How many engineers does it take ...?

In a perfect world we would have had a leisurely time frame in which to get the spa ready to open. Construction should have been scheduled for several months, not six or seven weeks. We should have had a few weeks, not three or four days, to get the finished space cleaned and set up prior to opening. And we should have been able to order equipment close to the end of construction and have everything delivered directly to the spa. Woulda, coulda, shoulda!

We realized a few weeks ago that we couldn't afford to wait until we had a firm construction end-date to start getting equipment shipped. For one thing, if we waited to order things, we were taking a chance that some items might no longer be in stock. For another, we were concerned that shipping could take longer than promised, which it turned out was a well-founded concern, and we would be forced to open without the necessary equipment. We made the decision to start placing orders and we figured we would just load up our living rooms, attics and basements with furniture and gear for the short-term, until the spa was ready to receive it all.

Shortly before we took possession of our first load of equipment, however, we began calculating just how much stuff we had coming. In spite of our initial optimism, we started getting a little twitchy about spending the entire summer living as if we were in an episode of "Hoarders." After coming to the conclusion that social services might arrive and take our children away for forcing them to live in the midst of a fire hazard, we made the decision to rent a storage locker to house the larger items that were on their way from all over North America.

Fast forward several weeks and we are now on our second locker and I am on a first-name basis with the manager of the storage facility. I have become good friends with delivery truck drivers. Recovering from a broken arm and dislocated shoulder, I have swallowed my pride and I have taken to sweet-talking these poor guys into helping me get the equipment neatly stowed in the ever-shrinking available space.

However, last week we got the delivery to end all deliveries ... 1600 pounds of equipment that had made its way to us from Atlanta. Three of the pieces were double-sided hairstyling stations with floor-to-ceiling mirrors on both sides. Seven years of bad luck multiplied by six just waiting to happen! The driver couldn't wait to get "all that glass" off his truck. The only problem - the units are nearly eight feet tall and the opening to the storage facility is six and a half feet high at the most. After inspecting the space, the truck driver looked at my husband and I and just shook his head, making it clear that his job ended when he got the stuff off the truck.

My husband is a strong guy. I had no doubt that he could muscle these pieces into the locker, tipped up on an angle to get them through the doorway. Luckily for us, though, he is also an engineer and his brain works in ways mine doesn't. I'm a big picture person, while he is all about the details. He quickly realized that if we tilted the units, the mirrors would crack on the bottom. That thought never occured to me! After a few moments of deliberating, we left the pieces in the hallway in front of our locker (we weren't really worried about someone walking off with them), snaked our way through rush hour to Home Depot and rented an appliance dolly. I won't say it was easy from that point on, but after much shuffling and tugging the equipment is safe in the storage locker. I'm just not sure we are ever going to get it out again!