Goodbyes, Running to Dallas, loading stock

Yesterday, somewhere in the mid-after, Jake realized that it would be the very last day he would get to spend on the farm in Bowie. I think he and Mama mourned the rest of the day. They even went to Dairy Queen to try to drown their sorrows in an Oreo-cheesecake blizzard. I think it helped some but the effect had worn off by the time I got home.

In the evening we went out and caught Jazz so Jake could ride for a bit. He ended up riding for the better part of an hour and most of that by himself. We did not let him go too far even though Jazz is about as gentle a horse as anyone could ever wish for. We kept the saddle and bridle on the horse until Victoria had a chance to ride and it was just after dark that we finally let Jazz go back to grazing.

By that time I had started the fire we were going to use for roasting marshmallows and for doing fireworks. Jake and I started the roman candles before Mama and Victoria were through messing with the horses and neither the horses nor the women reacted well to the light and explosions. Everything calmed down pretty quickly but it got a bit testy for a few minutes.

I did not get to bed until late and Mama was much later since Jake came over several times for little things. Mama was concerned she would have to sleep over at the trailer to keep him satisfied but I woke up beside her this morning so the two of them must have worked it out. Today they will pack him up and head for Dallas Love Field to send him home. I can only imagine the goodbyes he will have to say to the animals on the farm – five dogs, three pigs, twenty plus chickens and two horses. He had better start early.

Mama is going to meet me in Decatur on their way to Dallas so she and I can sign papers to make a formal offer on the house on Hwy 730 here in Decatur. It is an offer that may be quickly refused but I wanted to get that clear rejection before going further on any other property. We should know by tomorrow.

I think Peggy and Victoria are both going with Mama for the trip to the airport. Peggy has already suggested that they find a good place to shop while the traffic dies down since Jake’s flight is right at 5 pm. I am pretty sure they will beat the traffic there, but there will be no way to beat the “rush hour” traffic after they wait for the plane to pull out.

Meanwhile I hope to be getting the stock trailer positioned to load the three steers we are taking to sale tomorrow in Wichita Fall. We are going there because it is an easy trip from Bowie and the price we get on Holstein steers is about 30% higher than we can get here in Decatur.

When we have beef steers we will come to the closer market, but not for this run.

Road trip, zip line, spelunking

Mama, Jake and I have been on the road since Monday morning.  We traveled to Dumas on Monday and I started the visits I needed to make in this area on Tuesday. Meanwhile, Mama and Jake have been making the rounds between Dumas and Amarillo. On Tuesday they waited for me at the hotel and we went to Amarillo together so we could get together with Chase and Makaila. Our plan was to visit the caves in Palo Duro Canyon.

When we were driving to the park entrance we noticed a new company in one of the buildings right off of the road. It was advertising a zip line over the canyon. I turned around at the insistence of the passengers with me and we began talking to the man running the business about costs and schedules.

As it turned out the cost was not prohibitive and the next group was going to do the zip line run within the next twenty minutes – so we signed up Jake and Chase for the excursion. Mama, Makaila and I went along for the ride; for a nominal fee. There were three or four others in the party with us as we loaded onto an open, trolley-like, trailer pulled by a Jeer and we headed into the canyon. It was a short drive but it was enough to make Makaila close her eyes several times as we bumped and jostled out way to the launch point.

Mama and I were taken to the terminal end of the zip line and were able to video Chase and Jake as they flew down the zip line. I think it was the highlight of the trip for Jake; even though it took only thirty seconds or so to cover the 600 feet of space. After that we walked to the caves in the canyon and explored a little there as the sun set.

Jake and Chase were entering the caves as Mama and I rounded the bend that opened up to the cliff that contained the caves. They were not in very deep before they hurriedly retreated. Jake quickly explained that one of the walls of the cave ahead of them collapsed as they were going in. They took that as a sign that they should not go any further. I cannot wait until he shares that story several times back in New Jersey. I could be a really good tale by then.

