I got my Knitpicks catalog in the mail yesterday, and while browsing through it, saw a little article on Miriam Tegels, the official world's faster knitter (Guinness even says so) (the book, not the beer). Constantly bemoaning my slow knitting speeds, I had to check this out.
I almost wish I hadn't. Watch this.
Knitting fast just for the sake of knitting fast has never been my thing (and good thing, too). I always enjoyed the meditative, relaxing pace of my knitting. But it does get frustrating when things take so long (as I've mentioned before). All I could think of while watching this was, "Wow, if I could knit even half that fast, I could actually start a sweater in the season I hoped to wear it in, and finish it in time!" If I could knit a sweater in a month to six weeks I'd be happy. Miriam could probably knit one in a couple of days (or less). I just tried to imagine sitting down and knitting, like, an entire scarf or baby blanket during one episode of your favorite TV show.
Of course - she must have to spend a fortune on yarn that way. See, there's always a bright side - I only have to buy yarn once a year or so.
But, I'm plugging away at my sweater - got several more rows done last night. I'm nearing completion of the third repeat of the pattern on the back, so that's not too terrible. (I don't remember how many I need to do, it's in my notes which aren't handy - 7 or 8 maybe?). I started it last winter with the intent for it to be a summer sweater (3/4 length sleeves and all). Then when summer blew by, I decided it would make an acceptable winter sweater (back to long sleeves). Now it looks like it's back to being a summer sweater - a next summer sweater. Ah well. It's all knitting, so it's all good.
Moving on ... okay, I don't make a particularly fancy lasagna - I don't use ricotta cheese or anything like that, just plain fare - lasagna noodles, sauce and hamburger, shredded mozzarella and grated Parmesan cheese - but I love the way I make it (and the Dread Reverend's pretty happy with it, too, so we're all that matter). But I always made it the 'old fashioned' way - boiling the lasagna noodles, then making the layers of lasagna in the pan, then baking it to melt the cheese and heat it.
Well. I went to make lasagna last night, and discovered that by accident I had bought the oven ready kind that you don't have to boil first. I intentionally never bought this before because I was just skeptical - 'oven ready' implied, to me, 'pre-cooked' - and I didn't see how pre-cooked lasagna could be any good.
So when I discovered that was all I had, and I already had the sauce and hamburger cooking on the stove, I decided to go for it. Man - was I glad I did. This was the best pan of lasagna I've ever made in my life! I don't know if it was just the lasagna, or that in combination with the sauce (I always buy plain sauce, then spice it up to my liking, never the same way twice - maybe it just turned out exceptionally good this time). But I was deeply impressed with the oven ready lasagna. It was definintely done after baking, not sort of chewy like I expected it to be. But at the same time it had some structure left to it, wasn't all limp and lifeless like my lasagna is when I boil it first (even when I boil it al dente - the baking after the fact seemed to kind of wreck it).
So, kudos for oven ready lasagna - I'll never boil lasagna noodles again! For what it's worth, here's my lasagna recipe. Seasoned cooks (ha ha, pun intended) might find this boring, but the unadventurous and / or new cooks might like it. And it's open to a lot of personal tweaking. I happen not to like chunky pasta sauces with veggies in them, which is why I use plain sauce and fix it up. But you could of course use one of those chunky veggie sauces, or add mushrooms, or anything you like.
A simple basic starting place, but really good even just as is.
12 lasagna noodles - oven ready!
2 cans Hunts Traditional spaghetti sauce
about a pound or so of ground round or hamburger
1 pkg. shredded mozzarella cheese
grated parmesan
spices: Basil, Oregano, Onion Powder, Garlic Powder, Salt
Pour the sauce into a pan and heat (mostly because it tastes yucky cold, and you're going to be doctoring it up)
Add spices - those listed or experiment - and taste till you like it
Meanwhile, cook and drain the hamburger
Stir sauce and hamburger together. Spoon some into the bottom of your pan - I don't have a pan measurement for you because I don't have a proper lasagna pan at the moment, but ideally it'll be just wide enough for 3 strips of lasagna to cover the bottom. Or 4 pieces across the bottom - then you might need more than 12, depending on how thick you like your lasagna. Three to four layers of noodles works well for me.
Place 3 lasagna strips across the pan, on top of the sauce and hamburger mix you just spread around the bottom of the pan. On top of that spread a layer of the sauce and hamburger mix, a generous layer of mozzarella cheese, and a good sprinkle of parmesan. Repeat those layers till you place the last layer of lasanga, top with sauce and hamburger, and lots of cheese.
Cover tightly with tinfoil and bake at 375 for about an hour (or whatever oven temperature your particular box of oven ready lasagna tells you to use; that's what mine said). Take the pan out of the oven but leave covered and let stand 10 to 15 minutes. Then dig in - num yummy! (Also to-die-for left over).
Friday, November 21, 2008
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Knitting and Work - If Only The Twain Should Meet
It'd be cool to make my living by knitting. I wonder how people do that?
I have started working on the sweater again. I got 10 or 12 rows done on the back last night. Not a lot, compared to how many there are to go, but definite progress. I'm kind of psyched about it again, and want to start working on it more regularly.
But since the time changed, it's dark when I get home from work at 5:00 or 5:30, and by the time dinner's over the night's feeling pretty well shot, there may be a lot more knitting evenings ensuing.
The work situation has roller-coasted through several layers of hell lately. Last Thursday my boss dumped so much additional work on me I thought my brain was going to explode. I had one of those insomniac nights Thursday night, and at 5:00 a.m. Friday morning (still awake) I called off work. I didn't go in Saturday either, and I spent those two days basically in a horrible depression about what I was going to do about that lunatic job.
Finally by Sunday a plan had formulated. I went in Sunday and spent four hours doing nothing but prioritizing and scheduling my work for the week, assigning things days based on their upcoming deadlines. Then I took everything that had deadlines I wasn't going to be able to get to, and dumped it squarely back on my boss' desk with a big note telling him, "This stuff all has imminent deadlines, and I can't get it done in time."
