Did I forget to post here that I drove at Barber a week ago? The Saturday after the Friday we closed on the house, I was off to Barber for a high performance driver's ed weekend. The photographer got some nice shots of my car, and I'll be able to post them directly once I get the cd, but in the meantime, you can check them out by clicking HERE.
It was super duper awesomely fun! I am improving, if slowly. My instructor this last time was so encouraging and positive. And he helped me figure something out. It's not that I'm afraid to go fast. I do love to go fast! But I start to lift way early as I approach the corners, especially the tough ones, because I'm not at all confident with my braking. Braking on the race track is completely backward from what we do on the street. You basically stand on the brake as hard as you can short of locking them up (no anti-lock on my old car).
I know this somewhere deep down, recalling how my helmet has bounced off many a windshield upon application of the brakes at speed with a real racer at the wheel. It's one of those things I worked out early on, and forgot from lack of use. My driving coach came to visit me in the paddock before I went out on Saturday, and he swears we're going to get some time to work together in July. I won't hold my breath, but it would be fantastic to get over that hump. All that said, I did pretty well. I got passed a lot, but I wasn't the only one. I held my own in the corners, but was overpowered in the straights. There were several cars who stayed behind me for entire sessions. I have several complete sections of the track worked out very well, but I still get a little rattled with lots of traffic around me. Once I get a handle on that, I'll be ready for a check-ride, and then a solo driver once I'm checked off. I'm in no hurry for that, but it's out there.
In other news, I got the cabinet and shelves home from Sam's, DreamGuy and I and a dolly hefted them into the house, and I got those puppies put together and pressed into use.
My search for bookcases for my office was fruitless on Saturday, but on Sunday we hit some discount furniture places (headboard! score!) and finally, Target. There, I found what looked like they'd be good enough bookcases for me: two five shelf units, two three shelf units. It was hell getting the huge boxes into the car, and then quadruple hell once we were home getting them into the house and up the stairs.
Then it was time to put them together. These bookcases could not be a bigger pain in the ass, and if I read the instructions correctly, they whole unit can hold a maximum of 65 pounds? For real? I'll have to be sure they're well-anchored, and see if they don't explode under the weight of the boxes of books I have planned for them.
And then there's the sheet music. I thought tonight about finding some young violin student or new violin teacher to give the whole mess to. It's all my study books from my very first beginner book to the last, a collection of Paganini etudes (which I could never, ever play), all my solo and chamber group sheet music, and all my orchestra parts and excerpt books used to prepare for orchestral auditions. Lots of it has tremendous sentimental value, but it's been doing nothing more than gathering dust for years, and I just don't know if it's worth trying to find a place for. I'll get to the bottom of the rest and see how I feel about it down the line.
The new kitchen shelves are seriously loaded down, and I'm maybe a third of the way through the boxes. I still don't know what I'm going to do with dishes and glasses. There is literally no good place for them in the current set-up. If I can easily find some sliding shelves, that will do the trick in a lower cabinet, but the sizes are odd, and it's all a bit more involved than I hoped it'd be. So all my dishes and glasses remain boxed, but I'm working my way through the rest of everything else. The spices are in. The bakeware and gadgets are finding their homes. The seldom-used small appliances are lining up nicely. I'm still curious about where a few things are, but no sense wondering much until I dig out from under the mountain of boxes. I'm sure it's all in there...somewhere.
As usual, I'm all turned around sleep-wise. I was up half of last night unpacking, then I slept in this morning, and had another exhausting day today. After spending the evening wrestling with assembling those PITA bookcases, I dug into some more kitchen boxes. When I heard the dogs getting restless, I brought them out for a late romp, and I've got the laptop set up on the table back here. It's so nice out late at night. The rest of the time, it's insufferably hot and humid these days.
Tomorrow I work at home, and I'd thought I'd get a jump-start on a report I need to finish up, but I started here, and you see where that got us!
