Shannon Phillips

We’re feeling a little down today. Yesterday we learned that the latest house we made an offer on—a house we are both absolutely smitten with—had twenty five offers and ours came in second. We’re the backup. It’s a hard position to be in because we’re reluctant to move on so long as there’s any chance we might get this (fantastic) house…so we’re just left hanging. I encourage you all to help us out by sending your good karma and visualizing hopeful, positive things, such as an asteroid landing on the heads of the people who made the first-place offer.

This is our fifth offer. Interestingly, it’s only the second where we were actually outbid (assuming we were outbid; our agent suspects that the winning offer might be a lower price but an all-cash bid). We canceled our fourth offer when we discovered this house, we were outbid in Martinez, and the other two offers fell through on the sellers’ end. So it feels like we’ve been searching forever when in fact it’s mostly just that we’ve lost time dealing with short sale nonsense and incompetent listing agents. Still, we’re tired and dispirited.

At least it’s veggie day! We got a bag of white peaches, another bag full of nectarines, a big bunch of basil, two cucumbers, several pattypan squashes, about a pound (maybe more) of fingerling potatoes, a small bunch of carrots, two small stalks of broccoli, six heirloom tomatoes, and five little red onions. I love summer!

Tonight I bought a chicken and I plan to roast it with the potatoes. Tomorrow we’ll have a huge garden salad with ham and hardboiled eggs, and a nectarine and blackberry crisp for dessert. Friday I’ll make a fritatta incorporating the squash and whatever veggies survive the salad, and Saturday we can have spaghetti with pesto. Sunday, pan-fried salmon cakes; Monday, cheesy garlic soup and homemade bread. We’ll eat the peaches straight!