House update and some spring/summer stuff

The purchase and sales agreement has been signed and sent off to the bank. Now comes the nice 2.5 week waiting game until we know we can buy the place. House buying is so stupid – in my perfect world, you’d leaf through a house catalog, pick your favorite, get a loan super easily, and DONE.

Things that can still go wrong:

• The appraisal comes back at a way lower price than what we offered. It’s especially tricky since we are paying relatively close to the asking price. The contract is null and void if it’s appraised even one penny lower. This is made 100x more stressful because appraisers are still using comparable housing values from six months ago, and since then all market house prices have gone up.
• The bank decides  not to give us a loan.

I can’t believe I’m using words like “appraisal” and “comparable housing values” in this blog. Ugh.

In other news we’ve been fluctuating between midsummer and early cold nasty wet spring weather. Yesterday it was 79F and sunny. Right now it’s 42 and raining. AWESOME. We took advantage of the day yesterday to pick dandelions to make dandelion wine and also go to the beach.

I think we picked way too many dandelions, and I don’t have a big enough pot. Also I have no equipment in which to sterilize my stuff, and the brewing place is closed today, and all I have is a bottle of Everclear (for cleaning purposes, people, come on!).

The beach was fun. It was so ridiculously windy we got sand all over the place. I attempted and managed to spend a couple of hours playing my DS without too much sand woes – I just hid under a towel like a creep. Chris dug a giant hole in the sand until he hit clay with a guy we met named Brian. They then put a beach chair in the giant hole and took turns lounging in it.

It was fun. Today is all about laundry, cleaning, and trying to figure out what to do with the dandelions I have sitting in my freezer. Go Sunday!

This weekend I’m going to Maine

And I’m still alive. That’s all.

Things

Some things I’ve been doing/realizing lately:

• So, I actually quit my job. Go me! Quitting your job takes guts, even if you have another one lined up. I’m taking a big risk in a lot of ways and stepping outside my comfort zone and surprisingly not stressing or freaking out. This is good.
• I have a week off this week. It’s nice. I spent a few days feeling like I have to frantically do everything so I don’t waste any time, and then yesterday I collapsed pretty hard and read/slept all day. Funny how you don’t realize how much stress costs a lot of the time, even if you think you’re not feeling too stressed. Big life changes like getting a new job cost a day of sleeping for me. And taking a week off to do nothing is pretty weird. For example…
• Suddenly my decisions have become very small and insignificant. This morning I was walking back from a morning yoga class (which was hell by the way and I think my body will be crying in agony all week) and I was trying to decide what I wanted to do after I ate. I could either bike to visit Chris at work for lunch or I could go shopping. I mean, out of all the decisions I’ve ever faced, this is probably the most bland decision I’ve made since I was about twelve or so. And you know what? It feels good.
• One other thing I’ve been doing a lot lately is walking around barefoot. At the beginning of summer I decided that this summer should be about three things: doing actual summer things like going to the drive in, going to the beach, and sitting around with a book under a tree, taking care of my body (hence the yoga), and going barefoot. I get a lot of looks like I’m a crazy person, but I’m cool with that. After all, if nobody’s looking at you like you’re crazy, then you’re not doing anything interesting. It’s amazing how after you do this for just a few walks, putting on shoes starts to get unbearable. You find yourself wanting to take them off at random and completely inappropriate times. Your whole gait changes.
• I also discovered something profound (to me) about writing. I realized that now that I’ve been writing on a regular basis (as in almost every day) for six months, it’s becoming easier to write for longer. Writing is like a muscle – you can’t go into it expecting to write every single day and writing 1667 (just a random number, just saying) words a day. You have to go into it like you’re starting to take up squats – nice and slow and easy. Push yourself just enough that you grow, but not too much that you hate it.
• And finally, just a small tidbit of advice. Summer isn’t over, not by a long stretch. You still have time to make homemade pina coladas and have random dinner parties on a blanket (or better yet, a fold out table) in the park!

May: A recap

How did I do? Remember awhile back I posted things I wanted to accomplish in May. Well, I did a lot! I went to Austin and Montreal, I read five books, I migrated Going Postal, and I even built my urban survival kit in a little Altoids tin!

I didn’t paint the kitchen table, because every single weekend in May either rained or I was out of town (in Austin or Montreal!). That left Memorial Day weekend, but quite frankly, by the end of May I was so burned out from everything I was not in the mood to paint a table. I wasn’t able to do 50 pushups, but I can now do 25! That’s pretty good if I do say so myself. My arms definitely feel stronger and even look a teensy tiny bit more toned. I’m going to try to keep it up if I can! I also didn’t finish half my afghan because dang, afghans take FOREVER. I did finish about a fourth of it though – looking forward to showing off pictures soon!

Finally, I didn’t finish my roll of film. This I thought would be the easiest, considering I have about four pictures left on the roll. Ridiculous! But I didn’t finish it because I actually got a new camera in May! An actual real camera! Of course right after I got it, Chris stole it, and he’s taken way more pictures with it than I have.

In Montreal we attended Festival Kinetik. It was the best weekend of my life. I got to see three of my FAVORITE bands play and got to experience many, many more! I had the best time oggling everyone’s amazing cybergoth outfits and listening to amazing music and exploring Montreal. Montreal actually kind of reminded me a little of St. Paul and Austin combined, except French. We got hardly any sleep that weekend (in fact, we didn’t sleep at all Sunday night, as we drove the six hours back from Montreal at one in the morning, and then went to work the next day! Excellent).

Here are some photos from the event:

VNV Nation. I nearly burst from excitement.

Typical festival attire.

Incredible graffiti near Chinatown in downtown Montreal.

