October 2003

We did get to walk around our new house again today. We’ve been trying to pick out furniture and such for the house, since it’s considerably bigger than our old house, but being in the house only two times, it was hard to gauge room dimensions and colors and such. So we asked our real estate agent if we could get back in there and take a look around, measure rooms and such, and surprisingly, he agreed. So tonight we got to drink in the whole house again. What a wonderful feeling! 🙂 Now I’m more excited than ever to get into the house – I hope that the closing happens soon.

I am so glad that we are back on Standard Time. I’m not a big fan of Daylight Savings Time, I never have been. I know that it’s suppose to be better because then we have more daylight in the summer after work and I can go bike riding and all that, but honestly, I don’t mind it getting dark a little earlier and everything. There’s such a mystique about this time of the year – chilly winds, rustling leaves, early darkness. It all seems so magical to me.

I think I’ve been a little antsy, maybe ‘cranky’ is a better term, at work. I shouldn’t let my needless worries about moving et al reflect in my professional attitude, but alas, it does. Now that there’s been more signs of activity, I know I’ll be better.

I haven’t spoken to Earl about this, but I’m thinking about taking some online courses from the University of Illinois after the holidays. Computer science courses, so I can get certified in Unix. I’ve been promising this for a long time, and it’s high time I went ahead and did something about it! It’ll be easier to accomplish once we have the high speed internet connection that will probably be installed the first week that we are in the new house! I’ve dumped Linux in favor of FreeBSD, another derivative of Unix. I’m liking it! We stopped at Barnes and Noble so I could buy a new book – I’ve already implemented a couple of things and I’m loving it!

And life is good. Ever since the first time Earl and I drove on a portion of the local expressway together, I have traditionally said tapped him on the knee and said “someday this road will take us all the way home” every time we exited at the temporary end of the road. Well after a couple years of hard work from NYSDOT, the Utica-Rome Expressway was officially opened today with great fanfare. Earl, knowing what a road geek he has for a lover, suggested we drive the entire length, in both directions, so I could drink in the workmanship of the road and observe everything I could for my “road enthusiast” website. Cool part is, the new house is just off this expressway as well, just one exit closer to work.

The house is closer to reality, the mortgage company left a message last night to let us know that as far as they’re concerned, we can close on the house. We’re waiting to hear from the buyers of our current house to affirm the same and then we’ll set the closing date. Right now, it’s looking like November 13, which would be absolute kizmet for Earl and I (see this page why).

On a more somber note, we received word that Earl’s brother Rick was in a pretty bad motorcycle accident last weekend. He was banged up pretty good – fractured pelvis, broken wrist and arm (with six pins in it now), sprained ankle. So Saturday we headed down to Philly to visit him in the hospital. He seemed to be in pretty good spirits. I helped him out by shaving his head and face for him (he trusted me since I’m experienced in the head shaving area) and that seemed to cheer him up. He’s a determined guy and he’ll come out of the whole thing o.k…. a little wiser I suppose.

Earl and I started the weekend by trying out a local Italian place Friday night. We often drive 60 miles or more for supper on the weekend, but we decided to stay local and went to a place we’ve been eyeballing for the past couple of months. It was very casual, but very, very good. Killer eggplant with homemade sauce.

On Saturday we went on one of our long road trips. I’ve been steadily working on my “counties project” this summer… trying to take a picture of me standing next to a sign for every county (62 of them) in New York State. So Saturday we got up early and drove down to Long Island and back, just to get pictures of the Nassau and Suffolk county signs. Then we took the scenic way back through the Hudson Valley, grabbing those counties as we went along. You can see the results of our labor at my roadgeek site.

We stopped in Albany for a bite to eat at Houlihan’s and then we decided to see “Kill Bill” at the movies. Quentin Tarentino has some pretty wild ideas when it comes to cinema, but he’s clever and the movie was definitely a welcome change of pace. We both really enjoyed it.

Today was football day, Earl enjoyed his Eagles game (even though they lost) while I worked on my roadgeek site. Tomorrow Earl is bringing home boxes so that we can start packing up the house… we received our commitment letter from the mortgage company in the mail on Friday, so it’s official. Can’t wait to find out what the closing date is! We’re both getting very excited, though the prospect of moving is very daunting. I’m really looking forward to the holidays in the new house.

My dad and his girlfriend stopped in on their way through the area today, they were a welcomed site. They were out for a leaf peeping tour of the Adirondacks and wanted to see the landscaping on the old house and they also wanted to drive by the new house. It was good to see them.

I think I’m going to be retiring one of my other hobbies for a while. We’ve decided that it probably wouldn’t be best to punch holes in the walls of the new house for my school clocks collection. I’ll probably set up a couple of my favorites in the basement once we build the four or five rooms were going to put down there, but that will probably be the extent of it. While I’ve enjoyed collecting all the clocks and such, I pretty much have everything I wanted, with many duplicates. I’m going to continue to have the clock website up for a while, since there are a lot of people asking questions about their operation and such, but I don’t see me stringing wire through the new house for bells and everything.

I have absolutely forbad Earl from packing the house until we have the commitment letter in our hot little hands. I know the mortgage officer said that this was going to be a piece of cake, but gosh darn it, I’m not going to jinx this. I know that we are going to be celebrating the holidays in our new home. I know that the spacious rooms, jacuzzi tub for two, hardwood floors, and great room are all going to be ours. But can’t it happen already?

