Did Someone Mention Crazy?

The other day I mentioned that things have been a bit crazy here as we prepare to make our way out of the hurricane box my insurance company has defined in our policy. Well, karma or life or whatever it is, decided to show me that, where there is a little crazy, there can always be more.

On Monday we started installing lifeline netting on our boat.  Lifeline netting can usually be found on cruising boats that have either kids or pets. We have the latter and would like to keep them on board, especially after Madison's little adventure off the dock the other day.  While the videos and instructions all make it sound easy, it took us most of a day to do about 2/3 of one side of the boat.  Getting the spacing right and working around curves and hardware can be a pain.  I don't even want to know how many times we threaded something, didn't like it, unthreaded, and retried.

All we managed to install the first day

So, on day two of what was supposed to be a half-day project, we were making better progress and completed installing the same amount of netting that took us all day Monday in about 3 hours.  It was at this point that I needed to go find some clips to allow me to unhook the netting where there are gates in the lifelines (being able to use the gates seems like a good thing). I went to every hardware store in town (two towns, four stores actually) but couldn't find a plastic clip I could use to tie to the netting.  Finally, I found a set of cheap bungee cords at a local Dollar Tree and decided to scavenge the plastic clips from those cords.

Trying to figure out proper spacing during the install.

While we were out shopping, I got a call from our realtor who told me the appraisal on the house we are selling had finally been done (we previously had to alter the contract due to the inability to get an appraiser out in a more reasonable time frame...I guess they are busy in Denver these days).  The good news was that the appraisal came back at the sale price, so we had cleared the last big hurdle before closing.  The bad news is that, as late as it had been, the likelihood of an early closing was close to nil.

Of course, about 15 minutes later I got another call from the agent telling me they now think they can close on Friday.  This Friday. Oh no!  We were suddenly in a panic to see how we could get the paperwork sent to us, signed, and returned to Colorado in time for a Friday closing (for some reason, Colorado doesn't allow for electronic signatures and only blue ink on paper is acceptable).  Oh, and did I mention that some of the documents need to be notarized?  We come up with a plan to have the title company email us the documents so we could print them here, sign, and then next-day mail them.

So, netting project on hold, we start searching for options to print the paperwork and find a notary. We even bought a printer in case we couldn't find another option. Fortunately the resort we are staying at has a business center (a computer with printer) and even has a notary on staff, so we thought we were in good shape.  Well...until the package from the title company arrived (conveniently at 7pm local time...or 5pm Colorado time).  Included in the instructions was a note that it had to be printed on legal-sized paper.

Naturally, the business center doesn't have legal paper.  We run around looking for legal paper and the only office store in town (along with the other big box stores that might have some) were out. About this time I felt like I was banging my head on a brick wall. Then we found out that while the local Staples didn't have any legal paper in stock, the copy center could print them for us. (I guess the copy center doesn't get their legal paper from the same source as the rest of the store). We get the documents printed out and make our way back home for the night.

The next morning we look over the documents and find a number of mistakes.  Did I mention that we had an appointment with the notary at 9 am...which is 7 am Colorado time...and before the title company would be open?  How is it that a title company, whose only job is to get legal paperwork details right, does this one task so poorly?  Adding to the pressure is the fact that, if there is any hope of closing on Friday, the paperwork needs to be Fed-Ex'd that day.  We postpone the appointment with the notary and make a bunch of phone calls to the title company and the realtor.  We finally get a hold of Equity Title Associates, and they tell us they will get the missing papers to us in 15 minutes. After not seeing them for one and a half hours, we call back and suddenly the missing paperwork doesn't exist because they are waiting for information from the lender.  Then the story became that they are working on it and will have it to us shortly. Finally, we are able to procure the missing paperwork, get everything signed and notarized, and make the trip over to the Fed-Ex facility we found to drop it all off.  We can only hope we found all the title companies mistakes and the closing goes off as planned.

Now, where were we?  Oh yeah, back to the netting that has been hanging half-installed on the boat.  We finally managed to get all of it installed, and it only took 3 calendar days. We are also working on plans for the trip north.  It doesn't seem like we'll have much time to do any sightseeing as we head north. With all the misfires trying to get the hard-top bimini project going, I'm trying to find someone north of Cape Hatteras where we can spend a few weeks and get the top made.  If anyone knows of a good welder or fiberglass person on the coast anywhere north of the Carolinas, let me know.

Hopefully that will help keep the dogs and gear on board.

As a tropical depression passes us by (earlier than normal and threatening to be the first named storm of the season), we continue making plans to head north starting in just a couple more days.  Yeah...just a bit crazy.