I may have misread our mythological creature.

So our unicorn clearly has some faerie blood.   And not the cute Disney fairy; the traditional, slightly horrifyingly, devilish faerie.   

Or maybe our unicorn just has a dubious companion...

For those just joining in (seriously - where did you come from?  How did you land here of all the blogs?), we recently moved.   The new house was deemed a unicorn because it was both A - new (Chris' preference) and B - had a large yard (my preference).  Since they don't tend to make new houses with large yards everywhere, it must be magic.  Right?

Perhaps.  But magic is not always used for good.

So let's play the unicorn vs faerie game...

Unicorn - new house!  woohoo!  It's only a year old!

Faerie - new house needs new floors.   Faerie squared - vents for new floors "will be in in a week" -- 3 weeks ago.   Which means we have 80% of each room done but can neither finish it nor unpack nor move furniture into the right places.

Faerie the second (faeries are smaller than unicorns) - the front door is randomly smaller than every other front door ever invented?!?!   Huge credit to our fridge delivery people who defied the laws of physics to get the fridge that measured bigger than the door, through said door, without significant disassembling.

Unicorn - huge yard!

Faerie - that we can't fence until the builder finishes their grading (that will be....?   Somewhere between Oct and next year according to the neighbour) AND the city assumes the property (which could take up to 5 years?!?!).   Now that's all very dramatic, but talking to the random people who were inspecting our back yard this afternoon, it looks like this is already in process.  The city has deemed their grading insufficient so they have to dig up some of the grass, put down more dirt, have the city review it, replace the grass, city review again.  I believe that last piece is when the city assumes the property (at which point, we can fence) and it seems like it'll be in the weeks or months timeline rather than years; however, that's still TBC.  So we shall see.

Faerie the second - the mosquitos are winning the war!   There's a vacant lot diagonally behind us with ALL the long grass and standing water, a pond next to them, and wetlands across the street.  The end result is mosquitos.  ALL the mosquitos.  Neighbours on both sides have said worse this year than last (lot is newly vacant) so we're hoping once that gets under control our mosquito problem should lessen.   We've also invested in an outdoor mosquito killer so we'll see if that helps.

Unicorn - fiber run right to the house!

Faerie - this is really a junior faerie in that the wiring is very short and limiting to where we can put our box.  Mostly though, this one is all unicorn.  We have better internet now than we've had anywhere.

Unicorn - I have an AMAZING bath tub.  It's almost exactly the right size, has perfectly located arm-rests, and the back slopes just enough that I read for over an hour there the other night.

Faerie - the tub faucet is on the side.  Np right?  Except it means while the water is running, it consistently splashes on the book :(    

Faerie the second - the washrooms have no drawers?!?!  Like how do you put in a vanity with no drawers.  And no light in the master shower (that's not glass, so kinda impressively cave-like - do fairies like caves?).  I've figured out how to live without drawers thanks to baskets and other such concepts, but meh.   We tried one light for the shower that didn't work, but the search continues...

Unicorn - our AC is amazing!

Faerie - it is also very loud :(   I don't think I've slept through the night yet.

Unicorn - living in the middle of nowhere, parking is easily available and either free or laughably cheap ($1.75/h lol or $100 for a monthly pass).

Faerie - a frustrating number of businesses (like actual businesses with store fronts even) are cash only.  C is fine with this but it drives me insane.  I really love not needing anything other than my phone to live my life.   Even cards are old-school.   Cash?  It's archaic, makes my bookkeeping exponentially more difficult, doesn't earn me any points or cash-back, and kinda gross physically.  So yeah - I'm learning what stores I can give my business to and which ones I can't.

Unicorn - a ridiculous number of pizza places to choose from (and tonight's had a marvellous invention of half pizza / half garlic bread.   Amazing).

Faerie - very few other food options.   There are a disproportionate number of hair places?!?!  Maybe some of them could be converted into other food.   We DID find *really* good donuts though, so that's a unicorn all in itself.  I see no problem with living off pizza and donuts. ;-P

Unicorn - everybody seems to be super friendly.

Faerie - every single person we've met has asked C what he does.  Not one has asked me.  In many ways this town is several decades in the past.

Unicorn - amazing cycling trails (this'll get its own post)

Faerie - everywhere is downhill from here, which means cycling home when tired is *always* uphill.

So yeah - I suspect our unicorn has some faerie blood...   All first world frustrations for sure, potentially of the slightly mischievous magical creature variety.  

