September 29, 2016

 I slept in this morning and it was nice. That should be an every day kind of thing.

The deadline for my offer was noon and I didn't hear from my realtor all morning. And then noon came and went with nothing. It wasn't until after one o'clock that I heard from my realtor with the counter offer. Which wasn't really a counter. They agreed to go down $5,000 but they wouldn't submit a claim on the roof, saying I could have my insurance look at it if I wanted, and they wouldn't pay closing. I know they're losing money if you consider they're potentially selling the place for the same price they bought it at eight years ago, but that isn't my fault. I just don't get why they wouldn't fix things that obviously need fixed. I would probably want to get away with the same thing if I was selling but as a buyer it is a little frustrating.

I pondered that all day while trying to also be productive. I finished a personalized reading list and got ready for my class tonight. That was about it. It was really hard to stay focused.

Despite my distraction, my class tonight went really well. Three people signed up and they all came, which was unexpected. They also didn't show up a half hour early like some of the people in the first class. That was good because it gave me time to set some things up with the house. I liked the small group better than the large group. They were able to ask a bunch of questions and I was able to answer them, which broke things up and it wasn't me just rambling on up at the front. They were also really enthusiastic about the whole class and excited about being able to do all of this at home. That was pretty cool.

During my dinner break I had texted my dad and asked if he knew anyone that could check out the roof on the house I'm looking at and he said my step-cousin would be a good person to contact. So I did that before my class started. He wanted to run over tonight before it got dark out but he only had a small window before he had to pick up his daughter and I didn't hear back from my realtor so I told him not to worry about it. Then he said he could stop by tomorrow morning at eight o'clock before he left town. I had plans to meet my realtor tomorrow morning to talk about the offer because I only have until noon and I go to work at nine o'clock. I said that would be great and texted my realtor to see if we could meet at the house instead of his office. He had a thing going on tonight so didn't get back to me but I'm going to assume it works for him.

When I got home from work I talked to my mom about it and I think I'm going to accept the offer, despite the seller kind of coming across as a dick. I'm sure they would say the same about me asking for $5,000 off the asking price along with other stuff. On the top end, if I have to replace the roof, along with the door and the siding, it would probably be around $10,000. That is a lot but if you put it on the price of the house, it still comes in less than some of the places we looked at and it is a much better place. It is costing me that much more up front, which sucks, but I'm also getting the house for less, which means my monthly payments will be slightly smaller, which is something, I guess. There is also the chance that my step-cousin will look at the roof and say it only needs to be patched up in a few places, despite the vague statements by the inspector and roof company, which would be considerably cheaper than replacing a whole roof, which shouldn't need to be replaced for another ten years at least. That would be great news. We'll see in the morning.

I need to go to bed now. It will be another night with six hour's of sleep. Hooray. And tomorrow is going to be a long day. I may or may not agree to buy a house. Either way, it's going to be stressful. And then I have to pretend to be productive at work.

September 28, 2016

 I came up with my idea for an offer last night and texted my realtor this morning and said I could come in over lunch or after work. He said that lunch would work for him and I was kinda bummed because it meant I would miss lunch, but I also wanted to get my offer in before someone else came in.

This morning at work I started working on my new weeding list. Instead of having the cataloger print it off I decided to try an Excel spreadsheet that my boss sent me. I'm trying to come up with the formatting so that I can quickly go through the books and pull everything that meets the criteria. I did that with my first list but it was a manual process of going through and marking the ones that were too new to pull and noting the checkout numbers for the others. With the spreadsheet I only have to figure out the equations for one item and then I can copy it to all the others. It is taking a bit of time but it should speed up the actual weeding. Hopefully.

I got my newspaper article back from the technical services manager and there were only a few red pen marks for suggestions. It's a good thing I had other people look at it first or there would have been a lot more red on the page. She also liked the article, which is a plus. After I made the corrections I emailed it to the newspaper. Tonight I saw that past articles have had titles and I didn't didn't even think about coming up with a title. Maybe that is something they'll come up with at the newspaper. Or maybe they'll email me and ask for one.

At one o'clock I headed to my realtor's office. Turns out making an offer and signing a contract takes longer than an hour. There were a lot of things to go over. I ended up changing my offer a little bit, instead of asking $5,000 below asking contingent on the claim on the roof and paying for half of the siding, I dropped the siding and replaced it with the seller covering closing costs. That money will cover the siding or a new door, so it's basically the same thing but I'm not asking them to fix something else on the house that they don't think is a problem, even though it is. I'm just hoping I am in the ballpark to get a counter offer and not outright rejected. They completely rejected the last buyer's offer so it is a real fear. They have to respond by noon tomorrow and I didn't hear anything tonight so maybe that means they're at least considering it. Fingers crossed. I later told my sister that when I was signing everything I was glad it was her birthday because I was struggling trying to remember how to spell my name correctly but at least I didn't have to worry about forgetting what the date was.

I ended up being thirty minutes late getting back to the library and had to hurriedly eat my lunch as I drove back. Thankfully I wasn't supposed to be on the desk so no one had to cover me. When I was at my realtor's office I forgot my checkbook in my car and when I went out to get it I realized it was almost two o'clock so I called the library on my way too my car to let them know but I didn't think to see if I was supposed to be on the desk when I got back. But it all worked out.

This afternoon one of the old men I have helped with genealogy stuff in the past came back to ask about another relative. I ended up only being able to find the same information I gave him last time but we still had a fun time looking. When he first came up he said he was in a pretty good mood because he had just gotten out of the hospital. Later on when his wife came up he was about to tell her that he had already told me that he was in a good mood but she cut him off as he said “I already told him I'm...” and she said “weird?”, and it was great. They have a pretty cool relationship.

I also got a call from a guy in Texas that when to school here and was looking for newspaper articles that may have mentioned him on the track team because he is being inducted into some sort of hall of fame. I said I would look through our resources but asked if he had tried the university and their newspaper, thinking maybe they would have printed more information about school athletics. He hadn't thought about that so he said he would look into that while I searched through our stuff. The first thing I did was email the newspaper to see if they had a better method for searching their newspaper for names. Ideally they would have digitized their archives by now and made them searchable, even if it is only for in-house use. It would be nice to get an idea of at least which papers to look in, something more specific than a four year time frame, because that is a lot of newspaper to scroll through on microfilm After the email I started pulling old yearbooks from our collection and looked for his name. I found him in a few of the yearbooks and there were a few decent pictures so I'm going to get those scanned and email them to him. At which time I'm also going to try and get some more information, like maybe on what days they typically had track meets so I can speed to those days. I should be able to do that tomorrow because I think one of the assistants is going to scan the pictures tonight.

Today is my sister's birthday so we went to the Chinese buffet for dinner and then came home for cake and ice cream. The buffet was not at its best tonight but even if it was it would have been hard to top last time. After we at cake and ice cream it was time for gifts. I got my sister a gift card and a purple Pilot Metropolitan fountain pen. The purple looks pretty cool in pictures and I think it looks even better in person. It's a little too girly for me but it's still a good looking pen.

Now I'm going to go to bed because it is late-ish and I am tired. It's been a stressful week with not a lot of sleep. I'm going to sleep in tomorrow, hopefully, because I don't work until noon. I should be hearing from my realtor at some point but I imagine I will also have twenty-four hours to look over the sellers counter offer, if they don't completely reject my offer, so I'm going to try and ignore my phone and stay in bed for as long as possible.

September 27, 2016

 Waking up this morning was rough but I eventually managed it and went to get my haircut. It was very much needed. Sleeping an extra hour would have also been nice, but life goes on.

This morning at work I spent time on my newspaper article and getting ready for my class. I spent way to long trying to hook up a scanner to the laptop in the tech center classroom. And that was after spending way too long trying to get the laptop to turn on. Turns out it wasn't in the dock properly so it wasn't charging. The scanner didn't work I think because the laptop is Windows 8. And we don't have permission to install stuff. And because after installing the driver the computer had to restart but when the laptop restarts it wipes everything back to the original setup, so it erased the driver. Oh well.

I made the executive decision to go to lunch a half an hour early because if I didn't I would be getting back just as my class was starting. That would not have been good because I had to get everything set up, with the help of technology assistance lady. And because it turns out old people show up super early to tech classes. Like twenty minutes early.

