A few miscellaneous picture updates
Our last day in Boston... a nice view of this great city:
Heres Kyle at 3-4 weeks old:
Heres Karina, in Union Square, San Francisco a little before Christmas:
And heres a family shot:
Some pictures of our new pad...
Thats it really, a few photos of our new house... quick update.
Moved in
So we moved into our super expensive new house, got the stuff delivered, and we're living in a disaster area - boxes, stuff, junk everywhere. The toilet doesnt work, we have no internet or TV, and the heating system isnt enough to heat a very small matchbox, but its Christmas so I hope the booze will warm us up a little. Don't ya love moving!
Well, I passed
Yesterday was one of those "red tape days" I love so much... getting the car re-registered in California and then getting myself a California drivers licence. When we did this in Boston it was a very painful experience involving several trips to the licencing place, but in the end they simply gave me a driving licence after proving my driving history out of the country. Here however they made me take a theory exam! I only learned I needed this on Tuesday and had the test on Thursday and, miraculously, I got 35 out of 36 questions right. Its kinda ridiculous though - if you miss a question the clerk tells you where in the book the correct answer can be found then you re-sit (max 3 times I think). So I took my book in with me, thumbed to the relevant page for anything I was unsure about, and hey-presto... I still got one wrong!!! Then, to complete the days bureaucracy, I went through the motions to apply for Kyles birth certificates too. As soon as they arrive we can start the passport process, then the dual citizenship. I'm sure that will be a fun experience.
QUAKE!
Check it out... our first San Francisco earthquake happened a couple days ago:
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/Quakes/nc51177042.phpExciting!!! Anyway we're all OK, everything is intact, nothing collapsed and yes Mam, I
was wearing clean underwear :)
A new home
OK so we finally found a new place to live. Its a very beautiful house in an amazing neighbourhood in San Rafael (
http://www.cityofsanrafael.org/City_of_San_Rafael.htm), about 30 minutes north of the city. We have a movie theatre, mall, medical centre, stores and (we think) a lot of child activity places too. Best of all the schools seem to be top notch, public schools so hopefully if we're still here next year then Karina can get into a good place and it won't cost us anything. So - we move in next Thursday and have 3 days to unpack and prepare for Christmas!
Angry!
No - not me, for once... the bus driver on the #45 this morning. What a dick! It took us 50 minutes to travel 4.5 miles across town, mostly due to his massive agression and hatred towards all bus commuters. He went as far as stopping the bus and refusing to move until everyone packaed themseleves as far to the back as possible. That wasnt enough though... he marched up and down outside the bus banging on windows and screaming at people (kids, old ladies) telling them to "MOVE! NOW!" until he was happy we'd achieved maximum sardine-ness. I never saw that before... that guy HATES his job!
A new title
I guess we're not in New England anymore so - blog title updated, finally.
A bit of an update
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you: a long overdue update!
First - apologies for the lack of photos. We have some, but we have misplaced the cable for the camera in the move... so, until service is resumed, you're stuck with text. Use your imaginations :)
OK so - I gotta say - San Francisco pretty much rocks! We were worried about leaving Boston as its a great city but San Fran is so far revealing itself as a pretty worthy successor. The first thing I noticed is its incredibly friendly... reminds me a little of the north of England in terms of people wanting to help out and welcome newcommers. Very nice. The city center is great, a real mix of Euro-influences crossed with North American "big city".
The first few days here were beautiful - California sunshine with a slight autumn chill. We're living downtown right next to the baseball stadium (but the season is over - boo hiss!), and we plan to move to the north bay, the district known as Marin County. Here the area becomes very hilly with a lot of gorgeous coastline and little villages and towns built against the bay side and harbour. It also eventually becomes the Napa Valley wine region which I am assured is stunning. Its a shame I don't drink really :)
Yesterday I took a rental car and drove up that way to look at some houses. I saw some really nice places, affordable and spacious. Unfortunately tracking down the owners and trying to have any sort of conversation about moving forward is proving tricky. Same old same old for us! I looked at one place bordering on the China Camp State Park (
http://parks.ca.gov/photo_gallery.asp?page_id=466) which was the most tranquil place imaginable. However it looks like we'll take a slightly more urban place in a small town so that Natalie can find some civilisation to pass the hours with the kids.
Family wise, everyone is doing well. Kyle is eating enough to feed an army, I guess I really do have the start of a football team on my hands! He was born with quite bad "baby acne" (very common I hear) which now seems to be showing signs of clearning up. Karina is Karina - full of life, energy, and funny sayings! Perhaps theres also the start of some jealousy over her baby brothers time with Mammy. Its natural.
So - work. It rocks! It couldnt be more different to the last place I'm happy to say. I feel really content here already. Facilities, direction, creativity, and more importantly the people. Amazing - really friendly, welcoming, encouraging and supportive. We definately made a good move professionally, and hopefully for standard of living.
So thats about all for now. Pictures coming soon I hope.
We arrived...
Well, the horrible 2 day long relocation is over and we can now announce to the world that we have now left Boston and are living in San Francisco, California! Mostly this relocation was OK (as OK as it can be with 2 kids) - just long. Very very long. The shippers were amazing - nice guys, efficient, no problems - makes a change from the last lot! By Friday around 9:30AM everything was moved and we ended up waiting in a totally empty house until 5:30PM to tie up the loose ends. And most of the was waiting for the guys to ship our car - they decided to re-schedule it for the following day and not even tell us! When I mentioend that we would be flying then, they suggested we leave the keys in the car and they'll pick it up "sometime". Yeah, right! Anyway we solved it eventually after a lot of calls but Friday was a very trying day. And from just after noon our landlord was sitting with us, waiting for us to leave (after driving 5 hours from NY) so he could return our deposit. That was a bad, tense atmosphere, and with a 9 day old baby - not fun at all.
Anyway - we stayed in a nice hotel by the airport in Boston that night and flew out a little after noon on Saturday.
Onto our new life: our apartment in San Francisco is amazing! Its a really high end 2 bedroom place with a full size gym - very modern, very clean, very classy. Geordies don't belong here! :-) But we're really humbled that my new employer values me this much - lets just say that initial impressions of this move are incredibly favourable!
More soon, with pictures once I find the camera cable which is M.I.A. in the move :(
