Beth's Contradictory Brain

True

Scott Adams says everyone has a permanent age - and they either live in the past, present or future.

When I met Nerdstar she told me she was 80. And I believe she was at the time. But... ever since we got together - she's been 12. I always joke that I can't even get her to 13! She also lives completely in the now. Well, in the now and in whatever lovely world exists only in her head.

Me. Well. I was actually thinking about this sort of thing - as I begin the countdown to 40. I think I'm permanently about 28, fairly grown up - but not old. And I live in the future. I've got plans for my backup plans.

How about you??

Job Hunting

With the apartment hunting all taken care of, my job hunting has gotten underway.

I drove to DC yesterday for an interview at one of the hosptial outpatient labs. It seems like a dream job. The right hours, only a five mile drive, the right setting. I met with the lab manager, he seems really nice and like a good boss. I'm cautiously optimistic.

In the meantime, I had another hospital, a little farther away, call and I scheduled an interview with them for next Friday. I'm not sure if it's in or out patient, but it'll be good to at least see how the hospitals differ.

I also had a call from a medical staffing place in the area, but won't talk to them until I'm settled in next Friday.

I'm really ready to get back to working. Other than my paycheck being the one that improves our quality of life, (Nerdstar's pays all the bills) I'm ready to meet some new people and talk to someone other than the pets all day every day.

Pimping out the Dog

While apartment hunting and eating in DC last week, we got to talking about ways to make some extra cash to fund Nerdstar's food habit.

We had Ramen with us on the trip and one afternoon we were outside Nerdstar's future workplace waiting for one of her co-workers to come meet Ramen and several people stopped and asked if they could pet Ramen.

It simply can't be stated how much Ramen loves to be petted, I think even moreso by strangers than us.

We simply put two and two together and figured we'd place some ads for fur therapy - $15 for fifteen minutes of petting Ramen.

Another service would be to rent him out for weekend afternoons to people who for whatever reason can't have a dog but want one - they can take him out for walks and hikes.

(I'll leave it to my dear readers to figure out just how serious we are!)

Interesting

This link takes you to an online airing of a show on PBS called "In the Life."

This February episode was hosted by Ani Difranco, and features some interesting interviews with gay youth. It has some lengthy sections about a girl dealing with her church and being gay. She's remarkably articulate for her age.

Found over on Your Daily Lesbian Moment.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

To my cutest Nerdstar!!! And happy anniversary to Ramen dog - we've had him five years now!

We had really beautiful weather today! We took the motorcycle out for a spin. Then we got some steaks and stuffed mushrooms and apple pie and I cooked my girl a decent dinner. Can't ask for too much more.

Apartment Hunting

The last two days have been really crazy and stressful for me. Which means I made them really stressful for Nerdstar, too!

It's hard moving to an area this size without knowing hardly anything about it at all. Well, we know where Nerdstar's work location is, and that helped a little.

We also know that, in general, the longer you want your commute to be, the cheaper rent is supposed to be. So we debated and debated, close to work or cheaper?? Neither of us really wants to spend a couple of hours a day sitting in the car in traffic.

With all the stuff we have, we also really need a two bedroom - with one bedroom mostly for storing her 3 bicycles and our little grill and then the things a smaller place doesn't really have room for. But we were finding even the larger one bedrooms to be more than we'd like to budget at this point in time.

Also, the one of the biggest obstacles to finding slightly cheaper places to rent is having a dog.

Then there's always that "standard of living" thing.

So, we looked at listings, we looked in a huge apartment book, we looked online. Nerdstar made phone calls and ruled out most of them. It wasn't fun.

We went to look at two or three places on Thursday. They were kind of extremes. One was really, really nice, but when you factored in all the extra things they charge plus rent - you know, like parking spaces, it was just out of budget. The second was in the right price range - but a little more ghetto than I'd like. Plus, I really don't think half of our furniture would have fit through the skinny front door!

So, Thursday night I was really frustrated and depressed. I told Nerdstar that another option was for her to move to DC and me to move back to Austin! The one other option instead of us moving to DC has been that I move back to Austin and Nerdstar leaves for her five or six months of Officer Basic School out in Arizona. But that's not a total solution, because she still wouldn't find a job in Austin, or even Texas, after OBC.