Nine out of the eleven registered people showed up and I feel a little bad about not emailing everyone yesterday to remind them about the class and to remind them to bring photographs. But nine out of a eleven is still a pretty good turnout. I was also glad that I had the technology assistance lady and two of my fellow librarians to help me out. It would have been overwhelming trying to help everyone by myself. I think the class went well and overall the evaluations agree with that assessment. Much like my practice class, the intro part went fairly quick and the scanning didn't take too long thanks to the use of two scanners. Using the public scanner took a little while longer because we had to wait on another patron to finish but also because there were a lot more things to click to get stuff scanned. This left a lot of time for everyone to play around with Pixlr and edit their photographs. And a lot of time for us to walk around and help them. They all appreciated that we were able to give them individual attention and again, I am glad I had the backup to make that happen.

After the class it wasn't too long before I was on the desk and I was able to finish my newspaper article. I got feedback from one of my coworkers, my boss, and had another coworker edit it for grammar because she has a Masters in English and taught expos for awhile as a GA. I then sent it off to our technical services manager because she used to be an English teacher. By the time I have to submit it tomorrow it should be thoroughly reviewed. It got a good reception from the people who have seen it so far, which hopefully bodes well for it. There is a lot of pressure when being published in the newspaper for the first time.

I got a call from my realtor while I was at work and called him back after work but got an answering machine. He got back to me late tonight with more information about the house and we talked for quite awhile. Despite the current state of the roof it said in past documents that it was replaced in 2007. It's been a rough nine years. I also learned that the deal last month fell through because the buyer wanted the seller to replace the roof and siding and he refused so the buyer walked. That is good to know because the price has since come down $5,000 and I imagine the seller would be even less likely to pay for the roof and siding. My realtor said I should had least throw in the contingency that the seller puts in a claim on the roof to see if it can be covered under insurance. Right now I think my first offer is going to be $5,000 less than the asking price with the contingency of the claim on the roof and the seller paying for half of the siding. That ignores the door which needs to be fixed and will cost more than the siding but I figure I have to start somewhere. I'm going to contact my realtor tomorrow and see if I can go see him after work to put in the offer and write the check so seller knows I'm serious.

But that is tomorrow and I would be much happier if I had gone to bed five hours ago. Better late than never.

September 26, 2016

 A quick entry because it is 12:30AM and I have to get up at six o'clock in the morning.

A decent chunk of my day at work was spent writing my newspaper article and finding books to reference in my article. I wanted to have it done today but that didn't work out. The rest of my day was spent helping patrons. I walked several to the various books or sections they were looking for and I helped a couple with copying and printing. I felt very helpful, which is good. I also had some good conversations with my fellow librarians. I like my boss but I also kind of like the days she isn't there because I don't feel guilty about the distractions that may happen with coworkers. Although when she is there she is often a part of the distraction, so there's that.

After work I went to my realtor's office, met my Mom, and then she followed us to the house by the nursing home. My sister joined us eventually and we walked through the house again. I read through all the information my realtor sent to me and one of the things mentioned the sliding door in the master bedroom being broken but then fixed. It was a temporary fix at best. The door slid open just fine but when I went to move the screen door it fell off in my hand. The sliding door has shifted too close to the track the screen door slides on and the screen door won't fit on the track. Also, it appears the fix with the door was just a little bit of caulking around the bottom of the glass. This doesn't fix the issue with the screen door or the fact that the glass or the frame is a little wonky and you can see between the glass and the frame into the house. So that's on the list. But I still really like the house and so does my mom. I think my sister does as well but I need to talk to her about it.

At seven o'clock my Mom left and a little while later my Dad, brother, and step-mom showed up. I had sent my Dad all of the paperwork I had received and he read through it all and made notes. He had my brother climb up on the roof to check the condition of it and he went up into the attic to see where a vent was coming from and if there were any signs of water damage. Negative on the water damage, so that's good. My brother also went around and check all the plumbing stuff, looked for leaks, and checked several other things. He has learned a lot being a plumber and growing up with my Dad.

My Dad and brother found several things that need to be fixed, some of them agreeing with the inspection and disagreeing with the owner's claim of being fixed. Most of the little things could be good weekend projects but there are three big things: the roof, the back siding, and the sliding door. All three have gotten bids to be fixed but it is uncertain if anything has happened beyond that. The roof and the siding, if done in full, need the neighbor to go along with it. I believe my realtor is going to find that out tomorrow maybe, along with the contact information for the HOA president so I can ask some questions about that. He's also going to find out if anyone else is interested in the property. Evidently someone was close enough a month ago to put in an offer, which is why I have the inspection information, but thankfully it fell through.

Once I learn more updated and detailed information about the HOA it will come down to putting an offer in. And I need to figure out how to do that. Do I pay asking price with the contingency that the roof, siding, and door are replaced? Do I ask for just the siding and door and then have someone patch up the few spots in the roof that are looking bad? Do I ask for a reduced price and pay for the other stuff on my own? There are too many options.

After my realtor drove me back to my car I went by Sonic to grab dinner (because it was nine o'clock and I hadn't eaten yet) and then headed over to my Dad's to discuss what he thought about the condition of the house. We also got sidetracked by other stuff, hence not starting this until 12:30AM. It was a good conversation though and it gave me some stuff to think about. It got me focused on the major issues, which I think is what I need to focus on in the offer phase. Rather than getting distracted by the little things that could easily be inexpensive weekend projects. But I've got a lot to think about. I'm going to email my realtor some of my questions tomorrow and get his opinion on some things.

But that is tomorrow and at present I need to go to bed. I have to wake up early for a haircut before work because I am about two weeks behind schedule. And when I get to work I've got to make sure I'm ready for my class in the afternoon and hopefully have time to finish my article so it can be proofread and edited before I submit it on Wednesday. It's going to be a long day with very little sleep to get things going.

September 25, 2016

 This morning I finished reading Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde. I was a little disappointed with it in the end. I didn't like how the main girl went from being mean and aggressive the whole book to immediately turning on a dime and being super nice. Or how there wasn't much of a conclusion. It felt like all this time was spent building up to something and then the something wasn't that revelatory and it was wrapped up in a hurry. Like the author got disinterested in the story or had to meet a deadline. I did enjoy the humorous writing, so I would definitely give Fforde's other books a chance.

I decided that I wanted to make an offer on the duplex by the nursing home but I wanted more information about the house and the HOA so I texted my realtor this afternoon. He went out of town this weekend and said they were still driving back to town but he would contact me when he got home. Which he did around nine o'clock tonight. He emailed me the seller's disclosure and information on what an inspector had found and what had been fixed based on that inspection. Tomorrow he's going to get information on the HOA. I wrote down the things that stood out to me and that I wanted to check on. The big one is the roof and siding potentially needing to be replaced. They got a bid from a company and sent it to the neighbor but I believe they have to agree to it before anything can be done. So I want to know the status of that. Along with a couple other small things that were mentioned but it wasn't said if they had been fixed. I added in the things we saw this weekend during the rain that weren't mentioned in the documents. I thought I remembered seeing the washer and dryer in the basement but it looks like they aren't included, which means I would need to buy my own. That is unfortunate but if I can get my offer in and it is accepted, this house is so much cheaper than the other two I like, so that would lessen the blow a little bit. I just need to get my offer in because it would suck to miss out after all the stress this has caused me in the past few weeks.

I didn't get my newspaper article written this weekend but I should have time in the next couple days at work to get it done, which is where I'm supposed to be writing it, so that works out. I'm going to write about hobbies and life-long learning and it will help to be at work because it seems like every article mentions books in our collection and I will be able to wander the shelves and pick random books that fit the topic.

I also need to prepare for my class on Tuesday. When I checked on Friday we had ten people registered, which would make for a strong turn out. And I don't want to screw things up. My practice class was pretty informal because it was just my boss and the assistant director. I would like the actual class to retain a bit of that informal nature, though. It doesn't need to be a super professional class presentation. I think being professional is important but taking a more laid back approach is acceptable. I'm also going to be teaching a relatively old group of individuals how to do things with technology, so informal and less intimidating would probably be appreciated.