We decided to go see The School of Rock Saturday night in Syracuse. A quaint little flick, but it could have been a straight to DVD movie for us. We enjoyed the outing, I really enjoyed the popcorn.

My dreams have been very odd the last couple of nights. Saturday night I dreamed that I was hanging out with Ellen Degeneres. She was cool. I was telling her how much I enjoy her new show and everything. She asked my opinion and I let her know that she wouldn’t really care because this is my dream, but I told her anyways. Ellen has this “New Jersey Correspondent” named Lisa Lam on her new show. This lady is really Jersey. Joi-zee. While I’m sure she’s a lovely woman, she gets the benefit of a TiVo fast forward whenever she’s on because I find her disturbing and totally unnatural for television. I wouldn’t mind if she fast forwarded me sometime.

After the Ellen dream, I then switched to some whacked out ordeal of a dream where I was running with Lindsey Wagner bionic style. I don’t know where that came from, but I was very excited that the dream’s sound guy got it right with the bionic noise when I ran. I don’t know where I was running to or what I was running from, but I was doing it very quickly in slow motion.

I’ve become a little testy to those questioning my vegetarianism lately. A conversation today:

• “You don’t eat any meat at all? Not even chicken or fish?”
• “No, I don’t eat anything that shits.”

A guaranteed way to stop that line of conversation! Call me “Mr. Tact”.

If you’re keeping track, I weighed in at 177 lbs. today – I’ve lost 43 lbs. in 18 months. Move over Jared, there’s a new boy at Subway. I’ve complimented the slim look with a full beard – it’s that time of year.

And last, but not least, our cat Tom has lived with us for six years. We believe he’s between 9 and 10 years old. He’s finally figured out that he’s suppose to catch mice, not invite them over for lunch. He’s left four “offerings” in the computer room over the past week. We’re very proud of him.

Where to begin. A couple of weeks ago, Earl and I took a look at a house that was being built. To put it simply, we fell in love with the house. It was gorgeous and just what we were looking for. We made an offer to the builder. Unfortunately (for us, anyways), another couple made a higher offer and we didn’t get the house. However, the builder said that if we were interested in the spring, he would build us the same house on our property. (Earl and I own 33 acres).

Since we had been bit by the house buying bug, we talked about it and decided to put our house up for sale anyways. We figured that if by chance it did sell, we would simply move into an apartment until next summer when our house could be built. We figured it would take a while to sell the house, and to pass the time, we’d look at newer houses in the area that were for sale.

On Wednesday night, we listed the house with our real estate agent. The papers were signed, and the sign went up.

Friday morning, Earl received a call that we needed to scoot Friday night, two different parties were coming in to look at the house. We did just that by looking at a house that was only eight years old and in the general neighborhood. We then left for Philly on Saturday for a family wedding. We received word that one of the two couples was going to look at the house again Saturday afternoon.

Upon returning from Philly on Sunday, we had a message on our answering machine – they were coming back again to look at the house. As we were getting ready to leave, the real estate agent showed up and asked us to stay. We met with these house browsers and answered many questions.

Sunday night, they made an offer and we accepted it. On Monday, we looked at the house we had looked at on Friday, and decided to make an offer. The owners accepted.

So Earl and I are moving in the middle of November (after banks chat, lawyers chat, etc.) to our new house. To put it simply, it’s absolutely gorgeous. Huge! An above ground swimming pool. Oak hardwood floors throughout the house. Lots of space. Lots of potential. A cathedral ceiling in the family room. Just what we were looking for in a house.

It has been a busy time, to say the least. Am I sad that Earl and I are leaving the house we’ve lived in for the past six years. Admittedly, I am. This is where we’ve lived for the majority of our time together. But as we talked about it, I realized that this was a great place to start our relationship together. Earl and I are not handy when it comes to home repairs (by any stretch of the imagination), either that or we lack the motivation. In any case, there are tons of things we wanted to do to this house that we simply did not have the skill nor the money to do. The new house, while it does need some touch up paint and staining here and there, is pretty much what we are looking for. We are both very excited about the prospects.

I’m a little bit nervous about the whole affair, because everything is unsettled until the closing happens. I don’t like the uneasiness. Even back in my single (and somewhat transient) days, I always had to have the feeling of “home base”. I liked being able to say “This is where I live”, even if it was a rickety old mobile home in the path of a tornado. I wasn’t one that just popped in once in a while to take a shower or change my clothes between social engagements and work. I like to put down my roots. So this is a little unsettling for me, but I’ll get through it. Earl and I are both absolutely giddy with excitement about it.

I’ve often written in my blog about finding a place to make a “fresh start”, or to make changes in my life. I’m big on improving myself. Moving provides another opportunity for me to try to get my sh*t together. In the new house, we’ll have room for exercise equipment. We won’t really have room for my clock system hobby… not that it matters because while I’ve enjoyed putting the clock system together and getting it working, I’ve sort of dead-ended with the hobby. I have the clocks I want and they work. And we’ll have high speed internet through a cable modem! That alone is worth the trouble of moving! 🙂