Tuesday, September 01, 2009

General Update

Still no news about the contract. It is officially 1 month and counting. We are all really crackerdog about it, too, just really stressed and acting weird. It’s been that way all summer, but it has taken a turn in the past couple days from a manic barking stress to a quiet simmering stress. I don’t know which is worse.

This month is exceptionally busy for us, this week we have canning and planting to do. Matt is off this week, too, he’s going to get the land use permit so we can pour some concrete, and he’s going to be pouring a concrete floor in our root cellar (it is existing, off the garage). He is also going to be tearing the roof off the garage. Demolition and food prep will be the order of the day for this month, as well as ripping out summer veggies and getting about half the beds put to sleep for winter.

This Friday I get my last wisdom tooth removed, oh the joy. I’ll be out of commission for a few days.

Next weekend we have our annual Clam Bake up near Ashland, PA. It is the 75th anniversary and is going to be a big to-do. The Gettysburg Wine & Music festival is also that weekend, and we’re hoping to go to that as well. I may be going to the clam bake alone, Matt may be on call this weekend, dammit. If so, anyone want to go with? It would involve camping and woods and clams and a pond and some of my strange and interesting family and a pond and a stream and Fire! Fire! Fire!

The weekend after is a probable trip to Hawk Mountain with Angie, (speaker for mother life). This will depend again on Matt’s call schedule

The weekend after that I work.

After that it is October!!!! Holy cow! Why does the late summer always seem to just fly by? Why are we always SOOO busy this time of year as opposed to winter, when we’re just sitting around waiting for it to be over?

In other news, Matt and I have been talking about whether or not we really want to stay in this area forever (I don’t want to be in this area now, quite frankly). We have been trying to think about where we’d like to relocate to with permanence in mind. We’re young enough that we could purchase now while the prices are low, and come on folks: if nothing else it is an investment option because they are not making any more land, but they’re sure making more people. We’re thinking around 5 acres.

Some places are just out from the word Go: places like Florida, Arizona and New Mexico are out for heat. California is out just on general principle (sorry). Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Montana the like are out for snowload. I think New England and New York are options, but Matt feels they get too much snow/cold. Jersey is out. Much of the south is out for, um, heat and cultural reasons. I mean THE deep south. Midwest is out for tornado reasons. I think we should investigate Oregon, but it may be too close to brother David for comfort for both of us. Most of the costal eastern seaboard is out for hurricane reasons.

That doesn’t leave a whole lot of options, really. Sooooo….. We’re thinking northern North Carolina. Possibly parts of Virginia. Mountains. Cooler. Still some snow, definitely a winter and obvious seasonal changes. I’ve already started looking.

It kills me, a property just sold that would have been perfect: 4 acres, northern NC, basement prices and it would have cost us (collective gasp) only $130/month in mortgage. It was a blank slate and had everything we wanted. I know there are more out there, but we want to get some of our current debt paid before we seriously look and that is about 2 years out. But still, 2 years ain’t that long.

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