There. Let him deal with it. And that's the ongoing plan. Every couple days I'm going to take some time to sort and prioritize my new work, and anything with imminent deadlines that I can't get to, I'm returning to him. I figure that's the only way he's ever going to understand the concept of "too much work and too little time to do it" - if HE is the one who has to deal with it, rather than just continually throwing it at me and my co-workers and saying, "Well, you figure it out."
Since I've taken a lot of the pressure off myself, it frees up some brain space to start relaxing in the evening again - hence the knitting.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not a slackass who doesn't want to work. I work hard at that job, and take my responsibilities seriously. In fact, that's exactly why I can't let him over-commit me to work I can't do - because I know I can't do it, and I can't just sit back and watch it not get done, and not care - or kill myself with stress trying to do more than is humanly possible.
Balance! That's all I ask - balance. If I have to physically force the balance by shifting things around myself, well, that works for me.
Looking forward to getting through today and coming home and knitting some more!
I have started working on the sweater again. I got 10 or 12 rows done on the back last night. Not a lot, compared to how many there are to go, but definite progress. I'm kind of psyched about it again, and want to start working on it more regularly.
But since the time changed, it's dark when I get home from work at 5:00 or 5:30, and by the time dinner's over the night's feeling pretty well shot, there may be a lot more knitting evenings ensuing.
The work situation has roller-coasted through several layers of hell lately. Last Thursday my boss dumped so much additional work on me I thought my brain was going to explode. I had one of those insomniac nights Thursday night, and at 5:00 a.m. Friday morning (still awake) I called off work. I didn't go in Saturday either, and I spent those two days basically in a horrible depression about what I was going to do about that lunatic job.
Finally by Sunday a plan had formulated. I went in Sunday and spent four hours doing nothing but prioritizing and scheduling my work for the week, assigning things days based on their upcoming deadlines. Then I took everything that had deadlines I wasn't going to be able to get to, and dumped it squarely back on my boss' desk with a big note telling him, "This stuff all has imminent deadlines, and I can't get it done in time."
There. Let him deal with it. And that's the ongoing plan. Every couple days I'm going to take some time to sort and prioritize my new work, and anything with imminent deadlines that I can't get to, I'm returning to him. I figure that's the only way he's ever going to understand the concept of "too much work and too little time to do it" - if HE is the one who has to deal with it, rather than just continually throwing it at me and my co-workers and saying, "Well, you figure it out."
Since I've taken a lot of the pressure off myself, it frees up some brain space to start relaxing in the evening again - hence the knitting.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not a slackass who doesn't want to work. I work hard at that job, and take my responsibilities seriously. In fact, that's exactly why I can't let him over-commit me to work I can't do - because I know I can't do it, and I can't just sit back and watch it not get done, and not care - or kill myself with stress trying to do more than is humanly possible.
Balance! That's all I ask - balance. If I have to physically force the balance by shifting things around myself, well, that works for me.
Looking forward to getting through today and coming home and knitting some more!
Sunday, November 2, 2008
The Internet: Blessing, Curse
I've been having a problem with insomnia for awhile now. But it's lately developed a new twist: paranoia. (What's that called together - insomnoia? parasomnia?)
It goes like this. I will be exhausted throughout the early evening, or maybe just start getting really tired around bedtime, but either way - usually I am tired when I first begin thinking about going to bed. Then one of several things happens. Either I go to bed, but can't fall asleep - feel wide awake as soon as my head hits the pillow and the lights are off - or I fall asleep, but wake up in a few hours totally wide awake and unable to go back to sleep.
This was annoying enough. But lately when I'm laying there totally unable to sleep (or when I wake up in the middle of the night), I'm suddenly beseiged by a bout of total paranoia. I will be worried about anything and everything, but not just normal every day worries. I will either take semi-legitimate worries and blow them completely out of proportion, or I'll fabricate totally unfounded fears and let my mind elaborate on them for awhile. Then my heart rate goes up, I start feeling all antsy and anxious, and that just keep me more awake. Oy!
This is really getting on my nerves. A couple months ago this was bad enough that sometimes several nights a week I would wake up in the middle of the night, and be up until 5:00 or 6:00 a.m., when I had to work the next day (or, umm, that day).
At least tonight it's the weekend - and yes, you guessed - that's why I'm blogging this blather at a little after midnight. Not that that's late for some people, but it generally is for me, and earlier in the evening I was so completely exhausted I could barely hold my eyes open, and was only hoping I could stay awake until 8:00 p.m. (as going to bed any earlier seemed just wrong).
But as soon as my head hit the pillow, bam - I was wide awake. I tried staying there for about half an hour, then gave up.
An acquaintence of mine who happens to be a counselor told me once that insomnia has to be watched carefully, because if it goes on too long it can begin to create paranoia. Now I'm beginning to see what he meant.
So I'm up and awake, and decide to go do some browsing online. For fun, I typed into Dogpile "insomnia and paranoia" to see what I could find out. I turned up a blog where someone was talking about a disease they'd found online (probably during a late night insomniac bout of the same type of sleepless surfing I was indulging in) called "fatal familal insomnia." Just what it sounds like - the patient develops insomnia which worsens over several months until they can't sleep at all; hallucinations and complete delusions occur, followed by death. There is no cure.
"Oh, great," I thought. "Just what an insomniac who is also paranoid needs to read in the middle of the night!" I'd have been convinced I have it, except it's extremely rare - it's definitely genetic, and only 28 families in the world have been discovered who have the gene. I think I'm safe in assuming mine isn't one of them, or I'd probably know it by now.
Unless I've developed some mutant strain of it ...
