s/v Lark: February 2013

2/28

I let it get too late for coherent sentences.

Painting contractors, lesson 72, and South from Alaska today.

238.

I got the china cabinet emptied out today. Tomorrow, it and our second-to-last bookcase will go out to the garage.

Audrey did an awesome job with lesson 72. We're excited to make the switch to normal orthography in lesson 74.

We've got Mike, Alisa, and Elias almost down to La Paz in South from Alaska.

235.9

2/26

I took down most of the infamous pegs this evening.

I had a doc appt today and had BP of 112/78, even with the white coat right there. I may be having the fight of my life with the upper 230s, but I'm winning on the BP front. Hooray for not having heart attacks on passage!

238.4

2/whatever today is

We had another realtor in as a matter of due diligence. She was a huge downer.

2/24

We took today off of house selling.

Audrey did lesson 70.

2/23

I finally got all the grout sealer cleaned up in the kitchen. I also sealed all the new grout in the shower. I got my wardrobe thinned out sufficiently to fit everything in a dresser and a closet, and I repaired the closet bar in what is now my closet.

Audrey did a great job on lesson 70.

234.8

2/22

We got a call from a realtor for someone who wants to have a look at the house. Commence scrambling...

235.2

2/21

We made good progress on emptying some furniture today. I also paid my dues in tile cleaning.

I think we may have seen the error of our ways on the FSBO thing. You still probably have to pay the buyer's agent their 3%, then the attorney is 1%, then the MLS listing is several hundred dollars, plus whatever other marketing expenses we'd incur. Our prospective agent only charges 2% in the first place, so in the end I think we'd be saving ourselves something like .75%. So we'll just go for it I think.

I finally broke through 237 and got to 236.6 this morning.

2/20

I figured out how to clean that grout sealer from the tiles. It's not too hard, but does take some elbow grease. Like many boat projects! I got about 1/4 of the backsplashes done. The shower's going to be a real treat.

I also installed all the missing drawer and cabinet pulls in the kitchen.

Slow but steady wins the race, as Dad always told me, and as I was telling Audrey the other day.

Speaking of which, she did beautifully with lesson 69 this morning.

Now for a chapter of South from Alaska...

237.0

2/19

So our neighbor two doors down has just listed. That's a pretty good comp. We'll be very interested to see what happens there.

That darn grout sealer is pretty tricky to clean off the tiles afterward.

237.3

2/18

I got the kitchen grout all sealed, the window trim back up, sorta, removed the last of the baby gates, and all the baby locks on the cabinets.

I also did some pricing research with some comps. It's really weird the way things are priced right now. Big beautiful houses are cheap; little ones are expensive. Fortunately for us, ours is little. Hopefully things will be better sorted out in a few weeks.

Audrey did a great job with lesson 68.

239.4

2/17

I got all the tile caulking done. Audrey did lesson 67. I compiled another exhaustive list of tasks to prepare the house for sale and sell it. Again.

I bounced off of 237 again. I will break through it no matter what.

239.2

2/15

I didn't get to do much toward the goal today, but did do a bit more reading on FSBO on the bus today.

I'm infatuated with a beautiful old boat these past couple days -- a 47 foot Ted Brewer ketch from 1975. I know it's an awful lot of boat to handle but she's sure a beauty...

238.5

2/14

I got a book on selling your house and read about a third of it last night. I can't remember the title at the moment, but I'm really happy with it. It's got lots of good concrete guidance on how to do this. I believe it will be a great help.

I need to get back to the tile project and wrap up all the loose ends with that, hopefully I can get it all done this weekend.

237.7

2/13

We took a night off housework tonight, but Audrey did a nice job with lesson 65 today and I got to spend some good time on the bus today reviewing Pat's swing trading strategies.

239.4

Today is the groutest

Ok we finally finished that grout job. That'll really take it out of you.

Oh for crying grout loud

OK, that was bad, I know. Not as bad as going down to Home Depot for another 10 pound bag of grout, getting all psyched up for another night of it, putting on work clothes, mixing, taping, spreading, and then running out again. Oh well. Anyway we made great progress and now we get to do one more night of bonding over hard labor...

239.7

2/10

I installed the other new light in the kitchen today. I'm not sure I like it. It's the one on the right.

Also, here's a picture of the new tile in the upstairs shower. It's grouted on the left and but not on the right. You know how we ran out of grout and all. But anyway I think the grout makes it look better.

