“It’s all in the preparation” or so they say. I thought we’d prepared pretty well, but even so the days following the move were weird.

I was dog tired, but couldn’t stop myself running up and down stairs organising boxes. We have no intention of un-packing more than we need to, so knowing where to find stuff is essential. The only thing we can’t seem to find so far is Peter’s hammer.

But it was more than that. For weeks I’d been longing for a time when I could just sit down and do nothing. I’d bought lots of puzzle books for exactly this situation, yet now it was here I couldn’t seem to sit still.

Then there were all the ‘administration’ type jobs to do. Ensuring smooth change of address with utilities, banks and important people. We’d paid for 3 months re-direction with Royal Mail, and indeed we needed it.

With some places, changing address on-line was easy, others you had to phone and wade through the interminable ‘menu’ before getting to a human being. One particular conversation I had was held entirely with a machine. Why was I not surprised when it went wrong!

Then there was trying to change the address on my driving licence. A simple enough task you might think, considering I have held a full UK licence for 41 years, though it did involve changing my old paper licence to a photo one. (Thank-you to Angela and Val) Imagine my surprise when my application came back saying I had failed to prove my identity.

I braced myself and rang them. To my delight I got straight through to a person. Not only that but a person who could actually advise me on my problem. He was polite, helpful and most of all human. 🙂 I love DVLA. 🙂

I don’t love my mortgage lender, who decided to take their Direct Debit out of my account 4 days after the mortgage was paid off. There followed 2 weeks of phone calls and mis-information, but in the end I got a refund, an apology and the offer of £50 compensation for my ‘distress’ (not yet received).

Here’s an idea. Do your job right in the first place and I won’t be ‘distressed’ and you could save yourself £50!

It took a good 2 weeks before I was reasonably confident that all was in order and a routine settled into. (I like routine, so does Leonard.)

Before all this started I assumed that paying off the mortgage would make me happy, a sort of cathartic experience.

In reality it felt more like putting our affairs in order before we shuffled off! Not at all what I expected.

Despite all the preparation and hard work things still feel surreal and unworldly; as if this is it; forever; no future; no new house; no new garden. It’s a bit difficult to explain, I hope it passes.