Wednesday morning, the movers arrived right on time with our stuff.  As they were scattering rug protection for the floors, Bill said “We’ve already had our first shouting match.”

“What happened?” I asked, not sure if I really wanted to hear about it.  I have mentioned before that moving turns me into a raving bitch, especially if I’m also “hangry”, which I was before he started telling me the story.  Moving is a process I truly despise.  I don’t need a reason to get any bitchier.

Throwing caution to the wind, Bill explained that due to the congested road that leads to our house, the movers were forced to drive the wrong way down a one way street.  Just before the movers arrived, the trash truck was forced to do the same thing– drive the wrong way down the one way street.  We are now located on a very narrow street with many people parking their cars on the side.  It simply wasn’t possible for the moving truck to get down there the “legal” way.

Well… it seems that the moving truck inconvenienced a fellow American, who had to wait a couple of minutes for it to get down the street so he could make his turn.  The man got out of his car and started speaking perfect German… at least until he completely lost his shit and reverted to his native English tongue.  Bill said the guy was beet red and was absolutely furious that he’d had to stop so the movers could pass.  Bill took note of the man’s close cropped haircut and Washington, DC baseball cap, as well as his complete outrage at having to wait a minute for the movers.

First he screamed at the movers, who simply shrugged in response; then he started screaming at Bill.  We don’t know who this man is, but it appears that he runs a local business and Bill said he had the air of an extremely entitled retired colonel.  Apparently, he lives in our neighborhood or close by.  I’m glad I wasn’t there to witness this spectacle, because as Bill started telling me about it, I felt my own temper start to rise.

I can’t abide people who are verbally abusive.  I have a tendency to respond in kind, although I’ve now gotten to the point at which my responses are mostly non-verbal.  Make no mistake, though.  If I shoot you a death ray with my eyes, you’ll definitely know it.  Then I’ll start blogging.  If I start speaking when I’m in that state, there is no telling what will be said.  So I have learned to zip it.  I’m not sure I would have “zipped it” for that guy, though.  Actually, I might have had a good laugh at him.  Bill’s description of his out of control ranting and raving was kind of hilarious.

Fortunately, Bill is a very even tempered person and, when the pissed off American started his belligerent tirade, he calmly turned and walked away.  There is no reasoning with people who get that enraged over a moment’s inconvenience.  Perhaps a nice stroke will settle that man’s hash.  If he keeps up that level of vitriol, I think it’s a real risk for him.  Anyway, the whole incident would have lasted half as long if the guy had just STFU and stayed in his car.

One of the movers was really awesome.  I have a large dresser that the movers initially said they would not be able to get upstairs.  This guy, very enthusiastic with a “can do” attitude, managed to convince his co-workers that getting my dresser upstairs was possible.  The one insistent naysayer was the lone German on the team.  Well… the Croatians proved the German guy wrong.  Although it took some doing, they hauled my bulky dresser up the stairs with nary a scratch!  Bill rewarded them with a generous tip.

Our stuff was unloaded by early afternoon, so the movers left us to our mess.  Kudos to Weichert for sending us such a professional team.  They were truly outstanding.  I wish we could have them for all of our moves.  We’ve had a few doozies over the years!

We took a brief break from unpacking to visit IKEA for some household items and get some lunch.  I once swore I would never visit IKEA again.  Indeed, it had been a full four years since our last hellish IKEA experience in Sindelfingen.  I still hate IKEA, but we had a real need for storage solutions and didn’t want to wait for an online order, especially since we had no Internet and I was relying on my iPad with cellular access.  Our local IKEA is pretty nightmarish, but it wasn’t quite as bad as our last visit to the one in Sindelfingen.  We have visited our new IKEA twice since our move and I think I can safely say I won’t be back again for some time.  Once every few years is plenty of IKEA exposure for me.

Naturally, I was hangry after our IKEA experience, so we found a local Italian restaurant that turned out to be very nice, even if finding parking was appalling.  One thing I have noticed about the Wiesbaden area is that it’s really hard to find parking.  This area is very built up and everyone drives.  Nevertheless, we had a delightful lunch at Casalinga da Rita, tiny “hole in the wall” eatery in a nearby Hofheim am Taunus.  I notice it gets average reviews on Google, but we had a good experience there.  The other guests were Italians, which I take as a good sign in an Italian restaurant.

Bill’s blurry hands.

Spaghetti with pesto!

Tagliatelle salmone.  This hit the spot!

It’s a very tiny place, with ice cream, pasta dishes, pizzas, and cramped seating.  We’d go back.

A little culture break.

I took note of this charming bumper sticker in the car parked near ours.

By five o’clock, I was decidedly pissy, so Bill told me to sit down and drink some wine.  He’s a good husband because he knows when I’ve had enough bullshit for one day.  I wanted to take a shower, but the cold water tap in our upstairs bathroom was frozen from too much corrosion.  I ended up taking baths for several days, until we got the faucet replaced.  Our move also taught me the magic of using white vinegar to descale the taps, but the tap in our shower was too far gone for that to work.  Not even Liquid Wrench could free the cold water for us.

I sat on my can until Thursday morning.  Bill got up and drove back to Stuttgart to clean our old house again, pick up the dogs, and close us out of Stuttgart.  I stayed behind in Wiesbaden and continued unpacking and putting stuff away.

Bill found this in our bio bin.  I have so many questions…  Who would throw away an obvious going away gift?  Was it the recipient who tossed this, or a disgruntled spouse?  I may have to write a short story about this, once we’re totally settled and I’m bored.

I’m really glad I stayed in Wiesbaden.  I definitely would not have wanted to witness the final walkthrough with our former landlady.  More on that in the next post.