Category Archives: Forever Home

October 31, 2024 · 23:50

No Mo’ NaNoWriMo

Tomorrow November starts, and in many years that would have meant the kickoff of a National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) effort on my part. If you’re curious, you can look back in the archives here and search for that term – I’ve always published my feeble and incomplete efforts on here. A couple of them I liked, a couple were just embarrassing. You pays your money, you takes your chances.

This year there’s no way on Earth I have the time or energy to even think about another campaign. I’m already on such physical and emotional thin ice with other time pressures and priorities that it would be suicide.

In addition, in the last year there have been “issues” with the management of NaNoWriMo, which runs as a non-profit. A number of the issues are serious, and while some heads have rolled and some changes have been made, I’m not convinced that the problem has been adequately addressed. So I won’t be a part of the NaNoWriMo organization or efforts, even if I did have the time.

There is at least one other group trying to get a new organization going (I forget the name of the group) but I haven’t heard much, just that it was trying to get started, so maybe we’ll see where we’re at this time next year.

For now – as expected, not a single trick-or-treater tonight at our house, primarily because we live off the beaten path a bit on the top of a huge freakin’ hill. Again, we’ll see where we are at this time next year, hopefully in that legendary Forever Home in a more pedestrian and family-friendly neighborhood.

November starts tomorrow and it will be a big one, especially with the US national election in five days. The fact that it could still go either way is terrifying. For the life of me, I truly can’t understand why it’s not 95/05 in the polls, or more. And even if it does turn into a resounding defeat for fascism, what the Mango Mussoli and his cult do in the days afterward has the potential to be horrific.

C’mon, November. I know you got the short end of the stick and a tough assignment. Make us all proud!

Leave a comment

Filed under Forever Home, Politics, Writing

September 26, 2024 · 23:46

Halloween’s Coming

Is it me? Is it this year? Are people needing to escape reality starting weeks earlier than normal? (I blame politics – if that’s not a reason these days to escape reality, I don’t know what is!) Are the Halloween decorations starting weeks and weeks earlier than in all previous years?

We’ve got a fair number of houses in the neighborhood that go all out for Halloween, the same way I go a bit over the top for Christmas lights. But that has normally meant that three weeks or so, maybe around October 7-10th, we would see the decorations going up.

This year I saw the first big displays going up around September 15th. Of course, there have been Halloween candy displays in the supermarkets since July 5th, that’s “normal.” But today I noticed a dozen more houses that have their full displays up.

Again, when we were at the Pomelo house, a half block from the local elementary school, on flat ground, on a more prominent street, and at a place where we had been for decades, we would put out the telescopes, put up some decorations, and sit out there handing out candy and letting folks take a look at whatever was up in the sky that night. These days, nowhere near a school or anything other than more houses, at the top of a freakishly large and steep hill, we probably won’t bring out the scopes or doing anything else, no matter what all of the folks at the bottom of the hill are doing. I think we’ve had something like five Trick or Treaters show up at our house in six years.

Another thing to keep in mind when we’re finalizing our search for The Forever Home. Next year. I don’t see that happening in any sort of time frame for this year.

Leave a comment

Filed under Christmas Lights, Forever Home, Photography

August 18, 2024 · 23:30

Find The 747

The sky was almost stupidly blue and cloud-free, except for one broad north-south band that had to be at a different temperature or moisture content or something, since little puffy clouds where there and as jets went through it the left little contrails.

As is not uncommon, there was a rumble and yet another cargo 747 was headed from LAX to Asia. It may have been 11,000+ feet up, but the deep almost subsonic thrum of those four big engines is pretty easy to identify.

(Image from FlightRadar24 app)

I moved a bit so that I could see it through the trees. Can you find it overhead to our north?

This will be one of the things that I miss at the Forever Home, wherever that might be. In Apple Valley and Hesperia there are a couple of small airports, and one of the houses I’m really interested in lies just a half-mile or so from the end of one of the runways, but we won’t see any big jet traffic like this, more like the light, private aircraft that go in and out of Whiteman, where I learned to fly in Pacoima.

Leave a comment

Filed under Flying, Forever Home, Photography, Weather

August 10, 2024 · 23:36

To Pool Or Not To Pool

Soooooooo many factors to consider when looking through hundreds and thousands of Zillow postings for THE ONE, The Forever Home.

Deal killers abound both pro and con – steps are out, as are any HOA fees, but a walk-in shower, kitchen pantry, and high-speed internet are absolute must have items. (I’ll still be working, remotely, from home, so that internet isn’t just so that I can stream Real Housewives of Sheboygan any time I want!)

Other things are more fuzzy getting plugged into the decision tree. Solar panels? Really, really nice, but we can always add them later if we really need to. A trash compactor? Not a problem if it’s not there, we have one in this rental house and we’ve never, EVER used it.

