Our new house is a raisin-free zone

We were supposed to close on the house on Wednesday and all our stuff was to be delievered on Friday. On Wednesday we got a call that there a problem. Apparently there was a lien on the house that wasn't there when they ran the check a few days earlier. We had no information other than the fact that we couldn't close. We didn't know where the lien came from or when it would be lifted. So we were kind of on pins and needles waiting for 2 days to get news. We had to cancel the delivery of our stuff because we didn't know if we'd be able to move it in by Friday and we didn't want them to charge us for cancelling at the last minute. Finally, late Thursday we heard that they had moved the lien to a different unit to buy them some time to clear it all up, and we'd be able to close on Friday which we did. But it was still too late to move in, so our delivery is coming next Friday instead. We're going to move out of temp housing tomorrow (Sunday). We won't have our beds and linens until the movers deliver our stuff next Friday so we're borrowing air mattresses and linens from someone in the community until then. Fortunately, I was able to get the cable company to come tomorrow to install our cable internet so we will have a more reliable connection and we will not have to be without our internet fix...

So for shabbos we were put up again, and ate out meals. First meal was with another Microsoft family and the second was by people we met last week. For the second meal they had only raisin challah (again). Let me make this clear one more time: I HATE RAISINS! I think we are going to start telling people we eat by that I'm allergic to raisins. Next Rosh Hashana I'm going to daven for a raisin-free year. Why do people think that everyone likes those squishy gross little booger-like things in their challah? Can someone answer me that question? Would it be rude of me to ask for normal non-squishy-thing-infested challah? Is this a question for miss manners?

Other than the raisiny challah the meal was really good - lots of good food and LOTS of booze. But the more people I eat out by, the more I'm coming to realize how different our family is. At many or most of the places I've eaten by, the entire meal is like one salad course, 2 side dishes and one main, usually one piece of chicken per person. With our family, our meals are 2-3 times that size, so I'm really not used to it. Also, sadly, the best cholent I've had so far was at the kiddush at the shul. And that was by no means a great cholent. Everyone puts in too many beans, no kishke, not enough barley, and not enough seasoning. They're like bad shul cholents. Bland and beany. I can't wait to make my own again and show these people how it's done.

That is the news from here. Have a gmar v'chasima tova everyone!
Ari

P.S. Our new address is
7322 Rainier Ave S #108
Seattle, WA 98118

Keren is the winner!

The prize is getting your name mentioned in the title of a post on one of the greatest blogs of our time. You can expect fame and fortune to follow. Congratulations! I'm also shocked that Dovid didn't win - I figured this was more up his alley. I bet he's made that joke a lot more recently than third grade... I guess Keren is more lowbrow than we all thought.

Today was an evenful day at work. Every two weeks on Tuesday we have a team lunch with free food, which today was pizza (I requested kosher in advance. Today I asked the organizer if he was able to get it. He's like, "yeah, there's vegetarian pizza." yay. Good thing I brought a backup PB&J). In addition to the free food, they also play Deal or no Deal. It's a game show. If you don't know what it is you can see here. Anyway, they draw a name out of a hat to see who will be the contestant, but they only put in people who haven't had a chance yet. Today they played 3 rounds and I was one of only 4 who hadn't played yet. So I got picked for the third game. The grand prize is an Xbox 360, which nobody has won yet (Worst is a pack of gum). I won a 4GB MP3 player (Sandisk Sansa), which is the third-best prize. Woohoo! Someone else today won the second-best prize, which is a 30 GB creative vision:m MP3 + video player.

After that gruelling meeting I had another one, which we had outside because the weather was so nice. After that we visited the building next door because they already had the new I-Cup machines installed. They are way cool! It's like a huge machine with a window to 2 compartments of coffee beans. You punch in the size you want, which variety of bean you want (ours had starbucks house blend and the same in decaf), and push "brew." It grinds the beans on the spot and spits out a fresh cup of coffee within a minute or two. It's soooo good...

After work Rachel and I went to the mortgage broker's house to sign all the legal bliz blaz. So we are officially closing tomorrow. We will be homeowners! Yay!

Here's what we were thinking of doing for a succah. Our patio is really small, like maybe 12-16 feet square, and it's enclosed by a fence that's about 6 feet tall. So we thought we'd just use the fence itself as the walls - put a few two-by-fours directly on top of the it and put some bamboo mats on those. It would be kind of short, but good enough for the time being.

So that is all the exciting new from here. More news soon.

Ari

Rosh Hashana and bird poop

Rosh hashana was very nice. First day davening went from 7:45 - 1:15. A bit too long for my taste, so I went to the old folks home on the second day. That one was 8:45 - 12:30. Much better.

