Taking a week off.

Chris just left for work.  It's Monday again.  Last night, Brandon and Stephanie came over for dinner and I was explaining that I feel like I have deja vu often.  I set my cell phone on the counter to clean the kitchen and Greta starts crying in the background.  I realize I may not be having deja vu as often as I claim.  Often times, my days are very similar and run together.
As Chris was leaving he said, "Hey, let's not schedule any house showings for this week.  I think we need some time off." We have seen a lot of houses.  We were ready to buy the Mapleton home, and it went under contract.  That was heart-breaking. This past weekend, the search continued.  Our realtor took us to see a home in Provo that was just reduced $30K!  It was in a darling neighborhood with a nice big yard and mature trees.  There was a lady laying on the front porch leaning against a pillar.  I whispered, "I thought this house was vacant."  Chad (our realtor) shrugged.  As we approached the home, another lady with a long, gray braid approached the relaxed guard on the porch.  They started chatting until they saw us coming.  Gray braid met us on the walk and immediately grabbed onto my arm.
"Can I help you?"
"Uhh, we're here to see the house." I was so confused.
"Who sent you?"
"I work for century 21, I talked to Patrick and he said the house was vacant and we could come see it," Chad clarified.
"Oh, well I don't know a Patrick."
We looked at the for sale sign posted in the front yard, Patrick's name was right above it. Hmm.  Chad was getting annoyed with this lady, "I'm sorry, is the house not for sale?  Did someone buy it?  Does it have offers on it?"  Long, gray braid hesitated and fumbled and then declared that she just bought it.  Yep, her and her sister, aka lazy guard, just bought the house.  She was still holding onto my arm and she told me I must still go look at it because it is so cute and I would have to come visit.  And Greta would have to come and pick apples anytime.  My eyes were opened so wide.  I was in awe at this crazy lady.  She quickly dismissed herself to go feed "the neighbors" cats.  We walked passed the lazy guard and went to go look inside the house.  It was cute inside.  Needed a lot of updating, but had great tall ceilings.  We figured it was probably reduced $30K because it comes with those ladies and, all in all, we weren't looking to inherit any women that would make Greta call them her great aunts.
Over the next three hours we saw a lot more homes, our last stop was Salem, UT. There was a big home being sold "as is."  As we pulled up, I was impressed with the exterior.  The door was unlocked, we walked in and tried to find a light switch.  It was getting late and the sun was down and... the electricity was turned off.  Chad returned to his truck to get a flashlight.  From what we could see, the previous homeowners tried to do some renovating--but got distracted.  The place was trashed.  There was clothes and boxes and food everywhere.  The kitchen cabinet doors were missing and so were all the vents.  We were having trouble seeing, so we decided we would go back the next day. Brandon and Stephanie came with us.  In the daylight, the damage was a lot more apparent.  There was a hole in the living room wall.  Brandon peaked in and discovered that there was a box behind the wall.  A box and a fireplace.  The toilet was destroyed, the floors didn't match up, there was a lot of bottles of clorox in the garage.  Boxes and boxes of bottles of bleach.  This was a meth house.  We were definitely curious about what we would find if we did take the time to clean up this house and make it our home.  But I don't want to live in a previous meth house.  I don't want to risk someone coming back for all their bleach and oversized candy canes and whatever is hidden behind that wall.
We'll find something, just not yet and not this week.  Our contract for our apartment is up November 1st, but if we don't follow Chris's advice and take a week off, we'll start looking twice at trashed meth houses...oh wait.