Hi, welcome to the Grand Hill Chronicles podcast. I am your host, Don. And co-host 

Lila. I'm super excited to be here, by the way. Cause I haven't been on. Oh, thanks. Yes, I propose we trade things when, when we talk. Um, so 

we have a soothing chime ball Uhhuh. Then we're gonna pass back and forth and we're not doing a good job so far of talking on the, we have the chime ball.

Wait, wait. So I wanna say that I wanted to say I'm really excited to be here cuz I've only done the one episode that Don split in half and published in two. Um, I haven't had a chance to be back, so I'm really excited to be back. 

So I. I don't consider this to be a, a really real episode. I, as Joanna Penn would call it from the, uh, the Creative Pen podcast.

I would call this, or she would call this an in-between episode. Um, I just, I've been frustrated with, uh, what I feel as to be a lack of progress, and so I just wanted to come and talk it out with you guys and, and hopefully feel a. More at peace with how things are going. Vindicated. 

No, I'm just kidding.

Wrong word, but yeah, 

a little bit. Um, yeah, yeah. So who, who goes first? Did do, should I break into my topics? 

Oh, can I say kind of a preliminary thing first? I just wanted to say I have, uh Oh, yes. Thank you. I have word finding problems, so, Just, this will make me feel better if I just put this out there. So a lot of times I have to go through like four or five synonyms or related sounding words or, or similar sounding words, or that have similar letters in them before I finally land on the word that I'm trying to, to find.

Uh, I just feel so conscious about it because it makes me feel really dumb. Um, so I just wanted to say that. 

Yeah, there you go. Um, so like I said, I, I, I've been feeling frustrated with lack of progress, so I think. We'll start this episode with complaints. Uh, so yeah, this is an, an in-between episode. We're not gonna do any story or narration.

We're not gonna do any world building. Well, maybe a little bit of world building, not, not really. We're gonna talk about it. Um, meta world building, I guess. Um, But, uh, complaints so my grapes aren't sprouting. Uh, I posted in the blog a couple of weeks ago that I planted my grape seeds that I've been carrying for two and a half years, and they're not sprouting, 

granted, granted, um, it's, it can take like up to three months, I think they said.

For them to sprout, didn't you? 

I, no, no. Oh, really? You don't, because you're, according to the, the instructions that I found online, you're supposed to winter them for three months. Ah, so you put 'em in the fridge. And I did it for one month because I started late. Uh, but it said they should sprout in three weeks, and I think I planted them two and a half weeks ago.

And got that half week left. Yeah, we'll see. We'll see. I watered them 15 minutes ago and they're under a bright light 

right now. I was suggesting to Don that he should do, maybe we should get rid of this ball. 

It's just gonna be distracting. It's good calming sound though. I think it's probably gonna, the listeners will like it.

Oh, it's 

probably gonna be distracting, but you guys can tell us what you think. 

Yeah, give us, should we get rid of the ball? The calming ball? Oh, I need. Uh oh. Cut. I need to make sure the phone is on air airplane mode. Oh,

I'm trying to do it all in one cut. I can't see the airplane mode there it is cuz of these rubber bands.

And it is still filming. 

Um, oh, that I, wait, wait. Oh. Oh. We have to recut. I mean, uncut. Yeah, 

uncut. We are now airplane mode is on, so no caller text is gonna interrupt the video. 

So what was I saying? Oh, I was telling Don that he should do like, Like Toad does in the frog and Toad stories. I can't remember which story this is, but he plants some seeds.

So Frog has a garden and he kind of knows what's up. He knows how to make it work, and Toad gets all inspired. And, um, he wants to plant seeds of his own. And I, I don't remember if they're flowers or what they are, and they keep not growing and he, he misunderstand. What is actually supposed to happen? Um, I can't remember how it plays out, but he ends up singing to them and reading poetry to them, I think, and maybe playing the violin or something like does all these things to make them grow.

And first I think he shouts at them and then I think maybe Frog tells him that he's gonna scare them anyway. So he mellows out and he's super nice to his seedlings and it's a fun story. 