It's now midnight and I am going to go to bed soon because I need to wake up for work in the morning. And I am hoping I can fall asleep with house stuff on my mind. I was worried about missing out on the one place I had been watching since June but now that I've actually gotten to the point of wanting to put an offer on a place, the stress level has increased considerably. Especially with the price dropping again recently. It feels like someone else is going to swoop in and make an offer before I'm able to look everything over and get my offer in. So that's going to be on my mind tonight when my head hits the pillow. Can't wait.

September 24, 2016

 This morning I kind of slept in but not in terms of time slept, only the fact that it was after nine o'clock when I woke up.

After waking up I created my Pro and Con lists for my top three houses and a list of the questions and information I wanted to know about all of the places. I felt like I had a lot of stuff floating around in my head but my lists ended up being fairly short. It was still a worthwhile activity, though, getting everything on paper and seeing it, not just having it floating around ephemerally.

When I felt like I had everything written down, I took a break by getting ready and going to Target to buy a few things. I got back to my car right before it started raining, so perfect timing. I had texted my Dad before I left and he got back to me when I got home so I headed over to his house.

I wanted to see what the houses looked like with the rain (and he had the same thought because he had gone around this morning). My Dad drove, which was a good thing because there was a lot of rain and we encountered many instances of deep water on the road which my car would not have handled well.

The first house we went to was the one east of town. There was a lot of water on the surrounding roads and it was all flowing to the storm drains but the drains couldn't really keep up. My Dad pointed out all the spots on the road that showed damage due to the excess water. The house appeared to be graded well, which is good, but I was concerned about how much water there was in such a short period of time. What if it rains for a more extended period of time? I double-checked the GIS map today because of the nearby river and creek behind the house but it didn't show the house being in a floodplain. I thought maybe that was because it was in the next county and when I looked up their GIS website it didn't have a hydrology option. I find it hard to believe it isn't in a floodplain.

Next we went to the townhouse on the hill. It was only sprinkling lightly at this point but my Dad pointed out the deteriorating condition of the surrounding buildings and the spots on the place I like that would need to be fixed. He said he didn't know if the HOA was responsible for fixing things or the homeowners but whoever was wasn't doing their job.

We stopped back by the house after that for a bathroom break and so my Dad could check the radar to see when the next batch of rain was coming through. It had started sprinkling again so we headed back out. We drove around the neighborhood of the place by the nursing home for a bit and then up to the fancy new houses by the golf course because we still had some time. There are some really big, super fancy houses by the golf course. I haven't been up there since any of the building has happened so it was all new to me. My Dad pointed out at two of the biggest ones that are really just football houses. Meaning that the owners really only use them when they come into town for a football game. That is incredible. There are houses and condos all over town like that, however, so it's not really a big surprise, but it is still ridiculous. I can't imagine having that kind of money.

When the next downpour closed in we headed back to the last place. This was good because when my Dad had gone by in the morning it hadn't rained as hard. With the heavier rain we were able to see that the downspout off the garage that led into the ground actually had water bubbling out of the ground, which is a sign that somewhere there is probably a blockage in the pipe under the ground. There was also rain spilling over the edge of the gutter because it was coming down the roof so fast and the front of the gutter dipped down a little. Lastly, there was a corner of the driveway that was cracked, the water was running right down the driveway toward it and my Dad said the water probably got under there and washed it out, which led to the crack. I took pictures of all of it. Other than that, everything else seemed to look pretty good.

We headed back to my Dad's house after that and continued to talk about the pros and cons about the different places. It slowly became clear that the place by the nursing home is the standout, at least of the three I have narrowed it down to. I like the neighborhood, it seems well maintained, and the price is a lot less than the other two but I think I'm getting more out of it. I think I want to put an offer on it and I am worried that there will be an open house tomorrow following the price drop yesterday. If that does end up being the case I'm going to text my realtor about it, even though he is out of town this weekend. I still need more information about the house and the HOA to be sure but I want to have time to get that information before someone else comes in and makes an offer. The stress continues.

I life my Dad's house and got home around eight o'clock. I was able to do one load of laundry while I ate dinner and spent the rest of the night not doing much. This entry has taken forever because I'm tired and easily distracted. But I'm going to finish it up so I can go to bed. Tomorrow I'm going to sleep in and then work on my article for the newspaper. I'm fairly certain I'm going to write about hobbies, because I have plenty of them and the library has a decent collection of books devoted to things that could easily become a new hobby. It seems like something I could ramble on about.

One last thing. The power went out for an hour or so when I wasn't home. Following that, the light in the microwave and three of the nightlights I have set up in the basement to make it not pitch black at night, have all gone out. It's as if the power outage caused a power surge or something. It's weird.

September 23, 2016

 This is apparently a week of late nights. It is two o'clock now. Much too late.

Today at work was pretty laid back but I still managed to get some things done. I think I finished updating my homebound stuff. We got a call from the same homebound person who a month or two ago finished his books early and wanted more in the middle of the month. He was another librarian's patron but I agreed to it so I pulled the books. Today the librarian on desk agreed to it and then I agreed to pull the books. It went surprisingly fast.

I read through several past newspaper articles written by the staff to make sure I didn't end up writing about something that had already been done. My main idea going in was reading for pleasure and it turns out that was basically written about two weeks ago. So yeah. Now I'm thinking about serendipitous browsing. We'll see.

I weeded a bunch of books and I have nearly finished the row I'm on and I'm also getting closer to finishing my first list. Exciting stuff.

I helped a lady from a local business solve the mystery of why people keep calling about a class that hasn't been offered in several years. Turns out the class information was posted on a website that ended up being the top search result on Google so people searching for the topic ended up getting the phone number to this place and inquiring about the class. So now she has to try and contact the website to get the information removed. And the website doesn't look like it has been updated since before CSS became a thing.

I also had a lot of good conversations with my coworkers. It was a pretty good day.

After work I ate dinner and then went over to my dad's house around eight o'clock. I talked to him for awhile about random things and then we spent a long time talking about house stuff. He drove out to the one east of town this afternoon to scope out the neighborhood and I showed him all the information and pictures I had for my top three. When my step-mom got home she also had a lot of good insights to add. They pointed out the good and bad about all three and were fairly unanimous in picking the one on the west side of town as their favorite. It also dropped another $5000 today, which puts it $9,500 under one of the houses and $12,900 under the other. That is enticing. There is so much to think about. If I were a betting man I would say the one on the west sells fairly soon because it has been on the market for over 130 days and has dropped $20,000 from the original list price. Tomorrow I'm going to start my pros and cons list for each place and probably drive by all of them to scope out the neighborhood and maybe figure out drive times to work so see if I can got home for lunch.

Which means I need to go to bed because it is three o'clock in the morning and I don't want to sleep through the entire day. I also need to write my newspaper article sometime this weekend. I've got a lot on my plate right now.

September 22, 2016

 Goodness. It is once again late and I am tired and I need to wake up tomorrow morning. I'm looking forward to sleeping in this weekend.

Today at work I did things. I got a decent amount of weeding done but had to spend almost an equal amount of time looking for books to try and replace some of the really old Egypt books that look like crap but are still checking out regularly. I was unsuccessful. Apparently there haven't been a lot of good Egypt books published recently. But even in the cases where we have a newer book on the same topic, the old book checks out more often. I think maybe the old ones are just good for school projects. I don't know. It's kind of a mystery.

I also did other random things throughout the day but I can't remember it all and I don't think any of it would be interesting to write about. I spent forty-five minutes not too long before I got off work helping a man make “no smoking” signs. It was a rough process. I could have made him a really good one in about five minutes but we scrolled forever on Google Images looking for what he wanted. For one he picked a bicycle with a world for one tire and a no-smoking symbol for the other. I didn't get it but whatever. For the other one I put a no-smoking symbol in Publisher and then did the text. I was just going to say “no smoking” but he also wanted the word “sign” on it. So in cursive letters it says “sign” above the symbol and “no smoking” below it. I don't know why he wanted the word “sign”. It's obviously a sign. There was also a bit of a struggle over the size. I started by making both of them the size of a piece of paper but then he started pointing around at the desk calendar and scrap paper saying he wanted it smaller like that. I grabbed a ruler so we could get an exact size and every time I tried to show him on the ruler how bit it would be he insisted on resizing it on the computer until it looked right, even though it wasn't to-scale on the computer. It was rough but we got there in the end.

