The Bigger They Get

When One sells a house it’s always a good idea to have somewhere to move TO, especially when One has to hit the bricks in say, oh, 30 DAYS.

Thus, if One is smart, One begins house hunting immediately which One has been doing compulsively for two years already, but now it’s time to actually VISIT some of the places One has been stalking online.  So One undertakes a journey, meets with a Realtor, and visits the three most promising homes currently available in One’s price range.

And then, if One is me and Yes,Dear (which I guess, technically, would be Two), One chooses to make an offer on the only house of the three One likes and the one, apparently, whose owners appear to disagree, now that they have an offer,  about whether they actually want to sell.

And One sits and twiddles One’s thumbs, all four of them, and taps One’s feet – and I don’t mean gentle tapping; picture instead Michael Flatley of Lord of the Dance – waiting for a response to One’s offer while the property owners debate whether to actually sell the property they apparently agreed to put on the market over two months ago.

One is stressing.  One is overeating.  One is playing game after game of Spider Solitaire.  One is constantly checking for voice mails and/or emails from One’s Realtor.

One should be packing and hiring movers so One is prepared in very short order to move to…

Yeah, exactly.

It’s not even as if this is a super great house.  It is a good house.  It has good bones.  It needs some cosmetics, but nothing too far outside One’s skills and abilities and hopefully within One’s budget.

But THAT VIEW.

One would live in a BOX to wake up to that every morning.

One needs a drink.

We have to be out January 15th.  Talk about HERE’S YOUR HAT, WHAT’S YOUR HURRY?

We can do this.  It will be kind of like moving a circus, but without any elephants to clean up after, so I guess that’s better, right?

Eh, it’s all good.  Because we’re headed here (we say knocking on wood, spinning, clicking our ruby slippers and spitting twice over our left shoulders):

Posting for the next few weeks will be sporadic and will probably consist of the following:

AAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHH…

ACK!

OH MY ACHING BACK!!!

WHERE’S THE FREAKING TAPE?

WHAT DO YOU MEAN, DIDN’T I CALL THE MOVERS?  I TOLD YOU TO CALL THE MOVERS!

WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU PACKED MY ZOLOFT?

Christmas?  Christmas, you say?  How are we going to do Christmas with all this crazy going on?  We’re going to get a TREE.  And we’re going to DECORATE it.  Then we’re going to sing Silent Night around the tree on Christmas Eve and Joy to the World on Christmas morning.  The kids will unwrap their gifts which will consist of a clementine, a walnut, and a tape gun.  Then we’ll pack and pack some more.  We’ll put ribbons on all of the packed boxes because we are festive people.

Any moving hints, tips, tricks, or excellent drink recipes you wish to share to help us through this would be most welcome.

I am glad to hear you LOOOOOVE our home.  I admit to being a little freaked out when your agent told ours that you’ve been “stalking” our house, but whatever.  (We have dogs.  BIG ones.  Just sayin’.)

I have some questions:

1.  Do you really think an offer that’s 20% lower than our already reduced asking price and that includes a sale-of-home contingency would have us jumping up and down clapping our hands with glee?

2.  What are you smoking?

3.  Can I have some?

I’m sleepily pondering the irony of sitting in a hospital waiting room today, worrying, while doctors implanted a defibrillator in Yes,Dear’s chest – which we’re not entirely sure our crappy insurance will cover – while the waiting room TV was tuned to an Oprah rerun focusing on the healthcare mess in America. The program featured, among others, Michael Moore talking about his documentary, Sicko. It also featured a representative of the insurance industry who, while admitting that the industry isn’t perfect, says it is working to improve itself even while providing the best available care anywhere in the world.

Right.

Moore made her look like an idiot, which was great. But the whole thing was weird and Twilight Zone-y.

We put our van in the shop today to have a hitch installed so we can move Daughter to Chicago next week. We also asked that they change the oil and check the fluids for the trip. Our car guy called this morning and reminded me that when we’d had the van in for inspection he’d told us we’d need front brakes at our next oil change.

Oh, right. I forgot.

And, he says, you really need four new tires.

Uh Oh.

The total bill? $1200. But the car will be in excellent shape when he’s done.

And that’s a good thing because at this rate it won’t be long before we’re living in it.

I call shotgun.

(Ignore the cobweb on the wall behind the table. I didn’t see it until after I’d taken the picture. It’s gone now.)

Back to the plate.

We have twelve of these. Or had. Maybe still have, I’m not sure. This morning there were none of these dirty in the sink. There were none of these clean in the dishwasher. There was just this poor, lonely plate in the cabinet.

Where the hell are our plates?

Could they be here?

It’s a distinct possibility. Son Two actually did a respectable job of cleaning his room for the Realtor showing yesterday, but I don’t know what’s in the closet or behind his dust ruffle.

Honestly, I’m hoping they are in his closet or behind his dust ruffle, because if I find out he’s been throwing away our plates to simplify cleaning his room, the boy is toast.

Somebody cover me, I’m going in.

This evening we found ourselves following a commercial vehicle with a scrotum hanging from its back bumper. Go ahead, rub your eyes and then read that again. It still says scrotum.

I am not kidding.

The truck eventually turned into – get this – a CHURCH PARKING LOT.

When we got home, I looked at the website advertised on the truck. The business is a local agency of a national insurance company. This agency is run by a woman. There’s no way she knows about this, I thought to myself, so I called her.

SHE KNOWS.

Apparently she doesn’t mind employees decorating her company vehicles with giant reproductive organs as long as she doesn’t get any complaints. If anyone does complain, she’s warned the employee that she’ll have to castrate his truck. I guess she didn’t have the balls to say no from the get-go. Probably because he had bigger ones – HANGING FROM HIS TRUCK.

Turns out there’s at least one website that sells these things. Big surprise. They come in a variety of colors and some even light up when you hit the brakes. So if you’re at a loss to find the appropriate birthday gift for Uncle Rastus since they pulled fake hillbilly teeth off the market last week, why don’t you call this insurance agency – I’m sure they’d be happy to give you the URL.