Helloooo nurse!

It’s a cold and rainy day here in Belgium, and this is the Day for Good News. If you have any bad news, save it for tomorrow, because for once in my glass-half-empty life, it’s nice to have a day that even I will admit is perfect.

First:
Our stuff came today. It is dusty, wrinkled, and a little dented, but it is here! Opening the boxes was like the best Christmas and birthday wrapped into one. Food from America! The rest of our clothes! Not that I don’t absolutely love the four outfits I was wearing for the last two months, but wow! Now I will have some books to read, chain mail projects to work on, sewing projects, genealogy research, yarn, drawing supplies, and loads of other stuff to keep me occupied. Obviously we aren’t going to unpack everything right now because a.) it is a fully furnished apartment, and b.) we are moving!

This brings us to news item number two:
We were notified this morning that we got our first pick apartment! It is in Gent on Verpleegsterstraat, for those who don’t speak Dutch, a verpleegster is a nurse. Our new place will be a two bedroom apartment on the second floor of a building, within walking distance of the Sint Pieter Station. It has no closets, a tiny balcony, and a small storage space in a damp, ominous smelling basement. We will get to cook on a gas stove. The previous owners painted the walls a nice, neutral cool grey, and the living room has a nice new wood floor. Decidedly strange linoleum covers the bedroom floors, but believe me, this was the nicest place we saw during our search. Plus we found out that we can move in the first of December. But wait, there is more…

The third tidbit of good news:
I jumped onto the computer this afternoon to tell Travis that I had found something that he was looking for in all of our boxes, and found an email informing me that I have been accepted for the spring into the Masters program at CSU Dominguez Hills. I am going to get a second masters in the Humanities with an emphasis in literature, and when I get back to the states, that will really help with my applications to work in an academic library.

You know in the movies when people find out that they have won a lot of money, and they throw it all over a bed and roll in it, laughing? I think I am going to do that with some of our possessions now.

Over and out.