Okay, enough of that. To be more serious (not that death by wakefulness isn't serious) ... I actually am pretty sure I know what's causing mine, and I just have to get my head out of my ass and do what needs done to fix it. It's actually a number of things all piling up. Stress - both job and home. Drinking way too much diet Coke, especially throughout the evening (apparently my former immunity to caffeine is wearing off as I age). And I need to do a bit of personal cognitive-behavioral therapy on myself. I've just let myself become too negative, too always ready to assume and expect the worst, and way too much of a worrywart. I recognize that I do this, in just about every aspect of life (day or night, so it's not just a late-night sleeplessness thing). I've always been a somewhat negative person (okay, those of you who know me - stop with the sarcastic "(snorf) Somewhat!?").
But in the past year or so it seems to have gotten much worse. And that is something I could have some control over. While I don't practice what I preach, I am a firm believer in the concept of mind over anything. Our thoughts really do to a great degree create or effect our reality, and I really could work on not always seeing the world through soot-colored glasses.
As for stress, well, unfortunately it just got ramped up. My boss fired one of my co-workers Friday. I understand why he did it, but man, it wrecked my job. I was already just barely treading water with my own work - we recently hired a new person who had no law office experience at all, so I am training her totally from scratch - a very time-consuming thing.
My boss had also recently assigned me to create and handle a 'case management' system to monitor and track the status of all his domestic cases (several hundred) because we hadn't previously had such a system, and too many things were falling through the cracks. Now, I think this is a great idea, and I didn't mind doing it, in fact I was sort of looking forward to both the challenge, and the increased organization it would bring to the office. But it has been a very time-consuming thing to create and tweak the system until it works for us, and to begin entering all the cases into it. Out of the several hundred, so far only 30 are actually up and running in the system.
With all of that, I was barely keeping up as it was. Now I have to take on all of my former co-worker's work as well as mine. This just about doubled my work load, and I do not honesty know how I'm going to possibly do it - even increasing my hours from 25 a week to 40+ and working Saturdays, I still don't see how it's going to get done on time - because it's not like I can just say "I'll get to it when I get to it." It's a law office - everything has deadlines, and everything that isn't an emergency right now will be in 3 days.
They will replace her, but in my past experience of this (many experiences - there have been at least 14 or 15 people there who have quit or been fired) it takes quite awhile to find someone, and even if we're lucky enough to find someone with law office experience, I still have to train them for how we do things, our systems. So I'll be training two people, with all the rest of it.
Yeah, it's enough to make my head spin. In the 12 years I've been there, I have never, ever been in this bad a place with my work. I'm completely overwhelmed and do not see any way I can do all this.
That alone ramped my stress up to possibly unmanageable levels. And I'm sure it's what's contributing to tonight's wee-hours blogfest.
But there's one bottom line to all this: I am the only one who can do anything about any of it. I have to get myself straightened up, and start normalizing my life. I have to stop with the diet Coke and maybe in fact any caffeine for awhile, until I get this situation under control. I want to start eating better, and taking my vitamins again. Some exericse would probably do me a world of good - both for reducing stress, and maybe for helping me be relaxed and tired enough in the evening to actually sleep. I want to start meditating every day, to help calm my over-anxious paranoid mind.
And as for work ... I really don't know yet what I'm going to do about that, except do the biggest emergencies each day, and the rest of it will just have to wait. And my boss is just going to have to understand that. Fortunately, he's very cool that way, and he won't give me nearly as much grief as I give myself.
Well, I feel a little better for having written it all out. I'm still wide awake, but not as stressed.
And the bonus - I bet I put you right to sleep!
It goes like this. I will be exhausted throughout the early evening, or maybe just start getting really tired around bedtime, but either way - usually I am tired when I first begin thinking about going to bed. Then one of several things happens. Either I go to bed, but can't fall asleep - feel wide awake as soon as my head hits the pillow and the lights are off - or I fall asleep, but wake up in a few hours totally wide awake and unable to go back to sleep.
This was annoying enough. But lately when I'm laying there totally unable to sleep (or when I wake up in the middle of the night), I'm suddenly beseiged by a bout of total paranoia. I will be worried about anything and everything, but not just normal every day worries. I will either take semi-legitimate worries and blow them completely out of proportion, or I'll fabricate totally unfounded fears and let my mind elaborate on them for awhile. Then my heart rate goes up, I start feeling all antsy and anxious, and that just keep me more awake. Oy!
This is really getting on my nerves. A couple months ago this was bad enough that sometimes several nights a week I would wake up in the middle of the night, and be up until 5:00 or 6:00 a.m., when I had to work the next day (or, umm, that day).
At least tonight it's the weekend - and yes, you guessed - that's why I'm blogging this blather at a little after midnight. Not that that's late for some people, but it generally is for me, and earlier in the evening I was so completely exhausted I could barely hold my eyes open, and was only hoping I could stay awake until 8:00 p.m. (as going to bed any earlier seemed just wrong).
But as soon as my head hit the pillow, bam - I was wide awake. I tried staying there for about half an hour, then gave up.
An acquaintence of mine who happens to be a counselor told me once that insomnia has to be watched carefully, because if it goes on too long it can begin to create paranoia. Now I'm beginning to see what he meant.
So I'm up and awake, and decide to go do some browsing online. For fun, I typed into Dogpile "insomnia and paranoia" to see what I could find out. I turned up a blog where someone was talking about a disease they'd found online (probably during a late night insomniac bout of the same type of sleepless surfing I was indulging in) called "fatal familal insomnia." Just what it sounds like - the patient develops insomnia which worsens over several months until they can't sleep at all; hallucinations and complete delusions occur, followed by death. There is no cure.
"Oh, great," I thought. "Just what an insomniac who is also paranoid needs to read in the middle of the night!" I'd have been convinced I have it, except it's extremely rare - it's definitely genetic, and only 28 families in the world have been discovered who have the gene. I think I'm safe in assuming mine isn't one of them, or I'd probably know it by now.
Unless I've developed some mutant strain of it ...
