Margret Sloan

Had lunch with Rhonda today and hashed out her plans for the house in California that she just inherited. Originally she was going to fix it up a little – spit and polish – and then sell it. It’s a great house on a marvelous lot outside of San Francisco in this west coast picture perfect town called Pacifica. But with the housing market in the tank she probably won’t get much for it.

Being on the coast, the house has suffered a lot of weather damage and actually needs a lot more work than just spit and polish. She met with a contractor while she was out there settling the estate and he went through the house to give her a detailed estimate for repairs.

The contractor works for American Home Craft Inc and seemed to be very knowledgeable and thorough. The most pressing repair is to actually replace all the windows, especially the ones on the western exposure. Since I just went through the same ordeal with my house, I was able to give her a few pointers about replacement windows.

We checked the references for American Home Craft Inc and they have an outstanding reputation in California. They have a nice web site, too, with good information on their services and the products they recommend. When they replace windows thay have a special window just for coastal homes, called Simonton StormBreaker Plus® windows, which are energy efficient and impact resistant. All their windows come with a lifetime glass breakage warranty, so that really boosts her comfort level with that brand.

Rhonda is going out to Pacifica again next month to get some of the work started. I have a funny feeling that she is going to like it out there so much that she decides to move there permanently, or at least for a few years until the housing market improves and she can get a good price on the property.

The temperature actually hit 90 degrees today for the first time this summer season. We are looking forward to a week of hot weather with the chance of scattered thunderstorms every night. Now that school is out, families are packing up the SUVs and minivans and heading to the beaches for their summer vacations. Most people in this area head south to the Florida panhandle beaches, like Destin and Ft. Walton.

At least the ones with deep enough pockets to pay for the extra cost of gas these days are going. Some of us have to stay home and be happy with a backyard splash pool until our budgets have a chance to catch up.

Ever since I was a teenager I’ve loved New York City. We went on several trips to New York while in school. I’ll never forget the 8th grade trip to Manhattan. We boards large commercial buses at 3:00 in the morning and slept during most of the drive up, spent the entire day doing tourist things and drove back the same night. IT was exhausting but thrilling and I jumped at every chance after that to go to New York for another visit.

Most of my friends that left the medspa company have accepted positions with a new franchise that is based in New York. Sadly, that means most of them have had to pack up and move from here to New York. So now I don’t have the chance for the occasional lunch or cocktails to stay in touch with most of my friends. It’s down to a few emails and occasional phone calls.

Alexa is the last of the old crew to take a job with the new company. We had lunch today at our favorite Sushi place to say goodbye. She is excited about the move and I’m thrilled for her! She’s going to stay with one of our friends already there, sleeping on the futon while she looks for place of her own. To help with that I put her in touch with one of the best real estate agents in Manhattan, Dottie Herman.

Dottie is a broker with Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate, the largest real estate company in New York. I had met Dottie years ago at a real estate function in Las Vegas and kept her business card just in case I would have the opportunity to move to New York. Alas, it is Alexa who is getting that opportunity and I’m happy to share the contact information with her.

I don’t know who the others used to help them find a new home, but if I was looking for Manhattan New York real estate I would call Dottie first. As soon as Alexa finds her new condo and gets settled in, I’ll be flying to New York for a visit with my old buddies.

My brother called on Friday to tell me that he’d be riding in the Rolling Thunder this weekend. I saw last night on the news that they had a great turnout of motorcycles and parade viewers along the procession route in Washington DC, and that they even had the pleasure of President Bush come to the event. He was presented with an honorary leather jacket and although this is WAAAAAY out of his league, Bush seemed to be a good sport about the whole thing.

I have a girlfriend who decided to ride in Rolling Thunder this year, too. She has become quite the patriot since 9/11 and I hope she met some guys on the ride that opened her eyes and her mind to a totally different lifestyle from her little cocoon of a teacher’s life in suburbia that she’s enjoyed all these years. I can’t wait for her to call and tell me all about her biker experience.

I’m a little nervous about my nephew’s plans to go to South Africa this summer as part of his college studies. The news there has not been good this week, with a lot of violence and even riots over a wave of African immigrants.

My nephew is a real sweetheart – a humanitarian and he has always had a strong interest in helping people. The college program takes a lot of precautions to protect the students, but such an unstable culture as the African countries exhibit makes me very concerned. He’s leaving the U. S. at the end of the month, so it occurred to me that something he might appreciate taking with him would be a calling card. You know, the prepaid phone cards that let you make international calls at very cheap rates?

I found an internet site that sells the phone cards in different denominations and has different types of cards, from single use to ones you can reload. From reading about the rates between the United States and Johannesburg, it is much much cheaper to call FROM the U. S. to South Africa than to call the U.S. FROM South Africa. So I will get him a card with at least 20 minutes of calling time that he can keep in his wallet and in case of emergency he can at least call home and let us know he needs help. Otherwise, because of the expense, his mother should call him at a pre-arranged time to save money, so I’ve buying a calling card for her, too.