It was super duper awesomely fun! I am improving, if slowly. My instructor this last time was so encouraging and positive. And he helped me figure something out. It's not that I'm afraid to go fast. I do love to go fast! But I start to lift way early as I approach the corners, especially the tough ones, because I'm not at all confident with my braking. Braking on the race track is completely backward from what we do on the street. You basically stand on the brake as hard as you can short of locking them up (no anti-lock on my old car).
I know this somewhere deep down, recalling how my helmet has bounced off many a windshield upon application of the brakes at speed with a real racer at the wheel. It's one of those things I worked out early on, and forgot from lack of use. My driving coach came to visit me in the paddock before I went out on Saturday, and he swears we're going to get some time to work together in July. I won't hold my breath, but it would be fantastic to get over that hump. All that said, I did pretty well. I got passed a lot, but I wasn't the only one. I held my own in the corners, but was overpowered in the straights. There were several cars who stayed behind me for entire sessions. I have several complete sections of the track worked out very well, but I still get a little rattled with lots of traffic around me. Once I get a handle on that, I'll be ready for a check-ride, and then a solo driver once I'm checked off. I'm in no hurry for that, but it's out there.
In other news, I got the cabinet and shelves home from Sam's, DreamGuy and I and a dolly hefted them into the house, and I got those puppies put together and pressed into use.
My search for bookcases for my office was fruitless on Saturday, but on Sunday we hit some discount furniture places (headboard! score!) and finally, Target. There, I found what looked like they'd be good enough bookcases for me: two five shelf units, two three shelf units. It was hell getting the huge boxes into the car, and then quadruple hell once we were home getting them into the house and up the stairs.
Then it was time to put them together. These bookcases could not be a bigger pain in the ass, and if I read the instructions correctly, they whole unit can hold a maximum of 65 pounds? For real? I'll have to be sure they're well-anchored, and see if they don't explode under the weight of the boxes of books I have planned for them.
And then there's the sheet music. I thought tonight about finding some young violin student or new violin teacher to give the whole mess to. It's all my study books from my very first beginner book to the last, a collection of Paganini etudes (which I could never, ever play), all my solo and chamber group sheet music, and all my orchestra parts and excerpt books used to prepare for orchestral auditions. Lots of it has tremendous sentimental value, but it's been doing nothing more than gathering dust for years, and I just don't know if it's worth trying to find a place for. I'll get to the bottom of the rest and see how I feel about it down the line.
The new kitchen shelves are seriously loaded down, and I'm maybe a third of the way through the boxes. I still don't know what I'm going to do with dishes and glasses. There is literally no good place for them in the current set-up. If I can easily find some sliding shelves, that will do the trick in a lower cabinet, but the sizes are odd, and it's all a bit more involved than I hoped it'd be. So all my dishes and glasses remain boxed, but I'm working my way through the rest of everything else. The spices are in. The bakeware and gadgets are finding their homes. The seldom-used small appliances are lining up nicely. I'm still curious about where a few things are, but no sense wondering much until I dig out from under the mountain of boxes. I'm sure it's all in there...somewhere.
As usual, I'm all turned around sleep-wise. I was up half of last night unpacking, then I slept in this morning, and had another exhausting day today. After spending the evening wrestling with assembling those PITA bookcases, I dug into some more kitchen boxes. When I heard the dogs getting restless, I brought them out for a late romp, and I've got the laptop set up on the table back here. It's so nice out late at night. The rest of the time, it's insufferably hot and humid these days.
Tomorrow I work at home, and I'd thought I'd get a jump-start on a report I need to finish up, but I started here, and you see where that got us!
The last entry sat posted as "private" when I meant to go back and make it public long ago. Sorry bout that.
To catch up, we did close on the house, a week ago today. Halleluia! While I did end up paying that $400, I still came out ahead due to another change in another part of the overall transaction.
