I figured that the cold weather managed to freeze the snow that accumulated around the corrugated metal door around the creases and ridges. So after using this salt solution My Father gave me to melt the ice on my windshield and chip-chip-chipping away at the ice around the edge of the door and still not moving anything, I asked for help with the storage unit manager -- for the door as well as for my lock, which was not moving after spending a whole winter outside. She called her husband; he said to use WD-40 on the lock (it worked!) and that he'll look into my door.
A couple hours later, I got a call. It was frozen, all right -- really frozen. He had to use a chisel and crowbar, I think, to open it up. And there was ice keeping the door stuck shut -- a lot of ice. He warned me that it would startle me. And when I immediately drove back to my unit and met up with him, I opened up my door to see a solid ... glacier of ice, beginning from the threshold of my door, disappearing underneath the bags and boxes that obscure my view of the unit floor. I didn't really care about the ice, to be honest with you. I was more than content just to keep it and wait for the spring and summer to melt the ice. But the husband/co-manager was worried about the structure of the unit and whether this ice has seeped into the unit next to mine, so he asked me to move all of my stuff (or at least all the stuff I could move; I have bags and boxes I put on the floor and I was sure they are encased in the ice) into this unused unit which, even though he cautioned me was not climate-controlled, is accessible only after going into a hallway.
---
I had to do this the following week because I didn't have time. That was last weekend, after my folks came home. I swore to them I would come in first thing Saturday morning, once they opened up their office, but it snowed that morning and my folks went nuts and I had to shovel and plow, and so I was only there for about 90 minutes before I decided I wanted to go to the University of Minnesota baseball game. Once I started putting the bags on the top of the pile of things that is taller than me into the shopping cart they provided, pulled it through the snow because the wheels couldn't roll because it gathered up too much snow, and tried to organize it in my new space, I realized that this wasn't going to be done in a mere 90 minutes, or even over a day. The guy took pity on me; he gave me a second lock to use so I could lock the contents of both units that I had now been using. I promised to come back the next day, Easter, but I didn't know after seeing the enormity of my stuff to tell him I would be able to finish and give him the keys to the new lock.
While I had some dreams of going to Hooters or visiting the museum for Easter, this needed to be done, and even though I gave myself another week, I figured I needed to do the rest of this over one day. So, for Easter, as soon as I was ready to get up, I went back to the storage unit and dealt with my things. Well, maybe "dealt" isn't the right word; I just moved my stuff from once place to the other.
I will say that the day of sun from Saturday to Sunday morning help immensely. It melted the snow, so I had bare pavement to roll my cart back-and-forth -- massive help since pulling that cart on Saturday drained my energy. And since no one came at all during the day, since it was Easter, I had the time and space to just do my thing.
I didn't just throw everything I had into my new unit. I was able to set the bags and boxes all up and own the hallway. I was able to measure how heavy the bags are by holding them. I was able to find the sturdiest boxes to form as my base. I moved around papers to fatten up boxes and I found space in other bags for papers in bags that were ripped. And then I got to arranging the boxes at the bottom and then stacking up my things on top of them. I wanted to leave a space just in front of the other side of the door so I could step into the bags on top of the pile, but the plastic bags had to take all of that.
Nevertheless, once I put the last of my things in, I took a step back and smiled. After throwing away or taking home a few things, I was able to move and organize all of my things in a neat and tidy order. I had layers and layers of bags probably sitting securely on top of boxes. And even though the height of my things remains taller than me (the co-manager was going to give me a unit twice as long, but he said that over the week he needed to give it to another person), I was able to audit all the things I have in there, and a task that going in seemed impossible was now finished.
(By the way, there are, like, three bags and one box and several old bottles encased in a creeping glacier of ice I couldn't get out of my old unit. I don't know how it got there or how it stayed there, but try as I might, I couldn't pull them out or chip the ice around it. It actually looks kind of creepy, something I would see in Annihilation. The guy will have to chisel them out. Hopefully I'll find space for the rest of my things, too.)
I really didn't go through the bags, let alone sealed them in plastic (like I want to do with my EWs), put them into a single folder (like I want to do with my sports programs) or throw them away after reading them (like I want to do with everything else). But I had passing thoughts that the stuff that I threw into my old unit first, the stuff that sat at the bottom of my space, I was introduced to again. It was important to air those things out, look at them again, recognize that they exist still. And so I have re-resolved to do something about them. Maybe. But at the very least I was able to move all my stuff from one place to another, and to put them in a neat order. And, for the record, I did it all in 4:45, with an hourlong lunch inbetween. And I got a free month out of this, too! And, finally, I listened to my old iPod while sorting my things. I haven't used that doohickey in years!
