Gee honey, thanks....

Please cast your mind back and remember the sad tale of the Angel that used to sit on top of our Christmas tree. Well, in fact, she's still up there as I haven't had time to find a replacement. Which is what the Saint was thinking when he decided to "help out". The Saint is not the best shopper, so it should come as no surprise that when he looked for a replacement it was...well...not quite what I would have chosen.

She's carrying a wand AND a torch!

AND she's fiber optic!!

In many

Many

MANY colors!

And she comes with her own transformer!



She's going back tomorrow. Sheesh.

We had it coming

When we were decorating the tree on Saturday, one of the last things to be added was the angel on top. That is the TRADITION. She is always the last decoration added to the tree. She gets put atop the tree, plugged into the rest of the lights, a switch is thrown and she shines forth in all her majestic glory

Lights run around the bottom of her skirt, illuminating her from within. In her hands she holds two wee, tiny candles. I bought her for the first Christmas tree the Saint and I ever decorated together. The year we were ENGAGED. As in the year before we were MARRIED. For twenty three Christmases she graced the top of the tree.



I even COMMENTED to the Saint how AMAZING it is that year after year she continues to light the top of our tree!

You do see where this is going don't you? Yes my friends that's correct. I threw the switch and ...nothing. Oh the rest of the lights on the tree sparkled and shone, but not the angel. With a gasp she was snatched from the top of tree and I urged the Saint to find her replacement bulbs and get her back up and glowing STAT.

He turned her over and this is what he found. HOLES melted through the plastic in four places! Not to mention a large mass of tangled wires that I suppose did not raise safety concerns twenty some years ago.



Yes, it seems she's had it in for us for quite some time. Apparently she could have caused any one of the trees of Christmas Past to go up like a roman candle on the 4th of July.



The Saint simply shook his head and said "I guess she resented having a stick up her ass all theses years."

I guess she did.

OMG the HOUSE

Remember the house? And the inspection? It is not.going.well.

The team that came out last week to do the inspection was wonderful and thorough. It's been twelve years since we went through this and now they put the reports on line, with pictures and everything, which is very cool. But I digress.

Here's what they said. The roof and foundation are in good shape. A little termite activity, to be expected in a house that age, that the sellers agreed to treat in the original contract. All the windows are new, as are the kitchen appliances. The furnace and A/C are less than ten years old. The siding is in good shape, so is the deck.

BUT. There's always a BUT. There are some things that need to be addressed. There are wiring AND plumbing problems in the 36" CRAWL SPACE. And the A/C is not working at full capacity. The chimney crown has deteriorated and the chimney had so much debris that it needed a separate inspection.

The chimney inspectors came out last Friday. $600 bid.

The plumbing/AC/Heating dudes came out this morning. But my sister failed to mention the AC/Heating part. So just a plumber dude showed up. Plumbing bid is over $1,000. Though he couldn't inspect the WHOLE crawl space because of all the EXPOSED WIRING. And we have to wait until tomorrow to get the AC/Heating guy out.

So basically it's a death trap. I hope the words DEATH TRAP help when we go back to the sellers to re-negotiate.