On our way out of the canyon we stopped to get tickets to the play that is put on annually in the canyon – a young lady actually opened up the ticket office for us so we could get the tickets right then. The play is simply called, Texas. I got tickets for all of us to return on Thursday night. The only bad part is that the play starts at about 8:30 pm and runs about two and one half hours so we will not get back to the hotel in Dumas until well after 11 pm tomorrow night.

On Monday, as we began our trip over, Mama started to get an ear ache and it progressed to the point that she went to an Urgent Care yesterday. She was told she has “swimmer’s ear” and was prescribed an antibiotic for the infection.

Unfortunately she is not greatly improved yet.

Meeting Mama, house shopping

I got to meet Mama for lunch yesterday since she, Victoria and Jake were at Peggy’s. I could get used to that. When I got there Jake was already in the pool but Victoria was hesitating because the water was too cold for her. The ambient temperature was near 100®F but I did not touch the water to see what the temperature was like. All of us were getting eaten up by those tiny black mosquitos – especially Victoria. I think she finally got in the pool to escape the little blood suckers.

I met up with them again after work so we could begin our tour of homes. The realtor met us at a home Mama was very interested in – a “Texas-style” house in paradise. Once we got into the house we could not get the alarm to shut off. It turned out that the owners had forgotten that they had scheduled a showing for that afternoon.

It was a moot point since the house was very obviously not a suitable one for us. It was one of those projects that they overdid the areas of attention – the kitchen, the living room and fireplace – and left many other items poorly done – the window seals, the deck and steps, etc. We did not spend very long there. Within fifteen minutes or so we were heading to the next stop.

It, too, was a disappointment. Much like the first house of the day there was great expense put into the master bedroom and adjoining bath as well as the kitchen counters. Also, like the first house many other things had been neglected. Low ceilings (done so to accommodate the AC ductwork) and kitchen cabinets that hung solidly on very crooked walls were enough to shorten our visit there. The approach to the house was over a railroad track – which was built up quite high – and the house sat right off of the road. Two more points against it.

We took a break and went back to Decatur and got Victoria’s car and a bite to eat before meeting the realtor at the a-frame house. We spent over an hour at that property and I think if we were really anxious to buy we might have made an offer on the spot. The house was not perfect by any means but it was more than adequate. The owners/builders had taken their time to do most things very well.

The decks that attached to the house more than made up for any lack of entertaining room in the house. Although it was an a-frame construction it did not have the narrow, cramped feel typical of that style but seemed more open and spacious than I had expected. The shop was what I would have built; 40x40, insulated with fourteen foot walls and a 12x12 roll up door.

The property seemed to lay well but it was not clear what the boundaries were. I walked back to the back fence of the property but it was very overgrown. It appears to be a rectangle with a long edge on the road. That would be a good difference since most properties we have looked are narrow and deep. The realtor has asked for a copy of the survey and we will wait on that to finally evaluate our options. At least one of the three was a possibility.

Today is our anniversary; 32 years today. God is good!

Jake, marathon, formal contract, job front

Mama had quite the ordeal getting Jake yesterday. As is normal for her she planned her trip to the airport to arrive at the appointed time – which was a half hour before the plane was expected to land. Her plan did not include sufficient time for traffic problems and she had those aplenty. She ended up arriving to get Jake about a half hour late. Fortunately, the plane was not particularly early and Jake only had to wait about fifteen minutes for Mama.

Other than dealing with stopped traffic in two separate locations the trip went without incident. They got home just a little before I did. They had planned to drive by a house we looked at online on the way to the airport. That plan was abandoned when Mama realized she and Victoria had used more time at the farm in the morning than they should have. When I called that morning, Mama was getting in the shower - about the time they should have been leaving.

The three of them drove by the house on their way home and I drove by with the three of them on our way home from church last night. It was light enough to see what I needed. I really only wanted to get a feel for the distance to the house from Hwy 287. It was not bad but I am still hoping for something closer to Decatur – something north.

Regardless, we are going to meet the realtor this evening at a house in Paradise (south of Decatur) this afternoon. Mama has scheduled us for a marathon of viewings. We are scheduled to look at four houses this evening. The last one will be the one we drove by last night. None of the homes are in the area that I would prefer except the one in a short sale but we need to look in order to find the one we are willing to purchase.

