Good luck on your house, SJ. Believe me, the owners are sweating out the inspection way more than you are. If there are things wrong, you get to decide if it's worth your time, or if the price needs to be adjusted to address existing issues. Where's the house?

West Boylston, one town over from Worcester.

Jilli, how did the interview go?

It went really well! I'm being scheduled for a phone interview with the hiring manager either tomorrow or Friday, and it looks like I'll have an in-person interview loop sometime during the week of the 27th. Whoo!

I'm a little nervous, because it's for a technical writer gig, instead of a technical editor. But I've written documentation before, and I'm great at being dropped in something and catching up quickly. I just need to dazzle them during the interviews.

I hope it turns out okay, and that you can get it with little problems. The whole process is made to make your brain splodey.

Yay, Jilli! You can totally do it!

Cindy, it's lovely to have you around (putting aside for a moment the unlovely event that prompted your return); I don't mean to make you feel guilty, and understand if you need to leave again, but it's fantastic to see your pixels while you are here.

Yay, Jilli! I hope you get it.

I hope it turns out okay, and that you can get it with little problems. The whole process is made to make your isbrain splodey.

Yes, it is. I'm more worried about the appraisal. I'm afraid they will say the house isn't worth the price and the sellers are pretty firm on what they want for it.

I just need to dazzle them during the interviews.

I'm pretty sure you're great at that too. Good luck on the interviews!

sj, in re the bank appraisal, just remember, if the bank doesn't think it's worth it, most banks aren't going to think it's worth it.

Cindy, it's lovely to have you around (putting aside for a moment the unlovely event that prompted your return); I don't mean to make you feel guilty, and understand if you need to leave again, but it's fantastic to see your pixels while you are here.

You just made me (nice) cry, smonster. I feel a bit like the distant cousin, but I still had to come home.

I'm pretty sure you're great at that too. Good luck on the interviews!

Right? If Jilli can't dazzle mortals, there's no hope for the rest of us.

When I lost my dad, I got just as much support from this board as I did from meatspace.

Right? If Jilli can't dazzle mortals, there's no hope for the rest of us.

So true.

sj, in re the bank appraisal, just remember, if the bank doesn't think it's worth it, most banks aren't going to think it's worth it.

I know. I'm just not being very rational right now.

When explaining the bond with my friends here to my mother I noted that in a whole lot of cases we know more about each other than we do about our meat space friends. She understood that completely, but I didn't say meat space because that would have caused her to give me a mom look.

The painful timing of Maria's loss reminds me of one of my 'oh so Laura' ways I dealt with losing Stephen. I was determined not to remember the date. This was possible because of mind like sieve, but really tough because of the insane number of times I had to write the date on forms and such. Every time I wrote the date I thought, "I won't remember this." Probably I have the dazed grief stricken brain to thank, but I managed to forget the date. I know the month and year. It has been 25 years and I certainly think of him often, and always on his birthday and special anniversaries, but never on the date he died, because I don't know what it was.

And not surprisingly, almost no one in meat space knows that. My husband, mom, and sisters. And Buffistas.