San Francisco and Pictures of Stuff!

Dear Readers,

I haven't yet discovered a good way to start these.  I don't think that's a keeper either.  So last Saturday neither Carissa or I can remember what we did.  It was obviously a lot of fun.  We can remember we went to Newport Beach at night for dinner and I had a mahi mahi sandwich.  It was yummy.  The place was called Baja Sharkeez.  It was a weird place that had kind of a dive bar feel to it but it was really open and had a TON of TV's.  We managed to get seats at the bar and got the Bruins on one of the TV's (and they even won!  I think... don't go fact checking me).  Then Sunday we went back to Newport Beach and saw the beach (we didn't really go to the beach as much as we just were at and observed it), went to some shops, stood around while Carissa shopped, got some food, etc.  It was a more low-key weekend than the weekend we moved in for sure.  Carissa is now reminding me that she went to lots of yard sales on Saturday morning which means I likely played video games so we wouldn't lose our parking spot (we have a 1 car garage but the other spot is up to chance depending on whether there are spots available in the lot.  It's about 10-12 cars trying to fit in like 6 spots so its a hot commodity... Yes I'm trying to defend playing video games on a Saturday morning/afternoon instead of exploring Southern California).

So Monday morning rolled around and I was off to the airport.  Luckily there is one very close to where I live, possibly as close as TF Green was to my parents house in Cranston (but not as close as we were when we lived in Warwick).  Flight left Irvine at 6:45am and landed in San Francisco at around 8:30am.  From there I jumped on the Bart (public transportation - not a trolley to my dismay) and took it to about a block away from the Marcum office in the financial district.  Now you may be thinking "Woah! Jeff just got to California and he's already in San Francisco?! I wonder if he did that really fun thing I did 5, 10, or 20 years ago when I was there????  I'll keep reading and see all the things he did!"  I'll stop you right there.  Unless your favorite things to do in San Francisco are to go to the Marcum Office or go to a hotel/airbnb in the area chances are I did not do what you hope I did.  If those ARE your favorite things than you're in luck!  So the Marcum office is on Montgomery Street (in case you know where that is or want to google it) and the Airbnb I stayed in on Monday and Tuesday night was about 0.8 miles away on Post St.

The Airbnb was crazy because it was probably about a 450 sq ft studio apartment.  I suppose I have never really been in a studio apartment before but they are pretty awesome, pretty much just the essentials there.  The only problem is if you want to watch TV you have to lay in bed which leads to falling asleep and occasionally letting your beer spill on your chest (hypothetically of course).  They had netflix set up on the TV so I started watching Wilfred.  It's pretty funny but apparently also good to fall asleep to if you're already in bed (I think Brian, my Dad, and the Egg Chair know what I'm talking about).  I went to a bar on Monday for dinner and one of the items on the drink menu was a 16oz PBR and a shot of Evan Williams for like $5 (keep in mind San Francisco overtook NYC as the most expensive city in the US this year... so $5 is cheap).  I also got a sandwich that was called the Foghorn Leghorn that was delicious and had a great name.  From what I recall it had turkey, lettuce, onion, guacamole and melted parmigiana cheese.  Some of that might be inaccurate.

Tuesday in SF I worked another long day but went to a nice fancy Italian dinner where I had Pasta Carbonara and a really expensive beer that was 750ml and like $30 (thanks to the Marcum per deim... otherwise I would have stuck to the PBR).  When I got home I was still hungry though because what they don't do at fancy Italian places is give you a large portion.  So I dipped into Wednesday's per deim and bought a large pizza!  The pizza had San Francisco toppings (Pepperoni, Ham, Olives, Green peppers) and was very good.  I ate about half of it around midnight and brought the other half to eat the next day.

