I know I haven't been posting much lately. Just haven't been inspired to write. So - I'll give a brief run down of the last week.

For better or worse, my temp assignment ended (my choice). Hopefully I made the right decision.

Skipped an AIGA event I'd registered and paid for and spent the day with Patrick and had lunch in the park with Lauren and Maura. (Sorry Maura - don't know your blog URL or else I'd link you too.)

I met up with an old friend* I hadn't seen in almost ten years and had a lovely afternoon in the Lower East Side talking about work and old friends and new friends and music and Joss Whedon (there are posters for Serenity all over the city).

Patrick found out his job wasn't what he thought and quit. (More on that here.)

Enjoyed having a Wednesday off meeting Patrick after school at the Union Square greenmarket.

Had a romantic dinner at Raga Indian restaurant in Boerum Hill and then walked around the neighborhood enjoying the crisp fall evening.

As for the coming days?

Tomorrow we're meeting friends of people I was friends with three thousand (ok - it's really just eight) years ago when I lived Raleigh* and having dinner at a Thai place.

Saturday we're going to see Mirrormask. (Yes - we already bought tickets - I now know what to expect in this city.)

Sunday I have my first NY haircut (hopefully they're as good as Erin...) and then we're going to the Chili Pepper festival at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens and then back into Manhattan to see Interpol at their tour-ending hometown show at Webster Hall.

* I don't know what it is about Cleveland and people never leaving, but all the connections I have in this city are North Carolina based. Weird. |

I know that now that I am a New Yorker, I really have no room to complain about public transit, since I live in the city with the best transit system in the country. But even the best system is not perfect. And so I must say - I hate you 6 train.

The path that I take to my temp job requires me to transfer from the F at Broadway to the 6 at Bleeker. If I was going downtown I could transfer in the tunnel. But - when they designed the subway lines apparently it was impossible to connect the uptown tunnel like it is on *every other line* so I have to exit the subway, walk 2 blocks, and re-enter (thank god for the unlimited monthly pass...). Still - this wouldn't bother me if the train ran like it was supposed to.

I have been riding this trip to and from work for the past couple of weeks. It is the exception rather than the rule that the 6 will arrive on time. I looked at the schedule - during rush hour it should run every 2-3 min. I tend to find myself waiting 5-15 minutes. I think 10 minutes is the norm. Only twice have they announced on the intercom that there are any problems (once it was signal problems and today for some reason they closed the express lines so all the trains were on the local track). Twice the local train has been so full the driver honks and it drives right past me. After I've been standing in an oven in my polyester work clothes for at least ten minutes. If it does stop I get to experience the lovely human sardine situation, where even though I am not holding onto a bar I am not moving because I am so squished.

And so I say, once again, I hate you 6 train. |

Patrick and I are both now employed. (Please try to contain the applause)

Restaurant player that he is, Patrick actually had 2 job offers. I'll let him explain in detail, but basically the choice was between one that is very close to our house and low-key and a brand new place about a 10 minute bike ride (or 3 stops on the train) and a little more upscale, but primarily take-out so not that upscale. Since he liked the owners of both places a lot and they liked him it came down to the fact that one offers more money and a little better schedule (long shifts, but only 4 days a week) and the other offers lower pay with slightly shorter days but 6 days a week, including both Saturday and Sunday, meaning he'd have no days off with school added in.

I am working a freelance assignment I got through one of the agencies I applied for. While this is temp, without saying too much, something of a more permanent nature will most likely come up in the next week or so.

So yah - now we have some income coming in, which is a relief. Still - tho - it makes it harder to finish all the house stuff now that we're working! |

On dial-up because I finally figured out that i can use that while waiting for my wi-fi install. Will finally have reliable internet as well as tv (and Tivo!) tomorrow.