We had the first meal with the Rabbi. The second was with a couple who actually went to Penn and knew Keren - John and Dina Kaufthal (I don't know Dina's maiden name, but I think they were both 2-3 years below Keren). Anyway, he works at Microsoft in the building next door to mine. Third meal was next door to the place we were staying and fourth meal was at the Genauers. All the meals were very nice. The food was pretty good overall, but too many raisins and nuts in the food, both things I despise. One place didn't even have any alternative to their raisin-saturated challah! I choked it down as well as I could so I would have enough to bentch. I HATE RAISINS! At one of the meals, almost everything they served had either raisins or nuts. I miss Rachel's cooking! No nuts or raisins to be found.

The guy who I was sharing an office with moved out, so I have my own office now. It's pretty sweet, but now I just need to someone to come decorate it. It really needs like a couch or something. Or maybe some paintings would spruce the place up a bit...

We also had a big milestone this weekend. Our car got pooped on for the first time! stupid birds! arg! First of many, I guess...

In other work-related news, there are big changes coming. Every kitchen on campus is getting brand new fancy Starbucks machines (they're called I-cups. I'll give a prize to the first person who can recall the third grade joke I'm thinking of here). Supposedly, you punch in the size, decaf or regular, etc, and it grinds the beans fresh and brews you a cup right there on the spot! How cool is that?

That's all for now. Once we're settled in our house (!) I'm sure we'll have an easier time putting up pictures... Also our internet access is quite spotty lately. Oh, how I wish poodle would come back!

P.S. great comment dov. Very clever. Keep it up.

Ari

Thousands of rowdy nerds

Rachel is insisting on watching some boring show about the wives of Henry VIII. So I am forced to do something else constructive with my time.

The company meeting was today. It was really fun. First of all, they filled the baseball stadium to about 1/3 capacity. That's a lot of nerds. In front of the stadium there were these people dressed as knights that were "fighting" - most of them had microsoft product names on them, then there was one "knight" that had google on him and they were fighting. It kind of made me think of a star wars (no offense, dov) or dungeons and dragons convention...

The meeting itself basically consisted of a bunch of executives giving speeches and other people giving some product demos of some of the more interesting products and technologies they are working on. Some really cool stuff. I saw Zune! It's really cool - it has a bigger screen than an iPod, has built in wi-fi, and plays video in landscape mode. They showed us a couple of really cool things being done by MS research, but I'm not sure how public some of this stuff is so I probably shouldn't go into any detail here. One of the features they were showing off on one product that's coming out soon didn't work when they tried to use it at the demo, so that was a good laugh :-). Reminiscent of the time Bill Gates demoed windows 98 and it crashed in the middle. The highlights were the speeches by Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. When Steve came out it was like a wedding when the couple comes out for the fist dance - there was pump up music and everything, and he came out and ran around the crowd and jumped up and down like a crazy person. He likes to play the crowd. The speeches themselves ranged from very interesting to very boring, but most were at least tolerable.

It wasn't all speeches and demos, though. Part of the entertainment was an american-idol-style singing competition. They had auditions in advance, and 6 employees performed at the meeting. They will be sending out a survey next week asking us to vote, and the winner gets and Xbox 360.

After the meeting there was a product fair where different groups showed their products. I got a couple good freebies: scarf and winter cap with windows vista logo, a frisbee, couple pens, squiggly toy, and some random junk.

Keren - to answer your question, yes there was a mascot - the Mariner Moose -and he did have a t-shirt launcher.

All in all it was quite an experience.

Since this will be my last post before Rosh Hashana, let me take this opportunity to wish you all a k'siva v'chasima tova.

Ari

7-11

I think we have become the best customers of the local 7-11. We've gotten slurpees there probably about 2-3 times per week. It's right between our current apartment and the Jewish community so we stop by on our way quite often.

Everything with the house is coming together - we've got all the legal hocus pocus pretty much taken care of. Make reservations soon for your stay at casa de Polsky! The mortgage guy is working frantically to get everything done in time for closing next week.

We are going to Chicago for Thanksgiving (thanks Abba and Pat!). The Friday after is an MS holiday so I don't have to use any precious vacation days. And Abba and Pat are coming to visit for my birthday weekend. We are very excited to finally move into something permanent so we can be settled.

Tomorrow is the company meeting. It's held at Safeco field, which is where the Mariners play. There will be tens of thousands of MS people there. It's basically a big pep rally where the execs talk about how great we are (or so I'm told - I've obviously never experienced it first hand). Supposedly there's beer. Can you imagine having so many rowdy nerds in one place? The good thing is that Safeco field is about a 10-15 minute walk from our apartment. So no commute tomorrow. After the meeting there will be a product fair held at Qwest field (where the Seahawks play) where we will be showing off all our new technologies and up-and-comings stuff that's still under development. Hopefully we will get some cool freebies. Conveniently, Qwest field is right next door to Safeco field!

