Dispatches From New Mexico - Or Maybe Not

 

Sutherland Reservoir

Close to no one is coming to look at the house, I am seeing stories about how the real estate market is cooling, mortgage interest rates are expected to stay at 7%, Redfin projects that housing prices may drop later this year, and a home in our development with the same floor plan is now listed at $33,000 less than ours after the price dropped twice.

We may not be moving. Anyway, Jackie is talking about moving to Portugal now. Maybe next time, I'll write about that.

My walking has taken me to Sutherland Reservoir, with about 450 Nebraska miles behind us, and 75 more to go. I have been in Nebraska since the beginning of March. It is time to move on.

We are near the town of Sutherland, which, I am sorry to report, does not contain a Runza restaurant. However, there is one about 20 miles down the road in Ogallala, the last one between us and Colorado, and probably the last one all the way to Point Reyes.

Penticton

Art next to Okanagan Lake

Last week, we drove to Penticton, British Columbia, for a bridge tournament and vacation. The bridge only went so-so: I got 6 points total, with 3.6 of those being red points, which are awarded to people toward the bottom of the leaderboard, and 2.4 gold, which are harder to get. We earned some points in every game we played except one, but a few red points are not really what you are looking for. Alice and I earned the gold on the last day, so that was a bit of redemption.

Eight bridge players went, plus Jackie, and I think we all had a good time. The nine of us had dinner together twice, and some of the players took an evening off and toured a winery. Jackie toured a historical house, went through an art gallery, shopped, saw a movie, and got a lot of reading done. I played bridge.

While we were gone, someone looked at our house, the only bite we have gotten so far. Word from our agent is that the people who came through are just starting to look around. I am beginning to settle in for the long haul, not worrying about whether the house will sell quickly, or even at all. Wait and see. We are in the fortunate position of not needing to move on any schedule.

On a couple of the bridge days, I walked over 10,000 steps, including over 13,000 one day. As a result, I passed another milestone by making my way to Lake Maloney, Nebraska. We are now over 2,500 miles into the walk, definitely west of center in Nebraska, and 112 miles from Colorado as the trail winds.

 

Camping at Lake Maloney.

The Wedding

 

56 ft tall, 18 ft wide, once used to make wood pulp

This weekend, we went to a wedding in Bellingham, Washington. My niece got married, only not really, because the happy couple was already married so that she could be covered by his health insurance. Welcome to America.

The only pictures I took all weekend were at the brunch venue the day after the wedding, this morning. We brunched at a place called The Portal, an old industrial area near the water, now outfitted with various containers that have been turned into eateries, a beer garden, and a bar. The industrial remnants, especially these post-apocalyptic looking tanks, make for an interesting setting for the coffee place, fish and chips, the pizza joint.

When we left town on Friday, the house went on the market. It has been viewed hundreds of times on Redfin, and Zillow says it is more likely than 94% of the houses in the area to sell, for what that is worth, which is not much. The reality is that apparently no one has looked at the house yet, because we expected to be notified if anyone was going to come by, and we received no notification. The handful of people who assured me that we would get a lot of immediate attention and would get offers right away are in the process of being proven wrong already.

We do not have any desperate need to move, so if, for example, the price is too high, we will take the house off the market rather than lower the price significantly. We may yet end up staying for a couple of years. Patience, I need to let this play out.

I am back to playing bridge and walking on my normal schedule starting tomorrow, but we are leaving for a week in Canada this Friday.

A tree stump sculpture.

Whatcom Museum of History and Art, in the distance