That one Xmas emptying deceased Pop's AZ condo

Dateline: 2017, Xmas. Pops was a 'snowbird' ergo spent winters at his Scottsdale, AZ (next to Phoenix) condo. I visited him there ever Xmas week, 18 years in a row. The 19th he wasn't there. I had a tradition of always flying there on Xmas or Xmas eve. It's easy to fly then, not crowded. Security just waves people through without checking. When they're not napping. Planeloads of Jews high fiving over the cheap flights. It's a good gig. 

The population of Scottsdale swells in winter. I would scan license plates at shopping malls: MN, WI, MI, IA, IL etc. Every day is 75 & sunshine, hard to resist that alternative to living like an animal back home. Pops had a ground floor condo in a collection of 4-plexes. For those of you who know the area: Miller & McDowell. On the greenbelt. The cheap end of Scottsdale. Anyhoots. 

He had died (mostly) unexpectedly 2 months earlier. I was the estate executor. He left me with a stupefying amount of financial secrecy to unravel. Which took me 18 months. Will write about that separately someday. Meanwhile, I had 2 properties to empty & sell on top of the 10+ secret bank accounts. Remotely, as I didn't live in either state. One in wintery Midwest; the other in AZ as outlined earlier. 

Partly for nostalgia, partly for the cheap arse flight, I decided to fly to AZ on Xmas day as I usually did. This time: oy, a mistake. Didn't think that one through. Fun fact: normally he's already been there a month, ergo pantry is stocked. I land, taxi the few miles to his place, observing, yes you guessed it: everything is closed on Xmas! Fast food joints, 7-11s, all closed. Ergo, had the key, let myself in, to the condo. He's been gone for 6 months up north, ergo there's nothing. No crackers, no cans of soup, no pasta, literally nothing. Icebox unplugged, etc. There's a weird sound coming from his bedroom. Walk in there. A full-size fan, 5ft high, is turned on max. Covered by a plastic bag. A plastic bag is completely wrapped around the fan grill. Hence the weird noise. I'm staring at this going, what the fucking fuck. 

At that very moment there's a knock on the door. It's the neighbor, and my pop's pal. He didn't know pops kicked. Said I was there to empty it out, hire a realtor, hire an estate sale company, sell the car, etc. He's the one who set up the fan, explains why. There was flooding from rain, got in the ground floor units, carpet soaked, ergo the fan. Talk about a nice neighbor. This guy was fantastic. I leaned on him for random stuff for my 5 days there. I should have asked him for a sandwich. 

Because: I'm ravenous. Wasn't interested in drinking notoriously dirty Phoenix water for dinner. However...wait for it...on the corner of Miller & McDowell, a few blocks away...is a Denny's! Thank fuck. I grab a book & notebook and walk over. It's around 6pm, Xmas nite. Empty right? Wrong. It's half full. Or half empty. You choose. I grab a seat at the counter, I'm the only one, and have a front row seat to the carnage. I'm 10 ft away from the most pathetic, incompetent clusterfuck I have ever witnessed inside a restaurant. The servers, cooks, mgr all seem baffled at the general functions of an eating establishment. They're arguing amongst themselves, diners keep walking up & complaining. Loudly. Methinks nobody wants to have Xmas dinner inside a Denny's. Myself? I have no choice. But I just flew in an hour earlier. I have an excuse. But everyone else? What the fuck? This is your big night out? 

I remember vividly: I ordered a club sandwich with fries & coffee. Because: no cooking. Shouldn't take long. Right? Right? 

My sandwich arrives 45 minutes (!) later. Room temp fries but too ravenous to care. During the wait I'm watching the cooks & servers, right in front of me. Nonstop arguing. I'm spending Xmas nite in a dysfunctional Denny's in Scottsdale, AZ. With only myself to blame. 

And that would set the tone for the next 5 days. Jelly?

