Yet another mini-update

Financing approved! We're now chained to a $150K, 30 year, 6% mortgage... or we will be officially next month. Just have to wait for the sellers to finish up the few repairs and inspections that we requested, and we'll be good to go.

I am really looking forward to having enough space for my books and my knitting stuff. Right now I live with stacked bags of yarn and leaning towers of books everywhere.

As a side note - for anyone who I am linked to via Facebook, I do want to keep the ties from here to there a one-way avenue. In others words, people who read the blog can be aware of that stuff, but I don't want the people I know only from the big F to mosey on over here. If they find me on their own, fabulous. And kudos, too, because I have tried Googling myself in a hundred different ways and I never turn up, which I consider a good thing.

Sicko

Headcold just in time for my first day of work yesterday. So far, so good. Still in the set up phase, and it's hard to be productive when you're blowing your sore red nose every five minutes.

Mostly I'm reading all the information I need to be familiar with ASAP. Also signed up for Facebook. (Yes, finally! My sisters have been on me to do that for awhile.) So if I had an email addy from you, and you were in the Facebook network, you might have gotten tagged. Just say yes, okay? If you are on Facebook and are looking for me, I'm now there. I know you're excited - don't lie. Ha ha.

No new info on the house yet. I'll certainly update when I know more.

A few more tidbits

Inspection went very well. I highly recommend buying from a builder who doesn't like to be cold. Foundation solid, insulation good, no water damage, good electrical. The hot water heater and the furnace will need to replaced sooner rather than later, but we were expecting that. Mostly needs some cosmetic work - scraping, painting, caulking - deck needs to be bolted in on one side where it is pulling away from the house a little (like an inch) and the back corner of the garage/outbuilding has a bit of erosion that needs to be fixed. So now we're just waiting on the bank. Appraisal is scheduled for Monday.

And that's all for now, because I just came back from the eye doctor and my pupils are still pretty blown.

After we close in September, I'll put some pictures of the house on Flickr.

Meep

Home inspection scheduled for Wednesday. If that goes well, appraisal will be Friday.

I start the new job on August 20th. I will still be working at the LYS (that's Local Yarn Shop for you non-knitters) every other Saturday and teaching the occasional sock or lace class.

As for the job, I don't want to post too many details here, but it's basically a guidance counselor-type coach and coordinator for the at-risk first-year students. If they want to succeed, I help them find a way to do it.

Also, I deleted blog links for anyone who hadn't posted since March. If you visit here and notice your link is gone, that would be why. If you start posting again, please let me know, because obviously I liked your blogs enough to put up the link in the first place. There's still a few who haven't updated since May. If that's still the case in October, those will be cleared as well. I do like to remain mostly on top of stuff like that - otherwise I forget and click the link and get disappointed all over again.

Yay!

Got the job!

Details to follow. I'm so completely strung out right now.

Gah.

Made Peace

Came home to find another note from the LL - profuse apologies and telling us she'd like to come to an arrangement with us. I went over to talk with her because I desperately needed to not feel all stressed out all the time. Again, big apologies from her, hugs, congratulations on the house, encouraged me to stay until our closing (Sept 14th!) and offered to help us move when the time came.

She also explained a little better the source of her stress - her daughter's expecting her first baby (after a few miscarriages) in November - and admitted that she just freaked out and stopped listening and then completely overreacted by calling her lawyer.

I'm still a little less forgiving about the note she left for us yesterday morning, but I think I need to let it go.

Anyway... now we just need good news on the home inspection and from the bank. We meet with the bank tomorrow around noon. Wish us luck.

Checking In

We came to an agreement on price with the sellers. Going to sign papers in a minute.

We also found an alternate place to live for September.

Now we just need to get a house inspection and clear things through the bank. We were pre-qualified for $5000 less than we're going to need, but I don't imagine that $5K will be a huge stumbling block.

Will post more as it happens.

(I'm still too stressed to eat, but at least I got a good night's sleep last night.)

Blindsided

This all just went down last night, and I got about 4 hours of sleep (instead of my usual 8.5) and I know that unless I get this out of my head a bit, it's going to keep me up for many more nights.

