micheleandtom.com

We have officially done it — used our Zipcar membership for the first time.

Although we attempt to utilize public transportation, or our feet, for nearly everything, this last Tuesday we just couldn’t do it. We had a 2:15 pm school pick up, after which we had to race to buy soccer cleats and shin guards for Zoe. Next, we flew across the river to a 3:30 pm doctor’s appointment for Zoe. At the end of that, we commandeered a bathroom where Zoe had to change into her soccer clothes. Back into the Zipcar we went and I dropped Zoe off at a Portland Streetcar stop where Tom and Zelda were waiting.

The hubby and I switched kids right there on the street corner, with Tom taking Zoe to her first soccer practice since returning to the US (she loved it). Zelda and I were entrusted with returning our lovely Zipcar, which occurred without mishap.

After soccer practice, we had a Blazer game to go to, so Tom and Zoe hotfooted it to Hot Lips Pizza, where she changed out of her soccer gear, and then they caught the Max to the Rose Garden. Meanwhile, Zelda and I walked over the Broadway Bridge to the arena — something I would have never done if I had a car.

Anyway, our first experience with Zipcar was fabulous. We drove a Prius and it was really fun to maneuver around town. It had separate little buttons to start the car and to put the car in park. The gear shift was a kind of video game joy stick thingy in the dash.

We had about a page of instructions on the newfangled stuff, but it was all well explained and we returned it on time (which is something you worry about since they charge you an arm and a leg if you’re even the slightest bit late).

One of the interesting things we’ve noticed about participating in a car share versus owning our own car is that it really quantifies, by the hour, the cost of operating a vehicle. And I mean the whole cost, not just the gas! Having the real cost of driving spelled out for us really motivates us to try and avoid it as much as possible!

Tom didn’t get an iPhone after they first came out because he knew we were going to be making some life changes, so it didn’t make sense to sign up for the two year commitment. Yes, that means my poor husband read about it, pined for it, checked out friends’ phones…it’s a sad tale.

I know with the subtle foreshadowing, you will never guess what Tommy’s first order of business was upon our arrival back in the US. Yes, that’s right, buying an iPhone. He loves it in every way. Me, not so much, especially after I spent the entire Christmas holiday mocking his iPhone because, with the AT&T network, it was entirely useless as a phone. We had to drive at least 15 minutes from my parents’ place to get a signal, and forget about any data.

Prior to our holiday by the sea, I was on the fence…Should I get a Droid and the fabu Verizon network? Should I wait for the Google phone rumored to be coming out in January (which it just did)? Or, should I join my husband as an iPhonophile?

After our ill-fated trip to the coast with zero coverage, i decided the iPhone was out. I told Tom, “at least one of us needs an actual telephone.” So, I went with the Verizon network and bought the Droid, because I didn’t feel like waiting for the Google phone to be available on Verizon. How do we feel about our choices? We are both happy. My turn-by-turn GPS navigation is better and Tom envies my automatically updated gmail. I, in turn, am jealous of Tom’s sync with iTunes and the zillion apps that are useful and well written.

While it’s impossible to completely suppress a superior smirk toward the other if our phone has performed a task better, I think that we are, for the most part, behaving in an incredibly adult manner in light of our little phone-on phone-competition. Except, of course, when the GPS on Tom’s phone keeps locating our apartment on the wrong side of the river…

I am sharing our latest moving wisdoms…

Deep sinks. Our new apartment has a double sink that seems to be as deep as a utility sink. At first, i wasn’t sure how i felt about it, but I’ve discovered it’s primary function — hiding dirty dishes. You can pile up those bad boys in the sink for days and not notice them unless you are standing right over the sink.

Disappearing Stuff. As with any move, something will go missing. We have unpacked all of the boxes and have lost a) microwave safe glass containers with lids that we used for the Z’s lunches; and, b) all of the Zs twin-sized sheets. *sigh*

Fancy Swedish Appliances. I have learned that I cannot operate a Swedish washing machine without a manual, to the point of not even being able to open the front loading door.

Downsizing Reflections. A smaller apartment means that moving in will take longer, even if you are shrinking the amount of crap in your life, because you have less room for stowing things as you unpack, and you have to be more efficient as you cram it all in there (there’s always an element of stuffing, no matter how much crap you think you’ve gotten rid of)! Which leads me to my second point about living simpler, if you are moving into a building that offers a small storage unit, take it — even if you can fit everything in your apartment, it’s nice to be able to put luggage, etc. somewhere else.

Ikea Sales. We needed a TV stand and 2 desks for the Zs. I saw that Ikea was going to have a one-day sale of both of those items at DIRT CHEAP prices yesterday, but only while supplies lasted. Our intention was to arrive at the store as it opened, but of course, getting the Zs out of the house is nigh on impossible, so we were about half an hour late. As we walked into the store, people were streaming out with boxes piled high of the very items we were there to purchase. I panicked. We raced in the back door, found our items in the warehouse, and staked our claim. If we had been just 10 minutes later, we wouldn’t have gotten a desk. Whew.

Putting Together Ikea Furniture. If you do this with your children, it takes 3 times longer.