At this point I was still under the impression I would be able to go back to Irvine on Wednesday night.  I didn't book the Airbnb for Wednesday night because I thought there was a solid chance I would be going home.  Turns out it wasn't in the cards so I had to book a hotel around 2:30pm for Wednesday night.  (for those keeping track, including Wednesday night I had spent 7 night since moving to California in either a hotel or an Airbnb and 9 nights in the apartment we got - a horrible ratio).  Since it was last minute and San Francisco I had limited options and ended up deciding on the Omni hotel.  It was SUPER nice and made me feel like a big shot.  That night I also took a stroll for dinner.  I hadn't planned my day very well because I got an expensive pizza at midnight so I had to be more budget conscious for dinner so I just went to a little hole-in-the-wall kind of place.  I hung out and watched the Mets beat the Cubs and had a couple drinks and a quesadilla that totally sucked (I could tell from the menu that it was not a bar known for food).  So I hung out for an hour or two when this dude walked in.  I was finishing my last beer (or so I thought) and he was already a few drinks deep.  I'm not sure what he asked me but it was something about the area and the conversation went something like this:

Guy: blah blah blah San Francisco?

Me: Oh, I don't really know.  I've only been here a couple days for work.

Guy: Oh, me too.  What do you do?

Me: I'm a CPA.  So where are you from? (the question that would change the course of my night).

Guy: Washington DC... you?

Me: Well I just moved to Southern California two and a half weeks ago but before that I lived in Rhode Island.

Guy: Seriously?  I grew up in Warwick then lived in Jamestown and graduated from Jamestown High School.

Me: That's crazy, I moved from Warwick... I grew up in Cranston and went to West, then I went to Bryant.

Guy: No way! I graduated Bryant in 2000.

So as you can see... I have uncovered that I am actually in The Truman Show (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3gI9ms8Fdc)... you can all cut the charade because I've figured it out.  It only took about 25 years but its over now.  But seriously.  This guy did graduate from Bryant (or at least spent enough time there to know a lot about it).  He was talking about where he lived and naming different halls and stuff so I believed him.  He then got me a beer at that bar and a beer next door before we decided to head to our various hotels... which as fate may have it was actually the same hotel.  At this point I should have probably been concerned that he was trying to kidnap and "Bill Cosby" me but I'm just a small town boy living in the big city.  Luckily we both went back to the Omni and he got off the elevator at the 4th floor instead of following me up to the 16th.  So all and all his attempt to pick me up were futile... his attempt to liquor me up was successful however... It was a bit of a rough morning but hey... when don't people get out of hand on Wednesday night, right?

So Thursday as I mentioned was tough but I made it in on time and did my work as well as I normally would have.  I flew home later that day and got my first glimpse of something tourist-y!  I saw the Golden Gate Bridge out the window of the airplane!

If you look REALLY closely you can see it there in the middle between the greenish brown and the brownish green!  So yeah I got home around 6:30ish and changed and went right back out to a concert that included Ballyhoo! and Pepper.  It was a good show but it reminded me that Pepper (although in my top 5 favorite bands to listen to) is terrible live.  They just don't play enough of their songs... they either sing or play and don't do both at the same time often enough.  I'm assuming its due to various chemicals affecting them while their up there but yeah, that's my opinion on it.  The first opening band did bless us with the opportunity to be the fashion police.  This picture shows 2/3 of the members wearing either really long shirts or average length dresses:

Carissa coined the phrase "Welcome to Orange County, where the tee's go to your knees!"  This picture doesn't even do this justice either.  These just look like average tall tees but I assure you they were waaaaay too long.  To the point that we both pointed it out because it was so obviously terrible.  That's the only other thing we got out of the concert really.  Ballyhoo! is still great live.

Friday we both worked, Carissa had a 1/2 day.  Last night Carissa went out with some random girls she won't stop talking about that she met on the internet.  I think she's probably in love.  I stayed home and watched the Bruins and played some video games.  Carissa made it home safe and has been bragging about how many girls she gave her number to.  I think shes trying to compete with my obvious new boyfriend in San Francisco/Washington D.C.