The moving games continue

So we've been "small towned" (yes it's a verb) a few times since being here...   For instance, Chris and I tried a local pub today and when we sat down on the patio, the waitress came right away to ask what we wanted...   "Well, what do you have?"  "Oh!  Would you like a menu?"  lol.  Suffice to say, nobody else on the patio needed a menu, and most were being addressed by name.   Chris also got it in the convenience store the other day -- "I haven't seen you before, did you just move in?" lol.  I haven't been in there yet. We'll see...

The "downtown" is very cute.  Tiny, but picturesque.

You may remember from a previous post that we had to pull up the weed-infused carpet and attempt to get hardwood down.  Chris managed to get the master done (or done enough -- we still don't have the floor vents) so that we could set up a bed when we moved in.   This was an entirely new experience.  Why?  Well because we went with an Endy mattress.   

For those not in the loop - this comes rolled up in a box, weighing less than 100 lbs.  

It comes with these instructions

So we unroll...

It made a hissing sound as we opened the package...

And in less time than you'd expect, we had an actual mattress. 

As to the mattress itself?  Plus side - it's super non-motion sensitive.  Remember those bowling ball mattress commercials?  Way better than that.  I'm pretty sure Bailey could be having zoomies tearing around the bed and you wouldn't feel a thing sitting on the other side.   Down side - it's quite firm.  I think C likes it, but I find it too hard, esp when sleeping on my side.  Suspect all it needs is a pillow top though and then it'd be excellent.   It's also not nearly as thick as previous mattresses.  That's neither plus nor minus (well - for Tucker it's a huge plus), just a random fact.

So good to go right?  We have a floor and a mattress, what more do we need?   Wait - did you see those windows???  And did I mention, we live at the end of the street?

Notice the streetlight?  Yeah - shines right in our window...

So not only is there a streetlight right outside, but every car coming toward us lights up the room, AND if we have lights on, we give a show to anybody on the street.  Less good.   But for reasons I don't entirely understand, even Ikea was sold out of curtain rods?!?!   And Amazon was going to be a couple days.  *sigh*.  So what did we have?

Flooring boxes for the win!

lol it's the opposite of classy (or classy with a capital K), but it was surprisingly effective.

Fast-forward a couple days for blackout curtains and finally a good-night's sleep!

All the rest of our furniture is currently in one room until the flooring is done, making unpacking reasonably impossible...  But we'll get there.  C has been flooring on super-speed -- has both our offices as done as possible so far.  Would be helpful if the pieces we're waiting for would actually come in ;)   Meanwhile I've been unpacking the rest of the house -- trying to make the bathrooms and the kitchen usable...

Other randomness -- Amazon takes much longer to get here :(   BUT, our internet is awesome?!?!  😂  I guess you need something to do when you live in the middle of nowhere.   I've also had to wait for a ship passing by for the first time now.  I will admit they're quite impressive.

Our slightly evil unicorn...

So it's possible our unicorn has a slightly evil side. 

Yeah, just like that...

Let's see...  Where last we left it, we had purchased new hardwood flooring for the upstairs since the carpet is thoroughly weed-soaked and the oder...  Well rather overwhelming.

Well after purchasing, step one is to get said hardwood to the house.  Rented a U-haul for that adventure.  Driving was less than fun -- I hate not being able to see out the side, and while the double-mirrors did help to ensure there was nobody in my blindspot, it made it impossible to tell how close somebody really was (top mirror showed them way too close and bottom mirror showed them way too far away), which made me really glad I wasn't driving during rush hour cause I basically waited till there were no cars before changing lanes.  Not such an option most of the time.

Our new floor!

Ah well, suffice to say I got to the store, and the hardwood was loaded quickly thanks to a forklift.  Awesome.  Get to the house and time to unload...  The only issue?  I can *barely* lift one box.   We have 43 boxes.  Frig.  So I managed to get three boxes upstairs before my body told me I would very strongly regret trying to move another one.  My solution was going to be to open the boxes and carry portions at a time.  Chris' solution was that he would carry all the boxes.  And he was being successful, so I switched to carrying moving boxes, and when those were finished, carrying carpet and sub-carpet out of the house while he was carrying boxes in.  Every once in a while my muscles would feel okay so I'd try another box.  End total?  I think I moved all of 6 and C moved all the rest.