Well, um, Lila makes my complaining feel like, not complaining, but, uh, that that's a good thing. Uh, so my grapes aren't growing and I got sick again in March.

I might have mentioned it on the last podcast episode. I don't, I don't think. No, cuz it, it would've been recorded, but I don't know, whatever. I got sick again in March and. I had some weird stomach thing this past week. Hmm. So it, not, not a flu as far as I can tell, but made me feel, it made me feel nauseated and, you know, so those are our reasons that I, I haven't been able to give time to the project as I would like.

And also it's spring and, and so there's yard work to be. Um, I, I had to mow our, our house that was Airbnbed was rented out on Airbnb. I had to mow the, the lawn over there. I'm trying to mow the lawn over here, but I can't get the lawnmower started. Yes, we have a lawnmower over there. We have a lawnmower over here.

I don't want to carry a lawnmower back and forth. I, I could, um, but I can't get the lawnmower over here started, and I, I haven't had the time to dig into it. And then there are a lot of other things like that. Just things that need to be taken care of. Okay. And then there's Airbnb. Uh, if you remember from our January episode where we had our guest leave in October after smoking in our house for six months, just chain smoking, whatever.

When you said, we had our January episode when we had our guest leave, and I was like, we had a guest on the podcast. How 

exciting. No, not our podcast guest, our house guest, or our, our rental guest. I figured it out. Um, yeah, our rental guest in our house in October, um, their smoking made us move, made us buy this house.

We wanted to move back into our old house, uh, but we didn't want everything to smell like cigarette. We bought a whole new house because of it. Um, and now all this upheaval, right? All this upheaval and Airbnb hasn't paid us a cent. And they, they sent us an email the other day. Oh. And they, they, they've been really irritating.

They're talking about paying, they're talking about paying in a matter of like seven to 10 days, which is great, except they want us to acc accept, formally accept the payment, which is understandable. And when I do so, um, there's, uh, I. I have to sign a thing where I'm accepting. Um, and, uh, it includes some non-disclosure language, but I haven't signed it yet, so I can still tell everything about it.

Um, so this, this whole drama, right? They, they offer us one figure, which, you know, we, we have these quotes. Quote from ServPro to clean the contents of the house, quote from ServPro to clean the inside of the house itself, quote, to replace the carpet, quote, to paint the house. The duct cleaning that we already paid for the cleaning from our regular cleaning crew that we already paid for, uh, all the um, and all the missing and broken items.

All that added up is one figure and. Six months later. Oh, and that's fine. Airbnb, we'll get there. Oh, okay. Now, six months later, Airbnb is like, okay, we're, we're ready to release these funds to you. It's $12,000 less than the sum of your expenses. But I was saying, Hey, like how did you calculate that? 

Okay. 

I was saying part of the expenses should cover our work.

Oh, 

I'm getting there. Okay. She's right, she's right. So yeah, that's just the, like, if, if they had paid us in October, then we'd be like, I mean, if they had paid us in October and they should pay us the figure, all these things, these expenses added up. Okay, pretend we're still in October and they're offering us $12,000 less than that.

Like how, how does that, We're gonna have to look through these things and really, like nickel and dime. Well, this room does smell bad, but we can't have it cleaned and this room, we can't have it cleaned. Oh, and those, those, the contents of this room in that room, we can't have them cleaned. Um, right. Okay.

Now it's not October, it's April. So now let's add, uh, mortgage that we've been paying in the meanwhile, utilities that we've pay, been paying in the meanwhile. Um, and we neglected to include it previously, but let's include our labor. Mm-hmm. Lila did like a hundred loads of laundry. I think it was 15. That takes 

15, but there were all these other hours with cleaning 

and it was like 129 hours.

I don't remember. Anyway, so like all hour labor. Um, also with the ServPro quotes and the carpet and the paint, we're acting as general contractor and its standard industry. To add 10% plus, 10% for, um, for overhead and profit. And so we should take, we should take those quotes, all those quotes, um, and the, the labor that we already paid and add 20% to that.