Now for a chapter of South from Alaska and a snooze.

240.0

The grouting hands grout all they can

Well, we started to grout the shower. Then we ran out of grout. I sure hope there's not some dire consequence to allowing half your grout project to dry before doing the other half. I mean we didn't let big glops dry on the tile or anything. I will say that I'd be perfectly happy if this turns out to be the last time I ever have to grout.

I also hauled the debris from demoing the old hardboard travesty in the midst of a blizzard. It snowed for 20 minutes today and I spent the whole time at the dump. Good times.

241.3. Sigh.

2/9

After a couple days' hiatus from tiling, this evening I cleaned up all the stray mortar in the upstairs shower in preparation for grout tomorrow evening. Then it'll be caulk in the kitchen and shower, then replacing window trim in the kitchen and then grout sealer in both places and that project will be done.

241

Taking Stock

Wow. I feel completely exhausted and spread-thin and pulled in a million directions these past few weeks. Witness my recent series of barely-there posts. Not that I've ever been all that long-winded in posts...

I'm going to take this evening to just pour it all out in hopes getting a better handle on it all. It's going to be a classic brain-dump -- disorganized and inarticulate. Enjoy.

So I've finished Live on the Margin, by Pat Schulte of Bumfuzzle and Nick O'Kelly. It was really great. It was one book about 4 or 5 different things, all of which were just the right things for me to read at this point in the endeavor.

We're in the midst of South From Alaska, which is both inspiring and provides a pretty unflinching look at the realities of cruising, fun and otherwise.

We've been doing our DTRs religiously which has been great for our relationship. There's nothing like a joint BHAG and tons of shared meaning to replace bickering and nagging with support and warmth.

Audrey and I have been cruising through Teach Your Child to Read. I've been learning so much about how to be my kids' teacher, and she's been, you guessed it, learning to read. Check out the story she read tonight.

We've been doing all kinds of things to sell the house and have a million things still to do. The clock is now running quickly on getting everything ready to sell. We should probably list officially around April 1. Over the next 8 to 12 weeks we need to:

Learn a thing or two about selling a house
Fully bake our FSBO plan
Finish home repairs and improvements
Market
Stage
List
Show
Close

Here's the house stuff we've gotten done in the past couple months:

Got one of the three missing overhead lights installed in the garage
Replaced front door
Replaced kitchen door locking knob
Got rid of lots of stuff
Cleaned up a lot of entrenched messes
Got rid of horrible old stove hood
Put in beautiful new OTR microwave
Tiled backsplashes in kitchen
Got rid of horrible old upstairs bahroom hardboard "surround"
Took down baby gates
Scraped, sanded, filled, hardened, primed, and painted kitchen door and windows.
Tiled shower upstairs

I've been stalled out on losing weight at around 240 pounds. I'm down 33 pounds and very proud of it. All my old pants are loose and won't stay on without a belt. For the first time in my life I am able to ski Eldora top-to-bottom for hours without my legs burning. Still, I cannot afford to stop here. I must and I will find the motivation and the approach that will get me to 200 this year.

It's all left precious little time for things relating directly to cruising. Things like learning everything there is to know about boats and diesels and hull and deck and sail maintenance and repair and storm tactics, and the logistics of entering and exiting countries and how to fish and how to pilot and first aid. But we'll get there.

Something I've told myself throughout this effort was that it would be a long and winding road to ultimate success, and that while the entire effort might encompass a number of other separate arduous and mundane efforts that we have a good chance of achieving our goal by simply putting one foot in front of the other on each task and never slackening our pace. Hopefully that will prove to be true.

238.4

2/6

Audrey did great with lesson 63 today. That is all.

239.7

2/6

Whew! We have been busy around here! The house is really starting to come along, thanks in huge part to my dad. He was here for 10 days helping with our big tiling projects. He did an amazing job, and it is nearly done. As we complete things off our list, it seems like new projects are popping up. For example, our medicine cabinet has decided it has had enough and is now falling apart. Our new list is a bit shorter now though, and hopefully we will get it all done in order to officially put the house on the market by early spring.

playing a little pinball with Grampsy

We tried to have some fun with my dad too, and did some skiing (both with Audrey and the adult variety), swimming and just hanging out. We discovered the series The Tudors and managed to watch the entire first season during his trip (beware, it is occasionally slightly uncomfortable to watch with your dad), now we have to wait until his next trip out to watch season 2. I'm dying with anticipation.