No, not that change (and not this one either!)… A few posts down I had mentioned I was thinking of moving out of Florida, possibly to St. Louis. Well, that idea has crystallized into a decision. I am definitely getting out of Florida, and St. Louis is the goal. Why St. Louis? Well, I don’t rightly know. It has a lot of history, it’s on the Mississippi (rivers fascinate me), and it’s in a part of the country I’ve never been in. It’s not far from Chicago, a place I’ve always wanted to visit but not live in. It gets four seasons. Today Central Florida’s feeble imitation of autumn starts (it’s extra breezy, we’re supposed to get nightly temps in the 60s — oh, bring out my furs! — and humidity is supposed to go down to something less than “under the swamp”). It’s not enough. Also, I want snow.
My problem is a lack of funds, no job… but this week my assignment at the cabinet company ends, and I’ve had no new offers so far. I’m on the verge of tossing my cats and some underwear in the car and heading off, but my stupid sense of responsibility is telling me to try to stick it out until the end of my lease. That’s April. I may stab myself in the head before then… or worse, lose my momentum. Then again, if I can’t find a job, what’s the point in staying here? I’m sick of Florida.
Anyway, I already started to go through my books to pull out those I absolutely can’t live without. I don’t have any rare editions, or anything that isn’t still in print (or isn’t available free on the internet), so I’m hoping to get those down to no more than one box. (And not a giant box either. I’m going to move with very little stuff, and I need room in the car — which is a Toyota Tercel, not a van — for the cats and their carriers.) Eventually I’ll sell whatever I have that’s sellable. If I can’t afford furniture right away when I move, so what? I can sleep on the floor. I’ve done it before.
One thing I am going to do is sell my computer and trade it in for a new laptop. It’s a great computer — it’s still pretty new — but I need to be more portable. I don’t need all the stuff this one came with, like media hookups to turn the thing into part of your in-home theater, and other stuff that I don’t even know what it is. It has Vista Home Premium on it, but I’ve had hardly a speck of trouble with this install. Maybe I lucked out. It has 2 GB of RAM which can be upped to 4, a giant hard drive, the monitor (which I bought separately) is a 17 inch LCD. It’s not junk. I can get a decent new laptop for around $500.00. My old laptop is trashed, or I’d just switch back to that. (Maybe I will in the interim. In fact, I’m going to see if I can get it working.)
Anyway, this feels like the right plan for my life. I feel good about it. I’m going to log on to Careerbuilder and so on to put some feelers out for jobs (clerical and administrative assistant stuff is my “specialty”). The job market up there can’t be any worse than Florida’s in any industry but tourism (and that’s down since the price of gas doubled). I’m going to put an “escape from Florida” announcement above my Paypal links too. Like I said, I’d like to stay until April — well, not “like,” but should — in order to not break my lease, but if I can’t get a job down here I won’t be able to pay any rent anyway.
Stay tuned for updates.
Update the first: I tested the old laptop last night and it seems to be working fine, so maybe I’ll put off buying a new one and just save the money from the sale of the desktop for the move. Hmm, save money, what a concept!
10 Responses to “Big Life Change Coming”
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September 23rd, 2008 at 7:01 pm
1. I wish I could help with more cash, but maybe as time goes on I can free up a bit now & then.
2. I have a good friend from St. Louis, I’ll see if he has any info I can pass along, next time I see him.
3. I’m envious. Really, really envious.
September 23rd, 2008 at 7:35 pm
Congratulations on your decision to leave Floriduh behind. I spent many months out there over a number of years supporting testing at the Cape. I enjoyed my time on the coast but I’m not sure I would ever consider living there full-time. A bit too strange for me.
Being born and raised outside of Chicago I’d suggest you wait until spring to make the move to St. Louis if it’s at all possible. Winter in flyover country can be cold and darkβbetter to make the move in April, catch springtime in Missouri and give yourself some time to acclimate before having to deal with winter. I’m not saying winter in the midwest can’t be loverly, it can, but if you’ve lived in the South all your life your wardrobe definitely won’t include the cold-weather gear you’ll need to get through until the spring thaw.
Again, congrats and best wishes
September 23rd, 2008 at 7:49 pm
Info is good! I need all the info I can get.
Yep — waiting until spring is sensible. It’s also when my lease is up. Hopefully I can get some temp assignments to tide me over until then.
September 24th, 2008 at 5:31 am
“Feeble imitation of autumn starts”, ha, ha: I did notice this morning the cooler breeze; will see if it gets to 95 this afternoon, or a more autumny 85.
St Louis sounds like the place to be, sure: but in the spring, not in oncoming winter. Lived for several years in South Dakota and Montana and, believe me, winters take some getting used to: not that St L. is as ‘bad’ as Bozeman etc in that respect.
September 24th, 2008 at 8:32 am
I dunno, marcp — when I moved to Fairbanks in August 14 years ago, it was two whole months before it snowed, and another six weeks after that before it hit 45 below. Plenty of time to get acclimated.
St. Louis would be a piece of cake.
September 24th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
I live in St. Louis. If you move here, you should go to my vet, she’s awesome!
Winter is not too bad. It can get cold and icy, but it only stays that way for a few days and then it warms up. Last year I got 5 inches of snow, but it melted a day or so later.
The traffic is slightly annoying right now because one of the major highways is shut down for construction for another maybe year and a half. Not much to complain about, really.
I don’t have any info on jobs. An acquaintance of mine does the office temp thing, and it sounds like she’s always employed somewhere. Everyone who wants a job seems to have one. Maybe it’s not their dream job, but the cost of living’s not too bad so we get by.
September 25th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Yeah, come in the spring if you can. St. Louis springs and autumns are the reason I’m still here. But let me know when you get here. I’ll get hold of Charles Austin and we’ll have a Blogbash to welcome you to town.
September 27th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Belatedly answering you… thanks, I will! You bet. Now, no fair pretending you’re not home when I ring the doorbell… π
October 9th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Comming _really_ late to this post. Since you’re heading to Missouri, I wonder if you’d considered Kansas City? I’ll admit that it doesn’t have any real culture associated with the river, which sounds like a negative for you, but I understand that we are a bit cheaper to live in that St. Louis. To wit, I just checked gasoline prices today, Thursday Oct 09, and I saw 2.72/gallon here. I just checked rents at some established apartment complexes on bus-lines, and they seem to run $500-700 for a 1-bedroom. I realize that you may have already considered all this, but I always like to put in a good word for my hometome.
A long-time reader, first time commenter.
October 9th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Well you never know. I won’t discount the possibility.
Speaking of gas prices, I think they are gradually going down all over. Just the other day I saw a gas station advertising regular for $3.18 per gallon, which was thirty to forty cents cheaper than normal that day. There was a line of cars going down the block. Unfortunately I had already filled up earlier…