Celebrating 6 years of fun

Six years ago today David and I had our first date. After a game of LIFE in my South Baker dorm room a couple of days before, David invited me to join him for his Jazz teachers concert on Valentine's Day. I said I would "think about it" and David responded "see you Monday". What nerve! Needless to say, I found this assumption both flattering and obnoxious. Even so.... I found myself texting David (with my old school phone, probably one of the first text messages I ever sent... makes me feel old!) and telling him I'd go. We met up at Willard Straight before the concert (the Cornell union) and I happened to arrive first. While I tried to look "cool" staring at the various magazines David came up behind me and tapped me on the shoulder. After the concert we sat outside my dorm room under the Baker Tower arch and talked for way too long - all I really remember is my toes going numb. And so it began....

To celebrate it all, David and I finished off our relaxing weekend in IL by going go kart racing with our Groupons and gorging ourselves on Mexican food and snickers. At the track David's fastest lap was 24 seconds and mine was 27. I might not have been as fast, but I shaved 3 seconds off my first lap times!

Looking towards the future, on Sunday both David and the Seller signed the P&S, and today they posted a "SOLD" sign! We are now waiting on the garage permit from the city, and working on the final details of the mortgage. The closing date is now scheduled for March 25th. We are keeping our fingers crossed that everything finishes up as planned, and looking forward to getting to work on the house!

Settling in Somerville

Well, settling for the next few years at least. For the past few months we have been intently watching the real estate listings for a 2-3 unit home in Somerville. Requirements were:

1. existing two car garage, or space to build a garage
2. near Davis Square or Porter Square
3. one of the units needed to be 1 or 2 bedrooms and the other ideally 3 or 4 bedrooms
4. in an affordable price range (of course)
5. "unique character" and sunny rooms

After being out-offered on the first house we liked (with a garage) we expanded our search to more seriously consider houses without a garage, but that met our other requirements. We immediately found the above house, located at 3 Morrison Ave, Somerville, MA. David went to see the house armed with a new camera, a measuring tape, and pen and paper. He took many pictures (see link below) and most importantly (to the car nut) took measurements of the back yard space. We drew up various rough sketches of garage possibilities and David made many phone calls to the city to learn about permit requirements and building rules. After confirming that we could indeed build a garage for this house, we made an offer. The next few days were quite nerve wracking as we negotiated back and forth with the seller, until at the end of the week we settled on a price and both parties signed the offer. That Friday (Jan 28) we planned a home inspection for 8:30 am. As I was traveling back to Boston Thursday night I learned that David's plane was to be delayed until Friday - putting me solely in charge of the inspection. I brought my mom and Tommy along for moral support and expertise, and we braved the cold (and traffic jams) to see the house.

Throughout the inspection David was messaging me "how is it how is it how is it" and I'm trying to swype away and getting words totally off the map that make no sense because I'm sliding my finger across the screen so fast. I finally gave up in frustration and just took notes on what the inspector said. Having not seen the house yet, David was quite nervous about what I'd think and whether the pictures had been a good enough representation. Luckily, I thought the house was awesome - in need of some work for sure, but a really nice lay out with lots of "character and sun". I scribbled away at all the comments from the home inspector, and in my fervor forgot to take any pictures of the "problem areas". Luckily the house seemed pretty sound over all. Initial work will include removing the nasty carpets, fixing a duct in the basement, and supporting the main girter with new lolly columns as it is sagging with age.

With the home inspection in the clear, we set to work on designing the garage. Per city rules we had to hire an architect or engineer to make the plans, and so far it has seemed to be a good idea because they can check all city codes and have friends in the city offices to run plans by in advance. The picture below shows our final plan, though the car pictured doesn't have to be at that funny angle, it can turn in more to the right and be parallel with the edges of the garage. The garage will be made of concrete (must be fireproof), will be 15 feet tall and have a slanted metal roof. It will be large enough to accommodate one car, a two post lift, a shifter kart, a work bench, and a few other odds and ends. It takes up quite a bit of the backyard, but leaves enough space to meet city laws on landscaping and for us to have a grill and a small garden (the area along the right side of the house is all grass as well).

Currently we are waiting on the finished design from the architects, which will then be submitted by the sellers to the city for a permit. Assuming all goes well then the P&S will go forward, and we will be well on our way to owning a house! There is a tenant in the 1 bedroom unit for awhile longer, so we would work on updating the 4 bedroom unit first. David would then hopefully live there with 3 other roommates until I move back in a couple of years and we can take over the 1 bedroom.

For more pictures:https://picasaweb.google.com/dhp.porter/3Morrison#

The wedding, Part 2 & the trip home

At long last we are back in the United States and have time to post the rest of the story regarding the wedding! Once we arrived at the reception site, the entertainment provided was just unbelievable (literally).

