Divorcing Hair Girl

There are so many salons in my town that it can be difficult to choose where to go. I’ve gone through several, never being faithful for long. Sooner or later, I’d have a hard time getting an appointment so I’d move on. No big deal.

For the past four years, I’ve gone to the same gal. First, she ran a salon out of her house, then she moved to the same place as Spice’s daycare so it was even closer to home. Since I pay a decent sum for my “fancy highlights” I was delighted to learn that I would get a 10% discount because my child attended the daycare next door, which happens to be run by my stylist’s mother.

She’s been there over a year now and I’ve continued to go there every eight weeks or so. I know everyone that works there, so it was especially frustrating for me that every time I went I would have to ask for the daycare discount. After this long, they should remember me. Second, they have a computer system with all my information, how difficult would it be to put a note in there to give me the discount? I feel like I sound like a cheap bitch, asking for my discount.

Last Saturday I went for my appointment and she did the same cut and color she always does. A few things I don’t like, but whatever… no one is perfect. I went to check out and once again, asked for the daycare discount. Hair Girl says, “Spice isn’t at the daycare anymore. You are no longer eligible for the discount.” I said, “Oh, everything your mother ever sent out about the salon said that alumni were eligible too.” She then stated that she asked her mother repeatedly to take off “alumni” because they aren’t eligible. Ok, fine. Now I look like a cheap bitch asking for a discount that I’m not entitled to.

I fumed inwardly while writing out my check. I was humiliated to be talked to like that in front of the receptionist and another client. Thank you Hair Girl for being so loud. I am further pissed off at myself because it didn’t occur to me to not tip her. I mean, isn’t that proper etiquette? The owner of the salon doesn’t get a tip?  I don’t know, maybe that rule changed.

On the way home I called EN and bitched at him. I texted Fly Girl and bitched at her too. She used to work for the daycare, I knew she’d be sympathetic. After I vented, I made the decision to divorce the stylist. We know the Ice Princess doesn’t like confrontation or change, so we know how it’ll be handled: I’ll call the salon after hours and just cancel my appointment.

Boo and Ultra are floored by this takesie backsie of the discount. Ultra told me today that she’d bitch slap me if I ever went back to the salon. She’s younger and littler than me, but the thought of her bitch slapping me scares the shit out of me. Maybe I could pay her in beer to go slap Hair Girl.

xoxo

Ice Princess

News to Share

It’s practically officially official… the bank accepted the last offer we submitted. It looks like the Ice Princess has a new castle. In fact, for the moment, the Ice Princess has TWO castles. Dear God, what were we thinking?

This has been a crazy week. We’ve gone back and forth with the bank numerous times. I’ve been frustrated with the waiting and frustrated with their counter offers. They started off being highly inflexible so I researched foreclosures to see if that was standard behavior. As it turns out, banks are known for not negotiating. I read it on the internet, it must be true. Therefore, I feel lucky that they came down on price, contributing to closing costs and will pay for the propane and water hook-ups.

Though I consider the last week to be crazy, I’m smart enough to realize that the next few months will totally suck. We need to dejunk our house and get it listed. We need to close on the new house, move all our stuff. During that, we will be living in a home that is on the market… with two kids and three dogs.

In the short term, we are committing financial suicide. We will have two mortgages. We are taking from 401ks and savings for the down payment. Our savings will be low and there will be a 401k payment to make… along with the two mortgages. During this time, we hope there will be no catastrophes that would force us to spend more from savings.

Last night I had a complete panic attack and wanted to pull the plug on the whole deal. The thought of being so financially strapped took my breath away. I am extremely conservative with my finances. After dropping daycare, we are finally able to breathe each month. Now we are burying ourselves. So I did what no one will believe: I prayed. I didn’t ask for any favors. I simply said, “Dear God, I don’t care what happens… just make it all work out like it’s supposed to. Amen”

I think I’ve said before, I’m not traditionally religious. I don’t go to church and I’ll keep my thoughts about The Bible to myself. I do believe that there is a greater being that watches over us all. I believe we are never given more than we can handle and everything happens for a reason. Based on these beliefs, I knew that any Higher Power in my world would make things work out as they were meant to be.

I’m also a believer in karma, you reap what you sow, you get what you deserve. If that’s the case, two hard-working people that take their financial obligations seriously deserve to win. They deserve to be able to take a risk and have it all work out in the end.

