"Until further notice" got addressed when I came down for spring break. One of my jobs was to go through his stuff and find a proper place for it. When I asked him before what kind of "stuff" I would be going through, he shrugged his shoulders and just said "Stuff." Reassuring.
I got to this said "stuff", and it was just an elaborate, highly chaotic, collection of crap. Like, old eye masks (fact #2457 about the fiance: he wears an eye mask to sleep every night), various rubbery ipod cases, nasty old woven friendship-type bracelets type of crap. I found myself moving boxes of junk from one corner of the room to the other, not really knowing what to do with any of it.
After dinner, the fiance and I sat down together to look through his stuff. Whenever I asked him why he chose to keep things, he said "You never know when you'll ever need it!" This was the reply for: empty containers, ear buds, a bajillion bandanas (you know your fiance is a youth director when...), etc.
When I commented about how surprised I was that my fiance has kept all these things, he replied: "You don't understand. This is the first time I've had to share my space with anyone. All my stuff came with me. I went from one extreme to the other. Before this past year, I didn't use to save anything. Now I save everything."
Couple things -- 1) Kind of concerned that in 1 year the fiance has accumulated a rather impressive collection of eye masks... 2) Kind of impressed he saved all the cards I wrote him (1 point for the fiance)
Then I came across this:
It was in a card box with a bunch of other cards just like it.
"Oh, that's nice! We have some extra 'thank you cards' to use!"
Then I touched it; thinner than the toilet paper you find at the airport bathrooms.
Then I opened it.
Liar liar pants on fire; "I hope you have a good 2006"?!?!?!?!?!?!?
That was the day we had our first big laugh (to the point of tears) at our new house. *memories*