After work I went and met my mom and sister at the realtor's office and we all went out to look at some condos/townhouses/duplexes or whatever. The first two were across the street from one another and I wasn't into either of them. The first had really steep stairs that weren't very deep so it felt like at any step I was going to slide off of them. The second one had a little yippy dog next door. As we were standing there waiting for the door to be unlocked the owner next door came out on the driveway to walk the dog and as soon as it saw us it started barking. So that's a no. I also didn't like that the garages were right next to each other. We also went two three just outside the west side of town that were pretty nice inside but the outside wasn't great on two of them because the neighborhood was really crammed. On those two the bathroom on the main floor could only be reached by walking through the master bedroom. I don't plan on entertaining a lot of company but it would be nice to have a “public” bathroom. The other one would probably end up in a flood zone due to all the construction in the area altering the terrain, and I imagine the population of the neighborhood is heavily military, which means there would be a lot of turnover. And, speaking of construction, not being around construction is on my list of things that would be nice because I'm tired of getting stuck behind dump trucks. There are also specials on all of those because they're so new and still paying off all the crap that specials cover.

The night ended looking at a couple old houses downtown. I liked the first one because it had a lot of character but it also needs a lot of work done. I don't know that I would have the motivation to do that work. And to spend the money on it after dropping all the money buying the house. The second old house was also pretty cool but it had a creepy dirt-floor basement and it would also require quite a bit of work.

In the middle of everything we went two three places that are now in my top three. The first is the one I've been watching since we first drove by it in June. I think it lived up to the photos online. I really liked it. The downsides are that the garage is pretty tiny, I would have to walk up a flight of stairs to get to the main level and then another flight of stairs to get to the bedrooms, the road leading to the area is kind of steep so it might suck in winter, there is a house on either side so it is boxed in (although it is wider than the other places so it doesn't feel claustrophobic), and there might have been a couple other things. On the plus side, it looks nice, has plenty of bathrooms, the neighborhood is kind of secluded and cool looking, and it lived up to my expectations.

The second is a place near one of the nursing homes I deliver to for homebound. It's got a double garage which is really nice. I would like to have room for my tools and maybe a workbench and area to work on stuff, which a double garage would provide. It also looked well taken care of and had plenty of room.

The third house was out past the east side of town. It was the most expensive of the three but like the first one, recently dropped about $10,000, probably because it has also been on the market for more than 130 days. It only had a single garage but I liked the layout inside. The shared wall included the living room and kitchen, with the bedrooms on the other side, so I wouldn't have to worry about hearing the neighbors when I was trying to go to bed. The basement was also really nice and open, definitely the biggest we saw. And it was the newest of the three places, only being twelve years old, rather than forty-five or thirty years old. The downsides for this one are dealing with the traffic on that side of town, which I've heard can be annoying. They are also on rural water out there and I'm not sure about the pros and cons of that. The basement also has a sump pump, which I'm not sure is good or bad. And there are still specials to pay. The neighborhood was pretty nice but it also required a bit of driving through it to get to the house. I would also need to check on the internet out there because the internet is kind of a big deal. I need it.

So those are my top three, not only for tonight but also last night. I really liked the garage of the one house with the workshop area in the back but the house didn't really grab me. I'm going to be thinking a lot of about these three and I'll start developing a proper list of pros and cons when I'm not so tired. I hope that none of them sell in the meantime but they have all been on the market for over a hundred days so hopefully that means my chances are good. Also, if one of them sells, that would make my decision a little bit easier. So that's a plus.

When we got done my mom and sister headed back to the house and I went to get Chipotle. I had to drive around the block a couple times but I did finally manage to get a parking spot. Turns out Chipotle is really busy at eight o'clock on Thursdays. After a decent wait in line I got up to order and I got a girl who understands the word “extra”. My bowl was brimming with rice and beans. I added a little bit of cheese to that and I ended up only getting charged for three sides. I occasionally get that but more often than not I get charged for the full veggie bowl. It's nice when I don't.

Over dinner and after dinner we discussed the places we had seen. My sister's top two were the first one and the third one. My mom's were the first one and the second one. And there was no clear winner for either of them. I need to ponder.

My green fleece jacket arrived today and it is great. The green is even better in person and it fits well. I'm really happy with it and I look forward to getting cold at work and being able to wear it.

And now I'm going to go to bed because good grief I'm tired. It is after 12:30AM and I am once again going to get less than a full night of sleep. Can't wait.

September 21, 2016

 I'm tired and I have to open tomorrow. Let's do this.

This morning I had two hours on the desk to finish my homebound stuff. I checked out all the books I pulled last night for my homebound patrons. Then I typed up all the response slips and got those printed out and cut up. After placing the correct slip in each book I got them all bagged up and placed back on my cart. I finished just as my time was up on the desk and I had to do a walkthrough. I would have been done earlier but I had to help several patrons.

One of which is a lady that calls in frequently and has developed a bit of a reputation around the department. She's always wanting us to put in ILL requests for random books and if it isn't available that way than she wants us to do a purchase request. She also calls and wants publisher information or phone numbers for random places across the country. I didn't know about it before but I think she might have been the one who wanted to know the number for a church up north and then the information for a diabetes camp for kids on the East Coast. It has been decided that she kind of treats us as her secretaries and I am beginning to agree with that assessment.

Before I went to lunch I had time to call my patrons. I spoke with two, left one messages, spoke with someone in the office of one of the nursing homes, and the phone just rang forever for another one. Could have been worse.

I went to lunch and we packed up and went out to deliver books as soon as I got back. Normally we go out at two o'clock but it has been bumped up to one o'clock because the librarian I go with now has a meeting later in the afternoon that she has to be back for.

We went to a new patron to start things off but we didn't have any trouble finding the house because it's on the same street that one of my friend's mom lives on. My first patron for the day was our third stop and I scared her, which was funny because she laughed about it. She's one who sits in her back room and just wants me to come in. I knocked on the door really loudly first then picked up her paper and some mail left in the door before heading in. Once inside said hello and called out her name before heading back to her room. I then walked into the room but she was busy reading something. I was about to say something else when she looked up, noticed me for the first time, and let out a little scream. She then smiled and chuckled until she looked at the mail I brought in and said “oh, crap” in an annoyed way before we started talking about her books.

I was worried my next patron wouldn't be home because he normally emails me a list of books ahead of time but I didn't hear from him, he didn't respond to my email, and he didn't answer the phone today. But he ended up being home and he was a little more talkative than usual.The next stop was the first nursing home. There weren't any staff to be found, and we looked all over the place when we first got there because both my patrons weren't in their rooms. I found one out playing a game with a group of people and she said I could grab her books out of her room, which I was okay with because the door was open. I couldn't remember what my other patron looked like but she ended up being the lady sitting next to my other patron. I'll remember what she looks like next time.

When we got to the second building for that nursing home, where I have the only patron, they won't give us the code for the door and I got stuck in the little entryway. I rang the doorbell twice with no response and then had to call them to get let in. I guess the doorbell is broken. After the waiting I found out that my patron had actually moved into the building we just left. So we headed back. This is the patron that last month basically didn't care for all but two of the books I brought her. And those two were the ones she had picked out. This time around she seemed to like my selection better, so fingers crossed she has a positive review of them next month.

In the second nursing home I met one of my patrons for the first time. She normally just leaves her books outside her door but today she had family visiting and the door was open. I got a chance to talk to her and find out more specifics about what she likes and what she wants, which was really helpful. She then gave me the code to get out the back door so I could walk across the courtyard and go in the other wing to get to my other patron. I discovered an air conditioner right inside that second door so I stood there for a moment before heading down the hall. My second patron also had family visiting which was good because I was able to get all the books back thanks to one of her daughters digging around until she found them all. This is the patron who I ended up leaving one book every time so she was up to eleven books out instead of eight. But now we're even.

This is the nursing home where the other librarian's last patron is a bit of a talker so instead of waiting in the hot hallway, I told her I would probably wait for her outside where there was at least an occasional breeze. But first I went back to the air conditioner and stood it front of it for awhile. Then I went out and loaded up the car and stood in the shade for awhile before deciding to get in the car and get the air conditioner going to cool it down. Right as I turned on the car the other librarian came out. Perfect timing.

We had one patron left and we finished up a few minutes before three o'clock. Not bad at all, especially considering the new patrons, a couple detours, and a little backtracking.

