Tag Archives: Family

Gifts, Unwrapped

Posted on by John

And we have reached that time of year, the period for which I save to take time off work and get in some much-needed relaxation. So my vacation began on the 20th and will last till January 2nd as we aspirationally start 2025.

The first thing that happened, after our Friday holiday party, was our early dismissal at 3 instead of the usual quitting time of 4 PM. Those who work in manufacturing at my employer actually leave at 3:20, so figuring there might be a glut of people using our GoTriangle Access Paratransit service, I opted to summon a Lyft car. My driver spoke no English, which was immediately clear to me as I entered the vehicle and he didn’t respond to my initial statement and was using his GPS in Spanish. I was ok with this, except for the logistical challenge of ensuring I had arrived at the correct address. But never fear, I used basic high school spanish to convey my address’s exact numbers and we both had a laugh. It later occurred to me that I could have used my phone’s translation app. He was courteous though, waiting to see if I got inside and declining a cell phone call while driving.

I enjoyed that extra hour as a cold Friday unfolded and relief filled me at the time stretching ahead. My next task? Find a couple of good books to accompany my wife and me as we took our Christmas to Myrtle Beach to celebrate ten years since our relationship basically began. Well it’s actually part of our complicated story, one that involves an overlapping circle of friends who saw that we might connect given our similar temperaments. I’m sure I wrote about it in those early entries of 2015.

Anyhow, the two books I settled on after much deliberation were Playground, by Richard Powers, and Katharine, the Wright Sister, by Tracy Enerson. The former is sort of complex even to me, but it talks a lot about the ocean, colonization of so-called French Polynesia, and some sort of “floating city” the Americans want to build. It’s decent. The latter is an attempt to Chronicle the role the Wright sister played in getting her famous brothers off the ground. It flits between three first-person perspectives, Kate’s, Orville’s, and Wilbur’s. It’s riveting.

So after a quick jaunt to pass out and receive gifts from her folks on Saturday, we laid about on Sunday then headed for the beach on Monday. This time we opted to stay in a new (to us) property. I often find it interesting how so many of these hotels choose names meant to evoke faraway places: Tropical Seas, Coral Beach Resort, and our hotel, the Paradise Resort . We pulled in and arrived at the oceanfront king 1-bedroom suite as a cold, rainy wind blew in off the Atlantic. We were completely fine with this though, as it brought back fond memories of our trip down to Myrtle following our January 2018 wedding.

We took a couple of walks down there: a frigid one on Tuesday and a slightly warmer one on Christmas Day. She joked that this constitutes her anual “Christmas-day 5K” but she chopped it up so I could hang. Ha, well truth be told I ain’t no walker. In fact on Wednesday, my apple watch kept tapping my wrist to ask if I was doing a workout, probably to make sure nothing off was happening as my heart rate accelerated. I definitely need to exercise more. Maybe that’ll happen in 2025. Says about half the country.

So didn’t I earn the food we ate there? There was the Olive Garden, where I always get their spagheti and Italian sausage, alwayswith angel hair pasta. And then there wasPaula Deen’s Family Kitchen, a restaurant we found in Myrtle in 2018 and have visited every other time we’ve gone down there. Let’s just say you don’t go there to eat sallads. I had meatloaf, fried okra, and a mac and cheese that had been improved since I had last gone in May.

The only other noteworthy thing we did there was to exchange our own gifts. She got me a comfortable robe to drape over myself on these cold days that feels like a blanket. For my gift, I got her the Usher Confessions 20th Anniversary vinyl. “I know you didn’t spend $200 on this!” she said as she extracted it from the box. The joke was that we had been trying to get Confessions on vinyl from Amazon for some time but could not find it for less than that. I decided to just plug it in and see if I lucked up, knowing it was something she wanted and would enjoy. For the record (get it, record?) no I did not spend 200 bucks to acquire that. They’d only just released the 20th anniversary version.

So all in all we had and are having a good time. Hopefully I’ll be prepared for whatever the next year brings. At the least I hope it brings us all full hearts, full wallets, and whatever else we desire.

All Aboard for a Much-needed Weekend

Posted on by John

Do you have that person in your life who always gets you, no matter what? The one who, because of similar experience and an upbringing that involved many of the same challenges is someone to whom you always look for advice or just to vent. That person for me is my cousin: technically a year younger than me but seeming older in many respects.