Back in the midwest I went to his local post office with the death certificate and officially registered his death with them. Had his stuff forwarded to me, who else would it go to? I continued to get his junk mail crap for over 2 years. He was on so many mailing lists & catalogs it was brutal. I spent weeks trying to get his name removed. But here's the kicker. For some reason I assumed registering a death at the post was systemwide. Wrongly assumed, turns out. Because when I opened his mailbox down in the desert, it was packed with envelops & mags. 2 months' worth of continuous junk mail packed into a box 4" x 4". Ergo, wait for it, had to go the Scottsdale main post and officially register his death with them there. Jelly? Multiply that by several dozen & you'll know a small slice of why the overall process took me 18 months. Let's focus. 

The first morning of course I'm ravenous, again: no food in the place. So go to the car in garage which has been sitting dormant for 6 months. Turn the key: nothing. Not even a clicking. Fucking great. Can't even go grocery shopping. Well not true, I can via walking a mile to a fortunately close enough store. And no if you're wondering: returning to Denny's for flapjacks? Gak. As it's the day after xmas no car service places are open. The day after that I found some local shop who did onsite engine jumps with a space age portable batter pack. That was the ticket. Success! Had a car! Not for long, it was included in the estate sale. Sold for I think $10k. Someone got a sweet arse dealio there. But hey: everything must go. 

Pops was 'thrifty' is the polite term. 4pm dinner specials. Matinee movies only (1pm on a Scottsdale afternoon). Thrifty doesn't do it justice. Weird hoarder is more accurate. Example: I opened one of his bathroom drawers for the 1st time ever to find it filled with slivers of bars of soap. He was unable to throw them out. Why? In case there's a soap shortage someday? Who the fuck knows. Example: mounds of stuck together coupons in other drawers, years old. Burger King coupons. Dairy Queen coupons. Years old. He never went to those places. No matter. They were offering deals. Example: the wee flatware baggies included with takeout? The wee fork & nappy? He hoarded those also. Because you know: in case his metal flatware melted or whatnot: 

found on top of icebox caked in dust

wedged behind flatware

But the real hoarding was saved for 1 specific item: plastic bags. Somehow, I had missed this in all 18 of my trips there. But I began to realize why. For 18 years he had packed & jammed & wedged all plastic bags between the icebox and the wall. Or, in the ceiling shelf gap in his walk-in closet which I was never in. When I say packed, I had to take a broomstick, jam it into the rock-hard plastic and wriggle it out at an angle. Moreover, in his closet were several full-size garbage bags packed with, wait for it: plastic bags. 

unjamming the icebox wall gap

walk-in closet, 3 sides

There were hundreds of plastic bags. 18 years of nonstop shopping & he never put the bags in the trash. Recall how the fan was totally covered in a plastic bag? Now we know why. A few escaped their dungeon & were flying around the condo when the fan began.

bags packed with bags

I had to empty the place as outlined earlier. The upstairs neighbors, 2 gay fellers from Kentucky also wintered there. I met the fellers the next day, they heard me & came downstairs thinking I was pops. Told them the news. They knew him, they were sad. Sidebar, they had 3 big dogs in their small condo. Big like some kind of mastiff. 3 of them, scary. Guess they didn't like being hassled for being gay in Kentucky. 

These two gents did two sparkling kind favors to me. First, they set me up with guest wifi from their router. This was yuge as I was contacting realtors, estate sale companies, utility companies, banks. Looking up info, sending inquiries, etc. The biggie was creating online accounts for everything so I could track the closures etc. Pops had zero online accounts in either state. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise as it meant there was a paper trail I could sift through. Tedious but saved the major hassle of dealing with the fucktards at msn or yahoo to unlock accounts. 

all set for disco dancing

The other even yuger favor was them taking all of pops clothing to a men's homeless shelter. Saved me multiple trips to a donation place, which I did for the Midwest home. It's not fun, schlepping back & forth, watching all those memories get taken. But it's a good feeling to repurpose his items to people far more in need of them. One pic of their carload, they made a several trips:

1 of the donation trips

Those 2 upstairs fellers were so kind & helpful, thinking back now I hope I thanked them mucho for their generosity. I'm certain I did. Also the neighbor setting up the fan. Also the neighbor across the way. She was a loud talker pharma rep. She talked so loud on the phone, which was continuously, she could be heard through the walls in his bedroom. She left a thoughtful kind card for me in the door, writing her memories of pops who she knew for years. 

