Joys of Home Ownership

Too Many Sweaters

We got around to opening the last few clothing boxes today. How many sweaters does a retired person need? A dozen? Nope, narrowed it down to five. Also kept 2 Hawaiian shirts out of 4, two button down casual shirts out of four and just 2 of 4 Lands End quarter-zip knit shirts. Some needy folks in Klamath Falls will be dressed a little nicer and warmer after we donate these.

We are down to just a dozen book boxes to open up and shelve. After that, it is figuring out where to hang the eleven-hundred framed photos, prints and completed jigsaw puzzles around the empty vertical surfaces. Sometime not long after that, they will come down again as we add color to all the beige walls.

The garage is still a mess, all the tools and what not will be needed, arranging still on the existing shelves in the back. I will also need to figure out how to store our half dozen bikes while allowing easy access to them and the two cars. Then there is reinstalling the RaceDeck tile flooring and possibly adding some more for under the Mini…

A Washer and Dryer of Our Very Own

Better 8-1/2 days late than never. But like most things we have run across in our move, it wasn’t that simple. First off we got another surprise arrival.

Back when the garage door opener was replaced we were told we would get a call telling us of their arrival about 25-30 minutes ahead of time. On that day we decided to walk the mile into town to check the mail knowing that we could cover the distance back in a half hour. So wouldn’t you know it, the guy called while we were downtown, but he was calling from our driveway! So I lied to him and told him we were on our way home (true) and would be home in 10-15 minutes (false.) We quick walked back up the hill and made it in 25 minutes.

For our appliance delivery we were told to expect them between 1:00 and 5:00 in the afternoon. So we decided to walk into town about 11:30 to check the mail figuring we had plenty of time to do that and stop to buy a couple of bagels on the way back. So wouldn’t you know it, the guy called while we were almost downtown to say he was about 20 minutes away! The bagel place closed at 1:00, meaning we didn’t have time to get home, get our delivery and make it back, so Plan B was formulated on the fly. Donna would continue with the walking mission and I would turn around to head home and meet our appliances.

At least they weren’t waiting in the driveway when I got back, but it wasn’t long before the knock came at the door. They were fast and efficient at unloading and placing our stuff in where they belong. The fridge was easy, but the snags reared their ugly heads on the lower level where the washer and dryer go. First off, they brought the “wrong” 240v dryer power cord. Whenever the house was wired for the electric dryer they used a 3 prong straight bladed socket which is now traditionally used for stoves and the cord they had was the usual dryer cord with one blade with a 90 degree bend in it. Staying with the dryer, the flex tubing they brought was enough, but because of the existing tubing location it would be hard to move a junction to connect the new to the old. To top it off, the drain hose on the washer was too short. For whatever reason, the house drain was over on the other side of the water heater, so we would need an extension to make it reach.

I checked the Home Depot website and they had the dryer/oven power cord no problem. The extensions for the washer hose and dryer duct connectors they didn’t have, I could order it and have it delivered to the store for pickup — in a week! We drove to Home Depot and returned the cord and dryer ducting for in store credit. Then on the off chance the web site was wrong we went looking for the three things we needed. Turns out the web site was wrong, they didn’t even have the power cord.

Crap, another trip or two to the local laundromat would be required, but then we remembered seeing ads on TV for a local chain of electrical and plumbing stores called Grover. Went in and explained our predicament at the service desk and within 10 minutes were out the door with all three things we needed. An hour after getting home we were washing a load of clothes.

2 Weeks In

Today was the two week anniversary of us occupying 1025 Pacific Terrace and have technically owned for 6 days. We are still awaiting the arrival of our washer, dyer and fridge. They were supposed to be here last Friday, but I got a voicemail message Thursday that there was a “shipping delay” and the items wouldn’t be here until next Saturday, January 4th. Tomorrow we have someone coming over to give us an estimate on a new roof.

The Miata is still in transit somewhere, but no word on an ETA. We now know our household goods are at least on a truck, because Mayflower hit the charge card for the $5,000 deposit. Their original estimate on transit was 10-12 days, so we should have less than 2 weeks to wait at this point. It is time to start thinking about driver’s licenses and registering to vote to make us official Oregonians.

