Posts have been slow recently due to my recent move to Texas and ramping up in the new position as Director of Design Technology at Lake|Flato. Today's post shares a little about the move and transition!
The Move
It was a crazy time to move given the current global pandemic. But we had several moving parts in motion, and it is ideal to sell a house when there is not several feet of snow on the ground in Minnesota. We have been careful, wearing masks and lathering up on hand sanitizer at every stop.
My family packed up our house into the back of a moving truck, which was then driven for us, and we drove our two cars down I-35... nearly the entire drive was on a single road as shown in the image above. My house in Minnesota was about a 1/2 mile from the end of I-35 and it continues through San Antonio. So that was easy. By the way, in addition to four people, we moved two cats, a rabbit, and a bearded dragon! Thus, we drove straight through with two short stops for a power nap... the entire trip took us about 28 hours.
The Transition
Obviously the biggest thing we have to get used to is the heat. It has been around 100 degrees the last few days! I know it can be done, as the firm has folks who moved here from all over the country and some of them are sitting outside in Zoom meetings:)
I previously shared these images, but I have to share how amazing San Antonio is again. The downtown River Walk is so beautiful. The second image is on the River Walk, and is also a Lake|Flatp project from a number of years ago!
Helping smooth out the transition, I was so excited to see a deer just a few blocks from my house earlier this week. My family laughed as I turned the car around to go back and get this picture. Unfortunately we will never have them in our backyard like we did in Minnesota. It was rare to see a fenced in backyard unless someone had dogs... here, it is the norm; 6 foot high (solid/opaque) fences around every backyard.
My wife's co-worker in MN gave her this book before we left. It was meant to be funny, which it was, but it has already come in handy, surprisingly. For example, we now live in Bexar county... apparently it is pronounced Bear.
I have been told, and it looks to be true, that there is only one grocery store chain in all of Texas (not counting Target, Walmart, etc.). It is called HEB... good thing they are really nice!
Everything's bigger in Texas...
Since the house we bought did not have a clothes washer and dryer we had the opportunity to get something I have been interested in for a while. A heat pump based clothes dryer. It has refrigerant in it and is like an air conditioning unit that runs in reverse. It uses a fraction of the electricity as a traditional unit. It is also ventless and has a large plastic jug which needs to have its water emptied after each load.
The washing machine is also interesting... notice the Energy Star label, which says the annual energy cost will about around $18/year. It only has a cold water connection, which I believe means it has its own instant water heater built-in. I have not had time to review that detail yet:)
Here is an Energy Star video on YouTube highlighting the heat pump dryer value proposition:
So far so good on the move, the transition and the new job!!! As things smooth out in the near future, be sure to stay tuned for some exciting posts.
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