That's, that's what we should do as general contractor. And then add our labor as well, and then add the. Anyway, it comes down to this figure that they're offering to pay us. That was $12,000 less than pure expenses is approximately half. Of what they really ought to pay at this point, six months later.

And so now, like, if, if I sign this thing, then they'll, they'll pay us this money. And this wasn't supposed to be, be an Airbnb episode, but there's just so much going on right now. We're deliberating, we're deliberating do we take the bird in the hand and, and, uh, nickel and dime, what we're not gonna have.

What still might smell like cigarettes when we're done. Uh, and, and that way we can get back on our feet. Cuz right now we're losing money on this house. And, and it's a gamble. Cause savings going down. We just got our tax rebate and it's gonna be going down 

and it's a, it's a gamble because we don't know if we wait longer, if they're ever even going.

Decide to give us more than they initially offered or so. As we wait, things are getting more expensive and we don't know if we'll be compensated. So it's already bad enough. 

I'll go ahead and name figures. Uh oh. No, you shouldn't. I shouldn't. 

I don't think you should. I don't know. Okay. I don't know. I'm a little nervous about that.

Okay. Okay. I'm more private, I think. Um, but I suggested, we talked 

to a lawyer. I did name some figures in January, so you can reference that. 

Uh, I suggested we talked to a lawyer to at least get some kind of perspective on whether or not we have a chance, so that's all. Yeah. So we're on that. We we're trying to find a reliable lawyer.

Yeah, 

and it's just, it's hard because how does a lawyer. Uh, we have to take his time, you know, and he's gotta decide, like, when, when do I start charging them and start invoicing them, uh, just to listen to the, to their scenario and decide whether it's worth, um, uh, I don't know. So we're trying to figure that out.

I talked to a lawyer a month ago and, and we sent a demand letter to. And, uh, in the demand letter I said, Hey, you know, we sh we really ought to add these other things that we left out at first. And uh, so you need to pay us what you originally owed. Um, plus the mortgage and rent, um, rent anyway, plus some of these other things, but I, not all of 

them.

You mean the mortgage that we've been getting? Yeah, the mortgage loss, 

utilities income. N not loss of income. What was the rent? So I said, you need to pay these things, these things. Uhhuh, which was approximately, um, I'm trying to convert to ratios, which was approximately 130% of what our original costs, just pure costs would be.

And I, I said, okay, pay this by March 31st, or we'll recalculate. And every month we're going to add another. Mortgage and utilities. And also when we recalculate after March 31st, we're going to add the lost profits and something else. And it's a higher figure now cuz they didn't pay. Uh, now March 31st came and went last Friday.

Friday. And I saw the email yesterday. But they sent it, well they sent, they sent an email on Wednesday, today's Friday, they sent an email on, we. Saying, Hey, we're, I hope you're doing well. We're able to offer you a reimbursement of amount. If you're happy with this outcome, please go ahead and confirm your acceptance of our offer using the following link.

And that's the, the agreement where I accept, um, and I, I give up my rights to try to recover any recompense from the guests themselves. I'm fine with that. Because air cover is advertised to, to cover it. You're good. I don't need to go after the guest. I'm going after Airbnb. I like the 

little celebratory bells.

Um, okay, so there's a link to the form. It says, once you're done, just let me know by replying to this message, and I'll process your payout. Once the pallet is processed from, Your bank and payout method will determine how long it'll take the funds to arrive in your account. The average processing time is three to seven business days.

You can learn more about the payout, payout timelines in our help center. Thank you for your association with us. Okay. So burden the hand, right? And we'd have to nickel and dime what we're going to remedy, but it would get us back on our feet. It wouldn't be fair to us, but it would get us back on our feet.

Um, so to. So to speak. We still moved. We moved out of a, well, we didn't move out, we never moved back in, but we bought a new house instead of moving back into a house where, and Lila settles in very carefully and, and she settle. She determines that how she's gonna set things up. Um, and it takes her a lot of work and a lot of time we had already figured that house.