Vases. I know I got rid of many vases before we left for Argentina, but I could have done so much more. After a while, I felt like every box I opened contained a vase and I didn’t know where to put them all. I don’t even have fresh cut flowers in the house very often (I’m pretty lazy). What is with all the vases?

Mysteries. You wonder why you got rid of some things and why you kept others. Aside from the vases, the other big surprise for me was end tables/night stands. I think we had about 5 of them before leaving, but I must have given them all away in a fit of downsizing because we don’t have any left!

Hello beautiful mattress, we missed you!

After 8 months of sleeping in a full size bed that was a couple inches shorter than Tom’s 6’2″ frame, we found our big fluffy queen sized mattress to be an absolute dream last night, despite the fact that we were still in sleeping bags.

Day 2 of our move was very interesting. Willamette Valley Movers went to our storage space and were impressed with Tom’s Tetris packing of our 10′ x 15′ unit and asked if my perfectly balanced boxes (I’m so modest) were packed by movers. That being said, Charles and Dustin were not entirely thrilled with Tom’s system of placing pallets on the storage unit floor to keep air circulating and water away from our stuff. It meant everything had to be taken out by hand.

Most of the move went off without a hitch, until a freak snow storm began developing at the end of our transferring everything into our new abode. We ran to our previously blogged about smoking Internet connection and looked up the weather forecast — it said: “nothing would stick and the snow would end shortly.”

We made…well, okay…I made a command decision to pile the family in the parents’ 4 wheel drive Jeep to run to the store and pick out some lamps since we couldn’t really start unpacking in the dark (both bedrooms and the living room have no overhead lighting).

That was a HUGE mistake.

The snow storm brought the entire city to a standstill. It took us 2 hours to return from the store, something that would have normally taken ten minutes. We saw buses moving in scary, slow motion broadside skids on modest hills. Cars stalled out everywhere, squealing rear wheels turning on the slippery roads. At one point, we were stuck for 30 minutes behind a semi that couldn’t get up a short slope.

By the time we had crossed the river, I couldn’t sit in the car for another second. I hopped out of the vehicle, with Zoe and Zelda in tow, and we walked the rest of the way home. Part of our trek took us over a pedestrian foot bridge that spans the train tracks in Old Town near an historic train station — it was so beautiful. The snow falling in big fat flakes upon the pristine white rail yard and brick buildings, which we viewed from above, top lit dramatically from the span of the bridge.

A sign of the slow going — The Zs and I reached the apartment before Tom did in the car.

Furthermore, our snow outing put a serious dent in our unpacking productivity. We only put together and placed all of our furniture. I didn’t unpack a single box. (For those of you who know me, that is faint-worthy information.)

Pictured Above: From our place we have a view of the Willamette River, the Fremont Bridge, and part of what you see here — the riding grounds and training ring for the Portland mounted police. Every morning we watch them and sympathize with the newly minted equestrian officers of the law!

Pictured here is the master bedroom of our new place…we went a bit spare!

Our first day in our new apartment involved getting lease paperwork signed, taking a look at our storage space and figuring out what we needed to get together so the movers could actually move us, stole some towels from my parents’ place so we could shower, did some moving ourselves, met with the cable guy to get our smoking fast Internet connection, shopped for some food, put away all of the wonderful pantry staples my parents bought us…blah blah blah.

The kids have decided to try an experiment with our new living quarters. The girls are once again sharing a room, which Zoe, being older, is not thrilled about. However, their room has a humongous walk-in closet, so they have decided they would like to sleep on Aerobeds, which they can stow away in their closet with the rest of all of their belongings, leaving them with an entire room for playing.

We’re not sure how long this is going to last, or how much time will pass before they pop a hole in one of the beds, but we’re willing to give it a try!

Of course, for our first night in the apartment, sans furniture, Tom and I stole the Aerobeds and left our poor children to catch their Zs in sleeping bags on the floor. My 43 year old body doesn’t really rest sans mattress!

During our 14 months in Argentina, we downsized quite a bit by living in a smallish apartment and by not owning a car — we just used public transportation and taxis for everything. It was lovely, for the most part. We could clean quickly, we consumed less crap because we didn’t have room for anything, and were generally a lot happier without a lot of stuff.

As a result of our experiences, we would like to extend our downsizing and use of public transportation to our life in Portland. So, what specifically does that mean for us?

Housing. We have decided to start out renting a condo in NW Portland that puts us within several blocks of multiple transportation options. The unit we settled on, while bigger than our 950 SF Argentine apartment, is still significantly smaller than our old house!

Transportation. We are within 3-5 blocks of multiple Zipcars, the Portland Streetcar, the Max, and TriMet buses.

School. The girls will go to a school we can travel to via Portland Streetcar.

We put our resolve to the test during our first week in Portland. It poured rain (hovered around freezing the first day) the entire time the four of us trudged around the city wearing zillions of layers (we still feel like it’s summer), armed only with our umbrellas and some TriMet travel passes. Even though we had signed up for Zipcar, we took pride in the fact that we didn’t use it once as we looked for apartments, went to doctor’s appointments, met up with family, got glasses repaired, paid for a parking permit for the movers, shopped for birthday presents, etc. etc.