For our early life, really until mid-20s, we were never that far apart. Both of us are totally blind and have significant hearing loss due to a condition called Norrie Disease, so we have to work hard just to fit in to this world. We went to college together and lived in an apartment (albeit a slum) for six years.

Then life rolled on, and we were both fortunate to marry wonderful women. That has though necessitated changes in our relationship, as is common for all adults really. Now, we usually see each other maybe three or four times a year (with the time from January of 2020 till May of 2022 being the longest we didn’t get to spend time together due to Covid).

Anyhow, that’s slowly, finally, starting to change. This past weekend, as my work life ramps up and I feel increasingly nervous about my hearing challenges, I decided to see if we could just have a marathon Saturday watching sports and talking about nothing and everything as I like to do. My cousin and his wife agreed to allow my visit, so I purchased round-trip Amtrak tickets from Cary North Carolina to Charlotte.

I had to get the 5:43 Carolinian train, being fully aware of likely delays as it makes its way all the way down from New York City. And delays indeed happened, with emailed announcements throughout the day that the train was getting later and later.

I had Lyft take me over to the Cary station after a long day at work trying to hammer out the material for our upcoming Microsoft Excel workshop. The building was cold, and I found myself wishing I’d chosen to stay outside in the beautiful Fall-like weather to wait. I sat, snacking and reading, and tried to make myself take a break so all of my devices would make it onboard with a little life left.

The train finally arrived shortly before 7, and as I feared I was given an aisle seat so couldn’t plug in as easily. I always feel weird about asking my neighbor if I can stretch the cord over their legs.

The ride down was uneventful, and we arrived in Charlotte around 10. Knowing I would want to pick up food on the way to my cousin’s house, I decided to try downloading the Jack in the Box app to see if I could place an order in advance of getting there. I get Jack in the Box whenever I visit the Queen City, because we don’t have any of those in our area. And this would have worked, if I had already entered my payment method or at least set up Apple Pay. Trying to do that at the last minute just… didn’t work. Choosing the menu items I wanted though was accessible. Anyway, the driver just rolled me close enough to the Drive-through window to put in my order and I collected the food and headed to my cousin’s house. I do love this tech that makes it so much easier to independently move around and run errands.

Because it was already nearly Saturday by the time I finally arrived, we just stayed up a little while listening to the NFL game in Brazil and scarfing down the food. Then we retired for the night. I’d already understood that we would mostly be spending Saturday together anyway.

Knowing these folks wake by 8 AM, I was crawling out of bed just as the smell of bacon and eggs permeated the air. My cousin texted me, and I headed on down to sink my teeth into it. A small cup of orange juice and a big, piping hot mug of coffee completed the morning.

As far as sports go, our Alma mater UNC Charlotte (they call themselves Charlotte in the sports world) played, and were pretty much slapped around by, the North Carolina Tar Heels. Bowling Green University gave Penn State a scare, and number 5 Notre Dame were nipped by the Northern Illinois Huskies in an awesome upset. The prime-time game, North Carolina State University versus the University of Tennessee, was a bust as State were dragged all over Charlotte’s Bank of America Stadium.

While the games played, we chatted about our roles as Assistive Technology Specialists. We also noted the recent availability of high-powered, AI-driven Phonak Hearing Aids (NOTE: those may or may not be the right ones). Anyhow, I’m considering trying to get those, as they’re supposed to be really good at filtering out background noise. I have a hearing test (Oh fun! Except not), scheduled for September 18th, at which point I will begin this conversation with my audiologist. Where the money will come from for such a thing? Well… we shall see. No doubt I need it though, to help my rising career.

After our day of fun, we got food from a restaurant called the Skrimp Shack. (They mean Shrimp, but ok haha). I had a giant chicken “sammich” that I could not eat entirely, and a big styrofoam to-go plate of fries (the small is really small, the large is really large, no in-between). The food was really good, though.