A pool or jacuzzi? They’re not uncommon out here because of the climate and they fit into the price range and home size that we’re looking at. I would guess somewhere between 25% and 33% of the houses we look at have either a pool or a jacuzzi, and of those most have a combination. We had a jacuzzi at the Pomelo house for almost 30 years, but we didn’t use it more than a couple times a year (at most!) and sometimes it would go for a couple years at a time without being used, usually due to maintenance issues.

I could live without the expense of a pool and/or jacuzzi, but I do see where they would be nice to have. So it’s neutral to me – I wouldn’t mind having one and if we do get a house with one I’ll probably make an actual effort to use it more regularly. But if we find a nice home without one, that’s just dandy as well.

The one shown here is at a house in Lancaster that we looked at today. Nothing that I absolutely am in love with, but it would be acceptable if for some reason we had to pull the trigger on Monday (God forbid!) and be moved in 30 days (just kill me now). On the other hand, it’s better to have a Plan B and not need it than to need a Plan B and not have it.

As with so many things in life…

Leave a comment

Filed under Forever Home, Photography

August 9, 2024 · 23:43

Not In Glasgow

Worldcon has started in Glasgow – we really wanted to be there, but we’re not, in large part because we need to buy that Forever Home Real Soon Now.

Next year in Seattle, we can hope. That will be a little bit more fiscally possible.

With today’s communications technologies and social media, it’s easy to follow along as friends have migrated their way to Glasgow. I’m not sure if that helps or hurts. It’s not the same as being there, but it does allow us to watch the Hugo Awards ceremonies and some of the other major events.

The good news is that some of the final pieces are finally falling into place on the preparation for pulling the trigger on purchasing and moving to that Forever Home. It’s simultaneously incredibly exciting and incredibly terrifying. But if everything works out, we could be in our new place by the holidays.

It’s going to be “exciting.” With that happening on a personal level and *waves hands at the world* everything going on with the elections and life in general in the US, there’s gonna be some significant stress on multiple levels.

It is equally true that A) I’m too old and tired for this shit and B) the only way out is through.

Fun times!

Leave a comment

Filed under Fandom, Forever Home

August 7, 2024 · 22:44

Sunset Lizard

I know that all y’all have been wondering how the yard lizards have been doing. It’s a good thing, nothing to be ashamed of.

Just an hour or so before sunset. I went out to catch a final bit of daylight, my little lizard friend in all of his ectothermic glory, was doing the same.

Not so little. We’ve had quite the crop of tiny (maybe two inch long?) “popcorn” lizards this summer, but this one’s pretty good sized for a fence lizard.

The instant I got too close, our friend was off like a shot to someplace where they blended into the background a little bit more.

Being in the shade wasn’t ideal, and there was also a goal of staying opposite of me on the tree trunk, so when I moved, they moved.

Once they got up into a higher, sunnier spot, I backed off and went back the way I had come in, leaving them to catch those final rays for the evening. They needed it more than I did. I’ve got a billion years of evolutionary advancements working for me.

Of all of the things we’re looking for in the Forever Home that we love about our current and previous homes, our lizard friends will be the easiest to guarantee finding in the Victor Valley area.

Leave a comment

Filed under Critters, Forever Home, Photography

August 5, 2024 · 23:56

No Context For You – August 05th

If it ain’t one thing it’s another…

I sort of truly hate the stupid little home maintenance issues that pop up around the house. But while it would be one thing on our Forever Home or at least on a home we owned, it’s a royal pain in the freakin’ ASS to have one after another on a house that we’re renting and still getting stuck with them instead of having the landlord take care of them.

It’s a hell of an incentive to find that Forever Home and get the move done, as much as that move will be Hell on Earth for months. Its a lot like all of the recent dental work I’ve been having done – it truly sucks, but it’s an ordeal that has to be endured to get to the other side. That whole, “The only way out is through!” thing.

Still doesn’t mean that I have to like it, and I have no intention of doing so. I get to bitch and whine and pout and I plan on doing so!

Leave a comment

Filed under Forever Home, Paul, Photography

August 4, 2024 · 23:42

Take Advantage Of Your Opportunities When You Get Them

My philosphiphical advice for the day is to always be on the lookout for opportunities and to take advantage of them when they arise. In particular, I’m thinking about this in terms of the simple things, especially the ones that you just assume that will ALWAYS be there tomorrow if you pass them up today.

My example that got me thinking about this is the classic ice cream truck. You know, big and boxy, covered with stickers advertising ice cream sandwiches, creamcicles, bomb pops, and frozen Snickers, window on the side, usually with a cheesy, awful tune playing over a loud speaker system so that you could hear them coming from blocks away. When we were kids, that cheesy, tinkly, annoying music gave us time to go harass our parents for a couple of dollars and still have time to go running out into traffic to get run over trying to catch up to the truck. If we were particularly industrious, during the summer we would go walking along 72nd Street, scouring the weeds along the road for discarded Coke bottles that we could redeem for nickles at Pitko’s General Store, saving that change so that we could have our own money for the ice cream truck.