So much for move in ready

But the carpet was out and the hardwood in.  Win.  Repurposed the U-haul to get the carpet to the dump and good to go.  Then we had a few days of pulling up tacks and staples and other fun stuff.   Today we primed the floor to try to make sure the smell is cancelled permanently.   Which, hopefully will be effective, but really?  Painting the floor that you're going to cover forever?   I really wish I could think of something brilliant to write for whoever one day pulls up the hardwood ;)   Alas, my genius has been exhausted by the degree of BS required for term papers.

Painting the room before putting hardwood on top
is a very evil-unicorn thing to require.

So tomorrow the frantic installation of hardwood begins in a desperate hope to have somewhere to put furniture when the movers come on Tuesday.  Wish us luck!

Our super-fancy dinner.  
I was pretty proud of the pillow seats ;)

But... Water is always south. Isn't it?

There are lots of animals that learn at a very young age how to find food; today I learned tech can too 😂 

So I had Mum's car at the new house (like really new, we've owned it since lunch time).   Mum's car rather than mine because it has significantly more space in it for the transporting of stuff.  All good except I know neither the car, nor the location, and being not my car it is, reasonably, not stocked with my stuff.

Now when I got to the house it said I had about 50km of gas left...  Which means not enough to get home. But that's okay - lots of gas between here and there; C and I were even at a gas station not far away when we were looking at houses.

Spend the afternoon cleaning, cause the house is a disaster.  I don't get how they managed to get it SO bad in only a year.  And am moderately amused that apparently there was one roommate not like the others -- the room that will be my office is the only room in the house w a lock on the door AND also the only room that's clean and smoke-free.  But the rest of the house.  Ugh.

And - my phone was quickly draining battery, both cause I was using it to play music and cause it was searching for cell signal all day.   Nbd - I'd brought charge cable.  Plug in and continue working away.

Time to go home.  Phone is essentially dead.  Hmmm less than good.  Turns out the plug wasn't working.  For move-in ready, this house is requiring an awful lot of work :(    C went down and did some magic in the basement and the plug started again.  Alas, too late for my poor phone.

Get in car and of course none of my chargers are with me.  However, Mum had a few!  Win :)   Except that when I plugged in, all it did was connect me to the car, not actually feed my phone any power :(   Fail.  And somehow the car is now down to 40km left?  🤷‍♀️   

So C's directions on how to get to gas "take either the first or the second road and it's down there."   Uh right.  That's sure to end well 😂   The first was a piddly little street so I took the second.  I realized pretty quickly it wasn't the right one, but seemed to be a grid-type setup, so figured I'd be able to loop back at top.  Alas, that was incorrect.  I *did*, however, find myself at the highway so I figured I'd hop on and there would be gas somewhere along the way...   But, uh, north or south?  None of the signs had locations listed.  Fail.  Well we turned away from the water so therefore new town is north of the highway I want to end up on, so let's head south...

Yup, realized pretty quickly that was wrong too.   Fail.   Also, maybe I should look up my new home on an actual map 😂   Since I clearly have no idea where it actually is.  My whole life the water has been south, but occurs to me out there it's actually north.  Damn Golden Horseshoe.  And that just might be too much for my little brain.   So now I'm on a road that I can't just pull over to the side to ask my rapidly-dying phone for help.  And I'm down to 30kms left of gas.  hmmmm.

For those not from around here, I've always lived on top of the water ;) Even when not in Ontario.  

Suffice to say, new house is below the water...

And then the nav/entertainment system goes black.  White words flash up: "You're almost out of gas!"   Well gee thanks Car.  Super-helpful.   The loud ding and big orange gas light on the dash also told me that.  I get that you're hungry, but I'm working on it.

But then...  Then Car's self-preservation kicked in.  "Would you like directions to a near-by gas station?"

Why yes, yes I would. 

She offered me several options and I went w the closest brand I recognized 😂    The trip there took me through a tunnel under the canal, which was somewhat fascinating in that it was torrential rain out, so coming out of the tunnel it looked like cars were being swallowed by a wall of white.   But other than that, Car quickly and accurately led me to gas.   Win.

And since my phone was dying, I took the time to program home into Car as well, and let her figure out how to get me back to the highway (over a bridge this time) and pointed the right direction 😂.  That's usually either Alexa or Siri's job (depending whether I want Spanish and reliable or English and dodgy) but both were on time-out due to dying phone...

So Car for the win today.  That is definitely the best random use of technology I've seen lately.  My car certainly doesn't offer that ;-P   And yes, she even got me home correctly.

Just one more thing...

So today was a Day.  Aren't they all? you may ask...  No, you see everyday is a day.  This was a Day, with a capital D.   It's an entirely different beast.