BONUS! Here is a picture of me on the first day of the festival, sans shoes. I am making a face but oh well. That is a netted feather hair fascinator on my head.

Minnesota

Two weekends ago I flew to Minnesota for Stephanie’s and mine annual visit! It was a relaxing, fun, amazing, cold! time. I took a ton of pictures but really my favorite ones are the ones where we’re just sitting around, eating and talking. We did a lot of that, for sure. We also baked cake, saw St. Paul and Minneapolis and the Mississippi River and a ton of really expensive houses and the Mall of America. It was such a fantastic time.

Giant glasses of wine were consumed.

A certain cat was snuggled and petted and poked.

Cake was made and gushed over and rapidly consumed.

Food was eaten – a lot!

This weekend I will be off to Houston for a friend’s wedding. Hopefully I’ll have more pictures from that trip to share. This is the sort of travel I love – seeing friends, laughing and talking, even if the cities aren’t known tourist locations. The cab driver in Minnesota was flabbergasted that I would visit for a non-business reason! But St. Paul and Minneapolis were really cute. I can’t wait to visit Stephanie again and I keep hoping someday we’ll live closer to each other, because seriously! It was so much fun.

Back

Holy crap, back from San Francisco (with a last-minute decision to head to Austin for the weekend) and I’ve got 246 new things in my RSS feed reader. That’s what I get for not doing the blogging thing every day, I guess.

San Francisco was great, Austin was better! It was so good to see my family for the first time in awhile – but it’s also good to be home.

Things I have been doing:
1. Seeing old friends
2. Partying (yes, really)
3. Trying to avoid getting sick
4. Actually getting sick
5. Playing DS games
6. Starting a new secret hobby
7. Reading a whole lot

Thing I have not been doing:
1. Writing (two weeks now and not a single word written – I took off writing for Thanksgiving and then decided not to kill myself if I didn’t write any during my business travel)
2. Being at home
3. Eating much

All in all, it’s been a great trip. Now I feel totally behind everything else. But it’s worth it anyway. Now time to drink lots of fluids and focus on getting better …

Halloween in Salem

As promised, I finally got my pictures from Salem up! I really loved Salem – we went at about 5 when it was still light out, and I fell in love with the town. It’s really quaint, albeit a bit hoaky in parts. I actually really loved the whole witchery theme throughout – it was unusual and really cool. I definitely want to head back there on a nice weekend to check out the stores and museums – we only really had time to take pictures of people in costume and check out the outsides of buildings.

We ended up taking the train down on Halloween, which was jam-packed and really fun. Everyone was dressed up and the train was mobbed with excited people! I love taking trains!

Does anyone like picture posts? Nonetheless, here goes. If you know anybody in these pictures and they’re angry at me for posting, let me know so I can take them down.

Kicking it off with the Salem News. Isn’t this the best? I can’t imagine a cooler logo for a paper, really. I mean, it’s just funny!

Even though he’s the only one hidden, I was most excited about Elmo. When I was a kid, Elmo was the dude. He was the guy. He was the REASON I watched Sesame Street (note: my mom hated his voice, but still dealt with it anyway – thanks mom!).

King of all Cosmos from Katamari Damacy. I gasped and hit Chris when I saw him. SO AMAZING.

Finally, me and Waldo. I found Waldo! Also, yes, I went as Pikachu. Yes, I was the ONLY PIKACHU THERE. Yes, I had lots of people yelling “PIKACHU!” at me and wanting to take their picture with me. Costume: Success!

I hope everyone else had an amazing Halloween. It’s definitely my favorite holiday and I can’t wait for next year!

The best thing about biking to work…

… has got to be the smells. I know that’s really weird, but so far I’ve smelled the mustiness of the subway, the leaves of fall, the crispness of the air, and the delicious smell of bread baking. I love Boston.

Too much travel

Places I’ve been this year:

1. Boston five weeks in the first half of the year, then in August here to live
2. New York City for three days in spring
3. France for a week and a half in spring
4. Marfa, TX for three days
5. Houston, TX twice in spring and summer

Places I’ll be going:

1. Possibly Washington DC at the end of October for the Rally to Restore Sanity
2. Houston, TX for Thanksgiving
3. Austin and Houston for a week for Christmas
4. NYC for a weekend in December

Can you say overwhelmed? No wonder I’ve been so crazy stressed this year…

Suitcase!

I can’t believe I haven’t posted about my new suitcase! I’ve had it for a couple months now, and I completely adore it. Here it is:

Chris actually bought it for me, from here because I was expecting to make a lot of 2-3 day business trips. It’s brown with a tree painted on the side and I love it. It’s lined inside, with straps and a divider, and it fits into overhead luggage bins, so it’s perfect for short trips. Not heavy at all and it can store a TON of stuff! I love this thing. We’ve already used it a few times. It’s utterly perfect.

I actually really am picky about luggage. I can’t stand rolling bags, which is strange, because I definitely admit they are easy and convenient. The reason I hate them is twofold. First, when I’m running through an airport, trying to make a flight that I am inevitably late for (I AM ALWAYS LATE FOR FLIGHTS), I end up tripping over 20 million slow people’s rolling suitcases, all of which stick out about three feet from them, so you can’t easily slip past them in a crowded airport. So yes, this is partly my fault for rushing. The second reason is the reverse of this – if I have a rolling suitcase, I am less maneuverable and more likely to kill some little old lady as I swing by her with my suitcase extended behind me.

Both of these could be solved by me just arriving early enough that I don’t have to run for my flight. But that would be too easy. So! Instead I will forever carry around my giant suitcase as I run through airports, heart racing as they call, “Last chance to board!”