Our friends Lisa and Peter invited us on a hiking trip to “Little Yosemite” this weekend. We hadn’t been there before and since we enjoy the occasional hike, we were excited for the day. We stopped to grab sandwiches for lunch and then headed towards Sunol where we found our way to a beautiful park near the edge of Fremont. I was surprised that the weather was actually really nice out that day (it’s about time)! It was a short hike uphill, then a level trail led down to a running stream with huge rocks. We climbed down the rocks and found a nice little place to have lunch overlooking the water. Then we explored around the area and found an awesome mini-waterfall and a small pool to dip our feet into. We took some nice pictures of the scenery and of each other before we found our way back to the trail. We will definitely be back to this great little spot again soon!
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Monday, June 8, 2009
Goodbye PC, Hello Mac
Over the weekend we bought ourselves a new computer- an iMac! My old computer, a HP desktop that I’ve had since at least 2003 or so, has pretty much died. It still works, but only if you have the patience to wait about 10 minutes for it to load something. Apparently it caught some sort of virus a while back, but it never really seemed to recover. It would run slower and slower until I would have to restart the thing and try again. Plus, at the beginning of the spring semester, it completely stopped opening any kind of Microsoft Office document for some odd reason, which forced me to complete all my schoolwork on campus. Irritating! Therefore, we have been looking into buying a new computer for quite some time.
Anyone that knows me knows that I hate computers. That’s why we finally settled on a Mac. Many of our friends own only Macs and swear by them. Plus, I learned that I was eligible for a student discount through my school, which we wanted to take advantage of before I officially finish my program next month.
After comparing prices and options at the Apple Store, we ended up with a 24” iMac with a 640MB hard drive, which seemed to be the best value for the money (we just couldn’t pass up on the 24” screen- for just $50 more- it was so sleek and impressive!) We were very happy to learn that my student discount took $100 off our total bill, threw in a free printer, and even included a free iPod touch! We took it home that day and set it up in no more than 5 minutes- there were no programs to install, no annoying virus software to update- just one power cord to plug in and that was that. It detected our wireless internet and the wireless keyboard and mouse instantly. How easy! Then we set up our user account and played around on it for a few hours. We had fun amusing ourselves on the photo booth application, taking stupid pictures of ourselves. :)
I’m still new to Mac, so I’m sure it will take a while before I feel proficient working on it. But so far, I think we’re both impressed. I’m also excited to buy iScrapbook- a cool program where I can create digital scrapbook pages!
Friday, June 5, 2009
Condo Update
Happy June! It’s quite hard to believe that it’s June already! And it’s raining. That makes it even more strange. Anyway, I wanted to give an update about our market situation. It’s been about 45 days since we listed the place for sale. We get calls from agents frequently- sometimes up to three or four times each week- that want to show it to their clients, so we’ve been on our toes keeping the place clean and tidy. Overall, the responses have been positive. Our realtors forward the agents’ feedback to us and so far, there haven’t been any negative remarks (with exception of one person who had an issue with the electrical tower on the other side of the parking lot… whatever). We’ve had one official offer- which was more than $50K under our asking price!! Because they were not willing to negotiate, we had no other choice but to outright refuse the offer.
Other than that, we have also had a few unofficial offers. I say this because we originally bought the condo through a first-time homebuyer program offered through the city of Walnut Creek. And therefore, we have to attempt to resell it to another buyer who qualifies for the same program. Unfortunately, many interested parties are not first-time buyers or make far too much money to qualify for the program. Therefore, our potential pool of buyers is limited. But, lucky for us, the program limitations expire after 90 days if we are unable to find a buyer who qualifies. So, as of mid-July, we can sell the condo to anyone. It’s starting to look like we’ll have to wait it out until then. But we’re not getting discouraged just yet, since we’re in no rush to sell and move up. I am still working on some loose ends with my thesis, so it’s nice to still be close enough to the city when I need to head over to campus (if we were in Brentwood by now, it would probably add at least another 30 minutes onto my hour-long commute into SF). And our realtors already have interested parties lined up to potentially make us an offer once the limitation expires. So that’s good news.
We’re relieved that the kids have been happy and content with all of the showings so far. We usually close them away in our extra bedroom for a few hours when we know that an agent plans to stop by. We have their food and water dishes in there with them, along with their kitty box and a nice smelly plug-in thing that I found at Target. I also made a nice sign for the door asking guests to help us keep them inside. And luckily we haven’t had any problems or complaints so far. They’re such friendly cats to begin with, that I doubt they would ever do anything anyway.
So now, we just continue waiting I guess… In the meantime, I have found some killer places in and around Brentwood that we can definitely afford and be happy with. Some even with a pool! We also decided to expand our search to other areas closer to our current location that we might be able to afford, like Pleasant Hill, Clayton, and Martinez. Of course these areas are higher in price and we would be buying a smaller home, but we’re just trying to keep our options open. I’ll keep everyone updated.
Other than that, we have also had a few unofficial offers. I say this because we originally bought the condo through a first-time homebuyer program offered through the city of Walnut Creek. And therefore, we have to attempt to resell it to another buyer who qualifies for the same program. Unfortunately, many interested parties are not first-time buyers or make far too much money to qualify for the program. Therefore, our potential pool of buyers is limited. But, lucky for us, the program limitations expire after 90 days if we are unable to find a buyer who qualifies. So, as of mid-July, we can sell the condo to anyone. It’s starting to look like we’ll have to wait it out until then. But we’re not getting discouraged just yet, since we’re in no rush to sell and move up. I am still working on some loose ends with my thesis, so it’s nice to still be close enough to the city when I need to head over to campus (if we were in Brentwood by now, it would probably add at least another 30 minutes onto my hour-long commute into SF). And our realtors already have interested parties lined up to potentially make us an offer once the limitation expires. So that’s good news.
We’re relieved that the kids have been happy and content with all of the showings so far. We usually close them away in our extra bedroom for a few hours when we know that an agent plans to stop by. We have their food and water dishes in there with them, along with their kitty box and a nice smelly plug-in thing that I found at Target. I also made a nice sign for the door asking guests to help us keep them inside. And luckily we haven’t had any problems or complaints so far. They’re such friendly cats to begin with, that I doubt they would ever do anything anyway.
So now, we just continue waiting I guess… In the meantime, I have found some killer places in and around Brentwood that we can definitely afford and be happy with. Some even with a pool! We also decided to expand our search to other areas closer to our current location that we might be able to afford, like Pleasant Hill, Clayton, and Martinez. Of course these areas are higher in price and we would be buying a smaller home, but we’re just trying to keep our options open. I’ll keep everyone updated.
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