Okay, enough of that. To be more serious (not that death by wakefulness isn't serious) ... I actually am pretty sure I know what's causing mine, and I just have to get my head out of my ass and do what needs done to fix it. It's actually a number of things all piling up. Stress - both job and home. Drinking way too much diet Coke, especially throughout the evening (apparently my former immunity to caffeine is wearing off as I age). And I need to do a bit of personal cognitive-behavioral therapy on myself. I've just let myself become too negative, too always ready to assume and expect the worst, and way too much of a worrywart. I recognize that I do this, in just about every aspect of life (day or night, so it's not just a late-night sleeplessness thing). I've always been a somewhat negative person (okay, those of you who know me - stop with the sarcastic "(snorf) Somewhat!?").
But in the past year or so it seems to have gotten much worse. And that is something I could have some control over. While I don't practice what I preach, I am a firm believer in the concept of mind over anything. Our thoughts really do to a great degree create or effect our reality, and I really could work on not always seeing the world through soot-colored glasses.
As for stress, well, unfortunately it just got ramped up. My boss fired one of my co-workers Friday. I understand why he did it, but man, it wrecked my job. I was already just barely treading water with my own work - we recently hired a new person who had no law office experience at all, so I am training her totally from scratch - a very time-consuming thing.
My boss had also recently assigned me to create and handle a 'case management' system to monitor and track the status of all his domestic cases (several hundred) because we hadn't previously had such a system, and too many things were falling through the cracks. Now, I think this is a great idea, and I didn't mind doing it, in fact I was sort of looking forward to both the challenge, and the increased organization it would bring to the office. But it has been a very time-consuming thing to create and tweak the system until it works for us, and to begin entering all the cases into it. Out of the several hundred, so far only 30 are actually up and running in the system.
With all of that, I was barely keeping up as it was. Now I have to take on all of my former co-worker's work as well as mine. This just about doubled my work load, and I do not honesty know how I'm going to possibly do it - even increasing my hours from 25 a week to 40+ and working Saturdays, I still don't see how it's going to get done on time - because it's not like I can just say "I'll get to it when I get to it." It's a law office - everything has deadlines, and everything that isn't an emergency right now will be in 3 days.
They will replace her, but in my past experience of this (many experiences - there have been at least 14 or 15 people there who have quit or been fired) it takes quite awhile to find someone, and even if we're lucky enough to find someone with law office experience, I still have to train them for how we do things, our systems. So I'll be training two people, with all the rest of it.
Yeah, it's enough to make my head spin. In the 12 years I've been there, I have never, ever been in this bad a place with my work. I'm completely overwhelmed and do not see any way I can do all this.
That alone ramped my stress up to possibly unmanageable levels. And I'm sure it's what's contributing to tonight's wee-hours blogfest.
But there's one bottom line to all this: I am the only one who can do anything about any of it. I have to get myself straightened up, and start normalizing my life. I have to stop with the diet Coke and maybe in fact any caffeine for awhile, until I get this situation under control. I want to start eating better, and taking my vitamins again. Some exericse would probably do me a world of good - both for reducing stress, and maybe for helping me be relaxed and tired enough in the evening to actually sleep. I want to start meditating every day, to help calm my over-anxious paranoid mind.
And as for work ... I really don't know yet what I'm going to do about that, except do the biggest emergencies each day, and the rest of it will just have to wait. And my boss is just going to have to understand that. Fortunately, he's very cool that way, and he won't give me nearly as much grief as I give myself.
Well, I feel a little better for having written it all out. I'm still wide awake, but not as stressed.
And the bonus - I bet I put you right to sleep!
Friday, October 31, 2008
The Real Estate Roller Coaster
I don't think I'm cut out for this house-hunting adventure. Okay, maybe I'm just getting ... no, I won't say it, but I admit I was much more enthusiastic about it the last time (when I bought this house 14 years ago). I looked at all kinds of crappy houses then (the only type in my price range), and was terribly excited about all of them.
This time it's not working that way at all. This time I can afford to look at much nicer houses, but we're having a very difficult time finding ones that meet our criteria; when we do there's always some snag; and I don't know what to do about getting rid of my current house and mortgage so I can buy said new house (a problem I didn't have to worry about last time). And the whole process is just angsting me out badly.
That first house we looked at was beautiful, but a little out of our price range, so we had to get over that one. We looked at what I'll call Tod House 2, and really liked it. The more I've thought about it, the more I like it. In fact, so much that I was ready to make an offer on it. It really does fit all of our needs perfectly - including price.
But what to do to get rid of my current mortgage, so that I could move on the other house? Then, serendipitously, through mentioning my dilemma to my boss, he knew someone who was looking for a small, nice but not too expensive house to buy right away - and he could pay cash for it. Problem solved! I started transferring my down payment funds around to get them all into one account, and got my pre-approval letter from the bank - I was ready to go, and knowing we can easily afford Tod House #2, was sure we'd get that house and be in it by Christmas.
That's what I get for counting my chickens before the hen died.
Because then came another dip in the rollercoaster - I found out Tod House #2 is subject to short sale, and the time involved in making an offer just got seriously extended. The lender can take 30 days or more to even respond to our offer; and if they reject it, they don't make a counter-offer - if we want to try again, we just have to start the process all over again.
Fine, but that loses me my potential instant cash buyer - this person can't wait that long to buy a house, he needs something right away, and in his price range and ability to pay cash, will certainly find it elsewhere.
And our agent advised us that a lender would never accept an offer on Tod House 2 if we make it contingent on selling my house first ... if it's a short sale, they just want it done and over with (then how come they delay the process so long?) and won't be agreeable to wait for my house to sell in this not-so-hot market.
So while I'd still love to make an offer on Tod House #2, and since it's definitely in a range we can easily afford, I should have no problem coming up with an offer that would be accepted - if I can't make it contingent on selling my house first, and I don't currently have a ready buyer for my house, I don't see how I can make the offer. I have to get rid of mortgage number one before I can get mortgage number two.
Back to square one.
We found two other houses we wanted to go and look at, but our agent advised us that both houses are also bank owned, and require septic upgrades - something the bank won't pay for, and we can't (we need all our funds for the down payment, and septic upgrades can cost between $12,000 and $20,000).