The guy at the ghetto told us about another place with the same company. He said the two bedroom there was a little cheaper than the one bedrooms we'd been looking at.

So Friday we got up and looked at another two or three places. Learning what questions to ask before driving around. It was kind of the same situation, one was really nice, but more than our budget, the other was a little more ghetto but had the only two bedroom we'd been able to afford.

We grabbed some lunch and decided to go for it. We went back about 4:30 to fill out all the paperwork and see if we could get a lease on the two bedroom one.

It actually worked out a little better than I/we thought. I'd figured we'd be paying at least $3000 for the first month - to cover all the different deposits and fees and rent.

We'll move in next Sunday for under $2000.

I still have my apprehensions about living here. We'll be living about a mile from the Pentagon. The neigborhood the apartment is in varies quite a bit between really, really nice, and kinda ghetto. But there are tons of stores and restaurants and shopping and stuff not too far.

One thing that I'm sure of - it's going to take us FOREVER to learn how to get around this crazy area. I swear druken sailors designed all the roads around here. Not a single on goes in a straight line - and half don't connect to the other half.

I can say one thing for certain - we couldn't have done any of this without Google maps. I'm sure we're going to have a folder full of printed directions to everywhere soon!

One good thing is that the hotel we've stayed in is pretty nice - and has the best hotel bed we've ever slept in! Even the hotel's had it's problems - they had the power scheduled to be out from 10 to 2 yesterday afternoon. Not so bad, we were out and around anyway. But then, once we got back the tv hadn't reset right so no tv last night or this morning to check things like weather.

We also met up with one of Nerdstar's friends from back in Texas. She's a tiny little Korean lady with a nerdy white guy for a husband - they have the cutest little baby boy! Her friend is all set to take us to all the Chinese/Korean restaurants and grocery stores!!

I asked Nerdstar if I'll ever get to eat American food now that we're surrounded by so many good ethnic places - she said not too much!

Apartment Hunting

Tomorrow we're getting up on the early side and heading down to VA to look at apartments. We'll be down there until Saturday. I'm hoping it all goes smoothly. We've been surprised at not being able to find apartment locator services - but maybe the internet has replaced them. We've been going over listings on Craig's List, Rent.com, and I think Apartments.com.

We're really not very particular about living spaces. We need enough room for us, the pets, and our stuff, but other than that we're not terribly picky. It'll be nice to have a dishwasher and garbage disposal again. (This old house has neither.) We're hoping for a washer and dryer in the apt., but I'm happy as long as it's even on premises.

What I'm finding overwhelming is the scope of area we could be dealing with. Then there's the issue of commutes and such.

Anyway. We'll know more in the next couple of days.

Weekend

It was kinda an eventful weekend. We spent most of the day Saturday dealing with a backed up sewer line - right into the basement. Fun. Our poor landlady, not only are we moving out soon, she also had to deal with plumbing issues - not just the backup, but we've also had leaky pipes under the sink. I helped her fix part of the under the sink problem - but I think some seals need to be replaced, and I'm not up for that. At least she got to flirt with the plumber dude who showed up. That was fun to observe. Neither Nerdstar nor I are the "use your feminine charm type".

Yesterday we got a little bit of packing done. It's more and more tempting to let the movers do it all. But, I'll get as much done as I can. We kept all the boxes from the move here, that helps.

We've decided to go try to find an apartment Thursday through Saturday. It's still stressing me out.

Doesn't anyone have a magic wand I can borrow?

About blogging

Go read this post and my comment to it - that way I don't have to type it all here.

Lots of Snow

I'd post new pics of the snow - but really, it'd just look like the old pics of snow. Except this time it's a wet and heavy snow - and LOTS of it. It started early yesterday morning and hasn't stopped yet! I'd say by the time it's done we'll have well over a foot of snow.

Fortunately, we knew it was coming and planned on an indoor weekend. We've got to get started with this moving/packing stuff. I'm pretty sure we'll be moving into a smaller space in DC, so this weekend it's gather things for Goodwill time.

