Offending the potato sensibilities of Idaho

After I made the last bland post about "what we did last weekend" I remembered a story that I was meaning to relate to you but had forgotten about. So you get the BONUS FEATURE of two posts in one day.

So, as I mentioned below, one of the activities on our radar this weekend was celebrating the birthday of a close friend of mine. I wanted to find her the perfect birthday present, and, of course, she's kind of a notoriously hard person to shop for. Eventually I came up with something that I was pleased with, but then wanted to top the gift off with a little humor. And, as we now live in Idaho, I decided that a potato-theme was absolutely in order. I'd wanted to buy her a beautiful russet, tie a red ribbon around it and include it in her package, but as Friday afternoon ticked on, I ran out of time to swing by the grocery store to pick one up.

All we had at home was a bag of little red potatoes.

Creativity kicked into high gear, and I found a length of ribbon, a big needle, and strung three of the red potatoes onto the ribbon for, voila! a quick, home-made potato necklace. I stuffed it into the bag with her other gift (glassware, so I'd stashed it in my carry-on for safe travels).

Charlie and I arrived at the airport in perfect time. I took off anything metal, and we went through the security line. I have to say, for such a small airport, they sure were surly on Friday. The TSA women snapped at both of us, chastised us for heading in the wrong direction after the metal detector, and snapped at us for handing them more papers than just our boarding passes. It just seemed an extension of this hospitality when they stopped the conveyor belt to take a closer look at my bag.

There was much nodding and consulting behind the x-ray machine, and then finally one of the uniformed women stepped out, asked, "Is this your bag?" and told me she needed to take a look inside. She scooped up my bin, and led me down to the examination table. Kindly enough, once we reached the table she allowed me to put my shoes on before she started going through things. GEE, THANKS.

Her first question, "Do you have anything sharp in your bag?"

I replied that it was my work bag, and that while I didn't think I did, it was possible that there might be something I'd forgotten? (The whole time I was thinking of my old boss who'd forgotten that she had a giant steak knife in her work bag and then tried to go through airport security--didn't go over so well, but we had a good laugh over it.)

She opened up my bag and went immediately for Celeste's present. I didn't make a peep. First thing she gets to, of course, is the potato necklace. Three red potatoes strung onto a white satiny ribbon. She stops. Looks at me. Looks at the potatoes. Looks at me again. And, with no smile, question, or even hint of amusement, shakes her head disgustedly (with one skeptical eyebrow arched), and asks again, "Do you have anything sharp in there?" This time, her tone was annoyed.

I shook my head.

"Just go ahead."

"Thank you!"

Anyhow, I guess you can just call me "the Potato Bomber" from here on out.

I considered telling her it was a low-fat version of a candy necklace. Something for me to snack on during the plane ride if I got hungry.

Probably wouldn't have thought that was funny, either, though.

Misc. thoughts on various things.

So far so good. We've been on an almost-weekly roll with this blog. All things considered, that's not too bad. Of course, I'd like to be even better than that about updating, but, I suppose there has to be time to do those things that we're telling you about, right?

Rest assured that things continue to plug along in Spudward land. Charlie's job is picking up steam as we approach his busiest time of year (start of school, homecoming, etc), and he's working his tookus off. Lots of early mornings, busy evenings, and hectic days. It really makes me appreciate not having a 40-minute commute to see one another--when his job in Forest Grove was in a similarly busy phase, the amount of time we were able to spend together plummeted.

I am an interviewing machine as of late: one interview last week, and three more this week. Things seem to finally be starting to stick (cross your fingers for that). To date, I've completed applications for 30 jobs, have had interviews scheduled for 6 of those jobs, and have been rejected for approximately 14 (that I've officially heard back from... a few others I think I can unofficially assume I've been rejected for based on the length of time elapsed since I've applied). Wow. Of course, a few of those applications were long shots--"Wouldn't it be awesome if..." sort of things. Sooner or later the right thing will come along. Keep thinking job-y thoughts for me!

Despite all this business, Charlie and I have been traveling machines, too. Last weekend we made it back to Oregon to celebrate and wedding and a birthday. It was such a ridiculously short trip... we both wished that we could spend another day (or ten) there with friends and family. The wedding was at beautiful Skamania Lodge, and it was great to be able to connect with the whole Johansson clan on family and friends.