When we got back to the library we unloaded all of our books, took out the response slips and checked them for damage before turning them over to circulation. I returned the car keys and then headed up to the third floor to drop off an ILL request before going in the bathroom to change out of my sweaty clothes.

After all that I had about an hour before I was on desk again so I spent the time weeding books. I made it into the 930s which is a tricky section because one of the goals is for the books to have been published within the last ten years. A lot of them were much older than than but had pretty good circulation numbers. I filled up a whole row of my cart with books I want to check for newer editions and left several books on the shelves that could fit in the same category. My boss was off today but I'm going to check with her tomorrow and see how strictly she wants me to follow the publication date rule. That section is going to get a lot smaller if we decide to go strict.

I got off at six o'clock and headed across town to meet my mom at the realtor's office. And then we headed out to look at houses. Tonight we went to several houses and tomorrow we're going to look at townhouses/condos/duplexes and some of the older houses downtown. My mom would say there was one but I'd say there were two out of the eight houses with some potential. I liked the location of one but it smelled a little weird and there was only one bathroom. I don't really want to smell like my house, if that makes sense, and I would like at least two bathrooms for when I have company over. It also didn't have a basement, which isn't a deal breaker but it would be nice.

The second house had a really unique layout. I can't even really describe it but it almost felt like a puzzle, with a bunch of odd shaped rooms fitted together. It was kind of like a really tiny home had been built onto one room at a time. Very unique. It also had a big garage and a shop in the back of the garage, which would be nice. The downsides include a weird basement, floor elevation differences between each room which I think I would trip over all the time, a washer and dryer in the kitchen (with obvious signs of leaking and water damage), not much yard because it was right up against a duplex and a busy street, and the house needed painting. But overall I liked it.

I'm looking forward to finally seeing the townhouse tomorrow that I've had my eye on since June. I need to see it in person so I can see if it lives up to the pictures and see why it hasn't sold yet. I like the idea of a house over a townhouse because I wouldn't be sharing a wall or two with neighbors but I also like that there would be less outside upkeep with a townhouse. We'll see if my opinions change tomorrow.

After looking at houses my mom and I got Sonic for dinner and talked about houses. It still doesn't quite feel real yet and I don't think it will until I actually makes an offer on a place and it is accepted. That will definitely feel real.

The rest of the night I looked at house stuff and watched YouTube videos. Now I'm going to go to bed because it is after midnight. This took so long to write. And now I will get less than six hour of sleep before working a full day and then then driving all over town afterward looking at houses. At least tomorrow I won't also be driving all over delivering books in the hot and humid weather. Always a positive.

September 20, 2016

 This morning I slept in and then read a book. That is still the best way to spend a morning. Then I got ready and ate lunch before going to work.

The first part of my day was spent finishing up my homebound lists, which I accomplished. I even pulled a few books because I didn't have any specific ones in mind so I just went to the section I wanted and browsed until I had enough. I also did other work things like helped patrons in person, over the phone, and through chat. It was a fairly constant flow of work during the first part of my shift.

The second part of my shift was slower but I still did things. I finished watching more usability videos, bringing the total up to 200 for this month. I also cleaned up most of my inbox because that has been a long time coming. I wasn't off the desk until the end of the night so that is when I went to pull books for homebound. I didn't count how many books I pulled but I filled my cart and finished just in time to start the closing stuff for the night. It was super dead for the last hour or so of the evening throughout the entire library, which was nice because I was able to get my work done.

There was one incident tonight which I wasn't a fan of. When I got back from dinner the other librarian told me she had just talked to a group of teens down by the front entrance because they were being loud and horsing around. I think it was the same group that was down there yesterday being loud and wanting to race each other barefoot. I put off going down as long as I could but they got progressively louder and then started throwing out random curse words. So I went down to talk to them. I'm not a fan of confrontation and that was probably evident.

I asked them if they were being too loud and one responded by saying “No, we're just being black citizens.” And I looked at him and said “Or citizens? And yes, you're being loud.” The first kid continued being respectful in that patronizing sort of way and the other was more confrontational and argumentative, blaming the building rather than their actions. And then half way through the conversation he stopped arguing and just started staring at me. I think he might have been trying to be intimidating but he looked more tired than scary.

I could have handled the situation better. I feel like all my interactions with kids and teens at the library, outside of the ones I know from being at the school, involve me coming off as an authoritarian because I'm having to get on them about not acting like kids. There isn't really a good place for them to hang out so they end up in all the places that adults find them annoying. I need to work on my tactic because I'm not the bad guy and I don't want to come across that way. I imagine I will have many more opportunities to practice, so I will get better.

When I got home tonight I watched YouTube videos and got updated on internet things. Tomorrow I'm going back to work. In the morning I've got two hours on the desk which will hopefully give me enough time to checkout all of my homebound books, sort them, and print out the feedback slips. Hopefully there aren't a lot of patron interruptions. Then I'll spend my afternoon delivering books in the hot and humid weather, going into hot homes and nursing homes, with only brief reprieves in the air conditioned van. It's going to be a wonderful time. I just need to remember to bring a change of shirt (and maybe everything but pants) so I can change when I get back and have cooled down so I'm not completely disgusting when I go out with my realtor looking at houses after work. Which is the part of my day I'm looking forward to most. If I can get over being sweaty and gross.

September 19, 2016

 A good chunk of my morning was spent getting ready for my practice class this afternoon. I finished the presentation slides this weekend so today I updated the handout and the website, adding in all the links and stuff. That took me awhile because I kept getting interrupted by phone calls and in-person patrons. How dare they make me do my job. In the end it all worked out and I made the last edit to the website right before I had to leave for lunch.

I wasn't scheduled to get back from lunch until two o'clock, which is when the class was scheduled, so my boss got everything set up so it was ready when I got back. It was a little stressful walking into the building and right into the lab to teach but I survived. It helped that the only two attendees were my boss and the assistant director. This was probably due to my boss only posting on the staff blog this morning that the class was happening. I'm cool with it, though. The first class next Tuesday has eight patrons registered so far, and if they all show up, it will be the highest attendance to-date for one of my classes. To be fair, there have only been two classes so far, but I'm still counting it. Anyway, the class went pretty well. The content took me less than thirty minutes to get through, which is probably good because the scanning will take awhile and then they will most likely want more time to play around with editing their photograph. My boss and the assistant director both got sucked into that and it was kind of cool to see.

I had about two free hours after the class which I used to work on my homebound lists. I have nearly finished, with a few books for one patron and ten for another. I'm going to be cutting it a little close, finishing that up and getting everything pulled and entered by Wednesday afternoon, but I think I can get it done.

I texted the lady who cuts my hair and got an appointment for next Tuesday morning before work. I'm not looking forward to getting my haircut and then dealing with the little loose hairs for the rest of the day at work, but by next Tuesday I'll be about two weeks overdue, so I can't complain too much.

I also texted my realtor and he called me tonight after dinner. We're going to go out on Wednesday after work and then again on Thursday after work. I just realized that Wednesday I'm probably going to be a sweaty mess after doing the homebound deliveries at the peak of the heat, which is supposed to be in the 90s with over 60% humidity. I might take a change of shirts at least because I'm going straight from work to meet the realtor. I can at least be halfway presentable.

Tonight I wanted to relax after my slightly stressful day, and the weekend of working on work stuff, so I watched YouTube videos, played a couple video games, and read a few chapters in Shades of Grey. I feel good about my evening. I might read one more chapter but then I want to go to bed because I didn't get a full night of sleep last night and I'm tired. I don't go into work until noon tomorrow which means I can either sleep in or get up early and do stuff before work. I'm leaning toward sleeping in and maybe staying in bed and reading. We'll see.

September 18, 2016

 Today was a lazy Sunday. I set my alarm to go off early, mostly so I could turn it off and go back to sleep. It is nice to do every now and then but I'm a little worried about becoming too comfortable with the practice and then doing it on a workday. So it will remain a rare treat.

This morning I finished editing the old photograph I am going to use as an example for my digitization class. I got rid of all the blemishes and added a border and shadow. Then I added it to the first slide of my presentation, putting it next to the original picture, as an example of what can be done.

