Monday Monday 12.12.2007

Good Wednesday to You,

I hope everyone is ready for another exciting week at the office. I know that I can't wait to start answering phones and listening to the beligerant membership of the U.S. Navy calling me and my career any one of the following:

Worthless
Piss Pour Service
Explicative Explicative
A Waste of Time.

Actually that hasn't happennend yet, but when it does. . . I will let you know.

Maggie and I closed on our second home as planned on Friday. All I can say is that I didn't want to leave it to come to work on Monday morning. As I've said before, the new home is very small, but because of that we were able to furnish, decorate, and outfit it with all the necessary appliances very quickly and inexpensively.

For everyone out there thinking of buying a home, I would like to offer the following advice about Homeowners Associations. HOA's as these devil worshipers are often referred to seem nice and courteous to the potential buyer, but to the homeowner they are obtrusive, regulatory, and strict! The advice is to simply avoid them like the plauge. My home in South Carolina came with a piss poor garden, so I added Red Mulch to give it some color. You would have thought it was December 7, 1941 and we were in Pearl Harbor. . . My HOA (and every person over the age of 50 - and there are plenty) damn near had a heart attack. Needless to say I had to replace the Red Mulch with the Pine Needles that originally covered the ground. . .I'm not making this up. Did I mention that these crooks swindle $1200 a year out of me and all they do is mow the lawn and take care of the pool. Moving on to house numer 2, which i have officially owned less than a week. . . .and I've already encountered a major issue! As you may or may not know, the community we just bought our second home in comes through with all kinds of great amenities: ski mountain, riding stables, tennis courts, basketball courts, we own a lake with a beach, a huge pool, a lodge, our own store, and a baseball field. Now in order to use those ammenities and to continue improving on them, we have to pay what are called Capital Improvement Fees. This is the same as HOA dues, but it goes toward all the great stuff i just mentioned. The HOA is generous enough to let the owners, owners' parents, owners' children, and owners' grandchildren all use the above mentioned ammenities free of charge. . . .Now that would be all fine and great except that Maggie and I aren't married, so there is some crazy rule about one family. . . therefore only one of us could take advantage of the ammenities. We're searching for an exception now, so we won't have to pay double the fee for us both to have access.


No need to bore you further, but thought it was pertinent that I pass on my Home Buying wisdom. Enjoy what is left of the week.


Ryan