Of course, for those of you who know Charlie and I (which I hope most of those reading do!), you know that the trip wouldn't be complete without something a little strange and quirky. And boy do we have it for you this time!

Our good friend Devon drove us out to the wedding on Saturday morning, and, trying to squeeze in a little more time together, we decided to find a park and hang out by the Columbia River for a while (we'd talked about day hiking, but then no one did any research, and we decided to just walk around instead). Passing the turn for Skamania, we came across Home Valley Park... a little local park with a windsurfing beach that happened to be hosting a festival that weekend: The Bigfoot Bash and Bounty.

As you know, Charlie and I have a funny fascination with all things Bigfoot (we even chose a hike just because it featured a Sasquatch trap!), so we definitely had to check this one out. The Bigfoot Bounty and Bash turned out to be quite the serious affair. It featured lectures, a concert stage, a life-sized bigfoot cut-out, a person in a bigfoot costume, face painting, a beer garden, and a fun run! Yet, despite all of that, what it lacked was any sense of humor whatsoever.

We sat down to listen to a woman speak about her experience meeting bigfoot while hiking, and I still can't believe how solemn and sincere it was. Not an ounce of humor. She deeply, thoroughly believed that bigfoot was a kind, gentle creature--as evidenced by the restraint he exercised toward loggers destroying his forests! We were willing to give her the benefit of the doubt on that, but when she said that she "sincerely believed that bigfoot was an interdimensional species" we decided it was time to leave before our snorts and chortles offended anyone. Maybe he is. Maybe we're just not ready to believe.

Here are a few pictures from the event:

Devon and Charlie get up close and personal with the hairy man of the woods:




It's real, folks, I promise!



Despite all the infrastructure for fun, not much going on here. And yes, that is a giant painted bigfoot next to the tree.




Anyhow, Charlie has Labor Day off, so we're toying with the idea of taking a camping road trip down to Salt Lake City and back for the weekend. We haven't really set up much in the way of "plans" yet, so any ideas or suggestions would be awesome. I'll let you know how it pans out.

Not even a potato product of Idaho.

So I just looked at a bag of red potatoes I bought at the grocery store.

Guess where they're from.

Yeah, I would have guessed Idaho, too. Seems like a "DUH" sort of question.

They're from Tualatin, OR.

I've been quite surprised to find how many of our products and how much of our produce comes to Boise via Oregon. It seems like every time I take a moment to look, we're "importing" something into our kitchen from the motherland. Even, it turns out, potatoes.

Actually, I was doing a little website/company specific job-hunting the other day, and, knowing that it has a big presence in Idaho, wandered onto the Albertsons page. Well, guess where their corporate headquarters are: Portland.

Phllllllt.

This brings me to think about the conversations we've had about how Charlie and I are going to try to localize our purchasing power as much as possible. We don't have current plans to try for a 100-mile diet, and we don't do anywhere near the shopping we should at the farmer's market (and can't afford to shop as much as we'd like at the Co-op), but we've had some conversations about what we are going to try to consider "local." Let me emphasize, we're not "locavore" purists, but we appreciate the importance and power of that movement. So, we've decided to try and support products that come from a one-state radius: Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Montana, etc.

And probably from Mexico, too. Gotta have those avocados.

More importantly, we've decided to try to prioritize our spending when it comes to food--particularly meat. While neither of us is planning on becoming a vegetarian yet, we have decided to do our best to make ethical meat purchases. Rather than buy that cheap meat at the big box grocery store, we've decided to spend a little more on the small ranch raised, grass-fed products--or, if we can't justify the expense, we'll go without. Happy piggies taste better, and will make us feel better in the end. Not to mention we'll support small operations so as to avoid the ethical treatment issues, waste issues, and importing-across-large-distances issues.

So, anyhow. We're on the hunt for some good Idaho meat. Guess we'll have to visit the Co-op after all! Unless you know of a good meat producer in Tualatin?

On Idaho.

Well, believe it or not, despite having the Olympics to wrench ourselves away from (well, wrench myself away from, Charlie seems to have no trouble), we've still managed to get out and about a little over the past week. I apologize for the lack of updates, Charlie is due up to post a great entry about our two most recent camping trips, and I was saving the spotlight for him. Unfortunately, life and work got in the way, and he's off to McCall for a weekend leadership retreat. So, until he gets back, and puts together a great post about camping in Idaho, you'll just have to suffer with me instead.

