I Want Something to Happen

I was getting anxious about how things seem stalled so I drove out to Albuquerque to check out the apartment situation and to talk to my builder. It was about 104 degrees here every day and it was quite a bit cooler (88-90) when I got to Albuquerque.

I haven't looked for an apartment since coming to Jefferson City in 1976. Back then, we rented a large two bedroom apartment for $175 a month. I was in for a shock because things have changed. I went looking for a two bedroom, one bath apartment and found a few that I could maybe live in but the prices ran from about $760 to $900 a month. Some of them were pretty bad, most were sort of average and a few were very nice. I will need to go over the list and the material I brought back and come up with a short list of places I will call when the time comes.

I also met with Betty the Builder and we caught up on things and decided to keep working under the plan to build on my lot. There are going to be homes available cheaper than what it will cost to build but at this point I want to go forward. I've been looking at homes online and went to one open house but I'm not very happy with what I've seen.

We went over the plans and decided to try to reduce the square footage back to 1,600 sq. ft. if we could without making things too small or cramped. Betty suggested opening up the kitchen into a common area of kitchen, dining and great room. I agreed even though the closed kitchen was something I originally wanted. I have seen open plans and some of them are OK and her ideas make sense.

On Friday, before I left town, I met with Betty and her house designer, Max.  Max is amazing. He worked most of Thursday and on into the night so he could give me a new set of house plans showing the kitchen changes and other alterations to the plan. All together he was able to cut out over 500 square feet by making just a few changes here and there. The laundry room is smaller, the garage went back to its original size, the master bedroom shrank a little but is still bigger than what I have now, the foyer lost some space. He shaved a little off the outside areas -- the three covered patios (or 'portals') -- but I had him add some of it back.

The biggest change is the kitchen --- we knocked out a wall and integrated it into the common living space. I wanted a separate kitchen, but seeing other houses and some of the apartments this week made me see that it was OK to have it open if we can manage it.  This makes the house seem larger (even though it is slightly smaller) and will reduce some costs.

I went up to see the building lot. The developer has turned most of the unsold lots back to the bank and has walked away from his plans to develop the area. That concerns me but the subdivision is legally platted and the covenant that restricts mobile homes still stands. The road is almost impassable....mostly ruts. Trash is beginning to show up in places. Somebody has been skeet shooting and there are broken clay pigeons in some places. In spite of all that the place still looks good to me.