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We continue to casually look at houses with the possibility that we might move. I am pretty sure we'll stay where we are, but if the stars align who knows?
We saw two places today. The first one I thought wouldn't be quite right, but turned out to be better than I thought it might be, the second one has been on the market for a while and I didn't think we'd like it, but we finally decided to have a look just to be sure. It was much much worse than I'd expected. It wasn't going to be our house anyway - the decor was not to our taste (it was reminiscent of a Mediterranean hotel, which is fine, but not where I want to live) and it would have cost a lot of money to rip everything out and replace with stuff we liked. But the estate agent let us know that the couple who lived there were getting divorced, the wife having moved out already and that was why they were selling up. But I think we'd have guessed that anyway. The place stank (figuratively and literally) of a life breaking down. Anyone mildly dissatisfied about their marriage who dreams of freedom (luckily that's not me, though it might be the case for my wife) should be made to go round the houses of the recently separated. The ghost of the dead marriage hung over the place and it felt like even if you gutted the place and started again that that ghoul would haunt the home forever. It was, I think, a bit of a soulless home anyway - gaudy and showy in a way that was meant to impress rather than be nice to live in- but the split had made things worse and even though the husband must be desperate to sell, he was not doing anything to make that more likely. There was something in the bathroom that I am actually quite fearful of writing down. I was going to skirt around it, but even if the house had been perfect for us I think this might have put me off and had I lived in the house, even if I had totally stripped out all the stuff in the bathroom would have continued to haunt me. The toilet seat was down (not the lid, just the bit you sit on) and there was (presumably) human faeces smeared on it. Now look, I have on occasion had some poo based accident or bad arse cleaning that has led to a little smudge or two at the back of the seat. But this was a significant amount of poop and smeared at the front of the seat. I don't even know how that could happen. Or if it had happened how you wouldn't have noticed. And if you had noticed what would make you leave it there. Especially if you knew people were coming round that day to view the house.
Catie saw it too, but the estate agent didn't say anything if he did and it seemed rude to point it out, but for the sake of trying to sell the house I feel like maybe we should have mentioned it. It's really quite off putting. But again it says more, probably, about the state of mind of a man whose life is falling apart. I am sure it was his poo, as I don't think anyone else lives there and the kids were too old to make such a gross error. Whatever the case I think the wife was right to leave.
On the top floor there were loads of photos blown up and printed on frames of the happy couple with their kids when they were babies, all kissing each other and looking happy. As I say, just like Satan had arranged a trip to a Hellish future to warn couples that it was best to work things out and stay together. But to be fair the shit on the toilet had already convinced me of that.
We offered the asking price.
A couple of remote podcasts today, one before poogate and one after - the first with Bob Cryer who has written a terrific book about his father, Barry and then a last minute surprise afternoon one with Rob Reiner who is promoting his new podcast. I had limited time to prepare and to do the interview and didn't know how much he'd be happy to talk about stuff outside of the podcast, but got some good stuff about Spinal Tap and Albert Brooks and loads about the truth behind the JFK assassination (the podcast is about that and it's pretty convincing and is apparently going to name names). But what a delight to talk to one of my heroes and the director of the greatest film ever - and interesting Chris Evans also thought he directed the greatest film ever, but chose a different film and someone else I mentioned it to said he directed the greatest film ever and chose a different film. You can bet that it's one of the RHLSTPs where I remain polite and deferential. At one point I did think about saying “I bet it's shit.†But I didn't. And that's a mark of the man I was interviewing. We're putting this one out on Monday!
RHLSTP with Peter Richardson is now up wherever you get your podcasts!