That's not to say that things aren't a little busy in my life as well. I've had some leads on jobs lately that have led to a couple interviews. I'm sort of superstitious over talking about such things while they're still in the unconfirmed phases (job opportunities), so I'll give you more details later. They've both great jobs, and so far all the people have been extremely nice. I had one interview on Tuesday, and another lined up for next Thursday. So, even though I'm not showing many of my cards, keep your fingers crossed. As nice as taking a break from work has been, I think the cat is getting tired of sharing his couch.

I mentioned a little that we'd been doing some camping lately--we had an amazing trip up to the Sawtooth Mts. that I'll let Charlie fill the details in around later. But we traveled with Charlie's parents and friends, seven of us in total, and had the chance to see Stanley, ID, and the amazing area around it. Really, really spectacular.

Charlie and I had a conversation on the car trip home about Idaho in general. How are you feeling about it? What's your impression so far? We were both of the opinion that we're quite, quite fond of the place so far--especially everything north of the foothills. We've had some remarkable trips already. As for Boise, and the more arid parts of the state, I think they're growing on us, but there's still some growing left to do. We're toying with the idea of a Labor Day weekend camping trip south of here, and driving down toward Salt Lake City for the weekend. Maybe that will give us the chance to really appreciate this desert climate.

I've gotten out into the foothills for a little sagebrush appreciation lately, and I've found it quite interesting. So dry, and such a different climate from what I'm used to. But I certainly think there's beauty there, and I'm working on finding it for myself.

I'm trying to think of an especially interesting anecdote to share with you before I go, but it's still early here, so my brain is running on empty. I'm sure I'll come up with something as soon as I sign off. If so, I'll let you know.


UPDATE: While musing over something interesting to share with the blog-o-sphere, I remembered this post that I put up before our camping trip over on Portlandiaquill. It's about getting used to all the creepy crawly and extreme things that we've been encountering here. If things like spiders with boxing-glove-shaped genitalia sound curious and interesting to you, you should probably read it. And for the record, we've killed like five of them now. IN OUR HOUSE. I'm trying to talk Charlie into getting a vacuum cleaner despite the fact that we have hardwood floors. GUHHHHH.....!!!!!

A funny story about moving out (better late than never)

So, this story is a little belated timeline-wise. But I wanted to wait until things were all wrapped up with our property management company back in Portland before exposing this story to the world (internet). For those of you that haven't heard it yet, it's a doozy.

About a month ago (actually, exactly a month ago yesterday) Devon and I were working hard to complete the final scrub-down of our house in Portland. Everything was packed up and crammed into cars and moving vans, and the house was looking good. As we sweated and scrubbed in the 90 degree heat, we ticked off rooms: bedrooms, bathrooms, closets, living room--DONE! We had the kitchen left to scrub, and a final zoom through with the vacuum. Devon was scrubbing the kitchen, and I was touching up a little paint damage we'd managed to do to the baseboards around the house.

Let me advise you right now, NEVER do baseboard touch-up work in a house that you are about an hour away from being DONE with. NEVER AGAIN.

I was in one of the bedrooms, scootching my way around the floor of the room on my butt, filling the little dark spots where the paint had been chipped off. Let me add, the baseboards in our house were white, so I had a can of white paint I was carrying around with me. Paint can in hand, I stood up to take a look at how things were going, and promptly stubbed my toe on the carpet and tripped. The paint can flew out of my hands, and paint exploded across the BROWN carpet and onto the tan walls. There was paint EVERYWHERE.

Based on the speed at which Devon made it into the room, the tone of my voice when I howled "OH NO, DEVON!!!!" must have been a pretty good indicator of my emotion: panic. We grabbed as many towels as we could find and started frantically sopping up paint. What in the HELL were we going to do? Not only was our deposit as good as gone, we were probably going to have to pay to have the whole damn room re-carpeted--maybe even the whole HOUSE.

We had been probably TWO hours from being done with the house, and still hadn't had dinner. The frantic brainstorming started. I encouraged Devon to start helping with the carpet rather than the walls (we had matching paint for the walls, we could touch that up later). Thinking back to what had worked best as far as getting the paint brushes clean, I told Devon we HAD to keep the paint wet. If we let it dry, there was no hope left. I grabbed a water bottle and then a bucket and started pouring water directly on the carpet. Then came the dish soap. It had worked for getting the paint out of the brushes, why not the carpet? So, with a sponge mop, a bucket of water, rags and a bottle of dishsoap, we went to work. And believe it or not, it started to come up.

