Still "on the move"

Our cross-country trip is over but I still intend to update the blog with posts (past due and present). We still are looking for a house and of course we still feel like we just got here (because we did) so there's plenty of relocation thoughts still to come.

But for faithful friends who have been reading and wondering what we've been up to...

Temp housing - We are now in our second week of corporate temp housing. It's a great apartment -- 3BR, 3BA, which is bigger than our house in Sunnyvale! (And possibly more square footage too.) I've been enjoying having more space and less stuff -- I'm actually not really looking forward to getting all of our stuff from the moving company because it's been rather liberating living minimally since when our house was staged. Just goes to show how much *stuff* we Americans accumulate. Also a lesson for our next relo: get rid of stuff before, not after, you move. I already did, but I think there's a lot more that we could live without.

Exploring the new - It's been fun for me to explore the area. I enjoyed grocery shopping before (I know, bizarre), but now with new brands, new stores, new stuff (like WHITE American cheese), it's like an adventure for me. Some people prefer bush whacking in the jungle, I prefer finding new grocery stores. Last week I also made it a point to get into Lexington, our intended place to buy a house, once a day to get a feel for the town even more. I went to Wilson Farm for produce and the park at the center of town, even met a mom!

Getting around - Driving here has been an experience. It really is funny to see how the habits differ from coast to coast. My first venture out by myself was pretty insane. The GPS (thank GOODNESS for the GPS!) took me via local roads two towns over to the closest Target. None of the streets are straight nor intersect at 90 degree angles here so no wonder drivers here do crazy maneuvers to get where they want to go.

I was honked at no less than 3 times for not starting fast enough and while I thought I was abiding by the law by waiting for my right of way, I'd find Bostonians frantically waving me to go first like I was crazy not to take them up on their generosity. But when in Rome: I find myself feeling a little generous at times and waving my share of people into line.

Tobey has asked about the T a few times. And I'd love to take the kids on a T ride some time. But it seems like anywhere we'd go on the T is for "fun" and until we settle a little more, I'm afraid we won't have time for fun like that for a while.

Renting an apartment - Our timing was such that unless we went into 30-day closing the first day we got here, we'd have to find a rental apartment as an intermediate step from temp housing to buying a house. We wanted the flexibility of a short term lease so there were really only 2 available places in town, one old and one new. The newer one of course cost more but I could literally see myself hating the old place every time I had to do laundry in the basement or every time I banged my elbows on the narrow doors. And the kitchen of the old place was older than the kitchen in our house in Sunnyvale so in an effort not to move backwards in the housing food chain, we opted for the newer place. For local friends, we'll be at the Avalon in Lexington -- come drop by!

Finding a house - We interviewed 3 realtors, one of which we ruled out within 10 minutes of meeting him. Nice guy and humble, but just not the kind of realtor we need as people brand new to the area. We are still undecided between the realtor Sophie recommended after screening her realtor network or a realtor that a friend of friends used to buy their house in Sunnvyale. Each realtor has her strengths, both we like. We went out with the first realtor to see a couple of houses and were impressed with her attention to detail and willingness to point out the negatives of a house (and not just sell us anything to make a sale). We plan on going out with the second realtor as she seems to think outside the box, find properties early, act quickly. I feel like I'm on eHarmony, dating two realtors and needing to decide on committing to one in the coming weeks.

As for the houses themselves, we are slowly coming to the conclusion that the kind of house we intended to buy is at the tippy top of our price range, if not a bit beyond. So Lexington is still expensive although we still get more for the money than in Sunnyvale. We considered getting an older house on a good lot/location and then renovating it ourselves but even that isn't quite within range (or doesn't exist?? or just hasn't come on the market?). We opened the possibility of neighboring (cheaper) towns with good schools. It's just hard to believe that we made out so well selling our house in CA and we still struggle to find what we like here in Lexington. Makes me wonder if we are jumping a step from starter home to dream home. And I'm not even talking about dream home here, just home for the next 20 years kind of home. So I need to remind myself that God brought us this far and not to get too discouraged.

Friends - We do miss our friends back in CA dearly, but it has been nice to have some friends to reconnect with here in MA. We went over to my old roommate and college buddy Cecelia's house -- they live in Lexington and it was nice to vent about our housing search with them (as well as have play friends for Tobey and Eli). We saw many old friends at church the first Sunday we arrived. And tonight we're having our first friend over for dinner -- hosting at our tastefully decorated and furnished temp apartment that I had nothing to do with. :-) But we have no school friends yet (because no school) and no church family, and probably not for a while.

