exhausted

This morning was the house inspection, from 8 to 12. Very educational, learned all kinds of things about joist hanging nails, the difference between cesspools and septic tanks etc. All the stuff about roofs went over my head (no pun intended), but I think Sweetie got it. Very reassuring on the subject of the barn: there are all kinds of structural things that need to be fixed, but at least they are fixable.

But it was 4 hours of standing around attending to the house inspection. Afterwards, not feeling very good, I couldn't eat even one entire piece of pizza. Tried to go to work, but on the subway on the way over, I could not imagine actually getting anything done at work, making it worse than useless to go in. Went home to lie down instead.

by popular demand...

OK, the house details:

It's in Wilmington, very close to drbitch and frotz. Style is "unclassifiable"; it consists of a small original house and a large addition. 4 BR, 2.5 BA.

Good points:

* Amazing gardening potential. It's got a fairly large lot, with a large-ish garden plot already dug up in an area that must get many hours of sun. Already established compost heap, strawberries, raspberries and rhubarb. And my organic gardening consultant, drbitch, is not far away. She's seen the land and seems eager to advise me on making good use of it. Mmmm, produce!

* Amazingly close to the commuter rail, thus I can be Farmer Alex and yet commute to my job in town without immersing myself in car culture. frotz measured 0.6 miles from the station to the house. At that distance, it's a toss-up whether walking or biking to the station would be less hassle.

* The barn. It's a bit decrepit, but once we take a few measures to keep it from falling down (replace a couple of dry-rot sills, add some joist hangers, replace a couple of piles of rocks with actual support posts) and fix the potentially leaky roof, a lot of Sweetie hobby clutter can move into the barn.

* A big kitchen, with a gas stove and an oven that gets hot enough for pizza.

* Newly renovated, so no crud or peeling paint, the new kind of windows that are so easy to deal with, and lots of electrical outlets.

Not so great: the floorplan, which is just weird. The livingroom is so large that Sweetie wants to cut it into two rooms, which I don't agree with. But it's not clear to me either how to use the space. The kitchen has a large open area bounded by the island, the pantry door and the laundry nook door where the kitchen table should go, but I'm concerned that a table there will clog up traffic flow. The dining room does not directly open onto the kitchen, it's around a corner, which tempts Sweetie to steal some of the livingroom to make into part of the dining room... irk. But then what would the dining room become?