Today we took a trip to Balboa Island to try to find Rocky and see what it's all about.  There's a street with some restaurants and shops and a bunch of SUPER nice houses with yachts and the whole shabang.  We weren't sure what to expect, we were going to take the ferry there and thought it would be like Block Island or something but when we typed in the directions to the Balboa Island Ferry into the GPS it took us to the side that was on the island not the side that was on the mainland because it was closer to our apartment.  We just crossed a bridge that was maybe 30 yards long and we were there... the ferry is kind of a joke... but it's also only $3 for a car and two people.  Once we got there we walked around the island (took about 45min), grabbed some lunch and watched Carissa do a little bit more shopping.  While shopping I found this book that I was surprised to find out I didn't actually write:

(The first part... not the influencing people part... If I had written the first part I probably wouldn't have stopped at just 120).  Then I got a frozen banana at the stand that Bluth's Original Frozen Banana stand was inspired by (from the show Arrested Development):

When we were walking we also saw that a bunch of people had lime trees so we did a little research and decided that we could also afford a lime tree... so after we left Balboa Island we went out and bought a lime tree so we can have some fresh limes for vodka sodas and other uses too..... there's no reason for us to go buy limes just as an alcohol garnish.... QUICK get distracted by these pictures!

This is our baby lime tree.  If we care for it and water it I'm told that someday it can give us fresh limes!  That takes us to the end of Saturday.  Go Pats!  See below for pictures of my new car and for a video of the apartment!  Aslo, happy birthday AJ and Chris (it's AJ's birthday in California and Chris's birthday in RI! How crazy is that!!!!!)

MY CAR:

As you can see it is red!  It is also a convertible but I didn't take any pictures of it with the top down... sorry...  But here's a video of the apartment!  Again - should have taken the video in landscape but I didn't and I wanted the video to be authentic first try so if you want a better look at the car or the apartment you'll have to come visit!

-JD

We Have The Internet Again!

(Originally Posted 10/16/15) 

(Editor’s note – you’re looking at around 3,500 words so strap in)

When we last left our heroes they were in Irvine at an Airbnb.  Jeff had bought a car, Carissa had accepted a job, and they had decided upon a nice 2 bedroom apartment in Costa Mesa, California.  Since that is where I left off… that is where I will pick up!  This is going to be a long one ladies and gents so strap in.  A lot happened this week and I didn’t have the internet so I couldn’t share it with all of you!  (Don’t worry, I won’t keep giving you day by day updates… only the days where things that were mildly interesting happened will be shown separately.)

SATURDAY: Saturday was the day of days.  We were leaving our fun safe Airbnb… a place where everything still somewhat felt like a vacation.  We were moving from Irvine to a place to call our own in Costa Mesa.  For those of you who are not familiar with the geography of Southern California (like me) Costa Mesa is west of Irvine… and maybe north… I’m not really 100% sure.  My confusion is only amplified by the fact that in order to get to work in Irvine I have to take 55 north to 405 south.  Sounds to me like I should already be at work when I get on the first highway… I digress.  The apartment is a lovely 2 bedroom 2 bathroom vaulted ceiling loft(?) with a 1 car garage attached below the kitchen/family room area.  There are hardwood floors (laminate) throughout except for the bedrooms which have carpet and bathrooms which I believe have tile… not sure at the moment and not getting up to look.  I would have included pictures but there is no more space for pictures on my phone… that’s also why there will be no pictures of my car when we get to that but soon I’ll make Carissa take pictures of everything and post them in her blog… if she ever makes one.  So yeah, on Saturday we signed the papers and we became residents of Costa Mesa until at least October 2016!  The apartment came without a fridge (as many out here do for some reason… I don’t understand it at all – it’s not like anybody is actually living anywhere without a fridge) so we went to IKEA to do some shopping.  IKEA as fate may have it is only about 7 minutes from our apartment!  So we did the whole IKEA experience, ended up getting a few bar stools because we have an island of sorts in the kitchen and we got a fridge that was to be delivered on Sunday!  The other thing about our apartment is it does not have air conditioning (yes, this is going where you think it’s going… I’m about to complain about heat even though I moved to southern California… just move past it and laugh at my expense or something… or skip down… your call).  Apparently no apartments in this area have AC because it is close to the water and usually there is no reason to need AC.  But on this day it was in the high 90s (unseasonably warm we were told).  Things were hot to say the least and Jeffrey was being a complainy baby (ask Carissa… I’m surprised she didn’t just kill me).  So we went to CVS and got some essentials – beer, water, paper cups, paper plates, etc. and we went out to dinner.  We had Mexican, it was delicious.  We got home, it was terrible and hot.  We had no furniture other than 2 of the 3 bar stools that Carissa had assembled and our air mattress.  Life was terrible on Saturday night.  We just watched Scrubs on Carissa’s phone and fell asleep on the air mattress praying for relief.

