Sunday, August 29, 2010

happily employed

Thrilled to announce we were both offered-- and accepted-- new jobs this week!

What a relief. Fear of imminent homelessness? Not any more! Fretting over the financial burden of including costly protein in our meals? Nope. Life is good and we are grateful :)

Dan starts work Monday (!) at New Light Energy Design as their "Installations Manager." It's a small company that replaces costly, inefficient commercial lighting with new, sustainable options. Dan's bosses/owners also have GreenMBAs, so the three of them already jive . It's a perfect fit for him-- he'll use his electrical skills and get business thrills.

I start work in September at the Children's Hospital of Stanford in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. The patient population is {somewhat} similar to Gillette, but they get a lot of transplant, dialysis, and heart kiddos. *For my nurse friends-- a lot of ECMO & oscillators... a learning curve that I'm looking forward to :)

The sweetest part of our joyful employment was sharing it with our FIRST visitors!

My college roomie and her hub conveniently planned a vacation to wine country a few months ago- perfect timing. They made a pit stop on Wednesday to see our new diggs. Then we went to lunch in cutesy neighborhood Cow Hollow, hoofed it up Lombard street {aka: the crookedest street in world}, and took in some GG bridge sights.

Highlight of the day: found and photographed the Full House house. We also relaxed in Alamo park-- the site of many Tanner family escapades & where the opening credit picnic happens {if you're a true fan you know what I'm talking about...}

On Friday we met up with Lindsay & Kurt again in Sonoma Valley for some delicious wine tasting & a fabulous celebratory dinner. *Only the best kind of friends let you intrude on their romantic rendezvous to wine country. Thanks pals-- we love ya!

Can you tell Kurt is almost done with dental school? They have some rockin' teeth.



Dan & Kurt excited for their french dinner & annoyed I insisted on snapping a pic in the fancy restaurant.
(sorry it's fuzzy)

(our turn for a fuzzy pic)

So delighted to have time with friends :)


Thursday, August 26, 2010

Weekend-o-fun

Good news for peeps like us who are trying to conserve our rapidly dwindling moolah-- lots of free things to do in San Fran!

Last weekend we navigated Muni (municipal transport, aka: buses/lightrail) to find ourselves the haps in the fair city. Lucky for us, it turned out the mission district was hosting the San Francisco Street Food Festival. Cheap, ethnic, delicious food + people watching galore= feast for the senses. We had a grand ol' time :)





Sunday: conquered Muni once again {we're getting more & more adept every day!} and found our way down to a city park that hosts free concerts on Sundays during the summer. They Might Be Giants was playing, and we... well mostly Dan... were excited for yet another fun + free to-do. And this was no little to-do.

Approximately 8,000 people were there... the park was positively swimming with eager fans and other cats looking to relax on the bea-u-tiful day and listen to some rockin' tunes.


Trekking through the woods to find the concert

found it...

Our view of They Might Be Giants from the wooded hillside


Top the weekend off with some instant Netflix flicks in the eve & we had ourselves a fabulous weekend #1.

Only missing some amigos to share it with... Come visit?

Sunday, August 22, 2010

We made it!

It's official: we're SF residents! We arrived safely & soundly last Sunday-- happy to report a successful, non-problematic journey from MN to Cali. However, after 6 days of car- living, tent- pitching, & slow-leaking-air-mattress- sleeping, we were definitely ready to have a home again :)

Then on Monday-- after waaaay too much headache & hassle-- our goods were delivered {side note: never never never use WeHaul Moving Co! Long story short: the fee jumped an additional $1100 after they hauled our stuff away...} So, we've spent the week making our bare bones apartment liveable... fast forward 1 week, 100 boxes, 85lbs of garbage, and a rockin' trip to IKEA, and we're finally home again.

News on the job front...ummm.... no. Rest assured friends and fam, we are searching endlessly and applying as best & as fast as we can. In the mean time we'll just keep enjoying our ramen noodles, grilled cheese sandwiches and $1.99 bottles of wine ;) Ok ok, just kidding {kind of}, but we are hopeful this week will bring promising leads on gainful employment!

Dan strapped on his backpack and went to grad school orientation on Thursday. He came home chatting away & rearin' to go... mostly excited about some potential new friends....

Here's a sneak peak of our whirlwind adventure across the wild wild west:



Sad to say goodbye to fam & friends

Finally on the road



Salt Lake City, UT

Our noble steed

Somewhere in Nevada





Lake Tahoe, CA


Last night on the air-mattress

Hallelujah! Our things have arrived!

The perfect housewarming gift from Kate & Chris!