We're officially homeowners. Our realtor dropped off the key today. Our title company issued us a check for the difference between what we paid and what the closing costs actually were. The utilities are in our name. It's all ours, baby.
Maybe this weekend I'll be able to celebrate. Tonight we were both so wiped from the long work day that we simply had leftover Chinese food and sat around like heffalumps. Grinning heffalumps, though.
I can't think of anyplace to put our lovely dining room table in our new, petite home, and have concluded we may have to store it in our garage for future use at another house. I'd like to set up the computer to face the backyard, if possible, but again, the architecture may not accommodate this arrangement. However, I'm sure I'll get inspired when the stuff is actually piled up in the house. That won't be immediately. We plan to actually have the movers in on Easter weekend, the third weekend of April (guess we'll have to find heathen movers). That gives us three weeks to pack, and one week to desultorily clean up here.
I hold fast to my belief that we're still going to Japan in May. We should be getting back a fair chunk of our damage deposit, and it will more than cover our hotel costs. Since the air is already taken care of I think we can manage a vacation abroad. Remember how I was vacillating earlier this year between Rome and Tokyo? What a bad choice Rome would have been! This is not the year to go to Italy unless you like milling around with thousands of other tourists. I'm still swamped with Italian hotel arrangements at work, though I've finished the Spanish villa rentals (one in Granada, one in Ibiza), made car rentals in seven European countries, passed the tour of Scandanavia to someone else, pinned down most of the details on Egypt and Jordan, and been utterly relieved to discover one of the Italian parties has decided to go to France instead.
Work is actually so bad that I'm finding my mind goes into a fugue state around 11am, and stays there until I rush out the door to catch my train at 6pm. Too many calls. Too much responsibility. I can't rely on my famous memory. Notes are scattered everywhere, and I'm turning into one of those tiresome people who places a phonecall, and then has to say, "I had it here a minute ago, one moment, I just saw it..." God, I hate that sort of inefficiency. But I can't take the time to organize it onto one or two sheets of paper, so it's a frustrating, tail-chasing business.
Still, work is only 8 hours a day, and packing will occupy all the rest of my waking hours from now until Easter. I will be an efficient packer, because I have to be. I'm going to put an awful lot into boxes which I don't expect to open again for upwards of five years. I do plan to take time out on Saturday night to go to Jen's birthday party in San Francisco. I can't resist the opportunity to go to a place called the Make-Out Room. Also, there are free drinks if I get there early enough. It will be my reward for packing efficiently earlier in the day. No packee, no drinkee.
And I still can't think of a name for my garden journal! It's making me nutso. Kim Huett suggested Petal to the Metal, which made me laugh but isn't appropriate. Steve Boyd suggested Garden of Earthy Delights, which just made me groan. If you have a suggestion, let's hear it at the forum!
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