Keep us in your prayers. And hang on tightly… we’ve just boarded the crazy train. Wild times ahead. 

xoxo

Ice Princess

Simply Befuddled

Some processes are so painful that you go through them once and you say to yourself, “Never again!” The first two times I was involved in the home buying process, it was horrible, but nothing compares to the hell we went through when we bought our current house. Anything that could go wrong did: the neighbor sued the builder over property lines, two trees fell on the house during the construction process, the floor plan wasn’t what it was supposed to be. I could go on for days, but that would constitute whining.

In short, over the years, I think I forgot how bad this process is. Or maybe it really is even worse now… or maybe a whole bunch of different issues because the property we are interested in isn’t owned by people, it’s a foreclosure being held by a bank.

First issue occurred before we even got home on Saturday from writing the offer. Our realtor emailed and said that she realized that even though we are already preapproved, we also needed to be approved by their bank (I guess that makes it “themselves”?). How incestuous, right?  So I gathered up all the paperwork and called them this morning. We were preapproved and I received our preapproval letter quickly.

Then our realtor hears from the listing agent that neither water nor propane is hooked up to the house, nor is it winterized. Funny, none of this was disclosed on Seller Statement! The agent was also kind enough to send along an estimate of what it would take to have propane connected. There are so many issues with that statement, where can I begin?

First, the house is NOT winterized? Then why is there a sign on the door of the home that says the house is winterized and to not touch the fixtures. One would assume that the agent put up this note, correct? The house has been listed for less than a week, could it have been dewinterized already? Doubtful.

There is a well on the property, but EN noticed that some wires or something seemed to be cut. I understand that the house is being sold “As Is,” but we need to get a home inspection done before getting a mortgage, how can we get a full inspection without knowing that water is able to run through this damn house?

Same point with the propane. If propane isn’t connected to the house, how can the furnace get tested? In this area of the country, one would NEVER be able to live in an unheated house. The foreclosing bank, who wants my mortgage business MUST be aware that a mortgage can’t be written for a house with no heat?!

This confuses me greatly. Do they want to sell the house or don’t they? One would imagine that they would want it off their books as soon as possible. Given that the quote for propane hook up was $1500, you’d think they’d bite the bullet and just do it, so it’s not a bone of contention. Same with the water hook-up. There are some things that houses just cannot be sold without.

Let’s just project into the future and imagine that EN and I were able to buy this house without having water and propane hooked up. We then go ahead and get everything hooked up and worst case, all the pipes in the house burst! Imagine, if you will, that fixing that mess costs us gazillions of dollars and we are unable to make our mortgage payments… to the bank that has already foreclosed on the house once before. Does this sound stupid and make no fucking sense to anyone besides me?!

I’m amazed that the bank would rather mess around with teensy little numbers, when they could just pony up the coin, get those things taken care of, and sell it. Stupid people run this world.

***I was once dealing with this stupid-sounding woman who had screwed up royally. As she tried to talk her way out of it, she said she was, “simply befuddled.” I vowed then that I would someday use that stupid word when I dealt with a situation that is beyond comprehension. Here we are. 

xoxo

Ice Princess

Offer Sent In!

Rather than sitting around, trying to decide what to do, we made a decision on Friday night. Yesterday, we put in an offer on the foreclosed house we looked at on Friday. I still feel sad about potentially leaving this house and I dread going through nine years of junk and readying this house for sale. However, I’m excited by the prospect of what that house could be.

Up until about an hour before we saw the house Friday, there were multiple offers on the table. I thought that we’d have to fight for it if we wanted it. Then our realtor let us know that the offers had been withdrawn. This made me nervous as we don’t know why. We do know that it happened before inspections, so I know that wasn’t it. Our realtor was told that they were withdrawn for “the usual reasons” so she assumes the buyers couldn’t come to terms with the bank.

This, coupled with my recent dream about a house with two staircases and the first four digits of the MLS being my parents phone number, makes me feel like maybe it’s meant to be ours. Yes, I too can be superstitious at times.

We met with the realtor yesterday afternoon and were relieved that her idea of a good offer was the same as ours. She also told us that nowadays, it's somewhat standard that buyers ask for help with closing costs. The last time we played the real estate game, the market was so hot, no one asked for that. 