My job interview for Wednesday got pushed back a week. I guess that's ok. It's a long process to get hired, so maybe we'll be moved for parts of it and I won't have to drive back and forth so much.

We're still going to head down to DC this coming Wed. to check out some apartments. It's kinda overwhelming just because there are so many choices to narrow down.

Both of us are just ready for this to be done.

Update

It's dreary and overcast today - but that's better than the three days of snow we've got coming up. Fun. At least we got to break out the little charcoal grill last night and eat some yummy, yummy steaks!

The DC move is stressing me out more than it should. Turns out Nerdstar's new pay is going to be a little more than it is now - but about 8 to 10 grand less a year than we'd hoped.

I don't know when or where I got the notion that we should be able to live on her salary alone. Maybe because I've ended up unemployed a lot more than I'd like the past few years. Maybe because the move will deplete almost all of our savings and our safety net will be gone until I find a job. Whatever the reason, that thinking is going to have to stop.

I really am more than ready to start working again. I am being smarter this time and have already started applying for jobs in the new area. And I've even scheduled an interview for a dream job next Wednesday - say your prayers for me!! But I know I have to be mentally ready to work at McDs if necessary.

We're really pretty much in limbo right now. Nerdstar's working her butt off trying to find us a decent apartment. But, we don't have a date for the movers, we don't have a new address, we don't know exactly what her pay will be, or exactly when her start date is.

And I though hurry up and wait was only a military thing.

DVDs

I don't like using services such as eBay and Half.com. I don't like how much $ they keep. But... We've got a few dvds we don't really want anymore.

How about if you want one of these - email me, send me $10, and I'll send you the dvd.

Here's the list:

Miracle
In The Bedroom
Black Hawk Down
Clueless
Space Cowboys
i am sam
Garden State
Good Times - the complete 1st season
Def Comedy Jam All Stars 2

Moving Again

Our move to DC is in the works.

We don't have any details about anything yet, but hopefully soon she'll know her new salary and the relocation help. It will be the same moving company that moved us here - they were good so I've got no problem with that. And with the third across states move in two or so years, I'm getting better at packing.

For some reason I'm more than a little intimidated by DC. I know life there won't be like anywhere else we've lived so far. But I'm also hopefull that will be a good thing. Just think - we'll be living somewhere we could eat a different restaurant every day of the year.

They mentioned yesterday they'd like Nerdstar to start work there April 1. Yes, that soon. Our lease for this house ends April 18, I think that's going to work out about right. Her company should put her up in a hotel until she finds an apartment and schedules the movers.

I think for both of us, things are a little nerve-wracking until we know where we'll be living. We've been looking at apartment listings and so many are just so much more money than I'd like. Fortunately, her job location is literally yards from a Metro station, so that'll help. Hopefully I can find a hosptial or something similar close to where we end up living.

Weekend

Early last week I told Nerdstar we had to DO something for the weekend.

Fortunately, the weather was great and we went to DC to see a friend of hers from her soldier days in Iraq and went to the zoo. We got to eat some Greek food for lunch and then sushi for dinner.

But, we're such old people. Between getting up at 7:30, driving to DC, walking around all day, driving back in a terrible fog, getting to bed after 3 a.m., and the time change - all we did yesterday was sleep!!

I was hoping we'd find out last week whether we were moving in the next few weeks or not. Then she was supposed to find out today - I've got my fingers crossed, but still not sure when any decisions will be made.

Sucks

I hate when bloggers I've really enjoyed reading because they're not like other blogs stop blogging.

I can't say I ever agreed with much of Joshua's politics, but he seems like one of the more thoughtful bloggers out there. I was fascinated by his tales of growing up. I'm sad he closed up shop.

Just One Bite is quitting as well.

They both had people they didn't want reading their blog find them.

My parents don't even own a computer, although my brother does. And it's not like I would be hard to find. But I don't worry too much about my family reading this. I've mostly tried to not blog negative things about my family.

How sad is it that anyone who's read along for the past several years might know more about my life than my parents? It's not that I don't talk to them, we call every couple of weeks, it's just that they don't get all the details all the time.