We managed to get about 1/2 of the paint out that way, I think (or maybe it was just more spread out?). Devon started thinking, and remembered that she'd seen carpet cleaners for rent at Fred Meyer. At this point, it couldn't hurt. She jumped in the car, and drove out to the store to see about renting one. Sure enough, they had them. Unfortunately, they required photo ID to rent one. And hers was locked in her office at work (oh, the coincidence). She blasted home, tossed me her car keys (mine was packed with plants--no room for a steam cleaner), and I went and grabbed the machine.

I cannot BELIEVE how well it worked. It was outstanding. Emily, David, and their friend Allen came by to pick up Flymo (our hovercraft lawnmower) as I was sucking up the last of it and drying out the carpet. By that point, aside from my frazzled appearance, they swore you couldn't tell there'd been a bucket of paint spilled all over the carpet. The other awesome thing about the cleaner, is that it sucked up all the water we'd dumped on the carpet trying to prevent the paint from drying.

Devon stopped by the next day to check on things, and she said there was no sign of the disaster. Sure enough, we got our deposit back from the management company today, and it was the entire thing.

Good grief.

The moral of this story is: don't play with paint in rental houses.

Extra curricular.

I promise that this is, in fact, a Charlie and Ariel blog... searching and applying for jobs (while not far from a full-time job in and of itself) leaves me with a little more down time than Charlie has had recently to post updates. I’m sure than when our internet is up and running, you’ll hear from him a little more frequently.

Aside from all the moving in and job-hunting stuff, we’ve been pretty busy since we arrived.

To begin, as an amazing welcome to Boise gift, Brian and Marsha (friends of the Varlands), gave Charlie and I tickets to attend a performance of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, put on by the Idaho Shakespeare Festival. It was an impressive show. The acting was exquisite, and the subject, though a little somber for a typical Fourth of July, was poignant and thought-provoking.

The setting for their plays couldn’t have been more perfect. The performances take place around sunset, a little outside of town, in a sleek amphitheater tucked into a bend of the Boise river. Before the show, you package up a picnic (including beer or a bottle of wine!), and bring it and your blanket or lawn chairs to the theater. The seating is terraced, and you can find your assigned grassy plot, and set up camp. They also have tables and chairs set up further back for those less naturally-inclined (or with more extravagant picnics). Watching live theater in the cool night air (a relief after those 100-degree days!), with a bottle of wine and picnic is really about as good as it gets. I can appreciate why it’s such a beloved staple of Boise culture.

We’ve done a little biking up and down the Greenbelt (probably 5 miles in each direction, east and west), and have taken several walks around the North End (the historic district our apartment borders upon). It’s interesting to see a climate so different from that which we’re accustomed. Cottonwood trees thronging the river banks, "puncture vines" (still not sure what they are specifically except that they sound BAD) in the open areas surrounding the bike trail, and dry, dry, dry once you get away from the river. Despite all my "woe is me" over the brown hills and the lack of count-able trees, the countryside here is growing on me. The hills not sit in my mind as more "golden" than brown, and the scarcity of trees outside of the city makes the ones we have here a little more special.

Part of my "coming around" might have had to do with the short little hike Charlie and I took up at the Bogus Basin ski area a couple weeks ago. We drove up on a Friday (before he started work) and wove our way through the summer version of ski runs (dirt trails and double-tracks) to the top of the Schafer Saddle. Our trail was choked with wildflowers and thick with butterflies. To the north and east we could see acre upon acre of woods and mountains. To the south and west, dry, flat, "golden." We really do live on the edge of where the climate changes from one to the other. It’s a unique place. We had a nice picnic on the summit and enjoyed the views of the Treasure Valley and the Sawtooth Mountains. Given my skiing ability (or pronounced lack thereof), upon looking at the signs for the different runs up there at the top I gave that view an extra-hard look--it could be the only season in which I’m able to enjoy it. Unless, of course, they start allowing people to ride the lifts up and then back DOWN again.

