Don’t rent from a shady landlord, even if he is your friend’s father and the rent is cheap.
The moves were all within the same metro area, but like you, I had mail strewn about all over the place…quite literally, before things settled down.
Then, after I moved in with my bf at the time (hubby now), we moved to a different state. After we got married, we moved once, and that was over 8 years ago.
I don’t foresee a move in our near future (knock on wood), and that’s just fine with me!
I’ve done lots of moving too, although rather than from one place to another, it was generally a lot of back and forth, dorms to home. We did the Montana to Minnesota thing about four years ago as a family. Recently, I did the Minnesota to Tennessee thing. Best. Move. Ever.
Only, I stayed over night in Chicago on the way and nearly got stuck there because I had so much fun.
And I’ve already written this story
http://courtney903.blogspot.com/2009/01/real-thing.html
My worst moving related story is the one i end up going to two different schools during my first grade. ( Yep, two different towns, different teachers, different kids… and i was 6 and did i mention i was in first grade?) And then my parents got me moved for the next year, and the next, and the next and so on…
I literally NEVER went to the same school for two years running. seriously.
I’m now 21 and i have moved 13 times in my life.
The good part? It has actually given me the confidence to think that i can make friends with anyone, however “different” they may be.
the only moving story I have is when my parents and I moved from NJ to NC in 2006 and it took us a FULL YEAR before we were completely unpacked and settled.
it’s partly because we moved from a smaller house to a bigger house and so some of the boxes we didn’t touch nor realize we had until late into the year.
good luck with the move!
Good luck with moving! I’m restless and tend to get bored in one place after a little while, so your list is all too familiar. I’ve moved four times in the last two years, plus done a lot of extended house-sitting for friends and thus been able to sample life in other parts of town as well. I love it – there’s something about getting to know new areas, people, and town personalities. But I do hate the packing…
When you get more than 3 suitcases worth of stuff, my advice is hire movers. Best decision I ever made! Besides, there is not enough pizza and beer to convince my friends to haul my shit up three flights of stairs.
This one year when I was in college and looking for a room to rent, I kept running into ads that said “LGBTQ friendly” which I am, so I would apply but what they really meant was BE LGBT or Q. The gays didn’t want me. Phooey! I ended up in a house full of sorority girls which, let’s just sum it up, I am farfarfar from. I was like their cool “alternative” roommate. I lived on bagels that year because I never wanted to use the dirty/gross kitchen.
I tend to just stuff things in garbage bags, throw it in the car, and call it moved. Once helping my friends move from their apt into a duplex, it was during a blizzard. We rented a u-hall and got them moved regardless of the 10 inches of snow. It was horrible! Hiring movers is definitely the way to go. Good luck!
After college I found a great apartment that was available on sublease. The girl who had lived there previously never turned in the keys. I had to get ahold of the housing manager and wait until he could show up with a set of spare keys. I sat around the building by my moving truck waiting for him to finally show up so I could move in.
Once I had the keys I got started moving in. Of course, the girl had left the apartment floor/kitchen/bathroom a mess… but left behind a batch of helium birthday balloons. I kept them around for a while claiming they were actually my “Welcome Home” gift.
I don’t really have a totally memorable moving story, but the last few times I’ve moved it’s been October or December, which in Minnesota is NOT an ideal time to move. I hope next time I move it’s in May or September when I’m not freezing my ass off!
i don’t have a HORRIBLE moving story, but i moved back home from london this past summer and packing up your whole life into two suitcases and trying to figure out what stuff you wanted to keep and what stuff you want to throw away was ridiculous. i never was to move again!
Well…we already know when I’m visiting! I hope one of those parties happens, because I’m sure they’ll be fab.
Wow an iPod shuffle?? Is this part of your “throwing things away so that you don’t have to pack it” deal? Because we all know how much space a shuffle can take up! Have fun in Santa Monica!
It must be nice being able to pack up your life into a few suitcases. I’ve moved 6 times in the last 5 years. It will likely be 7 come April. I, too, have commitment issues.
Ahh, moving. I did a bit of it in college but the worst experience would have to be when my parents, thinking that when I moved into a house with 4 other girls during my freshman year of college it meant I would be out of their dwelling permanently, decided to sell the house I grew up in and buy a townhouse.
