Portland wanderings

We live in such a pretty city.

the biggest remote

I went over to my friend Zoe's the other day, and she has the biggest remote I've ever seen. and it's powerful! I pointed it at the wall opposite of her television, and tv turned on! Wow-ee!

craft partay

craft parties are always fun.

back to bizzy

I've jumped right back into business and busyness. The running around starts to feel like running in circles. I've been working, showing houses, shopping for houses, driving all over Portland. I'm getting to know this city pretty well. I'm trying to get some reading and research done this afternoon. I am quite behind on my magazine reading, I still have the last issue of Outside to read and I just got the new one! I also picked up the new issue of Portland Monthly, the cover is 20 best neighborhoods, and there is a whole bunch of well laid out data on real estate in 120 Portland area communitites. I'm doing my homework......I also found this really cool map! If you want to invest in property in Portland, buy in those yellows! and of course, come talk to me about that.
I've got more houses to go look at this afternoon.........gotta skee-daddle

cross dressed trivia

We choked at trivia, despite our cross-dressed efforts for bonus points. We did really great the first round, we were in 2nd place. But then things went so so wrong. I don't even want to talk about it, I don't want to re-live the pain. But check out our awesome cross-dressed outfits for gender-themed trivia! Yep, we look GOOD!

not permitted

It looks like we did not get permits to raft the Rogue this summer. AL and I both applied and my Dad and his friend Alan. Here's where it gets weird: I downloaded the list of people who got permits, it lists last name and first initial. There was a Larson, J. and a Martin, A. So we assumed that at least my Dad and Alan had gotten permits. But when I asked my dad about it he said it wasn't them. It was a different A. Martin, and a different Jeff Larson! So if we want to raft the Rogue Wild and Scenic we have to do it before May 15th. It may be a little cold...... or we can go after Oct. 15th.

one of my favorite things

I love shoes. And I love getting good deals on things. I really love getting good deals on expensive shoes. I got this pair of Keen's for $40. that's more than 50% off! and they're sample shoes. So inside they say "Sample, not for resale". That just makes them extra fun.

vacation

I just got back to Portland today. Jeff and I went to Canada and went backpacking in the Juan de Fuca park. It was awesome. The trail was really cool, very challenging. Lots of up and down in and out of canyons, steep stuff. We hiked about 16 or 17 km. Our first night we got to the park really late and still had to organize and pack our packs. So we started on the trail in the dark, hiked 2 km to the beach and set up camp. I think it was about midnight when we got to the beach.

-AND- I actually uploaded a whole bunch of pictures to my Flickr account. I've had one awhile, but never used it until now. Besides the few Rosie pictures I posted last August. Check out my pictures!

moving sucks

I feel as if there have been previous posts of the same title...... most likely because that's what I have to say about moving.
This has been the most disorganized I have ever been for a move. Though I'm sure it could be worse. All my stuff has gone back to pulpshopgirl's garage, where it was residing a mere 6 months ago. Only this time, I will also be moving into a bedroom! as soon as the painting is done. One more coat for the ceiling and the trim. The walls are a beautiful orange, truly fantastic. They may even be more orange than my old room at my alder st. house in eugene.
The last week has been a blur of working, scraping, spackling, painting, and shuttling people to the airport. I had a great super quick trip to Eugene last weekend. My parents spent two weeks in Roatan, where they bought a condo that is under construction at Infinity Bay. Looks pretty nice there! I'm looking forward to going someday.
I'm really looking forward to next week, Jeff and I are going to go camping in Canada! We're going to go check out Juan de Fuca park on Vancouver Island.

sky of the 5

Drove to the eug today, the clouds were amazing!

blog-GRRRR!

I've been trying to upload pics to blogger, but its not working. grrrr...... what I've been up to lately: I have no idea. Last night Jeff and I went to my firend and office mates home, we played snooker on her husbands 100+ year old snooker table. It was awesome. they made tawsty salmon and green beans for dinner, and I drank too much whiskey. Good times, good times.
So when I was down in Scio at my grandmas, we were going through the garage a bit trying to find the old papers from the survey of the lot that they had done quite awhile back. We did end up finding them, which is great. I also found a knitting machine! and my grandma gave it to me, it's a Light Knitter model LK 100. I have no idea how to use it and of course it didn't come with a manual. I haven't been able to find one yet on the internet, but I also haven't spent much time trying. I'm excited to get it set up and give it a try, i think I will wait until i am fully moved in with Pulpshopgirl. No point in setting up that crazy machine when i'm just going to put it back in its box and move it in a week and a half. We've been working hard on fixing up Pulpshopgirls upstairs. Scraping wallpaper, spackling, sanding, lots of scraping......We've got to really bust some ass so my room will be ready to move into. Lots more spackling scraping sanding to do before we can texture and paint! whee! I'm excited. i have lots of good pics, but like i said.....they're not wanting to post.

it pays to ask

I just called my credit card co. for two reasons: 1. I had a late payment last month and my dad wanted me to make sure it wasn't going to go against his credit since he is still co-signed on my card 2. my card is expiring next month and I wanted to know when I would get the new one.
So during this conversation the guy voluntarily removed the late payment charge of $40, then when he asked if he could do anything else for me I said "only if you can lower my interest rate." He lowered my interest rate from 9.9% to 1.9% for the next 12 months. What a fabulous miracle of timing! I am pretty much living off my credit card right now, so this huge reduction is a huge help and relief. Yay!
It's amazing what they'll do for you when you call and ask nicely.

