New Home Riddled With Problems, I Mean, Character

The move is complete.

I accept your hearty congratulations.

I'm all settled in my little ranch style house/condo/4-plex/residence.

Well, not completely settled. I'm still moving some furniture around, looking for just the right arrangement. I've purchased a swamp-cooler which I have to set up before it gets hot. I'm figuring out how to cope with how quickly cat liter spreads across those hard-wood floors.

The cats are figuring out the best places to sleep (Lily on the big pillow under the coffee table and Charles on the DVR because it's warm).

To be honest, the honeymoon period has been a little rocky. There are a number of things I didn't check before purchase which I now wish I had:

This is what a kitchen with no drawers looks like

• There are no drawers in the kitchen - not one. Don't know how I missed that. 
• Not all the windows have screens. 
• Not all the windows had locks. They do now. 
• The neighbors can hear the alarm every time I set or unset my new home security system. 
• The slope by the garage door scrapes the bottom of the car, unless you go just the right speed and turn in/out at just the right angle. 
• The neighbors can hear my deluxe surround sound system. 
• The neighbors can probably hear me go to the bathroom. 
• The knob on the back door comes off in your hand if you turn it the wrong way. 
• Front blinds don't go all the way down - rather one side does and the other doesn't. I see custom shutters in my future. 
• Because of the way they are arranged, you can't open the dishwasher and reach the cupboards at the same time - makes it a challenge to put dishes away. 
• The front screen door doesn't close all the way unless you pull it shut - no big deal unless you have cats. 
• The combination washer-dryer doesn't dry, it only washes. 
• Where is the furnace? Why does the heat come on when the thermostat is set to off?

Granted, I can live with most of these problems or fix them. But I admit to wondering whether it was wise to move out of a perfectly functioning domicile with working shutters.

The answer is clear when I go back to the old condo which I am preparing to rent out. I walk into the empty living room and say, "Boy, is this place small." The new (older) place is bigger. The bedroom is actually a bedroom, not a combination bedroom-office-laundry room. So what if there's a big burnt spot on the living room floor which had been covered up by the realtor's staging furniture. That just adds to the character of the place. Yeah, that's it. Character.