Took a little walk this afternoon that included about 3/4 mile of trails that reside up above our neighborhood. We were going to wear just sneakers, but at the last minute switched to our hiking boots. It was a good call as the trail was sneaky muddy. It didn’t look like it, but it was wet and slippery and slowly built up a heavy layer on the bottom of the boots making walking difficult. Even with scraping on rocks and walking on sidewalks the mile back, both pair of boots are still so muddy they are sitting in the garage awaiting the next sunny day for cleaning.

It is a long way off, but last night we started planning for spring. Not only thinking about next years Moss Motoring Challenge, but maybe repeating our South Carolina Post Office Extravaganza here in the Beaver State. I found a list of the population of the 355 cities in the state ranging from Portland at 653,115 down to Greenhorn at 10. In South Carolina I used the USPS site and located post offices in a 25 mile radii, but here in Oregon most of the towns big enough to have a PO are much farther apart than that. Then I got lucky and found a website called Postal Locations which appears to list every town with a post office. From my calculations this state has about 378 Post Offices in it 98,466 square miles compared to South Carolina’s 454 in 32,020. Probably going to take us a lot longer than the approximately 4 years it took to do South Carolina.

Really, That Long?

On Thursday morning I called around looking for a doctor to get a tetanus shoot and to establish a relationship with. I’ve got a few prescriptions that I’m going to need refills of in January and I think our old doctor in Aiken is eventually going to catch onto the whole I’m just visiting in Oregon thing.

My first call was to the Adult Medical Clinic at the local hospital. They were listed on the BCBS of Alabama website. When I called I was informed there were three doctors and only one was accepting new patients and the next available appointment was in July 2020! The nice person who answered the phone said I might try something called Cascades East, when I called them they said the waiting list is 6 months! I had them send me the forms to get on the waiting list.

In the meantime we could avail ourselves with the services of Basin Immediate Care, a walk-in clinic that takes anyone who can pay or has insurance. So guess where we spent 2-1/2 hours on Thursday afternoon getting a tetanus shot and a band aid?

This afternoon we had a shiny new 3/4 horsepower, kevlar belt drive garage door opener with two remotes and a wireless keypad installed. So much smoother and quieter that the old chain drive unit. Now it has got us thinking about replacing that old heavy wooden door. When the installer took the old unit down we looked at the date of manufacture on the sticker and it read 1995. Twenty-five years, so it had a pretty good life, but who knows how much longer it would have noisily gone about doing its job if I hadn’t accidentally killed it.

Fixing Up Our Christmas Present

Neither of us had any presents under the Christmas tree (which we don’t have anyway) this year because all that kind of money is going into furnishing and resupplying the one big shared present, 1025 Pacific Terrace.

The last owners of our new home were only in it for 2 years. I’m mildly curious as to why, but whatever. In those two years I don’t think they ever really cleaned. They must have done some sort of quick clean before they left because the place was habitable when we moved in, but a deep clean, not so much. We are on our second box of Swiffer cloths removing dust and cobwebs from nooks and crannies in every room. We are also on our second container of Clorox wipes removing various stains and dirt spots from the walls and ceilings. In the Master Bathroom there were lots of black hairs stuck to the walls and ceiling from the previous owner blow drying her hair.

I have replaced between 15 and 20 light bulbs throughout the house. I don’t know what the reason, to conserve energy or just plain laziness. I betting it was mostly the later because there was a burnt out bulb in almost every 2-light fixture. The light on the front and back porches had bulbs, but the one on the pole in the front lawn for the stairs didn’t. The light in the bottom of the microwave that illuminates the stove top was out. The light on the garage door opener was burnt out and this was vexing because the garage is really dark when we get out of the car at night.

On Christmas Eve I decided to replace the bulb in the garage door opener. It worked fine using the wall switch, but when the garage door would go up and down the light would flicker like a strobe light. I opened up the light compartment again and noticed the the bulb socket was held in place by some tabs, thinking maybe it was loose wire I pressed the tabs and pulled the socket out from the opener body. FLASH! CRACK! It was a loose wire and when I pulled the socket out the two wires touched and shorted out. Now we have to manually open and close the door until I can find someone to install a new garage opener.

