Handy WO-Man

In an effort to save money after I bought my house I ended up buying a washing machine and dryer from a relative for a pretty cheap price, and thought I was getting fantastic deal! Long story short it took about a month before the dryer was hooked up and plugged into the wall. "Finally," I thought "I don't have to keep wearing card board underwear!"

NOT! Have you ever stood by a freight train for say a 50 minute cycle? Holy cow this dryer was sooooo loud! Actually loud doesn't even begin to describe it! It sounded like it could use a gallon of WD-40 to stop the squealing, not to mention the cinder block that was tumbling around in there! Seriously, I could hear it plain as day behind the laundry closet door, my bedroom door, bathroom door, fan on and shower running!!! I couldn't stand listening to it and I didn't dare run the thing when I knew my neighbors were home. So I've spent the last month only using the dryer at a last resort. What a pain!!

Well after describing the problem to my Dad, 2 trips to the part store, and 4 more weeks of being annoyed and stressing about it every time I needed to do laundry I have finally fixed it. That's right me, myself, with no help from a man. It took me 2 hours last night, grease to my elbows, broken fingernails and a nice big cut on my arm but this is now the quietest dryer around. I basically rebuilt the thing and replaced all the parts except the motor and the drum. (Thankfully the new parts were only about $50 total so still cheaper than buying a whole new dryer.) Someone may actually be able to stand being in the same neighborhood while it is running. Woot Woot!

I'm feeling a bit like Rosie today. :)
So what I have I learned from this experience?

1. I don't really NEED and man to fix stuff for me - although having a mechanically minded one around would have been much less stressful.

2. Don't do business with family.

Movies

Some of you may remember hearing this story on the news a few years back. A young man was canyoneering near Moab and a boulder fell on his arm, trapping him for a couple days. After 5 days or so realizing help was not coming, he amputated his own arm in order to free himself.

Now, flash-forward to 2010 and some Hollywood producer decides to turn his story into a movie called "127 Hours". I guess the story goes that as this guy was on his way out to the canyon he meets two young ladies who invite him to a party that night. Well obviously he doesn't make it back in time for the party and while he remains trapped in the canyon he begins hallucinating, particularly about this party. (Or so the Hollywood story goes.)

Well this movie is being filmed around Moab and with the help of the Moab film commission they needed to find a vacant place to film this "party" scene. After some looking around they found this place:









Okay well I don't have a picture of it, but this house belongs to my Grandpa, some of my earliest memories were with my grandparents in this house, and when my family moved back to Moab in the mid 90's we lived there for about a year and a half. So pretty awesome right!? I think so... I remember making cinnamon rolls with my grandma there!!

BUT... if that wasn't cool enough, my family called the film commission to ask about 'extras' for the party scene. Explaining that the house has been in our family for years, (my dad actually grew up there) and it would be a really neat experience for him to be in that scene. Well after being politely told "you're 50 and too old to be attending a party with 20 something year old's" they did find a part for him!! SO... my dad is playing one of the doctors (well technically the anesthesiologist I think) that fixes this guy up after he's rescued!!! Ladies and Gentlemen we have a movie star in our midst. My dad shaved off his beard and has been down to the hospital the last two mornings filming! Awesome.

I don't know any kind of a time line as to when the movie will be out but I'm sure looking forward to it!

Dear Zeniff,

Call me Crazy

I'm not totally sure how I'll feel about these $85 in the next few months, but I've been thinking about running a full marathon for awhile now and hopefully 2010 will be the year. I'll know by May 7th if I've actually made the lottery drawing.

Just getting after getting the keys.

View from the front door:

Living Room:

Kitchen:

Master Suite:

House UPDATE

Okay I mush apologize for leaving you all hanging like that. I wish that I could tell you all I have been busy trying to close on a house and packing to get ready to move. But unfortunately... No. Here's how it all went down:

Friday: Submitted an offer

Weekend & Monday : No news.

Tuesday:
12:00 pm - My Realtor, Rodney, calls to tell me they have submitted a counter offer. I figured they would counter but it was still pretty close to my original offer so I was pretty much ready to go with it. They gave me until Wednesday to at noon to respond so I told my realtor I needed to think about it for a few hours.

12:30 pm - Rodney calls me back to tell me that someone else has submitted an offer on the same property and it has now moved to a "multiple offer situation," What ever that means. So the seller took back their counter and gave me until 10:00 am Wednesday morning to submit my new and best offer or keep my original.

The rest of Tuesday was just STRESS! Trying to figure out what to offer and hope that it was just better than the other guys.

Wednesday:
9:45 am - Submit a new offer (which was even higher than their counter offer back to me), and that agreed to close by the end of February.

10:00 - fax all my financial info to the lender to get the loan process started so is they do accept my offer we really can close in 2 weeks.

1:00 pm - meet with the lender and talk $$.

4:00 pm - meet my Dad who happened to be up in Salt Lake for work to show him my almost house.

Continue to wait on pins a needles all day for the phone to ring... by 9:00 pm...Nothing.

Thursday:
Continue waiting.

11:30 am - receive email from my Realtor that says they should be making a decision soon, but both offers were very close.

1:00 pm - receive phone call from Rodney telling me they went with the other offer. BOO!!

I've been having mixed feeling about it for sure. A little relief because it was at the higher end of my price range, but also upset because it felt like they sold it out from underneath me. It was definitely a roller coaster week, but now I'm back to looking again. :(

House Hunt

So I'm doing it. I've been wanting to buy a home for some time now and I finally think I'm ready. You know with mortgage rates and prices so low (or so they say), first time home buyer tax credit, etc. now is probably the best time as any. Not to mention that I'm tired of living in my bedroom. Keeping my ironing board in my dinky closet. Having the blow dryer, hair and make-up stuff in my room because there is no other place to put it in the bathroom. Not using my new knife set, mixing bowls, nice silverware, etc. because I'm afraid it will not get taken care of. Having to share and coordinate a kitchen schedule with 5 other people. Miscellaneous food in the refrigerator that doesn't get thrown out because no body knows who it belongs too. Having practically zero storage space for anything. Only having a tiny space in the fridge with a cardboard shelf. You know I'm sure we've all been there. But basically, I'm just ready to move on.

So I've been looking around a little since about October but really hitting things hard since the beginning of the year. And I think I've found something!!! Something I love enough to actually make an offer on. So that is what I'm doing this afternoon - sitting down with my Realtor and writing up an offer on this town home!! I'm a little nervous but super excited at the same time. It's about 2100 sq. ft. (1600 finished) in Riverton with a beautiful kitchen (I think) and a really nice patio and deck in the back.

Front

Kitchen

Hard Wood Floors!!

Master Bath

Deck

So keep your fingers crossed for me! I hope they'll accept my offer and things move forward. I should hear back by Monday or Tuesday of next week. Wish me luck. :o)