I woke up stupidly early, which I bitterly resent, especially on the weekend.  lol but the end result is that I got some work done on my paper and went for a walk all before I'd planned to get up.  We had planned for our house walkthrough at 10:45 this morning.   This is the "right before closing, check all the things work" walkthrough.   Now we've moved a few too many times over the last few years so we're used to these.   Walk around, check the water and appliances work, etc.

Driving out, all good.  Chris points out the craziness at the Home Depot - people lined up around the building.  So glad we didn't have to go to a store today.  Ontario just started reopening yesterday; it's the first time in ages stores have been an option and they're at limited capacity.

So when we got there, it wasn't a promising beginning with doggy bags left next to the front porch *sigh* - esp questionable as it seems they didn't actually have pets.  But okay.  Go in and there's a slight oder.  hmmmm.  And otherwise things are pretty dirty - for a house that's only a year old, the previous inhabitants managed to make a good mess of it.  

But sobeit, we start walking through and things are working.  The dishwasher was a bit of a mystery, but we got it working.  Chris saw the neighbour kid out mowing his lawn, and went and offered him $40 to do ours too ;)  Win.  Neighbour kid's mum was thrilled with the whole situation.  So not a bad start.

Then we ventured upstairs.  *sigh*   Remember that faint oder when we first entered?  Well from the best we can tell, there was a substantial amount of marijuana being smoked in the house *sigh*.  And on top of it, not only left-over smoke oder, but also multiple burns in the carpet and we're reasonably certain someone dumped their bong water on the landing.   So awesome.

Now "hardwood floor upstairs" was on our list of things to do some day, but super low on the priority list. Like maybe end of the decade?   What we had thought just required a carpet clean was going to be a much bigger challenge.

Fortunately the two rooms we were planning to use as offices were unburned.  The worst was in the master bedroom.  So we'd pretty much decided we'd apply the ostrich method (as in head-in-the-sand), and use an area rug to cover the worst of it and ignore it till future us could afford to deal with it.   When our amazing realtor volunteered to pay for the hardwood?!?!  She threw out a number and... wow.   So while on a quick google of costs I didn't think it'd cover it, it'd certainly do at least 50% if we were careful with what we picked.

Alright, so off to Home Depot...  Right - remember that comment about not needing to go to a store?  Much less Home Depot?   Right.  Hindsight's an ass.   We get to the closest Home Depot and the line up is insane *sigh*.   Okay, figure we'll go home and hit up another one after dinner when hopefully most people will have gone home.  But on the way home, we'd stop at a few flooring stores on the way.   Well the first one said they had no stock of anything and were booking six weeks out at best.  Not helpful.

Continue our trek and the next one was accidental -- we found it while on the way to a third one.  And it had a few options of hardwood that was not only in stock, but end of the line, so significantly reduced price.  Like 65% reduced.  Which brought it into the range our realtor had offered.  Amazing!   The only one we loved though, they didn't have enough left.  Sad :(

So we continued our journey.  The store C had been targeting was...  less successful.  Sales people were seriously meh and they didn't have anything we particularly liked and nothing in a price range we could possibly make happen.   Alright...  Continue on our way and hit up a Lowes that had essentially no line to get in, but all their product was both more expensive and not as nice as what the previous store had.  

We debated briefly and decided it was silly to pass on a good thing, so went back and ordered the hardwood.  So exciting news - we'll have new hardwood.  Less exciting - it can't be picked up till next week :(   Booo.   But we'll figure it out.

So okay - but if we're putting down hardwood, we need various other things to go with it.  Which means that Home Depot run still needs to happen.   We decided to save that for after dinner, and that ended up being a win.  We were able to go in with no line and collect the various things that had been on the list.  So that's all good.

But suffice to say the afternoon of paper-writing that was the original plan, most definitely did not happen.

All first world problems for sure, but just always that One. More. Thing.

Who said unicorns don't exist?

As some of you may recall, Chris and I moved in with my parents last March when COVID hit and relieved us of one of our incomes.  We decided to take the opportunity for both of us to go back to school -- Chris to teacher's college and me into an MBA program.

So the plan was to finish both these things (target November and October respectively), and give Chris time to find a full-time job.  Meanwhile, I would look for a remote job that would let me not have to commute to the GTA.  And once all those pieces aligned we would move -- sometime between next fall and next spring.

