Tuesday, December 21, 2004
Further weirdness, loosely associated with Christmas
OK. So as you all know, I’m moving. I’m moving IN with this GUY, and I’m trying to SELL my OWN LITTLE PLACE that I bought and paid for with (part of my mother’s money which I’m paying back, but mostly) my own hard-earned money. It’s causing me no small amount of anxiety. I feel that part of the anxiety is normal Christmas-time anxiety, but have a hard time justifying that statement because I love Christmas so much! Yay!
Last night, I got home and started packing more of my precious, precious belongings into boxes, all wrapped up with packing paper, and when I ran out of that, newspaper, which turned my hands all sorts of black and coloured from the front page section which has pictures. Pictures of what? You’d have to unpack my things to find out because in my frenzy to get things done, I did not notice what the pages had on them before I crammed them into the box (and if you want to help, you just let me know and I’ll buy you beer. Lots of beer.). Usually, packing is somewhat relaxing because it’s just a mindless activity (if you don’t think about the fact that your things might get broken, of course), and you can take the time to read all the newspaper stories you did not read when you first got the paper some time last year. Yesterday afternoon, though, I was not reading at all, I was packing, and sort of frantically at that, because I looked at the whole mess my whole house is (which is more than the normal mess it usually is) and FREAKED OUT!
As I was packing, and ignoring the NoodleDog’s quiet, strained whining because he was waiting for me to take him for a walk, the doorbell ran, and the NoodleDog switched from quiet whine mode to full on BARK BARK BARK mode, which either signifies a strong desire to irritate me or his excitement at being able to lick a whole new person. It was the latter (duh – doorbell) although the whole new person at the door was not the kind you’d want to lick. That doesn’t matter to the NoodleDog, who wants to lick everyone and everything, including your pants, especially after he has had a drink of water. This whole new person was a Horrible Realtor Woman.
The HRW stood outside the door as I struggled to hold on to the NoodleDog and surveyed me with quiet disdain. The HRW is from South Calgary, which is a snooty area of the City, and I live in a NOT SNOOTY area of a smaller town outside the City, so she was pre-disdainful of the whole situation. I threw the NoodleDog outside for a few minutes so she could come in and survey my place disdainfully, and survey the cats disdainfully, and stalk disdainfully through my house, which is messier than usual. I said to her, I said “Don’t mind the mess, ha ha, I’m trying to pack.” And she just sniffed.
She sauntered scornfully through the house in a matter of seconds (and although my house is somewhat small, if one was examining it for the purposes of obtaining my business as a real estate seller, you’d think one might spend a few more than 45 seconds doing it), and then we sat down to chat about my “options”. She presented me with the MLS listings from all the units exactly like mine that have sold since I bought mine just about two years ago. She went over the recent sale prices, which are slightly higher than what I paid for the unit (about 3.2% higher) and sniffed occasionally to signify her contempt for the entire situation. She also then explained that if I was planning on making money on this deal, I would have to immediately abandon that concept because the realtor had to make at least $3,000 on the deal in order for it to be worth their time. I then inquired politely as to what, exactly, the realtor would be doing for that $3,000, and was told that, well, the $3K only buys you so much – like listing in the MLS (for approximately $75), and office fees of $900, and this and that, and, well, I could plainly see that the actual profit the realtor was personally going to take away from doing the work of driving to my place aaaallll the way out of town to sign me up as a customer because these realtors don’t have any buyers “at this time”, was ONLY going to work out to be $1,100, after we deducted all the other expenses that came out of the $3,000.
I thanked her politely and said I’d consider her, and that I had to let my dog in now, and I’d be “in touch”.
Oh. Let me briefly describe this HRW. She was older (around 60, I would say, and that’s probably being generous), with tired coloured, permed hair that had seen better days, and closely approximated this anti-smoking ad I had once seen in jr. high school, which said: “Smoking. Glamorous, isn’t it?” and had a picture of a very terrible-looking old woman on it whose skin had all sagged and whose eyes were all sunken-in.
I was not impressed.
Then, I took the NoodleDog for a nice walk, and had a million-dollar idea, whereupon I called my fantastic Rob and explained it to him. We chatted briefly about it after I got home, and as the conversation proceeded, I thought about all the things I had to pack, and all the things I had still to do before Christmas happens, and the desserts I have to make and my brain started to work on various negative scenarios, which may be an asset in my job, but is certainly NOT an asset when you’re trying to contemplate major life changes.