Most recently, we were able to catch the Twilight Criterion bike race in downtown Boise. The final two races of the day (the ones we made it there for) were the top women and men racing that night--for those bike folks "in the know" I believe I heard someone say that the top riders were Category 2 racers. Included among them was Kristen Armstrong who walloped the ladies’ field in her final race before the Beijing Olympics. We had a great spot on the last corner before the finish line, and were thoroughly impressed by how fast and how nimble everyone rode. Ms. Armstrong in particular was outstanding. By the end of the race, she had left the pack in the dust--lapping them on her way to the finish line. I sent a text message to one of my bikey friends back in Portland exclaiming over this feat. Her response was "Wow, she must be a professional." It was later that we realized we’d seen someone headed for the Olympics. Explained a lot.

The men’s race was also exciting, though from our position it was difficult to tell how many laps they had left or how close they were to one another at the finish. Not exceedingly familiar with the competition, it also made it difficult to keep track of who was ahead and to not lose them in the pack. Despite that, the teamwork and strategy involved in the race was apparent, and we had a fantastic time watching it all unfold (even though we may not have completely understood what it was we were seeing at all times).

This coming weekend, we’re planning on putting together a short hike and overnight up in the mountains somewhere. We had some exciting thunderstorms blow through yesterday, so we’ll have to do some research and make sure there’s nothing washed out or burning where we intend to head. I think that we’re both excited to get out of the city (at last!) and see a little more of the state that we now call "home."

Until then,

xoxoxo

END EPISODE I.

(In which Charlie and Ariel pack their worldly belongings and attempt the Oregon Trail in reverse)

Some photos from the moving in process.

I've uploaded a whole slew of photos to my flickrstream. You, of course, can see the entire batch of our moving pictures there.
In the meantime, however, here are a select few to flesh out the longer post below.



As you can see, we are all still smiling. :)

This is at our first break in The Dalles. Charlie's wearing the awesome Woodpecker Trucking cap his parents found for him. It matches the giant Penske truck (for the record, I wussed out and refused to drive that truck AT ALL; Charlie is the real champ for driving it across Oregon and into Idaho).



Thank goodness for the fact that Charlie and I are cohabitating. This picture proves my crazy plant-lady tendencies. My car was packed to the gills with plants, cleaning supplies, and the cat.

All I need now is a scary Ms. Havisham cake.



We ended up having quite a bit of furniture that needed assembling. Our new Ikea loveseat is included in the tally. It was far simpler to put together than the cube of materials and 30-page booklet may have implied. We were even able to put it together as our brains slowly melted into the new hot weather.



NICE, isn't it? This was our scary view for the first couple of days. It looks like a garage! I think it's safe to say that it doesn't look like this any longer. I've taken the first couple of photos of the "finished" rooms, and will be getting them up here before long.

Updates since the prior post.

Since I typed up the prior post (at home, while un-wired), there are a few things to update. Of course, we're having our very first cloudy day. It's kind of nice. :)

Finally a post about something more than the internet

Even though the internet drama is still in the works (the internet is in a box on our couch, our property manager has verified that we have no normal phone jack, and she’s calling the owner and the phone company to see what happens next), I decided it was only fair to take a little time to type up a few observations about moving in, our experiences so far in Idaho, and getting used to living in an apartment again.

To begin, we had such a welcome send off from Portland and arrival in Boise on our moving day. Charlie’s mom and dad drove down to Portland so that his dad could assist us in driving our two cars and the moving van cross-state. It was such an amazing help to have that third person for the driving. We made a quick stop for a lovely warm breakfast (both the food and the people!) at the home of relatives of Charlie’s that live in Hillsboro, Oregon. After hugs and bon voyages, we hit the road.

There’s not a ton to say about being on the road. We drove. And drove and drove and drove. I’d had a bad experience the night before at an Oil Can Henry’s in which they essentially told me my car wouldn’t make it back to my house that night—let along all the way to Idaho!—so I was a little anxious about that most of the way. Suffice to say we made it here just fine. The cat survived the trip, too. We wedged the carrier into the front seat next to me, and he alternately meowed indignantly and slept with his back to me for the entire eight hours.

When we arrived here in Boise, family friends of Charlie’s showed up with tennis shoes and open arms and helped us unload the van. It was such an amazing help. We had six people in total helping us carry boxes from the street into our apartment. After spending the better part of two days painstaking loading things into the van, it was remarkable how fast we were able to empty it out. We then all hoofed it up to a bar and grill just up the road for a beer and a light dinner. After all the driving, and then a little drama with our apartment keys (the post office started forwarding my mail two days early, and thus the priority mail package containing our keys never made it to us in Portland—fortunately, our property manager lives within walking distance and could bring extra keys over), it was amazing to just relax and enjoy good food and such welcoming company.

