It was Her Tip

A whirl-wind day came and went, and by the time I called it quits, it was already dark outside. Oh how I dislike arriving at work in the dark, and then leaving after sundown.  Oh well, we’re approaching the winter solstice and much desk work to get completed, so I just put my big boy pants on and continue ploughing thru it. On the positive side, there happened to be a number of interesting things that took place today which I found to be not only remarkable, but also memorable.

My first duty outside my office was to go and open up 207 N. Hampshire for an appraiser who had nothing more than a computer tablet in hand. My how times have changed where years gone by, they had cameras over their shoulders and legal notepads and pencils in hand, along with high-end tape measurers. This over-reliance on computers is going to be something that’s going to come back and bite us in our bottoms more sooner than later.

I certainly must be a real estate dinosaur because the only “gadget” I use when listing a home, is having along my high-end camera which I use to take photos. I always have to laugh to myself when seeing how many of my colleagues use their cell phones to take their photos. One reason I’ll likely not switch to a tablet, is knowing I have all the notes I’ve taken, securely stored in a file, so if I need to do any back-tracking on a listing or sale, it’s all in that home’s file. Believe it or not, my office still has listing and closed files that go back as far as fifteen years or more, and more times than not, still having those at my disposal, allows me to easily research something I had listed or sold that many years ago, and especially when there are repeat customers on a given home.

Since I have some baking to do these coming weeks, I went searching for a five pound bag of rye flour at my “go to” groceteria. To my shock, they had every type of wheat flour but no rye other than two expensive bags of it which I forced myself to purchase, and since I had errands at both the east and west side of the City, I checked at the East Hy-Vee and once again, no five pound bags, but only four of the one pounders which I ended up buying. Believe it or not, the West Hy-Vee had not even a cup of rye flour.  The only reason I can come up with, is knowing that our Dakotas and Western States were experiencing droughts this year, which is where much of our rye is grown, so perhaps they didn’t even come close to supplying what our general public uses on a yearly basis. As Christmas approaches, I’m sure there’ll be many people who do holiday baking, being very disappointed over not having access to it. I’m still shaking my head over there not being five pound bags of rye flour available. I personally use it to make an old-fashioned Germanic loaf which is round and very good with any sort of meats or cheese. My mother used to make it only during the winter months because it’s more hearty and very good toasted, buttered, and then served with a bowl of homemade soup or stew. It’s already making my mouth water.

After a near half-day of stressing out over two closing files that are coming up in the next few days, I finally received the documents I’d been waiting for which took far longer than expected. After they were received, I finished up on the proposed closing documents and emailed them off to the closing agents with apologies for being late, clearly contained in those emails. I have two more which I’m babying, and unfortunately what’s remaining, is out of my control. I’m exceptionally thankful for having the closing agent over at Escrow Plus being aggressive about getting the involved parties to get their “shite” together. It’s going to be a close one, but I’m going to remain confident they’ll close on time.

I’m also prepared for the closing of my last available unit over at Prairie Place on 1st to close this Thursday. It’s going to be a bittersweet event because I’ve grown so very much attached to those owners, but hopefully I’ll be able to keep in touch with them. They’ve shared their life stories with me, as well as mine with them. There are several of the ladies who absolutely enjoy teasing me un-mercilessly, but I take it all in stride because I know they do it because they like me. Just like I used to tell some of my young relatives, “Now just remember. If didn’t like you, I wouldn’t be teasing you.” It’s very much true as long as the teasing doesn’t become wicked and spiteful which I don’t consider teasing, but rather on the order of taunting. How well I know the difference.

I did have to place a call to one of the “powers that be” in our City today, and only for the reason of finding out what it would take to make a small change. Afterwards, I followed up with and email, and later received a confirmation, as well as an alert that it would be passed on to another department. We’ll see how long it’ll take to get an answer, as well as to whether it’ll be something to my liking. Before calling, I already had my research done, as well as having communicated my thoughts to another office outside of our City government’s bodies. What I’ve always found best, is when you approach such entities with similar examples just so they have an idea what you’re talking about, they then have something with which they can compare.

While on my cell phone this afternoon, I just happened to walk to the back door of my office, just to have a look outside. Wouldn’t you know, there sat a woman who was seated on the ground near my door, and fumbling thru a large bag, as well as a her backpack. I got a good look at her, and thankfully she was too busy with her rummaging to notice me. Oh mercy! I could see she was on something because of her nervous twitching and not so lovely complexion, so I just walked back to my office. About ten minutes later, I strolled back to see if she was still there, and thank goodness she was gone, but she did leave the above flip-flop, so I sent a text to my associate to tell him about her visit. I had to laugh when he replied, “Haha. It was her tip for using your backyard.” My how our Downtown is growing all the more curious.

Tonight’s One-liner is: When you soulfully make a world tolerable for yourself, you make a world tolerable for others.

Related Property:
207 N Hampshire Ave Mason City
Joe Chodur

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