First, there was a band of gypsies to greet us -- while they played Jamie and Victoria had to drink from the same glass of wine and then Jamie had to break the glass. Around this time we met our hosts for the night -- one man speaking Russian and narrating the chain of events, and another man who translated the Russian into English. Neither of us really remember the order in which each show was put on, so we will just describe the ones we remember.

At one point there were two tests of sorts for Victoria. One of them started off with a tribe of people dressed as Native Americans -- with headdresses, feet stomping, howling, feathers, the whole deal. Some of the Russians actually asked the Americans if the Indians were brought straight from America!! They danced around for a bit, and then Jamie's father came out wearing a headdress to present the "babushka" (grandmother) to them to help them with cooking, etc. The woman came in dressed as an Indian and riding on a platform. She hobbled to the stage, and Victoria was called up to prove she didn't need the babushka's help. She had to correctly identify the things needed to make a soup. After the Indian tribe was dismissed, all of the men in the room were welcomed to come to the stage and kiss Victoria on the cheek. Jamie was to be one of them, and Victoria had to correctly identify her husband. She managed to do this (we later learned they had a secret code planned), and then handed candy to each of the guys who came to kiss her.

Throughout the night we also had several dances by different groups -- Russian dancers, clog dancers, unidentifiable (by me) dancers, and two dances by children of some of the Russian guests (about age 12). The kids were phenomenal -- they did ballroom dancing and were just really really good! Also, put up at the beginning, were three HUGE fans (like, the accordion style paper ones that open), about 15 feet tall, that had pictures of Jamie and Victoria on them. These were on the stage outside.

At one point we had grape stomping, to make fresh wine for the couple. There was a big (15ft diameter) vat which large amounts of grapes into and people from the party hopped in barefoot and stomped on the grapes. In the mean time, surrounding the main barrel, there were several smaller barrels with scantily clad women (see through costumes, thongs, etc.) swaying back and forth -- in the barrel.

We also saw a group of people dressed as Eskimos singing and dancing. At the same time a large ice sculpture was brought out, and Jamie had to chisel it open to find food and vodka. He and Victoria then had to pour the Vodka on a fire (the fire was wheeled in with a fake tree) and cook the fish (I think).

There was a probably professional redone debate between Obama and a Russian guy up on the projector -- instead of what they were actually talking about the debate had subtitles discussing the marriage of Victoria and Jamie, and how good it was for the cooperation between the two countries.

There was a cooking competition (David joined in and got stabbed by a knife while cutting cucumbers). Russia vs. US -- they were given a bunch of salad ingredients and had to stand up on stage and make a salad in the allotted time. Victoria and Jamie then tasted each salad and chose which one they liked better. Russia won.

Jamie and Victoria also sawed through a log at some point in the night. There was a large fireworks show (as big as Randolph 4th of July apparently) just for us, set off from across the river. At the same time there was a large group of dancers with drums and two fake pianos dancing by the river.

While all of this was happening, the 100 or so guests were enjoying a multi course meal with various meets, fish, caviar, bread, potatoes, wine, vodka, etc. The main dish was a choice of salmon or beef, we both had the beef. There was a fruity cake for dessert. The entire "reception" went on from about 5:30pm (when we left the hotel) till about 1am. You would think the night was over at this point, but it was most certainly not!

At 1:00am we boarded two coach buses and were driven to ANOTHER boat. This boat was much bigger, and fit all of the guests. There was more food, more wine, champaign and vodka. There was a band. We toured the rivers on this boat waiting for the draw bridges to raise at 1:30am, they are only raised for 2 hours each day. We watched this happened while we continued to celebrate.

At 3:00 am the boat dropped us off and we had a 20 minute walk back to the hotel. Diana and I actually more accurately hobbled back because wearing heels for that many hours made both of our feet quite sore. Once back at the hotel we packed up our stuff, and crawled into bed around 6am. We'd had a fun night, but we were both incredibly disheartened because the Russian maids had thrown out David's special Czech beer bottles. We are going to try to replace them, but its not the same because we can't ever have the bottles we drank from.

We woke up at 10:30 in the morning and thankfully had hot water. We had a quick breakfast, hopped in our taxi and headed to the airport. The trip home was mostly uneventful, though by the time we hit Boston David and I were both feeling tired and sick of unhealthy food. On the plane we both watched "The edge of darkness" which was not a very good movie, napped some, and ate two meals. After landing in Boston we took a taxi back to the apartment, unpacked, did some laundry, and went to the store to buy some pita chips and fruit.

And that concludes the awesome trip!