My First Listing

Please take a look at my new listing. If you know anyone who wants to buy a home with some acreage in scenic Scio, Oregon please let me know!
and you betchya we buried a wee St. Joseph in the ground upside down.

keep on workin'

I'm working floor this morning, no calls though. I have 30 min. left. I've gotten some stuff done, I like doing floor because I have to stay put and do things. My flakey buyer who I wrote up all those offers for has gone AWOL. What a bummer! He's not returning my phone calls. We even had two good counter offers and he had no response. So depressing. there was one of 'em I would have loved to buy at the price they were countering with, it was really a deal. Oh well I guess it's bound to happen sometimes. But in good news, I may be listing my grandmas house in Scio! that would be fun. It will involve some frequent commuting to Scio, and i will also see my grandma and my uncle more.
I have to go buy my first lockbox...... how exciting!
oh, and I found my keys. Somehow they got shoved way down into the laptop compartment of my bag....I even had looked there before, but when I finally took out all the magazines and files that I had shoved in there I found the keys.

general malaise

Some days are better than others, today was not one of those. I had to go to a stupid seminar, blargh, it was boring and could have been titled "realtor ethics for dummies." the most annoying part though, was that i was stressing the whole time because i had a counter offer that was expiring at 1 and i couldn't get ahold of my client to do anything about it. rather, i did get ahold of him, he was supposed to get back to me, and I never heard back from him. So there's one deal down the toilet. I'm also really cranky. The last couple weeks I've been feeling like, "How the hell did I get here, and what the hell am i suposed to do now that I'm here?" I'm thinking I've hit the February slump. thankfully february is almost over.Yesterday and today I've been feeling really bad. Like, woozy and ill and afraid I'm going to get a huge crazy head rush and pass out kind of bad. icky. spinny. no fun. i also seem to have lost my house keys, which sucks. They just aren't in the pocket of my bag where I always keep them. I hope they show up, i have my house keys, Pulpshopgirls house key, and my bike lock key on there. Plus my "Damn I'm Good" keychain that I've had since 8th grade. Lucky for me I keep my car key seperate, 'cuz those things are real "special" and expensive to replace.
yesterday my co-worker and I went to on a slightly drunken quest to a catholic stuff store to get statues of St. Joseph. Evidently, he's the patron saint of realtors. the lady at the store assured us that even though we weren't catholic, if we prayed to st. joseph he would help us out. They even sell him with a prayer card as a home selling kit.....you bury him upside down in the yard! I love it. Even though I don't have any listings, I figure he might help with selling to buyers too, and I can use all the help I can get!

my first offers

Yesterday I wrote up 3 offers for 3 different houses for one guy. my first contracts! my first real client! if they are all accepted he will buy them all, but we came in pretty low so I don't think they will be. but we'll see..... I'm going to be working with him more to find some more investment properties for him. We spent about 3 hours writing up offers, I wrote up 4 but he decided to hold off on one of them, so we submitted 3. I sure learned a lot about the Earnest Money Agreement and am quite comfortable filling 'em out now. I may be selling some houses! Pretty exciting!

adventures in broker's opens

Tuesday I toured a million dollar listing in gresham. what a joke, I don't know who priced it but whatevs, thats not the interesting part. the interesting part was the creepy stuffed animals all over the house. I only got pics of a few with my phone, and these aren't even the creepiest. the creepiest was a small whit dog underneath a side table. to many people around to snap pics of that one.






also, I'm proud to report that our trivia team came in 2nd on tuesday! we won $60. it was president theme night. sadly, we were missing pulpshopgirl as she has fallen ill. i think we would have gotten 1st if we had been in full effect. maybe next week.

whataweekend

Heres the short version of last weekend -
Friday:
left for Eugene around 4, arrived at my parents around 6. My parents dog Max promptly bit Jeff. Quick initiation into the fam. We made a quick dinner, then went to the "Garden" part of Braden's play, which was AMAZING. not only were the high schoolers british accents just priceless, but it rained on set for almot 10 minutes! they had this whole sprinkler and drainage system, incredible! Afterwards we had beers with R! and AKofN at their pad. good times.
Saturday:
got up early, went for a hike up Mt. Baldy with mom and the dogs. went to Dorris ranch in Springfield to see the port-a-potty house that Braden is building as his eagle scout project. went for a nice walk there and played some soccer. went and saw grandma mae. had a funeral for Honey. spent most of the afternoon preparing a HUGE indian food feast that R! and Andie also came to help us eat. went to the "House" part of "House and Garden", which was also fabulous. hung out at Andies for a bit after the play, then went back to my parents house to observe the cast party that Braden was hosting. What fun it is to eavesdrop on highschoolers!
Sunday:
walked the dogs, got a haircut, had breakfast with KC, hit the freeway, stopped in Scio to see my grandma and my uncle. we missed the bar b q for my cousins mission farewell, we were really late. made it home to Portland, watched a really bad movie (Black Dahlia.....so sucky) went to bed.

Here are pics from last weekend: