Possumblog

Mission Accomplished?

Well, who knows?

I was so whupped Friday by the time I got home, there was precious little in the way of cleaning done on the house. Instead, I just vegetated and wondered how it was exactly that I had gotten myself so very, very tired. Still, I couldn’t really do a good job of vegetating with all the stuff to do, so I finally got motivated enough later in the evening to begin shifting the huge stacks of dust-covered books and junk over on the distaff side of the bedroom to someplace unnoticeable. I got the area in front of the dresser cleaned out. HEY! FLOOR!!

Luckily, with the rain, I was able to effectively avoid having to cut the grass Saturday.

Couldn’t avoid Saturday itself, though.

Up early, and the first chore was that I had to go haul Oldest over to the Express Oil Change down at the foot of the hill. Seems one of her school clubs was having a car wash to raise money, so she dolled herself up in a tropical getup of some sort (floweredy capri pants were the main eye-catching element) and we were about to walk out the door when I noticed she had on sandals. Dress sandals, with a heel. “Uh, you really need to wear sneakers.”

“Oh.”

It was still cloudy and messy looking outside, but I figured it would probably clear out later in the day. It did, but not before it rained again. Hard.

BUT, before all that, I dropped her off at the shop. Pulled up in front, waited. “Uh, I doesn’t look like anyone is here yet, Ashley.” “WELL! They SAID they were going to PARK in the BACK!”

If only THEY would be a bit more forthcoming when telling me these things! “You know, that would have been something good to know before I pulled up and parked here.” Drove around to the back and sure enough, buncha kids with buckets. Which made me wonder why I was required to go to the Dollar Tree and purchase four buckets the previous evening. Dumped Oldest out--“Hey, do you have any money with you?”

Silly Dad.

I gave her eight bucks and went on back home, flung some breakfast at the kids, and the phone rang. It was Oldest on her cell phone. “I’M STANDING OUT HERE HOLDING A SIGN AND I’M HUNGRY!” Resisting the urge to ask her if she had written “Will work for food” on the sign, I gently informed her that she could take the eight dollars I had given her about fifteen minutes prior, walk over to Winn-Dixie, and BUY SOME FOOD.

Why, the very idea!

Such gall on my part!

Expecting her to actually walk somewhere!

Why, that was ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE PARKING LOT!

I could tell she was quite incensed with my suggestion--I'm certain she thought I would drop everything and come bring her some food--so she hung up with extreme prejudice. I bet she wished it was something she could slam down like a regular phone. Hey, whatever.

Time to start the final push to make the house ready for our impending guests. The kids were dispatched to their rooms to finish picking up their toys, and I went to ours to pick up more junk.

FAST FORWARD TWO HOURS--in which time I also had to take leave to go pick up Oldest around 11, because she was now standing in the rain with all of the other dim wet teenagers in her group. I didn’t say anything other than to tell her to go ahead and take her shower when she got home, but there is a fine old Southern expression about people without sense enough to get in out of the rain.

I kept that to myself.

Noontime finally arrived, and after hours of sucking up dust with both the vacuum cleaner and my nose, our bedroom finally looked clean. In fact, cleaner than it has ever been. It’s been covered up either with boxes or with Reba’s paperwork and junk ever since we moved in. Seven years ago. It’s very spacious. Now.

I hopped downstairs and mopped the kitchen--three times--and by two p.m., our house was clean. More or less. Reba’s method of putting things away rendered her closet impassable. ::sigh::

Shower, fix and do on a few more minor things, and then time to just sit and wait for our guests. Right on time they were there, the lady who first drove into our driveway (and who kinda reminds me of Michele Lee) along with her nephew and his wife. Young, clean-cut couple, they were. I brought them in and we looked around, and they seemed to be quite taken with the whole place. Their aunt told me she had purchased the house at the end of the street two doors down from us, and the young guy said that his life-long friend had a house just across the way. And his parents live in the neighborhood, too. Gonna have a regular commune going on.

I told them the various stories you all have heard over the years--the leaky bathroom toilet and floor replacement project (repair ongoing), the leaky control knob on the upstairs bathtub that caused the garage ceiling to get all watery (repair ongoing), the destruction and rebuilding of the chimney and my battles with Contractor Boy (blessedly complete), the Giant Plastic Not-a-Shed but-a-Playhouse, the Painters.

They all seemed to love it. I suppose it helped that the kids were around to distract them from the marks and gouges on the walls, which is only fair, I suppose, since they were the ones who marked and gouged things in the first place. The young man especially seemed taken with all of our books, and our old fusee clock in the kitchen, and the big engraving of New York harbor, and my armoire--gotta good eye, there, Kid. They liked the level backyard, and the flower bed, and the bench, and the pond. And the concrete curbing in the front flower beds.

Of course, after they’d left and we were recovering from the visit, it came about that Reba doesn’t really like the idea of selling. Despite the fact that for the past seven years all she’s talked about is having a place where the kids could each have their own bedrooms. ::sigh:: Figures, don’t it?

Anyway, after more discussions, she’s gradually warming up to the idea that has been hers all along, but it’ll still require that these folks actually make a reasonable offer, and if we can find something that we can purchase for that much. So, we might stay there no matter what. At which point she will probably be all disappointed.

Woman’s prerogative, and all.

ANYWAY, who knows what all is going to go on between now and then?! Not I. What I do know is that I have a crushing deadline I have to deal with at the moment, and I must be about it.

SO, when I get that all wrapped up, I’ll be back to dispense more free ice cream cones!

Posted by Terry Oglesby at September 20, 2005 08:48 AM