I keep my Tim Russert "thou shalt not whine" magnet on each place's fridge as a reminder that this is actually quite a privilege to live in gorgeous little apartments close to Harvard Square for 8 weeks and on average, it's less than a hotel, averaging around $160 a night. Each place has felt homey and comfortable, more than a hotel would. But the packing up our laundry, our fridge, our dog beds and supplies every Sat/Sun is really exhausting on all of us- especially in the hot weather or sometimes down pouring rain - and as the trunk of the RAV4 overflows with our stuff, it reminds me each time that we should have shaved a little less off the list of essentials!
I literally am carrying my former kitchen's "pen drawer" around with us (scissors, pens, post-its, safety pins, magnets and tape) since that was my essential living supplies. Our bathroom bag alone is about 7 pounds including my "industrial strength hairdryer" like in Spaceballs (can't live without it!) and if I had to shlep this stuff across a desert, probably 9.5 out of 10 things would cease to be essential. And then there's a big bag of dog supplies, too and even a separate bag that's just 8 weeks of poop bags.
Since our movers packed almost everything in the house (I said "go for it" unless it was nailed down or labeled), we ended up taking what was left in the fridge or pantry (cereal, jam, cheez-its) stuffed in loose Grocery Bring-Your-Own-Bags which means that they are hard to stack in the car, and things shift around in the shuffle. Last weekend, we laughed as José opened the trunk and watched an entire bag fall out on its head and tons of little kitchen containers of milk, coffee filters, plastic forks, and misc. sprawled out over a wet sidewalk.
Today we had a rare transition of apartments on a weekday, so I arranged a day off work, and shuffled the dogs and stuff into the car around 11, then shuffled into a new apartment around 1 pm. To make it even more interesting, I locked myself out of the first apartment at 10:45 with most things moved out except for the iphone chargers, the wine and the contents of the fridge. A kind housekeeper eventually let me back in to collect the rest.
AirBnB owners have been very accommodating with our schedule, knowing that the check in and check out window usually means I have to entertain a couple dogs for four hours on a hot afternoon. Sometimes we take the dogs on a road trip to fill the gap (like we went to Rhode Island and New Bedford two weeks ago). Today, we had the neighboring Cambridge Library lawn (about three blocks wide) to keep us company. The rest of our weeks, we are staying in repeat apartments that we have already been to, so at least we know what to expect.
Our apartment tonight is on the SIXTH floor which thank heaven had an elevator, but a very slow elevator, and we spotted a cute nearby fancy-grocery store so I picked up ingredients to bake homemade pizza with farmers market pesto, tart cheeses and a very welcome Sauvignon Blanc. I'm delighted that the locally famous Darwin's (pictured) coffee shop is downstairs from us, with most excellent coffee, sandwiches, organic berries, beer, etc. Prost!
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