After six weeks of packing, moving, deciding what stays and what goes, multiple trips to Goodwill and a ton of cussing, bitching and moaning, our home of the past 23 years is finally on the market. We signed all the paperwork with our Realtor last night and it goes into the Multiple Listing Service this morning.

The last decision was whether to repaint and recarpet or sell the condo “as is.” We opted for “as is.” The real estate market in Arlington is strong right now and most buyers of condos immediately repaint anyway so why waste the money? We should get about 400 percent over what we paid for the place 23 years ago.

We’ll spend the remainder of the week on some last minute details and packing up the last of it and then, with a little luck, head for the mountains and wait for the Realtor to call and say “we’ve got a deal.” Then it’s one last trip back to Arlington to close the deal and return to the mountains to build our dream home.

We expected some sadness in packing up our home and selling but after six weeks of hassles, bouts with the flu, interruptions by clients who expect me to put their wishes first and an incredible underestimation of just how much junk we had accumulated over 23 years, Amy and I will be glad to just have it done.

Anybody wanna buy a large two-bedroom, two-bath condo on the Orange Line metro in bustling Arlington, VA?