We have a rental fridge and are still scouring the universe for an affordable unit that will fit into the bizarrely small place carved out for a fridge in our postage-stamp-sized kitchen. But today I did pin down a storage solution, and tomorrow at least the elements will be in house. I will have to do some assembly and get help placing the pieces, but by this time tomorrow night I hope to have the things in place so that I can start unpacking and setting up the kitchen. I have yet to do anything but microwave leftovers in my new kitchen. We've not even done a first grocery shopping.
Since I'm sure you're dying to know, after examining a whole gaggle of options, from custom shelving to installed shelving systems to Ikea units to Home Depot track shelving where I landed was commercial kitchen storage. The sizes I need are kind of odd (no surprise there) so I wasn't able to find what I needed at the local restaurant salvage place. The guy there kindly directed me to Sam's, where the angels sang! I'm getting an 18" deep X 48" wide 6-shelf chrome wire unit, and a 36" wide x 18" deep 2 door stainless steel storage cabinet. I may or may not put the doors on it.
It's going to be tight in there, especially once all the stuff is loaded in. And my dryer opens the wrong way, so it's all kind of ridiculous. But it is what it is, and it's way past time to get out of boxes and start really settling in here. I had a couple of movers come over this afternoon to help me get some huge pieces up and down the stairs, and from the front porch to the back, to their final destinations. It took me awhile to decide where to put things, but that much we have pretty much down as of today.
The huge wardrobe boxes with our hanging clothes are finally getting emptied into our newly outfitted closets. Now I have half the living room piled up with empty boxes, half of which need breaking down. The other part of the living room is full of our art. Once we get the boxes all unpacked or stashed, we'll finally be ready to decide what art is going to go where.
Right now I've got my laptop set up on the Alabama art table on the back deck under the gazebo. The red art sofa is out back here now, too. The dogs are milling about, and the summer bugs are making a great big racket. Our house backs up to a quiet corner of a private park, and it's really nice back here. We have everything oriented to minimize the part of the view that looks toward the parking lot of the apartments next door.
To catch up, we did close on the house, a week ago today. Halleluia! While I did end up paying that $400, I still came out ahead due to another change in another part of the overall transaction.
We have a rental fridge and are still scouring the universe for an affordable unit that will fit into the bizarrely small place carved out for a fridge in our postage-stamp-sized kitchen. But today I did pin down a storage solution, and tomorrow at least the elements will be in house. I will have to do some assembly and get help placing the pieces, but by this time tomorrow night I hope to have the things in place so that I can start unpacking and setting up the kitchen. I have yet to do anything but microwave leftovers in my new kitchen. We've not even done a first grocery shopping.
Since I'm sure you're dying to know, after examining a whole gaggle of options, from custom shelving to installed shelving systems to Ikea units to Home Depot track shelving where I landed was commercial kitchen storage. The sizes I need are kind of odd (no surprise there) so I wasn't able to find what I needed at the local restaurant salvage place. The guy there kindly directed me to Sam's, where the angels sang! I'm getting an 18" deep X 48" wide 6-shelf chrome wire unit, and a 36" wide x 18" deep 2 door stainless steel storage cabinet. I may or may not put the doors on it.
It's going to be tight in there, especially once all the stuff is loaded in. And my dryer opens the wrong way, so it's all kind of ridiculous. But it is what it is, and it's way past time to get out of boxes and start really settling in here. I had a couple of movers come over this afternoon to help me get some huge pieces up and down the stairs, and from the front porch to the back, to their final destinations. It took me awhile to decide where to put things, but that much we have pretty much down as of today.
The huge wardrobe boxes with our hanging clothes are finally getting emptied into our newly outfitted closets. Now I have half the living room piled up with empty boxes, half of which need breaking down. The other part of the living room is full of our art. Once we get the boxes all unpacked or stashed, we'll finally be ready to decide what art is going to go where.
