home again...

no, not this house.

i don't want to jinx anything...

...but it appears we have bought a house.

this is an ordinary first-world event, in that it happens every day thousands of times over.

spoiler alert: we would have loved a chance, in this context, to be ordinary.

it started with a humble goal: to move out of the house we've rented the past two years. it's too small, too ramshackle, and it lacks the water views the missus was craving.

improbably, and with little searching, we found such a house over in the hoity-toity part of our neighborhood. much bigger, with eye-boggling views of puget sound and the olympic mountains. 

we would still be renting, since i was a mere contractor at spaceneedl sprockets and mortgage lenders look askance at that form of currency ~ meaning we couldn't get a decent loan to buy. still, it'd be a pretty cool rental.

cut to: events go upside-down, in three easy steps

step one: give notice at the current rental house (which rents to someone else shortly thereafter).

step two: owners at the new rental suddenly realize they are acutely uncomfortable renting to people with dogs, and therefore cannot rent to us.

step three: t-minus three weeks from having to be out of the current place, we are left with nowhere to go.

cue turmoil, angst, panic.

cut to: events go right-side-up, in four easy steps

step one: within two days, and without warning, spaceneedl sprockets offers to turn me from a contractor into a full-time employee. mind you, this is unprompted and completely out of the blue. make of that what you will. but suddenly we can qualify for a proper mortgage.

step two: rush out to look at houses in our neighborhood, in a low-inventory sellers' market. we are stunned to find a couple of remarkably suitable options the very first morning. happy coincidence: these are houses we would've been very interested in even if we weren't in a huge, panicky hurry.

step three: make an offer and wait. realtor holds open house. wait. no one comes to open house. wait.

step four: owners decide to accept our full-price offer ~ but can't close for a month.

cue frenzied, frantic, move out of old rental into a short-term furnished townhome. 

events become a blur. blurriness not completely due to excess drinking. move-related fatigue, new logistics, and lack of sleep also may be a factor.

cut to: more waiting, no easy steps.

the loan approval seems to be done. we wait for that to go upside down.

the new, short-term routine is becoming more routine. we wait for that to go sideways.

the first transitional week is winding down. we wait for earth's poles to flip.

we don't want to jinx anything...

...but we seem to have bought a house.