SUNDAY: (if you thought Saturday was a story… just wait) Sunday began as Saturday ended (as it often does).  It was hot, we were sweaty, still didn’t have our stuff, still didn’t have the internet, still didn’t have a fridge (it was coming between 1-4 o’clock).  The only good thing about Sunday was that Tom Brady was going to be on at 10am (or so I thought).  You see… the funny thing about time zones is that when you’re on the west coast, football starts at 10am – provided the game you want to watch is at 1pm eastern time.  What Jeffrey didn’t realize, is that Tom Brady was really playing at 4:25 eastern time… which meant he was really on at 1:25, not 10am.  So Carissa and Jeffrey went to a local bar for brunch and to watch Tom Brady play the Cowboys.

I Googled “bars with NFL Sunday Ticket” and looked at some reviews and we decided to go to a place with great brunch reviews and NFL Sunday ticket.  We got to this place around 9:45, buckled in and got ready for some football!  I got a breakfast burger which was a burger with a fried egg on top.  Carissa got some other sort of breakfast item.  Then the bartenders started labeling all the TV’s with a clever “Team A vs. Team B” so you would know what TV to look at if you wanted to watch your favorite team!  I liked the set-up of this place, the food was delicious… the only problem was none of the TV’s said “Tom Brady vs. Cowboys”…. NONE OF THEM EVEN SAID “Patriots vs. Cowboys.”  After a quick Google search I realized that I was in fact an idiot and that the Patriots and Tom Brady were playing at 1:25 pacific time.  Carissa obviously didn’t want to sit at this place for 6 hours (and understandably so, they cap the bottomless mimosas after 3 hours) so we watched the first quarter of most of the games, finished our meals, and went on our way.  Carissa went out shopping and I sat in the hot apartment staring at my phone for a couple hours while she did that.  She got home around 1:15 so I left to go to a less expensive place to finally see Tom.  I went to a different bar, a divey-er bar, the kind of place that had $3 pints of PBR (account for California inflation and that’s pretty cheap!).

I ordered a Sam Oktoberfest before I saw the special and looked at the TV’s for my game.  I was half paying attention because the game before went into OT so the Pats game wasn’t on yet when a woman stumbled towards one of the servers and said something to the effect of (and I’m paraphrasing here) “I’m feeling rather intoxicated, however my body is telling me it is time to urinate, would you be so kind and hold my beverage for a quick minute so that I might relieve myself?”  I have no idea why the server agreed but she took the drink for this lady while she stumbled into the bathroom.  I was only halfway paying attention to this and halfway looking at other games when about a minute later the server proclaimed “why the hell am I holding this” so naturally I looked down and made eye contact… this of course changed the course of my entire day… she looked at me and said “hey can you hold this and when they lady comes out of the bathroom just hand it off to her!” so I naturally said “like the people who hand out water during marathons?” and the server agreed.

So while I was holding this glass I kinda turned to the guy who was at the bar next to me who was texting away madly on his phone and I just said “I don’t know how the hell I got dragged into this.”  Since he was smart and minding his own business I had to explain the situation to him.  The woman came out of the bathroom a minute or so later and I handed of her glass and she looked puzzled for a second and kept on stumbling.  I’m not sure if she was confused because this complete stranger had handed her a beverage or if it was just the general confusion she likely had going into the bathroom but she kept walking so no harm no foul.

