Thursday, July 10, 2008

Welcome to Today.

I have been living retroactively to try and update my blog based on my adventures; however, now that I have completed the act of getting to California, I feel that it is ok to simply jump into life as it is currently occurring. Unfortunately, I have no pictures of my current place of residence--I should probably get on that. The apartment I'm living in belongs to Liz Cassel, a Stanford grad student, to whom I was referred by Megan. Liz is in Houston, TX and I am here sleeping in her bed and using her desk and looking at her clock (a photo-montage of pictures of her playing ultimate). The apartment is the bottom half of a residential building located directly on the street. Luckily, it's not a terribly busy street. And, on Sunday mornings, there is a street market with tons of fresh produce and flowers that is a block from me. It's one of my favorite things about living here. My other favorite thing is the kitchen in this place. It's phenomenal. Tiled floor, long, granite countertops, gas stove, and all the amenities like good knives, juicers, blenders, wine stoppers, etc. My roommates know how to live. Oh ya, I live with 2 other Stanford graduate students. I'm not terribly good friends with them. One of them is quite quiet and the other has been gone for the past month teaching in Colorado. But it's great. Except that there is no A/C and it's about 80 degrees in here at 10:30pm. However, comparatively, I hear that 80 is comfy. The people I babysit for woke up at 7am to a temperature of 92 inside their house. Ick!

So, as for the job situation. I moved out here partly because my boss, Becky, from the physical therapy clinic where I was working in Athens, GA moved out to San Jose this past March and offered to get me a job where she's working. That has happened. I'm currently employed by BaySport as a physical therapy aide. I love it. I get to do so much more hands on stuff with patients than I was able to do in GA. It's confirming that I love physical therapy and that it's something that is worth investing in for 3 more years of school. Aside from that I babysit for Becky as well. (Becky, my boss from GA). I used to babysit for her back in Athens when she only had Enzo, but now she has Nolan as well. They are 3 years and 10 months, respectively. I adore them both. Becky picked up some more hours at BaySport with my arrival. So, I commute to work and then to Becky's or to Becky's and then to the office. Or sometimes, Becky will drop the kids off at the office, as happened today, and I take them swimming. This is the BIG benefit of my job at BaySport: it's located within a super swanky gym. I get a free membership. They have 4 tennis courts, 2 swimming pools, a hot tub, 3 weight rooms, a pilates room, a spa, and a café. In other words, I'm getting a pretty good deal. So, sometimes I take the kids to the pool for an hour or so until Chris, Becky's husband, gets off of work. It works well, especially on days like today where is was 105 degrees--and I'm sure it was about 110 in Becky's house.

Starting next week, I'll be working at Starbuck's Coffee as well. I know, I know, I'm working for the man, right? Well, as it turns out, 'the man' offers health benefits for part-time work. That's right, with an average of 20 hours a week, I can get full-time health benefits. Unfortunately, I interviewed and got this job about 3 weeks ago and I'm just starting next week. I went out of town, and now my trainer/manager is out of town, so I wait. The Starbuck's is literally right down the street, about a block and a half away, which will be nice for those few mornings next week when I have to be there at 6am. My eyelids burn just thinking about it. Oh wait, maybe that's the fan blowing semi-cool air at my face. Either way, it's going to be a little rough. Monday will be a good test. I work at Starbuck's from 9-1pm, Becky's from 2-3:15, and BaySport from 3:30-8pm. Plus, it takes about 30 mins to get to Becky's from my place. I hate the commute, it's my least favorite part about where I'm living.

Now, to throw a wrench in all the plans: Megan and I took a little vacation trip up to Seattle last week. Through a series of events, we had free plane tickets up there from Sunday June 29th to Monday July 7th. We took advantage of it. We were also able to stay in Fremont at Megan's friend, Kendall's, house for FREE for the ENTIRE week. It worked out ridiculously well as Kendall was flying east for the next 10 days. We house-sat. Perfect. We also had run of the grill, the car, and some bikes, as well as camping gear. All in all, we had an AMAZING week. I have some pictures. I'll do a whole post on it at some point. But the main point is that I fell in love with Seattle--and so did Megan. I also fell in love with the University of Washington, which could serve me well come this time next year...SO now everything is up in the air. My living situation is up Aug 15th, and I have places to stay through the end of August so I can finish up my jobs, but then my path is unclear. I'm looking at full-time jobs with benefit options in the Bay Area as well as in Seattle--anyone have any connections they want to tell me about? I'm looking to work for the next year and then go to school. I figure the more I can save the better, so that's the plan.

Anyway. I'd love to hear some comments. This is what is going on RIGHT NOW. I know you've all been dying to know, so I feel good finally having posted something current:)