Office Space

I have my very own office now.  I have rolodex and a couple of little potted plants in my office.  

I don't think you understand how grown-up I feel.

For those who may not know:  Things worked out really well when we made the move to Albuquerque, and I was able to transfer to a different office of the company I was already working for.  As it turns out, the Albuquerque office has even more work for me than the Tucson office did, and I was able to come on full-time basically as soon as I wanted to after we had moved in.  And I've been with the company long enough now to receive benefits.  Benefits!!  I've never had a job with benefits before.  Needless to say, all of this is fantastic.  It's kind of crazy how well this move has worked out.

I'll be in the office for a while until the Highway 491 project starts back up in late March or so.  I'm actually kind of excited about this as it provides a normal-person's daily schedule for a while-- something I've not had in a very, very long time (maybe ever?).

And did I mentioned that I have my own office?!?

Rainbow bomb

The other day while driving through downtown Albuquerque, I took this photo from my car window.  At the top of one of the new loft complexes, probably ten stories up, I can only describe this as the coolest and happiest graffiti I have ever seen.  I hope they leave it up there.

Salty goodness

Last week after our POD arrived with all of our furniture and boxes, I was so excited to be able to make real food again that the kitchen was the very first thing I set about unpacking.  Then I baked some bread.  Not just any bread, mind you, but pretzel bread.  And it was delicious!

I usually find excuses to put salt on my bread.  Because I love salt.  The great thing about this bread is that it totally fulfills my salt-overload cravings.  Here is the recipe that I followed to make the pretzel bread.  I followed the recipe exactly, and ended up with about 12 sandwich-bun-sized rolls.  And instead of regular coarse salt, I used some rosemary-flavored salt (yes, and it is amazing).  Josh and I ate the rolls with our pasta dinner that night, and I've been using them for my sandwiches at work all of this week.  I had thought they would turn out much smaller than they did, so I wasn't expecting to be able to use them for sandwiches, but it turned out to be a wonderful unintended outcome.  I definitely will be making these again and again.

Snow? What is that again?

Albuquerque sits at about twice the elevation of Tucson.  Higher elevation means more snow.  I'd all but forgotten what snow looked like after my five years in the Sonoran desert... and I've got to say, though I truly do love the extreme desert or southeastern Arizona, I'm pretty excited to be back in place that has a true winter.  Once we've unpacked all of our boxes, I'm looking forward to taking my new snowshoes up into the hills for a test run.

Not a bad view, eh?

This past weekend, Josh and I drove up the Sandia mountains to check out the ski slopes.  From our house, it only takes 45 minutes to get to the parking lot.  I started skiing back when I first moved to NM for college, and have always loved it.  I've missed being able to ski regularly while living in AZ, and am thrilled to have the opportunity to ski more often now.  Josh, on the other hand, hates skiing.  He's tried it a couple of times, and just never got the hang of it.  So, this weekend he decided that he would try snowboarding for the first time.  I think we were both a little nervous that he would also hate snowboarding, but all turned out well.

The weather was absolutely gorgeous, the snow was great, and the slopes weren't crowded at all.  Josh took a private lesson while I made a few runs down the mountain, and after an hour or so of test runs, he was ready to tackle the bigger slopes with me.  He's already planning to go back again next weekend, and I'm certainly not going to argue.  Maybe next time I'll make him carry the camera all day so that he's not the only subject of all the photos.

Success!

Oh, moving.

Well, we’re here!  Yet alas, the arrival of our worldly possessions is still a few days away.

I imagine that when most people say the words, "I love moving", they probably say it sarcastically.  Not me. I really do love moving.  Weird, I know.  Right up until our move this past weekend, I’d been in the field four days out of every week.  This made preparing for a move very difficult, and incredibly stressful.  Part of the excitement about moving for me is that I actually enjoy going through everything I own, getting rid of things I don’t need, and obsessively packing the things I care about to keep them safe.  I feel like I was short-changed on this move, as a lot of things ended up simply being thrown into boxes at the last second.  And other things ended up being thrown out because there simply wasn’t any extra space in the POD.  Oh well.  The other thing I really enjoy about moving is unpacking, so at least I won’t have to be in any rush to do that.  I love rearranging furniture and organizing things and turning a house into a livable space.

Josh left on Sunday just as soon as we had completely packed up the POD, so he and Callie have been in the new house for a little bit longer.  Sienna and I left Monday afternoon, after I spent just about 36 straight hours cleaning the house and the yard.  I think now that we are all four in the new house, Sienna is starting to figure things out and not be quite so stressed anymore.

