Moving into 2012

It's been a long week. It took us about four days to move to our new place, including making trips to pick up various 'necessities' that (because of subletting) we haven't had to worry about so far. But as far as moves go, this was pretty easy.

We did, however, have to make a trip to an Ikea and to a local mall. Turns out that we weren't the only people who had the idea of buying things after Christmas. Ikea was basically the same as in the US: like lab rats, we scuttled through the maze of furniture in order to get the cheap food at the Ikea cafeteria, and drove off with more things than we'd thought we were going to get. Getting to assemble the furniture helped take a little of the edge off of the capitalist guilt...

And then we went to a mall called 'Southland.' It was... a mall. With the standardized mall experience, including the long quest for a parking spot. Colin was proud enough of finding one that he took the most boring picture you will see on this blog:

Fortunately, we didn't have to get everything new. Various friends lined us up with various pieces of furniture and household wares. We ended up with a nice dining table, though it needed a little re-finishing:

Here's the table in its new home, with a view of Step 839 of moving in (we promise more apartment photos to  come - when everything is more set up):

By New Years' Eve, we were moved in, and were able to head out to a park by the beach for a picnic of veggie Chinese food and to watch some fireworks with Adam and Tamar (of Thanksgiving fame). We may post some more pictures of that later, but for now - here's us:

Here's Adam and Tamar:

And here are the fireworks, with some Australians in the foreground. The big dark patch on the left below the horizon is the bay. The city's fireworks seemed to be mainly launched off the top of the downtown skyscrapers. Pretty cool:

We spent the first day of 2012 sleeping in, and then went for a walk in our new neighborhood in the 90 degree heat. It's an interesting mix of beautiful old mansions and ugly 60's-era apartment buildings. Just to the east is a block of military stuff:

A little beyond that is a good-sized park that we anticipate picnicking in regularly. We found one lovely spot:

Colin also inadvertently found something else. Here he is cleaning it off the bottom of his sandal:

If today's walk is any indication, then, 2012 will be a year of extremes: flowers and shady picnic spots vs. guns and dog-doo. Here's hoping the former outweigh the latter...

Happy New Year!