Right now I've got my laptop set up on the Alabama art table on the back deck under the gazebo. The red art sofa is out back here now, too. The dogs are milling about, and the summer bugs are making a great big racket. Our house backs up to a quiet corner of a private park, and it's really nice back here. We have everything oriented to minimize the part of the view that looks toward the parking lot of the apartments next door.
I think I may need to write a book or a wacky TV show script. Here's the past 24 hours:( Read more... )
Just when things seemed they couldn't get any crazier, they did. The seller kindly let us move into the house on Wednesday, conditioned on us closing Friday.
Yeah, you see that coming a mile off. ( Read more... )
Random crap:
The mover is available either tomorrow, or Monday. Nothing in between.
We have yet to close. Or get a closing date certain.
If we don't close by Friday, I lose $2K, and I don't know what happens after that.
Our short-stay is up. Tonight's our last night here. Tomorrow we pack up our crap into our cars, and we have not decided where we'll stay tomorrow night.
The NASA-SE that I drove in was....OK. A bit over my head. The autocross I drove Sunday was great. Much learned at both, much fun, too. Also, too hot.
The mover is available either tomorrow, or Monday. Nothing in between.
We have yet to close. Or get a closing date certain.
If we don't close by Friday, I lose $2K, and I don't know what happens after that.
Our short-stay is up. Tonight's our last night here. Tomorrow we pack up our crap into our cars, and we have not decided where we'll stay tomorrow night.
The NASA-SE that I drove in was....OK. A bit over my head. The autocross I drove Sunday was great. Much learned at both, much fun, too. Also, too hot.
We're not wild about our temporary accommodations, but they'll do. We got moved out of the house, got the stuff into storage, and got ourselves set up in our short-stay apartment.
Meanwhile, I totaled DreamGuy's car in a rather spectacular accident last Thursday. It was weird and fast and I'm still not totally sure what happened. Except the FedUps truck won. That much we can say for sure. So on Memorial Day weekend we were car-shopping. DreamGuy found a decent ride, and now we have a pair of CR-Vs out front.
I'm signed up to drive at Barber this weekend. Finally, some fun!
Hopefully we'll have a closing date by the end of this week and we can make plans to be reunited with our stuff and our critters. Man, I miss my babies! We've been to see them twice and it's been hard to leave them each time. They are being spoiled and no longer show much concern about coming with us when we go. Sniff!
Well this is just a quickie to catch us up. I'm off to BitchypooLand today. If I had the means to cook right now, I'd slide on over there and pick up some aigs! Next time....
Today was as wild and crazy as I predicted it would be. Thank God for my dear friend who came over for a last blitz of packing. I don't know what I was thinking when I left myself on the schedule for work today. Doh! Lucky for me, work is at a very low simmer right now. So it was a blur of a day. But I don't think I'll have to stay up all night. I have a few odds and ends in my office to get together, and a big box in the kitchen with some awkwardly sized things, and one more box in the living room to fill up, tape and mark. Pack, pack, and pack! ( Read more... )
What a weekend. I am bone-tired, but too wired to sleep, so here I am. Yesterday, the garage sale went pretty well, considering we had torrential rain starting at 10:00 in the morning, and continuing for the afternoon. We had lots of people come, some having seen a mention of DreamGuy's former store in the ad, where we noted we were liquidating the last of the store's vintage Playboys and memorabilia. DreamGuy really enjoyed seeing some old friends. ( Read more... )
Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of my father's death. And I still can't believe he's gone. As the day approached, I found myself getting weepy over reminders, memories. As I type, my family is gathered in Atlanta at a Mass being said in his memory at the old family church. The months leading to his death were so torturous for him, and for us. I still find it so hard to make any sense of it.
We have come a million miles since that day a year ago, too. The family home is gone, lingering memories in the form of things all around me in boxes now. Mom is living alone in a tiny apartment. The Lincoln is gone, replaced by a car my mother can drive. The mint, so abundant in the garden patch near their old back door, is mowed to the ground, and my efforts to propogate some of it at my own house here ended in dismal failure. That just fits in with the rest of the sadness.