Now I'll go back to my storage space, open the door and have all the papers hit me in the face!
A couple hours later, I got a call. It was frozen, all right -- really frozen. He had to use a chisel and crowbar, I think, to open it up. And there was ice keeping the door stuck shut -- a lot of ice. He warned me that it would startle me. And when I immediately drove back to my unit and met up with him, I opened up my door to see a solid ... glacier of ice, beginning from the threshold of my door, disappearing underneath the bags and boxes that obscure my view of the unit floor. I didn't really care about the ice, to be honest with you. I was more than content just to keep it and wait for the spring and summer to melt the ice. But the husband/co-manager was worried about the structure of the unit and whether this ice has seeped into the unit next to mine, so he asked me to move all of my stuff (or at least all the stuff I could move; I have bags and boxes I put on the floor and I was sure they are encased in the ice) into this unused unit which, even though he cautioned me was not climate-controlled, is accessible only after going into a hallway.
---
I had to do this the following week because I didn't have time. That was last weekend, after my folks came home. I swore to them I would come in first thing Saturday morning, once they opened up their office, but it snowed that morning and my folks went nuts and I had to shovel and plow, and so I was only there for about 90 minutes before I decided I wanted to go to the University of Minnesota baseball game. Once I started putting the bags on the top of the pile of things that is taller than me into the shopping cart they provided, pulled it through the snow because the wheels couldn't roll because it gathered up too much snow, and tried to organize it in my new space, I realized that this wasn't going to be done in a mere 90 minutes, or even over a day. The guy took pity on me; he gave me a second lock to use so I could lock the contents of both units that I had now been using. I promised to come back the next day, Easter, but I didn't know after seeing the enormity of my stuff to tell him I would be able to finish and give him the keys to the new lock.
While I had some dreams of going to Hooters or visiting the museum for Easter, this needed to be done, and even though I gave myself another week, I figured I needed to do the rest of this over one day. So, for Easter, as soon as I was ready to get up, I went back to the storage unit and dealt with my things. Well, maybe "dealt" isn't the right word; I just moved my stuff from once place to the other.
I will say that the day of sun from Saturday to Sunday morning help immensely. It melted the snow, so I had bare pavement to roll my cart back-and-forth -- massive help since pulling that cart on Saturday drained my energy. And since no one came at all during the day, since it was Easter, I had the time and space to just do my thing.
I didn't just throw everything I had into my new unit. I was able to set the bags and boxes all up and own the hallway. I was able to measure how heavy the bags are by holding them. I was able to find the sturdiest boxes to form as my base. I moved around papers to fatten up boxes and I found space in other bags for papers in bags that were ripped. And then I got to arranging the boxes at the bottom and then stacking up my things on top of them. I wanted to leave a space just in front of the other side of the door so I could step into the bags on top of the pile, but the plastic bags had to take all of that.
Nevertheless, once I put the last of my things in, I took a step back and smiled. After throwing away or taking home a few things, I was able to move and organize all of my things in a neat and tidy order. I had layers and layers of bags probably sitting securely on top of boxes. And even though the height of my things remains taller than me (the co-manager was going to give me a unit twice as long, but he said that over the week he needed to give it to another person), I was able to audit all the things I have in there, and a task that going in seemed impossible was now finished.
(By the way, there are, like, three bags and one box and several old bottles encased in a creeping glacier of ice I couldn't get out of my old unit. I don't know how it got there or how it stayed there, but try as I might, I couldn't pull them out or chip the ice around it. It actually looks kind of creepy, something I would see in Annihilation. The guy will have to chisel them out. Hopefully I'll find space for the rest of my things, too.)
I really didn't go through the bags, let alone sealed them in plastic (like I want to do with my EWs), put them into a single folder (like I want to do with my sports programs) or throw them away after reading them (like I want to do with everything else). But I had passing thoughts that the stuff that I threw into my old unit first, the stuff that sat at the bottom of my space, I was introduced to again. It was important to air those things out, look at them again, recognize that they exist still. And so I have re-resolved to do something about them. Maybe. But at the very least I was able to move all my stuff from one place to another, and to put them in a neat order. And, for the record, I did it all in 4:45, with an hourlong lunch inbetween. And I got a free month out of this, too! And, finally, I listened to my old iPod while sorting my things. I haven't used that doohickey in years!
Now I'll go back to my storage space, open the door and have all the papers hit me in the face!
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