So that is the news from here. What say you guys?

Ari

I got nothing to say

We finally got the contract back for the house... that is all the news from here. For those of you wondering about Rachel's job, she took a part-time job as a nanny for a down's syndrome kid in the community. Later peeps.

Ari

The new car is big enough for the belly

We picked up our new car today. I'm very happy with it. So now Rachel will be driving me to shul in the morning and I'll take the Vanpool from there and she'll have the car. Vanpool is a service of the county to encourage carpooling. They supply the van, gas, maintenance, etc., and you just have to get at least 4 people to carpool with. They charge like $65 per month, but Microsoft subsidizes all of it so it's free for me. So there are a bunch of guys who do it and leave from the shul every morning.

I know you all wanted to see some pictures, so we took a couple of Rachel's Belly, known as "RB" from now on (she bought some more maternity clothes today). So here are couple pics of Rachel with RB:





Have a good week eveyone.
Ari

A word from me.

Well Ari is running around hysterical cause he wants to leave for Shabbos in 15 min and he has yet to shower and pack. I, of course want to leave in like an hour so before I pack I figured that I'd post. I'm sure that even with stalling and posting, I'll be ready before Ari is. Oh the irony.

Anywho- this week has been kinda boring. Since Ari has the car and the pass to get into the building I've been here in the apt all day. I was productive though! I did a load of laundry pretty much every day and I found out where the garbage is thrown away. Ari couldn't locate it but I found it on my first try. In this marriage, I'm the eyes and the compass and Ari tries to be the ears.

We are picking up our car on Sunday- so I'll finally have wheels. I start work next week so it all works out perfectly. Ari's happy I'm making money (though barely anything) and I'm also in the process of finding an internship which I'm sure will be unpaid- but at least I'm working.

So that's it for now. Gut Shabbos!

video games

Work is going really well. Everyone is really nice and friendly - everyone eats lunch together every day. My mentor and boss are both Jewish, one reform and one conservative so they know about all the holidays and kosher and stuff. Yesterday and today they called me into a "meeting" at 4 to play video games. The only problem is that they've been playing this game for like the past 6 months and I just started so I kind of stink at it. I told Rachel that we'd have to get an Xbox 360 so I can practice and advance my career. The setup at work is cool though - they don't play it on a TV, they project it onto the wall. So I'm still in the phase of getting everything set up and learning a lot before I'll be able to do any real work.

We are spending shabbos in the community - we are staying with the real estate agents, who are also the community hospitality people. They are also letting us use their house for rosh hashana since they will not be there.

That's pretty much all the news from here. Have a good shabbos everyone! spread the word!

Ari

Second day and the wonders of chinese markets

My second day was much more eventful than the first. The first half was more orientation stuff, but after that I went to meet my group. So I found the office of the guy I was supposed to meet - he emailed me a yesterday and told me to report to him when orientation was over - anyway his office and all offices in the area were deserted. It was like a ghost town. He came back about 10 minutes later and told me that the whole team was at their meeting they have every 2 weeks where they play the game show "deal or no deal" - grand prize is an XBox 360 but nobody has won yet. The guy today won a 2 GB MP3 player. So it seems like a really fun and chilled out group. He also told me that since things are slow right now, they play XBox in the game room at around 4 every day.

Right now I'm sharing my office with another guy, but someone is leaving this week so as of next week I will have my own office. There are no windows but it is a whole lot better than a cube. I've got 2 computers, one for regular work and one as a test machine. I've got 2 monitors, a 20 inch and a 19 inch, so the setup is pretty sweet. My regular machine is running Vista. It is very cool!

If you have never been at a chinese market like the one below our apartment, let me tell you some of the more intersting items we found there while looking for ice cream: pork large intestine, pork small intestine, pork stomachs, pork fat slabs, pork blood... probably other things we would have found if we weren't too grossed out to keep looking.

Other updates: We are picking up our car on sunday, we met with the real esate agent today - she said we should have a signed contract by friday.... The Genauers invited us for a Rosh Hashana.

That's enough for now. Maybe Rachel will chime in at some point... maybe...

Ari

First Day

My first day of work was pretty uneventful and boring - just a lot of dumb ice-breakers (very upper-west-side-shabbos-meal-ish) and boring presentations on benefits - good as they are (4 weeks paid paternity leave!), not very interesting to hear about.

On an unrelated topic, our townhouse bid was accepted and we also found out that 2 other frum people put in bids in the same complex, so the demographic looks like it will be good. We just have to visit the agent tomorrow.

