Like Throwing Money Away

This evening was full of decisions.  One about laundry and the other about sod.


My dad, who's an insurance investigator, came by and checked out our home.  It's not worth making a claim on our insurance, but we do need to replace the laundry room flooring and the washer.  Turns out we bought it four years ago; it was the dryer we had to replace when we moved.  Our old place was all electric, and this is wired for a gas dryer.  From what I've been hearing, four to five years is now the common life span of these "durable goods."


I did find our old washer online, but I also looked into some bigger, schmancier models.  One that I especially like is about $250 more, but it's a high efficiency top loader with rave customer reviews (except for the one in which a person self-identified as the cranky old lady down the street, but with different words... she hated it).  Sort of the best of both worlds.


We talked it over.  Under what I think of as "normal" circumstances, we'd go ahead and upgrade.  We ultimately decided to save our money now, even if it means not having lower water bills in the future.  Without trying out the bells and whistles washer, we don't have an effective means of judging the potential savings anyway.


So I went online to order the simple washer.  It's not available for delivery or in-store purchase for at least 90 days.  I might have cackled with glee when I read that.  And the other one?  It'll be here on June 22.  That's a long time to go without a washer, especially since Mad's still dealing with diarrhea.  In the meantime, I'll have to find out where we can get our laundry done.  Margaret has offered to do our laundry for us, and she did do a desperation load for me on Monday, but we don't feel right having that become a two-week long habit.


The second decision has to do with our sod, our realtor and the title company from when our home was in escrow.  Today I received documentation showing that the lien against our property for not having appropriate ground cover out front has been lifted.  Dave, the realtor, ended up going to the head of some department in our city to get the fine waived since the work has been done and we were not the owners when the fine was levied.  While following up on that he told me, "In my research I found that two additional liens were filed (against the original owners).  The title company handled those, but the city hasn't cleared them yet."  He took up that matter with the city, too.  So we also received proof that those liens are resolved.


Then Dave requested that I send him our receipt for the sod and related equipment.  He wants to go after the title company and make them pay.  He said it's unlikely to happen, but he would attempt it for us.  Usually when he says that, he makes "it" happen.  Tom and I talked it over and decided to let it go.  The amount we'd potentially recoup would be quite helpful.  It would more than pay for our schmancy washer.  It just isn't our thing.  Tom said he knew the lawn would have to be replaced when we bought the house.  I figured we could just reseed and water it.  Whatever.  If Dave could get some sort of commission from this work, or if we had the money for a lovely thank you gift, that would be one thing.  All we can offer him is what he already gets from us:  Our undying respect, admiration and appreciation.  Oh, and we pass on his name whenever it seems appropriate.  So we're done.  The lawn is in.  The bills will be paid.  Life goes on.


If you need an amazing realtor, who really will go above and beyond for you, and you're in southern California, let me know.  I'll give you Dave's number, too.

Going Green

Um... no, I'm not talking about getting all environmentally friendly*, I'm talking about putting in a lawn.  In our yard.  Uh, yeah... in the desert.

*We are mostly environmentally friendly people.  If you saw the vegetable graveyard... er, compost pile we have out back, or know that we frequently recycle twice as much as we throw away... I've even made five or six trips to recycle concrete... you'd know that.  I just need a little green, soft, cool, slightly damp lawn to walk, sit or play upon.

Getting the lawn wasn't exactly high drama, but there has been some drama surrounding our yard.  Last fall when I (finally) went to register Maisy, I learned that we have a $460 lien on the property.  Why?  Because there was dead grass in the yard.  All of the city's records stopped just over a month before we bought the place (staff shortage), so technically, we're not responsible for it.  Dave, our realtor, has been working with the escrow and title companies to get it resolved. 

We had a small amount of hope that the title company would pay to have our lawn put in, but they are standing by the fact that the city didn't report that lien (there was another larger lien for something else, but that had been reported and handled).

Nine or 10 months ago, Tom ripped out all of the dead lawn.  We thought we'd have no problem getting a new lawn in before the real heat of summer, but then the truck conked out and we now have a second massive car payment.  Functioning cars (both are hybrids... we're environmentally friendly, I tell ya!) or lawn?  It was a tough choice, but I guess the right one was made.

Now that winter's over, and we still have that lien hanging, it was time to do some yard work.  Dave thinks he can get the city to drop the fee as long as the work has been done.  Can I just admit here that I'm glad for the lien because it meant doing the lawn before we otherwise would have?  Don't tell Tom... or Dave.

So we had some sod delivered...

Did a little gardening,

(Okay, some of us might have done more intense, hard labor)

And some of us might have dragged our feet more than we should have (and we still didn't get to go see Amber again, dang it all!),  

But in the end, a lawn was made.

I am more sore than I've been in years, but it was good to work side by side with Tom and have something to show for it.  He did most of the truly hard stuff.  Corey (mostly) cleared the spot on the other side of the driveway and picked up rocks and debris that came out of our yard (a four foot length of rusted metal? really?).  I cut open all the bags of topper and topsoil and did most of the sod cutting (edges and sprinklers).  And I swept dirt for what seemed like days.  Tom did pretty much everything else.

My dad and Margaret showed up at 8:00 last night when they'd heard we were struggling to wrap things up.  I could have cried.  Margaret took control of Madelyn and wrangled our downstairs floor into shape while Corey made dinner.  Dad helped lay sod and used the roller.  As soon as it was done, they were out of here.  They took a two hour drive (round trip) to help us.

We've definitely learned our lesson.  We didn't think we'd need much help (a brother-in-law helped us get all of the non-sod components home), and the backyard will be a much larger project (digging sprinkler trenches in clay? should be fun); we didn't want to ask for help too often.

I have already sent out an email to our local-ish friends and family.  We probably won't get to the backyard until next year, so they can either move far, far away, or be ready for the Bat Signal.