Tuesday, 7/9/2019
Started the day with a run, which felt not just normal but actually good. For an hour I worked on the book. Then it was time to drive to Tasso street to meet with Chuck.
There I met Sean, a tall, gangly guy with a wild blond hair and a gentle manner straight out of the 1960s. He’s employed by Deborah to house-sit for security. He’s been sleeping on the used McCroskey mattress and really likes it, so I suggested he talk to Deborah and buy it. (If he doesn’t, I’d just have to pay somebody to haul it.) When not house-sitting, Sean lives in the warehouse of a music store. He’s got a ten year old son in Munich and would love to go back to Germany, but he’s only just managed to qualify for SSI (bad back) and would lose it if he lived outside the U.S.
Aside from the mattress, there is very little left from the sale. All furniture is gone. The refrigerator is gone, and that pleases me; I had come to hate that refrigerator over the past six months and I’m glad it’s gone. Apparently they had trouble getting it out, having to remove not only the back door, but the refrigerator doors as well. But there’s a dusty space where it was. There’s yet another possible buyer for the washer/dryer coming Wednesday.
The only real surprise to me was that nobody wanted the Rorstrand dinner service. I really thought… well, what do I know. It was back on Day 6 that I started restoring it by ordering replacements for all the chipped plates. Then Denise didn’t want it. Just a surprise to me that nobody wants such a handsome, complete set. Well, I suppose it’s that anybody with a household, buys their dinner service early on, or gets it as a wedding present. And they don’t need another.
Chuck arrived and we went over the next steps. In order they are: To get Amy to take a quick look and decide what paint colors she wants; then to get the painting contractor scheduled. When the painting is done, or while it is done, get the area rugs removed. After the painting, to bring in a cleaner to polish the wood floors and clean everything. And then Amy does her staging. Last or nearly last will be to get Richard to apply a new layer of garden mulch, and maybe get someone in to power-wash the brick walks and porch.
Can all this get done in July? Doubtful, I think. Can it get done in August? It damn well better had, because on September 5 I am out of here for two weeks. I really, really want the house sale wrapped before September 1, and I need to push everyone for that.
After Chuck left, the guys from the fireplace contractor arrived, Jose and Noah. They opined that the only way to get electric ignition and a remote control, is to replace the burner and grate that is in place now. Their boss, Eric, is to send me a quote. They didn’t say how much it would be, but I’m predicting it will come in over $1200. Less than $2K I hope.
Back at C.H. I spent a couple more hours on the book. I resolved a nasty problem with cross-references. The publishing platform I’m using supports x-refs but I’m trying to use them within my end-notes file to do op.cit. references, that is, cross-references from inside one note, to another note. Their software wasn’t quite up to it, but I found a work-around and reported it on their user forum.
I am just about ready to generate a final, print-ready PDF, which I can then use to build a book on Kindle Direct or one of the other on-demand publishers, Lulu or Blurb. But I also need to prepare a separate PDF of the cover. To now, I’ve only needed a front cover because that’s all an e-text needs. But a print book needs also a graphic for the spine and the back cover. It will take a bit of creativity to generate those, working from the nice front-cover graphic I purchased way back when.
Ate supper alone at a table for one, reading, like a nerd. But dammit, by comparison, it is stressful to sit with other people and make conversation. Not difficult while I’m doing it, but in the moment of entering the seating area holding my plate of food, faced with the options of, A, going to one of the open tables and smiling and saying, mind if I sit here? and B, going to a small table on the side and sitting down alone and bringing out my phone and opening Kindle to read while I eat, well, A is more stressful and B, more relaxing. That’s being an introvert.
Codgerville 