It took a plumber, but everything on the ADDI list is done.
As soon as the inspector can make it back, and he clears the house, then we can close. I can quit paying both my early occupancy fee AND my mortgage for the house I am selling (we let the buyers do some repairs in lieu of early occupancy).
I loved that little house on Oliver Street, but I am relieved that this will soon be over. I only need two things in life right now-- to close on our house and get my DSL hooked up.
To add to the fun, the city code inspector came and left my brother a list of code violations that their house has. Their house that they live in, that is... My parents actually own the house. So guess who is technically responsible for the work? My parents.
How can a front porch cause so many problems? We replaced the decking on the porch, because it was so ratty. Then the FHA inspector came and said that the paint had to go, because somewhere on there may be lead. So we have tried and tried to get the paint off. Now we have just taken the wood off. And have to do extreme cleanup.
It is hard to focus on the advantages of the new house at the moment.
So I haven't written in what? Nearly a month? I guess it is really just a couple of weeks. I have started back to school--
My house is nearly done.
It looks darling and we have two "second-lookers" scheduled this evening. I hope one of them makes an offer. I am so tired of picking up my house. I have threatened my children that if they use "real" cups instead of disposable ones, I will maim them. I am so tired of chasing after them to put their dirty dishes in the dishwasher. And yes, I do know that by doing that I am depriving them of learning to do it themselves. But I also know that shrieking like a banshee when potential buyers are driving up is not a way to sell a house, even though the children may learn a great lesson from it.
In my old age (and having spent too much time painting lately), I have turned into a Muppephone. The "ow!" sound that escapes my body when I stand up is involuntary and really should fit into a Marvin Suggs rendition of Lady of Spain. Of course, Statler and Waldorf would probably boo me 
off the stage.
Just finished up the master bath. I had it kind of botched, really, with two different shades of green and rough drywall. And the top two feet of the walls were siding that was peeling and not very nice. So I scraped peeling paint and textured the drywall. And filled rough spots. And primed, and painted.
I hurt.
And the ceiling is still peeling. We are just going to put up new bead board and be done with it. I cannot scrape and sand 100 square feet of ceiling. Just can't. I can already hardly breath from the sanding, etc. that we have already done. Mea has been a trooper, doing what work that she could and keeping me company when she couldn't.
The color is an awful pale apricot. It looks so... boring. But it is done. And it looks more "finished" than it did before. There is some fiddly bits around the shower to sort out, probably with caulk. I sort out a lot of things with caulk.
My closet is located inside my bathroom-- not the best plan, but it is an old house. Much of it does not appear to be planned. Anyway, now all the stuff that I pulled out on Tuesday has to go back in. And the house needs to be straighted up, because I have so not been picking up since I started on the latest round of paint. So there is laundry to be done and kid stuff to hide.
And a trip to the mother-in-law's to pack for.
Yes, gentle reader, my husband has scheduled a trip to see his mother. Neil Gaiman canceled his reading in Tulsa, so he figured that it couldn't get much worse, so we are packing up the minivan with all three kids and my husband's breathing machine and heading to southeast Missouri in the heat of the summer.
And tomorrow, I must finish the tile in the other bathroom. Todd finally put the cement board around the window so I can (did I mention that I started this job in April?), so I need to get that done. Why the push to finish up all my home improvement projects? My classes start on Monday. Only six hours this summer (as opposed to nine last summer-- that was insane). Oh, and I have an article to co-write in the next two weeks.
It is after midnight, so I suppose I should go to bed. So I guess I will.
Neil Gaiman won't be coming to Tulsa. Evidently my tickets will be refunded.
And the only people who have looked at my house (so far) can't really afford it. (In the multilist, it is #10196134). And, turns out, real estate has been slower this June than normal.
Disappointing.
On the up side, we went to Branson yesterday to take the kids to Silver Dollar City to celebrate surviving putting the house on the market.
My Realtor probably thinks that we are lying to her. That we don't really intend to sell. That we are the most disorganized people on the face of the planet (well, that part is true anyway).
Well, she just called. She's coming by on Wednesday to advise about what our priorities should be.
Now I am off to pack up more of Miss O's stuff. Did I mention that that baby has more stuff than I do? Every time I look up, there is another box of her crap to pack up.
Is anything more alluring that stolen moments to write? Right now, I should be coding my research project, which is due on Tuesday. But I am not. Here I am instead, with too much to say and everything wanting to come out in a jumble.
The news of today? The county I grew up in has some of the cleanest air in the nation. That does not surprise me in the least. But I can't help but think back to high school when one of my friends did a science fair project on acid rain, and discovered that nowhere was safe from it, not even Newton County, of the A air quality rating given by the American Lung Association.
In other news, I have decided that I desperately want to sell my house. And truthfully, it is not that I don't love my house-- I do! But I need a four bedroom house in a way that is hard to express. Miss O occupies our bedroom, Mea's bedroom and the living room. I so want *one* room where all of her stuff can reside! I even know the house I want. It has four bedrooms and was built in the 1950s, and was never updated. Paneling everywhere! And a pink bathtub in one of the bathrooms. Pink! 1950s cotton candy pink. And you know what? I would totally leave it.
This is so, by far, not everything I want to say, but I have miles to go before I sleep.
Our never-ending saga of house selling continues today. We have cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. Today we took pictures of the interior and the exterior of the house because the pictures the realtor took were, frankly, terrible. We took over a hundred pictures and chose the best 10. I am thinking the realtor took, say, 10 and used them all. We are taking over the new pictures on CD tomorrow and are going to insist that they change the photos.
I hate the feeling that I am always being inspected. I hate the constant urge to find things to pick up and put away. I hate this whole process. I hate trying to find a new house. Hate it, hate it, hate it.
