New year, New duties

I've decided to restart this blogging thing.

I'm still missing my dad, but the pain isn't a sharp daily hurt.

More like a dull ache in my heart.

Our work webpage is migrating and supposedly we're getting a bit more control to directly publish it. My branch chief wants me to take charge of this and I'm all for it. The pages look a lot like blogs with a main panel and side panels. We can do HTML or simple design editing just like on here; so I'm the likely candidate. Not that they know I have a blog, but I'm pretty sure no-one else in our office even knows what HTML is. Here's an office directory from a couple years ago. We are an odd group.

I don't really need more "other duties as assigned" but with work being down because of the economy, it'll be good to have something to keep me working. Plus, I think my bosses are all for it because if their underling volunteers for something it looks good on their year end review too. 

The best of times and the worst of times

So I closed on my house and made frantic time to get everything painted and my stuff moved in. Then the Tuesday after that my mom called and said dad had fallen in the night and he wasn't well. He passed away that Thursday afternoon. I don't really have much to say about it now other than it's hard as a lifelong daddy's girl to lose your dad. He was the one person I always knew was on my side....always.

We buried him in the National cemetery this past Tuesday and I'm helping mom the best I can to process stuff and go through paperwork without making her feel like a frail old lady; because she's not. I wrote most of his obituary and I know I'm not processing this yet; but I just can't fathom life without that 89 year old man in my life. Geez, what suckitude.

Post Closing Letdown

I closed on my house last Tuesday. A friend of mine came over that evening and took a bunch of before photos for me.  Like this one:

Since then, I've been running nonstop. Shopping for paint, painting, packing, babysitting the movers, placing furniture... then, well there was supposed to be unpacking.

Not a lot of unpacking has happened yet. I still have the dining room to paint before I can place the china cabinet. There are a lot of boxes that go in my china cabinet so that's kind of overwhelming. Also, I kind of left the bedroom stuff until last. So that stuff was dumped into boxes and the thought of unpacking those boxes is horrifying.

I have a friend coming over tonight to help paint. Hopefully we can get the dining room done so I can start unpacking in that room. I still need to pack and bring over all my kitchen and bathroom stuff. All the stuff in my closets too. So I'm kind of living between both places. I'm sleeping at my condo on an Aerobed, and spending evenings at the house getting things painted and organized. Hopefully by this weekend, I'll be ready to move fully into my house.

Right now I'm just kind of tired and still anxious to get things done - although I feel like I could just go home and sleep until morning.

I can see clearly now

I've gotten to a point in my life where I don't like to see myself naked. When I'm brushing my teeth, I usually wear a towel because the girls no longer are perky and my belly is saggy and..... well, I'm fat.

I'm still waiting to close on my house btw. Which means I'm surfing house websites and decor websites trying to stay excited about owning a home. So I ran across this:

Spaces design by Interior Designer prizmastudio

It was on Houzz which is an interesting site, if a little cumbersome to surf.

But seriously???? A glass tub, that you can see from the kitchen! What skinny designer dreamt this up? Talk about my idea of hell. The only thing that would be worse is putting it in a room that had a wall of mirrors so I could see all my squishy bits smooshed against the tub walls.

Okay, I'm back to surfing. I felt I had to share; in case you were planning your dream home and loved the idea of seeing yourself naked in a tub.

Second verse (hopefully not) same as the first

So....


Wednesday morning I frantically called several banks. I also had to tell my broker and the seller. Well, the seller wasn't happy but I understand that - I was pretty upset too!  It had been almost 7 weeks since BoA started the loan process and they're just now telling me they can't loan me money?

My broker got me a deal with a local bank. They could do a three year balloon type of loan and close in 10 days. This would make the seller happy and was kind of scary for me. But I'd have the house and I'd have time to get a conventional loan.

The seller gave me the name of a guy who did a friend's loan or their loan.... I wasn't really paying 100% attention since I was feeling kind of numb and not in my body and cried at the drop of a hat. I called that dude and he called me on the way home. I told him the whole sordid tale and said I wanted to know if they could loan me the money or not before I went through another seven week process. He said he'd get some basic information from me and it wouldn't take seven weeks. He could close in three weeks - tops.

So, it looks like I have another loan. Heartland Premier sent me all the paperwork today. The interest rate is .125% higher but they can close in 10 days. I'm not counting my chickens before they become loan commitments though. I'll check back with them on Tuesday morning and see if they have the appraisal scheduled and if I can get a loan committment letter from them. Because a verbal yes clearly doesn't mean dick in the banking world.

Yeah, it sucks that I have to pay for another appraisal. But I'll have the house early enough to do some painting before the movers come on the 8th. And...AND... I'll have a house.

Oh, the worst part? The loan processing POS at BoA couldn't even call me to tell me that they denied my loan. His boss called to tell me and even she kind of beat around the bush. Seriously, grow a fucking pair! Seven weeks of bullshit and you can't even tell me it's a no? How did they get to be "too big to fail" if they are such fuck-ups? He asked for the same information multiple times and apparently it takes 5 weeks for them to even open up the file. 

Bank of America, you denied my loan and I'm pissed; but I'm more pissed that your employees don't have enough professionalism to tell me or enough timely work practices to not leave me hanging on so long. I used to defend you to people, now I'm on the other side. I have no idea how you got so big, but if success in the banking industry is that easy, sign me up!