One Month In!

A random update, with ramblings on things that strike my interest at the moment.















Give or take, we're been in a month. Long enough to know that cats need rugs, since they can't run across the bamboo flooring without wiping out. The temptation is great, and sometimes cannot be resisted, to throw a favorite toy across the room and see what happens.

There have been some interesting steps along the moving-in process.

Gas dryer hookup. Okay, it's not that hard, but apparently Sears and the manufacturers have decided that if you're going to connect a clothes dryer to propane fuel source, they're going to make it as difficult as possible. So, best efforts by the heating crew notwithstanding, we ended up having to bring in the techs from the propane company. It was a relief to finally get it connected after long delays...hanging clothes off the balcony rail to dry was going to be a little too Hatfield-and-McCoy.

Alarm system. The alarm system exists primarily to wake us up in the middle of the night when the power goes out - as it regularly does in this area. So, it's a long walk around the perimeter of the "balcony", down the stairs, and into the mud room to reset it. It is especially fun when the power goes out twice in a night. If my vision gets any worse, I'll have to start sleeping with my reading glasses by the bedside in order to find the right reset button on the panel.

Mirrors. Okay, I'm not a vampire, but our inability to find mirrors that we like isn't so bad...I have found that I really don't miss taking a look in the mirror in the morning. At some point, we'll really need to find mirrors for the bathrooms.

Wildlife.














We do have some great animal-spotting, particularly from the upper level. A doe and ~2 week old fawn wandered across the leach field the other day. The next morning, the healthiest-looking coyote I've seen trotted across. Hopefully the healthy look had nothing to do with the tasty-looking fawn. With room between the house and the trees, we can now see herons, hawks, and the periodic wood duck fly through. Today, we became more convinced that the cats will stay in the house, with our spotting of a fisher cat making its way the length of the stone wall. While not too big, they apparently consider domestic cats to be a particularly special treat for lunch. At night, we can hear the owls.

Acoustics. It's taking a little getting used to, but we're figuring out the acoustics of the house. There are definitely dead zones, where sound just drops off. The cats have figured out the best post-bedtime yowls, which when initiated from the right place, echo and could wake the dead. There is one more rug on order - we'll see if that makes a difference.

It Really is a Loft. I always wanted to live in a loft - probably inspired by watching the movie "Diva" way back when. This house is by no means that, but it is a far better loft than I ever imagined. This place is very open, and has a good flow. The kitchen which we were a bit afraid would be too small, is working out well. The only glitch is that it's hard to empty the dishwasher because we organized the dishes in cabinets that are hard to get to when the dishwasher is open. We love the Fisher Paykel dish drawers.

Lunar Landscape.














The landscaping and driveway won't happen for a while yet, so we look out on dirt and rocks, except the leach field, which had to be seeded. It, however, has a pretty bald top. We talked with a few folks so far, and will probably put down loam and seed winter rye in August. The top of the leach field will get local/native wildflowers and grasses, so that it doesn't need to be mowed.

A Place for Everything. We're so happy with the work Al and his team did on all the cabinetry that we had him over on Friday to discuss several more bookcases, shelving units for CDs, and a cat-proof cabinet to house the turntable and a few other audio components. Everything should be ready by late July - a much quicker turnaround than the now 6-month wait for a replacement cabinet door to arrive from Germany to replace the one broken by the cat when she tipped a speaker through it. Needless to say, the new speakers will be far less tippy.

There's very little left on the punch list, and some of the pictures have finally been hung. Soon enough we'll get the open house scheduled and invitations sent out.