*two months later.....* in shiny things

That’s kind of sad. But I have been ridiculously busy at work, after that little bit of downtime way back in January. All the August and December applications came in and we’ve been working like mad on them. And by all, I mean maybe a third of what we should have gotten. If that. Which was the case across all the colleges. When someone brought the extremely low numbers up to the Registrar’s Office person who is in charge of this new apply-a-whole-year-early graduation application lunacy, her response was “Maybe they just aren’t thinking that far ahead yet.” Yeah, because maybe.... IT IS TOO EARLY FOR PEOPLE TO BE APPLYING TO GRADUATE NEXT DECEMBER!!!!

Plus, NOBODY UNDERSTANDS WHAT APPLYING TO GRADUATE MEANS!!! And out of the August ones we did get, I’d say 75% had originally applied for May. Even though they are actually finishing their coursework in the summer. They can walk in the May ceremony, there is no August ceremony, ALL August grads walk in May, it is in everything we send them and all over the Graduation page and included in the application instructions in SEVERAL spots..... still everyone who is finishing in the summer applies for May and then has to move their application. Which is, frankly, a great big pain in the ass for everyone concerned.

Ummmm.... sorry..... I’m okay now. The upside of this is that once we got through the applications we did get for August and December, we were done with the worst of it. And now I just get a weekly report with “late” applications, which are easily processed. Which means I kind of don’t have anything at all to do at the moment. So maybe I’ll actually start getting caught up here and even write an entry or two now and then. Ha!

I’m kind of down right now, sad and gloomy, and renewing my writing ways would probably help quite a lot. I am gloomy because … we had to postpone our England trip. We JUST decided this a couple of days ago, and … and..... WAAAAHHHHHHH. It was a financial decision, and we just postponed till NEXT summer, and it’s the right thing to do and next summer will be here before we can turn around and it’s not like we’re NOT going EVER AGAIN, and I’ll be really happy this time next year that we postponed… but..... WWAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!

To keep it fairly short, my BFF and traveling buddy Kim has been having a whole bunch of financial issues. Some due to her very poor money management skills, but quite a hunk due to having a sick dog - he’s got diabetes they can’t seem to get under control for any length of time, and then he got pancreitis (I’m sure I’m spelling that wrong but spellcheck is offering no better choices) and he’ll have to be boarded at the vet while we’re gone which would be another huge chunk of money. And she’s had several other things come up too that were unexpected and unavoidable.

But she did not want to cancel. She was really looking forward to it too, and insisted it would be fine. Then. THEN. Baker B and I rent a very old doublewide trailer in Asheville to one of my nieces - long story but basically I inherited it from friends of my parents, and it’s on a bit of land my dad gave me. And I rent it to my niece for practically nothing, considering what rent runs in that area. But it is ancient (probably 45 years old) and had an equally ancient heat pump in it. That broke. It’s broken before, but was always fixable. This time, it is not fixable.

I was about to book our flight at last – I actually had my credit card out and the site up – when I got an email from the niece with the estimate attached for a new heat pump. (The ticket prices were careening up and down by hundreds of dollars like EVERY MINUTE so we kept waiting and waiting and stressing over them and they’d gone down a bit again so we decided it was time to just get the damned things and stop worrying about it.) I opened the estimate before finishing my booking.

SIX. THOUSAND. DOLLARS.

Yes. $6000.00. For a new heat pump. Which, astonishingly, is pretty reasonable. The old one was outside and they don’t even do that anymore - it has to be put inside, which means new ductwork and installation stuff. There really is no other option - a furnace would have to have ductwork too and also a tank put in. Propane would have to have ductwork and whatever set up they use, and it’s expensive anyhow. And the heat pump is heating and air conditioning too. And the old one was apparently a piece of crap so at least a new one will actually work properly.

BUT. OMG. SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS.

We are getting more estimates but I think that’s pretty much what it will be. And although we freaked out and decided we’re getting rid of that trailer, we’ve calmed down and even though it’s ancient, it HAS had quite a lot of work put into it. My brother lived there for years when the kids were small (bizarrely before I knew it was mine so I wasn’t getting rent way back then) and he did a lot to it, as did my niece’s ex-husband who also lived there for years, after they’d divorced, until he moved to the coast for a really good job (I was getting rent from him). The flooring has been replaced, and I don’t even know what else. So it actually is not about to fall apart (I hope) and does look pretty good for its age. And we’ve pretty much decided we’re moving back to Asheville when we retire because we are over the horrible weather in this place and although Asheville is still in the mountains, it’s considerably milder than here. And we’re getting too old for college towns. Baker B has grand plans for a modular home on the land I own. If we keep the trailer it would be an option until we can get the house built (we’ll give the niece like a years notice if we make her move.) Not that this is happening soon – Baker B can actually retire in six years (he thinks- I think we aren’t at all prepared, but whatEVER) - I can maybe retire in 10. There’s also a small chance I could get a state job down there after he retires and not lose any of my benefits.

Anyhow, good job making the long story short, but the gist is we decided it would be beyond foolish to go to England when we are both struck with such massive financial issues, when we can go next summer instead and not be stressed out about the money. I’ve got money saved for the trip that I can (SOB) use for a hunk of the heat pump instead, and we can finance the rest. And I’ll just start saving anew for the next trip. The only thing we had to cancel was our London Lodgings, which we book directly through the woman we stayed with on both previous trips, and being so far in advance she was fine with it. AND Baker B says he’ll go with us next summer, which is a big plus– we were disappointed that he wouldn’t go this time, but he just did not want to go again yet.

Still. STILL. I am REALLY REALLY sad. I had looked forward SO MUCH to the trip. There are many advantages to postponing, but.. still… WWWAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!