Beyond that, our first week was concerned primarily with unloading boxes and trying to find things like clean underwear and the little Ziploc baggies we’d packed full of our furniture assembling hardware. In the process of opening and breaking down boxes, it was hilarious how many knives accumulated all around our house. We decided that 1) we felt exceptionally safe in case of a home intrusion (there were weapons hidden everywhere!) and 2) it would have been an excellent setting for an action movie (weapons hidden everywhere, boxes to back flip over). Sharp pointies aside, Otto settled right in, and we utilized our AC only a few times as we got used to a standard daily temperature of over 90 degrees. The other night, taking an evening walk, Charlie and I noted that since we’ve been here, it’s been sunnier than you can even imagine—we haven’t even had a single, fully cloudy day. Two weeks of exclusively sunny days. All sun, all the time.

Readjusting to apartment life has been… amusing. As it turns out, we’ve had a rock band (real, not video game) living in the basement apartment just below us. Fortunately, they sound awesome and they shut down practices by 9:00pm. Unfortunately they like to play loud and their drums are just below our dining room/library room. It’s also taken us a while to get used to the number of smokers in our building. They can’t smoke in the building, but it certainly wafts into the windows when they smoke in the rear courtyard. Finally, there’s a screamer in the building. We’re talking Herbal Essences, full blown best-experience-of-my life type of screamer (if you know what I’m insinuating). At least we know everyone is happy, right?

Everyone has been so friendly and welcoming. We’ve met almost all our neighbors, and they’re all exceptionally nice. The people above us invited Charlie up for a barbeque on the roof (I was feeling a little under the weather so declined), and the people (non-band people) in the other basement apartment complimented how good our food always smells. Oh yeah, and, as it turns out, the band moved out this week and the apartment below us is now for rent. Overall, things are good.

Adjusting to living together has been a funny process for Charlie and I, too. We’ve found we have such a funny collection of duplicate things. Two coffee brewers (the conversation went like this: “Mine makes tasty coffee!” “Mine’s smaller than yours! It fits better!” “Mine matches our other kitchen stuff!”—of course it was all in good spirits), too many knives, and too many Norton Anthologies. We’ve also found a few things that we’re curiously lacking: glasses (as in water/drinking glasses), floor lamps, chairs. As I’m sure any couple moving in together can attest to discovering, one of us is also a little less tidy than the other as well. I bet it won’t surprise anyone to hear how than dynamic breaks down. We’re thinking about getting Charlie a dust buster so that he can follow me around and pick up the trail of debris that follows in my wake. Whoops!

We’ve found that we’re also sharing our building with an unusual set of neighbors: a swarm of honeybees! The other night we were getting ready for bed, and I noticed Otto, nose to the ground, following behind a honeybee that was walking along the floor. The next night, there were three in the house, flying around the light fixture. We stuffed the gaps around the air conditioner with towels, and then the next day went outside to see if there was anything out there. Sure enough, in a crack between stones, we spotted a nest of honeybees. We elected not to make a big deal about it, considering the state of honeybees in the world right now, and I have to say, sitting near that window, I love to watch them flying to and from their nest. The towels worked wonders, and we all can coexist happily. Yellow jackets are one thing, honeybees have a whole different benign presence to them.

I think that this is about it for now as far as apartment updates go. I have plenty more to share with you all about other things we’ve seen and done since moving here, but those will appear in future posts. Stay tuned for updates about the day hike we took, the play we attended, live (free!) music, and the perils of job hunting.

Meanwhile, I’ll leave you with this funny little Boise fact. According to Wikipedia, the climate here is officially semi-arid. Other regions of the world sharing a semi-arid climate include: the Australian outback, Northern Africa, West Texas, and Pakistan. They are doing a military training exercise south of here in which they’ve created a faux Iraqi town, have hired actors, and are going to try to give soldiers a relatively similar experience to that which they’ll encounter in Iraq and Afghanistan. The newsman said that, while the temperatures were on average 10 degrees cooler here than in Iraq, otherwise it’s a remarkably similar climate.

So, there you have it. We send our love from little Persepolis.

xoxo

Ariel and Charlie

The woes of getting wired

Well, we still don't have the internet.

