In With the New

I've been twenty days in the new apartment. I'm charmed.

We have two mattresses, one dresser, two floor lamps, two bookshelves, a chest, a rocking chair, two rugs, one table, and some kitchen appliances and miscellaneous articles. We intend for it to be a fully furnished apartment eventually, but I sort of like it this way.

Oh, we also have a writing desk and its accompanying chair. In case we want to write letters. Or draw a picture.

I've become so fond of my mattress on the floor that I don't know if I will ever go back to real beds again.

Most reading is done on the floor, in my case, due to lack of a sofa and the fact that if I attempt to read on my mattress, I will fall asleep. Which would defeat the purpose of owning the books, who in turn occupy the bookshelves.

The hardwood floors are exciting because when I wear socks I can slide across them.

The coat closet is very large. I bet we could squeeze up to eight people in it if we wanted to. But that would be silly because we can't have eight people over at a time, because I broke one of the drinking glasses so now there are only three, which means we can only ever have one guest.

(We broke this rule last night and had three girls over for dinner, but we drank wine from wine glasses, and Mary Beth has plenty of those, so the issue was avoided altogether.)

We have our own washer and dryer, and they are hidden tactfully away in a closet. It is convenient because I can use them when my garments are soiled and forget about them the rest of the time. But don't worry, that isn't how I treat my Actual friends.

There is a spacious linen closet right in the bathroom! No more drip-drying when I forget to bring a towel in with me when I shower!

The refrigerator is cold, and the freezer is colder. The oven is warm when I make it warm, and the gas stove lights up as it should. Altogether we have a very functional kitchen.

There is a comfortable view from the living room window of the lovely homes across the street. Today it is snowing so it is a very white view. Some disgruntled neighbors are digging their cars out, but usually they are very pleasant people.

Work is a ten-minute walk for me now. Nine on good days. Twelve on slow days. Perfect except for the fact that it's January and I have no gloves.*

Oh yes, and we can heat and cool each room individually. Except the coat closet is always cold, no matter what.

One of my favorite things about our new home, though, is that there are none of those beastly camel crickets hopping around and creeping up walls and attacking me in the night. I could live here forever for that luxury.

*See "Memoirs of a Miser," posted 02/12/10