What a difference a few hours can make. Seriously. Yesterday, I was talking about how I was antsy & ready to move, right. Well, shortly after we went to pick up my car from the dealership, Will got an email letting him know that he was chosen for a job at the Pentagon! He'd applied for a job there last fall but was told he wasn't going to get it because he was 5 months short of his 4 years at Andrews. I don't know. To me, it sounds like a bunch of "blah, blah, blah" but evidently he was required to be at Andrews for exactly 4 years before they would "release him" and let him get orders and/or take a new job. So, basically, after he was told that they wouldn't make an exception to this policy for him to be able to take the Pentagon job, we kind of forgot about it and started thinking about where we'd want to put in for orders once September rolled around.
So, yeah, he will be heading over to the Pentagon in May. And...AND...they must know by 18 February where we want our next set of orders. Yes, you read right. That's 3 weeks away. We're both completely shocked right now. Both about him being accepted for this job at the Pentagon and the fact that we have 3 weeks to decide where we're going to go next. Now, he'll be at the Pentagon for 14 months so it's not like we'll be moving out of state immediately, but we do have to let "them" know where we want our follow on base to be.
We definitely need to sit down & make a list of some areas we're interested in and the pros & cons of those places, plus the pros & cons of staying here in MD (although at the moment I'm having a hell of a time finding one thing to keep me here!!) and it's just a lot to absorb in a short amount of time.
Did I mention that he also has to take 28 days of leave before he starts his job in May?! I think we should take a serious road trip! Of course, being the middle of winter, there aren't a lot of areas I'm interested in road tripping to at this time. lol Maybe we'll go see his family down in Va Beach and then see my family in SC before heading to Florida. I hate the heat though so maybe we won't go to Florida.
Anyhow, on the top of my "wish list" is Alaska. Do yall think I'm crazy? You can be honest. lol I know I definitely do not want orders back down south. Nowhere in SC, NC, GA, FL, TX, the Gulf Coast, NM, OK, CA or Hawaii. That narrows it down quite a bit. I'd probably be happy anywhere in the Northeast, definitely out in Colorado or Wyoming, Montana, Washington, parts of the Midwest. Of course my wish list & his may vary drastically and in the end, I'm going wherever he's told he's going so we'll see.
So...those feelings I was having yesterday are gone. They're replaced by excitement and nervousness and confusion. I think I need to have a beer & just decompress & try to take this all in!! With the market the way it is, we'll probably put our house up soon in hopes that it'll sell well before we have to actually move. Besides, his commute is about to double in length and we'd ideally love to be closer to the Virginia line. Ack! See...I told you it was a lot to take in!
If anyone has any suggestions on locations, I'd love to hear your ideas!!
28 January 2010
27 January 2010
Ugh! Is it February yet?!
January has been just so ugh. It's been one of those months. I can't believe that the month is almost over already but I'm not sad to see it go, not by any means!! Will has been insanely busy with work, we've had a ton of automotive issues, I'm still getting the run-around by the military doctors as to why I have a freaking golf ball sized lymph node in my neck. Yeah, it's been one hell of a month!!
But, it hasn't been all bad - we did manage to take a day trip up to Pennsylvania the other week. That was nice. Well, actually, it was pretty boring but at least I got out of the house for a day! lol And Will & I went snow tubing one Friday night for a few hours. That was definitely a great time!! Here's a picture of yours truly & Mr Vintage Whimsy after a fun-filled night of snow tubing. Can you tell my face was frozen?! haha
I'm just feeling very blah this month. Unsettled or antsy or something. It's hard to describe. I'm hating this hot weather we've been having and really want to live somewhere with a true winter. You know, lots of snow. And pretty scenery. Because Baltimore doesn't have pretty scenery. It's gross. And dirty. And dangerous. I just want to get out of this state & move somewhere different.
Will's uncle called him the other day to tell him about some government jobs that were in WV and of course, being the real estate junkie that I am, I immediately go on Redfin.com and start looking up houses in the area! lol Now, the likelihood that we'll be moving to WV is about 5% but I still had to look. Gotta be proactive, ya know. And as much as I joke around about WV being full of hillbillies and rednecks, I do like the area. It's beautiful and peaceful and I love being over there. But, do I want to live there now? I don't know!!
Will has 4.5 years left before he can retire so I think I want to move somewhere else before we go to WV. Like, maybe Colorado. Of course, when I start thinking about moving to the West Coast, I start thinking about my family & how I'd never get to see them. Then I remind myself that I don't really see them all that much now & I only live 400 miles away!! So, is it really that big of a deal to move across the country? Yeah, probably not. I haven't seen my family since September so it's not like I see them on a very regular basis anyway. See, I said I was feeling very confused & blah this month!!
So, part of me really wants to move out west & live somewhere with huge mountains and lots of snow and experience that. But part of me really likes the familiarity of the east coast and knowing that I am just a 7 hour drive from "home" should I need to be there ASAP. And then I find amazing houses like this over in WV, and it really, really makes me want to just go ahead & move there. Isn't this house amazing??