I don’t think the previous owners used the two car garage for cars. I have been sweeping out dust and cobwebs from all over in there too. There was a long bench along one side of the garage that I decided to take apart today to make room for the imminent arrival of the Miata (supposed to be sometime this week.) This thing is big, about 2 feet wide and 8 feet long. Sturdy too, it is made up of 2x4s and half 1/2 plywood screwed together with deck screws. There are about a a dozen nails in one end. I figure whoever made it started hammering it together and realizing that that would be an awful lot of work, then switch to screws. I was about 90% through disassembling it when I accidentally stepped on a nice long nail. OUCH! Went right through the sole of the sneaker, my sock and probably a 1/2″ into my foot. Direct pressure stopped the bleeding after about 5 minutes. Thought it might be a good idea to go to the Emergency Room , but then thought of the cost, so just cleaned it out with some alcohol and dressed with a band aid and some polysporin. I’ll try and get a doctor to give me a tetanus shot tomorrow even though the nail was clean and shiny having spent who knows how long inside that 2×4…

I think I need to reassess my handyman qualifications…

39,000 Planks of Plastic

We have had a hectic week, (and for the last couple months, they have all seemed hectic) we have moved all our stuff, which includes what we brought with us and what we shipped to us and what we have bought since being here, out of the AirBnB and into our new home. I must have taken a dozen 5 mile round trips. Two of which were ferrying one mountain bike at a time with the front wheel off and the Mini’s hatch bungeed partially closed. Somewhere on one of these trips the Ladybug crossed the 39,000 mile mark.

Tuesday we had the cable company come in and install two cable boxes and the modem for the internet. One in the bonus room downstairs and one in the living room. The living room is hooked up to our new 43″ Samsung UHD Smart TV (that just fit inside the Mini’s hatch) that will eventually get mounted above the fireplace. The downstairs hookup will be for our old 50″ Samsung Regular HD Smart TV, when it gets here.

Also on Tuesday we visited a local flooring place and picked out the new “hardwood flooring” to replace the carpet in the 3 bedrooms. Thursday they dropped off the materials to let them acclimate themselves to their new home and 2 nice young fellows spent the day ripping out the old carpet and padding. Today they were back to actually lay the new laminate planks in the three bedrooms. It is all finished except for the 1/4 round molding in one room that will be finished on Monday next.

This morning while those two guys were sawing and banging we ducked off to do the closing on the house. Here in Oregon it was done at a title company’s offices, not a lawyers office like in South Carolina. Maybe because of this it seemed very low key. No real estate agents, no seller, just us, a banker and some sort of clerk. We went home for lunch and then this afternoon went out to Walmart and bought a small folding table and two folding chairs because we were tired of eating, sitting on the floor. We were also tired of sleeping on an inflatable mattress, so on the way back from Wally World we stopped at a local bedroom store and bought a nice new queen sized Serta memory foam bed and a new bed frame. We knew we needed a mattress because we tossed the old one away before we left Aiken. We didn’t need a new bed frame because we did bring one, but Donna feel in love with one while mattress shopping (and I did really like it too.) It will be delivered tomorrow.

We have also had an estimate for a new roof sometime this week, which we knew the place needed it after the home inspection (we offered $8k on the house less than asking knowing this), and will get get done sometime in January. We have also arranged to have someone come over and measure for some nice new vertical blinds to replace the old wood slat ones in the living and dining rooms. And I have also not detailed the tens of trips to Home Depot, Walmart and Fred Meyers buying other odds and ends.

Home Sweet Empty Home

Mid morning, after yesterday’s light dusting of snow had melted, we stuffed the back of the Mini with a couple hundred dollars worth of stuff we bought over the last week and drove over to our new home. These were things that we needed because we donated or left behind their predecessors back in Aiken (microwave, toaster and a Keurig.) There were also some things that we will need to occupy our empty home until our household shipment arrives after the first of the year in there too (towels, sheets, a blow up mattress, and some cheap silverware and plates.)

We brought over with us a take and bake pizza from Papa Murphy’s and ate lunch in our empty living room. When we came back “home” after to the AirBnB we ordered a new washer and dryer from Home Depot. Because we are a rural area they have none in stock, everything has to be ordered, so those won’t be here until after Christmas. Tomorrow we will go buy a 40″ TV to place over the fireplace because our existing 50″ one is too big. That one will stay downstairs in the “bonus” room with the futon for watching while washing clothes because the laundry room is on that level.

We’ll be probably go over for a couple hours each of the next three days farting around and will start sleeping there either Wednesday or Thursday night. We have to be out of the AirBnB by Friday morning at 11:00 AM.