come into the light.
Dinner with LLS last night was fun! We both have changed a lot since high school, but in a lot of ways we’re really still very much the same as we were all those years ago. I think the differences just have to do with growing up a bit. 
I’m getting ready to hit the sack…early for me…so that I can get up and do the Peachtree Road Race in the morning with RH. We plan on taking it easy since we haven’t been training. It should be fun!
The closing went fine, and Mom’s house is officially sold!
There is much dancing and celebration.
Many thanks to JWD for her expert real estate services and advice, RH (not mine) for letting us borrow his tools and actually putting in some time at the house, AR for offering to help, and RH (mine) for being the best boyfriend ever. Seriously…ever.
Now I need to turn my focus to the condo I still own with JW. That’s next up on the real estate chopping block, so keep those good home-selling thoughts coming my way. That’s one of the four properties we’ll have to address in some way before any new real estate purchases occur for me, RH and Mom. (The others being my condo, Mom’s condo, and RH’s house.)
On another note, RH and I are meeting one of my old high school friends for dinner tonight. I literally haven’t seen her since my senior year of high school (which was longer ago than I’d like to admit). We’re meeting her, her husband, and her three kids at The Old Spaghetti Factory, which is another blast from the past—I haven’t been there in ages. It should be fun to see her and catch up. I’m sure there will be much reliving of high school memories, which our significant others are angels for agreeing to sit through!
So the closing was delayed because they hadn’t received the appraisal yet. And this was the day before closing was supposed to happen! When I learned that, I got freaked and thought that the whole thing was going to fall apart. I mean, to compound matters, when I tried to extend the utilities due to the delayed closing, I learned that the buyers had not yet submitted orders to have the utilities transferred into their name. That kind of put me in a panic that the something was going to go horribly wrong.
But today I got the call from my wonderful friend JWD who has been handling the listing for me, and she told me that closing was confirmed for 4 p.m. tomorrow. Hooray! But I’m still not celebrating until I walk away from the closing table….
The closing on Mom’s house was supposed to be tomorrow, but I heard today that it’s not happening. The paperwork isn’t ready, or something along those lines.
Now I’m a little freaked out. The utilities will be turned off soon, and I wasn’t able to get in touch with the power and water companies in time (don’t get me started on my call with Georgia Power that ended in tears), so if for some reason this closing doesn’t happen, I’ll be paying to reconnect everything.
Awesome.
Please say a good word for me, will you? I’m really hoping I can put this all behind me by Tuesday.
I’ve bought into the whole bring-your-own-bag thing at the grocery store. I have a variety of bags—including one with insulation for cold foods—and actually really like not having a slew of plastic bags to deal with after my jaunt to the neighborhood Kroger or Publix.
I do have one complaint though. I check myself out 99% of the time. (Err, at the U-Scan terminals…I’m really not that vain.) The self-checkout bagging area is not made for a byob situation at all. First of all, you either have to tell the U-Scan attendant that you’re using your own bags before you begin scanning and bagging, which is a major pain, or you have to bag your first item and place your first bag down at the same time. (It’s an art that I’m trying to perfect.)
Unfortunately, with the regular plastic bags taking up so much space in the bagging area, and the little bag stands made for said plastic bags, there’s no good place to put your own bag that ensures you don’t get a “please place the item in the bag” warning from the U-Scan disembodied voice lady. When RH and I ran to the store tonight to pick up a few items for us and for Mom, we had an incredibly frustrating experience that made me think perhaps I should start standing in the long lines to have a professional check me out.
Sigh.
So here’s my plea to all grocery stores: Please support the byob movement by doing more than selling your branded cloth and Tyvek bags. Make the appropriate changes to make shopping with reusable bags as pleasant an experience as using your paper and plastic bags.
/end rant
RH, LS, KC and I went to the Alice Peacock show at Eddie’s Attic this weekend. She’s one of my favorite singer/songwriters, and LS and I went to her show in Piedmont Park two summers ago and had a great time. This show was just as excellent, and even more irreverent and fun. She’s incredibly talented, and apparently she has many doppelgangers as she reminds LS and me of our friend JSW, and KC swears she looks like her cousin.
On another note, I continue to strive to get a better handle on my e-mail inbox at work and at home. At home, it’s been totally out of control with over 16,000 messages in my inbox. I was speaking with a friend and coworker today, and she suggested I just archive everything older than a month. If someone wrote me a month ago and still hasn’t heard back, they’re probably not expecting a response now. And if it’s something really important, I can always search for it later.
So I did it. I archived everything prior to 6/15/2008, and now I’m working my way through the 63 messages in my inbox. It’s kind of a weird feeling, like when you throw away the receipt and have a weird feeling that something’s going to break…but I am looking forward to making progress on my quest to become an e-mail ninja.
I’ve started another round of unsubscribing from newsletters, etc. and I was pleased to see that Tablet Hotels is now on Twitter. I was able to safely unsubscribe from their newsletter, knowing that I will not miss a single update on hotels I will probably never stay in but enjoy drooling over.
Yay!
…I just have to say is that I am deeply saddened and disappointed at the amount of ignorance that still exists in the United States of America.
I have to stop reading YouTube comments…they make my stomach turn. 
We got an offer on Mom’s house! It wasn’t great, but the market isn’t great, so I’m hoping it works out so we can be done with the house! The counteroffer was accepted so we just need to get through the inspection, appraisal, and closing successfully. I’ve never been on the selling end of the real estate game, so it’s pretty stressful. Keep those good vibes coming.
Meanwhile, RH and I went to see Shine A Light, the Rolling Stones movie, at The Fox tonight. Seeing a movie at The Fox is a neat experience. Not only do you get to see a film in a gorgeous setting, but they also do an old-fashioned singalong beforehand. They also show a cartoon short. And today they showed the best cartoon ever.
EVER.
I’m not afraid to admit that it actually brought tears to my eyes (not that a cartoon has never done that before…ahem, Lilo & Stitch, anyone? three times???). But to make such a touching seven-minute film is quite a feat. It’s truly a wonderful cartoon, and I was pleased to see that I’m not the only one who thinks so. There are many glowing reviews on IMDb…check them out.
So, without further adieu, I present to you “Feed the Kitty.”
A few weekends ago, RH and I finally completed the updates to Mom’s house. Now there are only a few small things here and there left to do. It really looks great…now someone just needs to buy it! Feedback from a recent showing stated that house is nice and is priced to sell. So it’s really annoying that the market is so bad right now.
I’m so glad we’re finished, though. I think it would be a lot more difficult to sell the house in the condition it was in before the updates. We’re not trying to make more money…we’re just trying to sell it, period. The monthly costs associated with the house (utilities, insurance, yard care, etc.) really add up.
So please send good house-selling thoughts our way! We would really appreciate it!
I live in Atlanta, Georgia, and work as a PMP®-certified eBusiness manager. I enjoy photography, traveling, and snowboarding. Not satisfied?
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