First week

I have only been down in San Diego for a week, but it seems much longer already. Part of it is that I was down here only a month ago, so the time has just run together in my mind. Matt and Holly and their welcoming arms have also made the transition to calling this place home much easier.

This week I have been doing all the odds and ends of setting up camp in a new home and a new town. The first weekend was largely unpacking, finding places for things, and realizing that I still managed to bring too much stuff. I have been checking out the area to find all the outlets for the mundane stuff of life like groceries, pet stores, post office and the like. I've also been spending a fair amount of time at Target to pick up (cheaply) the things that didn't fit in the truck, as well as some bins to organize the stuff that did make the cut. Since I am trying not to spread out too much, I am leaving most things in boxes and taking out only what I need day to day. Clear bins make it a bit easier to keep track of where everything is.

The pooch has been slowly getting used to the new place and her new roomie. Matt and Holly's dog is a younger pup, and is used to playing and rough-housing with other dogs. My pooch is about eleven years old and a little broken, so she isn't up to wrestling anymore. They have mostly worked things out, and she seems to be on the mend from the long trip down.

Matt and the two Seans worked on the house this weekend. There are still some unfinished projects from the Extreme Home Makeover of 2008 (great video here), and the permit was due to expire this week, so we did our best to finish the work called out by the inspector. Unfortunately the makeover opened up a can of worms that had the inspector making us repair things that we hadn't touched (and were working just fine, thank you very much). Hopefully we can wrap up the added projects in the next couple of weeks so we can get back to working on the stuff we want to.

The internet is still down at the house, so I headed down to Starbucks this afternoon for a little coffee and web time. And their internet was down as well. Conspiracy! Fortunately, one of the things I did this week was to get a library card, so that is where I am now, getting caught up on e-mail, blogs and such. I also had a book on hold about improving your resume, so that is on this week's project list as well.

In some sort of odd trade off, the tv only started working a few days ago and the internet has been down for most of that time. The bonus of getting tv all of the sudden is that we have been able to watch the Olympics, which has been great. But after the Olympics are over, if I had to chose between tv and internet access, I think I would pick the internet. It can certainly be a time waster, but it has really become an everyday tool. We needed it for research on the house this weekend, and it has made just finding my way around my new town so much easier. One of the goals this year is to simplify, but I don't think I want to go back to using the yellow pages.