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I am reminded this weekend of why it is that we uprooted our lives and moved across the country. For starters, weather. As I write this, it’s 2-degrees F in Altoona. Here, it’s 54-degrees F. This weekend, we went to the Berkeley marina where we stumbled upon the Cal Sailing Club which I intend to join. Right there, there was also an adventure park which we did not yet explore and another playground where Sam stomped around in the sand, rode on the swings, and slid down the slide.

While I have been missing some of the aspects of our previous life (see previous post) — one aspect I’m not missing so far is the weather! Today in Altoona, PA, was a high of 48 degrees F with a low of 32 (and a chance of light snow.) Today in El Cerrito, CA was a high of 72 degrees F with a low of 49.

There’s been a little bit of activity on our home in Altoona. We have a contract with a contingency that the buyer needs to sell his home, and we just learned that he had a contract. While I’m terribly excited that soon we won’t be having to pay both rent and mortgage, and glad not to own a house that would otherwise sit unattended through a winter, I’m still a little saddened by it.

I think it was yesterday, maybe it was the day before — time gets so lost right now — when Sam made the half of the (stereo-)typical baby noise. She said “Ga” — Now all we need is a “Goo” to go with it, and we’ll be set! Also, people are coming tomorrow to see the house! It’s still not in great shape, but mostly it’s just clutter. I’ve finished the work I want to do to it (mostly thanks to the family helping out last weekend.

I’ve made a page for it, rather than a regular blog entry because I don’t want it to fade from view (until it’s sold). We listed our house on Monday with the Real Estate Agent who helped us buy it. It’s such a treasure — we don’t want to leave it behind, but as good as the Linden Lab relocation budget is — I don’t think it would actually cover picking up the house and moving it to San Francisco.

I haven’t mentioned it here much, but every Sunday, I played soccer with a few other people — mostly Penn State people, but we’ve picked up a few neighbors and others. I started this after having played wallyball with Mike — they don’t play in the summer, and there had been a little bit of buzz about it. Someone else started it up, but quickly stopped coming, and I gladly took over.

Whew. I’ve been holding my breath and biting my tongue on this for so long, it’s really cramped my blogging style. Finally, today I can write about it. I’m up-heaving our lives! During a long walk during the winter time, Carolyn and I took stock of our lives as we tend to do during long walks together. We found ourselves out in the cold, walking among the depressed (and depressing) houses of Altoona with our baby daughter strapped to us.

OK, so this is kind of a Sam post. But since two of these happened today, I thought they should go up. Carolyn and I were walking toward the post office. I was carrying Sam in the baby björn, and an older woman in one of those golfcart/wheelchair hybrids rolled along toward us. She stopped her cart to ask, in amazement, “Is that a real baby?” How do you answer these things?

The Pennsylvania Turnpike is an expensive but expedient way for us to get back to the Philadelphia area where Mom-mom and Granddaddy live. It is narrow, busy, and often under (much-needed) repair. When we were in Pittsburgh for Carolyn’s birthday last year, we picked up whatever the local City Paper-style paper is called. In it, there was an article or editorial lambasting the Pennsylvania Turnpike which, among other things, called it a blight on the face of Pennsylvania.

I had just finished a long phone conversation with my mom, and was talking it over with Carolyn when we heard what sounded like fireworks outside. I thought it wasn’t close enough to June to be fireworks season, and then it dawned on me. Maybe the Steelers had won the Superbowl. Altoona is close enough to Pittsburgh that this is considered “Steeler Country.” So, I went to superbowl.com and reported, “Yep, we won.