Journal Entries
Busy Week
Posted Sep 3, 2005
The contingencies are removed from the sale contract on my house. So, I've been trying to prepare to move. And get rid of a lot of stuff, since I'm downsizing. And my kitties are living in my garage. And wetting the concrete (but not the new carpet). And they hate living in the garage--they are meowing themselves hoarse.
And work has been a zoo. The new building is not really finished yet. I wish they had waited another two weeks before moving us in to it. There was some office trading, so some of the phones have to go a second round to work in the correct rooms. And, our telecom department is working overtime on the University's new football stadium--the first game of the season is tomorrow, so everything is taking longer for us.
The BEST lock company can't possibly be the best lock company in existence, the whole job has been botched from the start. So, there are about four hundred people moving in to an unfinished building, many want to go places they don't really have any reason TO go and are unhappy they can't, the conference rooms don't have phones, the painters are still at work, some of the labs don't have doors yet, the "punch list" grows daily, and my department lost my far-more-experienced and well-loved counterpart. So, I'm trying to cover the front desk and solve some huge problems while taking complaints as plentiful as ticks in the National Forests. And I brought some "homework" home from work.
The reception area is still short 1/3 of its file cabinets, so nothing is organized very well yet. These file cabinets have been missing for over two months now, and their "replacements" may be in next week. Wow. That's underwhelming customer service.
The architect must have been raised on Mars, since there are so many dumb mistakes in the building's design. The counters and desk in reception are made of very soft wood, so there are already scratches in the finish and dents from writing. Expensive lighting was specified to accent a "negative space" in the front of the reception desk that serves the purpose of being mistaken for a rubbish recepticle. But, you can't tell when that light is on; meanwhile, the "work" side of the desk space is under-lit, and the space from the work surface to the counter height won't accomodate a standard size notebook. The fire alarms are too high on the wall for most of us to reach. The building stores rain runoff in cisterns to flush the toilets, but one side of the system lacks filters; fresh manure was put in the planters around the building, so the toilets appear to have been used but not flushed and the smell is "tangy." The HVAC system has not been load balanced yet, and the faculty have not recieved any instruction for operating the climate controls for their individual offices. The huge floor tiles ring from vibrations generated by the HVAC system. The grad students are panicing because their workspace drawers were locked and the keys removed and put in large "porcupines;" guess who has to look through them to find each student's key one by one... There are no clocks in the main office, or anywhere else I can think of. The fax has worked almost half the time. The department director does not communicate information to me she should about tours, visiting donors, decisions about lock access, changes in office assignments, etc.. The people in individual offices all want me to do their menial tasks, and half are not following the procedure set up by the office manager for having their guests announced (and that will likely be blamed on me, too). I haven't had a full lunch break since before the move started two weeks ago, and then a faculty member wanted me to figure out where he should hang his raincoat, since there are no coat hooks (or space for them) in the individual offices. The business cards all have the wrong zip code on them. I could really use a bottle of damitol (damn-it-all).
I'm ready for a three-day weekend. Now, if I could just round up some help to pack and move some furniture. HA. I'm also trying to get ready for a garage sale. And I can't find a new HEPA filter for my vacuum cleaner, so there are still little loose yarns all over the carpet. At least the new-carpet-smell is starting to go away.
I did manage to get my updated application packet in for the step-up position that would pay more. I'll only get it if I can avoid nervous breakdown, though. And if they hire me for it, it will be another hiring round before we get a second full-time person in the front office. But, to be fair, I am EARNING that raise.
I treated my little pickup to a well-deserved oil change last weekend. I still have to have another problem attended to, though. It's either the oxygen sensor, the temperature sensor, or the pressure sensor that replace the EGR sensor in this era truck. I'd like to have it done soon, since the smallest price I saw for gas was 2.65.9/gallon on my fourty to fifty mile drive home. My 1994 truck has just over 61,000 miles on it and it's in otherwise VERY good shape. Fortunately, the town I'm working in has a really good transit system--I can leave my truck parked all week.
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Latest reply: Sep 3, 2005
Sold
Posted Aug 21, 2005
There is an offer on my house, for more than I was asking. We're working to remove contingencies.
I've been encouraged to apply for a step-up position at work. That would mean more money and the opportunity to work more independently on projects, which I enjoy. So, I'm going through my application packet with a fine-tooth comb, looking at properties in the town where I work, still getting rid of my late husband's stuff, working on my house (removed carpet last weekend), and helping a friend while he recovers from hernia surgery. I'm planning a garage sale, and trying to sell extra furniture, too. Oh, and at my job, we're moving in to a new building, so it will be total chaos there for at least a month, then it will be the beginning of a new academic year.
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Latest reply: Aug 21, 2005
House for Sale
Posted Jul 31, 2005
I put my house on the market last weekend. I got home this weekend to find that someone left the back door open, and someone left icky semi-solid by-product in one of the toilets (without flushing). There have been nine showings so far, but no word on offers yet. A guy on the next block called my agent to ask the price; when he heard what it was, he said "that's too much" and hung up.
