Let The Repairs Begin
Yesterday, Eric and his best friend spent the entire day ripping out my beautiful sidewalk along the south side of the house. I grumbed and growled, despite the fact that I knew it was necessary. See, we have a bit of a foundation issue. We live in a nieghborhod that once housed one of the country’s greatest polluters and, therefore, had the most poisonous ground in all of Denver.
Asarco, a smelting plant, was the reason this neighborhood was built. It was a great job for so many Russian, Polish and (to a much lesser degree) Mexican immigrants that were moving here in the early 1900’s. The land was fairly cheap and, at that time, building your own house wasn’t unheard of. They’d immigrate here, buy a piece of land and live in a shanty until they had the money and necessities to begin building and painting the house with the latest and greatest lead-containing paint on the market. That paint ended up being the least of their worries.
Sometime in the early 90’s, a group of residents banded together and filed suit against Asarco. They took samples of the soil and found exceptionally high levels of arsenic, cadmium and a whole load of stuff you definitely did not want in your vegetables. They won. The first suit of it’s kind ever won by the residents of a neighborhood that had been royally screwed by a big company. They got very little in return, a small bit of money and the replacement of their poisoned dirt. It sent Asarco into bankruptcy - although, not out of business because they’re setting up yet another plant in Houston, so we’ve heard.
So, when they came to replace the soil, they did no grading. They piled the soil in the middle of the yard and there it sat, as a small mountain, leading all the water from rains into the foundation. By the time we moved here, the basement was definitely the worse for wear. The paint is buckled and popping on all four walls but the worst to the south of the house. Eric’s been talking about ripping the sidewalk out to re-grade since we moved in and yesterday the project began.
After ripping out the sidewalk, they realized that A)there was not quite enough available dirt and B)the giant ash tree had decided to grow it’s long and super tough roots on top of the soil instead of underneath. They were going to need a Bobcat. By this time, it was late in the afternoon. They decided to put up the back porch light instead.
Since Eric made it clear that I’m not allowed to mope about it because it will be done, I’m not allowed to whine and complain that I loved that sidewalk and that now my house looks like more of a ghettofied mess than it already did. So, in an effort to be positive about the whole situation, now I have the great beginnings of a moat on the south side and partially along the backside of my house! Woohoo! New housing trend!
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It Came from the Drain
Thanks to the awesome powers of Craigslist, we got ourselves a washing machine!! No more dragging the clothing back and forth to the parents’ houses, no more dirty floor mats because we don’t want to ruin their washer - now we can ruin ours. I can finally start washing the mounds of baby clothing we’ve amassed - all in sizes 0-3 months, which I’m told is essentially worthless. Well, I can start in on washing the mounds once I get Dreft because, apparently, if you wash a baby’s clothing with anything else, their skin will spontaneously combust into small, deadly fires. As fun as it may be to have a randomly combusting child, we just can’t affort to be replacing his clothing every 10 seconds because of burn holes. I’ll save that honor for when he’s 8 and falling asleep with Marlboro’s in his bed.
So, after my poor father and poor Eric moved this giant washer up from a woman with the most adorable little girl ever’s basement, they had to then move it down to ours. To thank him, we bought both he and my mom dinner from The Tamale Kitchen. Dear Lord, was it good and cheap! It was the first time we’d officially entertained anyone in our house. It was nice. We still did not use the table to eat.
After watching Alberto Gonzales lie his face off, my parents left us to begin work on the washer. Eric cleaned it and hooked the sucker up. We did our first load, and it worked…sort of. The washer itself was beautiful. Did perfectly. Whisper quiet. It was our poor dear (nearly) 70 year old house that didn’t fare so well.
So now we must get a trap of some sort to slow the flow from the sink to the drain, and hopefully I can start on my mass cleaning sometime this weekend. Although, I’ll probably end up, as usual, flopped on the couch, complaining about a backache and whining for Eric to get me more water.
Filed under 3rd Trimester, house, pregnancy | Comment (0)Week of the Weak
How do I begin?
Last week, grandpa started having severe heartburn on the 24th. On the 26th, grandma took him to Kaiser (in Aurora, Colorado - want the name of the dumbass doctor? Let me know!), and the doctor sent him home with Prevacid. What? An 83 year old man is complaining of chest pains and severe “heartburn”, and you send him home with Prevacid? The 27th, we took him into emergency at St. Joseph’s hospital. They had him in an EKG for 5 minutes when they rushed him up to surgery. He had 3 main arteries close, they had to do an angioplasty to open one. It was touch and go for a few days. They couldn’t decide if, because of his age, he’d be able to handle a bypass. They kept him until 2 days ago, then sent him home to strengthen his heart for the bypass in 3 weeks. Grandpa is a strong man. He’s feeling better and wants to shovel the walk, already. I may have to tie him down should he try that.