We found another, really nice house we wanted to look at (city utilities; no septic), but just when we called to get an appointment to see it, an offer had been accepted on it.
It's just one damned thing after another.
I know I don't have quite the right attitude about this, that of a fun adventure ... but it's hard when I so desperately want to move, and move soon, and have the funds and credit to easily buy a new house - but keep hitting roadblocks at every turn. It would have helped if I hadn't waited till things were so dire here, till I felt so desperate to move. I know what kicked it in though ... it got cold, and I suddenly can't spend all my time outside, but instead am cooped up in this tiny house too much. During the summer when I could spend most of my time outdoors it wasn't so bad. Now, the prospect of another 7 months sequestered in this glorified garage makes me feel like I'm going to crack up.
So, it's frustrating. But we'll keep looking. And I do have a contingency plan of sorts. I started last weekend really cleaning this place out. I hauled a truckload of stuff to the dumpster at work, threw away several more large bags of stuff, and packed several boxes. This house just has too much crap in it, and if we're going to move, this cleaning out and packing up process has to be done, anyway - so I figure, if I start now, and can begin to reduce the clutter and clean the place up, maybe it won't be so unbearable to live here while we go through this torturous finding-the-perfect-house-that-we-can-actually-buy process.
In theory, anyway.
This time it's not working that way at all. This time I can afford to look at much nicer houses, but we're having a very difficult time finding ones that meet our criteria; when we do there's always some snag; and I don't know what to do about getting rid of my current house and mortgage so I can buy said new house (a problem I didn't have to worry about last time). And the whole process is just angsting me out badly.
That first house we looked at was beautiful, but a little out of our price range, so we had to get over that one. We looked at what I'll call Tod House 2, and really liked it. The more I've thought about it, the more I like it. In fact, so much that I was ready to make an offer on it. It really does fit all of our needs perfectly - including price.
But what to do to get rid of my current mortgage, so that I could move on the other house? Then, serendipitously, through mentioning my dilemma to my boss, he knew someone who was looking for a small, nice but not too expensive house to buy right away - and he could pay cash for it. Problem solved! I started transferring my down payment funds around to get them all into one account, and got my pre-approval letter from the bank - I was ready to go, and knowing we can easily afford Tod House #2, was sure we'd get that house and be in it by Christmas.
That's what I get for counting my chickens before the hen died.
Because then came another dip in the rollercoaster - I found out Tod House #2 is subject to short sale, and the time involved in making an offer just got seriously extended. The lender can take 30 days or more to even respond to our offer; and if they reject it, they don't make a counter-offer - if we want to try again, we just have to start the process all over again.
Fine, but that loses me my potential instant cash buyer - this person can't wait that long to buy a house, he needs something right away, and in his price range and ability to pay cash, will certainly find it elsewhere.
And our agent advised us that a lender would never accept an offer on Tod House 2 if we make it contingent on selling my house first ... if it's a short sale, they just want it done and over with (then how come they delay the process so long?) and won't be agreeable to wait for my house to sell in this not-so-hot market.
So while I'd still love to make an offer on Tod House #2, and since it's definitely in a range we can easily afford, I should have no problem coming up with an offer that would be accepted - if I can't make it contingent on selling my house first, and I don't currently have a ready buyer for my house, I don't see how I can make the offer. I have to get rid of mortgage number one before I can get mortgage number two.
Back to square one.
We found two other houses we wanted to go and look at, but our agent advised us that both houses are also bank owned, and require septic upgrades - something the bank won't pay for, and we can't (we need all our funds for the down payment, and septic upgrades can cost between $12,000 and $20,000).
We found another, really nice house we wanted to look at (city utilities; no septic), but just when we called to get an appointment to see it, an offer had been accepted on it.
It's just one damned thing after another.
I know I don't have quite the right attitude about this, that of a fun adventure ... but it's hard when I so desperately want to move, and move soon, and have the funds and credit to easily buy a new house - but keep hitting roadblocks at every turn. It would have helped if I hadn't waited till things were so dire here, till I felt so desperate to move. I know what kicked it in though ... it got cold, and I suddenly can't spend all my time outside, but instead am cooped up in this tiny house too much. During the summer when I could spend most of my time outdoors it wasn't so bad. Now, the prospect of another 7 months sequestered in this glorified garage makes me feel like I'm going to crack up.
So, it's frustrating. But we'll keep looking. And I do have a contingency plan of sorts. I started last weekend really cleaning this place out. I hauled a truckload of stuff to the dumpster at work, threw away several more large bags of stuff, and packed several boxes. This house just has too much crap in it, and if we're going to move, this cleaning out and packing up process has to be done, anyway - so I figure, if I start now, and can begin to reduce the clutter and clean the place up, maybe it won't be so unbearable to live here while we go through this torturous finding-the-perfect-house-that-we-can-actually-buy process.
In theory, anyway.
Friday, October 24, 2008
A House! Another House!
Wow, this is getting exciting. We went to look at House #2 tonight. It's the "downgrade" (in theory) from House #1, the "Dream House" - the perfect house that is just that much out of our price range.
House #2 is the very similar house down the road from House #1, and it ran a close race. Why it's the downgrade is: the bedrooms are smaller; there isn't a huge multi-tiered deck off the back; and it doesn't have a pool.
But that's about it. On the plus side of House #2, the rooms are all nicer (the kitchen is way nicer); it has 3 acres instead of 2 (and still goes to the river); and it's cheaper. As my buddy Rhys so astutely points out (and YES you always have crash space - any place you want), we can build our own decking, and have a pool put in some time down the road if we want one badly enough - although the work and expense of one sometimes makes me wonder. (P.S. - Rhys, Robin plans to start having Roughnecks Training Camps again if we get this place ... plenty of room for ya'll to wreck yourselves for a weekend).