Family - The main reason for our move was to be closer to family and let's just say it's starting to pay off already. With our move to our apartment coming up, both my mom and Tom's mom offered to come up and help and while they probably would have (and DID) had we lived in CA, it's nice to know it's not such a big burden for them to come out and help.

As far as being within an hour and a half of Tom's brother's house? That's been GREAT. We went to their house last weekend (our first) to pick up our 2nd car which was shipped to their house. We just spent the day up there. This past weekend we went up for an overnight for the long weekend. It's been great to see the 4 kids play so well together. And their New Hampshire lifestyle certainly is like a vacation for us. It's nice to just spend the whole day basically at home or at the local playground, without feeling like we had to "do" something together. It's nice to be able to say goodbye without feeling like it will be another 6-12 months before we see them again.

What's next - We are starting the ball rolling on getting pre-approved. We are also getting ready to move into our apartment June 13 -- happy anniversary to us -- what a way to spend it. After we move in, we gotta turn around and head out to Indiana for my cousin's wedding, a week's vacation with my family and a nice little return visit to the Bay Area for Melissa's wedding that I'm standing in. After all that, maybe we'll start to settle in a little more.

The Eagle has landed!

My dad says "The Eagle has landed" every time they touchdown at an airport. As much as I'm tired of that historical phrase, I feel it appropriate after our long journey:

THE EAGLE HAS LANDED!

We made it! We made it to Boston! It's a little surreal to be here. We haven't seen anyone we know (yet, we're going to Tom's brother's house tomorrow), I haven't seen anything I truly recognize (I don't know Newton very well), we've got an apartment that does remind me of the 3-star hotels that we've been in for the past 3 weeks. Even the towels in the bathroom were folded the same way!

I felt like I left the west when the landscape turned green in eastern Texas. Still don't know when I will feel like I've moved here -- when we sign our first lease or contract? When I buy my first staples like food and toilet paper (which will have to be tomorrow!)? When Tobey starts school?

More later...

The Tally

Miles driven: Around 4,000, including day/side trips! Lego/Disneyland weren't exactly "on the way".
Miles driven by Ang: 0
Days on the road: 21
States crossed: 13, including CA, MA and the 13 miles in West Virginia
States with "welcome" sign caught on camera: 9, none for CA as we were leaving and 3 to be caught tomorrow

Cities stayed in: 14, not including Boston
Different hotels stayed in: 11
Days in a hotel: 14
Days we stayed in a Hampton Inn/Suites: 6, 7 if you include the Hilton in Scranton (same rewards program)
Times we swam in hotel pool: 4
Times Eli rolled off the hotel bed: 2, and then we started getting cribs for him everywhere
Favorite hotel of the trip: Drury Plaza Inn in St. Louis

Homecooked dinners: 5
Tom's Starbucks: 9
Ang's Starbucks: 2
Times eaten at McDonald's: 1
Times we duplicated a restaurant: 1, if you count the In-N-Out in Gilroy, just 45 min. into our trip. Otherwise, 0!
Times we ate at a Chinese restaurant: 1

National Parks/Monuments visited: 4
Amount spent on admission to National Parks: $78.50
Amount needed for annual pass to National Parks: $80
Days before we finally crossed CA border: 6

DVD's watched in the car: 0, as long as we can get through tomorrow without it too
Number of portable DVD players kids think we own: 0
Surprises/new toys given: too many, that's why we got away with no DVD's
Windmills counted: 54, mostly in Texas
Fights in the back of the car: I have a headache just thinking about them
Gadgets in the car: 5 (GPS, Blackberry, 2 cell phones, iPod)

Days left on our trip of a lifetime: 1

Day 20: Pittsburgh to Scranton

Our day's summary:

- Breakfast and pack at Tom's parents'
- Drive
- Stop for potty
- Drive
- Stop for potty
- Drive
- Arrive in Scranton
- Wild goose chase for Olive Garden dinner
- Swimming at the Hilton pool
- Easy bedtime because the kids were tired

Today our destination was Scranton because it's about halfway to Boston. I had heard of Scranton but didn't think much of it. And then The Office came along and Scranton all of a sudden has a kind of celebrity status for me, as if I think I'm going to see Steve Carell or Jenna Fisher walk down the street. I did look for the sign from The Office (parts of Scranton are indeed as industrial as the opening credits make it look) but it seems like they might have updated the signs since filming although I don't think I ever saw the true location of the sign. Unless it's a fictional sign and then I feel silly.