And it was so, so, hard. It was a time in my life when I NEEDED someplace I knew, someplace familiar…I needed to know that HOME was there. Instead I drove home one weekend and rolled up my childhood in boxes, and watched an online virtual tour of the house–the windowsill I sat on in the summer and talked on the phone for hours, the bed I sobbed on when my first boyfriend dumped me, and the dining room table my friends used to spill orange pop on during my birthday parties. But the little things that made it mine, that made it OURS were gone. When the place was sold and even the furniture was gone, I walked through the house one more time and cried a little harder in every room. The direct result of not moving enough, maybe. A year later, I moved in with my parents in their townhouse, where I’ll remain until this economy grants me a new job. And I get it know…home is not at all a house. But I still can’t drive by that old house, not yet. Maybe not ever, who knows.
Oh, and since I wasn’t living there at the time of the move, my mom had to clean out my closet, and definitely found an open box of condoms from my senior year of high school. That was awesome, too.
Oh, and regarding Santa Monica…
I’ve never been, have no advice to give you, but would be HAPPY to attend any party you might have there!
When I first moved to Seattle. I was fresh out of college, I had never lived alone and it was my very first time leaving my home country of Australia. My employer set me up in temporary housing in the middle of suburbia with no rental car. On the very first night, I knew no one, my fridge was completely empty and I had no idea which direction the food was in. That was kinda scary.
Until I figured out I could just 411 for some pizza.
Orrrrrrrrr move to DC and be my new best friend!
My worst moving story was when I moved into my current apartment. The landlord (who, admittedly, is a bit of a useless drunk) told me when I signed the lease 3 months in advance that I’d probably be able to move in about a month before I needed to be out of my other place. Great, I thought!
Time went by and I wasn’t hearing from him. I kept calling and couldn’t reach him, then finally did reach him and he told me the apartment wasn’t ready and oh by the way he was driving to Florida and wouldn’t be back for a couple more weeks. This was about two months before I had to be out of my other place, but he assured me everything would be fine and I’d still be able to move in early.
To make a long story short, he give me the run around for the entire 3 month window I’d given him and then barely got the place ready for me to move into before the lease on my other place was up. In fact, he told me it’d be ready one day, so I stopped by to see it, only to find it completely torn apart and very much NOT ready for move-in.
Needless to say, it should’ve been my first clue, because his landlord skills haven’t improved in the past year and a half that I’ve lived there.
Oh, moving.
So freaking stressful, right?
I can totally and absolutely 100% relate to this blog post. (Especially: 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7 and “oh, it’s okay that I don’t know too many people here, I’m leaving soon anyway.”)
I’m so excited for you and your new adventure. California sounds wonderful. Mmm. Sunshine. Warmth. Why must it be so darn expensive!?
My first time I moved somewhere alone – I was going to Hawaii for a semester my sophomore year of college – was a particularly exhilarating experience (the independence!) My flight was delayed, and I ended up having to spend the night in the O’Hare airport. There was another guy my age hanging out around the ticket counters at 2am – so we watched Family Guy DVDs (I still have one of his DVDs…a fun reminder) and stayed up all night talking.
I landed in Honolulu, got a taxi to my new apartment and let myself in. No one was there. It was so odd. I was 12 hours away from home, in a state where I knew NO ONE. I didn’t even know my three roommates (who weren’t home…) I was starving, so I wandered down the street until I found a grocery store.
I had never had to buy my own groceries before, either. (Dorm food for the first two years of college. Bleh.) I fed myself some applesauce and Cheez-Its and fell asleep in this strange apartment, on this new street, in a tropical state several thousand miles away from anyone I knew.
It was during that semester that I became insanely independent.
(So this is so long. Geez!)
My best moving story…I gave the moving company the wrong address and then sat around all day wondering what happened to all of my stuff. Not exactly my proudest moment
I’m the complete opposite. I’m too wary of the process of packing up my stuff and starting over somewhere new to actually bother moving. I’ve been in my apartment now for almost two years, and even though September is still months away, I’m dreading the very real possibility of having to pack my shit and find someplace new to settle… within the same city. Imagine if I were to go through with my plan to move provinces! I’d be a total wreck.
Wow. You do move a lot! But Santa Monica sounds perfect. I loved California when I visited there nearly 3 years ago. Ugh, it’s been too long. I so want to go back!
You are going to be living my dream (uh, and your dream, clearly) in Santa Monica. Am SO excited for you!
