Spouse's oldest brother came over for dinner last night (the one separated from his wife). He liked the house and he's handy and can help teach me some basic stuff like changing out light fixtures and electrical switches. I admit to a bit of anxiety having family over because i know the house is not impressive, and i was the one who rubber stamped it, so i feel the blame is mine if it doesn't pass muster. I don't want someone to come in and only see the shabbiness (esp when we have not painted or moved in) and tell spouse he got stuck with a bad deal. You'd hope people wouldn't be so rude, but family can be unpredictable esp if they think they're "saving" you from something.

Getting a house at all was lucky - options were so limited and our budget was small for the current market. I mean _i_ like the house, and it has what was most important to us, but i know nobody's going to marvel over how fabulous it is. BIL was really positive about the house and loved the backyard (which is sweet, especially in the evening when we get all the golden sunset light). He had made noise about it being in a bad neighborhood, which isn't true, we're in a good area next to a bad neighborhood (sad trailer park), and he saw it in person and agreed. It's just a regular neighborhood with families on a quiet street. The problem with family in law enforcement is they know where all the drug busts get made, and i guess the trailer park has a bunch of frequent fliers and a bad rep. But with our budget we weren't going to afford a pristine upper class area, you know? So yeah, there's a rundown trailer park a couple streets over, and yeah, on the main road there's pedestrians carrying beer back from the corner liquor store, walking like they are high on something. It is what it is. But we're right by a huge forested park with all kinds of trails - spouse has an easy commute - we have several friends in walking distance - the location is great for us.

Frankly there's more neighborhoods in anchorage that get labeled as sketchy than good. Mountain view, fairview, muldoon, spenard. Midtown is sketchy now, i guess. There's definitely a lot more obviously high/mentally impaired folks on the streets. People yelling at nothing. The other day i watched a woman in a bizarre outfit attempt to cross a street but get scared by an invisible thing only she could see at the far side. She threw her gloves at it and ran, but then dashed back out in traffic to retrieve her gloves. Alaska is a very hard place to be if you suffer from any mental illness. Add the strain of covid, increase the availability of hard drugs like meth and a lot of people on the margins are going to spiral hard when they might have maintained a fragile balance before. It is obviously worse than it was 4 years ago. In some ways anchorage has done much better than expected in the pandemic - new businesses, new growth - but just driving around it is easy to see the most vulnerable are suffering. Anyway, i don't think we live in a bad neighborhood and unless a person gets a hard drug habit they will probably be fine in anchorage.

There's a habitat for humanity thrift store in town and it's awesome. I picked up replacements for the cheap, thin metal sliding closet doors. The entry closet will have wood doors and the guest room closet will have mirrored doors. Total $40 - inexpensive upgrade. Benefits of a '70s house - lots of replacement bits to choose from. Next I'm on the lookout for a replacement for the utility door that has some kind of glassed portion to let in daylight.

Household goods are scheduled to arrive early may. This will allow time for painting. Unfortunately spouse flies out this sunday for 3 months so he won't be here to give his input with the move-in. I will miss him - lately before bed we lay down on the air mattress and watch movies on the laptop and it's very companionable. Reminds you why you like being around someone, when you're "roughing it" and happy. On the upside, when he comes back everything should be nice and he'll skip the awkward messy project stage. That's the goal anyway. I have power tools and a credit card.

We ordered a couch. It is a lovely plush dark blue loveseat and should look very nice with burnt orange accents in the rugs and wall paint and such. ETA is four months but that's what you get when you don't want a couch that is grey or brown.

Today i have to get stuff for hanging wallpaper. I got enamoured with this paintable textured wallpaper in a geometric hexagon pattern. It might be a horrible mistake as i have never hung wallpaper but i am determined to try. It's going on this one large wall that bridges from the living room to dining/project area. It needed something and i am thinking the texture will be just the thing to add visual interest but still keep the white walls that maximize light & the feeling of open space. I prefer dark colors but the house is too small to go nuts with dark paint, you know? Supposedly it is "easy to apply" and "covers wall imperfections". We shall see.