It would've been easy to move back into. And, 

and I was so excited. I was so excited because in fact, I mentioned to the kids when we were first back, even though it smelled and everything, but I, I thought we would get this all taken care of and get it cleaned and painted. I, you know, I didn't know I was gonna drag on like this, excuse me.

Um, and I was so excited. I mentioned to them, Nice. It was that for once we were moving and everything wasn't gonna be completely topsy-turvy, we were mo coming back home and it felt so good. And here, here was like the little, the play area and I still had some things up on the wall, you know, and it was just our house still.

And it was really nice after all the, um, extreme amounts, uh, amounts of moving that we've done, um, it was just gonna be super nice to be back somewhere that was home. So there went that and we're still dealing with the fallout because we still can't use our stuff. I mean, we can use some of it, but there's just a lot of stuff we can't use.

Oh, that book's still at the other house. Oh, this is still smelly. It hasn't been cleaned, so we can't bring it yet. And just, we just, it's, our lives are on hold and it's just not fair. 

And the, we bought this house in late 2022. We bought the other. In spring of 2019. So the mortgage on this house, because we had to get a house that we would fit in the mortgage on this house is significantly more expensive than the other house.

And so, like talking about trying to get into, um, into being independent authors, we've got a much higher hurdle to get over. Like our, our income need is significantly higher because our house got smoked in for six. And we were forced to buy when dragged their feet, 

and we were forced to buy when interest rates really high.

So, 

so thanks Airbnb. Um, Yeah, if bureaucracy, I understand it, but they could have been faster than six months. You know, and 

I'd, I'd like to say something. It's one thing for it to, for them to have to go through the procedures and make sure everything is accounted for and all of their legal whatevers that they have to do.

I understand that, but the thing that really gets me is the silence that's been on the other side of this. Like we can't get them to tell us. And it's just been like months of this and they feed us little crumbs or like, you know, kind of keep us happy. Like, oh, we're working on it and never really tell us anything till, I mean, they have had a few points in time, but it's, it's just been really aggravating.

And it's weeks or, um, I think between, maybe even at one point a month apart. And they give us, like Lila said, tiny little crumbs. So I talked to my dad, who is a lawyer in another state, so he can't, he can't really help us. He can kind of help us. And he says the positive thing is they're communicating with you, but they didn't tell you how they arrived at their number, which I asked.

They, they said their number in late January, and I asked how they. No response. They, they didn't decline. Oh. And we can't talk to 'em on the phone. It's only email if we call their, their, um, help line. Mm-hmm. It's a call center in India that can't help with these matters. They're just not prepared. Yeah.

Okay. But they didn't tell you how they arrived at their number. Just as you broke down for them the amount of your demand. They should break down how they arrived at their amount and why they rejected or excluded some of your. It's their first offer. So of course it's low ball. They know you need to bring this to some kind of resolution.

Oh, I was gonna note that this March 31st came and went. Their lawyers received my demand letter, uh, about two weeks, probably a week and a half prior to that. Uh, so then here we are the week following the expiration of the demand letter when we're probably. Gearing up to talk to a lawyer and move this a step higher and maybe get ready to take it to court.

And we get an email on Wednesday and we get the same identical email on two on on Thursday. Um, so I don't know if it's just that their processes are weird and, and messed up internally and they finally hit a point where they can send me this email. And they're also disorganized, and so they didn't remember that they sent it.

Mm-hmm. And they sent it, they sent it again the next day, or they're trying to make sure that I, I got it so I don't take 'em to court. I don't know. Um, you may need to come down some in your demand to get them to go up. Okay. You could say something like, well, nothing in this letter constitutes a waiver of any amounts due to us.

We're willing to settle for less to save both of us the expense and headache of litigation. Therefore, we're willing to compromise and settle for. If we are unable to reach an agreement, we will move forward with a lawsuit where we'll assert the full amount of our claim, which will presently, which we presently estimate to be amount due to additional interest, expense and loss profits born by us.

