Quick Notes about the New House

The new house is sooo big to me. I talked about it with my husband recently, and we both realized that it's the first time either of us has lived anywhere with more than one bathroom.

In fact, when I lived in New York City in the 90s, my old apartment had NO bathroom. I had a nook with a sink, a mini-fridge and a hot plate, and then I shared a bathroom with three other apartments. And I considered myself lucky to get that. I had to pay an agency $300 just so I could apply for it.

I've lived in nicer places before and after, but I've always had to share single bathrooms with roommates.

We're starting to meet the new neighbors. Sunny is going to have neighborhood kids to play with here. He's already met a few of them. The subdivision looks like a very typical mix for this area... 1/3 elderly white people, 2/3 middle-aged black people.

It's nice and quiet here too. Our old house was on a busy street. Every few weeks we'd find a hubcap in our front yard because people kept crashing at the intersection around the corner.

The only drawbacks to the new house are 1) lack of sun for gardening due to trees and 2) huge amounts of mosquitos. Later in the year, I'm going to thin out the juvenile trees a bit, then start work on a mostly-native shade garden. The mosquito factor is compensated for by an awesome screened-in porch. Aaah...

Ojiichan has his own room for when he visits. I just found a couple cheap sources for tatami and real futons. Other than a tiny table and some pillows, he won't need anything else. He looks down on furniture. "Furniture is for barbarian Americans".