Am I crazy?

Am I nuts?

No. Don't answer that.

Some blogs back, I mentioned that we (me and hubby) were planning a trip to Europe.

Well, barring any catastrophes (knock wood), it looks like a 'go' for early November. Final payments have been made and I'm still researching like crazy what we want to see and how we're going to see everything we want to see.

Given the limited time available to us, we decided on a 12 day cruise that will go to Italy (Rome & Naples), Greece (Athens & Mykonos), Turkey (Istanbul & Ephesus) and Egypt (Port Said & Alexandria). We'll be staying four days in Rome and taking an overnight trip to Cairo. We'll be gone a total of eighteen days.

As you can imagine, this has been keeping me very happily pre-occupied. As you can also imagine, it's not going to be cheap. We thought long and hard about this and decided it's something we need to do now (see above-linked post).

So guess what I've done? I've scheduled our roof (which is 27 years old), as well as our windows (all sixteen of them) to be replaced. I started the whole process back in the summer: getting quotes, enduring hardsell up-selling tactics; checking references; and finally signing contracts that will all but use up any retirement savings I've accumulated in investment funds (who needs to eat as long as there's a roof over one's head and triple-glazed windows to keep out the draft, anyways). Not really, but pretty darn close. Our sons have been informed that any inheritance they might expect will have to come in the form of house 'equity', not cold hard cash.

I thought all this would get done by the end of September. As a matter of fact, I distinctly remember the window sales guy tell me they'd get to it in about two weeks. And I believed him. Silly, me.

It's now October and our departure date for Europe is only 30+ days away. Is the roof done yet? No. Are the windows done yet? No.

I'm pretty sure it's not a good idea to leave the house to the care and whims of roofers and window installers when we're not around. So, . . .

My husband called to inquire about the installation start dates (because, as all we ladies know, contractors DO pay more attention to other men than women) and inform them that if the job's not started by xx date, they'll need to wait until the new year to start. They didn't like that much.

The roofers arrived this morning and delivered the roofing materials. Everything is sitting on our front lawn ready to go. Barring rain delays, it should take about a week to finish. We'll have to wait and see when they actually start.

As for the window guys, we're still waiting to hear from the salesman who said he'd check and give us a date by the end of 'last' week.

Meanwhile, I'm putting on my optimist's hat and repeating a little mantra, "Everything will get done on time; everything will get done on time, ohmmm."