The girls were beyond excited while we made the offer. They tried their best to sit patiently and color but as always a few comments bubbled to the surface. The realtor even said to Spice, “I bet you’re Spice!” Then they asked for, and got, a tour of the real estate office. I think Spice liked the kitchen the best and even asked to see the inside of the refrigerator. Dear God.

Sugar got into the offer process herself by asking if she could submit a letter to the bank. We gave it to our realtor and it will be presented along with our offer. This is what she wrote:

Dear Bankers,

I think my family should get that house on Horizon Drive because my family doesn’t have a big backyard like that one has. My dad says that backyard can have a pool, a big deck, an ice skating rink in the winter and a swing-set.

My mom will love it if you let my family have that house because there is a play room above the garage so me and my sister don’t trash the family room with all sorts of toys. She also liked the bathroom that leads to the master bedroom because it has a stand-up shower and Jacuzzi.

I like the house because it is super close to my new school. I also like the house because it has lots of windows. I also like the way it is formed. I love the neighborhood because it is very flat.

So if you would just let my family have this house, we would love it. Thank you!

Sincerely,

Sugar

The only input I gave was the correct spelling of Jacuzzi.

After we signed the offer, the House Stalkers went to window peek once again. Our plan was thwarted by the presence of an extremely bitchy realtor. EN asked if she was a realtor and said we were just there to window peek. She had nothing to say so he said, “I guess we’ll move along then,” to which she responded, “Thank you.” As we pulled out of the driveway an out-of-state car pulled in. Even if they loved the house, I know my offer got in first! Not that it really matters.

Skinny Bitch and her girls went over to check the house out too and we have their seal of approval. Her girls said that it looks like a party house and her little one asked if she could have her birthday party there. I’m sure they’ll be less impressed when they see the toiletless bathroom and the little kitchen that isn’t.

Now we sit and wait to hear. Smart people would start going through the years of accumulated junk, just in case. I'm scared that pre-sorting will jinx us. 

xoxo

Ice Princess

Might We Move?

I know it is a bad thing that I have a job that is really slow sometimes. This job also gives me internet access. That means that I can surf the ‘Net all day and look at things I really shouldn’t be looking at. I’m not checking out raunchy sites that would get me fired, nor am I shopping for shoes and jewelry. Ok, you caught me, I do “window shop” online quite a bit, but I rarely buy anything.

Instead, I do stupid things, like look at houses for sale. If I see a house I like that goes on the market or know of someone selling, I stalk the properties like mad. The dream houses are always ones I could never afford but it’s fun to look and see how the other half lives.

On Tuesday, I stumbled across this one:

What is this? This is a foreclosure in my town. It is located in an entirely different neighborhood with much bigger lots and homes. What brought this house to my attention is the price tag. It is listed for a fraction of what other houses in that neighborhood would go for. It’s 500 square feet bigger than the house we currently have. The yard is twice the size. The style is completely different from the standard colonial we have. And the price is less than what we paid for the house we currently live in.

All that good stuff, how could I not tell EN? I texted him and told him to check out the listing online. His response was immediate, “Holy shit, we need to drive by at least!” So EN and the girls spent the bulk of the week stalking that house. I went once, on Wednesday night and peeked in the windows. There were things I liked and things I didn’t but I could definitely see that it is a great value.

And so… we bit the bullet today and went to see it with our realtor. I convinced myself that I would hate it. The master bedroom is on the first floor, so there isn’t a whole lot of family living space. The kitchen seemed to have only a few cabinets and they were white. I hate white cabinets. This house has too many doors to the outside, seven… not including the garage doors. Who needs that many freakin’ doors?

And this is what happened: I walked into this house and it took my breath away. The garage has space to build a fantastic storage area to keep coats, shoes, hats and mittens. The living space on the first floor didn’t feel as small as I thought it would. There is a beautiful wood staircase, leading up to two bedrooms, a bathroom and a huge room that is railing on one side, so one can look down below. The trim in the dining room is gorgeous. The master bedroom has a tray ceiling. There are two Jacuzzi tubs in the house. There is a separate staircase leading to a room and bathroom above the garage. This could someday be transformed into a master suite, so there is more living space downstairs.

