Blind cat silently stalks up steps... Like a ninja

And the ancient one has adjusted to the new house.

She is quite smitten with the new house and on the weekends will sleep all day on the back deck. On the Pooh Bitch scale this little tantrum is about a 6 out of 10. Unfortunately, my Sony Cybershot can't really do just to the volume she is putting out. For those that don't know Pooh, she is an ancient 17 here and mostly blind from high blood pressure.

The Basement

The basement is unfinished. It’s built on a floating slab so you can see some soil around the edges. The house has oil heat and a gas-fired hot water heater. This is nice because that means when the heater goes, we can eventually put in a gas heater with having to pay to have the street opened up. It also means Julie can have a gas stove one day. It was disclosed that the oil tank was new in 2005. There is also a utility sink in the basement (unphotoed.) No one knows how old the heater actually is, though the listing states 1990. The home inspector couldn’t date it. The other point of contention is the water pipe located in back corner behind the oil tank. The home inspector seems to think there is crack in this pipe because there was moisture at the base and the paint was chipping off. The problem is that again, the house is built on a floating slab and the soil there will be moist after any rain. Because this is up against the oil tank, only the Atom or Ant-Man could get back there to verify this. Time will tell, but during the contingency period the seller agreed to have this pipe and the plumbing certified.

The Bedrooms

There are three bedrooms upstairs. The master bedroom is so pink that it visually assaults the eyes. We’d really like to re-wallpaper this room before me move in. The current wallpaper is halfway between old lady and bordello. The next largest bedroom has white walls and brown carpet. I know what you’re thinking, “finally a neutral tone”. Eventually this will be a guest bedroom. Until then we’ll use it as a visual shelter to hide from the pink everywhere else. The third and smallest bedroom has white walls and blue carpet. For now, this will be a computer room and a place for our countless books. Three bedrooms, one giant bathroom and a hallway; well that’s about it for the second floor. Time to head to the basement.

The Bathroom

Ok, now on to the second floor and first up, the bathroom. Each of the four corners of the room houses one feature. There’s a make-up table, the bowl, a gigantic triangle-shaped tub and the shower stall. There is no picture of the make-up table as I would have had to stand in the tub to snap it.

The oddball feature is the glass window between the shower stall and the tub. You can see it in the third picture, there is a blue flower pot placed on the window sill. I understand that aesthetically it makes the shower space less claustrophobic, but I’m not sure I want to have a bather watching me shower. It’s all very odd. The giant tub has a whirlpool but no one knows where the access panel is to the motor. I’m hoping that the 80-year-old frame house can support that tub, all it’s water and me without collapsing on itself like the house from Poltergeist.

The Exterior Sides

These three shots are as follows: the left of the house as you face the front, the right of the house as you face the front, and the third is taken from the backyard walking along what is the right of the house if you were facing the house front. In the first shot you can see the oddball air-conditioning unit. The second two photos depict the side door, which leads directly from the driveway to the kitchen via a narrow cellar stairway/foyer.

The Garage

Yup, there is a garage. Now we can go and get an old collector car and insure it with Hagerty Insurance. They have unlimited miles and no attendance clause, which is awesome. The garage does need some work. There has been some termite damage, so the roof needs to be lifted and the sill replaced. We also need to dig out the soil encroachment on the right side of the garage. There is also a hole in the roof that needs to be patched, but that’s no problem. I’ll post pictures of the slight termite damage later in the week. Theoretically the seller is supposed to have the garage remediated.