I’m trying to convince Ju to move to Huntington in a few years (when her job will be transferable to there). I love California more than words can express.
Living with Ju has settled me down a bit, but between 17 and 20, I never stopped moving, ever. I still get all my mail sent to my parents house, just because I constantly feel like I could pack up and leave any second, and don’t want a change of address paper trail left behind me.
My best move was when I packed everything I owned into my car, and drove 12 hours away to Calgary, where I didn’t know a soul. I was 17, and I learned so much. I love the thrill of something new, somewhere new, some one new..
My best moving story was when I moved (for the second time) while in university. My best friend and I filled everything in the back of my old truck and while hugging my brother goodbye, he offered to come with us and help unload everything. So, he hopped in with us, spent 5 hours listening to girl music and spent the better part of his weekend figuring out how to get our too big couch up outdoor steps and into a too tiny door frame. My brother is younger than me, but that was the first time I looked at him and he seemed like an adult. Volunteering to do something I knew he didn’t want to do because he knew how much he would be helping me out? Aww. Now I feel like I need to call him today and tell him he’s my favourite sibling.
(He’s my only sibling.)
ooooooh yay! santa monica is so much closer to me and ohmygosh we can go to the beach together! haha. i’m pretty excited for you, and when is this move happening? woo!
Gah, that’s so much moving. That has to be really tough not ever having a real place to call home. I love traveling as well, but I’d rather have roots somewhere then continue moving. Just go on lots of vacations.
I love your Santa Monica plan. Hope that works out for you.
I’ve always wanted to live in California. (I live in Mississippi, enough said, right.) — I do have plans on visiting Cali this summer, I am stoked! So beautiful.
Hmm, well. I don’t really have a a terrible or awesome moving story. But I do have two I can think of that involves me and moving, just I’m not the one who is doing the moving.
#1. A few years ago, my cousin and I were helping my uncle move. We had to rent a U-haul truck and this is where I came in. Apparently, I wasn’t there to help move, they tricked me into getting the U-haul truck. Neither of them had a license and I did, so I was the one who signed the papers and what not. I didn’t do the actual driving, my cousin did. Well, to make a long story short, my cousin accidentally backed into a car (which turned out to be stolen) and totally smashed the driver’s side of the vehicle. I was only 17 at the time and naive. I was fearful because we were in a horrible side of town and my ignorant cousin is pointing the blame at me, since I was the one who signed the papers after all. Well, cops were called. The car was towed, the guy who stolen the car went to jail and my ass was terrified for weeks thinking that the guy was going to come after me. 
Not to mention the U-haul accident being on my driving record.
My second story is this.. My sister and I live in the same apartment building and she is moving today (as I write this a moving truck is over there now) — She has a 18mo old daughter who I have been babysitting since she was two weeks old. As you can imagine, I’ve become really attached to her. Just seeing the moving van makes me want to cry. It all seems so real now. They leave tomorrow and I am not looking forward to the next few weeks. They come back in August, but hell.. that’s so long away.
Well geesh, those are my little sad moving stories, lol. My fiancee and I just recently gotten our own place in November after so long of saving up. So I guess there’s a good one.
Santa Monica is my former stomping grounds! I lived on Santa Monica and Barrington, right near my two FAVORITE places in the world to eat: California Roll Factory (yummy yummy sushi) and the 50s Cafe (32 different shakes). Not to mention the great music scene (Temple Bar, 14 Below) and the fact it’s a mere hop-skip-and-a-jump to WeHo (gotta love the gays), Sunset (if you’re so inclined) and Westwood (for some hottie-UCLA-coed action). And OF COURSE, I will be visiting you, because it’s nearly an hour closer than Thousand Smokes was.
My moving stories aren’t bad. I hire people to move me. So I guess the only bad part is the bill.
(And I’ve only moved 4 times in the past 6 years.)
i dont have a great story. but i have a story……
i moved semi-cross country, from north carolina back home to chicago. i lost my mattress on the way. yep. thats right. it just fell off the truck, over the side of the mountain somewhere. hopefully there is a bobcat enjoying the pillowtop goodness that i miss oh so dearly. this unfortunate incident forced me to sleep on an air mattress for two months. i hope your moving luck is better than mine
My best moving story: after months of fighting w/my roommate senior year, including one battle where I made her cry, throw up, and call her mom to tattle on me which resulted in her mom calling me to bitch me out which resulted in MY mom calling HER mom and threatening her life (wait, that’s another story) I was finally moving out.