And sure enough, I started to freak myself right out. What if I get all this stuff packed-up, and he cancels the move? Then I’ll have to unpack it all, and I’ll probably lose precious, precious things in the whole ordeal, and I’ll be miserable thinking of the lost opportunity. What if I pack all these things up, and take them to his house, and he cancels the move? Then, I’ll have to bring it all back, and that will be hard because there will be lots of lifting heavy things and trying to figure out what is in these hastily-packed boxes that are marked “Office” from my previous move, but actually now contain “Kitchen” items. What if I pack all these things up, take them to his place, and this actually works out, but my house doesn’t sell? Then, I’ll have to forever be paying lots of money for a place I don’t live in, and the stress will get to me and I’ll be more difficult to live with, and he’ll then cancel the whole deal, and I’ll have to move BACK into the place I moved out of, and, well, it will be very horrible, all of it. I may also be a little afraid of success, too, because what if it just works out and nothing goes wrong at all? What then?!!
Also, I thought about where will all my things go when I get them to his house? We’ve been over this before, a few times, and he was trying to be very patient with me as he usually is, and told me over and over it was all going to be “fine”, but really, in reality, all that did was cause me further panic because all it did in my brain was underline the fact that he doesn’t understand how serious this whole situation is, and doesn’t understand the complicating factors.
There was then a very complex spiral effect, where he would tell me it was going to be fine, and my brain would take that as a complete and total insult, and overreact by further plunging me into absolute negativity. “It CAN’T work out,” my brain would say, “because he doesn’t understand what needs to be done. And if he doesn’t get that part of it, what’s going to happen when you two try to have a child, and you have back pains, and you can’t see your feet, and you feel really fat – fatter than usual – and he just says “don’t worry, honey, it’ll be fine.”…SEE?!!”
OK, so it only played that whole child-card when the conversation had deteriorated beyond salvage, and I was so totally freaking out that I was in utter despair and looked around me at all the things I had to pack and thought how hopeless this entire thing was going to be. Because I have to pack it all, but I still have to live there for a while longer, and I can’t pack the stuff I need, but I still have to get it out of the house so I can clean the place and list it and sell it, and aaauug, I can’t be in two places at the same damn time.
Instead, I just started to pack everything. I figure, well, what the hell? If I need something I’ve already packed, well, then, either too bad, or I’ll just have to unpack and find it. And I whirled into action, and packed many things, and archived files I had meant to archive for the past year now, and cleaned out credenzas and packed the bar, and packed away all the liquor (a terrible idea in hindsight), and started to pack the main bedroom, and then I started wrapping Christmas presents, because my brain was entirely scattered by then. I like multi-tasking because it feels like I’m doing more than I am, and probably, in reality, I’m doing less, but at least I feel better about it.
By the time he called me back to say goodnight, I was in a horrible state of mind, thinking that everything I was doing HAD to be done by me and only me, and there was no way he could help with anything, and it was all on me, and the only way this WHOLE relationship was going to work was if I DID ALL THE WORK, and made ALL the sacrifices, and changed my WHOLE PERSONALITY!! So if anyone out there has a spare personality that is better than mine, please let me know and if you want, I’ll trade you my condo for it.
I realized, as I was brushing my teeth, that I was being totally stupid, and called him back after I climbed into bed and was surrounded by warm, purring cats, and apologized for the stupidity, and told him I missed him and was just freaking myself out for nothing.
And while the nice, rational part of my brain that peeks out from all the panic, confusion and the Big Freak-Out understands that it’s probably all going to be alright if I will only just calm the hell down, the rest of my brain beats it with sticks, kicks it when it falls to the ground in the fetal position, and then pours sauce on it and EATS IT!!
Most of the time, the negative part of my brain gets turned off when I get home and turn on the TV. However, we haven’t had that nice down-time I usually look forward to (blame the television producers and schedulers who have filled the time-slots this year with inane reality shows and poorly-scripted dramas, like “Lost” – thanks, ABC, you’re causing the demise of my favourite category of television), so that “bad” part of it is working overtime and is probably getting a little tired and cranky.
