#045 In which our hero has quite a week.

What a week it was.

After my wife and I decided that we were really going to sell our house and not just live with what we had (small kitchen, small bedrooms, nearly non-existent closets) we painted, spackled, repaired and moved a bunch of our junk to a storage area to give our house (in marketing terms) a "roomy, airy" appearance. None of which really disguised the fact that our house is a tiny little bungalow, with a marked lack of storage space, especially in the kitchen. But, for what it was, it looked good.

And, as an aside, I had no idea just how good our house looked until we started to seriously look at other houses. Good lord! If you're selling your house, make an effort, huh? Tear up that crappy carpet, paint a wall or two, and for pity's sake (and you know who you are, owners of the colonial on Dorshwood Avenue) do something about the cat pee reek in your basement!

We had an open house on Sunday. About seven people came through, which, considering there was a Browns home game that day, was decent. Two of which were "very interested," according to the Realtor hosting the event. But I don't trust these Realtors, generally, and this guy looked just like... oh, I've already told you about that.

Then someone else came to look on Monday.

Then the same person came back on Wednesday.

Then that person made an offer the same day.

We counter-offered, she accepted, and we sold our house. Simple as that. And, since we were confident that the deal would go through, we made an offer on a house we really liked.

And they accepted. In less than a week we sold a house, and bought a new house. Again, easy as that.

Of course, it's not really as easy as that. There has to be home inspections, loans have to be approved, final legal hoops must be jumped through... as a first time home seller/buyer, I must say it's a bit of a pain in the ass. At one point we had to sign a form that confirmed that we had signed a form. I wish I was kidding. I have this fear that it could all fall through at any moment, even though The Scientist assures me it will not.

And we love the house. Really, it's fantastic. Big kitchen, four bedrooms, ample storage, there's even a playroom in the basement! The house is so great, and the selling/buying process went so quickly, that I'm really waiting for the other shoe to drop and something to go horribly wrong.

And it has. Sort of.

Seems the house we just bought has unacceptably high levels of radon gas. Now, I didn't know anything about radon gas and have the same uneasy and uneducated feeling as I do toward cancer. If your body has cancer, IT IS REALLY BAD! If your house has radon gas, IT IS REALLY BAD!

However, as it turns out, the EPA says that radon gas is pretty typical. It's naturally occurring in the soil, and the majority of homes have it, and it's only a concern if it's greater than a certain percentage (for the geeks out there, anything higher than 4 picoCuries per liter (pCi/L) has been deemed unacceptable). And, apparently it's not hard to reduce the radon gas levels in your home. There are several different methods to do this, but most of them involve putting in a fan to blow it out of your house.

A fan.

In my mind, this is like saying you can cure blindness with an aspirin. I had assumed it would be a huge affair, involving men in radiation suites, special yellow de-com bags, and maybe, just maybe, Geiger counters. But no. All you need is a fan.

So that's cool. Even better is that the homeowner is paying for all the repairs, and had to get it done before we move in BY LAW. Makes it seem scarier if it has to be done BY LAW.

So I'm not so worried about it. That is, until we don't need nightlights anymore because of the glow emanating from my testicles.