As a self-proclaimed book lover, I have to say, it has been a great summer for books!

At least, in my little world.  May saw many novels by some of my favorite writers: Pygmy by Chuck Palahniuk, Pretty in Plaid by Jen Lancaster, Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris, The Awakening by Kelley Armstrong,  just to name a few.  The next couple of months are also bringing out some books I’m looking forward to, including Rage Against the Meshugenah by Danny Evans and Vampire Haiku by Ryan Mecum.

And one thing these books also have in common is the fact that the authors never have any book signings schedule for Florida.  I know it’s not the authors’ fault but still, it really sucks.  I’m an avid reader.  I enjoy having signed books.  (My two most notable ones so far are Stardust signed by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess and a book of poetry signed by Jim Carroll.)

I have a few authors that I faithfully follow, whether from other books or online blogs.  (Or, in Mr. Gaiman’s case, both.)  I would love nothing more than to stand in a ridiculously long line, get my two seconds of gushing whilst collecting the autograph, and walk away with a new prized addition to my growing library.  But I don’t even get the chance.

Unless I want to drive to Atlanta.  Which is seven hours away.  Which is a hell no.  (Unless it’s someone epic.)

There are some authors, primarily the well-known ones, who work with their local bookstores; the bookstores will take orders for reserve books, which the author will then come in and sign when they can.  But this isn’t an option when you’re following a lesser-known or up-and-coming author.

Seriously, what does Atlanta have that we don’t?  I mean, come on: Disney World! Theme parks! Clubs! Fun stuff! Well, fine.  The Atlanta population is something like twice the size of Orlando’s.  And, okay, it’s conveniently located so you can just swoop by on a book tour.  But… um… Disney World!

Okay, so maybe Orlando isn’t exactly the cultural center of the world.  But it totally sucks being a book lover living in a state that is often ignored in the literary world.

Some day, I’m going to be able to look one of my favorite authors in the eye and tell them how much I truly enjoyed their writing. I know they will have heard it a million times over but it will mean a little bit more to me.

(Edited to add: I forgot Buzz Aldrin is actually coming to my neck of the woods. So that kind of makes up for things because it’s freakin’ Buzz Aldrin!)

When you’ve gotten about four hours of sleep, seeing one of those freaky realistic babydolls laying perfectly still and unmoving (as fake babies tend to do) in a car seat in the backseat of someone’s car — with the windows rolled up on a Florida summer day — is an absolute mindfuck.

Happy birthday, Husband o’ Mine!  I apparently have a thing for old men so you’re in luck.

So yesterday was quite possibly not the best day ever.  I woke up with a splitting headache, had a ton of stuff to do at work and then, the crowning glory of a shitastic day, some guy backed into the front of my car.  And, of course, it wasn’t the slow tentative reversing that most people do; no, he went full glory, hit-the-gas backwards and punched a neat little hole in my bumper cover (the lower part of my bumper where, thankfully, nothing important is housed) with his tow hitch because yes, it was of course a big truck that had a ton of blind spots.  I wasn’t even close up behind him either; I had been pulling into the parking lot to pick up my husband during lunch and wound up behind the truck.

Mind you, he was trying to park into a space reserved for electric cars.  (Which, by the way, they need to put a BIGGER SIGN in front of that spot because everyone tries to park there because it’s right by the front doors. Just sayin’.)

This is my first accident ever and, let me tell you, I think I displayed incredible grace, considering I didn’t take a sledgehammer to his truck right then and there.  I know it was an accident but I think I’m entitled to a burst of momentary rage, as silent as it may be.  We’re going to get an estimate on the bumper today (hopefully) and get this whole situation taken care of.

On the plus side, the lender should be sending over a contract for our house today.  We’ve already completed our financial paperwork and we have an inspection scheduled for tomorrow.  Helloooooo, homeownership!

It’s odd, you know.

The way the blistering beach weather cooled to a balmy summer evening.  The way that Saturday just so happened to fall the day before another major milestone, his 30th birthday.  The way the bustling hotel stilled as everyone watched and held their breath and, in a way, celebrated with us.  The way everything was perfect, even my father-in-law’s fresh sunburn.  How months of panic, anger and heartbreak fell into place to create the perfect night.

Almost like it was meant to be.

Today, my husband and I celebrate our second anniversary.  While there will be no grand overtures of everlasting love — mostly due to the chaos our lives have become between buying a house and being only weeks away from him getting his Bachelors — we are entirely okay with that.  Our relationship, five and a half years strong, has never been grandiose or showy; for that, I’m grateful because when the theatrics fade away, sometimes there isn’t anything left. We aren’t perfect and our relationship isn’t perfect — but we’re perfect for each other.