This is how you know we are "just making time" on our trip now -- we saw an interesting coal mine tour, but we thought maybe we should just get to MA tomorrow instead of stopping for something fun -- we do have a full 5 hours to drive. But so long as our kids are still youngish, if we ever do drive to Pittsburgh, we probably will be stopping in Scranton (and at this Hilton if the rates stay this low and the pool stays that warm!) and have a chance to do the tour another trip. Speaking of coal, I saw a sign that said "Anthracite Museum" and Tom was like, "Oh yeah, that's one kind of coal. The other is biticul-blah-blah-blah." He said he learned it in school. That's a Pittsburgh kid for ya.

Curiously missing from our day's summary is "lunch". That's because we ate lunch on the road. We first tried it on our 6.5 hour drive from Indy to Pittsburgh and Auntie Pauline made us sandwiches for the car. That saved quite a bit of time, calories, money (if we were paying!) as well as grief. It worked well so when Tom's mom offered this morning, I took it. I used to think of our lunch stops also as a stretch break but sometimes the kids are so hyper about being out of the car that half of the conversation at lunch is "Eli, get down from there" or "Tobey, use your restaurant voice." It's almost easier to stay in the car. They don't mind so much staying in the car if they are busy eating. We take other short potty/stretch breaks, but skipping a lunch stop certainly helped us get into town earlier in the end.

I first thought, "Darn, we should have thought of this sooner!" But 1) who would make us sandwiches when we stay in hotels? Me? Ha! Grocery shopping and food storage was the last thing on my mind this vacation. And 2) we were making tons of stops and weren't necessarily needing to make up time on the road.

These last two legs of driving (Indy to Pitt to Scranton) have been smooth. We're not looking for anything in particular but I've found a pattern for the day. Eli konks out soon after we get on the road. Tobey can either absorb himself in a book, play car games with Tom, or like this morning, take a nap himself! So sometimes I get to catch up on a morning nap while Tom is fueled by his Starbuck's. After Eli wakes up, it's usually time for lunch. After lunch, we are all awake so we try to do car games, stories, general car entertainment, listening to VeggieTales for the 3rd time in 2 hours. When the kids start getting antsy, it's time for a surprise from Collin, who is a schoolmate who gave us a goodie bag of "little" goodies to keep the ride interesting. Not that other friends didn't give us great gifts for the trip -- some we also gave during the trip or I'm saving for when we are in Boston. But the goodie bag by Collin's mom just happened to be all wrapped (upping the excitement factor) as well as "little" surprises (she said so herself) that I don't mind giving daily. Some of the other surprises were actually so nice that I would wait for a bigger event to give those. Anyway, after surprise time, there's usually just an hour or so left and it's not so bad when we are all anticipating an end to the driving day.

I realized when we sat at dinner tonight that it was our "last supper" on the road. Sure, we will probably eat out tomorrow night after we arrive into our corporate guest housing in Newton just because we will have nothing to eat at "home". But it will be different because we will already be "home", in our new home area. Kind of weird to think that. And like I predicted in the middle of our trip, I am sad to see this vacation end. It has had its ups and downs but mostly ups, many big ups and little ups, and some great family time. I can't believe we've made it all the way across the country. You can see the distance we drove on a globe. The trip we've talked about for so long is just about finished. I'll savor our last day on the road. And then it's time to move on.

On the road again...

My scribbled notes about Days 13-15 are in the car, so I'm still not caught up with the Midwest portion of our trip. But just to update, we've been in Pittsburgh at Tom's parents' for the past two days. It's been a nice break, home cooked food, getting to sleep in, even getting a movie night tonight (Iron Man -- quite good!). We went to the Pittsburgh Zoo and today mostly stayed home, played with silly string (thanks to Ramsey, Collin's mom), did some errand shopping for the remainder of our trip. The kids are quite self entertaining here, either with toys that we have from the car or just running around in the family room. And it sure helps to have the loving watchful eye of two grandparents around.

But as we prepare for the last two legs of our trip, I realize we are out of routine. Out of the road trip routine. When I was cleaning/organizing/repacking the car today, I saw the old relics of the first two weeks of *the* road trip: a map to Legoland, the EZ66 guide book, the kids meal toy from the Sonic drive in. We've only been here for two days and some of those things seem like ages ago already. Just like how, sadly, some aspects of life in Sunnyvale seem like months ago, even though it's only been a couple of weeks.

And though we embark on the last two legs of our trip, it's not with the same leisure that we did the first umpteen legs. We are trying to "make time" now, even more so than getting to Indianapolis before dinner or our 6.5 hour "marathon" to get here. In getting to Indianapolis and Pittsburgh, it was to get in before dinner or within a reasonable hour so we have time to spend with family in each place. But now, we are trying to get to Boston, to resume regular life.

