Where will we live next year?

You take the good, you take the bad,
you take them both and there you have
The Facts of Life, the Facts of Life.

There's a time you got to go and show
You're growin' now you know about
The Facts of Life, the Facts of Life.

When the world never seems
to be livin up to your dreams
And suddenly you're finding out
the Facts of Life are all about you, you.

It takes a lot to get 'em right
When you're learning the Facts of Life. (learning the Facts of Life)
Learning the Facts of Life (learning the Facts of Life)
Learning the Facts of Life.


FB sent me an email the other day with this this link included.

As you can see, the American Planning Association calls Park Slope, Brooklyn one of the Top Ten Great Neighborhoods in the country. This is not only a very cool honor for the Slope, but entirely true. It is definitely the most interesting/exciting place I've ever lived (no offense Westerville). The downside, of course, is that Park Slope is already an insanely expensive place to live if you are trying to buy real estate. This will certainly only make things worse. The housing market recession that the rest of the country is facing has not crossed into Park Slope...and probably never will.
FB and I have begun preliminary investigations into buying an apartment/condo in the area and the results are pretty frightening. Take for example, this lovely 1 Bedroom, 1 Bath apartment. Only $319,000!!
One bedroom not enough? How about this 2 Bedroom. Not quite $1 million, but pretty damn close.
Or, if you're feeling rich, there's this lovely 2 bedroom with a patio. At $1.3 million, it's a steal!

All this makes me sad. To stay in Park Slope...one of the ten greatest neighborhoods in the country...we'd have to save up for a while and sell a kidney or two. There's always Ft. Greene, Clinton Hill, Windsor Terrace, and a half-dozen other cute neighborhoods nearby, but nothing will be quite as good as living in the Slope.

It's nearly over...

Sometimes the world looks perfect,
Nothing to rearrange.
Sometimes you get a feeling
Like you need some kind of change.
No matter what the odds are this time,
Nothing's going to stand in my way.
This flame in my heart,
And a long lost friend
Gives every dark street a light at the end.

Standing tall, on the wings of my dream.
Rise and fall, on the wings of my dream.

The rain and thunder
The wind and haze
I'm bound for better days.
It's my life and my dream,
Nothing's going to stop me now.



The gigantic project that I have been working on for the past 4 months is finally beginning to wind down. Since June, I've been working late nights, long hours, and being driven crazy. But it is nearly done!
As a reward to myself for finishing up the program, I am going on a few short trips to visit family and friends who I have pretty much ignored over the past months. This Friday I head to Seattle to visit JL (the flute-playing Best Man at my wedding) for a nice long weekend. I haven't seen him since our mini-reunion in Las Vegas this summer, so it will be good to hang out and relax in the great Northwest.
After that, FB and I fly out to Columbus to see my parents and all of our wonderful Ohio friends. Most of them, I haven't seen since Heather's cat caught fire. In that time, two of those friends have left the state for greener/Momonier pastures. I feel bad that I wasn't able to give a proper send off to either of them. But, at least with Lulu, I can keep up with the trials, tribulations, successes, and barnyard creatures in her life.
Lately I've been thinking about how long it's been since I moved from OH. Over two years now! It seems like it couldn't possibly be that long....but at the same time it feels like I've been in NYC forever. I guess that happens.
I am hoping that, now that my crazy project is slowing down, I will be able to post occassionally on this decrepit blog. But I offer no guarantees. At least this is a start. Maybe I'll check back in later this week.

Lastly, I've been to a few concerts in the last week and will provide very brief reviews of them:

9/20 Patty Griffin: The last outdoor concert in Central Park for the season. It was a beautiful and warm night and Patty was amazing. Sadly she was the last of 3 acts to perform and there was an 11pm noise curfew so her set was way too short.

9/23 Rilo Kiley: Johnathan Rice opened, which was a nice treat. Jenny Lewis was at her best and they limited themselves to only a couple songs off their new album (which I am still not in love with). A few technical glitches with Blake Sennett's guitar, but otherwise a very good show.

9/24 Beirut: Part of the Wordless Music Series, a very cool set of concerts that a friend of FB's helps organize. Beirut was very entertaining, bringing out the best of their gypsy-influence, brass-instrument-filled musical stylings.

10/1 Mountain Goats: As usual, the Mountain Goats put on a fabulous show. John Darnielle is a weird by very entertaining guy. They played a short set, but followed up with two encores.

Those are all the shows for a while. In November we're seeing Sufjan Stevens, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and maybe a few others.