Wednesday, October 7, 2015

Holiday leave

G-man currently has 131 hrs of "use or lose" vacation time to use up before the end of the year.  The current budget resolution is through Dec 11, so as of right now, we don't know if he will be able to take Christmas week off. Probably.  But we won't know until December.  He would be driving, so at least we don't have to purchase airfare.

Given that Christmas may fall through, we were hoping he could come home for Thanksgiving, and if we saw him for both holidays, that would just be a bonus.  He spoke to his supervisor, who said someone from "his" office needs to be in, so he would have to work it out with his co-worker on who would be taking what days.

So he talked to her.  And found out that she already took off the week of Thanksgiving, but never mentioned it to him.  While I totally agree that they don't have to ask "permission" from each other to take time off, it is a courtesy that they should at least gives a heads up about plans, particularly for days that are popular to take off.

So, he can't come home for Thanksgiving, since he will have to work.  He also won't be able to go to his Mom's, since it is too far to drive for the day and he will have to work the day after.  That leaves him stuck at my parents house...and that is not a good option.  Hopefully he will find someone that will take pity on him and he can have Thanksgiving somewhere else.  He loves "my" Thanksgiving dinner, so I told him that as long as we are together for Christmas, I will make all his favorites then.

(Mom and Dad pretty much don't interact with him.  They never leave their bedroom.  They refuse any help.  We are trying to stay out of it.  If he stays at their house for Thanksgiving, he will probably not even see them.)

Since Thanksgiving is off the table, and Christmas may be off the table, I am wondering if he should come home in early December, and then if Christmas works out....it is a bonus.  This is just in the thought stage.

Meanwhile, he still has over 3 weeks of leave, and beyond a few days here or there, has no motivation to use it unless he is coming home.  We talked about taking a few days and maybe working at the grocery store on those days and he wasn't fond of that.  He said if he was going to work, he might as well go to the office (even though it would be extra money).  I may try and sway that one a bit...at least for a few days of stockpiling cash.

He will probably donate some of his leave.  There are a few people in the office that have some medical issues, and they have depleted their sick and vacation time.  So at least the leave won't go to waste....I am happy that someone will be able to benefit from it.

Back on the house front....nothing to report.  We had a showing yesterday who thought the house was too small for their growing family.  Can't do much about that!  Our choices right now are to be patient, drop the house price even more (and then have to figure out how to come up with even more cash....like $5-$10k), rent it, or consider a short sale (that will wreck our 800+ credit scores).  At the moment, we are being patient and hoping that the price drop from 2 weeks ago finds us a buyer soon.  

10 comments:

  1. What if he cam home the week after Thanksgiving but you just treat it like Thanksgiving. Make a big dinner and then put up the holiday decorations or whatever you normally would do. My family does it that way because it is too hard to get everyone together on the actual holiday with everyone having inlaws and the such.

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    1. That's exactly what I was going to suggest. Make your own holiday when you can. I understand policies of use it or lose it, but if they don't let you use it, they need to make some concessions.

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  2. This is so hard, I hope he can come home for a while even to just veg and see the kids and you. Your patience is amazing, but then again we have not many choices......

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  3. What exactly is a short sale? Never heard that term in Canada before.

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    1. Basically you are asking the bank to accept less than what you owe. It ruins your credit. You can't get a mortgage for at least 3 years and it stays on your credit for 10 yrs. You are considered subprime, so rates are high, if you can even get a loan.

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    2. Oh okay. Yeah that would definitely be a worst case scenario for sure. Hope it never comes to that.

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  4. How about a late Thanksgiving? He could come down the week after Thanksgiving- all the staples will be on sale for a feast! You guys can put up your tree and do fun holiday stuff with your kids. He should use a big chunk of that vacation before Dec. 13 just in case!

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    1. That is the working plan ...except the tree. All our stuff is packed. So it would be highly modified....

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  5. When we were packed up during Christmas, I bought a couple of cheap strands and make a tree on our wall out of lights.

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    1. Thanks for the idea. I was thinking green construction paper and lots of stickers!

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