For those of you playing along, here’s the score:

A young couple from a nearby town have put an offer in on our house.  We accepted.  It’s low, low, low, but we think the market is going to get worse before it gets better and it would be nice to sell this place while we still have some equity in it.  It was the only valid offer we’ve had in 6 months.  These kids are getting a GREAT deal.  Bob has taken exceptional care of the whole place for years.   And the peaches and nectarines will be ripe in a couple of weeks.   I hope they raise healthy, happy kids here.  It would be hard not to – this place is beautiful and safe and secure and snug.  But it’s in Bumfuck, Egypt.

Just in case the young couple’s loan doesn’t fall through, we’ve put an offer in on a cute little place in Sacramento, or, rather, one of the little burbs right outside it.  If this happens, I will have at most a 25 minute drive to work if the traffic is heavy.   The current commute is an hour one way IF there’s no traffic.  Two and a half hours was my record for a painful commute.   I will not miss that.  At all.

This has been a long 6 months, folks.  Having the threat of showing the house at any given moment meant it needed to be picked up, cleaned up, always tidy all the time.  Toilets and sinks sparkling.   I HATE having to constantly be this clean, and now I’m afraid it may have become a habit.  Feh.  We’re not showing it anymore and I’m still putting things away.  Life changing, I tell  ya.

I’m sure it’s a good thing, but being really messy is one of the basic components of my personality.  My parents called me Mess for years.   I don’t think they meant anything too bad by it, but I’d get going on some project for hours and then something else would get my attention and I’d drop everything and they’d come into the room and freak out over the gigantic mess I’d left in my wake.  Never, ever figured out how to clean up after myself adequately.   Until now.  Whew.  Old dog, new trick.