You should run their letter by your attorney and get his input. Ideally, your response back to Airbnb should come from him. Ah-ha. That's what I said. I'm so sorry. You and Lila are having to go through this. Yeah, and it, it should come from a lawyer. I, I talked to a lawyer on the phone. No, and I know he suggested sending a demand letter.

I prepared the demand letter. I asked if he would look over it and he never replied. I was just saying maybe he was just being super busy. Maybe I need to try him again. Maybe I'll get results, but, 

so yeah, no, you, I think you did right, like send your initial foray and then now that this has happened, I think we need a lawyer to step in, stare them down a little.

Yeah. Um, 

I think, I think we're probably about done talking about Airbnb. Sure. We want a resolution, uh, and we want a resolution soon. We even talked a few days ago before we saw these emails come in. We talked about maybe taking our tax rebate and doing an even worse nickel and di of, of what we're gonna remedy just to get back on our feet.

Uh, with, with this. Uh, and become, and become financially solvent. I, I mentioned we're losing money right now. We are not financially solvent. We've been losing savings. Um, and we were, we were just about out. We got our tax rebate, so we ha we're on the clock. And so it's, it's take the burden of hand even though it's an unfairly low amount.

Unfairly scrawny bird. Yeah. 

Or hunt the two in the bush that we really should have. I think we're done talking about Airbnb. What do you think? Sure. 

Let's do something 

fun. Okay. Well wait, let me check the time. How long? I don't wanna have too long of an episode. We've been running, um, for, I mean, recording audio for 26 minutes.

By the time we cut it down, it's probably 20. I mean, cuz we were setting up, we're doing a set up. We had to cut at one point. Um, after editing we're probably like 23 minutes. Let me look at what we want to cover and make sure we're not gonna go excessively long. Maybe we'll split this discussion in two episodes.

Again, where did I put sticky notes? There it is. Um, so we did our complaints and he has a category of complaints. We have. You know what 

my thing is? Can, can we My things are 

short. Yeah. Do your surprises. Okay. So we can end this episode on a positive. And then we're gonna keep talking and we're gonna record the next episode right now after the surprises, and it'll be the next episode when it comes out.

So I was 

thinking I'll have three surprises, so why not save one or two for the next? I mean, we'll see how it goes. It's up to, okay. Okay. Here, can I hold the ball? 

I don't know what these surprises are. 

It's nothing big. It's just that we never get to talk. So I figured we'd do our talking here and it'd be kind of fun.

Oh yeah. So I was saying all of these things take time away. Sorry. You probably can't hear me very well when I'm reading the bell. All of these things take time away from being able to write, from being able to, uh, Owen, I was sick. I was, I felt awful and I didn't keep up my social media presence. Uh, and that's kind of important if you're trying to build a brand.

So you've been not seeing me as a ghost on social media the past, uh, I don't know, week and a half. Um, but yeah. 

Okay, so, so this is the kind of mundane things I find excitement in. Because life is so difficult, um, these years. So anyway, um, we went to, uh, an Easter barbecue thing at Don's work today. Uh, took the whole family and we got back and I was unloading the car and, uh, rose had borrowed something from me and we were looking for it.

And I found, I found the thing eventually, but I found. Road trip. Bingo. It's a used car and we just discovered this. We, we've only had it a few months. 

This was in the car? Yeah, this was in the car. This was in our car. Uhhuh 

Inigo. Where was it? Oh, ENGO Montoya. Because we mount 

less confusing because there, there are other model names that are like, there's the, that have month in 

them.

Oh, I, I wasn't thinking of that, but. Okay. Anyway. Sorry. You were asking where I found it. Yeah, it was in the back of the driver's seat. There's like a little folder thing, like in the pouch. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, it's so totally fun. And Rose went ahead and used it already on the trip that we'd had driving around town.

Oh, that was another exciting thing. Um, I feel like there was something else I was gonna. So I'm just, I, I love car games, like fun things that the kids can do in the car. And I like doing them too, even though I never do anymore. But, um, so I'm excited. You want another? Yeah. Okay. Um, ta-da. Colors. 

