AC went out last week - again, the year's hottest week (same as last year) - only this time we hassled the new maintenance staff for not one, but two window units, and much to our delight they obliged. On top of that, they actually convinced our HVAC contractors to come out and work on installing a new unit all together; last year they may have just patched a broken wire to the compressor with some duct tape. Possibly scotch tape it was so inefficient.
AC and few other issues aside, our new site manager has been doing good things for the apartment complex. Our community garden is thriving - I just made a homemade ratatouille of sorts last night including homegrown peppers, tomatoes, parsley, and basil - delish! The pool offered a measley little hotdog for the July 4th holiday, but nevertheless we scarfed it down after a busy weekend of family time and fireworks that Monday off. The most recent exciting news related to the apartment is but of course an end in sight. On to bigger and ideally better things with buying a house! Turning the house into home will be our project, and the timing of it all is truly inescapably nervewracking...How long do we sign our apartment lease for now? When do houses around here sell the best? Fall and Spring. It is fall soon - do we look? How many? Our friends who do own homes already have generously offered realtors and their average home-looks before settling down and it seems to be at around 20-30. So shouldn't we start now? "Some weekends we'd look at 8 houses." HUH?! What a process. It will begin soon, but can't tell anyone how shortly it will take....
We're trying to give ourselves a good window through another winter in this place. Hopefully we'll be moving gradually if we can time things just right and get into a house by late winter/early spring. Oooh, maybe during my break for classes. That's a whole other year gone by, too which is hard to believe. My time off from work has been pleasant, and yet it starts up again soon! Next week I will be working oh so close to home, and with a healthcare company set up within an Independent & Assisted Living Facility. After speaking briefly with my sister who is a physical therapist, she exclaimed happily what this means to her -- that I can sooner move to MA and begin working with her in an office somewhere...I'll cover the Rehab Tech job down here for now and then we'll see about transitions to New England yet again :)
**Anecdote approaching** My sister Sara and I always had this infatuation to work together, in neighboring communities...She would live in the city writing next to my farm country house, and then we'd meet over lunch every day and I would (naturally) braid her hair for work every morning. It soon shifted into her writing for, and me taking pictures on behalf of National Geographic Magazine....It's no wonder something down the line may involve the pair of us. We've already lived together twice, maybe working alongside her wouldn't be the worst of it. ( :-P )
Anyways, it's good now to have the next month off academically and see what this new field of "mental health" (in a unique way) brings. We get to begin August doing what most Philadelphians do that we have not in over the 2 years living here -- my friend Dan and his family invited us to their shore house in Sea Isle, so we get to lay on sand this time and not bake in a chair poolside pretending to hear the ocean while splashing among fellow Meadowbrook residents! On to an amazing month full of beaching, jobbing, sistering, weddening (!), and friending with DC'ers up to our City of Brotherly Love. Come on, August - we've been waiting for you!