Right.  You're not new here ;-P

So first of all, Chris got his job months before finishing school.  He was only guaranteed part-time though, so not quite solid enough to commit to moving to that area.  But still, well ahead of what we expected.  Now I was interviewing for a job that was "just a job" but would've given me that remote position, when I was offered a non-remote job that had a high potential I would love.  Yeah, I went with that one.  Job satisfaction for the win.  Now, pre-COVID, this role would've been 100% in-office, non-negotiable.  However, since everybody's been remote more than a year, polices are changing.  It's looking like I'll have to go in either 2x/month and 2x/week.  I feel I have a strong case for the former, but if my boss really wants people in the office...  Well at least it's only 2x/week.

So to put the timing in perspective:

• Our house money is tied up in GICs till Sept;
• Chris is likely to have full-time work lined up for Sept (we should find out next week);
• I'm *hoping* for two days / wk in office -- I should find out about that next week as well.

Now with 90 days being a standard house closing, one would think that assuming Chris does get his ft offer, and I get confirmation that I don't need to be in the office all the time, we could potentially start looking for a new house in June...

As to the house...  Honestly, I was really dreading the search.  I had three priorities: a big yard with privacy, a bathtub (or the ability to put one in), and a space for an office.   In an ideal world, I'd also prefer a house with personality.  I'm not so much a cookie-cutter kinda person.  But that was not a "must have".  Chris had a very long list, but the vast majority of it would be met by purchasing a new house (although he was theoretically open to a house more than 100 yrs old, it was going to be very hard to find one of those that would meet his many other criteria).  The problem, of course, is that they don't put new houses on big properties anymore.  So this could potentially be a very long search.

And then Chris did the impossible...  He found our unicorn.  We weren't even 'officially' looking.  More just seeing what was out there in our price range to see how much we were going to have to negotiate or reconsider our shopping criteria.  So on Saturday of the May 24 weekend, he sends me a few links of possible houses (before I woke up - Saturday ams are for sacred sleep).  So when I woke up and was mindlessly browsing I clicked through them.  There was one I really strongly disliked; of the others, nothing particularly stuck out but nothing that would make me hate my life either.  So okay.  

But Chris tells me he *really* likes the last one.   Well okay, if you like it that much, let's go see it.  And while we're out there we may as well check out the other ones on the list and the ones I'd found the other day.  So we tag our realtor (who helped with the last purchase and sale) and ask if she's up for a road trip.  She was busy on Sunday but could do Monday.  Perfect.  Send her the list and let her do the organizing.

Now keep in mind, this is 1-2 weeks before we know if Chris has FT work, and 1-2 weeks before we know what my commute is going to be.  And, well, we both know we don't window shop well.  If we're going to look, there's a very good chance we're going to purchase.

So on our road trip, the first couple houses were definite "no"s.  They were in St Catherine's, and when we moved to Thorold (which neither of us know anything about) there was a definite shift in neighbourhood and we had a few strong possibilities.  Not strong enough to bump up our timeline by months, but at least to give me hope that one day we'd find something.   The house I really didn't like was even worse in real life, so that was a bit of a relief ;).

Then we got to the one Chris was waiting for.  And while it doesn't have the character I might've liked, it wasn't a sad box either.  And it's a new subdivision, but the houses aren't super cramped on top of each other.  So first glance is positive.  The downstairs is okay...  Nothing spectacular, but nothing wrong with it.  It'd certainly suit our needs.  Connected garage is very civilized.  And the basement was a HUGE space.  Unfinished, but future potential for sure.  And a home for the gym and my Oculus.

But upstairs...   The master is huge and the ensuite has a lovely soaker tub (win! - that wasn't in the pictures, so I was concerned), and good sized rooms for both C and I to have our own offices looking over the back yard.

That back yard.  A - it's a great size (I could have a pool some day!), and B - it doesn't back on anything?!?!   I mean there's a road there, but across the road is protected wetlands, so what would be my office has an amazing view.  Esp if we planted some trees along the back fence that over time would block the view of the road...   hmmmm - potential ;)  

This is the view from the living room; 
it's even better from the office

And did I mention that yard?!?!  One of two in the subdivision that have good yards.  AND it gets sun all day.  Amazing.

Now it's really in the middle of nowhere...  But apparently there are some good trails, so at least Sasha and I would have somewhere to adventure.  

So we go look at the last house on the list and it was awful.  Alright then...   Go back to the unicorn.  Yup, really is a unicorn.  In the mean time, our realtor was feeling out the other agent...  Yeah - they're expecting a bidding war and figure it'll go $150k over asking.  Frig.   Did I mention it was already at the top of our budget...?  Ugh.

But...  Unicorn.