The 28th, we were driving back from closing on the house (YAY!) in Denver Blizzard II, and some girl rear-ended me at a stop light. Rear-ended me going about 25 mph. I spotted lightly for a couple of days afterwards, but tried not to worry too much. I had an appointment for the 4th, so I decided just to wait it out.
We spent New Years in the house. It was fer-reezing, but it was ours. Unfortunately, sleeping in a freezing cold house has left me with a raging cold, and a strange sort of ear and eye ache that I only get when I’m in the house. It’s strange.
So, the 26th through 1st were pretty horrifying. I’m just so glad the week is over.
Filed under 2nd trimester, blizzard, holidays, house | Comment (0)One Mom at a Time
Eric’s mother hates me. She hates everyone, so it’s not a big insult, it’s just not something I’m used to. I generally get along with moms pretty well, and have never been disliked by any friends or boyfriends families. Eric’s mother, however, is a whole other story. In the past two years, and 5 times I have seen her, these are a few of my favorite gems of joy that have come out of her mouth about me.
- “You may want to air yourself out on the way to the concert. Some singers have allergies to such strong perfumes.”
- (To Eric’s dad, screaming in the most hateful tone I’ve ever heard) “And that girlfriend of his…SHE’S FAT! And he’s just making her fatter by feeding her all that junk!”
- (In response to my hearing her) “You don’t understand, I was having a bad day. Besides, I’m worried about your health. I had a bad day, better out than in!”
- “I guess I’m not going to see Jessica again until I get therapy and am perfect.”
- (To Eric, regarding our house - I’m paraphrasing here, because I’m not entirely sure exactly what was said) “I spoke to a lawyer friend about what your options would be if you and Jessica split up. He can talk to you about them when he drops by tomorrow.”
She’s also convinced Eric has suddenly taken up smoking weed . WEED! The man who gets angry about people smoking outside of a door because he’s afraid it might give him lung cancer. She suddenly thinks this when he’s dating me. Coincidence?
Needless to say, at this point, I’m seriously considering not allowing her to come within 100 feet of this child. She’s already not allowed to come near my family because I’m afraid I’d deck her if she said anything even remotely snide to my loved ones.
It’s a little sad, but because of her, I’ve decided not to have a wedding when Eric and I get married. I don’t want to deal with her response when she is not (and she really would not be, under any circumstances) invited, and I don’t want to give her any more leverage to keep Eric’s dad away from him. My parents got married at a courthouse, I guess I can, too.
A whole other issue is dealing with his father, who is a wonderful man. He’s so sweet and kind. He’s got a good heart. His mom, however, rules the roost and I’m not sure how I can have my child enjoy a lot of time with his grandfather (which would be nothing but really good), and stay miles away from Eric’s mother at the same time. Despite how she feels about me, she’s far from a child friendly person. Her reactions and responses to things are so scary, I can’t imagine subjecting a baby to these things. Then, as the baby grows, I can’t imagine what she’ll say to it if it’s overweight, or if she’s unhappy with me that day. Not to mention the energy surrounding her. You can feel it from a mile away, even if you’re not a new age hippy freak like me.
I feel like I’d be a shitty mom to let my child be around that, and that sucks.
Filed under house, in laws, marriage | Comment (0)The House…OUR House
We took my entire family with us to take a look at the house while out for my dad’s birthday yesterday. Surprisingly, even my mom liked it. Although, my grandmother did say, “You’ll have to build a fence between you and the neighbors. They’re dirty.” I was incredibly surprised they all liked it as much as they did. We were wary, however, because we didn’t know if we’d win the bid. Taking them down there to show them a house that’s not even ours yet, probably not the best idea.
We were supposed to find out tomorrow at 4pm whether or not our bid was accepted. Psh! I was not going to wait that long! I found the bid site online and found out that they would post the results today at 2pm. I found this out at 10am. I waited and refreshed for four hours. The results didn’t show at 1:59, 2:00, 2:00:45, 2:02. Then, at 2:03, the results showed up…and the net price was not the price we had bid. I got very sad. Eric nearly had a heart attack. Our entire dream was over.
Then, I realized net price does not mean bid price. I clicked on the link. It wasn’t yet updated. ACK! Refresh, refresh, refresh. At 2:07, the bid price, bid broker and bid confirmation number popped up. The price was right. The broker…the broker wasn’t Coldwell Banker, our broker. I nearly cried again. THEN (again) I realized CB’s parent company was the company listed. Eric confirmed the confirmation number and I screeched for 30 minutes.
We got the house. I’m still tentative until we close in 45 days, but a huge hard part is over. I’m so excited! Hold your babies tight, adulthood, here we come.
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