Christmas 2014

Christmas morning has finally arrived. I’m just doing little housework chores until it is time to go to the family dinner. After a respectful amount of time there I’ll return to my house in Vail and start packing for the trip back to San Felipe my real home. I’ll update this post later as things progress through the day.

I did get a couple of things done while here. I got a new ceiling fan installed took down another ceiling fan that wasn’t connected to electricity, that’s why it wouldn’t work! Had the electrician fix a light switch that controlled the lights in the dinning area and kitchen so now they work independently. Several things I wanted to do I didn’t because I couldn’t fit in the budget. The will just have to wait until some other time.

Basically I have been bored for most of this visit. Nice to see how the little kids have grown and to see my family, that took about a day. Had fun shopping, had a doctor visit got new medication and had Thanksgiving dinner with the family. Next year I’ll visit for one holiday and make other visits about every three months. Spending a lot of time in Arizona is not that much fun for me, I would rather be in Mexico with my friends and neighbors.

Below are photos of the Christmas tree and the electrician working on the ceiling fan. I’m glad I called an electrician as the wiring in this house has been messed with by the previous owners and I wouldn’t have had a clue how to fix it correctly.

New (to me) truck

Logo – Dodge Ram (Photo credit: Atelier Teee)

I’ve been looking for a truck for weeks and finally found and bought one. I’ve been borrowing the family’s pick up for over a month and I really needed to have my own set of wheels to get things done with the house I am purchasing. I answered an ad on Craigslist about a 1999 Dodge Ram w/extended cab (4 doors) and only 100k on the speed-o-meter. Went to look at it sunday and bought it monday, insured and registered it Tuesday then bought new tires for it and got an oil change Tuesday afternoon. The tires had sidewall cracks; not a good sign and I was worried that I would have a blowout and maybe an accident. Now the baby has new shoes, fresh lubricant Mobile 1, all fluids are up to snuff and she runs good. The people I bought from are immigrating to New Zealand and left this morning to visit relatives in San Francisco then on to New Zealand for the rest of their lives. Here are some photos of my new “old” truck. Not an economical vehicle with 5.9L engine but it could easily pull a small RV trailer 🙂

The white stuff is clear coat that is coming off no big deal.

The truck sports running boards!

Home inspection

Today made the second day of the home inspection business. The first day was getting the electricity on and checked as well as the water. The electricity seems to be fine all plugs are wired correctly only one fan in the back bedroom doesn’t work, but I don’t like its looks anyway so it will be replaced and wired properly. The water turn off valve for the house leaks badly and needs to be replaced as does one toilet tank seal. All this is an easy fix.

Today we had the gas turned on and found that the water heater needs to be straightened so the flue will work correctly and that there are no racks in the oven, the oven looks clean which surprised me as the rest of the house looks grimy. I was most concerned when the heating/air-conditioning unit didn’t come on when we had electricity. The HVAC man checked it out and it is a problem with the cable going to the unit from the thermostat and or the thermostat. I’ll have that replaced once the house is officially mine.

So far nothing serious has been found to be wrong just little things that need repair. A bit of good news today while at the house there was a strong down-pour of rain for about fifteen minutes giving the roof and windows a good test and they passed the test. The small amount of damage to the back windows was mostly caused be condensation and not a water leak as I first thought.

I am eager to get going with cleaning up the place; such as removing the carpet it stinks like someone or some animal peed on it and with the humidity the odor is stronger. Once the interior of the house is painted and new floor coverings are installed it will smell a lot better.

So, all-n-all I am more confident that this place can be made into a nice home once I get working on it. I did get to observe the neighborhood on a weekday morning and it is a quiet neighborhood just a few cars and small trucks passing by, the land drains fairly well and so far I’ve heard only one rooster, some horses and the train far off not using its horn at the crossing which is nice. I may like this place after I get it fixed up to my satisfaction. In a few weeks I’ll be trailer trash again maybe I should practice scratching in in-appropriate places and wiping my nose on my shirt-sleeve-nah, I’ll get by with the blank look on my face 🙂