And that was the crux of a great Saturday and weekend. I’m writing this as we speed back toward Cary on Sunday morning from 6:45 till 9:45. A bit of amusement: as we departed Charlotte, the conductor said we would be arriving in Cary, our next station stop, in 25 minutes. Cary takes three hours to reach, as suggested by the time I just posted, and it is not our next stop coming out of Charlotte. He meant a town called Kannapolis. I can only assume that it was too early in the morning for him, as it is for me of no or very little sleep. Although for some strange reason I feel hopped up on energy right now. Let’s hope that lasts till my Carolina Panthers (NFL) play the New Orleans Saints at 1, and hopefully start this season off right. You can’t get much worse than our 2-15 record the previous season. I do hope more of these restorative weekends are in store, and that you are able to find a way to lift your spirits when needed as well.

The Little Things: On a Relaxing July 4 Vacation and Work

Posted on by John

Happy late Independence Day to all of us Americans who celebrate. Understanding many of the nuances of this nation’s history gives me much to ponder on that day, but I suppose I can get down with good food and family fun, as well as knowing that I’m fortunate that people have worked hard so that I have what I do have.

And what I did have on this July 4th was mostly blessed quiet, the calm before the storm one might say. My wife just had one of her sisters over, and she threw some steaks, dogs, burgers, and even chicken on the grill. I ate till bursting, then topped the night off with some of her homemade butter pecan ice cream. That takes me back to my childhood, when we so often ate the boxes of that stuff my mom would get as it was her favorite. “Eat the strawberry I got for y’all” she would say. But such is life when you have kids I guess, as many times someone would not only eat all of her butter pecan, but also put the empty box back into the freezer.

Ah, the glory days. That piece of waxing nostalgic done, I return you to your regularly scheduled programming, already in progress. Friday was more of the same, as I opted to take it off and not have to return to the office immediately after the holiday. I spent much of the day in a groggy fugue, as I had awakened kind of early. And I spent most of it indoors, as we topped out with heat indeces in the low 110s. That’s smokin’!

As that heat finally, sort of, broke over these parts on Saturday, my wife put up the summerish swinging bench she got for the back porch. That thing is pretty cool too, another piece of childhood though they don’t make them like they used to. My grandma had a bit metal swing chair thingy on her porch that I loved to sit on for hours, listening to the world go by. This one is more plastic, with a cloth canopy overhead and tables to either side that can hold cups or phones.

And as the heat continued to mostly hold off on Sunday, we took a stroll through Raleigh’s Dorthea Dixx Park so she could see and I could put my hands on the sunflowers. As we did so, a light, warm rain fell that actually felt good walking through. And, I got to feel and sit in a hammock, which I’ve often tried to visualize but could not quite understand. I love when I get to discover how things I’ve only read about actually work. That rope is kind of tricky to get into, and I could quickly understand how you could easily lie in or sit down on one. Cool.

So all of that had me relaxed and ready to enter what I knew would be a fast-paced week. My work is picking up, as we begin the training I alluded to in the previous post. Turns out I’m going to help someone at least acquire the basics of braille, and I will work with another on Customer Service stuff. I think the most enjoyable part of this is getting to express and expand my creativity as I work with others. It was a good day, just long and ending with a rewarding sense of exhaustion (there are multiple kinds of exhaustion). So just remember to ake heed of and be thankful for those little things that make up a life.

UNDERHEARD: Eating Out While Deafblind

Posted on by John

If you are like me, you wonder how and among whom the restaurant custom started. The idea of eating out in a place humming with activity, where all sound seems to merge into a full-on roar at times and you are left at the mercy of the wave as you, hopefully, enjoy some good food.

And of course before continuing, I fell down a rabbit hole and discovered, via a website on The History of Restaurants that they were supposedly started in France in 1765. I cannot attest to the veracity of this story, and wonder if some other culture might also lay claim to their origins. Anyhow, it’s good food for thought.

However they started restaurants are a venerated tradition of U.S. holidays and continue to bounce back after the dark days of Covid. Well, sort of. I accompanied my wife, her parents, sisters, and my niece and nephew by marriage to Red Lobster. That particular establishment does not seem to be faring as well, with many having gone into temporary closure and the business as a whole in bankruptcy. I guess they served too many shrimp.

We went to celebrate Father’s Day on Saturday, as is usual for us. It’s often less crowded on this day than if we wait till the day of, though going to eat at Fullers, a delicious local (to Fayetteville, N.C.) eaterie that serves just about everything Southern you can think of for Mother’s Day on the Saturday before, the place was brimming. I joked that it felt like someone was drilling a hole in my brain, because there’s just no really good setting on my hearing aids to help me handle such ruckous. But I made it through, as I always do.

