More Pictures.
We have an apartment in Anchorage! My new boss Travis has been nice enough to drive by a few places we've been interested in, and this was the first one we asked him to take a tour of. It's entirely on the second floor, 1200 sq ft, 2BR, 1BA. It has just about the best of everything: 1 parking spot in an attached 3-car garage, a washer and dryer to ourselves, a dishwasher, a fireplace, and what looks like some kind of grill next to the stove. And the deck is enormous, it takes up the entire length of the apartment, it faces south, and has a nice view of the Chugach Mountains off to the east (you can see a hint in the picture). We're on the NE corner of Edward and 9th, across the street from Ptarmigan Elementary. We're about 4 miles from UAA, but only 0.6 miles to pick up a bus (free for us) that drives right past my office. We're very excited! And a bit relieved. One less thing to worry about, and we have an address we can give to the movers. We can start visualizing living in Anchorage.
On the flipside, we have to leave Hyde Park. Now, I know what we've been saying for the past few years: We're sick of Chicago, sick of its crowdedness and its traffic, its rude people, Hyde Park's lackluster customer service, etc. On the other hand, it's been home to me for the past 8 years. And last night I realized two institutions that I'll miss, and that will apparently miss us.
On Thursday night, Becca and I went to get tag-team haircuts, and we took Maia along. This is the salon I've been going to for just about 8 years now, and for most of that time I saw a woman named Rita. Rita's been gone for about 6 months now, but I still liked the place and decided I could make do with someone new. When Becca moved to Hyde Park, she started going there too, including for pre-wedding tanning (can I admit that for her?). They knew we were expecting, and they've gone ga-ga over Maia in person a few times too. The same woman is always at the front desk, and when she answers the phone she always knows my first name. Maybe that's just her fancy scheduling computer, but it still comes off as very friendly. Anyway, Thursday night we were there for about an hour, talking with them about moving to Anchorage, etc. When we left, the owner came back over and said she hoped we had good lives, and that if we came back through Chicago we should stop by. Very sweet.
Then we ran over to our favorite Thai restaurant, The Snail. Well, Becca had a favorite place up on the northside that we haven't been back to in a while, so maybe the Snail is just our favorite thai place that's tasty and only a few blocks away. We must get take-out from there every few weeks or so. Lately we've gotten lazy and asked for delivery more often, but we always used to run over there to pick it ourselves (faster that way!), and I'd always say my name was Andy. At some point, Marisa the co-owner started to recognize me, and now she can either tell it's me by my phone number or her call waiting. She says, "Hi Andy!" She gets so excited when I come by, with or without Maia.
There are other places we'll miss, places we hope we can swing by one last time before we leave town. But I just got a personal vibe from both of these places as we walked from one to the other and back home again. I mean, our soon-to-be old home. I think I'll miss it.
Chom & Marisa