Ugh! I'm so torn!! Of course, we have until September to really figure out what we want to do since that's when Will can put in for orders. I think we'll sit down and write out the pros & cons to staying here on the east coast & try to determine what we should do.
Moving along!!
Did I mention that I'm currently stuck at home without a car?! Yeah, which is probably how I found the motivation to actually get on blogger & update. It's not like I can actually go anywhere right now. My car is in the shop getting a new reservoir tank installed and having some recall repaired. Unfortunately, the reservoir tank is not included in the 100k mile warranty. Boo! But, it *had* to be repaired so here I sit, without a car. We do live on a bus route but I'm not that desperate to leave! The buses here in Baltimore are sketchy! I should have my car back this afternoon though which is a must because tomorrow is 25% off day at the thrift stores & I must go do a little retail therapy.
And since I'm stuck at home until at least noon, I finally have time to stop by & visit all of my favorite blogs. I really need to do a better job at keeping up with that because right now, I have 926 unread items! haha I'm never going to get through all of those! I should probably use this time to do something else, like clean my office, but what fun is that?!
But, it hasn't been all bad - we did manage to take a day trip up to Pennsylvania the other week. That was nice. Well, actually, it was pretty boring but at least I got out of the house for a day! lol And Will & I went snow tubing one Friday night for a few hours. That was definitely a great time!! Here's a picture of yours truly & Mr Vintage Whimsy after a fun-filled night of snow tubing. Can you tell my face was frozen?! haha
I'm just feeling very blah this month. Unsettled or antsy or something. It's hard to describe. I'm hating this hot weather we've been having and really want to live somewhere with a true winter. You know, lots of snow. And pretty scenery. Because Baltimore doesn't have pretty scenery. It's gross. And dirty. And dangerous. I just want to get out of this state & move somewhere different.
Will's uncle called him the other day to tell him about some government jobs that were in WV and of course, being the real estate junkie that I am, I immediately go on Redfin.com and start looking up houses in the area! lol Now, the likelihood that we'll be moving to WV is about 5% but I still had to look. Gotta be proactive, ya know. And as much as I joke around about WV being full of hillbillies and rednecks, I do like the area. It's beautiful and peaceful and I love being over there. But, do I want to live there now? I don't know!!
Will has 4.5 years left before he can retire so I think I want to move somewhere else before we go to WV. Like, maybe Colorado. Of course, when I start thinking about moving to the West Coast, I start thinking about my family & how I'd never get to see them. Then I remind myself that I don't really see them all that much now & I only live 400 miles away!! So, is it really that big of a deal to move across the country? Yeah, probably not. I haven't seen my family since September so it's not like I see them on a very regular basis anyway. See, I said I was feeling very confused & blah this month!!
So, part of me really wants to move out west & live somewhere with huge mountains and lots of snow and experience that. But part of me really likes the familiarity of the east coast and knowing that I am just a 7 hour drive from "home" should I need to be there ASAP. And then I find amazing houses like this over in WV, and it really, really makes me want to just go ahead & move there. Isn't this house amazing??
Ugh! I'm so torn!! Of course, we have until September to really figure out what we want to do since that's when Will can put in for orders. I think we'll sit down and write out the pros & cons to staying here on the east coast & try to determine what we should do.
Moving along!!
Did I mention that I'm currently stuck at home without a car?! Yeah, which is probably how I found the motivation to actually get on blogger & update. It's not like I can actually go anywhere right now. My car is in the shop getting a new reservoir tank installed and having some recall repaired. Unfortunately, the reservoir tank is not included in the 100k mile warranty. Boo! But, it *had* to be repaired so here I sit, without a car. We do live on a bus route but I'm not that desperate to leave! The buses here in Baltimore are sketchy! I should have my car back this afternoon though which is a must because tomorrow is 25% off day at the thrift stores & I must go do a little retail therapy.
And since I'm stuck at home until at least noon, I finally have time to stop by & visit all of my favorite blogs. I really need to do a better job at keeping up with that because right now, I have 926 unread items! haha I'm never going to get through all of those! I should probably use this time to do something else, like clean my office, but what fun is that?!
03 January 2010
Brrr! My Toilet is Frozen!
Happy New Year guys!! What did you do to celebrate? I did nothing. Absolutely nothing. lol Well, I guess that's not entirely true. I posted on Etsy, drank a few cherry wheat beers and talked to Will on the phone. Oh, and watched our jackass of a neighbor shoot fireworks into our yard. That was entertaining!
Remember last week when I said I had lots of things I wanted to accomplish while Will was gone? Yeah, approximately 17% of those things actually happened. I did manage to take pictures of linens & list those but otherwise, yeah, I stayed holed up in this house for the majority of the week. In fact, I think I've been out of the house *maybe* 5 hours since last Saturday! I'm finding that it's just too windy & cold to go anywhere. I mean this wind is freaking ridiculous right now. The windchill is 2. TWO. It is so cold that the water in the toilet in the 1/2 bath off of the kitchen froze solid overnight. I've never had that happen. Hell, I didn't even know that COULD happen!!
