The Cows Come to Roost?

The blog is getting the last dregs of my day tonight. I hope it ends up being coherent.

The majority of my day was spent serving the needs of my middle sister. Her husband accepted a position in another town several months ago and has been driving an hour and ahalf to work every day - one way. They wanted to allow their youngest son to finish out the school year and spend some time doing a little fix-up on their current home in order to gain the best price. Plus my sister will have to quit her job, for which she already drives out of town.

So she and I have spent alot of time looking online at homes and scouting out properties as I've been down there visiting. Over spring break we spent a day there. During the week of the family reunion we took a day to look at tax properties.

Not a pretty sight, if I do say so myself. But we did manage to find one of the properties she'd seen online back in March that she'd liked. They scheduled to see the inside. I have not.

So their new town will actually be quite a bit closer to me and a nice little jaunt down the highway. Since she's getting down to brass tacks, we spent a good portion of the day on the phone and reviewing some corporate owned homes that they hope to get in to see and perhaps make a low-ball offer. I plan to drive down next week while my son is gone so she and I can spend the day looking at the homes she decides upon from the list we successfully whittled down today.

Whew!

Then the remainder of my evening I spent delving into the world of my new book. Don't know about you, but when it comes to my characters I have to choose a name that really fits with their personality. Normally when I start thinking about who my character is, a name will pop into my head, I'll wallow in it then feel very comfortable as the name settles in.

For the last several days I've been having a devil of a time coming up with an appropriate name for my new detective. Instead of the name sinking into the skin of my character it seems to more bounce off the surface as if struck by rigor mortis. In all my years of writing, I've never struggled so to find a good name for a character.

So I called upon some trusted friends from my critique group.

Gary offered me names like Dallas or Smokey (gee, thanks!), but Tonya hit a home run. I ended up relishing one of the first names she came up with, however with a more exotic spelling, then pulled the last name from another offering she'd thrown against the wall. The two fit perfectly.

So Detective Shaun Landry is born. His opening scene was difficult to write because of the events, but I settled into his psyche so nicely that he already feels like a trusted friend.

Thanks again, Tonya!

Now it's off to bed before the cows come home to roost. Wait a minute...

What a Happy, Happy Day

It's been a very nice day.

And I'm not talking just about the weather.

Received an email from the real estate agent about a property that had another contract on it and was supposed to close by now. I was very disappointed that a contract was written up before I'd had a chance to see inside the property and show it to my dad. Really seemed like it would be a really cute rent house.

The huge lot wasn't bad either. Great feature for a young family with kids.

So yesterday I received the email from him that the financing had fallen through for the buyers and the contract likely wasn't going anywhere. Therefore he'd been given the thumbs up to show the house. Went to see it this afternoon.

Just as I thought - great rent home potential.

Made a ton of notes, really inspected the property inside and out, and saw only a few minor things that needed to be dealt with. Piece of cake! Emailed my parents all the data and made a recommendation to them about making an offer.

Plus the weather was extremely nice for getting out and seeing the property. Great excuse to get me away from the computer.

Then my son came home from school and puttered away to his best buddy's house for the rest of the afternoon. Called a few hours ago and made plans to spend the night over at his house. Yippee! A whole evening all to myself.

So I made good use of the time. Periodically I go through periods where I like to write song lyrics. Need to get a refresher on music theory and peck out the tune on the piano if I want to finish, but it felt good to just do some writing. Song lyrics really come up from the deep when I'm in the mood.

Earlier that evening, I decided to get out and just go down to the city park and relax, take in the fresh air, enjoy the sunset, and checkout the budding trees.

That's what got me thinking of a song.

Several years ago I was going gang-busters in my music. Then life happened and I had to step back to devote time to restoration of mine and my son's lives. Been a difficult road at times. Been frustrating not having the voice to express myself in song. That's where the depths of my heart were left in the cold.

In looking at the trees, anticipating their renewed vigor just waiting to burst forth from the branches, I got to thinking about my own life.