I checked the portable “closet” (a glorified garment rack covered w/fabric) to make sure I hadn’t left anything in it, I found over a dozen rolls of TP–THIS after she would refuse to buy it for 2 weeks even though it was her turn, causing me to frat house my own roll.
I took every single roll with me when I left.
In the beginning, I loved moving. I thought it was fun and exciting. Now I just think it’s a pain in the freaking rear and my darn credit card is always declined because I never know which zip code belongs to which card! My Verizon bill is also lagging behind and never makes it to my new residence until I get ready to move from that one into another one.
I suppose I’ve never had a horrible moving story. Heading to Cambodia was an adventure and I had rats in my first guesthouse, but then I just loaded all of my bags into a tuk tuk and headed across town.
Exciting! New move! And Santa Monica…I am jealous.
i moved to CA for a few months one summer. as i was pulling the car into my new underground-covered-parking garage, i heard a loud “CRUNCH” and thought i must have run over an empty box or something, so i kept going (i was really tired from driving for two days!)… anyway, suddenly little pieces of stucco began raining down on the hood of my car, and then some slightly bigger pieces, and then some rather large pieces. it took me a minute to realize that my brand new bike was still attached to the bike-rack on the top of my car… needless to say, i damaged the roof overhang at the entrance to the parking garage, and pretty much destroyed the handlebars and gear-shifts on my bike
Anyway, LOVE Santa Monica. Have such a great time. Visit the bluffs. Soo gorgeous.
I live in Culver City so I WILL visit you and attend your awesome parties, if you’ll have me. Promise. Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye.
(btw — the timestamp on these is coming out after midnight, but I’m pretty sure it’s 11ish Cali time. so, hopefully I qualify!)
I liked point number 5. The sad reality is…I throw away things coz of sheer laziness to carry them
I can totally relate to moving too much. I’ve moved at least twice every year since I was 14. And considering the fact that I’m now 23…that’s a lot of moves. I haven’t quite yet reached the point where I want to settle down, though. I long for a home and stability, but I’ve still got the itch to move…
Does a week before moving to New York from New Orleans and finding out the apartment you are supposed to move in has bed bugs count?
What about getting a flat tire moving back to college on the interstate at 1opm by yourself. When you called your sorority sisters to come find you, they ask “What exit are you near? Do you see any landmarks?” and your response is “I don’t know? Trees?”
I found your blog through Arielle’s- Hope to poke around.
I’ve been moving every year for the last 5 years so I have lots of stories! The worst so far is when I was moving from D.C. to Boston in the summer of ’07. Since moving to D.C. via a rented truck was too much of a bitch, I saved up for movers this time. They picked up my things on a Saturday (5 hours late, obviously, almost making me late for my final plane trip from D.C. to Boston) and were supposed to store my stuff for 3 weeks. Yeah right! After never getting a clear answer from anyone in the company, my truck arrived 8 weeks later! 9 hours after saying they’d be at my new apartment, they pulled in at 9 p.m. First, 2 kids (15 years old, tops) who didn’t speak a word of English jumped out, followed by the sketchiest man I have ever seen. Clearly jonesin’ he asked where the nearest liqour store was. I directed him down the street and he said he’d be back in 10 minutes…great! As all my roommates were gone for the weekend, so I immediately ran to one of my neighbors to ask him to hang out with me while said weirdos were still here. The two kids began to unload everything (and I had LOTS of stuff) and when the sketchball got back an hour later, he proceeded to smoke a bowl while telling us how he met his 17 year old girlfriend on myspace and that thier favorite thing to do was have sex while speedballing. Just as I was debating calling the cops, the two kids finished unloading the truck and sketchy driver let me know I owed him my final $400 in cash. Hell no! I haggled with him and gave him a personal check with an extra $50, which I put a stop payment on the minute he pulled out of my driveway. Then I checked out my things…most boxes were crushed and at least 3 were missing completely. I called the company to complain, filed an insurance claim, sent a detailed letter of the situation and never heard from anybody again. It was a nightmare but it sure makes a great story to tell at cocktail parties!
p.s. take my advice…NEVER EVER use America Van lines to move!!!
Santa Monica. Yea! I’m coming for a visit…..someday.
I feel you on this! I buy so much less because I hate packing and moving heavy things so regularly. Being mobile definitely has its ups and downs.