And the bad… The kitchen is a disaster. Not only are the cabinets white, but they are bottom-of-the-barrel cheapies with a countertop that looks like plywood covered in laminate. The flooring doesn’t even go to the edges. Some tiles have been replaced, much of what is there is cracked. The wall oven sits on the floor and there are empty built-ins that seem odd. The bathroom fixtures are junk, with the sink in the master bath held up with a piece of PVC pipe. One toilet is completely missing from a bathroom. The light fixtures are bogus. While some of the trim is elegant, other spots have no trim at all. There are light switches through the house that seem to serve no purpose. There is a mantel in the family room with no fireplace installed. There is no central air and the washer and dryer are in the basement. The yard consists of nothing but weeds. 

I walked through this house in awe. I could picture it finished and it is divine. It is a castle this Ice Princess could only have dreamed of. I envision walls painted in warm colors. I see a fabulous kitchen of gorgeous cabinets and granite counters. I see a master bathroom with enough room that I could have the little built in area to do my face and hair, like I always wanted.

There are things about this house that are perfection: the neighborhood is awesome. We would absolutely be able to resell and make a huge profit. The yard is completely flat, unlike our current yard which is on a hill. The house is full of big windows, making it extremely light. Sugar and Spice adored this house and ran excitedly from room to room. They would have space to each have their own room and a playroom to share. EN stood in the garage with his mouth hanging open, knowing full well that even he doesn’t have enough shit to fill that up.

I am excited, this is a tremendous opportunity to have something for a price that is unreal. On the other hand, leaving the house that I built makes me sad. Both EN and I moved a lot as kids, neither of us have ever lived in a place as long as we have lived here. We built it and we’ve loved it. Our view of the mountain is stunning and our girls really have never known any place else as “home.”

However, opportunity knocks and I’m afraid we’ll kick ourselves in the ass if we don’t answer the door.

xoxo

Ice Princess 

Gluttony

I am joyous to be tasked with providing food, space and meeting coordination for a bunch of animals who have taken over our office for two days. I am tremendously excited to have a different batch of babies to whine at me, and complain about nonsensical things. I wonder what they do when they work out of their home offices and have no one to complain to? I can’t imagine their wives put up with this level of bullshit?

It began on Monday afternoon when one dipshit called from Baltimore, demanding that I find him a flight. From what he could gather in the airport, flights were being canceled due to weather delays. Because I am She Goddess Who Can Do Everything, he decided it was a good idea to call me. Despite his insistence that there were other flights to be found, I was unable to help him (not that helping him is in my job description anyway). I giggled like mad when I arrived in the office Tuesday and heard that he never got to leave Baltimore the night before. I still feel giddy every time I look at him.

Yesterday they descended on our office and proceeded to take things over. In the past we have had these meetings in various hotels down the Eastern Seaboard. It is with great sadness that we don’t get to travel anyplace fun and must have the meeting in the conference room with food catered in. When we were at hotels, I could escape to my room. Here, they all found my office first thing so they knew where to go for help. 

As the meeting is made up of mostly men, the high points of the day occur any time they get fed. You know those Discovery Channel movies where they show people dumping raw meat in for lions? It’s kind of like that.

They are accustomed to having hot breakfast. When I set up my first meeting, I followed the guidelines set forth by the boss and served a continental breakfast. The VP walked in and asked where the hot food was and said, “Something needs to be killed for this to be considered breakfast.” Since then, I always order meat and eggs. For this meeting they were warned in advance that we would only have bagels, pastries, fruit salad, coffee and orange juice. This kept their food complaints down to a dull roar. They did find many other things to complain about: the temperature of the room, the size of the room, their connections (or lack thereof) to the Internet. They were happy with lunch too. However, those scurvy bastards broke into the cookies before snack time so I had to take them back and hide them, because the sandwiches, salads, chips, pickles and French bread weren’t enough.

Even dinner last night went uneventfully. We went to a really nice restaurant and had a private room so we didn’t need to worry about disturbing anyone. The food choices were good and the desserts were to die for!

Today everyone should have been tired and less hungry. Let’s face it they were putting back prime rib at 9:00 pm last night. I could barely force myself to have coffee and a chunk of watermelon for breakfast. However, by 11 am, not a croissant crumb was to be found. The juice from the fruit salad even disappeared.

