Rented!?

I'll try to keep a long story short. We think we've rented our place. Nothing is signed but we have a deposit cheque and a cheque for the first rent payment.

The guy renting it currently lives in our building. He is moving down from the sixth floor to our unit as the unit he is currently renting is "for sale" (now that is probably a story related to the economy).

He is, however, looking for a place to buy and may break the lease. In our lease he must give us 60 days notice so we should be able to fill it while he is still leasing the unit. He can't afford our place on his teacher's salary and hasn't found anything in a year so he may stay for the entire year he has signed on for.

He wants to take over on December 15th! We leave on the 14th. This is awesome. So although we went down a hundred bucks on his monthly payment he is giving us an extra half month that we weren't expecting and is interested in some of our furniture. We will find out how much of it he (or, interestingly his sister slash realtor) wants in the next few days.

Swell had a good cry as she said goodbye to our couch and her sheep chairs.

We also found out today that we are departing Portland, Oregon for our new home on January 12th at 6 pm.

Its getting close!

We're happy to have found a tenant and really looking forward to our time on the road (3380.38 miles) and with our families.

Today is the Day

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Lil' Nicles

I can admit when I'm wrong

I was backing up my computer the other day so that I could make more room for important things like movies, music and pictures. While copying and deleting things (successfully making more room that I promptly filled again) I began to read some of our old posts from our old blog. I came across the following which was written on March 15, 2006.

"So I was at Starbucks today (which sucked because I don't like coffee and I don't like the trendy, silly corporate behemoth that Starbucks is), anyhoo... I was sitting at my little table working on my thesis when next to me sat some silly middle aged men who have discovered how to make millions.

Now they didn't say to me this idea is copy-written and they were speaking in public place very loudly so you can take their idea and make millions if you get it done before them!

Here is the idea...wait for it...it's a doozy. You have to realize that they were very excited about it and were thinking they will make millions and millions. They were talking about all the contacts they have in industry and how great their lives are and how many people they know and talking and talking.

Their idea... it's a good one. I can't believe it hasn't been done yet. It's like the next wheel. It will change the world forever and one day you'll look back and say: "I remember when Matthew told me about this. I wish I could've invested in this thing because those guys who came up with it must be billionaires."


The idea - that was talked about for hours and hours and said great idea about over and over is -


to create a company that allows you to pay for things via your... I can't believe the ingenuity of this idea...

this company would be set up in such a way that you could pay for your goods and services with your cell phone! Your cell phone. You would call up some phone center load your cell phone with money and somehow the cashier would take that information and you'll have your purchase purchased. Their motto: "When you just don't feel safe carrying your cash."

I saw this sign at the parking lot across the street from our house the other day:



I don't know who is behind this program but if its you men I overheard in Starbucks I apologize profusely.

I still think its a stupid idea though.

Discovery Health Channel Tonight

If you have discovery health channel watch Mystery Diagnosis tonight at 10:00 pm.

Swell received the following email regarding tonight's episode. This is the same disease she has but the woman featured probably has it worse.

Hello everyone!

On Dec. 1, Discovery Health channel will devote an episode of their program MYSTERY DIAGNOSIS to the story of my being diagnosed with HAE - a 40 year journey.

Please check your local cable company to see if Discovery Health is available in your area and please be sure to check your local listings for the time the show airs in your area.

(I believe it will be repeated on Dec. 2 and 5 also.)

I always tell my friends to remember that this is a tv show, not a documentary - the most accurate and patient-oriented HAE-related medical information available anywhere is on the HAEA website www.haea.org, of course.

Please invite all your friends and family to watch together! Thanks!

Janet Long

December!

I can't believe its already December. This year has just flown by.

Our condo has been listed for rent in various realty places but we haven't had any interest so far. It was just listed a couple of days before Thanksgiving so we're not concerned. I'm sure we'll get more interest now that Thanksgiving is over.

We are offering it for rent furnished but don't expect anyone to want our furniture.

Because we are leaving for good in two weeks we are trying to determine what to do with all of our stuff. We already have a small storage unit but its pretty full.

We're slowly realizing that its probably not worth the money to put much of our furniture in storage. We'd end up paying as much in storage as it would cost to buy new stuff. We're seriously considering getting rid of the bulk of our furniture. Our realtor has expressed interest in some of it (to use as staging furniture) so we may sell it to her. We're also considering how much it would cost to store things for a year and then during our long break next winter flying back to Atlanta and loading it into a truck and move it to Washington.

Its tough trying to determine what should make the move with us. It is especially hard because we need clothes for cold weather for over Christmas and we need clothes for hot weather for when we move.

Swell's parents came for a visit a few weeks ago and we gave them two suitcases full of hot weather clothes that we'll pick up when we visit them in a month.

I have a bunch of books and everyday I decide to leave a few more behind. I'm also considering bringing some notes from public health school because I may take a certification exam sometime next year... we'll see.

Both Swell and I have loaded our iPods with hundreds of CDs as we won't be bringing the CDs with us. I'm currently loading my iPod with movies. That is a long slow process but it will be nice to have 15 or 20 movies on my iPod for traveling purposes.

We've just found out that we're wanted in Fiji the second week of January. This is sad as Swell's good friend is moving back to Washington from Maui right around the time we're leaving Washington to move. They will miss each other by a day or two.

The students arrive in Fiji on Jan. 19th for orientation and we need to be there at least a few days before them so that we can get oriented to both our jobs and our new city/country.

I'm having some serious difficulties getting a physical done for the paperwork we need for our work visas. HIV/STD testing is required and those tests run over $300. I'm not keen on spending that much money (plus office visit, plus x-rays, plus, plus, plus) but I guess I'll have to. I've been shopping around and may end up at Swell's doctor's as they seemed pretty reasonable if we understood the charges correctly.

Learning how much HIV/STD tests cost was interesting to me. As a public health person I wish that these tests were much cheaper. Pretty hard to convince an uninsured person to get tested if they have to go broke doing it. I know there are clinics and charities that offer free/cheap testing but still.

Thats our lives. We really aren't doing much other than packing and stressing out.

My back has been really sore for the past month so I'm looking forward to moving to a warmer climate where I think I'll have less back problems.

Well this is getting boring and too "Dear Diary" so thats it.