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Ah, the old refrain: "Will you help me move?" Usually followed by "You have a truck! I'll buy beer and pizza!" Many or most of us have been victims of this plea at least a few times, usually when we're young and have strong backs. Family, friends, whomever, desperately need help to move and don't have the funds to hire movers. We give in. It's a total PITA. A few months or years later, we might do it again.
I've helped people move about 5 times in the past until I said enough. That internal promise lasted about 10 years. Yesterday, I helped someone I never met move. He was a person who had experienced tragedy and needed help. I'm middle aged but I didn't do much because of a heat induced medical condition (we're in Texas). I just opened the door of the 3rd floor apartment and shifted boxes around while the wife, his mother, and him brought everything in on the dolly.
It took forever! It always takes longer than we expect. We didn't get pizza. But we helped, and he needed it. Never again, I swear (yeah right.)
My husband and I had been married maybe a year...maybe 2 at the time. His son, my stepson, was in prison, and his wife was pregnant, and wanting to move into a section 8 house.
She called MY brother and asked him if he would help her move, since he had a truck. He shows up to help. Her father and brother were there to help as well. At some point in the evening, Her dad and her brother stop helping and go home. My brother continues to help long into the night.
Later down the road, my brother is recounting to me how he was kind of miffed that first, I didn't give him a heads up, or ask him if he could do ME a favor by helping her. I was kind of shocked, because when he told me this, it was absolutely the first I'd heard ANY of it. I didn't know that she'd asked him to help her move.
Second, he was miffed because her own brother and dad had left the majority of the move up to my brother to help out, and he felt bad for her, that she still had so much to move, and no one to help but him.
I was aggravated at her, that she had completely circumvented ME to ask my brother (who she barely knew...like she met him at my husband and I's wedding) to help her, and NEVER even mentioned it to me.
One friend... we showed up on moving day and there was NOTHING packed, and no boxes. We went around to stores and picked up all the boxes we could find, and literally had to dump kitchen drawers into boxes.... drive them to the new place where we dumped them out, and returned with the empty boxes to do it again.
Same with bookcases and other cabinets in the house. Kids toys, everything. Anything unbreakable got put in garbage bags and piled in the living room at the new place. If the friend ever complained about not being able to find anything, we never heard it. None of her friends were happy and I think she knew it.
One other friend, bless her heart... we offered our horse trailer, which is a nice slant load trailer, seven feet high and only 6 inches from the ground.... wonderful for moving.
We moved it to her house a week before the move so she could fill it during the week at her own pace, and we'd tow it to the new place. Then we would come back for anything that didn't fit in the first load, but she didn't have THAT much stuff... right? Maybe just two maybe three trips.
When we got there, she had overfilled all the boxes she packed during the week, so they wouldn't close, and they were all set on the floor of the trailer, one layer, and you couldn't put anything on top of them, because there were breakable and crushable things in them, standing up.
So we had this nice seven-foot-tall space filled with one layer of boxes on the floor. No room for furniture or anything else. That was the first load.
Again with the trip to find more boxes... and I helped direct the future loads so they used the space better!
I must just be better at moving than other people. We have been tempted a few times to help with clients, and it's a hard line to draw! I stop now and helping to find boxes if needed, since we usually know other people who just moved.
Back in the early 70s a man moved to our town. We met him at church and got to be good friends. He had been renting a garage apartment then found a nice little house to rent. He asked my parents (I was in high school) if they would mind if he asked me to help him move. My parents said I'd be there the next morning. lol Anyway, one of the trip down the stairs from his apartment, I dropped all of his dinner plates! I was soooo thankful all those aluminum TV dinner trays he cleaned and stacked in the cabinet to reuse don't break! I bet he had at least 50.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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A good friend was moving about 1986 but within the same town. He had never driven a big box truck so asked if I would drive the 16' rental. It was not a U-haul, but a cheaper local place with older, beater trucks with 4 speed stick shift. The first load went smoothly. On the second the last thing loaded was a 6'high beautiful glass door china cabinet. In order to keep it from tipping or sliding he decided to ride in the back with it, so I closed the door and away I went. Well about 1/3 of the way there I was making a sharp right turn and hit the curb but just kept going. When we got to the new house I backed in, opened the door and ran for my life. Yes, he was pissed but not hurt and we laughed about it later.
Duluth. Last day of January, 1994. Helping two friends of my (then future) wife move from one apartment to another. Fairly new complex, no mature trees, up on the hill and exposed to the wind. Moving in the evening, after work. Very windy. Cold.
I just now looked up the temperature data for that day. The high was 5F. Of course, it was colder after dark. That's actually not that bad for Duluth in the winter. It can get worse. Much worse. Still, it sucked.
She wasn't moving, but a severely disabled neighbor of mine lost her live in caregiver partner who suddenly died.
I had offered to help with small tasks, and she ended up calling me to come over while the partner lay deceased
in bed, waiting for the medical examiner. Next thing I know, I am driving back and forth to the funeral home,
helping this neighbor to arrange final services and such. I started to feel trapped.
Then I spent a summer helping her purge all the crap out of her house. They collected too much stuff. The books
alone made me uneasy, I explained to her that they would make great kindling should her house catch fire. We
have a used bookstore in town that pays a nominal amount for any books they can resell. I was literally loading
her car trunk with piles of books, driving to the bookstore and back to her house for more books, several times.
Fortunately she found a mother daughter housekeeping team who helped her downsize most of her Christmas.
That required a U Haul truck rental to contain it all and cart it all off to a thrift store donations center.
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We have been tempted a few times to help with clients, and it's a hard line to draw! I stop now and helping to find boxes if needed, since we usually know other people who just moved. 
