Ten ... Is The Magic Number

Not only is it the number of hours the movers were at our house today, but it is also the number of movers who were at our house today, dressed ever so smartly in their matching plaid shirts.

These ten men rocked the house and managed to finish packing and weighing all of the boxes going to storage, and 1/3 of the boxes destined for California. They'll be back tomorrow when they'll complete this seemingly endless ordeal.

An interesting moment occurred late today that reinforced why I feel compelled to be actively engaged in everything. See, Matt doesn't make many missteps when it comes to purchases. Though the rare exceptions are generally doozies requiring additional costs in order to 'remedy' the unfortunate circumstances.

Cases in point ... When we first arrived in Tel Aviv, Matt purchased a 'slightly used' Saab Convertible. A car he pined for since his college days. However, within the first month Matt was at the only Saab mechanic in town, who we unfortunately discovered was intimately familiar with this particular vehicle. To put it bluntly, the car was a lemon, and Matt made valiant attempts to make lemonade. Very expensive lemonade. To the tune of almost $4500 of lemonade in just two months. As our disposable income was quickly running out, he decided to part with the vehicle, having completely satisfied his college whim.

Then came the watch. As many of you know Matt has a keen interest in watches. Rare, hard to find, unconventional timepieces. For months, Matt scoured the internet for one particular watch from his glory days. It was "the one that got away..." He was forever in search of an old Seiko military dive watch that adorned the well developed wrist of action hero / California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, in some of his earlier films. Eventually, Matt located one in good condition on eBay, paying full marquee value. Nicknamed "The Arnie," Matt believed the watch to be tough as nails, as Arnold wore it as he defeated alien "Predators" and overthrew evil militants in "Commando". Alas, imagine Matt's disappointment when the "so called" 150m rated dive watch filled with seawater as he frolicked in the surf at the beach with the kids one Sunday afternoon. His frustration was compounded when the repair shop said it was ruined, and was nothing more than a prop... which as he realizes now was probably all it was in the movies.

Which brings us to today. As the movers removed the 42'' plasma television from the wall, that Matt purchased mere weeks after arriving here, he discovered the t.v. really WASN'T 110 - 220 volt, but rather JUST 220 volt. WHAT??? He swears that when he was at the Panasonic showroom, the salesmen assured him that the television was dual voltage, despite what the manual later read once the t.v. was already mounted. Well... it's not. Sure, he admits now that there's been a mistake. But what were we supposed to do when the movers are 3/4 done with packing the television in its original box? It's not like we could sell it. To add insult to injury we had to declare what the television was worth. Matt sarcastically responded, "in which country?" "'Cuz it ain't worth sh*t now in the United States..."

Needless to say, Matt won't be buying the house for us next year.