This afternoon I laid in the dark, listened to music, thought about my class, and took the occasional brief nap. I needed the time to plan out what I wanted to say and how I was going to present things. I started the process sitting at my computer but I kept dozing off so I figured I might as well embrace it. And I think it worked out. I feel fairly confident about how things are going to work. I didn't actually time it out or anything because I figure that is what the practice class is for tomorrow. I have a feeling my talking portion is going to be pretty short because I don't want to overwhelm people with information. More time will be spent walking through Pixlr and then actually editing photographs. I'm still not that happy with the handout and it will probably need to be tweaked before the actual class. I have two version of it at the moment, along with the slides themselves, which I have thought about using as the handout. I think I'm going to try and get something I'm mildly happy about for the two page handout and then put the slides on the website for people who want those. It'll all get sorted out after tomorrow's practice. I'm trying to walk the line between beginning overview and in-depth photo editing, so we'll see how it goes.

Tonight I briefly skimmed through a book I checked out on archiving photos and then I watched a livestream while playing Just Cause 3. I feel like that is a game that has to be played regularly in order to remember the what button or key does what. It doesn't help that I didn't know those in the first place. Or that I'm using both a keyboard and a controller. On the plus side, I finally figured out what the storyline icons look like so I can finally start advancing the story again, instead of just running around and liberating towns.

I didn't hear from my realtor today but he apparently had an open house this weekend, so that is probably where his focus has been. And hopefully I will hear from him tomorrow.

Although I am not that tired due to my afternoon activities, I will be going to bed soon so I can wake up in the morning and go to work. I have my class in the afternoon but hopefully I can get some homebound stuff done in the morning. I need to send out letters to a couple patrons but it might be too late for those. They'll probably be delivered on the day we go out, which means they will get there after we go out. I need to get better at that.

September 17, 2016

 Today was a very relaxed, unproductive day. I slept in and then read books for the rest of the morning. After lunch I did laundry, watched YouTube videos, played video games, and watched Very British Problems on Netflix. The dry British sense of humor meshes well with mine and has made me think I might have been born on the wrong side of the ocean. Have watched two series of Very British Problems makes me almost certain I was born on the wrong side of the ocean. I think I'd fit in well over there.

I played a lot of Trials: Evolution because I watched a stream the other day of Trials: Fusion and it made me nostalgic. It is a very frustrating game but finishing a track feels so good. I tried to play both Zuma's Revenge and Bejeweled 3 but those are both through Origin and something must be up because the both crashed multiple times in the middle of a game, so I gave up on those. Tonight I dove back into Crashlands and enjoyed myself quite a bit. I have forgotten all the quests I had taken and didn't really know what I was doing, but I lost myself in it for quite awhile. The hardest thing is remembering where to get all the various components for building things, whether they come from plants or animals. But I powered through and had a good time.

My friend did the flyover for a football game today but they didn't broadcast it on TV. Instead they chose to show old dudes talking about past games and their predictions for the upcoming game. That sounds way cooler than watching jets fly over the stadium. Then they were supposed to show the GoPro footage from inside the cockpit during the third quarter but I never saw it. My TV lost the signal for several minutes so there is a chance that is when they showed it, but I have a feeling they didn't. Kind of annoying.

I was going to work on my presentation stuff today but I couldn't bring myself to do it. So I'll have to do it tomorrow. Can't wait.

I didn't hear from my realtor today. Hopefully soon. I also haven't heard from the lady who cuts my hair, who I texted earlier in the week about setting up my next appointment because I'm overdue. The two people I want to hear back from most.

September 16, 2016

 Today was fairly uneventful. I woke up early but ended up just listening to the radio and dozing on and off. It would have been nice to read but it is hard to pass up dozing and music.

At work most of my time before my dinner break was spent working on my presentation. I knew I had my practice class scheduled for next week but I checked tonight and it turns out I give it on Monday, so it's a good thing I focused on that instead of my homebound book lists. I still have some work to do on the presentation, including running through it once or twice, and that will have to be done this weekend. Off the clock. Don't tell my boss.

It would have been nice if I could have worked on my homebound lists because I still need to come up with and then pull about fifty books by Wednesday. That is going to be stressful. Especially considering I don't appear to have much time to work on it before then. It'll be fun.

I also did some other things at work, like watched usability videos, helped carry a bookshelf upstairs, and answered a few questions. It was just a quiet day at the library. That made it productive but I wish I could have been more productive.

Tonight there wasn't a custodian which meant we had a few more closing duties. My most nerve-racking one was walking the stairwell that has alarmed doors. You have to disarm it to get it and re-arm it once you're in. I was worried I would end up setting off the alarm because it seemed like it would be easy to do. But it turned out to be pretty simple. At least I think it was. Maybe I did something wrong. I also got to lock the doors in the atrium, which took me back to my theater days. And I got to turn off the last lights, something that I kind of want to do every time now because it gives a good finale to the evening.

When I got home I watched YouTube videos and clicked around the internet for awhile, mostly looking at fountain pen stuff and home theater stuff. I eventually got around to watching London Has Fallen on Netflix. I only very vaguely remember the first movie, Olympus Has Fallen, and kind of get it confused with White House Down because they came out at the same time and it felt like two teams had the same idea for a movie and raced each other to get them out. I liked both of those movie, though. At least White House Down, which I have seen more recently so I still remember it. As for London Has Fallen, I don't know. It had some good moments but it is definitely the most cliché-filled movie I have seen, maybe ever. I'm a fan of witty quips but they were trying too hard with most of the one-liners in this movie. It was very cringy. I probably won't watch it again unless I want to watch the first and second back-to-back for an over-the-top overload.

Maybe this weekend I'll go look at houses. Or maybe I won't. My realtor told me yesterday morning he would contact me later in the day. He did not. And I didn't hear from him today, either. I know he's a busy guy and I was kind of just dropped in his lap on Wednesday, so I can't expect him to drop everything, but I also want to get this ball rolling so I don't miss out on something. Like the condo I've been thinking about since June. I have started checking every day, expecting it to go off the market. Considering it has been on the market for over 120 days and dropped in price by $10,000 since June, it doesn't seem like a lot of people are interested. Or maybe there are a lot of people but something is wrong with the place. I don't know. And I won't until I get to look at it in person and find out for myself. But my realtor needs to get back to me first. He said he was going to start compiling a list of houses but he hasn't really talked with me about what I'm looking for or anything like that, so I don't know. I just need to pumped the brakes and let him do his thing. Or maybe go with the realtor I met in June because she's newer and probably has a shorter client list. Or maybe I could pump the brakes.

September 15, 2016

 I was going to go to bed early tonight but it is eleven o'clock right now, so that didn't happen.

Today work seemed to go really slow. And it didn't feel very productive. Most of my day was spent kind of working on homebound stuff. I made a list of the books all of my patrons have currently checked out so I will have a better idea of what I should be getting back from them next week. The main reason for this is one of my patrons currently has eleven books out but I only take her eight every month. Every month I seem to miss a book. At this rate she's eventually going to end up with the whole library. So my goal is to make sure I get all the books back next time, especially the one she's had for two or three months now.

I also worked on my handout for my upcoming tech class because I'm doing the practice class next week. The handout kind of sucks. Like a lot. I need to figure it out. When I hit a wall with that I spent the last bit of time at work editing an example picture so I can show the class a before and after so they have an idea of what is possible. I might need to pick a different picture though because the one I went with is really damaged and it is going to take forever to fix. But we'll see.

On top of the class thing I also need to come up with a topic for, and then write, my newspaper column. And create my outlines for the other upcoming tech classes. I have the slightest feeling of being overwhelmed but it's only a tingling feeling on the periphery of my life. For the time being.

For a good portion of my day I wore my rain jacket because it was freezing at the desk. When I get too cold I have to constantly go to the bathroom, even when I haven't had enough water to warrant that many trips to the bathroom. I also have trouble focusing on work when I'm trying not to shiver. When I got home tonight I ordered a green fleece jacket because a fleece jacket is warm and more professional looking than a green hoodie. At least that's what I'm telling myself. We'll see how it looks next week. And hope that it is the right size. The majority of the reviews said it runs small and I'm trusting them.

I got to be a librarian a few times today. I took a girl to the stacks to show her where our Psychology books are. She said she didn't have anything specific in mind so I showed her the more straight-up Psychology books but also the ones that were more pop-psych. I look up books on the 1960s for another patron and then showed her where to find the two she picked out.