Mama and I have signed papers for the sale of the farm. She will have to do some more signing when she and Victoria and Jake come to Decatur this afternoon for an afternoon at the pool at Peggy’s house. I realized when I reopened the email from our real estate agent that I had not scrolled down far enough to see the additional addendums sent in the correspondence with the contract. It is a small detail but a necessary one that we can easily take care of.

The amount of paperwork generated and required for the sale or purchase of a home is a little staggering. Mama and I have been through it enough to know what to expect but we are rapidly approaching the point that I will have to separate the selling paperwork from the buying paperwork. The projected closing date for the sale of the farm is set for the 5^th of September. We will see. It is incumbent on me and Mama not to move too quickly on offering to purchase until the buyer gets the financing set on his side of this transaction.

On the job front, my compadre at work who is the Training Coordinator for our asset told me yesterday in confidence that his job has been eliminated. He will have to report to a new position (within the same department) – in Houston. Here I thought I made a wise decision to keep my current job rather than take that one last year.

All along, God was guiding me to help me avoid the mess he is in right now; an unwanted job with an unwanted move.

Home? Maybe…

Mama and I met at the church yesterday evening since she was going on a church outing that night and we drove together to a house we had driven to before but had never taken the time to look inside. In fact, we had taken the house off of the list of prospects while we were considering buying Peggy’s house.  Mama had scheduled with the realtor to meet us there after I got off work. I suppose we were there for fifteen minutes or so before the realtor got there so we looked around once more.

The property had more to offer than we realized with some native grass and a very small watering hole. It would be too generous to call it a tank. It turned out that the property lines were not very obvious and no attempt had been made to identify them – which was curious. The realtor had to call and ask for the plat map so we could see where the lines were drawn. We have yet to view that map but I think we have a pretty good idea what the perimeter would look like.

Once inside we really liked the house. Someone had obviously taken their time in building the home. It was laid out with an unusual floor plan but offered a split bedroom set up with the master suite separated from the other two bedrooms. It was the way the builder had wired the house that caught my eye. Every room was wired for internet and cable. Every light switch was identified. The garage had two plugs for a welder or some other big user. It reminded me of the way Steve Whiddon was building his house in Victoria, TX.

Mama and I worked with the realtor to identify why the house had sat vacant for so long – and we got our answer through her patient probing of the listing agent. It was a short sale with a very difficult bank. The home had been foreclosed on by the bank and was now being sold for less than what was owed to the bank on the loan against the house. Those financial dealings take some extra work to finalize.

Mama and I also found out that there are already several offers submitted to the bank and that several prospective buyers had already backed out of the deals they were pursuing with the bank to purchase the house due to the delay in the bank’s response to their offer. We will probably go ahead and get the prequalification letter from our preferred lender and get our offer submitted by the end of this week, but there is not a great chance of us actually getting to buy the house.

 It is worth a try especially in light of the fact that we accepted a final offer on our farm – as we were driving away from the house. The projected date of closing the sale of the farm is September 8^th. That puts the onus on Mama and me to find a house and get the paperwork going to purchase it. We are being given ninety days rent free to move from the farm after closing – which puts us into the first week of December to be completely moved. As very generous as that offer is from our buyer, that will be a challenge!

God is working and I do not want to miss out.

Help, prospects

On the way to church Friday night our realtor called us to tell us we had a formal, written offer on the farm. He is a little surprised that we are already getting the offer but I have been expecting it. It was a good offer but Mama and I will counter the offer today in an effort to get closer to the listing price. It is a quid pro quo that is customary in buying as selling property. We should know the outcome in a day or two but the bottom line is that we are very close to actually selling the farm.

The offer comes from the man Mama talked with last week. The good part of selling the farm to him is that he is in no hurry to mover there. He told Mama we would be able to take all the time we needed. However, I asked our realtor to include in the counter offer that we need up to two months to move after closing. It is always better to have those things in writing.

I was up pretty early Saturday morning so I could get the porch structure rebuilt. I made a couple improvements to the frame as I extended it past the door toward the flower garden. I took most of the early morning to get that done and I was cutting the metal roofing I had bought for that purpose when Daniel Wycoff drove up. By the time Lee Davis got to the farm we were finished making the necessary cuts and began removing the damaged roofing from the apartment.