If it were $20,000 cheaper I'd buy it tomorrow. Er, Monday. It's really nice. Very nice hardwood floors. A huge living room. A beautiful 'family room' with a gorgeous brick fireplace, the whole room beautifully paneled in a lovely light wood (not sure what it is). It looks kinda small, but it's deceptive - it's the exact same size of the living room (of which I didn't take a picture, but looks much larger - they are both 24 x 12, the same size as the living room at House #1 and smaller than the family room with fireplace there; it's because this fireplace juts out into the room rather than being flush with the wall, but I am so not complaining - it's a beautiful, beautiful room).
It also has a built-in 'home office' in one end - a work station, shelves, and drawers galore - in matching wood.
The kitchen is to die for, huge, nice, tons of cabinets and space - way larger and nicer than the one in Alleged Dream Home #1. (This is only half of it - it continues on the right)
Upstairs, four bedrooms ... closets everywhere. Downstairs, a fantastic (large, clean, dry) basement with another fireplace. The three acres are at least half wooded (not so much at the other place). Just sweet.
I say "If it were $20,000 cheaper" but not because we're looking at houses we can't afford. Technically it's in our range - that's assuming, based on asking price, that they will come down at least somewhat from that starting point. It's just on the high end of comfortable, is all ... and I'd be much happier with considerably less of a mortgage. So I'm going to line up my ducks, and we're going to make a low-ball offer, and keep looking. *Shrug* Nothing else to do.
But I really like this place, although I am astute enough to realize that I'd probably like almost any house that was so much bigger and nicer than mine, and anywhere within spitting distance of achievable for us just now. So that's why we're going to keep looking - just in case. (And just in case they don't accept our low-ball offer, which is a good bet).
No new knitting news ... too busy house planning.
House #2 is the very similar house down the road from House #1, and it ran a close race. Why it's the downgrade is: the bedrooms are smaller; there isn't a huge multi-tiered deck off the back; and it doesn't have a pool.
But that's about it. On the plus side of House #2, the rooms are all nicer (the kitchen is way nicer); it has 3 acres instead of 2 (and still goes to the river); and it's cheaper. As my buddy Rhys so astutely points out (and YES you always have crash space - any place you want), we can build our own decking, and have a pool put in some time down the road if we want one badly enough - although the work and expense of one sometimes makes me wonder. (P.S. - Rhys, Robin plans to start having Roughnecks Training Camps again if we get this place ... plenty of room for ya'll to wreck yourselves for a weekend).
If it were $20,000 cheaper I'd buy it tomorrow. Er, Monday. It's really nice. Very nice hardwood floors. A huge living room. A beautiful 'family room' with a gorgeous brick fireplace, the whole room beautifully paneled in a lovely light wood (not sure what it is). It looks kinda small, but it's deceptive - it's the exact same size of the living room (of which I didn't take a picture, but looks much larger - they are both 24 x 12, the same size as the living room at House #1 and smaller than the family room with fireplace there; it's because this fireplace juts out into the room rather than being flush with the wall, but I am so not complaining - it's a beautiful, beautiful room).
It also has a built-in 'home office' in one end - a work station, shelves, and drawers galore - in matching wood.
The kitchen is to die for, huge, nice, tons of cabinets and space - way larger and nicer than the one in Alleged Dream Home #1. (This is only half of it - it continues on the right)
Upstairs, four bedrooms ... closets everywhere. Downstairs, a fantastic (large, clean, dry) basement with another fireplace. The three acres are at least half wooded (not so much at the other place). Just sweet.
I say "If it were $20,000 cheaper" but not because we're looking at houses we can't afford. Technically it's in our range - that's assuming, based on asking price, that they will come down at least somewhat from that starting point. It's just on the high end of comfortable, is all ... and I'd be much happier with considerably less of a mortgage. So I'm going to line up my ducks, and we're going to make a low-ball offer, and keep looking. *Shrug* Nothing else to do.
But I really like this place, although I am astute enough to realize that I'd probably like almost any house that was so much bigger and nicer than mine, and anywhere within spitting distance of achievable for us just now. So that's why we're going to keep looking - just in case. (And just in case they don't accept our low-ball offer, which is a good bet).
No new knitting news ... too busy house planning.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Houses and Knitting and Rum, Oh My
House News
Well, it's official ... I will be buying and moving into a new house. Why do I declare it official? Not because we've already bought one, alas - but because I realized something in the last week. One of the reasons - only one of several, but a major one - that our past house-hunting forays always ended in us just staying here is that I wasn't 100% fully committed yet to actually moving out of my house. Yes, the tinyness of it drives me nuts, and the work it was starting to want was more than I wanted to invest in it, and I knew I desperately needed more room ... but another part of me was still too tied to this house to be as serious as I needed to be about selling it and moving out. So though we looked at houses, I was never really, truly committed to actually buying one.
It's not a big surprise, though - I have quite a history with this house. It was the first house I ever bought solely by myself, fourteen years ago. Fourteen years is a long time! And my dad's fingerprints are all over this place - he did so much here after I bought it, helping me fix it up. That especially has been hard for me to think about giving up. Yeah, I know in a way it's kind of silly - but I'm not apologizing. I am sometimes a sentimental person, and after my dad passed away I was very sentimental about all the work he put into my little house to help me make it nice. I think, even, for awhile part of what held me back was this idea in the back of my mind that moving out of this house would somehow be kind disrespectful to all the work he put into it for me, as if it hadn't mattered.
But things have finally shifted. While I will be sad about leaving some of the things my dad did for me here, I've moved beyond some of that now. What he did, he did for that time and place, when I was living here alone and had no need of a bigger house - just one that wasn't so crappy, and all he wanted was for me to have a nice place to live.
Things in my life have changed. And he would still want me to have a nice place to live. And face it - this ain't it. Even he knew that. That's why he wanted me to keep his house - he said many times he wanted me to keep his house because it was nicer than mine. But I chose not to keep his house because it wasn't a good fit for me (a decision I do not regret), so finding my own nicer house now would be something he'd be happy about for me.
