After an evening of exploration featuring miniature animals

We looked at two fabulous apartments today. The first one is in the same neighborhood we live in currently ( further ewa on King st. right past Mccully Mart and Bec) and it has beautiful Japanese style wooden sliding doors separating the bedroom from the living room.



It also has a very straight forward, relaxing layout. I felt so happy looking at it. Ahh. Relax. Make a comfortable home place here. That's what it said to me. Also, I felt so relieved to find such a great place, I hadn't realized how anxious I was about apartment hunting. We filled out the application, sweet-talked the owner and won her regard by requesting automatic withdrawal for rent payments. She assured us that she would call tomorrow as soon as she got the credit check back.

Just as we were getting ready for bed, another apartment manager called me back. We sped over there (you really have to jump on the apartments you find here) with flashlights in hand (this apartment doesn't have the electricity turned on) to find an even BETTER deal! Way closer to work, a great big garden space, a bigger apartment with more storage space... We filled out an application there too, and again the apartment manager promised to call tomorrow after the credit check. So, we have beautiful and functional with no garden space, and not so beautiful but just as functional with a great garden space that no one else is using.

Ack! The suspense is killing me, which is why I'm awake telling you about it instead of sleeping peacefully like I want to be. I could potentially have all my plants back next week! But what if we don't get either? That's the first thing keeping me awake, the other thing is the process of packing. I can't stop visualizing exactly how I'm going to take things off shelves, put them in boxes, systematically check for egg sacks ( Yah. You're not mistaken. I check everything for cockroach eggs. No point in taking them with us)



Then, how I'll arrange the piles of Goodwill stuff so that it's easy to lug down the street to the car and drop off. Whether or not I should alphabetize the canned goods. Just kidding. I wouldn't do that. In real life.

This, however, is an enticing organizational project. But I wonder about the aluminum cans they're using. Hmm and hmm. I think I'll take my chances. I just won't put salt in them.

This would actually be a perfect time to move; I still have two days off a week (I'll start a babysitting job in January and go back to only having one day off.) which would give me time to do all of this sorting and checking and pitching. And that would also mean that Jacob wouldn't have take time off from work.

In other news I'm really excited about the yoga class I've been taking. Did I tell you about that?



I don't think I did. I found this really awesome class, just half a block away from my apartment at the Japanese cultural Center dojo. The teacher is a tiny little haole powerhouse with a perma-perky attitude. ( I actually really appreciate the attitude ) The class is mostly Japanese or Japanese speaking women and their children. For awhile, I was the only one in the class not bringing a child and speaking Japanese, then Anica and Atira started coming with me. I've recruited another friend now who's also kid-less, so we're evening out the odds here. Mel, the teacher, puts us through a challenging vinyasa flow, then uses the last half hour to work on partner poses like headstands. It's great because it's interesting, it's great because I'm stronger than I was a month ago, it's great because I'm learning more about correcting body posture, it's great because I feel more of a sense of community here ( which I need ). So my favorite pose right now is a headstand pose that I need a partner to do currently, but I aspire to solitudeness.

You can read a little more about it here, here, and get a quick how-to here. If you don't have a partner to hold your hips steady, I'd recommend doing it against the wall. I would do it right now, except that I just washed my hair, it's still wet. For some reason the floor and wet hair don't sound like an appealing combination.