My main problem is the carpets. I have three kitties that my husband adored, no children. All three have urinary problems. So my carpets smell, well, like cat urine. If I change it, the kitties will just soil the new one, and NOBODY wants to provide a home even temporarily, for cats with urinary problems. I would hate even to ask my friends and family to keep even one for a while. And, I'll still have this problem when I move.
My other two problems are the houses adjacent to mine.
The cream colored one is owned by a nice lady; she's very quiet, and nice,too. But, since her mother died she hasn't been keeping the yard up, and her mother's (1970's) car is still sitting in the driveway, tires completely flat. The gravel portion of the driveway to the side is quickly becoming a small field of native species (weeds). She's essentially a great neighbor, but someone driving by would not necessarily think that.
Even worse than that are the people in the blue house. I've taken to calling it "the dump." Their house not only looks worse, it's occupants are "socio-economically challenged" (what we used to call white trash). The have a proliferation of vehicles out front (sometimes in the yard), and they all look like some horrible genetic experiment; at any one time only three of the up to eight may run. Their guests squeal their tires and speed through our nice quiet neighborhood. They sit on the front step and drink beers; it seems like half the time, they all end up yelling profanity-laden threats at each other. They heap junk in the small space between their house and my car port. I am not the only neighbor who has had to call the police to quiet an out-of-control party.
They leave junky, broken furniture sitting on its side for weeks at a time, in front of their fence. The cast of characters (and vehicles) is always changing, but lately consists of large 1970's vans with run-down utility trailers behind them. We share a really large concrete space for driveway, and they leave broken light bulbs and cigarette butts near my house.
The actual owner is a young man who was run over by a car when he was ten years old. On a four-lane highway. He wanted to buy a house, so his mother supervised, and the money came from the settlement when he was injured. The only people his age I know who are willing to take on home-ownership are Mormons. It's a lot of work. He sustained permanent head injuries in the accident. I don't know how badly it actually affected him, because I can't think of any ten-year-olds that would get themselves near enough to a four-lane highway to be run over in the first place.
So, he has the emotions and maturity of a ten-year old, but wants all the priveleges of an adult. He makes the wrong friends; he brings people home from bars who are "not functioning well" (you know, anger management problems) and prostitutes. I think he prowls around my fenced back yard at night; he knows about stuff I put in my woodshed less than a week ago. He makes sexual innuendos when I'm present. He has anger management issues. He spends all the money he earns on beer. He asks the neighbors for beer money. He showed one of the neighbors a knife he was carrying up his sleeve, and made a "Psycho" like motion toward the neighbor with it. I don't know if he can always distinguish reality from TV, or fiction, or cartoons for that matter. That's why we call the cops at midnight to break up the arguments--we're all afraid to do it ourselves.
Why do people buy houses in nice, quiet neighborhoods and then let their places go to hell, and are noisy and inconsiderate? They know "nice" when they see it. How can it fail to register that care, maintenance, and good manners are what make it "nice;" that it doesn't have to be about how much money people make? How can they know they are the "neighborhood dump" but not see that all we do is treat other people with the courtesy we would like back? This is how neighborhoods begin decline. The neighbors are afraid to say something, and when they do, they may be depriving someone of their civil right to...take away our right to peaceful enjoyment of our homes.
It's like entropy. It only takes one household to destroy the peace and quiet and the safe, careful driving. It only takes one yard full of weeds making seeds before everyone else's yards are infested, too.
There is the rub, at least for me. Almost all the houses for blocks around me are inhabited by people who are quiet and responsible. That is what makes the neighborhood great in the first place. But if prospective buyers look at their prospective neighbors, or worse hear the profanity-laced threats spewed between their neighbors, this otherwise great neighborhood registers in their minds as a not-so-great neighborhood. People who think bad behavior is normal are the only people who will not see it as a serious drawback. The difference is tens of thousands of dollars to me. Money I feel I've earned by being a good neighbor in the first place, meticulously mainting my home, and essentially not being a problem for my neighbors.
Perhaps residential areas should be zoned, quiet or ...not, I guess. Where do my neighbor's civil rights end, and mine begin to protect me?
I have two options. The first choice is to, individually or combine resources with other like-minded neighbors, file an expensive, long, drawn-out civil suit to enforce laws that already exist. OH, we'd also be risking being labeled as elitist and politically incorrect by the local press, too. We could sue for monetary retribution for our property's devaluation; or just hassle the dump people till they get tired of it and leave. Or try to get the courts to uphold our civil rights. We'd never see the money even if we won it, and people's right to be terrible to their neighbors seems to be favored over people's rights not to be near terrible neighbors lately.
The other option is to buy a truckload of pork rinds, make a trail of them to, say...the Cape Perpetua Overlook, and put large quantities of beer near one of the steep cliffs. The best outcome would be that they follow the trail, drink the beer, and fall off the cliff. Even the worst outcome would be that my neighborhood is nicer till I can sell my house. Either way, the neighborhood wins.