The drama started when they broke for lunch ten minutes early. Add that to the delivery guy getting lost and arriving right at noon-when lunch was scheduled to be served-and I had a near riot on my hands. I scrambled around, trying to set up three hot entrees, salad, rolls, garlic bread while they salivated just outside the room. Once everything was set up, I ran to the kitchen for serving spoons. I returned to the conference room less than two minutes later to find them circling the food like their last meal was a decade ago. They were drooling, stabbing at lasagna and eggplant parmesan with plastic forks-nothing had even been cut yet.

I walked in with a huge knife and serving spoons. The wild wildebeests went still.  I said, “What are you doing?” and they stood, staring at me clutching the knife. I said, “That stuff isn’t even cut up yet.” Mr. Texas pipes up, “Well, it was all set up and smelled so darn good.” I looked at them all and growled, “STEP OFF.” They all jumped back from the food and I was able to cut things into beast-sized pieces. They dove back in as soon as I stepped away from the table. Again, I tried to hide the dessert but someone discovered it and dug in before I could put it out for everyone.

I ran into the guy that seemed to be the culprit, digging in too early and he apologized. I just looked at him and said, “You almost got stabbed today.”

I just don’t understand this behavior. Each one of the people attending the meeting earns in excess of six figures a year. Certainly they can afford their own food. There’s a cafeteria and vending machines on the first floor of our building if they really need something to tide them over. But truth be told, they are unwilling to spend their own damn money when there might be free food available. That behavior disgusts me. 

I was glad to see them all leave this afternoon.

xoxo

Ice Princess

Nice Voice

I wrote a few weeks ago about the proper way to complain. I neglected to include something that I’ve been accused of using at times. It’s called Nice Voice. My normal voice probably has a sarcastic edge to it most times, but when I need to, I apparently have a cutesy, sing-songy voice that I use.

I never realized I did this until I was making a call from my office for my boss. There was some sort of issue, so I had to fight to get my way, but be professional about it. I must have been over the top, because during the call, I could hear my boss smacking the wall between our offices. I’m pretty sure I heard gagging sounds too. After I got my way, I went into my boss’s office and said, “What?!” He imitated my tone, voice and then accused me of using Nice Voice.

Since then, every time I use that voice at work, it is mentioned and even worse, imitated. I know in my heart that I do not simper, giggle or bat my eyelashes. I think imitating Nice Voice just isn’t as much fun without over-dramatization.

I use this voice mostly with our IT department because they notoriously don’t help people they don’t like. So I try to make them like me from afar. I chat them up and get personal information so I can ask when I call next time, because we all know there will be a next time. I chatter away in Nice Voice asking about their kids, jobs, weddings, softball teams and pet snakes in their office. Oh yeah, I’ll even go there. I’ll even let the IT girl call me stupid on occasion. It makes her feel superior and she delights in helping my stupid ass out. She’s also the one with the snake in her office, she can say whatever she wants to me so long as I don’t have to contend with that snake.

Yesterday, my boss decided that he needed something done IMMEDIATELY and since I’m known for pulling crazy shit out of my butt, I was tasked with it. I had to call my friends in IT. I knew that Nice Voice wasn’t going to work for this one. The last time I asked for this favor, they said no and shut me down. I had to tell my nemesis that he had to do it himself (he was so mad he didn’t speak to me for over six months).

It was a ridiculous task really, one that I could do if I had high-level access, but no one is going to let me touch the inner workings… So I invented Sweetie Muffin voice. I pulled out all the stops. When I dialed, I initially sounded teary, then I flirted, batted my eyes and even simpered a bit. Not only did my little IT friend say he would help me, but he took care of it right then and there. He even sent a follow-up email to ensure that everything was working properly.

The follow up conversation with my boss went something like this:

Me: I just sucked up to an IT person to get it done.

Boss: IT Girl?

Me: No, she was on vacation. I used Sweetie Muffin voice on someone else.

Boss: Never try that voice on IT Girl.

Me: It’s called “role playing” and it works. I believe your favorite female employee ever used the same technique.

Boss: Fascinating.

So I got to thinking, how far is one willing to go to get assistance or get something they need? Is it ok to flirt with someone? Are you also willing to flirt with someone of the same sex (knowing they are homosexual and you are not)? Is it really so wrong to use our feminine wiles to get what we need? I say no, and I recommend that you look back to a post I put up months ago, about getting pulled over but not getting ticketed. My advice stays the same:

Shake what your mama gave ya! 

xoxo

Ice Princess