I wish I’d remembered to take a photo of my car before I left Tucson.  It was ridiculous.  I had the cargo topper, along with two bikes, on the roof.  The entire car aside from the two front seats was completely packed.  And when I say completely packed, I mean that I had to leave the ice packs from the freezer behind because I literally had no place to put them.  The floorboard under Sienna was filled with stuff, and I even had to keep a couple of things under my own feet while driving.  Next time, we’re getting a bigger POD/truck. 

I spent a ridiculous amount of money at Target yesterday.  It’s amazing how small household items can add up when you are buying them all at once.  Sometimes you’ve just gotta buy the fancy, nice-smelling hand soap, damnit.  Anyway, here are some photos from the last few days.

I found these while packing.  Quite the raggedy bunch.  Oh, and that stool?  It’s been proudly displayed (and used) for the last 27 years.

This is what happens when your boyfriend loads the dolly up with too many of your books, and then drops them all into a big mud puddle en route to the driveway.  And of course it had to happen to my expensive archaeology reports and not his D&D books.

I enjoy playing Tetris. 

Watching all of our belongings be taken away.

This is all that remained after I cleaned out the fridge at the old house.

En route to ABQ.

Our new front door!!

Departure

I’m really going to miss Tucson.  And I’m really going to miss my friends in Tucson.

I was very happy to be able to see almost all of the people I care about in Tucson before we left.  I went out with all of the girls from work, all of whom I’ve grown quite close to over the last few months, and we had a blast.  Josh got to hang out with all of his guy friends that same night.  Then this past Saturday, we met up with a huge group of our friends at the bar down the street to have a few drinks and say goodbye to everybody.

 I seriously have some great friends.  Crystal and Adam made us a handmade card for our departure, and had everybody sign it for us.  They also made a carrot cake!  Everyone knows I love carrot cake.  Shane gave me a framed photo of the archaeologists from our cohort in grad school, which will get a place on my desk once it gets set up in the new house.  Shannon brought me a box of wine to help with my last-minute scramble to clean the house.  Cannon gave me a bag of chocolate truffles for the drive.  Randy helped me make a big Goodwill run of crap from the house.  Liye came over and helped me clean for a little while Monday.  And many others came by to spend time with us and give their well-wishes and hugs.  I’m going to miss everybody.  Them’s good people.

I’m also sad to leave the house on Linden St.  It was such a great house, and our landlord was wonderful.  Things worked out great that we were able to pass it along to Lewis and Melissa, so I know it’s in good hands. 

I’m thrilled to be back in Albuquerque, and I’ve spent my first day here trying to re-learn my way around town.  So far, not bad.  We are without our belongings and without internet access at home until next week, but we have a really cool house and the dogs are adjusting well, so all is good.  Photos of the house to come soon!

The problem with smart dogs.

Poor Sienna.  She's just too smart.

Sienna knows that when I pull out my sleeping bag and big backpack, she is likely to join me on a camping trip.  A couple of weeks ago I pulled out my old tent and set it up in the backyard to clean it, and Sienna immediately grew very excited and jumped directly into the tent.  She also knows that when I pull out my duffel bag, it likely means that I'm going to be leaving her for a few days.  Unfortunately, she has become very accustomed to this latter event over the last six months, and as a result has become increasingly anxious and clingy when I am home.  It makes me feel awful.



Meanwhile, Callie is blissfully unaware of her surroundings and goings-on and is rarely bothered by much of anything.

We've been packing up the house for a few weeks now-- moving furniture, getting rid of things, and filling boxes.  Sienna is, to put it simply, freaking out.  I'm not sure if she remembers our two previous moves, but she definitely knows that something big is going on right now, and she definitely doesn't like it.  She has been ridden with anxiety and is made nervous and antsy by the tiniest things.  She follows me around attached to my heels and generally gets in my way at every opportunity.  I think it's stressing her out that she can't interpret what's going on.

The other day, Sienna knocked over a can of paint onto the hardwood floor and then promptly ran through the paint, leaving pawprints all over the floor, the rugs, and Josh and I.  Then she spent an hour or two breathing heavily, panting, and hiding in the corner because we had both screamed at her and chased her around the house after said paint-spilling.  She still has paint all over her paws and belly.  I guess even the smartest dogs in the world should be allowed to have anxiety attacks every now and then.

Who knows-- maybe UNpacking boxes will have a calming effect?  At least I'm not the only one whose dogs have a hard time with moving.  (Please, please read this blog.  It is quite possibly one of my favorite things ever.)  I'll post more about the actual move soon.