After this episode I began talking to the guy next to me.  His name was Scott.  He was an average looking dude who I came to find out was 50 and a commercial airline pilot.  He said he was in town on a layover and that he came to that bar that fateful day because one of his buddies was a regular there and he was trying to surprise him.  He also said that a different buddy of his lived nearby and if his first buddy didn’t show up soon, this OTHER buddy (Tim) was going to pick him up and drive him around.  We continued to talk and shoot the shit and eventually he said Tim was on his way but that he wanted to “take me (meaning Scott) to his (meaning Tim) damn house… I wanna go out and watch the games!”  This continued into a phone call once this OTHER buddy got to the bar and eventually after Scott yelled “COME IN FOR ONE DRINK” enough, he got Time to come inside.  Tim ended up sitting between me and Scott where the open seat was and he introduced Tim to me and bought a round of drinks.  By this time the Patriots game had been on for a while, probably around halftime or so when Tim arrived and the day continued.  Scott apparently had money on every single game that day, betting the underdog in all of them… because who the hell knows why.  He obviously put money on the Cowboys which was something that Tim immediately started making fun of him for because even he knew that the Cowboys without Dez and Romo couldn’t match Tom Brady.  We all hung out, talked about whatever, Scott kept buying rounds for the three of us, when out of nowhere (literally out of nowhere… dude came from like down the hall where there are only bathrooms so I assume he must of came up through the toilet… which actually made his name make more sense now that I think about it) I hear a guy yell “WHITEY! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING HERE?!”  Scott turned and shouted back “SHREDDER!!!!” at the mystery man who came out of the toilet.  Apparently this is the guy they had been waiting for who they had decided long ago was not coming.  Once Shredder (whose real name was Tad I think) got there things escalated rather quickly.  Shredder appeared to be completely in the bag when he got there and I think Scott was just trying to get on his level.  They (meaning Scott, Tad, and Tad’s entourage he came with) went to a table nearby and started getting shots.  Tim and I just hung out and Tim started telling me he didn’t want to come in because he knew this would happen and that he was supposed to give some girl a ride to the airport.  He also said he apparently had 2 ex-girlfriends at his house and that one was crazy and the other was texting him about how the crazy one was apparently just walking around naked.  Tim knew Scott because they went to pilot school together so Tim was also a commercial airline pilot and he was 52 if I recall.  The Pats game at this point had become a blur in the background of these shenanigans and I lost focus on the fact that the Patriots had taken the lead.  I don’t think I saw like 85% of the game I had been looking forward to all day but I saw a play or two when Scott was yelling at the TV for the Cowboys to come back and win.  The game finally ended and Whitey and Tim left Shredder at the bar to go back to Tim’s house… or maybe another bar… not really sure.  I was there for probably a good 3 and a half hours or so and only bought 1 beer thanks to those two so I would classify that as a great day!  I grabbed two burgers to go and made the long trip home (approx. half a mile).  I was so flabbergasted by what had happened that I managed to stream together a thought or two to describe the night to Carissa… quite frankly she knew right away that Jeffrey had enjoyed a few sodas and was glad I wasn’t driving.

In all this madness I had forgotten about the fridge (which did not arrive by 4:00 and came closer to 5:00 I think).  The IKEA guys were nice enough to bring it up the stairs and drop it off right where the fridge was supposed to go.  They didn’t unwrap it though and as it turns out it was EXTREMELY annoying to undo 4 bolts with only a Leatherman’s tool (those fold up pliers that are only about half as effective as real pliers).

After that we were desperate to find a fan so we went to Big Lots! to look.  Naturally they only had heaters… because when it’s in the 90s, people clearly need heaters.  There was also a Wal-Mart Market next door which is just like a super Wal-Mart but only the super part.  So they didn’t have any of the normal things that Wal-Mart would have, just food (we didn’t know such things existed but apparently it’s not uncommon).  We got some groceries for the fridge and a Redbox movie to watch on my laptop since we still had no internet.  When we got home we just put the laptop on a barstool at the foot of the bed and watched a movie while falling asleep (it was “Focus” with Will Smith and Margot Robbie, I thought it was good… like the kind of movie you watch on a Sunday night when you have nothing to do but probably not the kind of movie you go out of your way to find).  So yeah, Sunday was a hell of a day.