We'll have to look for a rental, interview real estate agents, start working, apply for driver's licenses, etc. Cook, run errands, grocery shop. And although making and reconnecting with friends will hopefully be fun, it also comes with the extra burden of *needing* to make friends in order to start to feel connected. It wasn't the leisurely optional friend making, it's the kind where we hope to find someone to replace the Thomas & Alice's and Eric & Chia-Chi's of our lives. To find a church, a growth group, a mom's group, a school(s), housing, neighbors, etc. all to try to regain a semblance of the comfort we had after 15 years in CA.

It's been fun to talk to a couple friends from Sunnyvale. Our neighbors said it was weird to look across the street, see "our" door open and to feel like someone else was living in our house. Our growth group called and left a voicemail on the cell all saying Hi. I got to talk to Alice live and Tom got a message from Richard. It's nice to be in touch a little as we head into completely new territory.

Sooo, back on the road tomorrow. The kids did great in the car from Indy to here, 6.5 hours, our longest day. We have two 5-hour days ahead of us -- although there's a little bit of apprehension on my part, not knowing how the kids will do on the road again, I'm quite excited to roll into Boston and finally enter into this next phase of our lives

Cars and Route 66

I wish I had seen this guide to Route 66 and the Cars movie before our trip so I could make more connections between Cars and the real Route 66. Some of the fun things I didn't know were that the tractors were probably representative of the burros we saw wandering around Oatman and the "RS" that I never noticed on the rocks in Radiator Springs was a tipoff to the "T" that I DID see on the mountain in Tucumcari in real life. Well, but even so, we did make a lot of movie to real life connections and we watched the DVD extra where John Lasseter talks about the inspiration to Cars. It's nice to see someone who knows the Mother Road to put in the work into deciphering the movie to the rest of us. It makes me fall in love with the movie all over again.

So while we were driving through Shamrock, TX -- actually, we were just there to eat at the Pizza Hut but we drove through "town" since it was right off the highway. We found the tall Conoco spire that I wanted to see because our Route 66 guidebook author said it was great neon. While we passed it, Tobey says...

Tobey: "I want to see that! That!" (pointing)
Us: "What do you want to see?"
Tobey: "The thing that looks like Radiator Springs!"

And so I feel like all of our effort to choose Route 66 over the shorter northern route was all worth it. I was waiting for something to "click" for Tobey, that he recognizes Route 66 as being from the Cars movie that he knows so well. And to hear him mention Radiator Springs unprompted just makes it all worth it.

Route 66 Thoughts (Guest Blogger Tom)

Traveling on route 66 has been fun, but not for the reasons that I expected. I was expecting a lot of the old buildings, gas stations, and signs to be restored to their original pristine condition. In reality, only very few have been. Most of the sights are as run down and decrepit as I'd expect for being unmaintained for almost 30 years - faded, covered in graffiti, broken neon, etc. And it doesn't help that the guide that we bought seemed to be exaggerating the descriptions of the sights. A building would be described as being "well preserved and having vivid colors", and the only thing left would be 3 walls covered in grafitti. Maybe I'm exaggerating now, but that's what it felt like. We learned to take the descriptions with a grain of salt. When I heard about the Route 66 mini golf, I was joking that maybe they just give you a stick and a rock to play with. Also, the poor preservation of the Route 66 sights just seemed to pale in comparison to my trips to Europe, where buildings and sculptures seem to last for centuries in excellent condition.

I think the fun part for me about traveling Route 66 is that it's like a giant scavenger hunt played over thousands of miles. Drive for a few hours down some deserted road, and then look for some ruins described in the book, and snap a photo of it. It doesn't matter that the ruins look even worse than the guide's description. Point is, that we hunted it down and captured it (on camera). I don't think the kids understand at all -- they are barely amazed at the Grand Canyon, why would they be remotely interested by some broken neon sign? But that's how I'm "getting my kicks".

However, there have been some true gems on Route 66. Cadillac Ranch was a really fun stop. The only painting I've done in recent memory is the inside of my now-former house and I had to be very careful about not getting anything else dirty. And I can't remember the last time I did any spray painting, so it was very freeing to just buy 2 cans of spray paint at the local Home Depot, and just freehand paint on the cadillacs. And the idea of an orange construction sign with "Chang Xing '08" seemed to perfectly sum up the spirit of our trip.

- Tom