A Valued Inventory

I spent my lovely Tuesday of sunny 80 degree weather in my apartment.

"Why?" you ask...

Well, for starters, 80 is too hot.  Seriously.  If I go outside and come in 5 minutes later sweating, it's too hot.  And as much as I love doing laundry, I'm not doing 6 loads a day because every time I go and come in I have to change my clothes.

I happily enjoyed the weather by looking out the windows, which probably would have served to cool my apartment down a wee bit more had they been open all the way.  BUT since Germans have not invented screens that work yet (read "think a piece of netting that you tape onto your window is a screen"), I have to keep the windows tilted (read "only open 4 inches at the top and slanting inward") so that my kitties don't escape into the scary streets of Dresden.

Also, I have lists of things to get done, all of which are still NOT done, as I have become an expert procrastinator.

One of those things is our Valued Inventory- a fun little spread sheet that details the value of all the goods to be shipped back to the US.

Doesn't sound too bad, right?

WRONG.  In every way.

This lovely spread sheet is about 43 (okay, maybe 2) pages long.  Divided into section by room.  Lists all objects you might own that would be present in each room along with space for the number of items, cost of items, color and approximate dimension (okay, those last two are exaggerations...).  Keep in mind when completing the spreadsheet that any items of dissimalar value should be listed separately.  SERIOUSLY?

Can't I just say "kitchen- $3000" and call it done?

So I have dilligently walked through each room in my house making tick marks and unreadable notes about items on scrap paper so that I can come back to the spread sheet, look at the paper, wonder "what the heck does this mean?" and go back and do it all another couple times before finally writing down numbers of and values of all the things I have.

This is one of those times when I wish I had less things.

5 hours, 1 headache, a quick nap, and 2 freak outs later, I think its done.

YAY!


ps.

Dear Shipping people,

I have completed my valued inventory to the best of my ability.  I did not, however, find it necessary to count the number of pairs of underwear or socks I own and group them by similar value.  I'm pretty sure they all came from Target anyway.  And I just guessed how much they cost.  Also, after looking up all the electronic equipment we own on bestbuy.com and officedepot.com, I decided that we don't have that great of stuff.  So I might have rounded up a bit to get the next best model in case the ship carrying our stuff sinks.  That doesn't happen very often anyway, right?  And for the record, we don't even have a dishwasher, and if we did, we wouldn't be shipping it home; if we owned a "portable radio" I wouldn't even write it down because it would probably be more valuable as a doorstop; I am not a writer and certainly don't own a typewriter; and what about sofas? I'm pretty sure everyone has a sofa...

Thank you for wasting 5 hours of my life.  Just for that, I hope the ship sinks because after completing your stupid form, I think I'd much rather have the chunk of money than all my things.  In fact, why don't you save yourselves a couple days of work and just leave our stuff here and write us a check?

Sincerely,

Kris.