We found a place to live, we were tired of acting like tourists, and it was time to work on settling down to a "normal" routine. But where were all our belongings, and more importantly, where were they being shipped while we waited?

No sooner did we ask, this question when I got a call from the moving company. Our items were being held up in Customs, and could we please hurry up with our customs forms, and get this all straightened out as soon as we could, please? I was also dealing with a moving company I'd never heard of, and in fact didn't have a list of all the contents of our boxes, so I had to make something up for the customs forms.

The customs forms were a hoot. If you had bought anything within the last six months, or you had super expensive stuff, or it was illegal, you had to list it all out. ("What? Bought anything in the last six months? Of course not!") Among the list of things you are prohibited from bringing into Britain are illegal drugs, an assortment of weapons, the usual stuff, and horror comics. I wonder how you explain that to your grandkids. "Yep, well I was heading over to Britain to do some work, and got thrown in the smaller with hardened criminals for a year all because I brought some horror comics with me!" Alas, we had no such propaganda, so we happily left the box to list your illegal goods blank.

After a couple more days, our stuff was finally going to arrive! Hooray! I skipped off work for an afternoon so I could meet the shipment, and they came. Two giant crates, left on the street. I asked the guys what we were supposed to do, exactly, since I had been left with the impression that they would be emptying the big crates and delivering the contents up three flights of stairs to our flat. The driver looked at me like I was crazy. "Carry this stuff up the stairs? No, we're just supposed to leave it on the street." I could barely understand him, as I had not yet fully adapted to listening to the Edinburgh accent, and grimly noted that it looked like it was soon going to rain.

Back inside, I called up the moving company. They said that the guys who dropped the crates off were supposed to have unpacked them and brought them up. They didn't know what had happened, but they'd get right on it, and call us back. About half an hour later, we didn't get a call, but the door buzzer blasted out. A nearly unintelligible bark came through it, which I decided was a sign to go downstairs and pray that it was someone to help move all our things. After a quick discussion about what was going on ("empty the boxes, move contents to top flat"), he said "Forty pounds." The moving company had not mentioned antyhing about it costing me anything directly, but I was in no mood to move all of my worldly belongings that were coming to Scotland inside myself, so I said "sure", only slightly panicking that I had about ten pounds at the time. I'd straighten that out after everything was moved.

Of course, he had no equipment with him. No hand truck, or trolleys, or anything of the sort. He even had to borrow a pair of scissors to open the crates. The wind was picking up, and the skies were darkening some. Happily, he kept tromping back and forth with boxes, moved everything inside, and then a bunch of trips up the lift, and voila, all our things were inside, except for the remnants of two large crates, itching to be blown to Timbuktu by the wind.

I told him I would need to visit a cash machine in order to pay him, so he drove me over to one, and I got his money. I nearly expected him to take the money and run, but he happily ferried me back up to the flat, and went on his way. I never did hear back from the moving company again.

Only one last trial before the ordeal was over: the crates. Crates, to my surprise, aren't really crates any more. They are built from a cheap wooden palette on the bottom, and the sides are just a giant piece of cardboard wrapped around your things and the palette. The top of the crate is a giant cardboard lid. All this is strapped together with a couple thin strips of plastic. If you're eight years old, this would be a windfall. Enough cardboard to build a fort, a castle, a tunnel between them, and have bits to spare.

I'm not eight, and wanted my home to be my castle, not my packing crates. I strapped them together as best I could, so they wouldn't blow away, and didn't know what to do next. Our neighbor was helpful, and offered information about garbage pickup. Over the next couple days, as we were busy trying to sort out the contents of the crates, our neighbor each day rebundled the crate refuse, until it finally was compact enough that the garbage collection took it away. Finally, we were done moving.