Realtor Shopping

When the plan was to move back to Austin and get a house there, I knew just what would happen. I would go to my very good friend Genesis and she would find us the perfect house and get us the best deal and explain everything 47,000 times if I needed to hear it 47,000 times because she's my good friend first and my realtor second. I knew there would be no second guessing her, she's completely knowledgeable and would have our best interests at heart. However, with the change in plans and our sticking around here for a while instead, I lost that and I'm really mourning the loss now.

To be quite frank, I tend to group realtors in the same category as car salesmen. As I see it, both want to make a sale at the highest personal profit, maybe even to the detriment of the customer. So in losing my Genesis, I lost a lot. However, based on a recommendation, we've found another lady who will be showing us our very first set of houses this week. I'm excited and nervous but at least the process will now be in motion. I'll also get to pretend we're on "House Hunters" or "My First Place" in my head as we walk through the houses, so I'm really looking forward to that.

Spring Break

Sis had knee surgery again last week and timed it so she would recover during spring break. Spring break is also when South By Southwest hits Austin and now that I don’t live there anymore, this is one of my favorite times to go there. The energy is high and there’s lots of people coming out and getting to experience first hand what a great place it really is. Mom and Dad were out to help with her recovery too, which was really rather minimal after the first few days. We spent time talking, shopping and relaxing. I even also managed to squeeze in 3 workouts at her top of the line gym (thanks to Mom's early wake up calls and excellent workout partnering skills) so I was pleased as punch. Of course coming back was not so nice. The return flight is always the hardest part. We take off and I'm looking out the window, watching as we leave this lush, green rolling hill country and two hours later, we land in the dusty, dry desert. Not exactly a terrific trade off but certainly we had a great time as usual and our appreciation for “home” grew just a bit more with each tasty bite of Tex-Mex.


...and that one naughty but nice, deliciously decadent cupcake.

Boot Camp

As some of you may know, I did a month long boot camp fitness program these last few weeks. It involved a lot of running and interval-style cross training. I did it three times a week for an hour at 5:30 in the morning. The first day was totally brutal and I wanted to die (right after I caught my breath that is). I’m under the impression that running should be reserved for life or death situations only so needless to say I was questioning the whole thing when the first words out of her mouth were “Let’s start with a short lap.” I struggled through that lap and most all other things we did that day. The first week I could hardly move my arms, bending or extending them was painful since they were so sore and I'd cough and wheeze for hours after class. Eventually, however, my endurance and strength started to improve and I didn’t totally dread it anymore. In fact, I did the unthinkable and signed up for another month that began today.

I'm happy to report that while it was certainly hard, I noticed a huge difference between this session's first day and last session's first day. I'm feeling pretty good about this whole thing now and would recommend this type of fitness class to anyone considering it.

Here I Am

So, no, I didn't drop off the face of the earth.  I was just computer-less for far too long.  My faithful old computer died after a little over 5 years of service.  It took some time for us to decide whether to try to fix it or get a new one.  I'm not into fixing old electronics, these things run their course and should just be replaced in my book.  However, I was tempted to try that route just because it burns me that we've worked so many (many many many many) hours to save and save for a down payment and I didn't want to dip into that for a new computer.  In the end we did get a new imac, though, and she sure is pretty.

To be honest, I've not had much time to play with her, although Keck sure has and assures me she runs like a dream.

I'm just thankful to be back online, since we still can't write or read blogs at work, I've been having serious withdrawal issues.  Also, we didn't lose anything in the transition either since Keck had just backed everything up a few days before the old imac went on to a better place, where I imagine all desktops are as lovely as this:

And so to my imacs I say "Goodbye, old friend!  Hello, my new workhorse!" Here's a fun 3 generation photo of our little imac family:

Moonlight Drawings

While at Zoolights I started "drawing" with the moon on a whim.  It's a technique I once saw a fellow photo student use.  There was a big, bright lovely full moon hanging low in the night sky and so I used its light through a long exposure to create lines and pictures.  While the shutter is open for the long exposure, I move the camera around like a writing instrument.  I have no idea what will materialize but since it's digital I don't have to wait very long to find out.

I got some interesting photos but the masterpiece of the series is definitely Constellation Little 'dillo.

Do you see it too?  :)

A New Year, A New Smile

On account of various childhood injuries, Keck has had 2 chipped teeth since I first met him over 15 years ago.  I always found them rather cute and thought they gave his silly little smile lots of character.  However, in the name of good oral health, he decided to get them fixed some time ago.  It took a number of professional opinions and even more visits to our dentist (whom we really love and appreciate) but Keck finally had the chips fixed and now has an even more beautiful smile if that's even possible.

BEFORE

AFTER

Post Holiday Wrap-Up

We had a great time over Christmas and New Years with the family out from Florida and Texas.  We even had the actual Christmas Day and New Years Day off - a first in many years.  We gathered around the Christmas enlarger on Christmas morning and I finally got to open the knives I had gotten the sisterly telepathy about weeks earlier.  The thing about working with good knives is that you realize you've got some bad habits from working with those bad/dull ones for years and you cut your thumb again and again.  Then your husband does it too and you end up at the urgent care clinic with the doctor gluing the flap shut on his thumb to avoid having to use stitches.

Anyway, after the gifts we watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and got started on a fairly early dinner, that turned out to be fabulous and and later watched The Dark Night.  We did some shopping and took a drive up to Flagstaff a few days later.  We welcomed 2009 in the apartment where we can see the various fireworks shows from our balcony.  

The best part of their visit was how our place looked after they left.  If you recall I had been wanting to clear the clutter in our place and really downsize the amount of stuff we have.  Well with 5 people working on it we really put a huge dent in things.  Our place seems nearly twice as big now and the carpets are shampooed and look almost like they did on day one.  There's space for all the necessary things and those things are now all put away in said place and all the unnecessary things were either tossed, donated or packed away for now.

One last note - over the last weeks I've also come to accept that we will be staying in Phoenix after all, at least for a while.  So it seems there will be more Zoolights to wander through and cacti wrapped in Christmas lights yet to photograph. We've started looked for a house to buy and trying to familiarize ourselves with that most overwhelming process.  We're also working very hard to come up with a sizable down payment over the coming months.  With the way things are right now making a big move will not be the best decision for us at this time.  I know lots of people will be disappointed by this (us too) but we sincerely feel we're in the right place for right now and appreciate everyone's support throughout this fairly difficult decision.