We have come a million miles since that day a year ago, but today I am right back there. I don't know what else to say except he's gone. He's gone, and I can't believe it, and I miss him more than I ever imagined possible.
We have come a million miles since that day a year ago, too. The family home is gone, lingering memories in the form of things all around me in boxes now. Mom is living alone in a tiny apartment. The Lincoln is gone, replaced by a car my mother can drive. The mint, so abundant in the garden patch near their old back door, is mowed to the ground, and my efforts to propogate some of it at my own house here ended in dismal failure. That just fits in with the rest of the sadness.
We have come a million miles since that day a year ago, but today I am right back there. I don't know what else to say except he's gone. He's gone, and I can't believe it, and I miss him more than I ever imagined possible.
So a nice little family bought the washer and dryer. They gave us half down to hold them, and came back later with a truck to settle up and take them home. An hour later, the truck pulled back up and the man came to the door and said that the dryer wasn't working. "Oh gosh, I'm sorry. It was working when we put it into storage. Just bring it back and I'll give you back your money." "Bring it back?" "Yeah, just bring it back and I'll give you back your money."
Off he drove, to get the dryer. Or not. Is it a scam? They drove a hard bargain, then tried to leave without paying the second half, then when giving us the second half, joked that they were only giving us half of that. Haha! No problem. Does the dryer not work and he thought I'd just give him back his money because he said it didn't work? Is he trying to get a dryer for free? Is the dryer really broken? DreamGuy allowed as it's entirely possible, noting that it had fickle electronics. Maybe it didn't like the ride in the back of the truck. Either way, I'm happy to give him back his money. I asked him to bring the dryer back without thinking, but after he left, I wondered if I was being a jerk. For what it's worth, DreamGuy says he'd have done the same thing.
I guess if he was trying to scam us, and he wants to keep the dryer for what he paid, he'll just never come back. Or he'll pull back up with the dryer, leave it, and get his money back. I'd like to think I could tell the difference between an honest person and a liar, but who really can?
Edited to add: The guys did come back with the dryer. I gave them their money, and they turned around and spent most of it wheeling and dealing over other items. I felt kind of bad about asking them to bring back the dryer, but what's a girl to do?
Later today, we will be engaging in the Great American Pastime - the Garage Sale! I just wrote down a few notes for first thing tomorrow:
- Sign on mailbox
- Take down the swing & move to garage
- Change box
- "Make an Offer" Banner
- Move entertainment center to the front porch
- Move big stuff from garage to driveway
- Price signs for pornos
I can't believe this song is out on YouTube. I never knew the name of the band was "Living in a Box," though I did suspect that was the name of the song. The chorus has been rattling around in my head for over 20 years. "I'm a-livin in a box. I'm a-livin in a cardboard box." Dig it:
( Read more... )
( Read more... )
The low-level panic is sticking around. Whee! Today was a work day, but my technology did not cooperate, so I took my leave after lunch and focused on home stuff. I had a helper here, and once again, it looks like a different place now. Big spaces are cleared. Things are getting organized. The garage is filling up.( Read more... )
While my immediate surroundings are not much different from the last time I posted here - my desk is piled higher than ever with crap - we made enough progress today that I am not in freak-out mode as I wind down for the evening. We got tons of stuff out to the garage for the garage sale, and I got the ads out on craigslist and the local paper. I listed a few big items separately on craigslist, and lo and behold, the treadmill is already gone, and I have a nice check in my pocket. Yay for that! ( Read more... )
Wow. What a week. I seem to say that a lot lately, but even for me, this one was a doozie. The house stuff finally got over one hump last week, and now we are praying for a closing date that's really really soon. It was a nail-bitey roller-coastery bit of business, but I think we are almost there. We really are unlikely to close soon enough, so we're packing up our stuff so that we will have a few things in temp housing. ( Read more... )
Yes, we're back to this one. Our new house. Really!