Colors sometimes.

So for the audio, um, people not watching the video. Oh yeah, yeah. She pulled out a color. On a, a paper color palette, a four page 

pick, a paint color. Well, so we need to repaint the deck. Right. And I came across this as I was organizing the garage, our old house here too. Yeah, because it's coming. We need to get it before it all starts to rot because Virginia is really harsh on Dex.

It rains a lot. Yeah. So anyway, so I wanted to propose, we have to do one of the solid color ones. I think because it's an older. I want to green this time. We keep talking about green for things and then we never do. Oh, oh, okay. I'm just putting it out there. We have, okay. A choice of several different greens, 

but when are we going to, I guess after Airbnb pays the full amount?

I mean, I don't know when we're gonna 

do 

it. I'd mind to, to paint the deck. I don't know when we're gonna do it, but I came across this and I thought, well, it's something that. Done. And these are some colors we can choose from. So they're fun colors. 

Yeah. 

That's all I have. One more, but we'll see that for later.

Okay. Um, 

oh, here, sorry. I'll drop another nugget before we go. Um, I've been working on creating a logo for Grant Hill Media, and I, uh, it might also be an emblem used in the country of GR Hill, like maybe it's, it's on their banner. Um, so I, I've been playing with ideas, and you probably don't know this yet, but Grant Hill was founded by the, the union of three smaller, um, cities or towns, um, that.

Relatively near to the Fallon Rose. And in those days, um, long before our story begins, the Fallon Rose was just in the countryside. Um, but then, then, uh, anyway, the, these three towns unified and formed the country of Grand Hill. And so here we are. I want something that represents the Fallon Rose and the three towns that that formed it.

And I'll post, uh, I'll post one image, one, one possible version, uh, along with the podcast episode. It might, it might be the, the episode art. So if you load this podcast up in Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever, um, I think I'll use this image. Uh, as, as that image right next to the, the episode, um, for you in the video right now, I don't know if I'll, I don't know if I'll take the time to load the image.

You should into the video lines doesn't, 

as I should. This, this doesn't do it justice at all. Like it looks kind of like a, a 

marker iob. I have, I have a black and white printer, so yeah, you can, you can see there. There's a, a rose, I pulled up a YouTube tutorial on how to draw a rose because it needs, it needs to look, uh, vector ish.

And actually, some of you're gonna laugh, some of you're gonna roll your eyes because it's ridiculous. I stumbled across this idea online and I was like, all right, because I need vector graphics. I'm creating the logo and Microsoft. It's 

good though. I really like it. And the, like I say, this black and white printout totally doesn't do it justice.

It's a really pretty rose. It has some shading. It's, it's complex and dually. And I really like it, kind of like stained glassy, 

like when I work with gimp, uh, GNU image manipulation program, and, and you make the shapes and then like you fiddle with them, you move 'em around, you change color. You wind up with artifacts at the edges, at the borders between colors and where, where it's done Some anti aliasing or anti Eli aliasing.

I think it's aliasing. I don't, um, but uh, you can't really have that in a logo cuz that's dominant. It looks bad. Um, so yeah, Microsoft Word and you'll see another version with the next. Episode, and actually if you, if you're following the story of the Grand Hill Chronicles on Royal Road or on, uh, Wattpad or on ck, then you've already seen this, this image, because I posted it with this week's revised, uh, chapter that I posted.

Uh, yeah. So follow the story on, on Royal Road, Wattpad or ck. I like, they're all, they're all great platforms, honestly. Um, but yeah, just go and search for Greenhill on there and you'll find me follow and read the next section every Wednesday. You can, you can read, uh, you can read a significant portion of the beginning of, of the Greenhill Chronicles on thorn.link/greenhill already, but I'm doing some revisions, so I'm posting those revisions on those other platforms.

That's where we'll stop this. And we'll 

stay tuned for more surprises next time. Yeah. Or 

one. Yeah. And hopefully we've gotten all the complaining out

next.