Tag Archives: real estate

Internet, I’m soaking in it

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Well, we’re all moved in. Apparently my mother mistakenly spread the rumor that we purchased a condo, so relatives are emailing to congratulate us. When in Rome, right?

Effective immediately, I am changing my blog name to ClamShandy. I don’t know, it just sounds filthy. Also, I’ll be guest-blogging at my sister’s blog for the next *unspecified period of time*. She’s in some medical study on the heartbreak of colitis, or possibly hair don’ts. Then I’m trying to entice her to the great northerly east, where she will see that you can bilk people out of vast amounts of money per hour for making food dance on the internet.

-xxoo

Happy Groundhog Day Again!

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The big move is tomorrow. We are wildly unprepared, but that’s the beauty of having movers. If only they’d stay and clean up after us too. Part of me is tempted to just abandon the stuff in storage and live like wolves. We’ll burrow, we’ll chase things, we’ll roll in dead stuff. It’ll be great. Who needs furniture when you have wall-to-wall carpeting?

-xxoo

Movin’ on up

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This morning Mr. H and I signed the lease to our new place. Our very nice landlord, who looks like Moby, handed over the keys even before the check cleared. Now that’s small town livin’.

The place looks like this:

We have the second floor. The turret room is for the cat, or visiting crazy relatives. I could go on and on, but the kitchen is uncarpeted, and that’s good enough for me. Party invites to go out as soon as we rescue our stuff from storage!

-xxoo

She’s a brick house

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Last night I went to the towniest bar on the entire planet with my sister-in-law. We watched a cover band, and overweight women throwing bras. I can’t even make this funny. I get uncomfortable around people with bad hair.

We’ve given the heave-ho to the evil, deceitful apartment people. They are refunding our money, but hemming and hawing about reimbursing us for the storage fee for our crap for the month we stupidly waited. I am thinking of calling the local paper and asking for the Bone To Pick Department. Now it’s off to look at ten or twenty apartments this afternoon. I am totally opening all the medicine cabinets and checking for water pressure.

Oh, confidential to Mr. Baby’s parental units: I am sure you get lots of parenting advice, and maybe you’ve already done this, but don’t you think it’s time to photograph him in a roasting pan or a soup tureen? I mean before he gets too big. I can’t tell you how often I fondly look back on my “kitten in the microwave” series and wish I’d thought to pose her in the toaster oven too. Now she’s just plain huge.

-xxoo

I’m OK, you’re OK

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A flash of peripheral motion caught my eye out the window, and I looked up to see a red-tailed hawk on the ground, bending and bobbing over something. Then it swooped off, clutching the limp dangling body of a squirrel. Stupid squirrel, of course you’re going to show up against white snow. Duh. My mother used to dress my sister and I in bright colors, to avoid hunters, she said, but maybe she was trying to attract hawks.

I owe this nature hour to the backyard of Mr. H’s parents’ house, where we’re still bunking. The evil building management people say our new place will be open for business on February 1, and that the holdup is the state elevator inspection people. I wonder if they have heard the phrase “cross my palm with silver.” It seems to be indicated. I have also heard of a person called a “permit expediter.” Apparently they hand out $100 bills all day at City Hall. Maybe this doesn’t work with a state agency, although I don’t see why it wouldn’t.

Some alert and concerned readers have asked if Lambchop and I are both stark, raving mad. I would have to say we’ve both seen better days, but in many ways no more so than usual. She handles the mania, and I am in charge of ennui. You see, we are a team! We both might fancy a trip to someplace warm, involving umbrella drinks!

-xxoo

bodies, rest, and motion

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I’m taking a break from packing, my face blackened and smeared from newsprint. I make a great guttersnipe. In other fashion news, I accidentally dyed my hair burgandy. Does “Brazillian Bronze” sound like burgandy to you? Me neither. The picture on the box looked frigging chocolate brown to me. This is my karmic reward for taking matters into my own hands. I thought I’d save a few bucks (now that I’m unemployed in the future) and cover my sadly grown out highlights. I just never expected to turn into Shannen Doherty! I know this is a highly prized color amongst filing secretaries and teenage girls, but it’s just not right for me. So back I shall slink to my colorist. She will twit me mercilessly and leave me under the dryer a bit longer than necessary. Spiteful witch.

We’re down to the pile of strange wires and incomprehensible electronic bits and discs, so I’m letting Mr. H take over. I already packed 6 million pounds of glassware. You know how we roll. Like Crate & Barrel, apparently, with a sheet of butcher paper on the diagonal. Speaking of rolling, I also found a long forgotten bong! And my highschool yearbook! I’ve been throwing things away ruthlessly, because I realized my number one favorite pastime is trading stuff in for better stuff. Even Mr. H has caught the fever;I just saw him fling a framed baby picture of his neice into a Hefty bag. “I know what she looks like.” Applause! Applause!

-xxoo

Lolly lolly

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I am finishing the Big Move (from one bedroom to the one right next door). It took a while, because I did it one sweater at a time. I have already started painting in the new posh pit. I am taking a break to twirl a lollipop and wonder where the cigar in my pocket came from.

If you know the answer to this ponderous riddle, do rattle my cage. I will be here listening to Roxy music and flexing my new muscles until its time to go see my fellow Smuggler play at the Somerville theater. Do come, and slip mysterious objects in my pocket. I won’t remember!