In answer to Kerry's card (sorry - I'm lazy about sendng cards. I will send you real mail soon, just not yet :)) I haven't posted pictures yet because my apartment is not yet ready for prime time. The Ikea furniture we bought arrived but the bookshelf had a broken backboard and the table had a missing screw so we're waiting for word from their customer service on when we'll get replacement parts. We just put some stuff up on the walls today (towel rack, spice rack, knife rod, hanging basket). We haven't finished painting yet. We have no sofa, medicine cabinet, shelving, shades. No pictures on the walls. So - no pictures til it's all done.

Mom's here now for the weekend. So I'll update again probably on Monday. Had some good job interviews this week but, of course, no word on anything yet. |

Like a cross to bear or a stone around the neck our luck has gotten much better since we dropped off the Uhaul yesterday. We now have bank accounts and library cards and much of the apartment unpacked (we need to get a bookcase and dresser before we can finish) and ate our first meal at home last night. The cats are back to normal and we're sleeping again and I don't have that gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach like I have had since moving day.

Although things are better for me I just found out one of my best friends who I grew up with lost her house in New Orleans and is on the road staying with various family members waiting to hear where she'll end up (she was doing a post-doctoral internship at Tulane) and her mom lost her home too. I'm glad they're all safe, but it certainly puts my feeling of being lost in perspective. |

It has been a really rough 48 hours. Hopefully our ordeals are over for the time being. I don't feel like spending the time to go into minute details at the moment so I will be brief.

- The cats screamed most of the 10+ hour trip into the city

- The vet gave us Valium for them which apparently doesn't work on cats as well as it works on people or as well as the veternary sedative I had for Oliver last time so they just got crazy instead of sleeping.

- Oliver peed in his crate on the way there. We had to hose him off with water bottles and the poor cat had to ride first inhis own urine and then cold and wet for about 3 hours.

- We were barely on time and almost in the city when we got turned away because trucks can't go through the Holland Tunnel. We had to go to the Lincoln Tunnel, getting lost once and having to call our broker for directions back to where we were supposed to be. This added an hour to our trip.

- Once we got here our once normal cats had been tranformed into feral beasts. Even docile Byron was hissing and spitting and growling at everything.

- (Minor but still adding to the bad list) We got dinner at about 9pm, starving by this time, at the Indian place up the street and it was the blandest Indian food I've ever had.

- Between the city noise (we're on the block with a firehouse, on a bus route, and it was trash pickup night) and Byron screaming we barely slept at all Tuesday night. Byron was so crazed we had to put him in his cage (after he slashed up Patrick's face) and face him against the wall where he cried himself to sleep and so did I.

- Wednesday started OK but then we found out that due to our broker telling us the wrong thing we now owe the balance of our September rent ($800) today, not on the 15th. So today we have to scramble to open bank accounts. We also can't have satellite TV so I had to rearrange all our scheduling so now cable and internet will be installed a week from tomorrow.

- I spent 2 1/2 hours at the DMV and all I have now is a temporary license until they mail me my new one. The DMV truly is purgatory.

- We had a harrowing trip trying to return the Uhaul, which had to go back to Manhattan, involving much yelling (at Uhaul) tears panic attacks and turning down 5th Ave the wrong way (ie - facing traffic on a one way). We did manage to finally return the truck this morning but not before we got a $65 parking ticket.

So. Hopefully things get better from here on. Because at many times iin the past couple of days we have wondered why we did this and thought we'd made the biggest mistake of our lives and wanted to go back to our nice apartment in Cleveland with all of our friends nearby. We will stick it out - we have to. I just hope it gets better.

As a note - we have no internet access at home until next Friday (the 9th) so please call our cel phone numbers to get in touch. And Kerry - thank you very much for the card - it's perfect! I taped it to our fridge.

I also wanted to say to Mary, in case yoou're somewhere with internet access and can read this, that I've been thinking about you a lot the last few days and hoping you're ok. I know for all my complaining that your situation is much worse (the radio said the mayor isn't letting anyone back into the city). I am hoping for the best with regards to your house and your job and everything. If there's anything I can do from afar please call.

That's it for now. Hopefully I'llbe able to get online again tomorrow. |