We've been living in our current apartment for two years. We don't have a written lease. Partly because our landlady told us she's never had written leases, and also because we had a very good experience with our previous landlady without a written lease and it didn't occur to us that this time might be different. (Not smart on our part, clearly.)

When we moved in we agreed to stay through May. In May '06 we agreed to stay through August. In August '06, we agreed to stay "through the winter", and that after that we said we would be looking to buy a house. She asked us in June if we would be able to move out by August. As we hadn't seen any houses we liked then, we said that we weren't able to guarantee that, but that we were looking for houses. So in June, she told a potential renter that the place wouldn't be available for sure in August. She never seemed terribly upset about this and just asked that we keep her informed on the status of our house hunting.

We've been keeping her updated. There just hasn't been much definite to share.

Last week we found a house we like and today we'll be putting in an offer. If the offer is accepted, then our real estate agent said to expect 4-6 weeks for the closing process. We wanted to wait to see if the offer was accepted before giving our LL a definite date. For some reason, we were thinking that 30-45 days notice would be appropriate. (Maybe because it always has been in the past...)

Last night LL showed up all pissed off and ranting about how could we forget it was the beginning of the month? We had forgotten to give her the August rent check, which admittedly was our error. She lives in another house on the property so we usually just hand it to her when we see her. She's been down at her son's house taking care of the grandkids this week, and we've been running around house hunting, job interviewing, and farewell partying for friends who are moving away. But we've been a couple days late before and she hasn't cared, and we've given her rent up to a week early before when she needed it before a vacation. So I thought this was not such a huge deal.

She apparently took it as an insult and thought we had decided that August was going to be our last month and that we had just chosen not to inform her. We apologized repeatedly, but she wasn't hearing any of it, she just kept accusing us of taking advantage of her. She asked us if we could be out by September 1st because she has someone else who is interested in renting, and we said that we didn't think so. We said that October would be acceptable, and she countered with "I can't do November!" Um. Okay.

Insert much more yelling that we were being unfair and deceptive and just wanted to do things on our own schedule without thought for anyone else. Especially since EVERYONE KNOWS that she rents August to August only... Everyone except us, apparently. So we're sitting on the couch kind of just sputtering because we're completely unprepared for this, and she just says fine, she'll talk to us later, and storms out.

Ten minutes later she returns to let us know that she just talked to her lawyer and is "serving us papers" to be out by the 9th of next month. She says this is more than fair, fairer to us that we have been to her, and that she's giving us more notice than we gave her, and that she should have known better because she only has problems like this with people who have too much education. (!!! She teaches, same as we do...) We asked for clarification on that last month's rent and the security deposit, and she answered, adding, "Because I'M not dishonest." Basically implying that we are, of course.

I'm more upset about that than about having 30 days to figure out our living arrangements.

Pretty much I think it comes down to all of us hearing the same words and interpreting them differently. It's an issue of communication more than anything, and I have definitely learned my lesson about getting these agreements in writing.

So right now, best case scenario is that our offer is accepted, inspection goes well, bank agrees to finance (we are pre-approved, but they have to decide the house is worth the purchase price), and we're in the new house by October. Worse case, inspection goes bad, we have to find another apartment for a year. Either way, I think we're going to end up with our stuff in boxes, sleeping in a friend's spare room for a couple weeks.

I'm not sure whether I want to cry or scream.

Still Here

Been a hectic week or so. We found a house we intend to make an offer on, had friends visiting from out of town, have friends leaving town unexpectedly for a new job in Virginia, had a job interview for a newly created position at the college, been working at the yarn shop, been knitting, been reading...

Hmmm. Looking at that list, no wonder I haven't posted in a while.

The job interview went well. I'm one of their top two candidates out of 56 people who applied. The other guy interviews on Monday, and I should know about the job by the middle or end of next week.

We'll officially put the offer on the house after I know about the job, just for peace of mind sake, though we will still offer on the house even if I don't get the job. It's a little farther north than we had originally intended to look, but it's the first house we've seen that I felt at home in. It has views, three bedrooms, good light, a separate garage/workshop, about 3 acres, and in a quiet neighborhood that's really only about 5-10 minutes from the interstate, and 5 miles either direction to two good kayaking lakes.

Things might continue to be quiet around here until the next week or two play out, but I will be sure to update as I get new information.