So, Will is coming home today, finally. The first half of the week seemed to fly by but since Thursday it's been really dragging. And, as usual, he's bringing lots of goodies home with him. This time instead of Belgian chocolates, I'm getting chocolate rum from the Virgin Islands. Sounds delicious to me and maybe drinking a bit of that will help warm me up!! He's also bringing back rum balls and rum cake. And jewelry. I'm so spoiled!!
Will is supposed to be off for the rest of the week starting on Tuesday and I'm hoping we can take some day trips out of Baltimore. I am starting to go stir crazy being home all alone!! I'm sure he'll want to stay home & relax since he's been gone for a week though. We always run into this same issue when he comes home. He wants to stay home and I want to go out. He wants to eat every meal here and I want to go out. lol See, he gets to eat out 3 times a day while he's gone and when he comes home, he's ready for home cooked meals. On the other hand, I'm eating at home 3x a day while he's gone so by the time he gets back, I'm ready for someone else to do the cooking, preferably that someone being a chef at a restaurant!
I think it's almost time to take down the Christmas trees too. Although I love looking at the trees, it's time to get my house back in order and the first thing I need to do is get the Christmas stuff outta here. Even my pretty retro tree in my office needs to go!! Hopefully I'll get them put up in a more timely manner next Christmas. I feel like I *just* got these things decorated and now it's already time to put them away again.
I have a huge list of things I should be doing today. Things like cleaning and organizing and taking down the decorations and getting all of my linens put away. None of that sounds like a good time though so I'm thinking I'll put on some thermal underwear, bundle up in layers and brave the elements and go do a little retail therapy. Tomorrow is, of course, 25% off day at all of the thrift stores but I haven't left the house since Thursday so I think I need to get out of here before I go insane!! Besides, I'm pretty sure my car heater works better than the house heater so at least I can finally warm up!!
I'm leaving you with a picture of my favorite ornament on my retro tree. It's all scratched up but I love it so! I'm loving my new camera! I'm so not good at taking pictures and I have a ton to learn but I'm so happy that I'm not stuck using Will's work camera anymore. I should probably sit down & actually read the manual that came with the camera but let's face it: that's kind of boring!
Remember last week when I said I had lots of things I wanted to accomplish while Will was gone? Yeah, approximately 17% of those things actually happened. I did manage to take pictures of linens & list those but otherwise, yeah, I stayed holed up in this house for the majority of the week. In fact, I think I've been out of the house *maybe* 5 hours since last Saturday! I'm finding that it's just too windy & cold to go anywhere. I mean this wind is freaking ridiculous right now. The windchill is 2. TWO. It is so cold that the water in the toilet in the 1/2 bath off of the kitchen froze solid overnight. I've never had that happen. Hell, I didn't even know that COULD happen!!
So, Will is coming home today, finally. The first half of the week seemed to fly by but since Thursday it's been really dragging. And, as usual, he's bringing lots of goodies home with him. This time instead of Belgian chocolates, I'm getting chocolate rum from the Virgin Islands. Sounds delicious to me and maybe drinking a bit of that will help warm me up!! He's also bringing back rum balls and rum cake. And jewelry. I'm so spoiled!!
Will is supposed to be off for the rest of the week starting on Tuesday and I'm hoping we can take some day trips out of Baltimore. I am starting to go stir crazy being home all alone!! I'm sure he'll want to stay home & relax since he's been gone for a week though. We always run into this same issue when he comes home. He wants to stay home and I want to go out. He wants to eat every meal here and I want to go out. lol See, he gets to eat out 3 times a day while he's gone and when he comes home, he's ready for home cooked meals. On the other hand, I'm eating at home 3x a day while he's gone so by the time he gets back, I'm ready for someone else to do the cooking, preferably that someone being a chef at a restaurant!
I think it's almost time to take down the Christmas trees too. Although I love looking at the trees, it's time to get my house back in order and the first thing I need to do is get the Christmas stuff outta here. Even my pretty retro tree in my office needs to go!! Hopefully I'll get them put up in a more timely manner next Christmas. I feel like I *just* got these things decorated and now it's already time to put them away again.
I have a huge list of things I should be doing today. Things like cleaning and organizing and taking down the decorations and getting all of my linens put away. None of that sounds like a good time though so I'm thinking I'll put on some thermal underwear, bundle up in layers and brave the elements and go do a little retail therapy. Tomorrow is, of course, 25% off day at all of the thrift stores but I haven't left the house since Thursday so I think I need to get out of here before I go insane!! Besides, I'm pretty sure my car heater works better than the house heater so at least I can finally warm up!!
I'm leaving you with a picture of my favorite ornament on my retro tree. It's all scratched up but I love it so! I'm loving my new camera! I'm so not good at taking pictures and I have a ton to learn but I'm so happy that I'm not stuck using Will's work camera anymore. I should probably sit down & actually read the manual that came with the camera but let's face it: that's kind of boring!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)