The trees may appear dead and decaying in winter, but they aren't dead merely dormant. Life still courses in their veins and is only waiting the end of the dormancy to burst forth with a reflection of new life.

I guess my life has at times felt in the winter. My life has lain dormant for many years not only a season. But just like those trees, life is still coursing through my veins waiting to burst forth.

So I wrote the song tonight. Felt good to write something - anything - again. Felt good to think about music again. Felt great to get out in the amazing sunshine today.

Yes sir-ee-bob! It's been a marvelous day.

House-Hunting Weekend

The weekend house-hunting went really well.

We made it around to see all nine homes in record time. My dad was very pleased with my choice of agents (which, of course, pleased me). Then we were able to narrow our thoughts down to the ones I felt he should prioritize to make offers on soon.

All in all, couldn't have asked for a smoother day of house searching.

Except Mom and I could have done without the flu.

Yep, that's right. My mother and I both came down with the nasty flu bug this weekend.

Chalk up three times illness this winter. This is getting really old.

But the important thing was that we made it around to all the houses before things got really bad. So the goal of the weekend was still set, even though it was a bit of a struggle.

I only hope and pray that the poor real estate agent doesn't come down with the love after all that.

Possible Promising Properties

Getting ready for a very busy weekend. It will be likely I won't be able to post on Saturday.

Mom and Dad are coming up this weekend. I've been working to find a good agent that my dad will appreciate, finding some good properties, and working with the agent to set up appointments.

Missed out on a few of the properties on my list. Four are already under contract, with one estimated to close on Monday.

Shoot!

However, in scavenging about I may have stumbled onto a tax sale property. The agent is doing more checking into this for me, but I did verify that at least for the last reporting period that the owners were delinquent on property taxes and that the property is vacant.

Maybe the county will be auctioning that off soon. Be nice if we could get into it to see. Gee, that almost sounds a little heartless. Guess it would feel bad if the people hadn't already vacated the property. Who knows how long it's been sitting empty.

There are a few other properties that I've checked into that are FSBO - For Sale By Owner. One sounds like a possible promising property.

How's that for an alliteration?

So far we have nine appointments set up starting at 11:00 on Saturday. I only hope we can get some good deals on a few of these properties to make all this worth my parents' and the agent's time.

Be horrifying if nothing came from all of this - for everyone involved.

The Object of Desire

Well I ended up not getting any writing done today.

Ended up spending a little time with my salon friend. She's getting the remake completed and really wants to work with me on marketing and employee development. Met her new business partner, who is really sweet and a people person.

I'm looking forward to seeing what I can do for them.

Also spent time this afternoon working on finding a real estate agent and looking up property tax information on some homes we're going to be perusing. My parents are coming back up next weekend and we're going to do a few run-throughs on about eight to ten houses in the area.

It's going to be alot of fun for me, probably a little stressful for my dad. But I think he'll like the agent I found. My dad is no-nonsense when he's considering property. He's not interested in salesmanship, just someone who can let him look and give him time to make decisions then wrap up the details with a nice bow at closing.

He's going to be impressed with this agent. I had a wonderful conversation with him this evening and think he'll be just the perfect match.

You know, it's so nice being needed and wanted.

This job prospecting has been rather frustrating. Since the industry is so depressed at the moment, there's almost no activity happening in my area of specialty. But I'm a quick study and can always take my specialty and translate it into something else.

I think the other problem is that the finance industry probably doesn't want to pay the salary I previously earned. It's not the salary I want, it's the opportunity! I'm more than willing to take a cut just to get in the door and show someone the value I can bring to their organization.

However, I do not want to get back into the big corporate lifestyle, but I do want to work. Which is why this freelancing stuff just might be my ticket. I've even got an online publication that wants me to write articles for small businesses. Little money, but good publicity potential, eh? Hard work getting things off the ground, but hey! I'm a single mother.

Hard work is my middle name. It isn't for cowards either. Neither is freelancing.

Which is why I might make it.