Finally! Conflicted. Where I have been lately.

It doesn't seem like a whole hell of a lot has been going on lately and yet... 

First, my bank really dropped the ball. Not only did they lie about when the document they were supposed to be sending out would arrive, but now they seem to be ending free checking. That's fine, I was closing with them anyway. 

Second, the housing authority came through for us, voided the other check, and cut us a new one. So, we've gotten our friend Rachel paid back and mostly paid back Amanda's parents. We still owe them a little, but it will be taken care of shortly.  

Third, the housing inspection went well, the owners are going to fix basically everything, and the loan officer has already made arrangements for an appraiser to head out and look at the house. So far it looks like every thing is on schedule. However, December 13th, our closing date, can't seem to come soon enough. My plan is to get the painting done right away, let it dry, then move in. This is so we don't have to deal with the cats and paint. That's if every thing works out and we get the house. I am a little worried, the universe has thrown me some heavy slaps lately, so I am cautious. 

Speaking of, my panic attacks have gotten a little worse. I had one the other day that lasted half a hour. Amanda wanted to take me to the hospital. I am really getting sick of this. 

To keep my mind off things, I have been binge watching stuff on netflix. Total avoidance, I know, but it's what I can do right now. Between Voltron, Grey's Anatomy, and trouble getting to sleep at night, I managed to cook up a Voltron fanfic and I'm not too happy about it. Well, no, a fanfic is fine, but I want to focus on writing novels not fanfic, and I didn't want to start anything until after I was moved into a house. I tend to get obsessive about writing and don't like interruptions or distractions when I get going, and sometimes get a little cranky. And while there is a little privacy in two of the places we are bouncing between, there isn't really any place comfortable for me to set up- comfort as in my desk chair. However, it seems that no matter how resistant I am to writing this fanfic, it is that much more determined to make me write it. So, after much hemming and hawing, I finally broke down and wrote up a character bio for an OC, did a little research, and today I am going to start it. As Amanda keeps reminding me "all writing is practice". Yeah, I know that, but I'm not going to make a career out of fanfic. It is just frustrating. 

Aside from that, I've had some pretty awful dreams lately, two of which involved my mother either being seriously hurt or her dying. Another was an unsettling dream to begin with but only grew worse when I saw Amanda at a bus depot and the relief and safety I had in seeing her was ripped away when she came up to me and introduced me to a woman she was replacing me with. As if that wasn't bad enough, she said she was going to keep me to be the companion animal to this new wife and that I was going to be their cook and maid. Dream Amanda is a hoochie-mama-heffer-head-bitch! 

Well, that's about it for now. I'm rather tired, didn't sleep well last night, so I might take a small power nap. I'll catch up on blog reading a little later. 

I screwed up so bad, limbo, pain.

We are visiting our cats today. They are staying with the in laws until we have a house. 

Speaking of which, we made an offer on a cute little green house that our cousin Kitty Kat said looks like a fairy cottage. The offer was rejected and the owners asked for full price but they will pay closing costs and repairs. We are okay with that. That will work. So we have to put down our earnest money and then pay for a housing inspector to check foundations, wiring, ect... But, I fucked up royally. 

When Valley 206 gave us the relocation check, it had Amanda's and my name on it. We don't have a joint bank account. So when I signed and deposited the check into my account, my bank posted it then removed it and destroyed the check and sent out some legal document that we both have to sign, in person, in front of a teller, at the bank. Um, okay. That's fine, it really screwed us up, but okay. Except that we moved and our change of address- where we are getting our mail- hadn't yet kicked in. So if they sent it out like they said they did, then it would have gone to our old apartment- which had a vacancy sticker in it. So the letter would have gone back to Seattle, to the postal hub, to be rerouted to our forwarding address. Except it hasn't shown up and it has had plenty of time to come twice. 

We have been to the damned bank and the bank won't do shit for us. Not a Gods damned thing. We keep trying to get a hold of the Spokane Housing Authority to get them to cancel that check and reissue another one but we can't get a hold of them for shit and we aren't even sure if they will do it. 

So Amanda and I are sitting here, praying for the damned document to show before we lose out on this house. I've been so stressed out over all of this, over this one simple, yet colossal mistake of trying to take care of business while in the midst of moving out of our apartment, looking at houses, figuring out whose house I am going to be sleeping at this night or the next night, and going to the doctor, to therapy, and so on, that I can hardly stand it. I've cried every day over it. I've had panic attacks every day over it. Why can't we catch a break? 

A lot of people say its no the end of the world, but then they have never been in this situation. 

In other news, I went to the doctor today to get my blood drawn so she can check my thyroid. She made me pee in a cup too, to check my kidneys. I want to see what she says about my labs but I'm pretty sure we are going to change doctors soon. But I will talk about the why later. Oh and I have tendentious in both my Achilles tendons and carpal tunnel in both wrists. I now have to sleep with wrist braces for awhile. I also have had consistently high blood pressure for almost a year so I get to start taking blood pressure meds. Part of that is genetics, part of that is stress, and yes, part of that is my weight, but since every single person in my family, on my Dad's side, for the last several generations has had high blood pressure, um, yeah, it's probably mostly genetics. 