And, I plan to take at least a few of the things he did for me with me. He planted several rose bushes for me, and I have every intention of digging them up and taking them with me. Likewise with some other stuff as well.
Now that I've wholeheartedly committed, the process is rolling right along. I've already been pre-approved for more mortgage than I'm comfortable getting, so we're looking in ranges far lower than that - meaning there will be no problem with the loan. I've figured out a scheme to get my current mortgage out of the equation - paying my house off now, before we even try to buy a new place, which solves several problems at once. I've scoured the listings and picked about 10 houses we're really psyched about going to see, and we've picked an agent and are in the process of setting up appointments for them all.
And one reason I know this time it's going through: I'm ecstatic beyond the telling of it to think of moving out of this house, into a "real" house with actual room, with closets for God's sake, with a second bathroom so I don't have to hop around the house every morning waiting for Greg to get out of the shower ... (I know, TMI) ... a house with enough space for all our stuff for a change, so that it won't be cluttering up every surface I look at. I'm so ecstatic about that, I can't even tell you, and it can't happen soon enough. My favorite plan is to be in the new house by Christmas - for which I'll celebrate by getting a real Christmas tree for the first time since ... umm, I believe 1972.
Oh, the dream house I posted about - yeah, we've been back to see it again, and it's still the perfect house. But unfortunately it's just a little out of our comfort range, mortgage-wise. We talked it over and know what we're comfortable realistically paying each month, and I don't believe these people are going to drop the price by $50,000. But - we haven't entirely given up ... once all our ducks are in their little row, we do plan to make a low offer on the house - nothing ventured, nothing gained. And probably (assuming they'll reject it) I'll keep my eye on that place and renew my offer every month or so until either (a) they sell it to someone else, or (b) we find some place else we can accept as a substitute, and buy it instead.
But in my scouring of the internet house listings, I've turned up some others that, while not the dream house, are quite acceptable substitutes, so I'm still psyched about going and looking at them in the coming days.
Knitting
I've been working on the sweater. I buggered it up pretty good the other night. I forgot to move my marker on my pattern, and knitted the same row twice. I tried to unknit it, but for some reason couldn't seem to manage it (probably based on a combination of it being late, my being tired, and rum). So I decided to just go on from there as if it hadn't happened.
The next day I kind of regretted that decision, thinking I shouldn't have been so lazy, and I might ruin the whole project by this wonky line of mismatched knitting right across the back of the sweater. But I still didn't feel like trying to unknit it, and was considering ripping it out - either completely, and starting over (I'm only on row 13), or at least back to the plain knitting in the hem, and just starting the patterned part again.
But I got over it. It'll be fine. It's way down by the hem, and hey - it's a hobby.
In fact, I think I'll go work on that some more now.
Rum
I just threw that in there for cadence.
Well, it's official ... I will be buying and moving into a new house. Why do I declare it official? Not because we've already bought one, alas - but because I realized something in the last week. One of the reasons - only one of several, but a major one - that our past house-hunting forays always ended in us just staying here is that I wasn't 100% fully committed yet to actually moving out of my house. Yes, the tinyness of it drives me nuts, and the work it was starting to want was more than I wanted to invest in it, and I knew I desperately needed more room ... but another part of me was still too tied to this house to be as serious as I needed to be about selling it and moving out. So though we looked at houses, I was never really, truly committed to actually buying one.
It's not a big surprise, though - I have quite a history with this house. It was the first house I ever bought solely by myself, fourteen years ago. Fourteen years is a long time! And my dad's fingerprints are all over this place - he did so much here after I bought it, helping me fix it up. That especially has been hard for me to think about giving up. Yeah, I know in a way it's kind of silly - but I'm not apologizing. I am sometimes a sentimental person, and after my dad passed away I was very sentimental about all the work he put into my little house to help me make it nice. I think, even, for awhile part of what held me back was this idea in the back of my mind that moving out of this house would somehow be kind disrespectful to all the work he put into it for me, as if it hadn't mattered.
But things have finally shifted. While I will be sad about leaving some of the things my dad did for me here, I've moved beyond some of that now. What he did, he did for that time and place, when I was living here alone and had no need of a bigger house - just one that wasn't so crappy, and all he wanted was for me to have a nice place to live.
Things in my life have changed. And he would still want me to have a nice place to live. And face it - this ain't it. Even he knew that. That's why he wanted me to keep his house - he said many times he wanted me to keep his house because it was nicer than mine. But I chose not to keep his house because it wasn't a good fit for me (a decision I do not regret), so finding my own nicer house now would be something he'd be happy about for me.
And, I plan to take at least a few of the things he did for me with me. He planted several rose bushes for me, and I have every intention of digging them up and taking them with me. Likewise with some other stuff as well.
Now that I've wholeheartedly committed, the process is rolling right along. I've already been pre-approved for more mortgage than I'm comfortable getting, so we're looking in ranges far lower than that - meaning there will be no problem with the loan. I've figured out a scheme to get my current mortgage out of the equation - paying my house off now, before we even try to buy a new place, which solves several problems at once. I've scoured the listings and picked about 10 houses we're really psyched about going to see, and we've picked an agent and are in the process of setting up appointments for them all.
And one reason I know this time it's going through: I'm ecstatic beyond the telling of it to think of moving out of this house, into a "real" house with actual room, with closets for God's sake, with a second bathroom so I don't have to hop around the house every morning waiting for Greg to get out of the shower ... (I know, TMI) ... a house with enough space for all our stuff for a change, so that it won't be cluttering up every surface I look at. I'm so ecstatic about that, I can't even tell you, and it can't happen soon enough. My favorite plan is to be in the new house by Christmas - for which I'll celebrate by getting a real Christmas tree for the first time since ... umm, I believe 1972.