And the most librarian thing was the last patron who came in and asked about the local newspaper. She asked where to find it and when I asked how recent she said within the last month. I got up to start to show her where we keep the older issues that haven't been put on microfilm yet but when she asked if she was going to have to look through all of them I asked what she was specifically looking for. It ended up being a letter to the editor and she knew who wrote it so I pulled up NewsBank, which we just added this week I think. It has an archive of our local newspaper for the last twenty years and I was able to type in the name she gave me and it showed up as the first result. It ended up being really freaking easy. I was shocked. And I felt like a badass librarian.

Tonight I watched YouTube videos, read a couple chapters in a book, and looked at houses. Tried a new site which had several that weren't on the other site, so that was interesting. I also looked at houses in other towns, which made me a little sad because there are way more options in the surrounding towns. We have a decent selection here in my price range but the vast majority are in a floodplain, which I'm not going to go near. I have lived here all my life so I know to avoid the floodplain areas and the more sketchy areas of town. I don't have that type of knowledge for other towns so it is easier to look at all the houses and not dismiss them for their location. Oh well. My job is here and I don't plan on commuting. My realtor said he was going to start compiling a list and get back to me to set up some times to go out and look at them. Shit's gettin' real.

Now I'm going to go to bed because midnight is creeping up and I have to wake up in the morning. I don't go into work until eleven o'clock but it would be nice to do something things before work. Even if those things just mean laying in bed and reading a book.

September 14, 2016

 I'm tired and this seems like it might be an entry that is mostly typed with my eyes closed.

This morning at work most of my time was spent finishing up my writing on customer service for our departmental meeting this afternoon. I also helped another librarian tweak the Caution book wraps she was making to go over the covers of the books on the Banned Books display. I probably did some other things as well but they're not coming to mind.

At one o'clock I drove across town to the bank to meet my mom for our meeting with the lender. He previously asked me what price range I was looking at and I found out today he actually got me pre-approved for around $10,000 more than I intend on spending because he said it would be easier to adjust the numbers down than up. Which makes sense. It's actually nice knowing I have some wiggle room. But, that pre-approval amount is at the extreme end of what I can afford, at least in terms of percentages to my income, and I don't really have any interest in going that high. Plus, there are only a few houses at that price point and I'm not interested in them. Along with letting me know I was pre-approved, he walked me through the whole process, explained everything, and gave me a lot of good information. I left feeling good about the whole experience. It was a relief knowing that I can get the money and knowing that I can ask him any questions that I have. The letter he gave me is generic, not listing the approval amount, so the seller of a house won't be able to use it against me, like if I put in a low bid and the seller refuses knowing that I have been approved for more. That is one of the things I was curious about when it came to negotiations so I like that my amount isn't publicized. He also said that if I find a house that I want to put a bid on, I can email him the address, he'll double-check everything, and then type up a personalized letter with the address of the house on it so the seller knows I am serious about their house and my lender knows about it. I like it.

After the meeting I had just enough time to run home before needing to go back to work. I actually had to start eating lunch on my way home and I was still finishing it up as I was walking back out the door to go back to work.

Shortly after getting back we had our departmental meeting. It went well. I talked about the upcoming tech classes and our future goals of doing more hands-on tech stuff that we are wanting to start in the Spring. Then we each took turns talking about favorite reference sources and going over what we found about customer service. We are wanting to make a customer service statement for our department but the library also needs one so my boss has kind of been put in charge of that.

About seven minutes before leaving I decided I needed to pull a few more books for one of my displays. I probably should have just waited. I ended up getting two books for each of my displays and none of them were on my list. So I added two books to both displays even though my Tidbits display didn't need it and my Whimsical & Witty display could use more. So tomorrow I'm going to go pull more from my list for that display.

Tonight I had my leftover Chipotle for dinner and did laundry. The washer lid nailed me in the head when I leaned down to get my pants out of the washer and that part of my forehead is still tender. I put an ice pack on it and I am hoping that will be enough to prevent bruising. I would look awkward with a bruise on my forehead. I'm also hoping I can sleep off the headache that Ibuprofen didn't do much for.

At the bank today the lender emailed the approval letter to the realtor that my mom has used and really likes. He called and texted her about it today and I texted him back this evening. I mentioned that we had met with someone else from his office back in June when he was out of town and he said he would pass my text on to her. My mom didn't really want that realtor, though, so she texted him back and said she wanted to work with him. So it looks like I'll be working with him. That is kind of what I prefer because the business is named after him and he has decades of experience. Whereas the realtor we met this summer seemed pretty new. I liked her but I also like experience. We'll see how it goes.

Now I'm going to go to bed because I just go distracted for an hour watching a guy construct a handmade guitar. Fascinating stuff but I'm freaking tired and I have to open in the morning. At least I'll get off at five o'clock.

September 13, 2016

 I had things to talk about today but now it is late and I've been distracted and things have left my mind.

This morning I opened at work and after doing the normal stuff I sharpened a bunch of pencils. I wanted to sharpen all of the pencils we had left but the sharpener started crapping out on me. I'm hoping it was just overheating and not actually crapping out.

I had a lot of free time today. I think I was only on desk for one hour and the rest was either open or I had walkthroughs, which are basically open. I continued weeding and made two trips up to the head cataloger. Yesterday I went up to ask her to move a book from the 920s to the 740s because it was on the verge of being weeded and it seemed like it would do better in the 740s. Today I took her a book from the 920s that I thought would make more sense being in the Kansas history section. And the second book, also in the 920s, was about famous mathematicians, and it seemed like it would make more sense in the Math section. We are replacing the math book with a new copy because it has been super popular, even in the 920s, but I think it will be better in the Math section.

I also gave the librarian in charge of purchasing the printout for a new copy of the math book and a new book on world flags, because I weeded most of them today. The flag books had been relatively popular at one point but they were all old and met the criteria for weeding. The one I picked was published within the last few years so it should have more updated information.

I made a sign for a Banned Book Week display. We scanned a picture of a page from Slaughterhouse-Five (a banned book) and put a semi-transparent image of fire over the top of it. It is fitting because throughout history people have burned books they don't like, but also because the books involves a fire-bombing.

I heard back from the community organization about teaching the budgeting class and it doesn't look like it is going to work out. They require a minimum number of attendees, which we can't guarantee, and it also didn't seem like they could do both classes. So now I need to add coming up with content for the class back to my list. I will keep them in mind for the future when hopefully our classes are pulling in a larger audience.

I also did other things today. I'm sure of it.

Tonight was Chipotle night and my bowl was decent. I also didn't have nearly as much trouble using the buy-one-get-one coupon this week, which was a great relief.

After dinner I responded to the banker who had a few additional questions regarding my loan application. My mom and I are meeting with him tomorrow during lunch and hopefully good things come of it. It will be nice to actually know how much money I will have to spend on a house. Based on the estimated monthly payments on Realtor.com I have a rough idea of the price range I could probably afford but that will also depend on the interest rate of the loan and there are probably other things I'm not thinking of. There is also the chance that the bank won't give me a loan, which would definitely suck. But I will remain positive until I find out what's up.

Assuming I can get a loan, then the stress of actually finding a house begins. I'm a very indecisive person and I'm worried that will lead to months of looking at a million different houses that I pick apart and can't pull the trigger on. There is one condo that we first found back in June and it was out of my price range but I have kept an eye on it because it really looked like my kind of place. It dropped in price and should now be within my range. If that is the case, and I'm able to look at it before someone else comes in and buys it, it would be super convenient if it lived up to my expectations in real life. Like not falling apart or previous owners that are smokers or horrible neighbors. It would be nice to have a place right off the bat and not have to go through the months of house-hunting torture. We'll see.

After I emailed the banker I emailed my old friend who contacted me the other day for the first time in at least six or seven years. It has been awhile and it was good to hear from her. She kinda dropped off the face of the earth after she got a serious boyfriend and she is now married to him, living on the other side of the country, and expecting her first kid. So she's definitely been up to some stuff since last we spoke. I hope we can keep the conversation going. I know it will be more difficult once she has her kid but hopefully she won't go completely silent again.

