We’ve just had the magic phone call. Everyone is now tied in, & my step is a good deal lighter. All being well Mr & Mrs Buyer can now get their school appeal in, if they  drive quickly, and in the fullness of time funds will become available for us to do with what we will.

It’s the Tuesday after the move, and we’ve just been told that Mr & Mrs Buyer’s buyer has paid a deposit but no-one can exchange until the cheque has cleared on Thursday. Which is the first of the month and too late for the school appeal. They now need to harangue their solicitor to ensure that exchange happens tomorrow at the latest – if that doesn’t happen then there is still the possibility that they decide it’s just not worth it & we’re back where we started. Quite literally, in this case.

I don’t think my nerves can take much more of this.

That’s it, we’re in the new house. The kids left the old house to go to school this morning & when we pick them up this afternoon they’ll be coming here. Bit of a race on to get their rooms sorted so that they’ve got some kind of stability, but so far they’re taking it in their stride. Then it’s living out of boxes while we get organised and back to the marina to see what’s in stock. Assuming of course that we exchange contracts sometime soon.

Due to the lack of internet access following ‘Packing’ the following entries are made from contemporaneous notes. Just thought I’d share that with you in the interests of full disclosure.

We move tomorrow, and everything is in boxes ready for the lorry which is due in about half an hour. Debs is off to work & the kids are in school, so at the moment it’s just me, a kettle & a huge amount of boxes. 

So 30 days after installing the 30-day 3ivx trial I can watch anything but it comes stamped with a ‘Demo Expired’ watermark all over it. I didn’t look too closely before burning a DVD so I lost about an hour and won a new beermat. Being an honest kind of guy I stumped up the $19 required for a full copy & all was well again.

One thing that’s been added to the skip is a favourite possession which has been with me and a source of constant entertainment since Christmas 1983 when I lived in halls at college. I speak of a Technics SL-7 quartz controlled direct-drive fully automatic turntable with linear tracking tone arm, which worryingly I can quote from memory. A beautiful beast and a design classic, better looking than the SL-10 and costing if I remember rightly £225, a not inconsiderable sum back then. Around the size of an album sleeve (a proper vinyl one obviously – midi was all the rage back then) it had a couple of good tricks, not least of which was the way it shone a red light through the deck at 7, 10 and 12 inches so that it could detect the size of the record and set the speed accordingly. There was a pleasing red strobe effect around the edge of the platter for fine adjustments to the speed, and closing the lid clamped the record in place. Hitting ‘Play’ caused it to spin up to the correct rpm and the arm to move satisfyingly along before magically dropping on to the correct place. Unless I’d chosen Alien Sex Fiends ‘EST – Trip To The Moon‘ of course, which was the world’s first (and I hope only) 11″ single which meant that the stylus dropped in the wrong place and at the wrong speed if I’d forgotten to set 45rpm manually. Housemates John & Mark were at the gig where part of the B-side was recorded – pretty rock n’ roll, eh? But less so than if I’d been there too.

It’s been with me for twenty four years and seven houses. I considered eBay but that seemed somehow disrespectful; if it has to go I should be the one to do it, and since most of the above is in the past tense I think I’m coming to terms with the news.

We moved here three years ago and at the time had a heavy duty clearout which involved one mini skip (resulting from a burst of optimism) followed by two full-sized builders ones. We filled them all convincingly so we expected to have not too much crap to shift now. Not so. During an interminable packing spree we’ve just filled another skip with all sorts of nonsense that we haven’t touched since we carted it here. I do feel much lighter somehow, if a little guilty.

I though this was some sort of Thatcherite anti-gay nonsense from the eighties but no, it’s apparently an agreement between house builders and the local authority that the roads will be brought up to an approved state before the LA adopts them. Fairly standard and not a problem you might think, but a bit of a hold-up when the buyer’s solicitor’s searches show the existence of one but no-one at the district council can find it, or even agree whether or not it exists. Just one more nightmare to add to the list (think yourselves lucky that I’ve spared you details of the Section 104, the property transfer forms, the NHBC guarantees …) that means we won’t be able to exchange contracts before we move on Friday. I’ve heard nothing to suggest that the sale won’t go ahead so don’t want to lose the rented place and deprive the girls of their trial week at the new school, but I’ve got my fingers firmly crossed. It means that the break from here won’t be as neat as we’d like but we’ll be able to leave some of the ‘putting things right’ jobs until later. No, that’s trying to look on the bright side. It is a risk and the nightmare scenario will be paying rent and a mortgage for six months and then having to move back here, tails between our legs, with less money, no boat and disappointed (and confused) children. Sod fingers, what else can I cross?

Busy day today, cats & tortoise to the vet so that they’re appropriately drugged up should they need to go into temporary care while we move, visit the hoped-for rented house so that we can see inside it followed by a grilling at the school and meeting the local childminder to arrange after-school care. All went pretty well with one slight concern. We can apparently have the house but won’t be able to sign the tenancy agreement until the morning that we move in. That means we won’t have just exchanged contracts without anywhere to live being confirmed, but will have moved out. We’ll be properly homeless for about two hours. If that goes horribly wrong we’ll be off to the local Travelodge … Limbo, baby limbo.