The adventures of Craigslist:$20 (or best offer)

To prepare for the move I've been selling furniture and electronics on Craigslist for the past two weeks. The original plan was to sell almost all of our furniture and store only a few boxes of items.  Since I have a slight obsession with furniture shopping I was totally on board with the idea of starting over and had even started looking up furniture stores in the UK online.  I quickly realized what little money we would earn from selling our possessions, after converting it, would barely cover a new dining room set at IKEA!  After reconsidering our plan, we decided it would be best to ship a few pieces of furniture to England. Unfortunately, this meant some of our super-sized American furniture, including our beloved California King bed, would be relegated to US storage.

The pieces not selected for team UK or team US storage were listed on Craigslist.  This included our self-built Swedish furniture and a few newer pieces, like our coffee table.  I was hesitant to give up our coffee table. After all, it took me months of scouring stores to locate the perfect round coffee table, plus it was only a year old.  I agreed only after Rory pointed out that the table was "scratched to hell." The damage occurred when the dogs escaped from their day time doggie jail and managed to scratch the entire top of our new wood coffee table. Initially, the damage infuriated both of us but we soon were trying to guess what the dogs were doing to end up on top of the coffee table. I finally settled on a theory that the dogs must have been tap dancing on top of the table.  Every time I noticed the scratches, instead of getting angry I simply visualized tap dancing dogs.

Even though each sale meant there was one less possession to move or store, I couldn't help but feel sad as strangers walked away with pieces of our life in Costa Mesa.  Even our scratched up coffee table sold. While I don't know what our new home in England will look like or where it will be, I do know that our dogs will still be able to tap dance on our next coffee table.  In the end, I think that is what matters most

Lessons from Craigslist:

1. Gamers (Dad: a gamer is someone who spends all waking and sleeping hours playing video games) offer to pay half the listed price and expect you to respond via text immediately to their 40 questions about the unit.  They also expect the console to be under warranty. Apparently, they mistake "Craigslist" for "Target." 
2. If selling a gaming system, expect to receive text messages at 3:00 a.m. when the gamer's console breaks during an incredible game of Halo.  
3. The spammers (all with Russian sounding e-mail addresses, no offense) all reply to your postings at 7:38 a.m. simply by writing "interested."  Against my better judgment I actually responded to the "interested" e-mails and now my spam e-mail overflowith.   
4. If you have any piece of junk that you just need to get rid of, post it under the "free" section and you will have 12 calls in 30 minutes.  
5. Even if selling furniture, expect an e-mail with questionable sexual innuendos.  Apparently "armoire for sale" is a secret code that I do not want to decipher.   

At this point, I've managed to sell almost everything we posted on Craigslist. If anyone is interested in an Armoire, and I mean the furniture, or a Neuton lawnmower let me know!

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It is Official...we are moving England!

Rory and I are moving to England!   


Since things are moving quickly now I decided to start a blog to update our family and friends of what is happening. So I guess I should at the beginning because many of you are wondering how this move came about.  Well, it all started with our trip to England (Ireland and Paris) last September.  We were in England to visit Rory's family and celebrate his grandmother's 90th birthday. Throughout our trip, we were both surprised by how much we loved England. My only other experience with England was a whirlwind spring break tour during my sophomore year of high school.  My memories of England were cold, grey and fuzzy.  Not fuzzy because of time, but because I lost my contact (I'd lost the other before the trip) in Stratford Upon Avon.  Those who know me truly appreciate how blind I was without contacts. I mean, I couldn't even see the eye chart, let alone the big E on the eye chart.  I digress.   


By the end of our trip, Rory suggested that he apply to jobs in England when we returned to the US.  As I thought about moving abroad, I questioned whether I could walk away from the home we just purchased (and saved for years to get), my job as a civil litigator, or Rory's in house position as a patent attorney.  Not to mention our friends and family!  This wasn't the first time Rory suggested moving abroad. It was something we briefly discussed after I finished law school.  I'd always scoffed at the idea because I couldn't walk away from a legal career that I had just started.  Besides, at that point the economy was horrible and we were both lucky to even have jobs.  Yet three years later, I reflected on all the reasons that held me back before, but as I was sipping wine in a Paris cafe I just could not think of a single reason why he couldn't just apply to a job. 


For the rest of our trip, we spent our free time day dreaming of what it would be like to leave our jobs, family, and friends to live and travel in Europe. However, once we returned home, our little day dream seemed to quickly disappear as the reality of taking two weeks off from work (I know, what sane attorney would take two weeks off!) quickly consumed us.   


A few weeks after our trip I returned home to find Rory on the computer.  When I asked  what he was doing, he explained that he had a frustrating day at work (not uncommon) and he was applying to jobs in England. I guess the look of shock on my face prompted him to say, "you said it was ok."  It was one thing to day dream about leaving our lives, but to actually take steps toward doing it was another!  Rory was particularly excited about one job he applied to. It was US pharmaceutical company seeking a U.S. patent attorney with a Chemistry background to work in England.  After reading job description I agreed that the position would be perfect for Rory. He had been trying to break into the pharmaceutical industry for some time, so why not roll the dice and see what would happen? 


As luck, or fate, would have it the job he found on the internet was exactly what he wanted to do.  After 7 months of interviews and waiting, and interviews and waiting, Rory was offered the position with the pharmaceutical company.   


Some of the details... I say "some" as many details of the move are still being worked out.  Rory will be working in Abingdon, which is 10 minutes from Oxford. Oxford is west of London and located here: 

Rory starts his position on May 9th. After one week in England he will be sent to Cambridge for four weeks of training.  At this point, we are not sure where we are going to live as this is an ongoing debate.  There is city life in Oxford (Vanessa's preference) or country life in Abingdon (Rory's preference).  Thankfully, since we will be in corporate housing for 8 weeks, we will have some time to figure this out.   


Yes we are taking our dogs (Rusty and Scotty) with us. The drama with moving pets abroad will surely be a topic of future posts. 

I am hopeful this blog will be a way of keeping our family and friends (maybe others?) updated with the status of our move, the transition of living in a foreign country, my job hunt, and of course our travels across Europe!