At our old house on Pomelo, the streets were flat and we were about five houses down the street from the elementary school, so we would have the ice cream truck by almost daily during the summer, every year. I would always hear it and always be busy, so I always figured that I would go out and catch the truck and get a random, spontaneous ice cream treat some other time in the future. Tomorrow. Or the next day. Next week, maybe. Next month…

Six years ago we moved to this house, which is at the top of a really long, steep hill that the ice cream truck might or might not be able to actually get up, and we’re nowhere near a school. Thus, NO ice cream trucks here. EVER.

And something made me think about that and realize that I had the opportunity almost daily for DECADES and I almost never took advantage of those opportunities. And now I’m out of luck.

Something else to check out when we’re shopping for the Forever Home. And you can bet if I find out that we’re on a regular path for an ice cream truck, I’ll be dropping everything and sprinting out for an ice cream sandwich when I hear that tinny, electronic circus tune. If I happen to be in the middle of a work Zoom meeting? C’est la vie! A guy’s gotta do what a guy’s gotta do! I’ll be older and wiser the next time.

Leave a comment

Filed under Deep Thoughts, Forever Home, Paul

July 27, 2024 · 23:41

Brain Sludge

That’s what I’ve got between my ears these days, or at least it’s what it feels like way too often. A huge factor is the whole “Forever Home” hunt. I have looked at so many houses on Zillow in the past three years. Literally hundreds. Probably not at a thousand plus just yet, but if Zillow had the stats to show me otherwise I wouldn’t be that surprised.

They all blur together, both individual homes and locals. This is the view from our hotel room in May when we went to visit the Apple Valley / Hesperia / Victorville (the “Victor Valley” or “High Desert” area) out on I-15 about halfway to Las Vegas.

There’s still a little snow on the surrounding mountains, and it looks very nice in the winter when there’s more. Sometimes they even get some here, being up at about 3,000′ elevation. But if you didn’t know, this could be Las Vegas, Phoenix, Tucson, Palm Springs, or anyplace in the Los Angeles area away from the coast (the “Inland Empire”). Huge lots of weeds, huge shopping centers, parking lots to the horizon, dotted with housing tracts, some “okay” and some really nice. But they’re all cut from the same cloth.

Now we’re seeing houses that we looked at in May which sold in June that are now dropping out of escrow and coming back onto the market, which confuses me even more as I’m trying to keep track of what we’ve seen, what the current price and status are, and so on. One place was “the dream house” and it’s absolutely freaking stunning, but not perfect and I have to wonder if the yellow flags are actually red flags and my “house lust” is blinding me to their true nature. Another that showed up today looks great on Zillow, but I remember going to see it in person and it was a bit on the “what a dump!” side. So never buy something sight unseen based on the Zillow listing. Those pictures might not be current and they might have been “cleaned up” just a touch, or selectively edited.

I would kill right now to have our ducks lined up on financing, pick a place that hits all of the “must haves” and has a handful of “wanna haves” and is more than just “good enough.” Then we could pull the trigger, get through escrow, and get through the ordeal that is going to be moving again for the very last time.

When that time comes, I think the biggest decision will be how much “good enough” is actually good enough. We’re looking at a range of houses and a range of prices, and there are $450K houses that I could live in if it were an emergency but they’ll never be my first choice, while there are also $700K “dream” houses. Of course, there’s a whole spectrum in between, with some $550K houses that are pretty nice and some $650K houses that I like a lot. Where on that spectrum do we take our shot? It’s a big decision, we’ll be there the rest of our lives if the everything goes to plan.

For those who have watched “Ted Lasso” (hopefully all of you) I would remind you of the angry and vulgar speech that Roy makes to Rebecca when she’s started dating and the guy she’s seen a couple of times is “fine.” Roy (correctly) reminds her to NEVER settle for “fine” because she’s spectacular and deserves nothing but the best. (It’s my second favorite scene in the entire series.) That sentiment haunts me when I’m looking at an array of potential houses. I don’t want to pay the mortgage on an extra $50K or $100K if I don’t have to, but I also don’t want to end up six months after moving having buyer’s remorse because the Forever Home we picked is “just fine.”

And it turns my brain to sludge. Anyone have any wisdom to share?

 

2 Comments

Filed under Forever Home, Photography

July 19, 2024 · 22:41

Sunset – July 19th

Two days ago I had cloudy “skyscape” photos and noted that by sunset they were gone and “we just got a nice gradient effect. Nice, but not spectacular.”

This is what I was talking about.

Lots of color, but very subtle hues. Pastels, not “Holy crap!” reds and oranges painted on dramatic cloud shapes.

Trees and human infrastructure silhouetted against the fading light. It’s a refined taste.

One of the things our Forever Home will have will be a nice, comfy bench or swing facing west so, gradient or clouds or anything in between, I can go out and chill and relax and breathe and watch the sunset.

Leave a comment

Filed under Forever Home, Sunsets