We are the couple that reads quietly at a restaurant, enjoying a comfortable silence.  We love hanging out at a hole-in-the-wall diner as much as we love dining at one of the top restaurants in Orlando.  We’d just as soon spend an evening on the back porch with our friends, drinking and smoking cigars, as we would roaming the busy streets of downtown. We have both become better people as a result of being around each other so much.  Our brainwaves are in sync in a way that’s almost eerie.

Almost like it was meant to be.

So, here’s to us and all the things we have to look forward to.  To my co-pilot, my best friend, and my pedicure buddy: I love you.

I am not an overly touchy-feely, in-your-business person.  My parents were not brash and outgoing, I am not this way.  It’s not to say that I’m cold, although I’m certain I come off that way, but it’s a lingering effect of having been a painfully shy and quiet child who never made the first move.  I tend not to prod people in conversations or ask any further about something; I figure, people will share when they’re ready.  I’m content to let people move at their own pace and, for the most part, let them be.

So it’s completely baffling and slightly annoying to me when people are constantly in my business.  (Of course, I married into a family that is bawdry, loud, and nosy — but I love them like my own blood and give them a free pass.) As I get older and move along in this whole journey of life, it seems people, especially older folks, are constantly butting in.  When I started high school, everyone wanted to know what college I was going to and what I would major in.  When I chose my university, everyone wanted to know what career I would choose.  When I started dating a new guy, they wanted to know if I wanted to get married.  When I got engaged, we were constantly asked when we were getting married.  When we got married, the baby questions started. I can only imagine the questions that will come up should I ever get pregnant: when are you due? What will you name the child? Do you want a boy or a girl? Can I touch the bump? Where will your child go to college? What profession do you want him or her to choose?

And then I get a finger wagged in my direction that I’m growing up too fast and that I should enjoy life.

It’s hard not to lose patience, some days more than others, because most people really do mean well whether it’s because a certain path has led to their own flavor of happiness or they’re curious about decisions that they didn’t make.  Mostly, it’s frustrating because — and I’ll let you in on this secret — I have no idea what the hell I’m doing in life.  I don’t have everything mapped out.  I don’t really plan ahead if I can help it.  I try to take things as they come and only set short term goals for myself.

I am young and unreliable and learning; I need room to grow.

(For the record, nothing specific happened as a catalyst for this post.  I was just reading some blogs and came across some posts that got the gears going.)

Have there been times when you’ve just wanted to tell people to back the hell up?  Or do you not mind sharing everything with others?  (Maybe it’s just Only Child Syndrome, haha.)

Forgive me, Blogosphere, for I have sinned.  It has been seven days since my last update.

I just wasn’t sure how much longer I could kvetch about the whole “buying a house” thing because dude, it totally sucks.

We have a second offer in the works; our first offer on this totally awesome, totally perfect townhouse was turned down in favor of a cash offer from a real estate firm.  (So it can sit empty until they’re able to jack the price way up, instead of letting a young couple make a home in it.  Not that I’m particularly bitter or anything.)  The house we’re looking at now is a bit smaller but the layout is pretty good and the HOA is less militant.  Plus it comes with a bunch of upgrades like dark cherrywood cabinets, berber carpet and Corian counters!

What surprises me most is how utterly horrifying some of these places are.  One of the first places we looked at was an “as is” corporate-owned property; it was a mess.  At the time, we thought it was just a nightmare!  (Oh, how naive we were.)  The carpet near the entrance had large patches of mold which we’d have to replace all of the carpet downstairs since it was one giant piece, the fridge had a horrendous smell that declared war on your olfactory senses, the walls were poorly patched and dinged up… it just wasn’t pretty.

And then!

Over the weekend, we viewed a property that seemed okay; the floorplan was poorly designed but we figured we would at least check the place out.  The carpet was some cheap stuff that was already kind of matted and worn, the counters were sticky and dirty, and, for some odd reason, there was an army of dead, dried-out earthworms littering the living room carpet.

I automatically checked out the sliding glass door; the house we’re currently renting didn’t have a properly sealed slider so we had a huge influx of lovebugs when we first moved in. I pulled back the verticals — and freaked the hell out.

A massive brown blob was glued to the top of the slider.  I was promptly informed that it was a mud dauber nest.  As in, giant wasps.  Casually creating an entire colony inside this house.

