Not Quite Out of the Park

Holy shit. We've bought a house. Holy fucking shit.

My expletives are a little premature. Until we've waived the conditions, we can still walk away.

But in my opinion, the inspection was a home run. Our inspector, a different inspector from last time, was impressed with the house. I was impressed with the house. The real test will be Steve going over the inspector's report and having a look at the back unit where he and Shelley and the Little Dog will live.

Based on my extremely rigorous sample of two, I say that building inspectors are kind, efficient and thorough men. This one reminded me quite a bit of the Great Dater. I didn't get it quite at first, since he's a generation older, with a head of close-cropped grey hair and a neatly trimmed brush mustache. I had just a vague feeling of familiarity. Again, it was the hands - one particular gesture that riffled quick through my memories and came back with a warm feeling.

Of course, there are some things wrong with the houses. The century old foundation of the front house is going to leak. The water pressure's low. The front house attic needs to be vented properly. The water pipe from the house to the street is lead (ditto on the street water pipe).

Whenever something like those last two came up, I say "Okay, ballpark, how much is it going to cost to fix?" And he'd say something like "Well, if the city's already done the street pipe, then you're looking at, oh, fifteen" and here my heart fell into my shoes "hundred."

And it flew back up into my chest and burst into crimson blooms of joy.

I was so fucking happy that I almost said "Fifteen hundred?! That's nothing! Everything that was wrong with the other place was one more zero more expensive than that!"

However, I did not. My agent was standing right there, and though she knows that there was a possible other deal, we have silently agreed to pretend there never was.