You call it 'being cheap,' I call it 'being smart'

While out running errands Saturday morning I stopped in at a local thrift store where I buy vintage paperback books from time to time. I had just planned to run in and check through their latest stock very quickly and then go home so that Sparky and I could go back out and run the other errands we had planned for that day.

As I went in the store I saw they were having one of their periodic bag of books sales. The deal is you get all the books you can stuff into one of their bags for four bucks. So I grabbed one of them and I commenced checking through every bookcase and book rack they had. By the time I was done I had stuffed that bag with 43 paperbacks and 1 hardback book. That bag was bulging like Carla from Top Chef's eyes, like Rush Limbaugh's leiderhosen, like a baby's diaper after a long night. I noticed that the bag was starting to split in places so I ran with it to the counter and I paid my four dollars.

As soon as the gal gave me my change I said, "This bag is about to fall apart, can I have some other bags to put all these books in?" She said, "Sure." So I took four bags. As I started putting the books into the other bags I thought, "Holy hell, I just saved myself $12. I hope the check out gal doesn't notice the irony of me asking for more bags and demand more money." Luckily enough for me she didn't. Boo ya!

Better homes and gardens

After being guardedly optimistic I am now pretty excited because it looks like we've got ourselves a new Monkey Central on our hands.

We saw a house on Sunday and we both liked it very much. So we went back and looked at it again yesterday for about an hour and a half. Then we decided that the price, the house, and the neighborhood was right so we decided to make the owners an offer.

We had been holding off making offers until we found out if the people buying our place had a buyer for their place and we found out this Monday that they did, so we decided to jump in and start negotiating on houses we liked. And we liked the house we saw on Sunday and saw again yesterday. Sure, it's not perfect and we'll have to do some remodeling to get it the way we want it but the potential on this place is huge. It's in a solid neighborhood and it's a sturdy house that was built in the late '60's and it has a modern retro feel to it.

The dining room.

We knew the owners were motivated to sell so we offered a bit less than they were asking, but we didn't low ball them. They made a counter offer that was slightly higher than our offer and yet still below their original asking price and we accepted their counter offer. We have not officially closed yet and we still have to get a home inspection done but if it passes inspection and there are no termites, then it looks like we'll be moving soon.

A view of the sun porch that's off the dining room.

Sparky is super excited about the new to us place. She's been dreaming of getting a real house almost since the day we moved into this condo. I'm excited as well because I can put in a garden in the backyard and the lawn upkeep doesn't look like it's going to be too much of a problem.

There's a ton of stuff to do to, packing, hiring a moving company, filling out paper work, switching the cable, the electricity, etc, so we'll be pretty busy for the next few weeks. If everything goes smoothly maybe we can be in the new to us house by the end of September. Keep those finger, toes, and prehensile tails crossed for us as we navigate this process.