For those that don't know, Maisy and I have worked out a deal for a new home. Basically, the one we're in now is turning to shit quickly, due to new owners who bought the house. The new owners bought it, and within a week began invading the downstairs area to do massive reconstruction. Knocking out walls, putting up walls, tearing out plumbing, wiring, floors, ceilings... Basically gutting our downstairs. They want to gut the upstairs (where we live) as well, and are constantly pressuring us to leave for a week so they can install all new windows, doors, plumbing, walls, carpet, fixtures, replace both front and back porches... Also, everything they change seems designed specifically for senior citizens. I give it a month before they make us put those disgusting, soft, mushy toilet seats in.
And, our suspicions were correct when they came over to tell us they were raising the rent and we had about 8 months to get out, because they're turning the entire building into an assisted living habitat.
No wonder all their changes were so sterile.
They have this large air compressor downstairs that kicks on by itself every 20 minutes, a large table saw, various other tools, and they've just started putting up vinyl siding all over the house (which means hammers, which means noise, which means all day long for weeks).
Also, they came in and cut down our cool, old tree, took a weedeater and cut down all of Maisy's flowers, removed the bushes in the yard, tore down the hedge, which separated our yard from the neighbor's yard, and sprinkled poison all over the yard and driveway (which they're paving any second now) and didn't bother telling us, which really pissed me off because we have a cat and he walks in the yard and likes to lay in the driveway.
Fuckers. This all started, exactly, the day we brought Painter home from the hospital. I mean, right then, minutes after we walked in, tired and drained, we hear some loud-ass banging downstairs, looked at eachother, and frowned. "Didn't they just fucking buy the place last week?"
What sucks more is that they live across the street. Not more than 70 feet from us. So they're over here constantly. Also, they tend to complain about everything. "Sorry to bother you, could you take your barbecue and maybe store it in the house... it's just that we're trying to show the house to potential customers..." "Sorry to bother you, but could you not smoke out front anymore? The cigarette butts are bothersome, and out back, they are troublesome. But don't smoke in the house." "Sorry to bother you, but we're raising the rent this month, and also, could you vacate the premises tomorrow all day so we can remove your beautiful wooden front door and replace it with a cold, hospital-like metal door, painted white, with lots of deadbolts and those tapered kind of inlaid windows that only old people like because they think they're expensive and fancy?"
So, my wife and I worked out a deal with some other people we met to move into a nice 3-bedroom house over in Coos Bay. The deal: We have to fix it up. They buy the materials, we do the labor. This has been going on now for about 2 months. I've learned how to remove wallpaper (and what we discovered was 5 layers of it, including a layer of latex paint in the middle), sand hardwood floors, stain hardwood floors, paint the shit out of everything, fix the painting, fix it again, touch it up, paint, fix what we touched up, put up trim, sand trim, pry open windows, seal ceilings, install light fixtures, get paint everywhere, move tons of furniture, and relocate all their belongings that were still inside when I started.
It's a bit of a nightmare because neither Maisy nor myself know how to do any of this.
I'll post a picture of the old place and later today, one of the new place.
Also, my publishing slump has ended, finally. I was beginning to crawl around in the mailbox in a sad and pouty kind of manner.
We're going to the house to work on it in a few minutes, so I'll post again very soon...
