Do you know what stupid thing I did last night? I had a friend come and pack up my tv, tivo, modem, iMac, and any other items that could provide entertainment or background noise. Good lord what a boring night it was. I guess I could have put on my iPod but then I would have been walking around with headphones on and that’s like inviting a serial killer to sneak up behind you, kill you, and wear your skin like a pretty pretty dress. And that just sounds so unappealing, although I would make a bitching dress.

Tonight is painting night at the new place, followed by cleaning lady/cable day, and then the biggie: Moving Day. All of which jparks is out of town for. Lucky bastard. No, I keed, I totally gave him permission to go out of town. Actually, I might have forced him to go. Trust me, it’s easier if he’s in another state for the move.

On a totally different, but slightly related, subject I signed up for an intro to being a stripper class. It’s really an intro to sensual dance class, but poles and stilettos are involved so I think that qualifies it as a stripper class. This way, when jparks and I can’t afford the mortgage, I can go work at a club and make the big bucks. My mom must be so proud right now.

(You know I’m not really going to strip, right? But I am really taking the class. You’ve got to try new things. And I figure pole dancing kinda blends well with aerial acrobatics)

What, you guys didn’t like me sticking that we bought a house right in the middle of a post? I thought it was rather sneaky. I can’t just come right out and tell you stuff, no, I’ve got to make sure you’re all paying close attention.

Yes, jparks and I have taken the big plunge and purchased a house here in Silicone Valley. It was as pain-free as something this painful can be, mainly because we bought from friends. Friends that were very nice and understanding when we proclaimed “we’ll buy your house!” without actually having our finances lined up for such a transaction.

And, just so we are all on the same page, I have to disclose this bit of information: we didn’t actually purchase a house-house; we purchased a townhouse. I know for some people (read as: people like me that have only lived in reasonably priced areas) buying a townhouse instead of a stand alone house is bizarre and slightly ridiculous. But, in this area, buying a townhouse is a necessary evil for first time purchasers like jparks and I.

So, do you want details? Maybe pictures? heh, well I don’t really have those things. I can give you basic details but since we bought the place before it was listed that limited the “walk through with a camera and take pictures so we can decide if we want to sign away our lives” opportunities. Actually, we told our friends we would buy the place after seeing only the bottom floor, one time, many months ago. We are not insane, it was just too good of an opportunity to pass up.

What I can tell you is that it’s a hair over 1400 square feet, 2 bedrooms, and 2.5 baths in Santa Clara. We have a 2 car tandem garage and the Sanders are leaving us all the stainless steel appliances we can shake a stick at. If you want to know what something like this costs, send me an email and I’ll spill the beans. If you don’t really care about the exact figure, I’ll just say it was pricey, but we got a really good deal.

We are supposed to move into the new place in August and I plan on filling my time until then with interior decorating magazines, books, and websites. Or, I am more than willing to let someone step up to the challenge of decorating my house. Between jparks being colorblind and my inability to commit to anything out of fear that it won’t work with the rest of our stuff, the decorating of a new place is a huge stress for me. Any takers?

Jparks and I are super excited about this big step into adulthood. Now whenever the cats start fighting I break them up and tell them that shortly they can each have their own room. We have started to run Lily up and down the stairs at our apartment complex to prepare her for a new life full of stairs. For the past few night I’ve had wonderful dreams about being able to watch tv uninterrupted by Mr. I-Don’t-Want-To-Watch-But-Can-You-Tell-Me-What-Just-Happened. Oh my, I can’t wait! Jparks can be on one floor of the house and I can be on another! Our marriage might just survive after all!

Sorry everyone, I didn’t mean to leave the “woe is me” post as the main thing facing the world on this here blog o’mine for the whole weekend. I hope I didn’t make everyone think I’m a pathetic excuse of a human, hiding out in my apartment, scratching at myself, and occasionally pulling out lumps of hair as I mutter under my breath about the state of housing in the Bay Area. I mean, I totally did that, but I found time to do other things as well.

I would like to thank everyone that offered to drive around with me and help me search this vile area for a new place to live. It really made me feel better that so many people wanted to help me keep my sanity. But, in the end, the best decision for jparks and I was to just resign our lease. I know, I know, we could have found a better place to live, but really did we need to spend money on a deposit? Did we need to spend money on a rental truck? Did we need to kill our friends by making them lug around boxes of our crap? After much thought, we decided the answer to all of these questions was no and, with heads hanging low, we marched up to the rental office to take it up the ass resign our lease.

The other reason for resigning our lease was that I needed to stay put. All we’ve done since June of 2005 was move and I am sick and tired of it. I want to remain still for more than a year. I want to not have to update my address with my 391 magazine subscriptions. I don’t want to get a new driver’s license. I need to not move to another apartment even if it was in the same building. Humans are not meant to move as much as jparks and I have recently, dammit.

So stick around folks, in about a year you will probably see another “woe is me” post. Then I’ll be ready to accept your offers of apartment hunting help. This also gives you a year to think of excuses as to why you can’t come and help me move. And they better be good excuses or else I’m not going to accept them.

Since the hurricane I’ve had a hard time adjusting to the fact that I no longer live in New Orleans. I pause when people ask me where I’m from; do they mean where do I currently live, or do they know I’m not local and want to know where I came from? The past few times I’ve been asked this question I just stood there with my mouth open, puddle of drool gathering around my feet. People assumed I was from Mississippi, based on that puddle of drool and my inability to answer a simple question.

I’ve slowly started to accept that in certain ways California is home. I voted here, I’ve got a CA driver’s license, and I drive a yuppie car. I’m very Californian in those aspects.

