This Must Be the Place

Here's the latest... Our house in Virginia is currently under contract and the inspection was Thursday morning. We found a house in Charlotte and we are currently under contract for that house. The inspection for the Charlotte house is this coming Thursday morning. I'll be in Charlotte this week for the inspection. I've been holding off revealing the new location for Lago's Lounge because I didn't want to jinx the deal. Lago and I are both very excited about the new house. It's an older home and needs a little work and some TLC, but we can see its potential. It's in Charlotte in a quiet, well-maintained older neighborhood - 8.5 miles from my work and about 3 miles from Lago's new gig. The kitchen needs some updating and the yard needs some taming. The photo of the outside of the house must have been taken when the house first went on the market. We'll also need to get a large storage shed for the back. The remnants of an overgrown 1970s-style metal shed are in the backyard, but this needs to go. There's a cement driveway that goes around to the back of the house and a cement walkway in the backyard. The backyard looks as if it had been landscaped at one time. Most of the back is overgrown with ivy and we want to get rid of all of it and see if we can get some grass growing – a tough task we know. The front porch and the inside entry-way have slate floors. You can see the slate floor in the photo below of the stairway. (Click on the images to see larger view)




The Total: We decided on this home after looking at almost 40 homes. We did some 2nd looks and this home was one of the homes I initially looked at by myself. I checked it off as one I thought Lago would want to see. I saw 12 homes sans Lago the week I started work in Charlotte. She liked all the homes I thought she would, although I was a little on the fence about this home at first, mostly because I wasn't sure if she would like it because the kitchen needed work. There were a lot of deciding factors, but its potential was a big one.

Today we're going to see Dave Matthews Band (DMB) in Northern Virginia at the Nissan Pavilion. It's the first day I can think of in awhile that neither of us is working or doing this or that or making phone calls, etc. We're going to the show and looking forward to doing nothing but enjoying one of our favorite bands and having a good time. There's a threat of storms today and tonight, but our seats are sheltered from the elements. The show this past week in Charlotte was great, but I'm really looking forward to tonight's show because it's one of our favorite venues to see DMB and last year's concert tops the list hands down for best DMB show we've ever attended – FYI the Charlotte show made an even dozen. The show last year at Nissan tops the Garden show in NYC when James Brown made a surprise appearance. The set list last year was great from beginning to end with one of the best versions of "Warehouse" ever. It started with "Dreamgirl" which in my mind is a perfect opener. They did "Say Goodbye" one of Lago's favs. It was the first time they performed the song since 2003. Robert Randolph joined the band at the end of the show for blazing versions of "Stand Up," "Louisiana Bayou" and "All Along the Watchtower." Did I also mention that we had front-row center seats for last year's show, well we did. We were upgraded by the DMB fan club, thanks again! I realize that may have clouded our memory of the show, but we have that concert on CD and it still rocks.