Cool

These are some really good cartoons, so check em out! "30 is the new 20" and "31 POSSIBLE REASONS WHY SHE ISN'T CALLING ME BACK" are great. Wander around the site... it's worth the time - but not necessarily safe for work.

That last entry about spring...

Apparently, it's still a few more days away. Last night and today brings us about 6 or 7 inches of new snow. Lovely.

This is my first winter with any amount of real snow for any length of time. I keep joking with Nerdstar that God is a racist - since he makes everything white every winter.

O, Spring, Spring, Wherefor Art Thou?

Last week we had temps in the low 40s and lots of sunshine and melting snow. I actually took the motorcycle out for a ride around the neighborhood. (If you'd told me back in Texas that I'd ride a motorcycle when it was 42 outside I would have called you crazy!)

This weekend and today - more snow.

Tomorrow the high is going to be around 15 with the low overnight of 7.

I used to think I didn't want to live in a place where it was summer six months or more of the year. Now I don't think I want to live where it's winter six or more months of the year.

Not The Only One

I've joked for years that I gave up religion for Lent. Can't say that anyone ever really got it, or if they did, didn't think it was funny.

So when I saw this on PostSecret I was so happy.

Not The Life For Me

My childhood was very white bread surburban. My Mom was a stay at home mom. My Dad did his tour with the Army, came home, married Mom and got a job I think he intended to keep until he retired. They've lived in the same house for almost 40 years and attended the same church that long as well. Dinner was on the table every evening around 5, Dad read the paper until it was time to eat. After dinner it was tv, then bed. I did my homework right after school.

There was racial diversity in my schools though. One of the first boys I liked was Hispanic. In high school I dated all kinds of boys. The boy next door (literally), an Indian, an Afrian American, Hispanic, all American white boys. Smart, not so smart. Then I ended my high school years dating a girl. Pretty diverse. My poor parents, I'm not sure they were happy with all that diversity. But I must say, they always treated anyone I brought home with respect.

All that to say, I'm not sure why it is I'm not happy in a small, 85% white town.

There were times in my past I would day dream about living a fairly solitary life in a cabin in the mountains. Or I thought that as long as I had cable and the internet I could live fairly happily in any small town.

But Nerdstar and I both find that's not the case.

I don't know how people enjoy life in small towns. Life without really good restaurants. I mean, you have to enjoy cooking to live in a small town. But even if you like to cook - the grocery stores don't have a wide variety of high quality food. Yes, you can get a haircut, but it might not be that great a haircut.

I guess we were really, really spoiled living in Austin. We had access to high quality everything. Yet, it didn't feel like an expensive life. But I know we both now believe that some things are worth paying for, just maybe not on a very frequent schedule. A good haircut or massage every four or five months. A trip to a high end grocery store once a month. I mean, it's not like I wouldn't shop at Wal Mart even if there were a Whole Foods nearby.

Whatever the reasons, and there are quite a few, we've learned we're not made for small town life. It feels like we've retired forty years too early.

Thankfully, there's a light at the end of this tunnel, and we hope to know within a week or so if we're moving.

Not Even Close

Nerdstar should have a blog called "Groceries - A Love Story"!

I don't know anyone else who not only fills a big suitcase full of groceries when flying back from Houston, but also mails two decent sized boxes back home as well. No, there's not anything close to resembling an ethnic grocery store around here, but still...

When I told her that I'm pretty sure she loves groceries more than me, her reply was "Well, I've know groceries longer." WTF? It's not even close.

That's my girl.

You should see her face light up when we walk into a really good grocery store. Or how I have to drag her out of even the lamest grocery store anytime we go shopping.

Support A Good Guy

While waiting on his cookbook to come out - you should check out Steve's The Good the Spam and the Ugly.

His blog has become one of my favorite reads in the past few months. And he's definitely a guy I'd love to spend a day with learning how to cook, talking about restoring old cars, and the wood work his grandmother used to do.

DADT Repeal Hope

I'm a little under the weather the past few days, so I don't have tons of energy to do a little more research on this and list some Reps that should probably be contacted, but...

At least there's some movement in the direction of repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell.