I am in the middle of a somewhat hastily arranged home refinance. I don’t know what made me think about refinancing, but the idea popped into my head while at work one day so I went online and looked at exactly one mortgage option from exactly one bank. I filled out an application and according to my calculations, if it all goes through my monthly payments will be about $200 less a month. Of course, my calculations are hardly ever correct. And if I take after my mom, who went through a refinance last year, I will somehow end up paying more than I do now.

One of the items on the long and irritating list of tasks that have to be completed before this deal is wrapped up is to get the home appraised. Because I am always looking for an excuse to work from home, I arranged for the appraiser to come by my house this morning, despite her repeated attempts to schedule it for Sunday afternoon. I had really, really wanted to clean the house over the weekend. I thought it was important to get it all shiny and sparkly to try to make up for the tiny blemish on the bathroom shower wall:

But I didn’t clean. The thing about cleaning, is that it sucks. It sucks in general and sucks most of all on weekends. So, as the appointment time for the appraisal drew near and I looked around my messy house, my head filled with dread and shame. When the appraiser arrived, though, my feelings changed.

She knocked on the front door which (rightfully, if you ask me) caused Riley and Sigh to bark and approach the door. When I opened the door a crack, the appraiser immediately commanded me to lock the dogs in a room, and refused to come in until I did so. And I can understand why. I mean, have you ever seen anything more terrifying than this:

So for the duration of the appointment, I had to shuttle the dogs from room to room (the appraiser waited outside on the porch during each of the relocations) while she did her assessment. I don’t trust people who don’t like dogs, even though this lady claims that she is only skittish because she was attacked by a dog a few weeks ago. As the inconvenience of dealing with this woman grew, I found myself caring less and less about the disastrous state of my home. In fact, I was more than a little pleased when she turned to leave the house and I noticed that a rather large tumbleweed of dog fur had attached itself to the back of her black pant leg. Serves her right for making my dogs prisoners in their own home (but I hope she didn’t notice it until after she wrote and submitted my appraisal).

Tags: Home refinance, Riley, Sigh