Can we make it through a Portland winter without running out to buy a car? Let the experiment begin!!

We were riding the Portland Streetcar the other day and a woman behind me was having a LOUD conversation on her cell phone, the volume of which led me to have a re-entry moment where I lamented how much harder it is to tune people out when they are speaking one’s mother tongue.

As she blathered on, I couldn’t stop listening. A funny thing happened though — I soon became riveted by her conversation, which provided a perfect snapshot of the hurdles that exist for those seeking employment in the United States.

She was telling her friend the story of applying for a marketing job in the radio industry, and even with all of her experience, still not making the cut to count herself amongst the top ten applicants. She asked the station manager why and he said, “we have former radio station directors from major markets with decades of experience applying for this job.”

After a sigh, she continued to say to her friend, “this is what we’re up against.”

Then, her story proceeded to get worse.

It turns out that this poor woman fell for a scam in her job hunt that goes something like this: thieves posted job openings for American Airlines on Craigslist. They then set up meet and greets with respondents who revealed their home addresses, and proceed to rob these job seekers’ homes when they were on the way to the phony American Airlines job interviews.

My fellow passenger sent off all of her personal information to these scam artists, but then managed to avoid the robbery/phony interview because she heard about the con on television.

She said she now lives in fear of home invasion, and has a hard time answering Craigslist ads, which are often blind, thereby encumbering her job search even more.

Thank God my stop came up at that point in her phone conversation…I couldn’t handle any more bad news!

After landing in the a.m. and retrieving all of our bags, Tom and I were dropped off at our hotel by family members while the Zs were whisked away to my parents’ place. When my hubby and I went to check in, we learned that no rooms would be ready for occupancy until 4 or 5 pm, much later in the day than we anticipated. (Note to self, cancel plans to sack out in the room immediately upon arrival, which incidentally breaks every rule of jet lag recovery, but I didn’t give a shit, I was tired.)

Anyway, back to why we adore Portland.

Although the hotel couldn’t get us in our room right away, the desk clerk was super helpful and polite and ensured that we had the biggest one bedroom possible on hold since there were 4 of us. (And boy did she deliver, this place is huge!)

Then, as we were arranging with the bellman to store our luggage until our room could be made ready, we got into a long discussion with him about grass-finished beef, Argentina, and Omnivore’s Dilemma. How awesome is that? In what other city, with the bellman…I ask you???

Anyway, before our bags could be whisked away, Tom and I dove in and grabbed a “welcome home Rice Krispy Treat” that Mom had made for us. It felt good to be home.

Photo by Cacophony under creative commons license.

Yes, we’re back in the good ol’ US of A…so I ask you, do we keep blogging? Tom and I have given it some thought and have decided that we still have something to say…big surprise!!

We figure we have a lot of future fodder related to:

1. Did our sabbatical actually help us accomplish any life changes?
2. Sharing our experiences related to starting up a business.
3. The difficulties and joys of re-entry to living in the US.

And besides, Futból says we have to keep on writin’, so what else can we do?

1. All of the amazing people we’ve met in Argentina — Argentines, Australians, Malaysians, Brits, Canadians, Irish, Americans, Brazilians, Colombians, Venezuelans, Chinese, parents at school, the Zs Spanish tutor Maria, their tennis teacher Cesar, and lastly, the wonderful cab driver who returned Zelda’s school blazer after she left it in the back of a cab one day.
2. Radiant floor heating.
3. The Zs school.
4. Living in such a child-friendly city. Really, Buenos Aires has a million things for kids to do, and showing up with your little ones in tow never phases anyone. LOVE IT!
5. Coffee, tea and medialunas.
6. The central boiler hot water in our current apartment building — it is scalding hot with awesome water pressure and we.never.run.out! This will, of course, present a problem when we return to the States and the girls have to begin rationing their shower time.
7. All of the vendors around our apartment, including the verdulería family from Bolivia, the Deli guys who laugh at Tom’s lomito munich order every week, and the Persicco ice cream guy who doggedly tried to converse with Tom in Spanish every time he visits.
8. Our doormen (although one of them has fallen in our regard since he forced us to buy the less-than-stellar CD of his band)!
9. For the Zs: their friends, buying junkfood at the kiosko on field day, the fact that we give them a few Oreos in their lunch once a week “because all of the other kids have them every day!” (That will come to a halt when we return to the US!)
10. Traveling in this beautiful beautiful country.
11. The adventure that is gadding about Buenos Aires on the colectivo (city bus)! We will especially miss the 64, which is our closest bus…I swear it goes everywhere. We’ve been all over the city, by cab, and invariably we look up and there it is, the 64. I ADORE that bus.
12. Zoe and Tom: attending chess tournaments on the outskirts of the city with Gil and Sebastian
13. The fact that no one complains about noise in apartment living. Granted, that means we hear our neighbors at ridiculous hours engaged in ridiculously loud activities, but on the flip side, no one bitches about our loud music, running little person feet, us screaming at the kids, you know — life.
14. Spring, fall and winter in Buenos Aires. (Summer, not so much!)