So we drive home and think about it a bit.  The house is empty atm, so it suggests they'd like a quick sale (tricky with our $ tied up till Sept).  Okay well what can we do...  We could put the deposit on the line of credit, but to get the house before it goes to a battle, we probably need to offer a quick close.   Well thanks to both sets of amazing parents we were able too borrow the money for the downpayment until our money frees up - which meant we could, technically, close whenever...

May as well at least try...  Put in a strong offer, although likely well under what they think they *might* get, but with a three-week close, no conditions, and a super-quick expiry.  The realtors went back and forth a bit and they wrote it back at a price we agreed to.  Ran a few things past the lawyer and by EOD Tues, the deal was done.

And then there's the whole moving thing...  So both of us are in school and C has a big exam mid-July...  Knowing what my schedule is like, my options are to move the wk of June 20th (with no stress - I'm off school that week), or July 15 (more stress - 2 papers hanging over my head but that's the longest break between papers), or mid Aug.   Really didn't want to wait till Aug if we bought the house in June soooo....

Of course we're doing the super-speed one.  Internet and fencing people are coming the day after we take possession (which I've booked off work to go deal w stuff).  Hopefully will hear from the movers tomorrow about if they can do the date we'd like for the actual move.

And if the world is good, this'll be the last move for a very long time.   A few more weeks of chaos followed by a couple more months of the painful school and work combo.  And then life becomes dramatically calmer.  Until I find the next thing ;)

On the move again...

Those of you who’ve been around the blog for a few years or who actually know me in real life, may be familiar with the concept that I rarely do things in half measures.  So when you combine that with 2020…. Well let the games begin :)

All that’s about to come transpired because neither Chris nor I were happy in our current jobs.  For me to progress my career much farther, it’s looking like an MBA would be a really good idea.  And Chris didn’t want to progress his career so much as change it entirely.

Thinking through the options for Chris, he landed on teacher’s college.  He was really enjoying teaching at Sheridan, however there was no opportunity there for FT or consistent hours.   So while I am - if not happy, at least not miserable in my current role, Chris hates his with a passion.  MBA might help further my career but it’s not an immediate catalyst for dramatic change.  Whereas a teaching degree/certificate/? (I’m not entirely sure what he graduates with since it’s not a BEd - but the power to teach at HS level tech) definitely makes and instant and complete career change for Chris.  It is also imminently more affordable than an MBA.  He wins.  

So we do some research, it looks like there is a demand for tech teachers, so we apply and are not surprised when C is accepted (he was way overqualified AND had already been teaching at Sheridan).   Woohoo!  Win.  His school started first week of July — all online due to COVID, but at least in progress.

Okay but that means that C is now working part-time hours because he’s in school full time.  And, well, in reality I can’t carry the mortgage on my salary alone.  So we can either slide into debt (which we had accepted — essentially the cost of a mid-range car by the time all is said and done) or we sell the house.   I love the house and will be sad to see it go, but C really does not.  And we’d both like to live in a more rural environment.  So okay.  List house.  In a pandemic.  That’s fun.

We actually listed the day before the world shut down.  And, obviously, got nowhere.  So after a week or two we pulled the listing — there was just no point.  When things started to ease up a little, we listed again.  

Had to of course sign all the COVID forms “haven’t been out of the country” etc etc.  And, anybody who comes to see the house also has to sign on.  No open houses, only showings.  Everybody has to wear masks.  They can’t touch anything so make sure all doors are open (you’re supposed to anyways but more extreme now).  Etc etc.   And of course, I was working at home during all this so every showing the dogs and I had to get out.

Then we got an offer that had a home inspection condition.  Okay.  We’re cleaning up the basement so the home inspector can get where we need to and…. Finds minor evidence of a leak.  Frig.  One that’s out of range of C’s tools to fix (ie - need to chip up concrete).   Classic.  So okay, their person isn’t coming till Tuesday, get somebody non Monday to fix.   Done.

Home inspection goes well, except he finds *another* leak.  Wtf?!?!  One that has never leaked the whole time we’ve been there.   Call plumber back — he looks at it and is not touching it.  Not a good sign.  All signs point to very costly and horrifying repairs.   Our realtor finds a different plumber who will come out.  He takes a look, makes a minor tweak, problem solved. ?!?!?  Yeah I still don’t quite believe it, but I’m pretty thrilled.  We’ve had a paper towel under it since then and not a single drop has passed soooo…. Win :)

And with that, the house is sold.  Now we just have to pack up and move by the end of Aug.  No problem.