Baseball Season

This weekend was the Washington Nationals' first home game in their brand spanking new $611 million stadium. Lauded as the "taxpayer-built palace," it sports freshly manicured Kentucky Bluegrass field and local favorite fares, such as Ben's Chili Bowl half-smokes (accordingly priced $2 higher than U Street) and Five Guy's burgers. Apparently, views of the Capitol are spectacular. One view, however, did not sparkle this weekend. Decked out in his baseball gear, our President was present to wave at the crowd and throw out the opening pitch. He was greeted with a hearty round of boos - and some cheers - and I imagine went home and stomped on his "W" hat. Perhaps it was disapproval for the war, but I like to think that the boos were attributed to the fact that he has done everything in his power to sink our voting rights bill. Thankfully, it didn't put much of a damper on the evening, and the Nationals were victorious.

I haven't been to a Nationals game yet, and given our break-neck pace for fleeing the homeland, I'm not sure I will. Maybe we'll make it out west in time to catch a couple of games at PGE Park - home of the Portland Beavers minor league team. The stadium was a quick walk from our first hotel on the February scouting trip and we passed it at least 3 times a day. I did a bit of research when I got home and found out that PGE Park, as it stands today, was originally built in 1926 as a football venue. However, the history of the site dates back to 1891 when the Multnomah Athletic Club set up a playing surface and stadium for all sorts of activities such as cricket, football, and bike races. The wooden stadium burned and was replaced, but the city decided a larger facility was necessary, resulting in the 1926 building. Football was not very profitable, so the main attraction between 1933-55 was dog racing. You heard me, pooches kept this place running for over two decades. In 1956, the Portland Beavers arrived and stayed through 1993.

Faced with the dilemma of having to attract a team back to the city, officials decided to renovate the stadium in 2001 rather than building a new one. This is one example of why I fell in love with Portland. All over downtown there are examples of how the city decided to invest in its old building stock, even in cases were it was clear that starting over from scratch might have yielded something much bigger, and (maybe) better. Although the inside of PGE Park is completely modern, the stadium still retains its old charm. And, for $8-15 a game and a quick walk from downtown, I'm ready!

My New Love

Surprise! I'm fresh out of things to say about Portland. So, please let me introduce my other new love, Quicken.

When I told J last December that I wanted to start using financial software to track our money, I think he was a bit skeptical. Somehow my conversation about budgeting and tracking expenses translated into deprivation, banishment of beer, and the elimination of CD shopping forever, times infinity. In reality, all I wanted to do was see how we used our money. Neither of us really kept track of finances until a few months ago - there was always enough money in the bank account, so we hardly looked at were it all went.

After agreeing that we'd give budgeting a try, we started talking about finances. Almost immediately it became clear that we each had pretty different philosophies on how to handle money. J often worked in cash, while I hardly ever used the stuff. Personal paper checks blow my mind, and he was perfectly content writing them for bills etc.

Because of the ridiculous system we had established (Jesse writing me a check for his half of the rent every month), I sometimes felt like Faye Dunaway in Mommy Dearest screaming and wringing my hands, "No MORE personal checks! No More Personal Checks!" Now, I don't paint on my eyebrows, and never make him scrub the bathroom floor in his pj's, but it felt that dramatic (to me). In the name of simplifying our lives, we took a few baby-steps to financial sanity:

Step 1: J added Brasilliant to his checking account. He held her hand at the ATM across the street and watched her marvel at the wonders of having cold, hard, cash in her wallet. It was tough, but she's now withdrawing and depositing like a pro.

Step 2: Brasilliant introduced J to online banking/bill pay. She stopped his paper statements and saved some trees. J reduced Brasilliant's emerging grey hair by eliminating last minute, over-the-phone bill payments.

Step 3: They both (but mostly Brasilliant) welcomed wonderful Quicken software into our home.

Our success on paper will be determined in a few weeks after we review our first two months of budgeting and saving. However, I already feel closer to that house, yard, and dog.

Our First Submittal

Today Jesse submitted the first of our Portland job applications. I say OUR, because this job application process really does feel like a team effort. He writes. I edit. We talk, and he adds/subtracts content. We brainstorm, and write some more.

So far, the past two weeks have been all about about gathering information, hunting for job postings, and getting applications ready. I spend my lunch hours finding potential places of employment and we are both busy updating and expanding our resumes. I never knew how much work would go into just getting ready to start the job hunt. I think we spent around 20 hours just getting this application together!

Task for this week: Have patience while waiting to hear back from Jesse's first job.