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Irish day

This morning we headed out to the Sam's Club parking lot on Greenville and Park to "tailgate" for the St. Patrick's Day parade with the ND Club. Thanks to my sister the coordinator, the Club had a float with some food, t-shirts, plenty of ND-Irish decorations and beer. The staging area was next to the Hare Krishna float. (?) But we were clearly more Irish. It was so much fun to meet new people, including one family with 5 (and almost 6) six kids, another with an adorable baby boy, and a few transplant couples with kids out of the house (including a few working in D.C.). That was one thing I noticed, by the way - an awful lot of people are transplants here and a lot of people seemed to have lived in D.C. at some point. The other main place of origin seemed to be Chicago (well, with any ND Club that makes sense). I guess Texas is a pretty welcoming place.

The tailgating was so much fun, I wanted to watch a football game afterwards, but unfortunately, it's March. Instead, we jumped onto the flatbed and rode (near the back of the parade) a few miles down Greenville, throwing beads and dum-dums to all the parade-watchers. The route was pretty packed. It was a beautiful day and really a fun event. Yay to my sister for planning such a successful Club event!

Now that I somehow survived the bar exam, I feel like I am starting to settle in here (except for the bugs, who keep making unwelcome appearances - ugh, time to call the exterminators back). It's nice to have people to go to lunch with at work (and visit with during not-lunch times while the market's slow!). We're also starting to drive around and look at neighborhoods so we can find a house by end of summer/fall. I'm excited about the process but I'm trying to set myself up for compromise in terms of the house itself. The problem here is that my "Not So Big" houses, which I have loved ever since I read about the concept and could put words to why I hate two-story foyers, are actually not completely the stuff of future dreams here, but are available and in our relatively modest price range (like, $200,000 or less for a four-bedroom - inconceivable in D.C.) from certain builders. Walking through some of these models is fantastic - cozy spaces, good sight lines, open floorplans, spaces with multiple purposes. So it would all seem to be within reach! Oh, but the catch is, none of these is in the established school districts, and/or has much longer commute times. I may end up just being practical for the sake of the future family, and stay within the better school districts closer in - and get a completely uninspiring house. But we'll see...

Full post as published by Irish Law on March 15, 2008 (boomark / email).