It took less than an hour to get all the damaged pieces off the roof and onto the ground. Once we started on the porch roof we got a system going and the three of us had the entire roof replaced in about four hours total. Mama had to help Daniel at one point to get the sixteen foot pieces up to me and Lee but she was only out there for about an hour. The repair is complete. Praise the Lord! One more task off my list.

It was perfect weather for the work. The temperature was below 90®F that afternoon and the wind was very light. It got a little hot for me and Lee up there on the reflective metal sheeting but we were only in the predicament for about an hour and a half. We both got a little sunburned on our faces from the reflected sunlight; nothing major. I slept very well Saturday night and Sunday afternoon.

Mama and I are scheduled to look at a house this afternoon. We have driven by the house and property several times but are not at all impressed by the eleven acres being sold with the house. It is rocky and pretty barren but the price they are selling the house and land for is pretty attractive to me. We will see today if the house will suffice for Mama; everything else I can deal with pretty effectively.

Peggy talked with Mama again last night at our churches ice cream and cake social. She asked Mama if a lower price would allow us to reconsider buying her house but even at the lower price it is still too big a stretch for us to make at this time. As much as I wish I could, I cannot take on that much debt, look thirty years out, and feel confident about the deal. That could change but it is not something I am earnestly praying about.

Tonight Mama and Victoria go with the ladies of the church to the Cheesecake Factory for an outing. Mama is really looking forward to that.

Return visitors, our Anniversary dinner

As Mama and I talked on the way home from church on Wednesday night I told her that if we were on the right track, in the house we were looking at and the consideration of taking on the Rita franchise then we could expect things to begin to happen pretty quickly. She questioned just what I meant by that and I explained that when we finally line up with God’s plan we generally find all the many pieces falling into place pretty rapidly; most of the time God is waiting on us to line up with His plan.

In light of that, Mama called me yesterday in the late morning to tell me our realtor had called her to let her know that the man who had come to our farm last week was coming back to look at the old farm house with a friend who is a contractor. Since neither realtor was present they were able to speak freely and Danny, the potential buyer, is very interested in our place.

He has some life considerations to deal with just like all of us do, but he is interested enough to continue to pray about buying the farm. I do not know if he will be the one to own our farm next, but he would be a good person for me and Mama to work with in the sale. He told Mama that he would not need us to move right away; we would have several months to get all our stull off the property. That would be a good thing.

Mama met me in Decatur yesterday afternoon so we could go out for our anniversary dinner. She had been informed that Texas de Brazil had a special going on and the normal cost of dinner was half price through the end of July.  So we left from the office to make the additional hour drive to Dallas for dinner.

I had called to make reservations and was informed that they were opening a half hour early to accommodate a larger than normal crowd – probably due to the special pricing that was ending that night. So we had reservations at 4:30. We got there in plenty of time and stayed there for over an hour. It was an unusual but fun dinner.

The salad bar was impressive and expansive. We could have eaten that and been satisfied but the whole draw of the restaurant is the fire roasted meats that are served by carvers who come to your table with the meat on a spear. They cut you off as much as you want to eat of the twenty or so varieties they have of beef, chicken, lamb, pork and sausages.

You let the servers know if you are interested in being served the meat by putting a token you are given on either the green side – yes I would like more – or the red side – no thank you, I’m full. You are not obligated to take anything they offer, and Mama refused most of the initial offerings to wait for the meat to be more thoroughly cooked, but it is fun to see what the y are serving as they come to your table. The leg of lamb was especially good.

One family sitting very close to us was entertaining a young man visiting them from Spain so the conversation switched back and forth from Spanish to English. It was delightful to hear them converse in the Spanish I had been taught. Of course, Mama and the matron of their table shared stories during the dinner.

After a small dessert we go the check and it did not reflect the half price special so Mama asked and a coupon was required. The waiter winked and took the bill back, reduced the price – and got a very good tip from me and Mama.

All in all, it was a delightful – and very filling – dining experience.