Why not to be a morning person, Reason #8

We are fortunate to have an extensive trail system right out our back door. It was created primarily for mountain bikers, but I prefer to run/jog/walk instead. Other people horseback ride. In the winter the trails are used by (loud and smelly) snowmobilers and (much quieter) cross country skiiers.

Yesterday I ran into a bit of a trail jam, as I was passing two horseback riders at the same time as two mountain bikers were coming up behind me. No collisions, no worries. But for me, encountering that many people is pretty rare. During the week, it's not uncommon for me to see only one or two other people total, but yesterday was a beautiful, sunny Saturday, so some overlap is to be expected.

I usually head out to the trails in the afternoon or early evening, because exercise in the morning just isn't my thing. I don't feel alert before, during, or after, and I never really hit the stage where the activity feel good. So anyway, point is that I am not out in the morning. Other than a few bikers here and there, the only thing I usually see are chipmunks, bunny rabbits, toads, small birds, and maybe a deer or two.

Jay prefers to run in the morning. Now he rarely run into any other people on the trail, so that's all to the good. What he does see, however, are things like a momma bear and her cubs, a giant moose, and most recently - a psychokiller pheasant. Thing puffed up like a balloon, spread its wings, and chased him down the trail hissing like a raptor.

So the choice seems clear to me. Morning = animals that could eff you up. Afternoon = fuzzy bunnies. No contest.

Broken

Recently I've been listening to This American Life while knitting.

This episode: Two Steps Back captures perfectly the reasons I haven't fought too hard to get back into public school teaching. The school and the teachers described and interviewed in the program just about reduced me to tears, because it so closely resembles my experiences with the public school system in this country.

I firmly believe the system is broken. Some individual schools have been spared, but the federal mandates currently in place would change that.

No sane educator would take an honors student and place them in a remedial course. Why then are the educational reform programs doing just that with high-achieving schools and teachers? Yes, some students, and some teachers, need a structured program to help them rise to the expected heights. Knocking people off the top of that peak and making them climb back up at the same pace as the slower ones is pure lunacy.

And this is why I would have to think long and hard about sending a child to public school - not because of the teachers or the curriculum (though I have questions about them, too) - but because of the politics and bureaucracy that have far too much control over the whole system.

Hotheaded? Me?

Your results:
You are Green Lantern

Green Lantern 65% Spider-Man 65% Supergirl 63% Hulk 60% Superman 60% Wonder Woman 58% Robin 48% Iron Man 45% The Flash 45% Catwoman 40% Batman 35%

Hot-headed. You have strong will power and a good imagination.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Quiz

Pause

I think the problem is that I'm thinking about too many things at once. I actually have about four different blog entries I'd like to write, but I've been knitting and reading and traveling instead.

We spent this last weekend down in New Jersey visiting Jay's family for his 30th birthday. A nice time as always, though the drive is a bit of a hassle. This time my sister was able to take the train out from NYC to hang for the weekend, too. First time that part of Jay's family has met any of my side of the family. One of the things we kind of skipped by not having a wedding.

To answer some of the questions from the comments below, I found all our accommodations on EnjoyEngland.com - great site for finding all sorts of different places from B&Bs to larger hotels. As for the rest, we kind of played it by ear. I asked some of the Brits on the web forums I frequent for recommendations, which is how we ending up down on the coastal path near Poole, and up in the Lake District as well. We joined National Heritage while we were there, and that helped us locate some of the random manor houses and other historic attractions. Mostly we just looked at the tourist information available at the guest houses and tourist info in the towns and took it form there. Having a car made a huge difference as well. I don't think we could have gotten to many of those places without our own transportation.

Alrighty. Just checking in today, but I should have some actual content sometime in the next week. Unless all the thoughts in my head collide in another bottleneck...

Wrapping it up

I'm getting tired of the trip posts, but I can't leave it half done, so here's the rest...

From Derby we drove up to Keswick in the Lakes District. We stopped at Sizergh Castle on the way there, mostly to break up the drive a bit. We, of course, did another walk there. Should have been a short 2 mile loop, but we made a wrong turn and ended up wandering some fields in the wrong direction for about an extra mile or so. No pictures of the castle itself, as the exterior was covered with scaffolding and the interior was too dim for photos, but here's a shot of the grounds (or near the grounds...)



