"Can you come look at the house at 8:30?" "PM?! Uh... sure...."

(Caveat: The following was written and posted at about 10 pm after a crazy day of house-hunting that started at 4:00am in Portland, OR. I've decided to leave it up, crazy and disjointed as it is--it captures how crazy I felt by the end of the day!!)

When we finally got back to the hotel (to finally stay there for the night, that is), Charlie turned on the TV and John Stewart was saying something about people taking vacations.
Well, today is the first of our "vacation" days off from work for the purpose of visiting Boise and finding a house to live in.

Trivial, light-hearted fun!

Actually, we're having a lovely time together--exploring Boise, meeting people, and enjoying the 70 degree days (!!!). It's just that we've been up since 4:00 am this morning.

Of course the day started E-A-R-L-Y in Portland this morning. Even the cat, known for his 7-am-on-a-Sunday-good-morning-walk-up-your-body-and-lick-your-forehead, seemed to think this was a little extreme (he was the last one in the house to get up this morning, and when I fed him, he kind of stumbled into the living room--because that's what he was "supposed" to do--and then spent a while looking at his food in a confused sort of way). We had a gorgeous and amazing flight from Portland to Boise. I forget how much I enjoy flying! As we climbed out of town, we were moments away from identifying my house from above when we broke through the clouds and into clear, sunny skies.

It was breathtaking. Mt. Hood, Mt. Adams, Mt. St. Helens, Jefferson and the Sisters, and possibly even Baker (though, we weren't entirely sure about that one) were all rising above the clouds. I've never taken pictures from a plane before, but I think I got some nice ones today despite the fuzzy, blurry airplane windows.


In addition to the mountains, it was amazing to see how the clouds ended abruptly at the Eastern edge of Mt. Hood, and kind of poured into the valleys and into nothingness.


(In the picture above, from left to right: Mt Hood, Mt. St. Helens, Mt. Rainier, Mt. Adams)

(Above: Mt. Adams in foreground, Rainier behind.)

After we landed in Boise and picked up our rental car, we set out immediately to meet up with a rental management representative and check out a house. And so began our day. We had three appointments lined up to see houses even before we arrived. Aside from a brief interlude in which Charlie took a brief work meeting (and I went to Starbucks and searched for more houses) it was all houses all the time. Back and forth across Boise I-can't-tell-you-how-many-times.

In the end, the tally has us at: 5 houses toured, one house rented away before we could view it, and countless houses visited from the outside and either rejected or added to the "emergency back-up" list. We have three applications in-hand that we intend to complete this weekend, all three of which are for places with their perks, their quirks, and that we all love a little already. We'll see. Once our brains are feeling a little less loose and wiggly in our skulls (aka, tomorrow!) we'll be figuring out our game plan and lining up a few back-up apps.

Boy. Are. We. Exhausted.

I have to say, we've sure met some lovely people along the way today--everyone has been so kind and so friendly. I really think that we're going to enjoy living here. If for no other reason than that Boise is such a trusting place!

TWO of the appointments for houses we had lined up in advance for this trip involved landlords who left the doors unlocked (or told us, raw strangers from the internet, where the keys were hidden)--when I asked the first leasing agent about the car break-in rates in the neighborhood (a valid question, I thought, given he busy street close by, and our experiences with petty crime of that nature in Portland!), she looked at me as if I'd just said something truly appalling. It took her completely off-guard, "I don't keep crime statistic rates on my properties." But I love how trusting and sincere Boise seems. That said, I don't plan on changing my habits of locking doors any time soon!

Anyhow, we had some fun checking out rentals today, so I'll leave you with a couple funny shots.







(And no, ye curious minds, Charlie didn't actually use the toilet in the picture above.)