Pops had a staggering amount of trash in his place. How much you ask? Well. There's multiple 4-plexes as outlined earlier. Each unit is assigned a 55 gallon trash bin & a recycling bin. I filled both of his instantly. Didn't want to fill the adjacent neighbors of course. Ergo, for the 4 nights I was there, each night around 10 pm I loaded bags and dropped them into bins all around the complex. I thought I would get busted but truly didn't care at some point. Fuck this shite.

prepping that night's deposit

I had to hire a realtor, which I did. She came over, we chatted, she vetted, did a great job. Sold the place fairly quickly. Told me the bedroom carpets were a disaster (she was correct). Also needed new paint, correct again. She put me in touch with both fixers. Here's my sms with painter, saved for estate spending purposes, stop me when this gets too exciting.

Carpets were a grand or whatever they were, no matter. Had to be done. The bigger problem was the estate sale aka truly emptying the place. Bunches of art big & small. 1st world problems yeah, but somebody aka me has to deal with it. Ergo the estate sale owner came over, vetted, said yup I'll take on the job. It's a lot of work on their part actually as they need to research all the items to get fmv. Plus they do all the marketing & of course are there onsite during the sale days. Talk about a trust business. I have no idea what anything is actually selling for, I'm several states away. The property owner is prohibited from attending the estate sale btw, for very good reason if you think about it. Everything was up for grabs, 

I didn't want any of his stuff, I have my own art collection poor me, other than a couple items. 5 feet tall. Not the sort of thing you take on a plane. 

I bought the middle piece directly from the Phoenix artist back in, sweet jebus, 2005 maybe. Hand carved plywood. Pops owned the outer two. Pops was friends with him & I became friendly with him also. He's somewhat famous in the phx area actually for his outdoor installations at public buildings. City & Uni commissions, etc. He also did art for the black panther movement back in the 60s. Endlessly fascinating & intelligent person & artist. So I had called him before my trip to break the news. We agreed to meet during my visit. He stayed for a couple hours. I told him I don't want your stuff being sold on the cheap during the estate sale. Lotta sentimental value here. Can you stash these 2 at your house & mail to me whenever? He said of course. So now I have the triptych in my entryway. He made 4 total btw, unknown where the 4th is. But I own 3 of the 4. 

Fun fact: pops owned those two for years & never knew what they were. I was there in phx when the artist came over for lunch and told him. Fucking priceless. Look again & see for yourself. 

I did rent a bicycle for a few days and road around from copying routes via prior trips. For some reason I decided to tackle the notorious local sufferfest out & back to Bartlett Lake from Cave Creek (n of sdale). Needed mental & physical break. Actual route I did. Near the finish I thought I was having an actual heart attack, my entire body was pulsing or pounding ugly in a way it never had before or since. Stop me when this gets too exciting. 

One ride I did was a 50 mile route over Usery mtn out of Mesa. During the tail end received a major bummer phone call from the title company related to the condo listing documents. Whatever sig they needed I signed & took pic of doc on my phone & emailed back. They said, 'not acceptable.' I was furious as usual. Why the FUCK would it possibly matter I (literally) yelled into the phone on the shoulder at the summit of the Usery pass summit, cars roaring by. Oh we need a scanned document. I shouted: it's a picture! Same as a scan! ABSOLUTEY NO DIFFERENCE!

They would not fucking budge. Complete morons. Brain dead worker bee cubicle jockeys. Print out my pic and there's your scan. So it was 4pm or something & there was a deadline (naturally) so I flew back to my car and found a public library further west in Apache Junction. They had copiers & fax machines. I had to pay to print the docs there, sign them, copy them (what fucking year is this) then, wait for it, fax to them. Those type of on-the-fly problem solving hassles continued nonstop for 18 months.

Which reminds me of my favorite joke:

Sorry I'm not able to fax from where I'm from.

Where are you from?

The current century. 

==
That's it for now, may add more as the memories arrive but I need a break from mentally revisiting this 5-day shitshow.