After 3 days of being on lock down in our apartment because of air quality, we were finally able to resume our regular routine this morning.  Today, Rob attended his first Project Walk session since Friday and I went back to work.  We are still unable to spend any significant time outside because of the ever present ash but at least we are feeling productive again.  The voluntary evacuation for Carlsbad has lifted so aside from sweeping all the ash of our patio, wiping down our outside furniture, cleaning the inside of our car, changing our air filters and bathing Marley (poor little girl has black paws and very sticky fur), we are almost through the crisis.  We do feel very fortunate that we were able to remain in our own home as several of the other clients at Project Walk were displaced due to mandatory evacuations.  We’ve posted a few photos in our gallery of what the smoke looked like on Monday from our neck of the woods.  All of them were taken within 50 feet of our home, many from our front and back patio.

With one crisis averted, it’s only fitting that another has commenced.  Yesterday we learned that there was a buyer for our home.  The buyer, however, will not purchase the home unless the underground oil tank is removed from our property.  The state of NJ is offering a grant program which funds the entire removal of the tank (except for ~$750 in admin fees), however, because we are no longer residents of NJ we are ineligible for the program (despite the fact we own a home and pay NJ taxes).   So essentially, to remove the tank privately, it will cost $4000.  We began the process of scheduling the removal and quickly were haulted by the discovery that our tank insurance will be void if we complete a voluntary anytime before May 2008.  You see, even though we purchased tank insurance in January 2005 when we bought the home, the insurance company changed in May 2007 and the new company will not cover voluntary removals in te 1st year of coverage.  I am sure you can all understand the pickle we are now in: We can’t sell our house unless the oil tank is removed and we can’t remove our oil tank until May 2008.  We’ve spent the last 2 days on the phone with everyone in the industry we could possibly think of and the situation has not yet been resolved.  My realtor passed on the news to the buyer that we are unable to pull the tank and she is presently ‘considering’ our offer to put several thousand dollars in escrow for her to use to pull the tank in May 2008.  We are extremely frustrated by the situation as you can imagine.  To top it all off, we also received a letter from our homeowners insurance compay stating that since we are no longer residents of NJ they are terminating our coverage (thank you very much New Jersey Manufacturers).  The company is sending us referrals but my goodness ....are we on an episode of Punked?  The good news is Rob and I have become pretty apathetic about our seemingly rotten luck so don’t worry too much about us-we haven’t thrown in the towel yet!  I apoligize for providing all the dreadful details about this situation but we figured our team of well wishers/prayers would want them (at least we hope so).   

 Mandy