Productive
Last night and today:
- Read a week's worth of submissions.
- Learned a lot about real estate. Kam pointed me to the Multiple Listing Service site, which is a great resource for getting a sense of what housing prices are like in a given city, at least in the Bay Area. Discovered that there seem to be a fair number of 2-bedroom condos in Mountain View (and some in Redwood City, right near both work and Pam & Arthur's place) that are somewhere roughly in my price range. I'm not quite certain what my price range is, but a mortgage calculator suggests that I may be able to afford a little more than I'd been assuming. Sent email to a realtor who Kam's parents put me in touch with.
- Measured various rooms in my apt to try to figure out my current square-footage (seems to be about 650), to get a sense of what size place I'd want (I'm thinking 900-1000ish).
- Chatted for a while with an old friend who's been out of touch for years but suddenly resurfaced a couple weeks ago. (In fact, several people I'd been out of touch with for a long time suddenly got back in contact a couple weeks ago. If any of you are reading this, thanks! Unfortunately, I'm often as flaky about maintaining contact as about initiating it.)
- Learned that Macy's doesn't carry curtains. I suppose this item doesn't actually count as productive.
- Stopped by the dry cleaner to pick up my suit, but alas, they'd closed. I suppose this item doesn't actually count as productive either.
- Bought a car stereo (though it won't be installed 'til next weekend, sigh).
- Did various database-updating tasks and various tasks related to ongoing editor search.
- Drove past a condo complex half a mile from here, right next to the train station, that had a unit listed at MLS. Tempting, though small and may be toward the high end of my price range. (And all the units look identical—little boxes—but I can live with that.) Has a nice little park-like area built into the complex; is literally a five-minute walk from train station; has a little café built into the complex; is also literally a five-minute walk from big shopping center (Safeway, Walmart, Trader Joe's, etc) and little dairy/fresh-produce market (and Planned Parenthood, interestingly); is a slightly further but still easy walk to DMV, various banks, Tower Records, and a couple of drugstores. Most of those items aren't big draws for me, but a few of them would make a bunch of things more convenient for me and for anyone who visited me.
- Stopped at the grocery store on the way home to pick up milk and cheese (no, not Milk and Cheese, just milk and cheese), ended up also picking up a new item I hadn't encountered before: prepackaged yakisoba, plus some frozen mixed veggies. I came home and made an impromptu yakisoba/stir-fry for dinner—which probably sounds unsurprising to those of you who are unaware of how rarely I do anything that resembles cooking even to that extent.
Also, yesterday I came up with a possibly interesting new strategy for coping with loud car situation. But I'm not quite ready to discuss that yet; needs to percolate some more. Don't worry; nothing illegal, immoral, or harmful to anyone.