At the moment we are in limbo and the last several days I have been sleeping a lot and have been in a lot of pain. I have some big knots in my back that feel like knives. Amanda rubbed my back a little bit ago, but I might have her do some more later.

Honeymoon adventures and moving

We are back from our honeymoon. We are moved out of our apartment. We are living out of suitcases and couch surfing because we are officially homeless. There's a numbness to it, on the surface and maybe even a little under. Or perhaps I've shut down again to keep myself from crying. I am not okay and yet there is plenty to be thankful for. Staying positive, trying to look at things positively, I admit is exhausting, but I'm putting in the effort. A new chapter in our lives is beginning and I am fighting tooth and tangled hair to see excitement and the silver lining. So I'll go in order. 

We went to Seattle for our honeymoon. Amanda;s cousin graciously paid for our entire hotel stay in a lovely hotel in Issaquah. The bed was amazing and for the first time in years, I awoke in the mornings with little or no back pain. I felt spoiled. 

We were both sick the entire honeymoon but we got did not let it stop us. We went to the Northwest Railroad Museum and I rode a real train for the first time in my life. I loved it. All of the cars were from different trains and different time periods. We also got to see Snoqualmie falls on the ride, drank fresh, warm hot apple cider, and the train had to make an emergency stop because some jack ass tried to race the train and nearly got hit. Afterward, Amanda and I ate a picnic lunch in the rain by a river. 

Uwajimaya, a huge Asian food and gift store, in Seattle, was our next stop. We splurged a little and I'm still a little shocked that I spent 20 dollars on a bottle of Sakura Sake, which I am saving to drink in our new house (when we get it and are moved in). We spent so much in the grocery part of the store that we opted out of going to the book/anime shop nestled inside. A travesty to be sure, but I was really tired, aching, and we had one more place to go. Thankfully, Daiso, another Asian store on our list, was across the street. It is a very neat shop with interesting things from Japan. I would love to share our haul from both places but most of it is packed and in storage. After we finished there, we went to dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory.

On another day, we took a ferry from Seattle to Bremerton. I stood on the front deck the whole hour long ride and enjoyed the breeze and water. I saw jellyfish, loons, seaguls, and seals. It was amazing! As we pulled into port, I noticed that there is a naval port there and saw the ship Kitty Hawk, which I thought was pretty cool. From there we drove down to Tacoma to a little shop called Crescent Moon Gifts. Largely a pagan store, they also had a tea room, and some fantasy stuff too. I was in pain when we arrived and there was so much to look at. The staff was so nice and I enjoyed talking with them. The store is also very peaceful and despite being in pain, I relaxed while we were there. 

We were supposed to catch dinner with Amanda's cousin and his family back in Issaquah but we didn't make it. One of our tires went flat and we discovered that we had forgotten to buy a tire iron. So, with a dying cell phone, we messaged Amanda's cousin and knocked on the doors of three houses for help. House two didnt have a tire iron but lent us a cell phone charger. House three had a tire iron and while we changed the tire, the man's daughter asked if she could help. Of course! We weren't in a hurry and it was a learning experience for her. After we put the doughnut tire on, we thanked everyone, returned the phone charger, and headed to Costco so see about getting a new tire or repairing ours. Our tire was toast! Apparently in losing air, it got hot and shredded from the inside, and sadly Costco didn't have one to replace it. So we drove from Tacoma to Issaquah at 45 mph because the doughnut tire couldn't go above 50 mph, on the I-5 and I-90. We were only honked at 3 three times. The next day we spent milling about a small shopping center while Firestone changed our tire. 

Coming home was hard. We had a good time but we missed the kitties. We also dreaded the thought of moving out of our apartment.

Two of our friend had packed the majority of our apartment while we were away. I can't even begin to express how much of a help that was. We still had a lot to pack and we were both still sick. We took a day to rest and visit with Amanda's cousin Kitty Kat before she flew back to Tulsa. She'd come up to visit family and see us. 

In the scant few days following we were a chaotic rush and mess of packing. We've made several trips back and forth between Spokane WA and Post Falls ID- where Amanda's parent's live. We are storing our stuff in a garage they are renting at their apartment complex and they are watching our cats. A couple of friends pitched in and helped up load and unload the u-haul and also helped me when Amanda was at work. Because Amanda needs to be in Spokane to work and because we are looking for houses and I have a few doctor's appointments, and because of rental agreements of the people we are staying with, we are couch surfing. We can stay with Rachel a couple nights a week and stay with Amanda's parents a couple nights a week, and to finish out the rest of the time, we are staying with another friend a few nights a week. We are taking our mail at one of our friend's houses in Spokane because that's where we will be a majority of the time and it is one of the places we are staying at. 

This is all very stressful. I feel so lost and displaced. Some other things have happened, good and bad but I haven't processed them all. When I do, I will share. However, we are house hunting and trying to get well, and just trying to enjoy time with our friends, family, and kitties.