MONDAY: It was Columbus Day!  Everybody got the day off!  Except Jeff.  Jeff worked.  Jeff had his first day of work in fact!  Since I didn’t have my car yet Carissa dropped me off at like 8:15 and I went up to start my old job in a new place!  There was an itinerary waiting for me of things to do.  The first items were filling out paperwork and get a tour of the building and meeting people and stuff.  There were 1.5 hours allotted for this.  We completed it in about 35 minutes.  After that I had things scheduled in one hour blocks every hour.  The second item was supposed to start at around 10 (an IT setup… I brought my computer from RI) was completed by around 9:30 since all the technology was the same, the third item was supposed to show me how to use a computer program I’ve been using for a year and a half then Lunch was scheduled for 12.  It was 10.  So I did what anybody in my position would do.  Deleted old emails and went on YouTube for 2 hours to kill time.  I went to another Mexican place for lunch, got taquitos and I think my body finally said “no more fried Mexican you moron” and I had a stomach ache for the rest of the day… Which was full of nothing by the way.  I had meetings with managers and stuff to say hello and one of them wasn’t even in the office and the other had a phone call after about 5 minutes of talking to him.  Either way I had met and talked to both of them already so there wasn’t much to talk about.  I was told in one of these meetings that the client I was supposed to be working on all week hadn’t gone through the client acceptance procedures yet so there wasn’t much for me to do.

TUESDAY: nothing happened.  Our apartment was still hot but it was starting to cool down.  I bought a fan on Amazon but didn’t get next day delivery because I’m dumb.  The internet router was delivered but it didn’t work so a technician had to come out but that couldn’t happen until Thursday.  I watched more YouTube videos at work.

WEDNESDAY: THE POD THAT HAD ALL OF OUR POSESSIONS CAME!  Carissa unpacked some of the stuff that was in the front of the POD and that she could get to.  I had called a moving company to come help us unpack describing our move as “nothing is really too heavy, we just can’t do it alone… I pretty much just need a friend but I just moved 3,000 miles so I don’t have any.”  So two guys who I assume were in college showed up around 5:00 to help us move everything from the POD up into the apartment.  The moving company told me their rates were for 2 guys for a minimum of 2 hours.  When I showed them the POD they got so pumped because they knew it would only take like 30 minutes.  Sure enough about 45 minutes later they had brought everything inside and even assembled the bed for us.  I gave them $160 bucks for their service and realized that if Carissa and I had done that ourselves it would have taken about 4 hours and probably would have led to a shouting match or two.  So it was worth every penny to have those guys come (Mission Movers for anybody looking for movers in Orange County).  We went out to dinner at this place nearby called Mimi’s Café and we realized we are probably going to become regulars there because the food was great, they served breakfast all day, and the house wines and sangrias were only $5 a glass.  I got a quiche and 3 glasses of chardonnay and it was gloriously affordable!

Also I watched a video at work about the maker of 5hr Energy.  I guess he’s worth $4 Billion dollars now and wants to change the earth.  It was a YouTube Advertisement that led me to watch a 45min movie about him.  This is the link to the trailer: https://youtu.be/se_fYZRbyJs  this is the link to the Documentary:https://youtu.be/YY7f1t9y9a0  (I want that bike… and those squeezy pants)

THURSDAY: The fan I bought on Amazon came and the cable guy came and installed our internet!  Carissa also did some serious work unpacking during the day which was SUPER awesome (thanks again!).  My car came during the day (as foreshadowed above… I haven’t taken any pictures but I will eventually) Carissa got to drive it around while I drove her car to work.  We went to a sports bar for dinner and watched Adrian Gonzales, Carl Crawford and the dodgers lose to the Mets.  At work I literally couldn’t find a single thing to do… it was October 15th too… the corporate filing deadline.  All I did all day was drive 5 minutes to a client to have them sign a tax return and then drive back.

