One step closer to reality

In newsrooms, there are numerous cliches likely to elicit a groan from an editor -- among them phrases like "Rain didn't dampen the spirits of those in attendance at (fill in the blank with lame parade/festival/county fair you didn't want to cover)" or "More and more people are doing X" (because I'm supposed to write about needlepoint/sudoku/amateur porn and because I've noticed it, it must be a trend that's on the rise, or why else would I be writing about it?).
One of those groaner phrases typically comes out of covering something like a city council vote on some new development: "Blah blah blah is one step closer to reality following yada yada meeting."

But since I'm a suit now, I got no editors. Our landing an apartment is one step closer to reality following a productive meeting with Nick at 2 Lincoln Square, who, it turns out, actually exists.

It's a long, ridiculous story, but Brett twisted Nick's arm into setting up an appointment for Tuesday night, only to have him later start back peddling, saying he had a doctor's appointment that conflicted. You understand, all those last-minute 6 p.m. doctor's appointments can be a real hassle.

I show up about half an hour early, to see if I can get into the apartment before his "appointment." Nick startles me by being there. I was working up my righteous indignation about getting stood up the whole way there, and didn't get a chance to use it. He takes me up to the apartment, which is great, we have a nice long conversation about the building and the apartment and our tight time constraints ... whereupon he agrees to forego redoing the hardwood floors (they don't really need it) so that we can move in faster. AND he offers, without me asking, to take the rent down because of that.

Brett hasn't even shown up yet and I'm dumbstruck because I've seen the apartment, I have a lease in my hands and a volunteered rent reduction. When Brett arrives for our scheduled meeting time, I greet him in the lobby with the lease in my hands. Victory is mine!

Well, almost. Now I have to fax it to John, get his signature, and set up a time to take it and our money to Nick, hopefully tonight.

In the meantime, I celebrated what feels like the end of this quest over dinner with Brett and some of his pals at an Italian restaurant where the food was lovely and I had entirely too much red wine. I was pacing myself reasonably until I found a bug in my wine, the waitress brought a free bottle ... now I'm suffering what Mary Jean and I have referred to as the emotional hangover and trying to reconstruct everything looking for signs that I was the embarrassing midwestern girl. If only red wine didn't taste so good, I wouldn't have this problem.

The Michigan connection

Rick Lucas, a Michigan evening MBA who graduated this spring, accepted a job with MTV the same week I accepted with AP. He called me on I think Tuesday of that week to find out if I was in New York, and I sulked because I hadn't heard anything yet. By the end of the week, we were both preparing to move from Michigan to NYC.

I emailed him early in the day Sunday to check in, see if he's here yet, suggest that we should catch up. Then I packed up some stuff to go enjoy a beautiful afternoon in Central Park.

Walking up 8th Avenue, I hear a familiar voice next to me. It's Rick and his wife. They were heading to Central Park from their apartment a few blocks south of where I'm staying. We hung out in the sheep meadow for a few hours, soaking up vitamin D and chitchatting about relocation.

In a city this big, how weird is that?? Apparently the Michigan connection runs deep if you can just will someone to bump into you by thinking of them.

Keep those cards and letters coming
Even with an apartment (hopefully!) set up, it'll likely be two weeks before I get back to Michigan to supervise movers. This period of being in a vanilla furnished apartment on my own is starting to wear on me.
I want my wardrobe, my kitchen supplies, my husband ... it's one thing to be on vacation in a hotel room for a few days, but a month of living in a place that's purposely beige and inoffensive while flying solo is too much. At least at Ben and Gabrielle's in December, we were together and that place felt pretty darned homey.

Sooo... I've gotten cards from Mary Jean, Rob and Lara, Jeff and Rachel, and I've got a fountain pen, a whole load of notecards and a book of stamps searching for a purpose.
Email, write, call, whatever. Once the apartment search isn't taking up every spare moment of my life, it's going to be a long two weeks until I get back to A2. Help keep me entertained?