House Distraction Update, Plus Thingies

The Official House News Letter came yesterday, spelling out details of what is going on with our rental. What it boils down to is that next week two real estate inspectors will walk through the house to value it; we have thirty days to decide whether or not we want to buy it; if we don't buy it the house will go up on the open market as-is; and if someone else buys it we'll have sixty days to vacate.

I'm not as perturbed about this...yet...as I might be. Certainly not as much as I was the first time the college considered selling its rental properties three years ago. One, as Laurie pointed out, we've been through this before, and we knew there was the possibility of it happening again. Two, surveying the general real estate situation in our immediate area, we already have houses on our street that have been for sale for three years or more, and two other houses on the street are campus-owned so they may be going up for sale as well, thus I'm hoping there's only an even chance of it selling if we don't buy it.

The rental situation in our area isn't that great, at least not for people with pets. As for buying, three years ago we were in the pit of the housing recession and couldn't get a loan; we may have an easier time of it now, but that leads to other questions. There are some fundamental problems with the house that we would be taking on, but if the price is low enough, buying could be worth it. Then there are the other houses for sale around us...

...But this is all speculation for the near future. As it is, our first choice of a loan provider, the USDA, probably isn't even open for business right now.

So far we're early enough in the process that my main annoyance is how my writing time is spent packing instead. (I never realize quite how many books I have until I have to box them up.) I get grouchy when I go for awhile without writing (especially when I'm so close to finishing something) so I'll need to do at least a bit soon, no later than the walk-through.

And at the moment we're still early enough in the process that I'm not waking up at 4 am in a cold terror--like I did, say, a few weeks ago when my car wouldn't start, before I discovered that the problem was just a $20 fix.

In other news, I may not be working on Copper Heart besides the ongoing spot research, but other writing work progresses. My editor has nearly finished going over The Matter of Camelot but sent me a challenging message yesterday: She wants me to change the title. I'm discovering how entrenched the title is in my head because nothing else seems right. Granted, I changed Shenandoah to Freedom's Valley despite that book being in my head for two decades and then on paper for five years, and I came up with new titles when I broke up Arizona, a book and title that squatted in my brain for a quarter-century. But some of those new names took weeks to come to me. Camelot is due out in three weeks under whatever name it finally dons, so I don't have the chronological luxury here.

I'm still working out ideas for the Secret Project too, but this won't happen without agent and publisher approval, so there's no telling when and if I would start writing that.

So, in summary, I'm not letting myself think too far ahead beyond the basics just yet. We still have the roof over our head and all of our animals around the house. And in the meantime I work, pack, and blog, and plan out what I'll be writing next on Copper Heart even if I'm temporarily separated from my keyboard.