This is becoming somewhat of an interesting saga. First, we ordered the internet from Qwest. Charlie was on the phone with them for nearly an hour. First came the identity verification test. His information failed the first time, then went through the second time (what, you have to have a green card to get the internet now?) for inexplicable reasons. Countdown: 20 minutes verifying information. Then, upon giving the associate our address, we apparently did not exist as an apartment building. We were listed as an "institute" of some sort. To remedy this situation, they need to contact our property manager and have her vouch as to the fact that we indeed have a bed, a stove, and a couch in our domicile, and that no, there weren't padded walls or any officy goings-on in our space. Once these two hurdles were cleared (countdown: 30 more minutes of waiting) the associate thanked Charlie profusely for his kindness and patience, and promised to send a box with the internet to our doorstep.

That was, I believe, Monday morning. With the giddy patience of kindergartners on Christmas Eve, Charlie and I checked our front porch daily to see if the internet had yet arrived. Finally, come Friday, it showed up. The irony of waiting for a snail mail box to bring us the internet was not lost on us--in fact, the chuckles we shared over it made the wait that much more tolerable (as did the free wireless at the Library!--that's how it's officially written here: always with the exclamation point). Charlie unpacked the box and we petted and ooh-ed over the sleek cords and fancy wireless modem router.

Then we set to locating the phone jack for the long-awaited consummation of our internet hopes. Funny thing is, there wasn't one. We've searched our apartment high and low, and unless the phone jack is hidden behind the refrigerator, we've discovered that there simply ISN'T one in our apartment. THE PAIN THE AGONY! It seems like a strange thing to be lacking, since these have been apartments for, oh, the last 99 YEARS or so. We have a call into our property manager (late in the day on Friday) so hopefully we can get this ironed out sometime this week. We asked another building resident whether he has a phone jack in his apartment, and apparently they do, so hopefully we're just not looking in the right drawers or storage closets for ours.

More about Boise and our experiences here once we're wired, I promise! For now, things are going well, and I hope they are well for you too.

We're both missing you all but having a great time here so far, too.

x's and o's,

Ariel and Charlie

Short post

I just wanted to leave a short post on here to let you all know that we made it to Boise just fine.
Cat, Charlie, and Ariel are all happy, healthy, and HOT. It's supposed to be 106 here today. That's just WRONG.

Lots of stories from moving and pre-moving to share with you all, but since I'm on library-time internet, I don't have the spare minutes left.

Rest assured you will hear all sorts of fun things in good time.

Once we dig out of all the boxes in our apartment and get our internet set up, you'll be the first ones to know.
:)

Until then, think chilly thoughts for us.

One more thing...

I forgot to mention in my previous post, I found out a little more about the building that our new apartment is in.

Apparently, it's on the National Register of Historic Places! The building was built in 1909, and it's one of two "Wolters Double Houses" (it, and the building next to it)--essentially, old "duplexes" or row houses. It was built by the same architects who constructed the beautiful Boise High school and the Egyptian Theater downtown!

Our leasing agent also let us know that these beautiful fixtures (in the dining room area) are original:


We'll be living in turn-of-the-century STYLE my friends! I can't wait to have you all over for tea, crumpets, and a ballyhoo.

And thus commence packing.

Wow. One week (did you hear me: ONE WEEK) until Charlie and I (and Charlie's dad!) make the big drive from Portland to Boise, earthly possessions in tow.

The closer we get to that day, the more things speed up. Tomorrow is my last day of work, and then it's a pack-a-thon until we fly our little nests on the morning of the 1st.

Pack-a-thon and clean-a-thon that is.

I remain stunned by how much dust accumulates in my house. I also remain stunned by the amount of JUNK that builds up. Time to purge. Hopefully a "free" listing on Craigslist takes care of at least some of it.


I'm also going to try to sell a few more things (couch, nasty old papasan chair, some old bike wheel rims, old horseback riding breeches/boots, etc.). Hopefully craigslist works out, and we'll be done with those things soon.

* * *

Otto isn't exactly sure what to make of all this packing up. He'll zoom around the house, frolicking in all the new, extra space, and then he'll stop, look up at me with these forlorn, confused little eyes. It's pretty apparent he knows that SOMETHING is up, just not quite what.

One thing is for certain, though, he doesn't want to be left behind:

Forgot to add...

Forgot to mention, the rest of the pictures from our trip are up... you can check them out at http://www.flickr.com/photos/arielarielariel/ if you're so inclined!