But in other ways I’m having trouble becoming Californian. Whenever jparks mentions buying a house here, I clam up and won’t even discuss it with him. I think that some part of me isn’t ready to own property in this ridiculously over-priced area. Or maybe it’s just that as long as we don’t own property here we can leave at any time; head back to a land below sea level where I feel more comfortable.

Right now we think nothing of heading back to NOLA for the holidays. But once we have kids, flying halfway across the country will no longer be an easy feat and holidays will have to be spent here. But without Celebration in the Oaks, Cajun Night Before Christmas, and Benny Grunch and the Bunch I’m not sure how the holidays will ever feel right.

And at what point in time do I need to stop feeling like it’s my right to have time off of work for Mardi Gras? When will I stop feeling like something is not right if once a year I don’t stand in the middle of a street with a beer in one hand, cold Popeye’s chicken in the other, and yell at men on floats to throw me some long beads?

I guess what I’m wondering is how long do you have to be gone from a place before you stop thinking of it as home? I need to know so that just a day before I hit that amount of time I can move back to NOLA.

…or some other year before the internet.

We moved into our new apartment on Monday and by Tuesday we were supposed to have cable and internet. Supposed is the keyword in that sentence. Jason didn’t want to pay the instillation fee for internet and told me he could take care of it himself. The problem with this is Comcast, the local cable/internet provider, wants your money, especially $100 for internet instillation, because according to Jason it’s the easiest $100 they can make. So when he tried to install our internet, it didn’t work. Figures. Stupid Comcast.

After spending a half hour on the phone with the Comcast representative we still didn’t have internet, but they promised to call us back within 24 hours. It’s now 20 hours later and we still haven’t heard from them. I’m also willing to put money down that we don’t hear from them in the next 4 hours. I’m also willing to go double or nothing that we’ll have to call them back and that we won’t have internet in the next few days.

But at least we’ll have saved our $100 set up fee. We’ll need that money to buy blood pressure medicine for Jason, because I guarantee he’s going to need some after talking to those Comcast reps again.

And how am I posting this you ask? Well, if you go sit in the middle of the field in our complex there are some internet connections you can borrow. Thank you to my fellow residents, keep paying those internet bills on time, I depend on you!

Today I went apartment hunting in the Bay Area. Tonight I attempted to throw myself into traffic on 101. Luckily Jason was able to lure me down with a bottle of wine and a mini dark chocolate bar.

First problem encountered: Slightly racist, extremely self-centered, talkative yet deaf to anything not uttered in his own voice real estate agent ‘helping’ me locate apartments.

Second problem encountered: The delightful agent didn’t listen to a word I said when I explained what we were looking for in apartments and decided to drive me around the Bay Area to a bunch of apartments that were totally not what I was looking for.

Third problem encountered: The apartments he brought me to were not only not what I was looking for as far as amenities go but they were also crappy. Crappy like “Why does this place smell like cat pee?” crappy. Crappy like “You don’t say that the 1970’s exploded in this kitchen and sprayed itself all over the appliances” crappy.

Fourth problem encounter: My agent has one-night stands with women that work in the leasing offices and therefore creates quite a nice environment to bring clients like me into. Apparently, most of these women didn’t realize this was only a one-night stand and are upset that he never called. So yeah, lots of the leasing agents were super happy to see him.

By the end of the day I still hadn’t found a place to live, but I had found a massive headache. I can’t believe that you can barely find a one bedroom for $1500 with a washer and dryer and air conditioner. This place sucks.

I did finally find a place. It’s the same exact apartment complex that our corporate housing is located in. And the real estate agent didn’t even recommend I look here. Yeah, he was so much help. I’m happy that I found a place but at the same time I wouldn’t wish apartment hunting in this area on my worst enemy. Yeah, actually I would wish it on them and I would make sure they have to go with my agent. Ohhh even better, I would make them go out on a date with my agent.

*edit* I forgot the bird poop. Yup, I actually got crapped on by a bird at the first complex. Not a good sign. I should have given up right then.

Am in California, alive and not covered in my own puke. All the animals survived their first plane trip and seem to be enjoying our super fancy corporate apartment.

I’m still having trouble accepting the fact that I live in California. Don’t get me wrong, I am excited to be here, but it doesn’t seem real, like California isn’t a place normal people live. Somehow in my mind it’s a place that only fabulously wealthy, beautiful people live and everyone else can visit, but not stay. After 10 days in California the pretty police come around and throw your plain ass out into Nevada.

The movers came on Friday and loaded up the apartment. They also spilled coffee across the dining room carpet and wall, broke the garbage disposal, and forgot to pack two bathroom drawers. I can’t wait to see how much of our stuff actually gets to California in it’s original condition.

The cars were picked up today by the shipping company and we fly out tomorrow afternoon with the animals. Wish us luck with the drugged kitties on the plane. Wish me luck so I don’t puke during landing.

ugh, have fallen behind in moving duties. Even though the moving company packs for us we still have to set aside anything not getting packed (cooking oils, cleaning supplies, clothes we are bringing ourselves, animals) and I haven’t started on that yet.

I have, however, successfully watched a good number of Alias’ season 4 episodes, played Katamari, caught up with reading my magazines, watched some reruns of Friends, and played with Lily. You know, high priority type of things.

I was waiting for Jason to turn in his notice with PalmSource before I mentioned this on my blog and since he did that yesterday I can now say that we are moving to California. I know for most people this is old news but I’m sure there are a few people I haven’t told yet.

Jason took a job with Google and we have to go out to the Bay Area for it. Hopefully we won’t have to stay very long and will be able to transfer to one of Google’s many other offices around the country within a year.

For those of you that know we are moving, this might be different than what I orginally told you: We leave for California on April 9th. Or around April 9th. Basically sooner than I probably mentioned.