Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Busy Bees

Well, after seven years of living at the Beach, Jon and I are moving inland.
A ghastly 4 miles inland to be precise.

Oh the tragedy of moving so far away. It will now be a 10 minute drive to get to the beautiful sands of Redondo.

Actually, I am still getting used to the fact that we are leaving this neighborhood. So many things I will miss. The pier, the quiet neighborhood, the wild parrots, the drugstore right up the street, and the amazing beach sunsets that we got so used to that we started taking them for granted.

The new neighborhood is a cute tree lined street with little bungalow houses, one which we will be renting - yes, we are still renting....prices are still insanely ridiculous out here for homes. There is a small downtown area nearby with a Fosters Freeze, a small town bakery, and some nice non-chain restaurants. Jon will be able to walk to work as he will be so close to the office. The one thing that I believe is the icing on the cake is the fact that we will have a washer and dryer....one that I will NOT have to feed quarters. YEAH!!!!!!
I wonder if I will still collect quarters like a squirrel collects nuts. There have been times at the store where I will hold up a line just to count out the change in smaller denominations to save the quarters in my coin purse....No more...I will hand over that quarter with glee, unless I find out it is a rare quarter from some special year that is worth more. And I will still hold up the line with coupons.

The place we are renting is a small three bedroom with a fireplace, a little backyard and a HUGE garage. The bedrooms are very small, but I am hoping to fit all the furniture into them.

Well, that is also why I have been so lax on updating the site.
We are in the midst of packing:
Right now I am shoving things into boxes a little haphazard. I dumped all the drawers from the kitchen and living room and labeled it combined junk drawers. Hopefully the movers we hired will know exactly where to put that valuable box.

Trying to purchase new items:
We must find a washer & dryer to buy before April 1st when our sales tax in this state reaches an all time high...what was it again, 90%? I also want to buy an area rug, curtains, and a huge bottle of Excedrin.

Writing a list of places I need to make sure get my change of address:
Whew...so many, I cannot believe we have been in our place for 7 years....too much has accumulated.

Setting things aside for Yard sale:
Well, a couple of days ago a few very expensive items that we could have probably sold to a collector were taken to the goodwill. I tried not to get too upset as I should have said something before, but blast it, they was worth monies.

Stay tuned for pics and for things I will NOT miss! :)

Sunday, March 08, 2009

The Odds

I started out on Sunday with some shopping and then as I returned home and parked the car I bumped the curb with my right front tire. Thought nothing of it until later that evening and realized I had popped the tire and it was as flat as a pancake.
Well, no worries on that one. Not a big deal. Swapped it out for the spare and then the next day we took it to America's Tire. Yeah, New tire, rotation. Swell!
Then on Friday, we went out to dinner with some friends and we drove through a construction zone. We hit what we thought was a little gravel and I kept hearing a sound come from the rear right tire. Jon figured it had to be a rock stuck in the tread, but all I could think was...not again....so when we arrived at our friend's place I got out to look and sure enough I heard the distinct hissing sound of a punctured tire. It seems that one of the construction workers left a utility blade out on the street and that is what lodged in the tire. Kinda looks like a ninja blade. Yeah, we were hit by ninjas in our beach community.So, once again the spare was brought out from the trunk. BUT SERIOUSLY....Two flat tires in one week!!! What are the odds?
I have found this week has been full of eating a lot of food. Note to self: STOP immediately before having to purchase elastic waist pants.
I have gone out for lunch a couple of times this week, ate Portillo's sandwiches (makes me miss Chicago) with friends who went out to Buena Park to pick it up and a vast variety of other lovely items. There is a show on the BBC called "You are what you eat" and in the show the host has the person who needs to lose weight write down everything they eat in one week and then they display the entire contents of that one week on a table for the person to see and be horrified by all the food that they have eaten. Well, this week I kept thinking about that table. At least I did get to the gym a little bit.
Hoping I have more time this next week even though I do feel cheated a little cause we just had to "Spring Forward" an hour.