Updates on everything
In the past 72 hours or so:
- I found out that the insurance I've been trying to get for the past week (dealing with various unhelpful and/or difficult-to-reach insurance people) isn't necessary at all.
- The house loan was approved!
- We "removed the financing contingency," which seems to be a fancy way of saying that we told the sellers that we're no longer waiting for the loan to be approved.
- I found out that the court that has to approve the house sale may not actually look at the documents 'til 9/15, so the closing date may not be 'til then. But I think I don't have anything else to do regarding the house 'til we close, with the possible exception of advance-scheduling people to come in and do some work on it shortly after closing.
- I finalized the dates of my sabbatical: August 20 (a week from next Wednesday!) through October 19. (That includes sabbatical, saved-up vacation time, and a little unpaid time off.)
- I decided to go to the SH workshop in Oregon, and bought a plane ticket for that. Also reserved a room in a motel down the street from the place the workshop's being held.
- I found out that one of my great-uncles just died. I don't think I ever met him, and certainly never interacted with him in any meaningful way, but it's still a little sad. My grandmother was the oldest of six kids; I think this is the second of her siblings to die. I should call her to offer my condolences.
- I made tentative plans for my Big East-Coast Trip. I was going to just spend two weeks in Boston, but it seemed a shame to be out there, a few hours' drive away, at the same time as the NJ workshop. So I looked at schedules and talked with Jim and looked at plane fares, and came up with a tentative plan: fly to Philadelphia Wed. 9/24; visit Swarthmore for a couple days; train to NJ Fri 9/26; workshop there; possibly make a very brief side trip to NYC on Monday 9/29; train up to Boston; attend Jim's birthday party in Boston 10/4(ish); fly home Tues 10/14. I'm a little unhappy about spending three weeks of my time off on one trip, but I think it'll work out fairly well, and it gives me a few days back home of resting up before I have to go back to work. Of course, it may mean that I won't get a chance to actually move to my new place until after I go back to work. It also means that I won't be attending WFC, which is a shame; lots of cool people will be there, and lots of cool projects will be debuting there. I'll have to give some cash to one of my agents and have them come back loaded down with cool small-press publishing projects. But I digress.
- I noticed that we rejected nearly 150 stories the week before last.
Whew. I'm sure there are other things to mention, but I need to go get some dinner. If you think my Sept/Oct plan is a bad one or should be modified in some way, you have about an hour to let me know that before I purchase the tickets.