It is now much later than when I started typing, because that's how time works. So I'm going to go to bed. I need to have a favorite reference tool and examples of customer service for our staff meeting tomorrow afternoon and I don't really have that nailed down yet. So yeah. I might try and wake up early. I've also got time in the morning when I get to work so I'll probably opt for more sleep and throw something together once I get to work. Sleep is good.

September 12, 2016

 This morning was pretty great. I slept in and then I read a book for awhile before I had to get up and get ready. If only every morning could be like that.

When I got to work I had three hours without being on desk or having to do a walkthrough so I went up to the third floor. I spent that time doing a bit of reading about Nordstrom's customer service, I emailed a community group about doing a class, and I watched forty-nine usability recordings of our website. So I was productive.

After that three hours I was on desk for an hour, had an hour for dinner, had two hours of walkthroughs where I spent most of my time looking for technology grants, and then two hours on desk where not a lot happened. The day went by surprisingly fast.

I was two minutes late getting back from dinner because during dinner I spilled salsa on my pants. I then had to quickly scrub my pants so they didn't stain (in case salsa stains) and iron a new pair of pants because my pants never come out of the dryer without wrinkles. It was mildly stressful and I'm shocked I only ended up being two minutes late.

And I think that's all I've got to write about today. It was just a quick, uneventful day.

Tomorrow I open, which sucks, but it also means I get off at five o'clock, and it is going to be Chipotle night. My first class is also tomorrow. I'm not teaching it, and only two people are signed up to come, but I'm still invested in its outcome. So I'm mildly anxious about that. I'll be full on anxious later in the month when it's my turn to teach.

September 11, 2016

 This morning I kind of slept in and then got ready and went to get gas before picking my sister up and heading to my Dad's house. Ten or fifteen minutes after that, we headed out of town. I drove my car with my sister, brother, and his girlfriend, and my Dad and step-mom drove together. I'm not a big fan of following someone. I knew how to get to our first stop so I ended up going around my Dad and going at my own pace just for a little bit of freedom. Last time that stop was just a quick bathroom break but this time we ended up eating lunch at Popeyes. I had red beans and rice and a couple biscuits. The main flavor was sodium. They were both so salty. The red beans and rice were nothing special and the biscuits were pretty good but the saltiness was too much. They would be good every now and then but I would need to chug some water afterward to flush it all out of my kidneys.

For the second half of the trip I went back to following. But then we made it down to see my aunt and grandma. Tomorrow is my grandma's birthday so my aunt made her a three layer angel food cake with fruit filled whipped cream topping. I'm a fan of plain angel food cake but the fruity topping was pretty good.

We stayed and talked until a little after four o'clock and then parted ways so my grandma could relax a little bit before her dinner. It sounds like as early as the end of next week she might be able to go home, which would be really nice. A neighbor who is a contractor pulled one of his carpenters off a job and they designed shallower steps for the garage that will be easier for my grandma to go up. They are also longer to accommodate her walker on each step. Pretty cool.

Instead of driving back to our first stop and eating dinner, like we did last time, it was decided that we would eat in town. I wasn't really hungry because it was only 4:30PM but by the time we actually got food it was around 5:00PM, so that was a little better. We went to P.F. Chang's and I had the pad thai with tofu. It smelled kind of bad but it tasted pretty good, so that's what's important. I also had strawberry lemonade, which is always good times.

I followed my Dad out of town and back to our first stop, where we took a brief stretch break, and then my brother and is girlfriend moved over to my Dad's truck so my sister and I wouldn't have to drive back to their house to drop them off. And then my sister and I headed out. At this point I knew where I was going so I didn't have to follow anyone and I was able to drive at my own pace. It was glorious.

I ended up getting home a little after nine o'clock. Thanks to the lunch and dinner stops the trip was extended by quite a bit. It would have been nice to have more time to do my own thing today but it's not like I would have done anything productive, so I'm not complaining. I also got to eat at two new restaurants and hang out with my grandma. So it was a pretty good day.

September 10, 2016

 This morning I slept in a little later than I would have liked but my bed was so comfortable and I wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to just lay there. And, I still got in some reading before lunch. I continued reading Shade of Grey and I started reading Batavia's Graveyard: The True Story of the Mad Heretic who Led History's Bloodiest Mutiny by Mike Dash, which is one of the books that is going to be weeded. I've only made it through the prologue and the first chapter but I'm hooked. It's definitely a book right up my alley.

This afternoon I read more, did laundry, watched YouTube videos, and read about house stuff. I also probably did some other things but nothing is coming to mind. Tonight I eventually got around to playing Just Cause 3. I think there is something more I need to do to advance the story but I don't know what it is. When I first load the game something is said but I am never paying attention and I can't find any mention of it in the menus. So instead I just run around and liberate towns. I also flew a plane for the first time tonight and that was a lot of fun. Out of everything in the game that I have driven or flown so far it easily handles the best. I'm getting better at driving the other vehicles but they are still a disappointment to drive. The plane however, at least the one I flew, was actually fun.

Monday is my grandma's birthday so tomorrow we are driving down to see her again. I'm not looking forward to the drive because there goes another weekend day to driving, but I am glad I will get to see my grandma. It was nicer when I could just drive a few minutes across town to see her but I'll survive.

And this has been a short entry but I had a pretty simple day and I'm not in a very talkative mood. Maybe I'll have more to write about tomorrow.

September 9, 2016

 This morning felt like it came far too fast, and I stayed in bed longer than I should have, but I still had plenty of time to get ready and make it to work five minutes early.

Today at work I did things. Which is almost always the goal. I went out and weeded twice and my overall total of weeded books is around 80 books. That's quite a few and I'm not very far into the process. It really helps that I am going with the analytical approach and focusing on the numbers. I am paying attention to what is leaving the collection, however, and it can be a little sad. Today I weeed a bunch of books about women throughout history. They haven't even checked out enough to pretend like they are worth keeping, at least in the eyes' of the patrons.

I found one book, a giant Vogue book, that seems like it should be in the 700s, not the 900s, because it is big and filled with pictures. The recommended call number, and the one that is the most popular is in the 920s, but it just feels out of place. We looked around and there are two libraries nearby that have it as a 747, which sounds better to me. It is one that is on the fence of whether or not to be weeded, so I'm going to go up and talk to the cataloger on Monday and see if we can try changing it and see if that leads to more checkouts. Fingers crossed.

I came across three books that are going to be weeded but I wanted to read them first. There is a Studs Terkel book, a book about a mutiny, and one filled with short biographies of important people throughout history. I'm already way behind on the books I have checked out but we'll see what I can do.

Other than weeding, my big librarian thing for the day was spending an hour with an 87 year old gentleman trying to figure out his Kindle Fire for him. In the end I was not successful. At least not fully. He wasn't able to download books from the elibrary because if he picked a Kindle book it took him to Amazon and required him to log in but he didn't remember his password, and if he did an EPUB it required an Adobe ID, which he had but couldn't remember the password. And he didn't remember the password for his email so he couldn't do any of the recovery options. At one point I created a new Amazon account for him but couldn't add his device. I even created a new email address to try and get his password reset for his old one, but that didn't work either. We were running in circles. In the end I showed him how to download the Kindle Unlimited books, so at least he could do something. He handled it all pretty well and it was a little inspirational seeing someone his age trying to embrace new technology, especially when it led to the type of thing we had today.

Tonight I at the rest of my Chipotle and I was going to spend my evening doing the same old thing. But then I heard from my Dad and he needed my router to finish up a project for my aunt. I haven't had a chance to use my router in forever so I decided to help out. I packed up my stuff and headed over to his house. He needed the edges of two chair seats rounded off and I was able to do that. It took awhile to get everything set up but it's better to spend that time in the beginning and getting things right than spending it after the fact trying to correct mistakes.

When all the routing was done I stayed and talked for awhile before heading home. When I got home I filled out the loan application for the bank. I have a meeting on Wednesday and filling out the application now should speed up that process tremendously so we can hopefully get things sorted out over my extended lunch break. Especially considering the application took quite awhile and a lot of digging to get all of the financial information. I learned that I have more money than I thought but not as much as I should considering how much I have made in my life. Which isn't a lot considering my hourly pay for the last however many years I've been working, but I still made quite a bit more than I currently have. But we'll see what the bank says. Hopefully good things.

Now I'm going to bed because I typed nearly half of this entry with my eyes closed and I can't stop yawning.