We didn’t even bother going upstairs.

Of course, my mood may have been a little sour due to the fact that none of these places had the power turned on.  In the middle of summer!  In Florida!  And you know how heat rises?  Yeah, trying to objectively assess an entire upstairs area while feeling like you climbed into an oven is incredibly difficult.  I mean, come on, couldn’t we have the power going for, like, twenty minutes?

We’re hoping our search is coming to an end.  We should hear back on our offer  by Friday, although everyone seems confident it will be accepted.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed because, seriously, I’m convinced that one day, we’re going to walk into a potential property and get eaten by a mold-wasp-ant crossbreed creature that will have evolved in the dark corners of these neglected houses.

Hmm.  That’d make a great horror movie.  Stephen King: call me!  We’ll do lunch!

… well, you know.  Everyone has one.

In the short week that I’ve been elbows-deep in all things real estate, I can say that, above everything else, it is frustrating.

Now, I will concede that we are, perhaps, a little bit more of a difficult customer.  We have a relatively low price range, we prefer to stick to the area we currently live in — which has the added bonus of qualifying us for a USDA loan anyway — and our lease is up in three months.  We’ve found a fantastic buyer’s agent who is definitely earning his keep with us, helping us trying to find a great house within our numerous parameters; to be honest, I think I probably would’ve wound up on a police blotter by now if it weren’t for him.

In a world of short sales, cautious sellers, and properties going under contract seemingly every second, our search gets more and more difficult each day.  (By the way?  Short sales are a crock of shit, as there is nothing “short” about them.  We’ve been told that they can take four to six months on average to close, sometimes going on for as long as a year.)

Another thing I’ve learned is that real estate gets shelved with conversational taboos like politics and religion.  Everyone has advice and ideas as to how to buy a house; while they mean well, a lot of what I’ve heard has not been too helpful.  I’m lucky enough to have a few people well-versed on real estate: our buyer’s agent, for one, who works for us and is dedicated to helping us, and my dad, who earns some income from properties that he purchases, fixes up, and rents for a profit.

Things we’ve heard from “helpful” people: look at no less than fifteen houses, crossing out houses without appliances is wrong (even though we are, again, on a budget and couldn’t comfortably afford to outfit a house with all the necessities), don’t buy in a neighborhood with an HOA (even though a majority of the neighborhoods in this area have them and are virtually unavoidable), townhouses don’t have any resale value, having a long commute is okay if you can get a bigger house (have you seen Orlando traffic??  Also, our jobs and friends are all on this side of town, plus we don’t have to pay tolls every day to and from work)… and I can’t even remember what else.

My head is spinning.

But I know that, once I have those keys in hand, none of this will matter and, in all likelihood, I won’t have to worry about this stuff for at least another five or ten years.  (Of course, given how much of a headache this has all been and the time I’m going to spend obsessing over decorating, I may not want to leave ever unless they drag my cold dead body out of there or offer me a large sum of money to demolish it so they can put in another strip mall.)

Just getting to that point is going to be difficult.

It’s (kind of) official: we’re going to be homeowners in a very short time!  (Hopefully by August 31st since that’s when our current lease is up…)

I’m incredibly excited, nervous, anxious and overwhelmed.  The next few months are going to be insane.  I already feel an ulcer boiling away in the depths of my stomach and I can feel the white hairs sprouting from my head.

Hopefully, once we get a professional involved, we’ll be able to speed up the process of finding a suitable house. Which reminds me: in my next life, I want to be born as a real estate agent because seriously, almost every agent we’ve ever dealt with never answers their phone, they’re never in the office, and they just seem to come and go as they please. And they seem so damn calm whereas my intestines are already being put through a shredder trying to learn about short sales and litigation fees and figuring out what’s due when!  (Hence the search for an agent.)

It’s all kind of a sudden development — otherwise, we wouldn’t have tried to get this going three months before our lease expires — but it seems like it’s going to happen.

The thought of not having to clean 2600+ sq ft of house is way more thrilling than it really should be.

I have always loved libraries.  They’re neat and orderly, calm and peaceful; the sheer amount of books contained within present a world of possibilities, ready for exploration.

In fact, as part of my community volunteerwork for my college applications, I signed up at my library; I was there often enough so why not?  There was a certain solace to wheeling that cart through the aisles, returning books to their proper places and wondering about the people who checked them out.  I also spent some time in the back, where the cubicles were housed, prepping circulars about books for the blind and boxing up orders for home delivery.  I sat with the cheerful women who kept the place pleasant and even offered my services for their much-anticipated computer classes for things like surfing the web and introduction to computers.

