Two Words.

Uncertainty.

Interesting.

In my last post, I announced that we were moving back to Alaska, and I am still excited about that.  However, with all this corona madness going on, it seems like everything in our plans changes by the day.  And this is creating a lot of uncertainty, which can get also get interesting.

The way things are developing, we have no idea what's going to happen to us.

First of all, that house that we were gonna buy, we bailed out of it because the inspection report came back with some unfavorable findings that we didn't want to deal with.  So that whole house-hunting trip was a waste of time and a waste of money, because now we're back at Square One, looking at houses on line again.  When we get up there again, we will try and look at some different ones.

But this also means, that we will have to rent an apt after we get there because we no longer have a closing date right after our arrival.

I've been searching for apts that offer short-term leases, but unfortunately most of them want a 6-month or a 1-year lease. We are hoping it won't take us that long to get into a house. I found one renter who accepts 3-6 month leases, but I still need to contact them and find out if they will have any apts available for us when we get there.

We also need to find out from the moving company how long they will store our stuff for us in their warehouse once it gets up there.  That is another factor that may determine how much pressure we're under to find a house fast.

On a side note, there is a latest development regarding that house we were gonna buy.  The sellers weren't happy with the results, so they had it retested.  If it comes back okay, they want to know if we would still be interested in buying it.

To be continued until we know more.........

Okay, now this is where things get kinda hairy for us (uncertainty emphasized).

We have been paying attention to Alaska news, and the governor there has mandated that everyone coming into Alaska must be quarantined for 2 weeks upon arrival, whether you're flying or driving or coming in on the ferry, whatever.

I wondered how they were going to enforce this, and I don't know all the details, but I think what they do is they make you fill out of a form telling them where you are planning to quarantine yourself, and then they check on you to make sure you're not contaminated.  I think you're also supposed to record your temperature several times a day as well.  I'm not really sure.  Anyway, it's easy enough for people who live there or have somewhere to go.  But for us, as of yet, we still don't know where we're going, so I need to have an apt waiting for us to go to, so I can provide an address for them.  But, what if we need to spend the first night in a hotel?  Then what?

Uncertainty.

And what if they shut down all the hotels in order to deter travelers?

Uncertainty.

Will we even be able to get across the Canadian border?

Uncertainty.

What will we do if we can't get across the border?

We are getting kicked out of our house on the 30th and may not have anywhere to go!

And how long would we have to wait to get across the border?

And if we can't get up there, will Chuck's boss extend his pick-up date and tell us to stay here until further notice?

If we have to spend weeks in a hotel, this would deplete a huge chunk of our savings.

Uncertainty AND homelessness.

But at the same time, you could say that things could get quite interesting.

It'll be an adventure, that's for sure.

So many questions like these keep running rampant through my head, and none of them can be answered because things change every day. All I can do is pray, pray, and pray some more, and hope that things ease up by then.

We sure did pick a bad time to move back up there.

In all fairness though, we didn't pick this time to move, it just happened this way.

  

I am reminded of what the prophet Habakkuk said to the Israelites, to encourage them when they were being threatened by a Chaldean invasion:

"Though the fig tree should not blossom and there be no fruit on the vines;

Though the yield of the olive should fail and the fields produce no food;

Though the flock should be cut off from the fold and there be no cattle in the stalls;

(though the stores run out of toilet paper) - my addition

Yet I will exult in the Lord; I will rejoice in the God of my salvation".

I struggle with the uncertainty of all of this craziness, but Habakkuk helps to remind me to keep things in perspective.  We aren't being invaded by the Chaldeans, but being invaded by a virus can wreak a lot of havoc and turn everything upside down.

This too shall pass.

So anyway, now you know what's happening on our "buying" side of the coin; on the "selling" side, we sold our house on the 3rd day of having it on the market, which was really fast!  It came on the market on a Thursday and sold on Sunday! I'm glad though because it was a big pain getting informed when "someone wants to look at your house", so we had to keep the house clean at all times which is hard to do when you're living in it, but also when we got the call, we had to go through the whole house, scrub out all the sinks, wipe everything down in the bathrooms and kitchen, have all the dishes washed and put away, all the carpets vacuumed, then we had to put stuff in the garage that we thought might be unsightly, like the laundry baskets, and all evidence of our cats (all 3 litter boxes, kitty dishes, and the cats themselves).  Luckily we only had to do all of this twice before we got an offer.  The first time, we took the cats with us in the car.  But because of this corona craziness, nothing was open.  We couldn't sit in a coffee shop or go to a bookstore or anything, so we just sat in the parking lot of the nearest grocery store.  What made it more frustrating was they came 45 minutes late, so that made our car sitting time a lot longer than it would've been and the poor kitties were stressed out and shedding like crazy.  But I figured it would be good practice for them before we hit the road with them next month.

The second time was on Sunday, which happened to be the first Sunday that we didn't assemble at church because of the virus, so it worked out good for us.  They came and looked at 11:00, but this time we left the kitties in the truck in the garage so they wouldn't stress out from being in the car and SHEDDING EVERYWHERE!!  After we got home, we put the litterboxes and the laundry baskets back in the house, and then we got another call saying that the people wanted to come back and look at it again.   ...............sigh! So we had to take everything back out again and stuff the kitties back in the truck.  It was a good sign though, that at least they were interested in the house, and sure enough, they made an offer.  So the closing date is set for April 30, which works great for us because we plan to be gone by then - if we can get across the border.  If not, I don't know what we're gonna do, but we'll just have to cross that bridge when we come to it.  Chuck doesn't seem too worried about it, so I don't know why I'm fretting about it more than he is.  With God's providence, I know we will get through this.

Unfortunately, we may not be able to see our church family again before we leave, and it will seem really weird (and sad) to just leave and not say goodbye to anybody.  I will probably have to make a lot of phone calls.  I've already had some people calling me.

Well, so that is what's going on here. 

I will leave you with a picture of Peeka sitting on her butt warmer.

I have never seen her sit here before, so I have no idea what was going through her head.  I just thought it was funny that she was sitting right on top of the burner like she waiting for it to do its job.