So think good thoughts for me, all of you. Feel free to send me comments of support, or to, you know, laugh at the craziness. I’m laughing. Hysterically, maybe, but at least I’m laughing. Heh.
Last night, I got home and started packing more of my precious, precious belongings into boxes, all wrapped up with packing paper, and when I ran out of that, newspaper, which turned my hands all sorts of black and coloured from the front page section which has pictures. Pictures of what? You’d have to unpack my things to find out because in my frenzy to get things done, I did not notice what the pages had on them before I crammed them into the box (and if you want to help, you just let me know and I’ll buy you beer. Lots of beer.). Usually, packing is somewhat relaxing because it’s just a mindless activity (if you don’t think about the fact that your things might get broken, of course), and you can take the time to read all the newspaper stories you did not read when you first got the paper some time last year. Yesterday afternoon, though, I was not reading at all, I was packing, and sort of frantically at that, because I looked at the whole mess my whole house is (which is more than the normal mess it usually is) and FREAKED OUT!
As I was packing, and ignoring the NoodleDog’s quiet, strained whining because he was waiting for me to take him for a walk, the doorbell ran, and the NoodleDog switched from quiet whine mode to full on BARK BARK BARK mode, which either signifies a strong desire to irritate me or his excitement at being able to lick a whole new person. It was the latter (duh – doorbell) although the whole new person at the door was not the kind you’d want to lick. That doesn’t matter to the NoodleDog, who wants to lick everyone and everything, including your pants, especially after he has had a drink of water. This whole new person was a Horrible Realtor Woman.
The HRW stood outside the door as I struggled to hold on to the NoodleDog and surveyed me with quiet disdain. The HRW is from South Calgary, which is a snooty area of the City, and I live in a NOT SNOOTY area of a smaller town outside the City, so she was pre-disdainful of the whole situation. I threw the NoodleDog outside for a few minutes so she could come in and survey my place disdainfully, and survey the cats disdainfully, and stalk disdainfully through my house, which is messier than usual. I said to her, I said “Don’t mind the mess, ha ha, I’m trying to pack.” And she just sniffed.
She sauntered scornfully through the house in a matter of seconds (and although my house is somewhat small, if one was examining it for the purposes of obtaining my business as a real estate seller, you’d think one might spend a few more than 45 seconds doing it), and then we sat down to chat about my “options”. She presented me with the MLS listings from all the units exactly like mine that have sold since I bought mine just about two years ago. She went over the recent sale prices, which are slightly higher than what I paid for the unit (about 3.2% higher) and sniffed occasionally to signify her contempt for the entire situation. She also then explained that if I was planning on making money on this deal, I would have to immediately abandon that concept because the realtor had to make at least $3,000 on the deal in order for it to be worth their time. I then inquired politely as to what, exactly, the realtor would be doing for that $3,000, and was told that, well, the $3K only buys you so much – like listing in the MLS (for approximately $75), and office fees of $900, and this and that, and, well, I could plainly see that the actual profit the realtor was personally going to take away from doing the work of driving to my place aaaallll the way out of town to sign me up as a customer because these realtors don’t have any buyers “at this time”, was ONLY going to work out to be $1,100, after we deducted all the other expenses that came out of the $3,000.
I thanked her politely and said I’d consider her, and that I had to let my dog in now, and I’d be “in touch”.
Oh. Let me briefly describe this HRW. She was older (around 60, I would say, and that’s probably being generous), with tired coloured, permed hair that had seen better days, and closely approximated this anti-smoking ad I had once seen in jr. high school, which said: “Smoking. Glamorous, isn’t it?” and had a picture of a very terrible-looking old woman on it whose skin had all sagged and whose eyes were all sunken-in.
I was not impressed.
Then, I took the NoodleDog for a nice walk, and had a million-dollar idea, whereupon I called my fantastic Rob and explained it to him. We chatted briefly about it after I got home, and as the conversation proceeded, I thought about all the things I had to pack, and all the things I had still to do before Christmas happens, and the desserts I have to make and my brain started to work on various negative scenarios, which may be an asset in my job, but is certainly NOT an asset when you’re trying to contemplate major life changes.