Well that was a surprise! The deal on house #2 went all to hell. The story we got was that the seller didn't have an accurate payoff, and suddenly he was upside down in his house debt-wise. Short sale, bla bla bla. He basically refused to sign anything about any of it at one point, so we had to get him to sign a release letting us out of the deal, which thank god he did sign. Because we took that and went back to house #1! ( Read more... )
Hooray! We're halfway home! ( Read more... )
Yeah, well The Crazy (tm Nance) continues. Nobody should be surprised! We have a contract on a new old house. We love this place more than we loved the last one, though we are compromising many of our former "musts" in this place. The good things about it far outweigh the bad, and the things we've compromised to get in are things we can remedy over time. Like a garage. At least here, there is room. Click on the picture (or on the flickr link to the left) to see a bunch of photos of the new old place.( Read more... )
Greetings! Welcome to The Crazy! We've got a house. We don't have a house. The house is good. the house needs $20K of foundation work. On and on, round and round. My head hurts.
The good news: We are packing up to move out of here. We close on the sale of this place on Tuesday. No contingencies for financing or inspection. Cash sale, as is. Good deal in this market for sure.
The bad news: The house we're looking at was inspected this week, and we're having to meet a contractor over there on Sunday to attach some dollar amounts to some of the more critical issues. We're torn. It's a 108 year old house. It's not going to be perfect. But we don't want to find ourselves in 10-20 years facing a buyer who says, "Yeah, looks great, but it's falling in!" There are support beams hanging loose, and a spot on the most critical load-bearing part of the foundation that is crumbling, and which it looks like may take $20K to repair. Never mind the "little" things like the dryer vent to nowhere, the HVAC intake that pulls from the crawlspace instead of the outside for fresh air, and the dangerously soft spots on the front porch decking.
If this house doesn't work, there will be another. And in the meantime, there will be temporary housing for us, boarding for the critters, and storage for all our crap. Lord help us!
Work has been insane, and it still looks like I may be going to trial the Monday after our last weekend in this house. So I have moved the move back a week earlier - first weekend in May, we need to have the truck come and take all our crap. Where it's going remains to be determined. Head. Hurting.
Moving along - well OK that's about it. I got nuthin else. I'm spending the weekend packing for the Move to Somewhere.
Welcome to The Crazy, yall!
The good news: We are packing up to move out of here. We close on the sale of this place on Tuesday. No contingencies for financing or inspection. Cash sale, as is. Good deal in this market for sure.
The bad news: The house we're looking at was inspected this week, and we're having to meet a contractor over there on Sunday to attach some dollar amounts to some of the more critical issues. We're torn. It's a 108 year old house. It's not going to be perfect. But we don't want to find ourselves in 10-20 years facing a buyer who says, "Yeah, looks great, but it's falling in!" There are support beams hanging loose, and a spot on the most critical load-bearing part of the foundation that is crumbling, and which it looks like may take $20K to repair. Never mind the "little" things like the dryer vent to nowhere, the HVAC intake that pulls from the crawlspace instead of the outside for fresh air, and the dangerously soft spots on the front porch decking.
If this house doesn't work, there will be another. And in the meantime, there will be temporary housing for us, boarding for the critters, and storage for all our crap. Lord help us!
Work has been insane, and it still looks like I may be going to trial the Monday after our last weekend in this house. So I have moved the move back a week earlier - first weekend in May, we need to have the truck come and take all our crap. Where it's going remains to be determined. Head. Hurting.
Moving along - well OK that's about it. I got nuthin else. I'm spending the weekend packing for the Move to Somewhere.
Welcome to The Crazy, yall!
The sounds of Spring are everywhere. The birds are back, chirping and tweeting. The bugs are starting up with their clicks and buzzes. Even the tree frogs have been singing on warmer nights.
But around here, the surest sign of Spring is....
Ahhh yes. The sounds of Spring!
But around here, the surest sign of Spring is....
Ahhh yes. The sounds of Spring!
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