Red Lobster, by contrast, was relatively quiet. We arrived at just prior to 2:00 and departed just after 4:30. I conversed some with those in my immediate vacinity, and ate my fill.

Ok first I had one of those delicious cheese biscuits, which according to my last doctor’s visit I don’t really eed to be eating. But hey, I offset that with a side salad. When I chose to order that salad, I expected to get basically a bowl of lettuce with bleu cheese dressing (another of my guilty pleasures). But actually it was loaded. Little flecks of meat, another kind of cheese (I’m not food afficianado, though I did apply to a food magazine as editor and they told me my resume was good once), croutons, and other stuff. Hey, my wife and I joke that my food critique is as follows: Real good, Good, Ok, not good, nasty! So there you go. Anyway, I had to stop eating before I became full off just that serving.

As we broke bread, talking about work, home, and life, the main course arrived. As I had on my previous Red Lobster visit, I’ve only eaten there twice if you can believe that, I had stuffed flounder (real good) with some kind of seafood sauce) and fries. I decided to walk on the wild side and went for a glass of mango lemonade, (good, I guess)? I don’t eat a whole lot of seafood, but I suppose it can be good on occasion, and I know it’s generally healthy as well.

The last sort of interesting thing I want to think about as a blind person is how we handle visiting the restroom. I needed to go before hitting the road, and it just made me think about my general strategy for finding what I need to find in there. When I enter through the swinging door, I immediately move toward the right wall and make my way around in a counterclockwise direction. This is because, at least in most of the men’s rooms I’ve seen, the sinks to wash hands are just to the left of the entrance with toilets in front. If I move in that direction, I usually manage to locate a stall, exit it, and get to the sink without any embarrassing mishaps. This time? Well, it was sort of strange as I did bounce off of someone as I made my way to the sink. Naturally, he then began providing assistance. It didn’t go completely sideways at least.

So there you have it, a little look into my mind as I work to negotiate the social norms that surround a typical holiday in my family. I enjoy it mostly, and by this point I know that most of the concerned parties know about my challenges and do not think any less of me. But sometimes having these hearing problems can be a struggle. Like when I find myself on a paratransit vehicle with a new driver who loves to talk, but I can’t comprehend him over the engines, as happened recently. I’ve learned though that the best, and really only, thing I can do is make the other person aware of this and take it as it is. More of my shenanigans as the summer time unfolds.

SHIFTING SANDS: My Much-needed Trip to Myrtle Beach Part 2

Posted on by John

Isn’t it funny how much easier it to wake up wen one is planning to travel? Heck, I also find it hard to sleep, mostly because I am and will likely always be a big kid.

After Wednesday’s tire craziness, we had decided we would wake at 10 AM. I am up by 8. I make my way to my mancave, taking care to grab my hearing aid kit (if I forget it I could have a very long trip indeed as it dries out wax and other moisture) and start packing. I try to remember to get a little of everything, jeans, shors, button-down shirts. But the one thing I don’t get and should have is a long-sleeved shirt. Hey, I can’t remember everything.

Before hitting the road, we make a stop at that venerable Southern institution Bojangle’s. The sausage, egg, and cheese biscuit they give me is actually tender and well cooked, and I’ll admit that this can be hit or miss as sometimes they’re hard and not very fresh tasting. But my favorite, the seasoned fries, really hit the spot. I settle in and prepare for the roughly three hour trip.

A big reason I love travel is the ability to discover. I have three GPS apps, and they all give me slightly different information as we zip through small North Carolina towns. Good ol’ Ariadne, in addition to being the one that produces maps I can tour with my fingers, tells me the exact street addresses and even some of the neighborhoods, if they are labeled. BlindSquare makes it easy to see GPS coordinates and nearby restaurants. And the Goodmaps Explore app displays real-time information on changing points of interest as we move, to a degree that BlindSquare does not. It can almost be too much information, but it is also fascinating to really get a look at what we’re passing.

Not that we passed too much as we wound down I-40 and Johnston County, to I-95 and Cumberland and Robeson Counties. Just over the South Carolina line, after passing through a town called Taybor City (Columbus County) on the NC border, we kind of lose the direct, interstate route and are forced to navigate a series of backroads until we finally arrive at Myrtle Beach proper, in Hory County.