Anybody want to make a donation to my pork rind fund?
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Latest reply: Jul 31, 2005
Dust in the Wind
Posted Jun 19, 2005
In a previous episode, I had arranged to deliver some mementos of my husband to his family a mere three hour drive away. In late July, the hot season. I carefully chose family items that would remind them of him, time they spent together, you know, "family items." I loaded them in my truck. The night before I was to deliver the stuff, I was faced with a problem not of my making. The ashes.
I have enough problems in my life without volunteering to solve other people's. I just don't need more.
So, I have my husband's creamains in a double plastic bag (since getting an urn did not make sense for a number of reasons). His family want all of them, which I am under no obligation to give. I think it's a good idea for them to have half. His father has had MONTHS notice to get an urn for their half. I wonder if he "failed" to get one in hopes that the awkwardness of splitting them up would cause me to decide not to split the ashes up and attend their family's occasion to spread them, and somehow miraculously make us all like each other (not likely without overt apologies from them under ANY circumstances). I don't enjoy being manipulated, and have met them more than half way on many occasions only to be snubbed or treated as an outsider.
So, being practical, I consider my options on the night before I am to deliver them to his family. Nothing would ever be good enough for their son, especially now that he's dead and therefore perfect. His mother consistently doesn't like anything she does not choose herself. My husband's family have a way of ignoring most of what I say, so it wouldn't do to give them the bags the ashes came in; they include stickers and a metal tag that identify the remains, it is technically illegal to spread remains on public property, and dollars to donuts they would leave something that could be traced back to me. I've spent a great deal of time and energy accomodating their requests, and been treated with no respect for my efforts. It would, I think, prove therepeutic for them to solve their own problem, just once. Someone aside from me ought to face the wrath of the rest of the family. And I don't really care what they think of me, since it's obvious that the function I serve in their lives is to be a doormat.
So, whatever I choose needs to be, well, economical. Convenient; it's about eleven at night, I need to leave my home at nine the next morning, so no time to shop. Sturdy; all the ashes weighed about thirteen and a half pounds, so a shoebox will not really contain them. It needs to be...about the size of a two-pound coffee can. Which I have. My husband liked coffee. Nothing else occurs to me, other than the fact that I'm very close to spending more time and energy on something that I have made special efforts NOT to spend much time and energy on. Besides that, My late husband's father surely has come up with something; if not, it would certainly not be due to any shortcoming on my part. I decide to move on to another task and hope that another option will present itself.
Two and a half hours later, I realize that nothing else seems close to the right size and also something I can do without. I start to rummage through clothsets in search of something else. At two o'clock, I give up. There is nothing else. I do have some masculine all-occasion (no santa claus or "happy birthday" schemes) gift wrap to cover up the label. It is a dignified pattern that, I think, reflects my late husband's taste; it is sober, elegant even. It's two-thirty; there IS nothing else. And it's not really my problem. AND it's become more my problem than it ever should have been in the first place.
I have to leave in six hours, and I need at least eight hours of sleep since my husband died. I wrap the paper around a nice old coffee can (he probably shared the coffee with his father), and get the ashes. They are still in the canvas bag I took to pick them up. I haven't actually looked at them yet; they seem very fine, so I get a scoop to transfer some of them into the coffee can.
There are nails in them. Or large staples. I imagine from the box from the cremation; or maybe for cosmetic purposes--there was an autopsy, then viewing. This stops me, I was not anticipating anything like this. Another bit of reality seeps into my life. I can't think of anything to do about it. I don't have a magnet big enough to sort them out, and sifting them is out of the question, they'd settle everywhere in my house.
Reality. That's what they wanted, isn't it? I scoop about half the ashes into the can.
I still think it was the right thing to do; the coffee can, the nails, all of it.
Explanation to follow.
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Latest reply: Jun 19, 2005
Late Husband's Employer
Posted May 30, 2005
I should start by explaining that I was raised to think that it's rude to ask for things; one should wait till it's offered. You don't take the last cookie on the plate until everyone has had one chance at it. I didn't even ask for ice cream at grandma Zora's house.
About a month after my husband's death, I was encouraged to attend his company Holiday party. They presented me with an engraved plaque and invited me to display it in the store where he worked permanently. I agreed for a number of reasons, including that there would be no marker in a cemetary.
His dad immediately wanted to see it. The store manager sent a picture. I had this eerie feeling that when they visited near my husband's birthday, his family would want to take it home with them, so I reminded the store manager that I did not elect to display it in the store because I did not want the plaque. During the family pilgrimage, they stopped by the store to see it. His father asked to have it!!! After I made it clear to him that I had decided to display it in the store so we could all enjoy it.
After the company showed the generosity to commemorate my husband,I thanked them, naturally.
His father asked them to make him a plaque so he could have it. They did. It's being shipped to my former father-in-law tomorrow. Now, I'm wondering if his wife and other two sons will ask for plaques, as well. And I'm worried that the company will remember me when they think of my former in-laws tactless behavior.
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Latest reply: May 30, 2005
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