Nice Weekend

Today I am thankful because:

1. My test went very well! I was extremely nervous all morning, but out of 100 questions, I felt completely confident on the majority, and pretty sure of all the rest. I think there were only about 5 questions where I just took a guess.

2. We have expanded our house search to another county. We'd originally not looked there because we'd heard the Prattvegas school system was so much better, and although we don't plan on having kids in this first house, we don't want anything like that to damper our re-sell possibilities. We've noticed, however, that houses seem to be selling there just as well as in Prattvegas, and it's literally just across the interstate, so it's not a location problem.

3. I have someone at work with whom I can share my frustrations. I will miss her once I escape, and I hope she won't be far behind me.

4. Only 11 days until bar results (and approximately 5 weeks until my results)!

5. A new house we've found is closer to work and has a view of the lake… who knew we could afford a view of the lake? (I didn't say a water-front house.)


I had a pretty nice weekend. Friday, in order to cheer ourselves up about the house we lost, as well as discuss our other options, Z and I went out to dinner at Carrabba's. I love that place! We had a very nice meal talking over what was not perfect about the other house (there really were some things we weren't thrilled about, and it helped to point them out) and what our next move was going to be.

Like I listed above, we've decided to look in the neighboring county for houses. Prattvegas is pretty much in a bottom corner of its county, so there are two others very close by. It's not that we're looking farther away; we're just looking on the other side of the interstate. So, after dinner (and a quick trip to the pet store where I was horrified to watch 3 fish try to rip their brother to pieces) we went home and looked up a bunch of new houses to look at.

Saturday was exam day. I woke up with enough time to glance through my materials again, but mostly just time to get worked up. I obsess and get nerves on top of nerves in situations like that. But I arrived at the test site with plenty of time and waited in line to get in the door. It was held in a junior high's cafeteria, and it was packed. We had to sit on those stupid mushroom stools (as my mother calls them) which was ridiculously uncomfortable. We were allotted three hours, but I got finished in one. I left feeling very confident and generally good about myself and my new-found opportunities. Driving home, however, I looked over and there, in the next lane on the interstate, was my current boss. I started to laugh and had to fight myself back from rolling down the window to shout at her what I'd just done. Take that!

That evening Z went to a party for our friends. I'd already planned not to go because of the exam, and I was just happy to stay home for a while and read magazines that had been piling up. It was wonderful.

Sunday, Z and I took our list of homes and started the elimination process. Here's how we operate when searching for houses: run a search on our agent's site, save the best ones (maybe 20) to our "saved list," go through them again to delete any houses with too few square feet, too ugly kitchen, too small backyard, etc (now we're down to about 12). Then we get directions to each (that's the hard part – agents don't want you to have directions because they want to drive you there. So sometimes it's hard to find these places, since we haven't lived here that long, and we've never had anything to do with this new county) and drive there. This is the stage where we eliminate the most, because even if it has granite countertops and hardwood floors, we will hate living there if it's in a cookie-cutter neighborhood, or if all the houses are close enough to shake hands through the windows. Also, we eliminate it if there's a cliff in the backyard, or if the "deck" covers the entire yard. (Seriously, we've seen these – who wants a wooden yard?) S

o yesterday, for example, we started out with about 20 new listings on our saved list. We actually visited about 12. One of those is a possibility. One other was really nice, but it was in one of those brand new neighborhoods that looks like it was dropped out of the sky, and they're not done yet, meaning we'll have construction directly across the street. The house that's an actual possibility is pretty nice. It's a new construction, sits on about half an acre, and has a pretty decent view of a lake. It's not lake-front, but you can definitely see the water. And the back porch is covered, something the other house lacked. We have not been inside this particular home before, but in a different neighborhood we toured a home with the same floor plan. I liked that house a lot, but it had about 100 square feet less, and it was just too small. So, we sort of know what this one's like, even though we haven't been inside yet.

Regardless of where we decide to buy a house, the fact remains that we will be moving soon! I am more excited about this than I can begin to explain! This apartment has served its purpose nicely, but it is so much smaller than what we're used to. When we're at home at the same time (which is pretty much all the time) we are usually in the same room, simply because the kitchen, dining room, and living room are all the same room… If we want to watch different things on TV, whoever goes into the bedroom to watch TV has to shut the door. I hate "open floor plans."

Even though I hate moving, the only reason I hate it is because it's always been sort of sad. Think about it: I moved from home to college – that was sad; from college back home – well, home had changed; home to college and back a few dozen more times; to the good apartment in Tuscaloosa – not so sad, but still temporary; Tuscaloosa to Prattvegas – left good friends, left good job, left good apartment, yes, that was sad. This will be the first time I move into a place I'll stay in for more than a year. That's pretty exciting. I'm also glad that this move will be an in-town, not-in-one-day move. Hooray! That means we don't have to enlist a dozen family members to arrive at the crack of dawn and work non-stop all day while bickering and hurrying and dropping. And – the best part – we'll probably be there for at least three years!