We arrive at the Sea Watch resort at nearly 1:30, having made good time. We enter the North Tower lobby and are jostled about by excited passersby as they to get ready to enjoy their journey. Seasoned traveler that I am, I have my credit and ID cards out and on the counter practically before the person checking us in asks for them. We are given room 712 in the South tower, which in itself is 16 stories.

I remember during our last trip out of North Carolina prior to this one, way back in January of 2020 (because of Covid) we walked through an endless hall in a Tampa boutique hotel called West Wing and had a ta-da experience upon entering an amazing, large room. This room, while fairly large, was… let’s just say a lot less ta-da-ish. My wife said it still appeared stuck in the 90s, with a dirty landline phone (ever seen one of those?) rusty hangers in the closet, and spaghetti sauce droppings in the kitchenette. The Sea Watch is really a collection of condos, or rooms that different people owned, so you get a lot of variability from property to property. But then as someone on my Facebook said “you ain’t going there for the room.” True enough, though of course one still likes to have a place that makes one feel safe and comfortable.

Anyhow, we shuck our “road clothes” and don waterwear, me putting on a pair of shorts for the first time this season. But we don’t remain oceanside too long, because even with our nice new beach chairs, snacks, and cold water, the heat soon wins. Well I am not really too hot, mostly because I’m never hot. But I knew my wife had to be getting toasty with the sun remaining out, and I know that even if I’m not feeling hot I still have to be careful of sunburn and heatstroke.

Our evening wraps up with what is now a regular pilgrimage to Paula Deen’s Family Kitchen, this time joined by my cousin and his wife. A lot of fellowship is had, with conversation having been improved by the kind hostess who saw to it that we were seated in our own section to accommodate my cousin’s and my hearing difficulties. While we chat, I scarf down some delicious meatloaf, the best fried okra I’ve ever tasted, and macaroni and cheese that was pretty decent (I’m a harsh macaroni critic). Oh, and the biscuits that arrive before the family-style entrees get there can nearly fill you by themselves, so eat with care. I don’t even need dessert after this meal.

And that makes up my Thursday. It is very much the kind of day I need, as I fully emerge from Winter’s lingering effects. And there is more where that comes from on Friday.

SHIFTING SANDS: My Much-needed Trip to Myrtle Beach Part 1

Posted on by John

We’d planned this vacation just after Christmas, as my mom, wife, my cousin, his wife, and I sat in our humble home on the southeast Raleigh. Full off of some delicious eating at Logans, a chain steakhouse, we enjoyed relative warmth inside, and contemplated where outside warmth might be had.

The idea was to take my always-hard-working mom down to the beach, as she doesn’t do a whole lot of traveling. We decided the first weekend of May, this weekend, would be a good one, as it is typically warm but the beach is not yet crowded. My cousin and his wife have a timeshare, so they booked in their property of choice, the Sea Watch Resort. I then booked a room for me and my wife in that same hotel. And I felt happier already, because having this trip to look forward to would make staying on the work grind easier. It’s always better when you feel you’re working toward something, right?

So time passed, and a week or so out my mom said she would be unable to make it due to something having come up. Also we had initially scheduled to remain out there from Thursday to Sunday, but my wife asked that I move our checkout day to Saturday so she could get us back in time to relax a little before returning to her teaching duties. This was all fine and good, and I was just happy we would get to go in some capacity.

well… sort of. Our story begins, inauspiciously, on Wednesday night with a nail. The first thing we needed to do was get the dog to my sister-in-law’s house so she could be looked after. The nice thing about our tiny Pomeranian, and I know I’ve written at least one entry about her but am assuming you won’t feel like trying to find it, is that she is easily taken care of. She only needs food and pee pads and she’s good to go, similar to a cat.

So we made the 30-minute ride across Wake County to drop our furry child off, chattering and feeling increasingly excited about the days of sun-splashed sprawling that awaited. Went inside and chatted, as the dog in residence, a biggermix of Pomeranian and some other breed, greeted our arrival. He’s older, but still hanging in there. Fortunately for us, we’d only stayed inside for about 20 minutes.

as I slid into the front seat and buckled in, my wife said she was hungry and we began the usual dance of trying to figure out where to get dinner. As she started the motor however, we heard the ominous beep that means the car is telling us something. Turns out the PSI in the back right tire was dropping fast. The other three held steady at 37, while that one had already plummeted to 25. Being the glass-half-empty person I am (I know I know, I’m really trying to work on that mentality) I feared the trip was gonna be swallowed before we even hit the highway. And worse, we were already inside of the 24-hours one has prior to arrival that the hotel reservation could be canceled. So I’d also be eating $200+. Great!