-xo

Our house, was our castle and our keep

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So, not an hour after I am assured we can move into the new place on Monday, the human blowdryer at the real estate corral calls MY HUSBAND to say “um, you can’t after all.” I guess Verizon was right, the building is imaginary. It’s a good thing he decided to go over my head, because I would have taken his call, kicked my heels up on my desk, and had a voiceover segment. There would have been some spangly dream sequence music, and a perky voice would ask “What would Anna Wintour do?”

And then I would have REAMED HIM WITHIN AN INCH OF HIS LIFE. His office is a few blocks from mine. I still might. Throw a cellphone at his head and key his Grand Cherokee.

Point of clarification: I am not really a douche bag when I deal with people. This is a fantasy, designed to detract from how totally crushed and helpless I feel. We’ve scheduled a shut off for the utilities, scheduled them for the new place, given our landlord notice that we’ll be out, and hired movers. Even my new haircut, which looks amazing, thanks for asking, isn’t helping. I am so calling Hank Phillipi Ryan. And, as Aaron suggested, I’ll be booking rooms at the Ritz and deducting the bill from our new rent. One for me, one for the cat, one for all my stuff.

Panic in the streets

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Today is all about dread. Fear of the blinky red dot on my mail icon. Fear of the blinky red light on the phone. Fear of the clucking chicken ring on my cellphone, which means messages waiting. I guess it’s my own damn fault for picking that ring, I should switch back to the Bewitched theme.

I am short of breath, and my ears are humming. Now more than ever, I need a personal whitelist of who is actually allowed to address me! I don’t want to field a question from the assorted ding dongs that need to get all up in my existence today. The clueless freelance client who can’t remember where they bought their domain but still needs it pointed somewhere else. The real estate monster, calling to say “We-ell, you can still move in on the first, but you may not have a working elevator…” Verizon, saying “Oh, you would like a phone in your new place? How NOVEL.”

I also don’t want to give advice to people with poor life skills who won’t take it anyway.   Oh, you have baby daddy trouble? That’s too bad. You gained weight? Ha. I am getting a sore throat.

Did this entry stress you out too? I’m sorry. Really, I am. You shouldn’t have to suffer too. Why do we always hurt the ones we love? Let’s talk about a far more soothing topic: my hair. Oh, deep breath. I am soaking in it. I am getting a cut today, which always makes me feel like a squillion bucks. Yes, I know I just got it cut a month ago. But I am like a nappy little Shetland pony. If I don’t go today, when will I go over the next few hellish weeks? The terrorists will have won, and my layers will be shot to shit. Please do not bring up my grown out highlights. I will buy you a gingerbread latte if you just look the other way.

-xxoo

Leaving on a jet plane

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Well, not really. Not at all. But Mr. H and I are fleeing thickly settled Somerville at long last! We’re moving to beautiful downtown Lowell. Yes, that’s right, Lowell. We just put a deposit on a loft in an old factory. And don’t get me wrong, this is a yuppie loft. It might sound all industrial, but I have no interest in sledge hammering out my own breakfast nook. There are people to do those things, and those people thankfully already did them to this place. Nothing to do but figure out what art to hang on the walls and enjoy paying less than $1 a square foot per month because it’s LOWELL. Also, there is a surveillance system. I’ve always wanted to hover my finger over the button marked “hounds” when various relatives pitch up. Or to be fair, my own relatives as well, although they are easier to anticipate because they are usually blowing on jugs.

I’ve noticed there’s a baseball series of some sort going on, and it seems to involve a Boston-New York rivalry. How quaint! I don’t really follow the sporting world aside from hating figure skating, but I have heard the strident hooting in the streets.

The fact is that I don’t think Boston cares that it’s not New York, and that infuriates New Yorkers infinitely. People who enjoy Boston enjoy it for what it is. It’s city-lite, with just enough historical nonsense tossed in to feel legitimate. I’ve lived in Boston for about seven years now, sticking around after college like everyone else. I’ve lived in the Fenway, in Brookline, in Beacon Hill. I’m an around the way girl. It’s been good, and I am lucky.

So I must recognize some of the acceptable things about Boston. It’s so cute and manageable, so clean. Ridiculously easy to get around, provided you keep your intended use of public transportation to civilized hours. We have adorable miniature similarities to New York things without all the fuss and bother of muggings and traffic. They have Central Park, we have the Boston Common and Public Garden. They have the Statue of Liberty, we have…um…that phallic thing in Bunker Hill. They have the Empire State building, we have (oh jeez) the Pru. They’ve got Chinatown, we have the Fung Wah bus drop off and a stone lion or two. Hey, we’ve got a bridge and a tunnel. We’ve even got hipsters and eurotrash, for chrissakes!

Essentially Boston is like a cunning little souvenir snow globe filled with people with hilarious accents. A snow globe with lucrative employment opportunities and overpriced real estate and bars that close shockingly early. Don’t make it out to be something it’s not, be ye Bostonians or flatland touristers. Boston is forever doomed to be irritating Scrappy Doo, but New York is doomed to be Bluto. Pick on someone your own size for a change.

And…I’ll be in Lowell, opening a Sushi Samba rip off. Hahahahahahahahaha.

-xxoo