That's all from me for now, but hopefully rachel will post some of those pictures I know you are all dying to see.

Ari

car update

So we went to the dealer to pick up (and pay for) the car today, but we decided to get the extra treatments for the cloth seats to make them more stain-resistant. It also comes with a 5-year guarantee that the interior will not stain, which probably comes in handy for kid owners, which we will be soon enough.

So instead of picking it up today and bringing it back for the treatments and picking it up again, we just left it there and will pick it up next week. It kind of works out better anyway since we only have one pass for getting in and out of the parking garage here so parking it would have been a challenge. But next week we return the rental car so the timing will work out well. The only problem is that now Rachel won't have a car this week. Oh well, another week of butt-sitting for her... Speaking of Rachel, she took some pics of various things while we were on the road today so I'm sure with her vast butt-sitting time over the next week she'll have plenty of opportunity to post them.

Tomorrow is the first day of work - very exciting! Start sending in your software orders now :). A microsoft guy on the shabbaton said there's a $1000 limit per year, and you're allowed to buy for friends and family. He said Windows XP is $25 and Office is around $40.

Chammie made the comment on a previous post that it looks like she is the only one in our family that knows how to post comments to blogs. Come on guys - is that any way to rocket me to fame and fortune? We need some more action here!

More as the story develops...
Ari

Pictures

Since Ari has been providing the details of our accomplishments, I thought I would introduce you to Seattle. When we were driving through Seattle Tues morning at one in the morning first thing we noticed is that there was no one in the streets of Downtown. It was dead. Quite a change from the Heights where the three year olds are still running around outside at that hour. The second thing we noticed is that there are a billion of wires above the streets. It makes the whole city look industrial. Really really ugly. But that's what the buses use to get around. Ari and I still crack up every time we see a bus. Look at the picture below to see what I mean.

There are two prongy things coming out of the bus that attaches to the wires. And look at all the wires! As for the temp housing, we are a mere two blocks from Qwest Stadium- Home of the Seahawks. It's really pretty at night- it's lit up with blue lights. I'll try to take a pic and post it. We are staying at the Uwajimaya Village. When we first got here, Ari noticed as he was running errands that everyone was Asian. Turns out this complex is in Chinatown. So we are probably the only two Ortho Jews living in Chinatown. It's actually quite nice and beautiful. No people selling turtles or smells of exotic animals here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Uwajimaya_in_Seattle.jpg

I have to go give Ari a haircut now. I'll write more next week.

Shabbat Shalom!

Houses

We met with the real estate agent yesterday. We looked at a townhouse in this new complex they are still finishing. It was very nice, but small and in our price range... Then we looked at 2 of the ugliest most horrible houses I have ever seen - they were bigger than the townhouses but a lot more expensive. Later we looked at a couple houses for rent that were actually really nice and big and affordable, but we opted to put in a bid for the townhouse. Renting is better than buying, and the townhouse will be big enough for at least a few years - it's got 3 bedrooms and 3 floors with a master suite on the third floor. Our litmus test was whether the places would be nice enough for Abba and Pat, and this place definitely qualifies.

Anyway, they will be looking at the offers on Wednesday, but barring any strange circumstances, we are hoping to close on 9/27, after Rosh Hashana and before Yom Kippur. Yay!

We're also waiting to hear from the car dealership when our new car arrives. But we should it get it Monday or Tuesday at the latest.

So it looks like we will manage to drain our entire life savings in a mere 3 days! Yay again!

The stuff we had sent to temp housing came yesterday, so now we have the SD card reader to get pictures off the digital camera, so maybe we'll start posting pictures soon if we (Rachel) have time. That's all for now. I start work on Monday.

Have a good shabbos everyone.
Ari

First Post!

Welcome to our blog! We figured this would be an easy way to keep everyone informed on the latest news from Seattle ("The Emerald City," as we have just found out).

So far everything has been good - I think we've accomplished more in the last few days than in any month we were in NY. We set up a PO Box, a bank account, bought a car (2006 Civic LX), and started looking at permanent places to live.

Our temp housing is very nice - it's basically similar to a hotel suite. We have a large main area with a living room/dining room/kitchen, 2 bedrooms, laundry room with a washer/dryer, 2 bathrooms, TV, free wireless (at least as long as someone with a wireless network named "poodle" is here).

This shabbos we are going on a kollel shabbaton at some camp grounds, so we will get to meet some of the younger people here.

Anyway, we will post more later if we have time, including some pictures of the weirdo buses in this city (here's a teaser - they are electric but they are more like the trolleys in san francisco than hybrid buses elsewhere).

Ari