We almost died yesterday. We got better.

We almost died yesterday.

We were working in the house for nine hours straight yesterday. The windows were closed and we were all sealed up. We were working hard. But what neither of us could get out of our minds was this thought that something had crawled under the house over the winter and had died. It was like 63 degrees yesterday and we figured, "Oh, something died and it's finally a little warmer." If you have ever fished out a dead cat from under your house then you know what it smelled like.

Well, after nine hours we were beat and I had to go to work in the morning. So, we wrapped it all up, locked the door, and drove back to Durham, satisfied in the four days of demo we had accomplished.

Today, Evelyn drove back up to the house to meet with the contractor and the window salesman. They were all out there already to it when she got there. They all talked about the smell and the window guy said, "That's propane. I used to work for a propane company and they sent that stuff with the smell of rotting flesh to "warn" customers of a leak." Or something to that effect.

A leak? What leak? We've owned this house for like, four days and NOW there's a leak in the propane system.

Anyway, it seems that our old friend, the appliance lifting former owner of this place, had struck again. When we got our keys we did see that he had taken the small, wall mounted propane heater in the "dining room" in the "addition" (more on that later), but failed to cap the gas line. WHAT? So what we were smelling last night was propane? And our rosy cheeks, that we thought were signs of our "virtue" as we labored to achieve the "Good Life." (blah, blah, whatever). Those rosy cheeks were actually the signal that we were being poisoned by carbon monoxide?

We got better.

Work In Progress

Entry before and in progress

Upstairs Bedroom before and in progress

The Neighbors.

Last night after we got the keys we started in right away ripping off paneling and tearing up the old carpet. There were 2 layers of carpet over linoleum and a layer of newspaper from 1979 but underneath are nice plank floors, the sparkly stuff in the photo below is dust.

The walls upstairs are beadboard and downstairs are these really cool wood walls. We're pretty excited by what we found.

Here's a photo of the neighbor cows. I think we're gonna like it here.

The Door is Open

So, it is done. We closed and are now the owners of our country house on two acres, along with a chicken coop. We are taking the first load of stuff up there in about five minutes.

Oh, do we have a story to tell you. This morning our agent had us drive all the way up to the house for a "walk through." Now I've heard of a walk through on a new house but not on an existing house. So we get up there and the family that sold us the house was still removing their stuff. We were standing in the kitchen while the seller, who's a older gentleman, was telling us about his power bill. You know how that can go. So while he's talking I am looking around the kitchen and I notice that the stove is not the same stove that was in the kitchen when we made our offer. So when he left the room, I tapped Evelyn on the arm told her and she said "the old coot switched it out."

So, we told the agent and it was going to be handled, she demanded that they return the original stove and fridge that were to come with the house (he also switched the fridge) or we'd withhold their money.

So later we're at lunch and the agent gets a call. Apparently, the old guy went up to Virginia where he had stored the pilfered appliances and was on his way back when he had an unfortunate event. Somehow, the stove fell off the back of the truck and into a ditch where it met its demise.

So instead of making off with a new stove, he ended up having to buy a new one for us and take the old one back.

So it goes.

We close tomorrow!

Updates on renovation and move to come . . .