gray area

I shopped for a better mortgage on my condo this afternoon. Erin, representing the lending institution, smiled her way through the interview, but I think she is gunning for a promotion. She maintains a record number of loans processed in her credit union. And she is determined to lend me a mortgage-lending hand.

I brought Ed along because he has a history of telling me after these meetings what I should have done instead. His presence was a security against this.

He fiddled with magnetic 6 millimeter nuts during the fifteen minutes meeting. Erin commented that this was the most popular toy in her office.



Earlier in the day, I presided over appeals of nonresidency determinations at this university. (I caught a very early bus to campus. It was dismally gray out at the bus stop.)





Students sometimes have a hard time understanding how it can be that they are residents for voting and (part time) employment purposes, but not for residency determinations. But, the world is full of such inconsistencies. For property tax purposes, the value of my condo has gone up. For securing a mortgage – probably not. But, I intend to super-clean my condo before the assessor comes around. People are swayed by weird things.


The skies turned colorless and snowflakes fell again. After the interview with the lender, Ed and I drove out randomly, into the country (a mere mile from the office of this top loan officer – that’s Madison for you).

It felt sadly winterish.




We stopped at La Baguette and bought the bread for supper and I was very happy that Madame saw me enter. She waved her hand and smiled in greeting.