Knit Break

Oof. I just got back from southern California last night. I spent four days out there with The Brain, searching high and low for a suitable place to live which would allow him to commute south to San Diego and me to commute north to LA every day for our jobs. I was hoping it could be a pseudo-vacation, since we never got a honeymoon after we got married last November (in fact, we only spent 3 days in the same city together...but more on that later).


Instead, we spent half a day on either end traveling, and then 3 days driving all over Newport/Costa Mesa/Irvine, and learned many things about the differences between Minnesota apartments and California apartments:

1) While it is standard in Minnesota (and everywhere else I've lived) for landlords to require a 60 day notice before vacating, in California most places only request a 30 day notice. It would have been nice if someone had mentioned this during the past couple weeks when I was calling to make appointments, since we would have made the trek in July instead. As it was, we spent 3 days visiting apartments only to find out that the landlords had no idea if they would have anything available in August or not.

2) While it is standard in Minnesota (and everywhere else I've lived) for landlords to show your apartment to anyone who is interested as soon as it goes 'on the market', I was informed that in California, this is 'just not done'. This means that the rental agency is happy to take you through elaborately decorated and furnished models that represent what you will be getting if you sign a lease, but there is no way to actually know how the actual apartment will compare.

3) Pretty much every place we visited was owned by the same management company, and gosh, I really hope they're a good one because it seems as though they own all the land in southern California!

4) Southern California is actually much cooler than Minnesota in the summertime (especially near the coast). You really don't know misery until you're landlocked in Minnesota in 95+ degrees and air so humid you can swim through it, with swarms of bloodthirsty mosquitoes just waiting to suck you dry. I can't WAIT to get out there!!!


I know this post really has nothing to do with knitting. I left it all at home because I really didn't have time to do anything anyway. But I did have two packages from KnitPicks waiting for me when I got home!!!