Friday the 13th

The total trip to Providence of 416 miles takes seven hours. The tolls amount to about $25. I was a little worried about arriving in a new place on Friday the 13th, but things seem to be working out okay.

The weather was perfect, and there was no traffic. At about 9AM, we showed up at our hypothetical house. We looked in the windows to check if anyone had broken in over the past six weeks. Apparently, thefts of copper piping happen pretty regularly in Providence. We both hopped into the screen porch, which is missing a panel of screen, to look in the windows.

We noticed about forty or fifty tiny praying mantises, and we located a small white nest or egg which had apparently only that morning hatched them. I tried to take pictures, but the little suckers were too small and almost see-through.

We went over to Seven Stars Bakery which is about a half-mile from the house for some tea and a snack. While we were there, Bruce called to give us the lockbox number. This was sweet music to our ears, and he said, we would be able to move our things into the house!

I breathed a sigh of relief. Until that moment, there was a very real possibility that we'd have to have the moving guys deliver our things to a storage unit, only to have to move them again ourselves whenever we eventually closed.

Bruce also, however, suggested there were some additional problems with the closing. The seller’s agent was going to be in court all day for something related to his son. The deed the bank had overnighted the day before had errors in it. We still didn’t have a sewer bill.

The movers delivered everything at about noon. Most everything is going to stay in boxes until we close, because A) the house is absolutely filthy (pictures forthcoming), and B) if anyone in authority came to the house and wanted us to leave immediately, we want to be able to oblige.

Because the weather was splendid, in the afternoon we stopped at Home Depot and did some sorely needed yard work. While we were in the front yard, we met Julie our neighbor to the east. She was walking her big, black Poodle, Lila. (Here’s a couple pics, Ma, since everyone knows you’re a big Poodle fan. Lila seems super smart and very nice.) Julie said we could use all her garden tools and said her shed was always unlocked.



Jonathan, from two doors down (Noel and Avi are his wife and son, in that order), the gentleman who had helped to “sell” the house (see bottom of linked page), came by with beers to share. He offered to serve as our interior design consultant. Larlar, you can talk with him at some point. I think he’s teaching design locally and consulting as well.

When we told Ellen, our neighbor to the west, that we wouldn’t have electricity until Monday, she said she’d put an extension cord out the window we could use. Once we're up and running, Sue will reciprocate with beer bread.