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And then I was in Arcata to stay.
Restful time? Not a chance. Still had to find a place to live, and it was the same as before. No, it was worse. Finding an apartment was hellish. A couple of time the agents told us we had the place, and when I went to sign the papers they told me they’d rented it to someone else. What the F!?
Brian told me the university here—and there is no significant above-ground industry other than the university here—had admitted double the previous number of freshman, precipitating a housing crisis.
And the university was giving special deals—kickbacks—to the rental agencies who got houses for students. Wow,” I thought, “maybe having the uni here isn’t an advantage.” I’d find a place that took pets and call the agency and they would say something like, “Come by on Tuesday morning at 10:30. Don’t be late. Open House is for 15 minutes.” And there would be 30 people waiting to see it! This went on for weeks. I was disappointed when I had returned to Berkeley without an apartment weeks earlier. Now I was in despair.
We finally found a place through Alisha’s contacts (and she seems to know half the populace here). Her friend Mara, my new neighbor, was acting as agent for the house next door to hers since the last residents reportedly bailed in the middle of the night. She was trying to reserve it for a friend of hers for “when she sobers up,” but realized that was a losing proposition and gave us the go.
Well, when I spoke on the phone to the landlord he said, “Send me the deposit right away.” We went right out and bought paint.
It’s a damn cute little house, but it was filthy. It’d been rented to students for several years, and before that the old lady who lived here was certified crazy. She used to stalk up and down the streets talking to nonexistent people. But she took ill and was put in a home, and the students moved in.
So we decided to clean up and paint the place. We decided we wanted Mexican colors. Here are some pictures of it.
One day as we were painting the county probate officer visited the house and spoke to Suzanne and said, “Don’t send him a penny.” Seems the house is actually under the conservatorship of the county! After a long chat with the probate officer we have things straightened out. He explained that the county was likely to sell it, in six months at the earliest. This hasn’t made me feel secure and settled, but then, we have been planning to move into my daughter’s “extra” house when it is repaired in another 6-12 months anyway. Then the landlord explained he was going to try to get control of the house again, and so I am petty sue that there will be quite a while before it is settled through the courts.
So we painted up a storm, to exhaustion. Didn’t finish the kitchen or bath before exhaustion set in, but so it goes. Szn wanted to contact paper the shelves in the kitchen, so it took longer to unpack all of the kitchen stuff. But the bedroom and office are finished—though organizing my office was a bitch and a half with all my misc boxes of papers. And once we got the living room cleared of boxes and stuff, it’s pretty much be empty since we have no furniture except our two extra futon mattresses and a desk that was left behind. But heck, that is sufficient for guests! So stop on in when you are in the area! :-)
We are located down town. More downtown Arcata than we used to be downtown Berkeley! 3 blocks to the town square, to the coop grocery, to the hardware store, to several restaurants.
We like it.
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