FRIDAY (today):  Nothing happened for most of the day.  I seriously couldn’t find a damn thing to do at work.  Went to lunch and had Pad Thai (which was delicious) then somebody said “heard you’re going to San Francisco on Monday” to which I replied “really? Who told you that?”  That was around 12:30 and I didn’t hear another word about it after that.  I had been told I might work on one of the San Francisco jobs in November but hadn’t heard anything about next week.  Then at around 4:40 I am sitting at my desk, watching hockey on my computer (benefit of games starting at 7pm EST is they start at 4 pacific) when one of the managers walks up to my cube and says “so I talked to a partner in San Francisco and he wanted to know if you could help out on one of his jobs next week.  It’ll just be a couple days, probably like Tuesday through Thursday or something because I don’t think they’ll have you go out on Monday since that’s really short notice.  I’ve been trying to contact [the partner] for like 30 minutes but he hasn’t answered my calls or emails so I’ll let you know when I know something.”  About 10 minutes later I got a phone call from the San Francisco partner telling me he wanted me to come up and help them work on something.  He figured it would only take a couple days, probably three at the most but he wants me up there Monday morning.  Sooooooo I booked a flight on southwest and I leave Monday morning at 6:45 to take my first trip to San Francisco!  Something tells me I won’t have too much leisure time while I’m there but hey! At least I get a free trip to San Francisco!

On next week’s edition I will do my best to include pictures and videos of the apartment and car and stuff!

-JD

Holy Shit We Live Here Now!

(originally posted October 10th)

Soooooo for those of you that haven’t figured out whats going on yet, Carissa and I packed everything in a POD and moved to Southern California this week. I transferred jobs with my company and Carissa can actually say she quit her job and moved to California. I’ll do a quick recap of the first week here.

Monday: Left TF Green Airport in Providence, RI and traveled for 10ish hours to get to Los Angeles, CA around 7pm (local time). From there we went and rented our sweet Kia Sedona minivan (thanks Ronnie) and drove to the Airbnb where we were staying. We also went out to dinner at a place whose name I don’t remember but that my Uncle Jim recommended. they had good food and it was overlooking Laguna beach.

Tuesday: It was a day of apartment searching. We saw like 10ish apartments and pretty much did nothing else all day. We had dinner at Del Taco which is pretty much a different taco bell chain but I didn’t have to be wasted at 2am to want to eat it. Also the property manager at the first place we saw was a girl named “Carmel Monger.” We had to explain the concept of what a snow day was to her because while talking about New England weather she didn’t really understand what a “snow day” was. I’d like to think its because she was too focused on her carmel endeavors.

Wednesday: Carissa had job interviews out the wazoo and i went to look for a car. i went to a stereotypical used car dealer and when i was looking at the car it was falling apart before my eyes. needless to say we left and i kept on trucking along in my super cool mom-mobile. We also ate dinner at Buco De Bepo which is the most fun thing to say in a confused voice with an Italian accent like “aaaayyyyyyy buco de bepo buco de bepooooooo“. We also saw the Martian which was a great movie. Matt Damon.

Thursday: More interviews for Carissa and more car hunting for Jeff. I went further north on Thursday to check out what there was north of Anaheim. I drove past Angels Stadium (baseball) and the Honda Center (hockey) which are conveniently on opposite sides of the highway. I drove a car that seemed pretty neat but the place didn’t have great reviews. It was still probably the best option to that point but you never buy the first candy you see right?

Friday: Drove to San Diego to look at more cars. Ended up buying a 2005 Audi A4 Convertible. Its red and has a multi-disk CD player (I’m moving forward slowly in the car audio department). It was a long day of test driving cars but when we woke up we had no apartment, Carissa had no job, i had no car, and both of us were not sweaty. By the time we got home around 9pm we found out that our apartment application had been approved, Carissa had accepted a job, I bought a car (pictures forthcoming) and both of us had sweat through our clothes! All and all I would say this week came together much more nicely than either of us really expected. Side note: we went to Ocean Beach for dinner after we put the down payment on my new car and Carissa stepped in puke. then she walked around like she had a club foot trying to get the puke off her sandal. So everybody was a winner!
-JD