And sure enough, I started to freak myself right out. What if I get all this stuff packed-up, and he cancels the move? Then I’ll have to unpack it all, and I’ll probably lose precious, precious things in the whole ordeal, and I’ll be miserable thinking of the lost opportunity. What if I pack all these things up, and take them to his house, and he cancels the move? Then, I’ll have to bring it all back, and that will be hard because there will be lots of lifting heavy things and trying to figure out what is in these hastily-packed boxes that are marked “Office” from my previous move, but actually now contain “Kitchen” items. What if I pack all these things up, take them to his place, and this actually works out, but my house doesn’t sell? Then, I’ll have to forever be paying lots of money for a place I don’t live in, and the stress will get to me and I’ll be more difficult to live with, and he’ll then cancel the whole deal, and I’ll have to move BACK into the place I moved out of, and, well, it will be very horrible, all of it. I may also be a little afraid of success, too, because what if it just works out and nothing goes wrong at all? What then?!!
Also, I thought about where will all my things go when I get them to his house? We’ve been over this before, a few times, and he was trying to be very patient with me as he usually is, and told me over and over it was all going to be “fine”, but really, in reality, all that did was cause me further panic because all it did in my brain was underline the fact that he doesn’t understand how serious this whole situation is, and doesn’t understand the complicating factors.
There was then a very complex spiral effect, where he would tell me it was going to be fine, and my brain would take that as a complete and total insult, and overreact by further plunging me into absolute negativity. “It CAN’T work out,” my brain would say, “because he doesn’t understand what needs to be done. And if he doesn’t get that part of it, what’s going to happen when you two try to have a child, and you have back pains, and you can’t see your feet, and you feel really fat – fatter than usual – and he just says “don’t worry, honey, it’ll be fine.”…SEE?!!”
OK, so it only played that whole child-card when the conversation had deteriorated beyond salvage, and I was so totally freaking out that I was in utter despair and looked around me at all the things I had to pack and thought how hopeless this entire thing was going to be. Because I have to pack it all, but I still have to live there for a while longer, and I can’t pack the stuff I need, but I still have to get it out of the house so I can clean the place and list it and sell it, and aaauug, I can’t be in two places at the same damn time.
Instead, I just started to pack everything. I figure, well, what the hell? If I need something I’ve already packed, well, then, either too bad, or I’ll just have to unpack and find it. And I whirled into action, and packed many things, and archived files I had meant to archive for the past year now, and cleaned out credenzas and packed the bar, and packed away all the liquor (a terrible idea in hindsight), and started to pack the main bedroom, and then I started wrapping Christmas presents, because my brain was entirely scattered by then. I like multi-tasking because it feels like I’m doing more than I am, and probably, in reality, I’m doing less, but at least I feel better about it.
By the time he called me back to say goodnight, I was in a horrible state of mind, thinking that everything I was doing HAD to be done by me and only me, and there was no way he could help with anything, and it was all on me, and the only way this WHOLE relationship was going to work was if I DID ALL THE WORK, and made ALL the sacrifices, and changed my WHOLE PERSONALITY!! So if anyone out there has a spare personality that is better than mine, please let me know and if you want, I’ll trade you my condo for it.
I realized, as I was brushing my teeth, that I was being totally stupid, and called him back after I climbed into bed and was surrounded by warm, purring cats, and apologized for the stupidity, and told him I missed him and was just freaking myself out for nothing.
And while the nice, rational part of my brain that peeks out from all the panic, confusion and the Big Freak-Out understands that it’s probably all going to be alright if I will only just calm the hell down, the rest of my brain beats it with sticks, kicks it when it falls to the ground in the fetal position, and then pours sauce on it and EATS IT!!
Most of the time, the negative part of my brain gets turned off when I get home and turn on the TV. However, we haven’t had that nice down-time I usually look forward to (blame the television producers and schedulers who have filled the time-slots this year with inane reality shows and poorly-scripted dramas, like “Lost” – thanks, ABC, you’re causing the demise of my favourite category of television), so that “bad” part of it is working overtime and is probably getting a little tired and cranky.
So think good thoughts for me, all of you. Feel free to send me comments of support, or to, you know, laugh at the craziness. I’m laughing. Hysterically, maybe, but at least I’m laughing. Heh.
