My California relocation
Relocating is stressful. While Google did pretty much everything they could to make it painless, it was still painful. This is my experience.
Before the move
The period leading up to the move was probably the most stressful. You have a deadline, and once you commit to scheduling movers and turning in your resignation and setting a start date with the new employer, these are deadlines that you can't easily change. And if you can't do something by the deadline, you're flat out screwed because you aren't going to be around to fix it.
So I made my arrangements, and went over my plan every day for weeks. The first thing I had to do was get rid of half of my crap. Apartments in California are expensive and small. I wasn't going to be able to fit 1200 sq. ft. of stuff into an 800 sq. ft. apartment. Craigslist was indispensable, but a few things I couldn't seem to give away. So out to the curb they went, and they disappeared within hours. It's not clear to me why two weeks of listings on Craigslist got zero bites, but some random person driving by was willing to snatch it up without a second of consideration.
Then came the preparation for the movers. Everything had to be disconnected, sorted, stuff thrown away, cleaned and accessible. This takes a lot more work than you might think.
I also had to take this opportunity to set aside everything I was going to take myself. I was going to be without my things for up to a month, so I had to have clothes, paperwork, my shiny new MacBook, a litter box for my cat, toiletries, etc., etc. This was the focus of a lot of my stress.
Moving Day
The moving day itself wasn't so bad. Mostly I stood around and got in everyone's way. The movers were very friendly and even let me have a sandwich. (My food had been boxed up by this time.) Finally everything was gone, and I was left with the stuff I had set aside, and a box full of things that somehow the movers missed, and I missed when I walked through checking to see if they had missed anything. My luggage was packed, so I had to make a stop at the UPS store to ship it.
I got a direct flight to San Francisco, because I had to carry my cat on board. How my cat was going to handle the flight was the #1 thing that I worried about. I researched the best way to do it online for hours. I talked to vets, I bought carriers, I talked to everyone I knew in the airline industry. She did fabulously. She didn't cry once until we were finally in SFO and in the rental car. I was relieved almost to tears.
The following month
Google put me up in "corporate housing", which is just an apartment that they rent, furnish, and make available to those that need it. It was on the third floor of a building in a beautiful complex in downtown Mountain View. For the following few weeks, I got to venture out a bit, saw San Francisco, Mountain View and did a few touristy things. I took a spin with one of the relocation people and saw some apartments. But mostly I didn't do a whole lot.
Moving Day (part 2)
Finally the other Big Day came, but this was much less stressful. It was mainly a matter of pointing the movers to the right rooms, and growing increasingly worried that I still had too much stuff. One of the movers even said, "I don't know where we're going to put the rest of it! He still has more he's bringing up!" The only real problem was the office. I had a ton of computer junk, cards, gadgets, thousands of feet of cabling, etc.
My utilities were largely set up, though AT&T didn't set up the phone right (no dial tone when I moved in), so they had to fix that, and I get no wireless reception at the apartment, so my cell phone is useless except when I'm out and about. I decided to get a number through Grand Central that would just ring both phones so I wouldn't have to deal with keeping people informed about phone number changes anymore.
Cable was (and remains) the biggest hassle. More on that in another post.
That's pretty much where I am today. Buried in boxes and still unpacking.