My high school boyfriend also just happened to be the son of one of the librarians, though I didn’t know it at first.  As a result, I never had to pay a late fee, which is kind of awesome because I’m terrible at returning books on time.  After I graduated from college, I kept receiving e-mails from the campus library, telling me I owed them over $300 in fees!  It turned out most of that was because the books hadn’t been returned — even though I could’ve sworn they had been.

So it’s no surprise that my entire college career revolved around becoming a librarian, which is primarily why I majored in English for my undergrad.  I had my life all mapped out: get my Bachelors in English, get a Masters in Library Science, then begin a career working at various academic and public libraries until I worked my way into something cool, like a Hall of Fame or, my biggest dream, the Jeopardy! library. (I’d seen a behind-the-scenes one time and became obsessed.  Mostly because I wanted to meet Alex Trebek.  Hey, I have a thing for old guys!)

Anyway, while my life plans have slightly altered, my love for libraries has not.  I visited the local branch of the public library a few times when I first moved to Orlando but it was so small and drab and lacking that I never went back.  Then I discovered the campus library, chock full of old books, five floors of delicious academic joy; I delighted in the battered copy of Sylvia Plath’s journals, found The Cracker Factory next to Girl, Interrupted, and worked my way through many classic texts and embraced random discoveries.

Long story short, I spent a lot of time buried in those stacks.

And then it just kind of… stopped.  Life — as it has a way of doing — simply got in the way.

Over the weekend, on an impulse, I coerced my husband into going to the local branch of the public library, the first time in over five years I’d been there.  We both signed up for new cards and, within seconds, turned into kids at a candy shop.  DVDs!  CDs!  Books!  All at our disposal!  And, okay, the branch was still kind of small but they repainted and stocked their shelves.

In fact, we’re even planning a trip to the main library in downtown Orlando; it’s a huge structure with one of my favorite downtown gimmicks: a set of four or five giant light-up bars on the side of the building.  When you press the button under each bar, it lights up and plays a musical tone.  The inside also has a little cafe and three floors for your reading pleasure.  There’s also a Friends of the Library bookstore that sells withdrawn books for an incredibly cheap price, sponsored by the Friends of the Library, annual sponsors.  (I fully plan on joining, as you can become a Friend for as little as $10!)

It’s refreshing to have rediscovered the library and to see how it’s come so far from the days of the dewey decimal system and a handful of VHS tapes as the media section.  In fact, I might even go through my collection and see what I can donate to the library.  The more people I can share a love of books with, the better.

Have you been to the library lately?

If there is one thing that is not said enough in this world, it’s this: “Thank you.”

After the gym one particularly miserable and rainy evening, the husband and I stopped at Chik-Fil-A for a quick dinner.  (Nothing fried, mind you.)  A chaos of screaming, running children, a balloon artist and awful 90s Jock Jams music greeted us; clearly, we had stumbled upon the weekly Kids Night.  Seated behind us was an police officer, his wife and an adorable little girl that kept bouncing to and from their table.  After the officer told his wife he had to go back out on patrol, he kissed his girls and, after nearby diners wished him well and told him to be safe, walked out the door.

And it got me thinkin’.  How does she do it?  How can she watch her husband get in his patrol car and drive off, not knowing if he’ll come home safe that night?

Orlando has a huge military presence, what with all the government defense projects housed here.  It’s not uncommon to come across a uniformed soldier or see a bumper sticker proudly declaring the driver’s retirement from the military.  And, being a big city, there certainly is no shortage of cops, from county to city to highway patrol, and firefighters.  Whenever I see them out and about, I try to be as respectful and supportive of them; I admire them for what they do and the risks they take and the services they provide.

But it’s not just these servicemen that should be thanked.

Their wives, their husbands, their families: all deserve a healthy amount of respect and appreciation.  It can’t be easy being married or related to or in love with someone in that line of work.  They have accepted the duties of their loved ones and bear the burden of constant uncertainty.  I would have to think that, after awhile, you try not to live with the fear and the doubt, always anticipating the worst.  But it has to always be there, lurking in the corners.

They are all far more courageous and stronger than I could ever hope to be.

I know that, personally, I wish I could thank each and every serviceman and their loved ones because they’re all doing something I couldn’t do — and that, my friends, earns them a load of respect in my book.