We stayed at Ellergill House - probably our favorite B&B of the trip. Room was simple but elegant, location was excellent, food very good (and they had veggie sausage!), and the owners were around our age. I think we just felt more comfortable there than at any of the other places. So thanks to Robin and Clare!

Here's the street we stayed on:



Main Street - a pedestrian zone - Moot House at the center there.



This is Jay's favorite sign:



One day we split up. Jay hiked Skiddaw and Barrow



and I walked up to Castlerigg Stone Circle and then back into town.







The next day we drove toward Ullswater and walked down to Aira Force.





From there we drove toward Windermere, stopping along the way so Jay could climb up Red Screes, since its elevation is listed as 777, which happens to be his birthday. We stopped in Ambleside for lunch - great little bakery/restaurant, whose name I completely forget, but they are apparently well known for their apple pie.

After lunch we ducked over to Hawkshead to visit Beatrix Potter's home. Unfortunately, the gallery was closed by the time we got there, but we drove up to Tarn Hows and walked around the lake before heading back up to Keswick.

AND FINALLY - York.

This was our first day of not-sunny weather, and we got lost trying to find the Guesthouse because we had a too-small map, and apparently the streets change name at every intersection. Eventually we just stumbled upon it by accident.



After moving in to the tiniest room imaginable (way up on the tippy top floor), we went walking on the walls.





York seems like an interesting place. I kind of wish we had spent another day there, but by this point, we were pretty much vacationed out. But really, how can you not appreciate a place that has signage like this:







From York we drive back to London, and between being tired and the weather being kind of crappy, we just stayed in at the airport Holiday Inn until it was time to leave (at 5am! Ack.)

Derby, um, Darby, dammit

Alrighty, onwards. We departed Holmhurst (which, btw, had the best coffee of the places we stayed at... or maybe just the most generous servings.. either way, I'd stay there again) and heading northwest to Derby, which I pretty much renamed the above.

We stayed at Thornhill Guest House, which I neglected to photograph. The room was very nice, and it had a guest kitchen and computer, which is partly why I picked the place. However, the location was not ideal for our intentions, and if I had it to do over again, I would have based us further north, perhaps in Buxton. But the breakfasts were tasty, the accommodations were lovely, and I was completely in love with the silverware. Sounds strange, but it was very smooth and nicely weighted, and the artist in me appreciated the sleek design. Jay, of course, appreciated being able to cook every night instead of going out. And I have to admit that eating out every night actually does get tiresome. And expensive.

Conveniently, there were several groceries within a five minute walk of the B&B, so we strolled on over to peruse our options.

As tempting as this looked, we stuck with tuna steaks and chicken.



The next day we drove up through the Peaks to Castleton, where we walked a 7 mile loop up Back Tor, around Mam Tor, and then back around the caverns on the other side of town.







We stopped in Bakewell on the way back to Derby, to pick up a famous Bakewell Pudding. Oh my god. Inedible. It was described to me as a tart with strawberry jam and egg custard. What was not mentioned was the three pounds of butter that must have been in the recipe. By the time we got it back to the B&B, it had soaked through the bag. It was also sadly lacking on the strawberry jam side. I would recommend enjoying one of the other treats the bakery has to offer.

Regardless, it was a cute town.



Next day, in the interest of not spending a lot of time in the car, we visited Kedleston Manor. Nice grounds - we enjoyed the long walk around the property and the tour of the garden and manor. Also a really neat old church on the grounds with graves of the ancestors of the family who still lives there going back to the 1500s or something ridiculous like that.



In the gardens, we saw some of the biggest rhododendron we'd ever seen.



And that's about all the excitement for Derbyshire. On to the Lakes!

Standing Stones (and sheep)

Pretty much everything on the trip, barring London and York, can be tagged "and sheep".

So, let's see, we're up to Sunday, May 20th...

We headed out from Salisbury intending to visit Old Sarum and Stonehenge and Avebury, but Old Sarum was closed because of some triathlon. Yes indeedy, imagine taking those narrow little roads of two way traffic with cyclists on your side of the road. Fun fun. Jay did fine, however, and I only had to shut my eyes once or twice.