Off we went, slowly losing speed along the way as the pressure continued to drop. She swung by her dealership, already closed as it was 6:30. So she plugged in (ha, ha) a query for places to fix tires, and came across a Pep Boys that would stay open till just 8. Happily it was only a little over three miles away, so we practically limped over there as the pressure was down to 21 PSI.

“Can you help,” she asked the woman as we got there.

“We’ll take a look,” she replied (there are four cars ahead of you.”

So I collected my things and followed her inside, where the temperature was set to frigid and the air smelled so heavily of rubber that my head immediately hurt. I tried to read, found it hard to concentrate as we contemplated the possilibity that we’d be parting with a big chunk of change for new tires or significant repairs. 7 became 7:30 became 8:00, and the place emptied out. Finally, mercifully, they got to our ride. As luck would have it, we were the last customers to be seen, well after 8 as we had arrived early enough. They told us, a little before 9, that she had inded run over a rogue nail and the tire only required a patch. $25 and lot of relief, and we were good to go again! And with that, your friendly neighborhood pesimist learned a lesson again in how things can indeed work out in the end. More, hopefully, on the actual trip tomorrow. Or Monday? Sometime within the week!

The Last Great Battle?: A Primer on the Duke-UNC Rivalry

Posted on by John

Welcome to the best rivalry in all of sports! And yes Yankees/Red Sox fans, this is true. For if you’ve ever spent time in Tar Heel Territory (because there is no Duke territory or if there is it’s in New Jersey somewhere) you know the bad blood that flows along Tobacco Road. And yes it’s done respectfully, mostly, because we’re still Southern after all, y’all.
Even with all those classic matchups, we have never had one this big. In fact, it surprises me to learn that the two teams hadn’t even met in the NCAA Tournament before. I guess either one or the other would go far in their days of greatness. And what do you know, in Coach K’s last season and Hubert Davis’s very first we finally get the epic matchup that will serve as his perfect career sendoff, because there’s no way they’re winning that game. Ok ok, I’d better not talk too much noise or I might end up eating my words on Saturday, but ah well. In any event, the week leading up to the game is going to be fun, as my wife and I stand on different sides of that line. We’ll both wear our shirts on the day of and try to cheer our teams on to victory.
I vaguely remember when I was introduced to this rivalry, sometime in the late 80s. I barely understood sports then. But my dad had me in his room, which was a den sort of area in the back of the house that he had equipped with a minifridge, a leather couch and a recliner. I rarely entered this room uninvited, but on occasion he would allow me to accompany him to listen to music or have some long conversation out of everyone else’s ear. Anyway, he turned on the game and told me, in his thick unusual accent, that “Naw-Calana” was playing.
“Naw-calana?” I asked.
“Yeah! The school in Chapel Hill,” he replied. Not that I even knew what that meant at the time. I thought maybe he was referring to some other state and just settled in as he tried to explain to me the vagaries of basketball.
In this area you tend to take on the fandom of your family, unless daring enough to march to your own beat. So, I did this once more able to comprehend what this all meant, watching Carolina games with a fervor starting in 1993. The games they play with Duke are something like a holiday: whether in Duke’s old and small Cameron Indoor Stadium or in UNC’s (relatively) newer Smith Center you can count on the intensity. And records don’t matter either, as both teams leave everything they have on the floor once that game gets going.
So to have this game set during the Final Four in the part of March Madness that actually occurs in April is going to be something special. I know the other two teams, the University of Kansas and Villanova University, are probably champing at the bit to get whomever is left though, as the Duke UNC winner is going to have a task getting up for the National Championship. We shall see what happens, but here’s hoping the right, CAROLINA blue will reign supreme by Saturday night’s end. Go Heels!

