What with all that rain and the river rising and the next high tide not until half-past-two in the morning, we were on "floodwatch" last night and binge-watched on iview all eight episodes of TROPPO, a new TV series about an eccentric private investigator and a disgraced ex-cop.
The high tide never even licked the top of the jetty and TROPPO also had a satisfactory ending, on top of which a neighbour, who is not really a neighbour as we live far too far away from anyone to really have any neighbours at all, rang to inquire if we were all right. Nice touch and I could assure them that there was no cause yet for any schadenfreude.
With all that bad news about floods, it is probably not a good time to think about selling a waterfront home such as "Riverbend", but I thought I sound out one of the far too many resident real estate agents, and so I emailed him, "I don't know you but I know OF you, and so I thought I make you my first call. I am, without being in any hurry, considering selling my property and would like to talk with you about this, on the clear understanding that this would be without any obligation on my part and IN STRICTEST CONFIDENCE on your part so as not to alarm (or excite, as the case may be) the neighbours. If you are prepared to do this, I would welcome your call so that we may meet on site."
I didn't have long to wait for his reply, "Guten Tag Peter. Thank you for your email, yes I know your property right at the end there very private it’s in a great position and offers a lot to the right people I sold (blah blag blah) in 2020 I know its nothing like yours if it suits you I am happy to call in at a time that suits to let you show me over the property I would be happy at that point to provide a no obligation appraisal on my thoughts or if you would prefer to do preliminary discussions on the phone just let me know, I drive a car with no signage so I am sure the neighbours will not pick me for a typical Real Estate person. Alles Gute" (just two commas! are the punctuation keys on his computer stuck?)
"Guten Tag?" "Alles Gute?" Who has he been talking to? Not the far-away neighbour who oh so many years ago used to put anonymous notes in our letterbox calling as un-Australian, or so I hope. So I wrote back to him:
"Received your email. Busy right now with building myself a Noah's Ark, so things may have to wait until the weather dries out. A word to the wise: if I do engage you, it will not be for your linguistic prowess nor for your wit but for your skills in selling real estate, so go easy on the 'Guten Tag' stuff unless you can keep it up for the whole of the email. It tells me that you haven't quite heeded my IN STRICTEST CONFIDENCE and made some inquiries which in the case of good ol' Nelligen means you got the wrong end of the stick because no one would have said to you, 'Oh, that NICE German chap at the bottom of Sproxtons Lane.'"
That's Nelligen for you: they know all about you, and what they don't know they make up. Methinks I advertise again with SaleByHomeOwner.