We arrived fairly early at Stonehenge, fortunately. It wasn't all that crowded at 9:30am, but that soon changed as the big tour buses (coaches) arrived. In some of our pictures, you can't even tell that the place was swarming with touristas.





The reality looks more like this:



Then we drive a bit further north to Avebury, which has an even older, even larger stone circle, plus a nice manor house/garden and museum.



Here, as you can see, the sheep and the people can get right up next to the stones. The village of Avebury runs right through the middle. Unfortunately, the 4 mile loop walk we had intended was derailed due to current restoration of part of the site.



Jay especially enjoyed the garden. Just the kind of guy he is...



Next up, Derbyshire and the Peaks.

Wiltshire etc

As we departed London, we stopped back at Heathrow to pick up our rental car. There we had the unfortunate experience of meeting Claude at Europcar. Guy obviously either had mental problems or some sort of thing against Americans. Maybe both. He insisted in speaking to us in Spanish for some unfathomable reason (he wasn't a native Spanish speaker) and then asking snottily, "Did you have any idea what I'm saying to you?" Bizarre. And enough to make me never want to rent from them again.

Anywho, once we escaped Claude's clutches, the drive to Salisbury went remarkably smoothly, considering the whole reversed driving situation. It helped that it was only a two hour drive, and that it was pretty much a straight shot.

We checked in at Holmhurst Guest House



and parked our little Fiat Punto



before heading over to check out the Cathedral



and into town for dinner.



The next day, we headed south down to Poole and Swanage. I might be mistaken, but I'm pretty sure that it's Bournemouth on the opposite side of the bay behind me in the next picture.



We walked the Coastal Path about two miles west from Swanage and back. Gorgeous.







We ogled Corfe Castle on the way back,



but decided not to go in because we were getting tired and we wanted to detour out to see the Cerne Giant near Cerne Abbas. Not really on the way back to Salisbury, but Jay and I saw it in a documentary recently and we couldn't resist going a bit out of our way to get a first hand look



so to speak.

In the interest of not crashing anyone's computer, I'll pause here.

Next up: Stonehenge and Avebury.

Starting in London

Days 1-2

After a two hour delay due to thunderstorms in Toronto, we flew into Heathrow only to discover that our bags had not made the transfer with us. Fortunately, after the German adventure of 1997, I always carry the essentials with me: mascara and clean underwear.

We took the tube to Canary Wharf and attempted to call our friend T. Sadly, T was having cell phone issues and we couldn't get hold of him. Fortunately, I remembered the name of the back where he works, and we walked over to his building. This was probably easier without our luggage, so the delay wasn't all bad. The security guards outside the building probably thought we were nuts, but they allowed us to sign in and enter the lobby to see reception. T was quickly located, and came down to walk us to his flat. Yay!



We crashed right after he left - dead unconscious for about three hours. The airline claimed that our bags would arrive in the early afternoon, so we waited around. They told us that if we weren't there when they did arrive, the bags would not be delivered. I guess that was the one bad part about staying with friends instead of in a hotel. Alas.

We had intended to get in a bit of touristy stuff that afternoon, but five, six, seven o'clock and the bags still hadn't arrived. Eight o'clock, T came home from work, and we went out to dinner. Still no bags. But T's lovely girlfriend I got home jut as we were going out, and apparently, the bags were delivered five minutes later. Fricking airlines.

The next day, we hit the London streets.





Narrowly escaping exhaust fumes and other excreta, we made our way through Hyde Park to the Natural Science Museum.



Then over to Buckingham Palace





and through Green Park.



Then we hopped on the tube



and headed over to the Tower of London



where we declined to pay the $60 to go inside to look at old stuff. Instead, we walked over to the Tower Bridge.





Jay insisted that we needed to walk across the bridge completely before going back for the tour. I resisted trying to explain that the tour would require us to walk across anyway, mostly because of the greater pay off of watching Jay realize his silliness later. Heh. Love you, hon.

After that, we foolishly believed the map, and decided to find the tube station that was closer to T's place instead of the one that was closer to the Bridge. Much farther than we thought. This was also the point where it became clear that Jay's usually excellent direction is completely foiled by the presence of steel and concrete. Put the man in the woods, he's amazing. Put him in the city, and he will guide you in the wrong direction for days.

And that pretty much sums up day two. Days 3-5 coming soon.