mlah.us

i bought a house today.

negotiations were fun. they initially offered a 5k discount. i proposed a 20k discount in various forms. improvements, closing fees, and a price break.

they countered with a 10k discount, spread it around how i like it.

then i very cagily re-countered with a 15k discount. they said, ‘well, how about 10?’ and it was all downhill from there.

it’s hard to try and lowball someone when the house is so nice.

so i got all of my upgrades, including complete lawn sodding, (it’s a new house) a complete lawn sprinkler system, garage door opener, and a water softener system. they’re paying 3k towards my closing costs, and i rolled the price back a little.

want to take a peek at the actual house? it’s not quite finished yet.
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i’ve picked a house. at least i think i have.

i’ve gotten a good faith estimate. and now been pre-approved for the loan.

now i have to actually produce documents to secure the loan, pay, and then i guess i get to wait ’til it is finished so that i can move in.

the house is pretty close to being finished, the superstructure is anyway. the windows are in. the brick is up. the walls are up.

little things though, like the stairs still being boards and the floors still being concrete. those little things will definitely need to be addressed.

i get the tub with jets, and a standup shower, a fireplace. nice house.

want to see?
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i was just flipping through the tv channels when i spotted something on c-span.

a kind of smallish asian woman.

i also heard the word internment.

being a devoted reader of M & M, i immediately flipped back to see if it was her.

i got lucky! i got to sit and watch the majority of her sept 8th speech and q & a session at the university of california (berkely). there was a protest going on outside. you could tell they were chanting, but couldn’t really hear what they were saying.
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so i got up early this morning and went to a martial arts tournament at san antonio college. downtown.

first thing. i get in my car and start driving. there’s a crazy lady waving at me. seems she’s actually the apartment manager, ….

and she wants my blood.

they’re running some kind of a blood drive.

my first response is no, y’all probably don’t want my blood, what with all of the supplements i take.

she assures me that it’s ok. and then mentions that the blood is earmarked for delivery to florida.
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here is the little photo collage i took of state lines along my journey. some of them are hard to make out.

the first pic above is me getting off of highway 3 in bowie, md. and getting onto 50 west, towards dc.
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got my regular computer setup just now. attached it to my new wireless network, with WEP of course.

now, where is that camera of mine?

and i can finally get back to ranting. y’all now. about important stuff like rathergate.

that moron.

Last post about my trip ’til i get the pics up. i promise.

i started my thrid and last day in katy.

it was around 200 miles to san antonio. the drive was quick and straight down i10

except of course for the swarms of black flies on the road. i stopped three times to clean my windshield. i used two complete gallons of that washer fluid. only two gallons because one of my stops was out of the stuff.

the third stop, i didn’t even get off of the on ramp before i had hit another.

at one point, i drove through a swarm, and it literally looked like it was raining!

didn’t help that i was doing 80.

i made it in, wentr around 410 to the north side. and stopped at schlotzky’s.

original on rye. been waaaaaay too long since i had one. i had rye because they were out of sourdough.

then i looked up my hotel, and made the drive downtown and checked in.

total drive time this day was around 3 hours.
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well, i’m in a little aprtment. i’ll try to get my pc setup tomorrow, which requires a wireless router as well. then i’ll have my photoshop to prep pics for posting with.

the pics are coming.

i’ver been doing some house hunting. and i just had to laugh. all of those billboards around md that advertised single family homes ’starting in the low 400’s!’

well, here those say starting in the 70’s.

i should be back to a normal posting routine fairly soon.

at least i think so.

so i started in atlanta.

i watched the weather the night before and knew i was safe from ivan, but nevertheless, there was rain forecast for southern alabama and georgia.

so i started my day by driving west to birmingham down i20. i59 mixed in with it soemwhere east of birmingham. it was a pretty drive. i had these angry storm clouds to my left and partly cloudy skis to my right. there was some construction east of birmingham as well. but on sunday, there were no workers.

i just drove on.
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1682 miles.

3 days. i could have done it in 2, but that second day…..

thursday the 9th was my packout. what a mess. the guys showed up with a tractir trailer, and there was no way they were going to get it into my little cul de sac. they had to cart all my crap 50 yards or so on a dolly to the street.

while watching this, my sister gave me the odd phone call. and that’s a bad thing. nobody from my family ever calls me. unless it’s bad news. i think it’s a leftover from being stationed overseas. for so long i have been unreachable. my dad had to go into the hospital. the stint he had put in a year or so ago just wasn’t doing the job. double bypass. kinda put the kybosh on my plans of just driving up on the weekend and watching a sooners game. i had to tell my sister i was moving. she claimed she’d keep it a secret. she promptly told my mom. now, i’m not going to narc my sister out, but her initials are ‘jennifer’.

friday (the 10th) afternoon, my work did a little bbq lunch for me at work. they catered in. it was way more than i expected to tell you the truth. way more than i wanted.

friday night, my tkd school sent me off with dinner at damons. it was an awesome steak. and i think more people actually came to this than did my work sendoff. now, somebody decided it was my birthday. and it was not. i heard a rumor that it might be my birthday and threatened to pull out the driver’s license to prove it.

i got the wait staff singing happy birthday to me anyway.

so i was 21 again! and had my first legal beer again.

i’m not going to narc the person out who set it all up, but his initials are ‘michael visitacion’

whole lotta not narc’n.
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yep,

say goodbye maryland.

i’m in a marriott in downtown san antonio. for the next couple of days. it was a long drive!

big blog coming, as soon as i can find my camera cable. i have pictures to upload!

this sunday, chien took a bunch of us to king’s dominion. it’s down in virginia, and was a nice little field trip at the end of the summer.

part of taekwondo is teaching. chien likes the senior belts to undertake a little teaching. it hones your own skills a little on the more fundamental skills.

kind of like grading papers in college.

so he had a number of us teaching over the summer. the kids were off for the summer, and he had them in the ’summer camps’ teaching the lower belts basic skills.

pretty much unpaid.

so he took a bunch of us to king’s dominion as a thank you for our hard work.

it was a lot of fun.
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Appetizer:
If someone gave you 3 new goldfish today, what would you name them?

Nina, Pinta, and Maria

Soup:
What’s the worst movie you’ve seen this year.

The Life of David Gale

Salad:
If given the chance and you could pick the person, would you want to switch lives with someone on earth for one whole day?

sure, Hugh Hefner of course.

Main Course:
What’s your favorite season? Name 2 things you love about it.

Spring, Because women start to wear bikinis again, and because i love the smell of honeysuckle.

Dessert:
What is something you frequently buy that you don’t really need?

DVDs

“I will never relent”

pretty much says it all.

i’ve got to be one of the worst ever for returning videos to blockbuster. i’m so horrible, that fater the initial 4$ rental, i’ll usually wind up paying at least 2 late fees.

now, i just cut to the chase and buy the damn things. some of my friends give me hell. they say i’m wasting money on my burgeoning dvd collection, but i know the truth. i would have paid that much anyway, now at least i have the actual dvd to show for it.

i’ve taken to buying the used videos out of blockbuster. everybody else is in there looking at the rentals. i’m looking at the clearance dvd’s. usually 2 for 20 bucks, or 3 for 25. something around there.

i was just in a video store, kara had to force me to put ginger snaps ii down. i’m a real sucker for vampire movies.!

well, i’m off to go watch my cheap b-rate movies.