The move
Friday was chaotic.
It was moving day. I woke up tired from being up too late packing the night before. I woke up sore from all the exercise I've got in the last week. I woke up grumpy because we had a housefull of stuff to move into two small rooms.
The pickup truck we rented arrived around 10:30 a.m. and we took our first load over to the sublet. Marcia and Ryan D. - friends of Shokes and the couple we're subletting from - hadn't move all their stuff out yet, but had cleared half of the livingroom and the small bedroom for us to move stuff into.
The first task was to capture Marcia and Ryan's cats and lock them in the master bedroom so they wouldn't escape during the day and so they wouldn't be under our feet. That was fun.
Shokes got the first cat, Gordon, right off the bat and locked her up. Shokes, Ryan P. - Claire's boyfriend - and I spent a good forty-five minutes trying to get Paisley, the other one. She had escaped into a huge pile of Marcia and Ryan D.'s furniture and other stuff piled on one side of the livingroom.
We tried calling, we tried food, we tried treats, we tried pretending to leave and then swooping in to snag her (which almost worked). At one point Ryan P. tried dangling a length of extension cord to try to get her to come out and play. Claire showed up and we sent her INTO the pile. She's a slender girl. Paisley just fled deeper. In the end we gently chased her out with a broom extended under the couch. The poor thing was terrified.
By the time we got back Christa was waiting. She'd volunteered to come help move, rather than spend her day off unpacking her own stuff at her parents' place.
We took another load - three vehicles - to the sublet and to Claire's new place. Christa and I went to pick up Ian, who had graciously volunteered to help.
We took another load. And another. And Christa and I picked up Jer, who had also accepted my plea for help.
More loads. No organization. Too many people used to organizing group endeavours and no one person to coordinate it all. It went smoothly enough, but it was not my finest day for intelligence.
Christa and I were talking about it at one point. I said it seems that group intelligence is inversely related to the number of people in the group. She said it seems like there is only a set amount of intelligence allowed in a group at one time and adding more heads just means every individual has less to draw on.
Matt, a friend of Shokes, showed up with his pickup. We ordered and ate pizza.
Eventually we finished and watched Brother Bear. Not a bad movie, but much funnier when you watch it the second time with the commentary on.
It was moving day. I woke up tired from being up too late packing the night before. I woke up sore from all the exercise I've got in the last week. I woke up grumpy because we had a housefull of stuff to move into two small rooms.
The pickup truck we rented arrived around 10:30 a.m. and we took our first load over to the sublet. Marcia and Ryan D. - friends of Shokes and the couple we're subletting from - hadn't move all their stuff out yet, but had cleared half of the livingroom and the small bedroom for us to move stuff into.
The first task was to capture Marcia and Ryan's cats and lock them in the master bedroom so they wouldn't escape during the day and so they wouldn't be under our feet. That was fun.
Shokes got the first cat, Gordon, right off the bat and locked her up. Shokes, Ryan P. - Claire's boyfriend - and I spent a good forty-five minutes trying to get Paisley, the other one. She had escaped into a huge pile of Marcia and Ryan D.'s furniture and other stuff piled on one side of the livingroom.
We tried calling, we tried food, we tried treats, we tried pretending to leave and then swooping in to snag her (which almost worked). At one point Ryan P. tried dangling a length of extension cord to try to get her to come out and play. Claire showed up and we sent her INTO the pile. She's a slender girl. Paisley just fled deeper. In the end we gently chased her out with a broom extended under the couch. The poor thing was terrified.
By the time we got back Christa was waiting. She'd volunteered to come help move, rather than spend her day off unpacking her own stuff at her parents' place.
We took another load - three vehicles - to the sublet and to Claire's new place. Christa and I went to pick up Ian, who had graciously volunteered to help.
We took another load. And another. And Christa and I picked up Jer, who had also accepted my plea for help.
More loads. No organization. Too many people used to organizing group endeavours and no one person to coordinate it all. It went smoothly enough, but it was not my finest day for intelligence.
Christa and I were talking about it at one point. I said it seems that group intelligence is inversely related to the number of people in the group. She said it seems like there is only a set amount of intelligence allowed in a group at one time and adding more heads just means every individual has less to draw on.
Matt, a friend of Shokes, showed up with his pickup. We ordered and ate pizza.
Eventually we finished and watched Brother Bear. Not a bad movie, but much funnier when you watch it the second time with the commentary on.