Road To Home Ownership: Signed, Sealed…

Posted on by John

Now all we await is the delivery (e. g. construction). That’s right, this time about a week ago we were told to make our deposit so that the contract could be drawn up.
As soon as my wife noticed that she had received the message, somewhere around 2 PM on Tuesday prior, she zipped out of her workplace and got to work shoring up the dollars needed to complete the transaction. As she worked on the form from home at about 4:30, I sat on the bed across from her computer desk in the small room that occupies the top floor of this apartment feeling a range of emotions. I think even the Pomeranian sensed that major change was afoot as she bounced back and forth between me and the desk, getting me to pet her as her tail wagged hard enough to generate wind. Dogs really can feel what we’re going through better than most humans can.
After checking and double checking that everything was as correct as she could get it she whacked the “Submit” button, and a good piece of dough along with our hopes and dreams raced down the wire. Confirmation came that all had been done on our end, and we just twiddled our thumbs waiting for the contract which arrived on Thursday evening. In it we learned our address, on a road that does not actually exist just yet but will soon. We will also be required to inhabit the residence for at least two years, but after making a decision of this magnitude I would bet that we will remain there for a good deal longer. We are already over four years in our current apartment anyway, so that should be no problem. I do not think there were any major hold-ups therein, other than a noting of the amount of time the company was giving itself to have the house constructed before we could be released from the agreement. As I’ve said before, that’s going to be the biggest “fingers-crossed” portion of this, as of course some of it—weather, supply chain issues — is out of their control. Anyhow, we did all the fun electronic stuff to put both of our signatures on the contract, and now we basically are just awaiting that distant closing sometime towards the end of the year and hoping to secure enough funds to clear that final hurtle. I guess the best news here is that we do avoid all that due diligence and outbidding madness, and thus will experience a lot less stress.
Meanwhile, we’re doing a few trips by the area and really familiarizing ourselves with it. Google tells you a lot, but just driving around and taking a look says a lot more. (And yes, we are avoiding that pesky alarm by staying far enough away from the actual residence). I guess the only real challenge I see so far will be that my work commute time will nearly double. But I’m ok with this, more so in the morning than in the evening when I wish to just get home, but we’ll just see how everything plays out. Transportation should be no problem at least, since though we are on Raleigh’s fringes, almost in Garner, we are at least still within Raleigh city limits. It’s hard to find something affordable and yet close enough to my current employer, but I can live with that sacrifice. More podcasts, books and the like will just be taken in on the ride.
I do not know when the next installment of this series will be posted, but probably shortly after building commences. Oh and that’s another thing, the contract says we must meet with our builders 3 times to discuss how things are being laid out and whatever tweaks we wish to make. We’ll be bringing along someone who kind of knows what they’re looking at with regards to construction to help us with this. More once all that fun gets started. Till then, continue to wish us luck.

