The Next Great Chapter

Around Christmas time, we started talking about where we might end up after New York.  Our lease is up at the end of September, and we both knew that we definitely did not want to be in New York past then.  We always saw New York as a short-term thing (for better or worse...who knows how things might be different if we'd left it open ended), so it was just a matter of putting in our time, checking off the "Lived in the greatest city on Earth" check box, and figuring out where to go next.

Early on, there were many options: Boston, Chicago, DC, and Seattle.  Sadly, Indianapolis was never really in the mix.  Damn you, Indianapolis, for not having mountains or lakes or something.  Way to be boring and flat!  (Don't worry, I still love you a lot.  I will get there someday.)  The more we kept talking about where to live and where we would go, we kept coming back to two: Boston and Seattle

On the one hand, moving to Boston meant moving home.  On the other hand, we have no house, no kids, nothing tying us down at the moment.  What better time to explore another part of the country?  We'd already taken a big step by moving to New York City and exploring true city life, but were we ready to pack up and move across the country?  Were we ready to become West Coasters, having been East Coasters our whole lives?  (Well, one of us anyway.)

In the end, we decided to push for Seattle.  Marek lobbied hard for a transfer through work, and in the end, some things fell into place and after what felt like an eternity - but was probably a couple of months - we had a firm, official "YES" to move to Seattle.  Before we had the official official "yes", we did tell a few people (family, very close friends, and my Internet BFF, for obvious reasons), and then we just sat around and waited for the dust to settle on everything else - getting the official approval from my work, listing our apartment, getting a quote from the moving company, booking flights to Seattle to apartment hunt, and figuring out the exact timeline of our move. 

So today marks the day: T-minus 31 days until we move out of New York City.  I'm not going to lie - it is a little bittersweet.  For better or worse, NYC and our little sardine can apartment has been our home for the past 18 months, and I'd be lying if I said I won't miss it at all.  We'll especially miss the friends that we were lucky enough to make in our time here!

For the creepers detail-oriented people out there, we'll be heading home to Massachusetts for a week and then taking the following route as we head west.  We've got eight big stops, passing through 21 states and one district (including eight new ones), across almost 4,000 miles.  

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The Barricade!

As we've (*cough* I've *cough*) said before, the bad little dog known as Claudius Weenie likes to jump on and off of things and get angry faces in his log book. He jumped off the bed in the middle of the night a few nights ago and I had to figure out a way to keep him on the bed without having to hold him or force him to sleep next to the wall (not an easy task).

Enter the barricade, made up of an extra pillow and my Patriots Pillow Pet, Gronk! They are too tall for Claudius to see over and the provide a nice little wall to keep him on the bed.

It has been working so far!

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Claudius the Jumper

This little brat is supposed to be on strict rest for awhile but is feeling so much better (yay!) that he is jumping up and down from the couch again (boo!). We keep a log of everything he does, and whenever he jumps, he gets a big angry face in the log. That will teach him.

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10 Day You Challenge: four books

(ten secrets / nine loves / eight fears / seven wants / six places / five foods)

This one is crazy easy...and also very hard.  I love reading and I love books (real ones, not fake electronic ones (and especially fake electronic ones that cost more than the real ones)), and while I've got a pretty clear-cut list of favorites, there are also so many books that I love that didn't make the list.

{Click the pictures to go to Amazon.}

1.  The Count of Monte Cristo.  My favorite book of all time.  I try to read this once a year.  I even have a favorite edition.  I still haven't gotten around to reading the complete mammoth of an unabridged version, but I'm going to...someday!

I love you, Lowell Blair.  Thanks for the fabulous translation and abridgement.

2.  I, Claudius (and Claudius the God).  A bit of a cheat, but you can't have one without the other.  As long as you can keep the all of the names straight (and enjoy trying to make sense of the their incest), this book is so good.  Another one of my all-time faves - it was gifted to me by a friend in college and it took me a really long time to finally read it, but once I started, I couldn't put it down.  And the sequel is just as good.

Loved you so much I named my dog after you.

3.  Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles.  Not a bit, but a huge cheat.  My dad got me hooked on these books and we both love them.  When I was down in New Orleans this past fall we were texting each other really dorky jokes about the vampires (because that's where some of the live, DUH).  If I had to pick a favorite, I'd probably pick The Vampire Lestat.  I still haven't finished them all yet (dropped off right before Merrick), but I will say that Rice's work (including her other novels) isn't for everyone.  She tends to ramble and delve into philosophical prose for pages and pages.  Still, if you want to read about cool vampires and have some patience, then it's definitely worth a read.

AWESOME

4.  The Three Musketeers.  Another favorite of mine because it's just fun, and as a former English major who abandoned that path because it sucked all the fun out of reading, fun reads are the best reads.

Lowell Blair again...told you he was awesome.

Runners Up
The Shopaholic series
Rebecca
Any book about language
Sherlock Holmes

Other books that aren't favorites but I've really enjoyed include:
One Day (highly recommend this one)
Novels by Margaret George
The Sex Lives of Cannibals (hilarious travel memoir)
Thursday Next novels by Jasper Fforde

Okay, how about you?  I'm always looking for new book recommendations, so please share!

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