Hark! What is that mellifluous sound?

It could be: the remnants of whatever cold/flu I had last week clearing out. I am a symphony of coughs and sneezes this weekend, punctuated with random bursts of tuba as I blow my nose to clear out the mucus that built up seemingly overnight in some giant bottomless cavern I never knew existed. But seriously, where does it all come from? One of the great mysteries. and you know people always look like a million bucks in this state. I am how you say? Le Sexy? HN is muttering and shaking his head off in the corner, I'm pretty sure he's counting his blessings and I just know I'm one of them. On the other hand, when I'm not coughing my voice is all Sexy Phoebe so that's a plus. As long as one's burst of contact with me is less than 2 minutes, they are doubtless left wondering who I was and why do I seem so mysterious. Anything longer than that and they're wondering if they're going to catch what I have and if I'm going to live.

It could also be the sound of the Great Purge That Accompanies Any Move. I LOVE THIS PART! It's only been a year, so there isn't as much as I would like to get rid of as when I was leaving Hampden but it still feels good. I did sneak into the kitchen cupboards when HN was down and out with his flu and tossed a crapload of spices, vitamins and canned goods that had expired ages ago. We had tuna I remember Adam buying. Expired in 2008 and HN was all "it's canned, it does not go bad!" I popped open a couple of cans of other things to test this theory, found them to be "not as good", and also gross and rusty inside the cans and so I justified tossing the lot of it, even though it hurts me to be wasteful. I told him to think of the gas we're saving in not moving it around the state with us again. And there were a bunch of non food/clothing things that I did bring last time that I was on the fence about and one year later if they've not been touched or dealt with or fallen in love with all over again, out they go. So far I only have 2 boxes for Goodwill, but I am truly inspired and I think I can do better. Now that round 1 is done and I douched the house in the wake of that I can look again with fresh eyes and see what's left and what else can go. And not a moment too soon. We told FFFO the news yesterday (well actually we copped out and told her wife, the nice one because FFFO was not around) but it went over about as well as we thought it would, which is to say not so well at all. It's a shitty situation all around, and I don't enjoy the fact that they feel like we're leaving them in a lurch but it is what it is. I told her 2 mos ago we wanted to stay, she told us just over a week ago she was raising rent and when I said "Ok" as in "Ok, I hear you and I understand you" she heard "Ok, I will pay an increase in rent" which I surely did not mean. 30 days is standard notice, but in her mind she deserves more than that. It sucks but short of a personality transplant I see no way it won't be awkward and angry filled. It's just how she rolls, she's too new at this to be a detached landlord so in her mind she is slighted. And so, now packing begins in earnest.

As does househunting. HN and I spent the weekend looking at a few more places. I believe we have narrowed it down to where we want to move, and there is only a minor hiccup. It's a house that is for sale by a friend of ours. It's been on the market 4 mos, as have 7-8 other houses on the same road. We're in discussions with said friend about renting for the short term (i.e. to get us out of here) then making moves to buy. It's a solid piece of property in a neighborhood I think will only get better and the price is about right. When we were looking around last year, the market here was just cresting so little rowhouses were going for 250-275 which is just gross so we passed on it all and crossed buying off our list. Now that things have evened out some, rowhouses are in the 200K area, which is still a little tough to swallow for a non-standalone house but in the end is I think about where it's going to be for now and likely for the future. I certainly don't see values ever going much below that mark at this point, and as I said the property is solid. Our friend is the latest in a string of architects that we know (4 to be exact) to have owned this very house (apparently it just gets passed around the firm, but hey I can respect that!) , and each of them made a little mark on it's design. And it's obvious when you're in that the ideas all came from people who understand design. We went to poke around in there yesterday, and there were a couple of open houses on the street so we went into another one just for comparison sake and while there was one that was what some would call "nicer" you could tell that that was all commissioned by some homeowner dude who was all "I want this bigger and more expensive" because it was gorgeous in parts but a little disjointed overall. The one we're looking at is just cool, and everytime you notice a detail, everything clicks into place about what the point of the detail is and how well it plays with the other details. Overall it's a cool little place and there is only 1 drawback, which is that to get to the backyard you have to go down to the basement. I'm more a fan of "yard access from living space so I can just leave door open and let dog do her thing all day" but I can suck it up in the end. The basement is clean, light, finished and dry so there's nothing prohibitive about going down there other than being lazy. And I already have plans and visions of the crazy cool garden beds I'm going to build for the yard. I learned from my experience in the last rowhouse with a slot yard and I have ideas that are NEW! and IMPROVED! and I also have HN who is the master of square foot gardening to help me "maximize my efficiency" His words, not mine. So, we're still in the discuss-y phase of it all but it's seemingly moving along. We are still technically looking at other places, but I think we're both sort of sold on this joint. So we'll see. We had written off buying anything last year, so it's a change of mindset that we're both struggling with a bit but in the end I don't think it's anything we would regret doing.

So real estate, snot, moving. That's pretty much the tune I'm humming this week. I don't even have time to be working myself up about my impending travels to Chile. (6 weeks!)

More later, you can count on it!

besitos
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