Oh, the dream house I posted about - yeah, we've been back to see it again, and it's still the perfect house. But unfortunately it's just a little out of our comfort range, mortgage-wise. We talked it over and know what we're comfortable realistically paying each month, and I don't believe these people are going to drop the price by $50,000. But - we haven't entirely given up ... once all our ducks are in their little row, we do plan to make a low offer on the house - nothing ventured, nothing gained. And probably (assuming they'll reject it) I'll keep my eye on that place and renew my offer every month or so until either (a) they sell it to someone else, or (b) we find some place else we can accept as a substitute, and buy it instead.
But in my scouring of the internet house listings, I've turned up some others that, while not the dream house, are quite acceptable substitutes, so I'm still psyched about going and looking at them in the coming days.
Knitting
I've been working on the sweater. I buggered it up pretty good the other night. I forgot to move my marker on my pattern, and knitted the same row twice. I tried to unknit it, but for some reason couldn't seem to manage it (probably based on a combination of it being late, my being tired, and rum). So I decided to just go on from there as if it hadn't happened.
The next day I kind of regretted that decision, thinking I shouldn't have been so lazy, and I might ruin the whole project by this wonky line of mismatched knitting right across the back of the sweater. But I still didn't feel like trying to unknit it, and was considering ripping it out - either completely, and starting over (I'm only on row 13), or at least back to the plain knitting in the hem, and just starting the patterned part again.
But I got over it. It'll be fine. It's way down by the hem, and hey - it's a hobby.
In fact, I think I'll go work on that some more now.
Rum
I just threw that in there for cadence.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Here We Go Again
I'd mentioned in 'blogapalooza' about the new house. I went to see it yesterday, and oh. my. It really is my dream house. If I made a wish list for the perfect house, this one would seem to be custom built from the list. It - literally - has everything I could want in a house.
It has four bedrooms; 3 full baths and 1 half bath; a formal living room, then a rec room with a stone fireplace on the first floor; and another rec room with another fireplace, and a wet bar, in the finished basement. It has a whole laundry room in the basement. It has a gigantic tiered deck off the back, an in-ground swimming pool (with pool house!), 2 acres (in the city!), and goes all the way back to the river behind the house. It's absolutely perfect.
I've actually wondered if it's "too much house" for us, if it's more than we need. But really - no. I don't think so. The four bedrooms is exactly what we need to finally have room. The first floor rec room is a perfect solution to my complaint of having all of us crammed into one tiny living room every evening, and the 'main room' of the house always being junked and cluttered up. We probably don't need the second rec room in the basement, but what we do desperately need is more storage - and we'd certainly have that. After living in this tiny Cracker Jack box of a house for 14 years, having that much space just makes my head spin. It would be heaven.
Yeah, the place is just perfect, and they've dropped the price on it to a level that's astounding for this house. I can't believe no one's snagged it before now, but I think they only recently - in the last few weeks - dropped the price this last time. But even so, it's still stretching the upper limit of what we can afford, and that makes me very nervous. I would love to have this house, but not if it takes every dime we make, and I have to worry every month about how I'm going to pay for it, or how we'd afford it if a repair or something needed done. I'm not sure it's that extreme, but ... well, figure it like this - the house payment alone would be double my current one, and then there's all the utilities being higher because the house is 3 times bigger than mine (plus the pool). It's a whole lot more than we're used to spending. And I know how easy it is for things to look good on paper, but not really work out that way in reality.
Well. I think I'll go to the bank today and talk to a loan officer and see realistically what our options are, first off. Find out how much mortgage we can actually get, and whether or not it's anywhere in the range we'd need to buy this house. That's probably a good starting place.
Meanwhile, there's also the issue of having to unload my house before we could officially buy a new one. That's a prospect I'm not looking forward to, not only because of the market, but because of how cluttered and junked up this place is, how much 'sprucing up' and work it'd need to put it on the market, and the now very short time frame we'd have to do all that.
But this house is so nice. I'll leave you with some pictures. I didn't take very many, I was too busy walking around in awe.
It has four bedrooms; 3 full baths and 1 half bath; a formal living room, then a rec room with a stone fireplace on the first floor; and another rec room with another fireplace, and a wet bar, in the finished basement. It has a whole laundry room in the basement. It has a gigantic tiered deck off the back, an in-ground swimming pool (with pool house!), 2 acres (in the city!), and goes all the way back to the river behind the house. It's absolutely perfect.
I've actually wondered if it's "too much house" for us, if it's more than we need. But really - no. I don't think so. The four bedrooms is exactly what we need to finally have room. The first floor rec room is a perfect solution to my complaint of having all of us crammed into one tiny living room every evening, and the 'main room' of the house always being junked and cluttered up. We probably don't need the second rec room in the basement, but what we do desperately need is more storage - and we'd certainly have that. After living in this tiny Cracker Jack box of a house for 14 years, having that much space just makes my head spin. It would be heaven.
Yeah, the place is just perfect, and they've dropped the price on it to a level that's astounding for this house. I can't believe no one's snagged it before now, but I think they only recently - in the last few weeks - dropped the price this last time. But even so, it's still stretching the upper limit of what we can afford, and that makes me very nervous. I would love to have this house, but not if it takes every dime we make, and I have to worry every month about how I'm going to pay for it, or how we'd afford it if a repair or something needed done. I'm not sure it's that extreme, but ... well, figure it like this - the house payment alone would be double my current one, and then there's all the utilities being higher because the house is 3 times bigger than mine (plus the pool). It's a whole lot more than we're used to spending. And I know how easy it is for things to look good on paper, but not really work out that way in reality.
Well. I think I'll go to the bank today and talk to a loan officer and see realistically what our options are, first off. Find out how much mortgage we can actually get, and whether or not it's anywhere in the range we'd need to buy this house. That's probably a good starting place.
Meanwhile, there's also the issue of having to unload my house before we could officially buy a new one. That's a prospect I'm not looking forward to, not only because of the market, but because of how cluttered and junked up this place is, how much 'sprucing up' and work it'd need to put it on the market, and the now very short time frame we'd have to do all that.
But this house is so nice. I'll leave you with some pictures. I didn't take very many, I was too busy walking around in awe.
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