Nicole feels

It has been a real up and down week. Lots of interesting developments amid many still unanswered questions!

I am not even sure right now what I have written in here as far as developments in VA and here on the homefront. Let me see if I can summarize a bit (I apologize if I repeat myself)...

Rob has accepted two job offers that will result in an 80 hour work week initially. This is simply to get us mortgage loan qualification. He is still actively looking for more financially substantial employment with benefits. I adjusted his r�sum� to highlight and showcase his sales experience, so now he has three r�sum�s focusing on three different areas of experience: management, technical, and sales. Several friends in the area are passing his r�sum�s along; they often say it's who you know, right?

We are not going to pursue the yellow house because it is in a bad neighborhood (hence the incredibly low price). Rob found another house in a nicer neighborhood that isn't on the market yet, but is being totally refurbished inside. The owner plans to offer it to us at whatever the appraisal is. Rob says he is going to pray for a grumpy appraiser - heh!

IF we get that house, Kaytlin will attend a private school to finish out the year. Test scores, as well as violence issues, are a factor at the middle school and high school in that area. The elementary school is awesome, however, so there must be some not so great elementary schools that feed into the middle and high schools. We are just not ready to put Kaytlin in a school where girls fight with switchblades.

Rob had a nice talk with the pastor of the church out there and they are very excited about us moving and plan to help with some of the expenses. Yay, to that!

Rob is in MD now and flies home tomorrow. In some ways the time has flown by. He is not going to have to go out earlier than us; at least that is the plan so far.

As for the house here, I thought we were going to have a showing today, and a real promising one at that according to their agent, but when they saw the location (we live on a busy road), they wouldn't even look at it. We are probably going to have to lower the asking price by about 5K after this weekend due to the time of the year and needing to sell quickly. Feel free to send up some prayers that someone will come and see it before then and make a great offer! We will still make money on it with the reduction, but that will mean less for a down payment.

I have two test, a quiz, and a paper due this week! The paper is supposed to be a bioethics deal; we choose the topic from a list on the textbook website. I chose "Bulimia: Definitions and Deliberations". We are supposed to discuss two points of view, but based on the article, what two views they want discussed seems a little muddled. I will hopefully hear from my prof tomorrow so I can choose the right approach. Oh, there is a ton of research out there, but should I be discussing the pros and cons of forced in-patient treatment, the socio-, psycho-, and/or biological causes, the controversy over pro-ED websites...see what I mean? The article itself seems rather silly to me; I don't really think a bulimic would act in this manner, but... you can be the judge if you'd like (click here).

Today I was so overwhelmed with everything, I grabbed my backpack and bio notes and headed to Paner@ Bre@d for a bowl of clam chowder and hazelnut coffee. I never go out to eat alone.

I really, really needed to get away, even just for an hour in a coffee shop of sorts.

That verse in Matthew bumps about in my head...

"So don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today." (6:24)