Road To Home Ownership: Against All Odds

Posted on by John

We’ve been approved! Turns out we were number 12 on the waiting list for one of those new construction townhomes being built in Southeast Raleigh. There were four people sparring for two homes, and we were fortunate enough to snag one as some backed out. This is thrilling, and while there is still much to work out before out probably late-year move-in, we are cautiously optimistic.
First, of course, we have to pay the deposit and sign the contract. This will likely not be accomplished till the end of the month, but if we are able to do so it will lock in the property’s price even as the market continues to edge the area’s value upward. And yes I am somewhat conflicted, understanding that we are kind of taking advantage of urban gentrification, but I guess I justify it by noting that apartment rentals are becoming out of hand and we thus need something with a fixed rate. Heck, I would love it if everyone who desired to do so could actually own a home or at least stay in a place they could afford without having much of their income sucked into it.
Anyhow, once that’s done we’ll just sit back on our haunches and watch as construction progress is being made. This will largely be out of our control, and we’ll mostly have to hope that weather, labor, and supply issues don’t dog us throughout the process. Let us hope we are able to get to this and future steps!
In anticipation of obtaining the home, I accompanied my wife to check out a model today so that I could get a general feel for the place. And just as I had when entering our current residence, I immediately liked the sense of homeliness therein. There were things about the layout that I couldn’t fully understand until I had experienced them.
For instance, the downstairs is pretty much an open floor plan, with no walls to separate living room from dining room and kitchen. Before checking this out, I wondered what it would do to my spatial awareness and ability to navigate easily. But it doesn’t actually seem too challenging, especially once we have our furniture all in and arranged just so and I can use that for reference. The model had couches and tables inside, so that one could get a sense of what the space would feel like when occupied. The most interesting aspect is that we have a tall counter in the dining area that can be sat at with stools, and that the sink is an island completely unattached from the walls. That will probably take some getting used to. We’re to have a single sink, as even the person who was showing us around said she had a “personal vendetta” against double sinks since they make it harder to rinse and soak larger dishes. My wife is a big fan of the single sink concept as well.
We went out the back door, where there is just enough room to set up a couple of chairs. This is basically all I need. The front also contains a little porch area, so I’ll be able to scamper around to whichever portion is in sunshine at the moment, or shade if we are in the hottest parts of summer. The only drawback about being out back is that there is an AC unit right there on the porch, but I’m hearing that now on our apartment’s balcony on this beautiful 70-degree day, so that is a feature common to most homes. Why haven’t we made AC’s quieter yet?
We came back inside and made our way upstairs, finding the stairs built into the left-side wall about midway as seen from the front door. They were full of turns, and it’ll be good exercise going up and down. The master bathroom is a good size with a fiber glass shower, and the room is a little longer than our current one and will allow for a small sitting area. But I rather liked the one that would likely be my man cave, since I can picture my speaker sounding good in that slightly less echoey space than the one I have here. As we sat in comfortable chairs in that room, my wife lobbed impressive fastball questions at the salesperson, and she noted she should make a list of them. They also discovered that they both enjoy crafting. Shortly there after, we departed.
We tried to drive around to where our house would be constructed to see if we could take a picture out there, but apparently they have a security system rigged up. As the car idled in that spot, alarms began going off and messages saying we needed to leave flashed, so we hightailed it out of there. I still got to explore the neighborhood with my cadre of GPS apps, learning where some of the closest restaurants and grocery stores were.
So that’s what we’ve got going on now. It’s exciting to have suddenly come so close, even when things looked unlikely a short month ago. Amazing how quickly circumstances can change. I will be back to update more as this continues to unfold.

Road to Home Ownership: What’s New Is New Again

Posted on by John

I begin by noting the start of ValDayVersary. As I’ve written before, this is our own personal holiday that starts on our wedding anniversary (1/27) and ends on the first Saturday after my wife’s birthday unless her birthday (2/18) is also on a Saturday. It of course encompasses Valentine’s Day as well. This year, as last, we are spending it relatively quietly with ordered dinners, flowers and other stuff for her, and the reflections that four years of marriage bring. Ah I miss those first two years when trips to Florida were involved, but for now I travel vicariously through books. I am doubtless aware that what we have is a beautiful thing, and I couldn’t be more fortunate, though we’re hoping maybe we’ll be able to get rockin’ and rollin’ again for Number 5. These blasted Covid variants will largely dictate that, though.
Along with, of course, whether or not we have decided to purchase a house by then. There have been some crazy occurrences in that department, not surprising given that the Raleigh market is the 3rd most in-demand in the country and, well, we are still learning how this whole process works.
First, a couple weeks ago we came close to getting an offer. It was going to be sight unseen, meaning that we hadn’t even walked into the property and had seen few pictures of it. We were going on assurances that things were new and updated, and that there were no serious structural problems. The issue was its price. The would-be seller wanted nearly 20% more than Zillow said the property was worth. If the appraiser said it was indeed worth a lot less, we would be on the hook for the difference immediately as our loan wouldn’t cover it. We were told that the seller would be willing to negotiate in the event of this happening, but with there being no telling if he would get anywhere near the appraised price we were not willing to assume such risk. It likely would have been a nice place, but I’m not sure any place is worth sticking one’s neck out to that extent. Truthfully though, you almost have to roll the die in such a way to get a spot up here, thus jumping the bidding line that will occur once the home is put on the market. Unless…
Now we’re considering purchasing a new townhome that hasn’t even been constructed yet. It would have 3 bedrooms and two baths, thus meeting our needs, and be well-located near the interstate in Southeast Raleigh. Projected move-in is September or October, giving us more time to stack some dough in preparation. But we had to place our names on a wait list and see if we get called about one being available, as I think determined through a lottery. We shall see if we are so fortunate. Till then or barring some other unexpected happening, we’ll likely just deal with this too-high rent for a little longer.