Up and Up

Do you think that the house you live in can make you feel depressed? I certainly do, and right now this house is doing it. Don't get me wrong, this apartment is ideal, no neighbours, no salesmen, were on great terms with the landlord etc. etc. Only during the summer this place turns into a dump. The living room has A/C, the rest of the house is a 100 degrees easily. This means I'm of course not doing any housework, I value my life. Apart from the living room it's impossible to properly clean the place without dying from heat exhaustion.

During the summer this place feels like a cage too. It is not exactly situated in what you can call a 'good neighbourhood'. Sure we got no burnt carwrecks and homeless people on our doorstep here, but most of the inhabitants of the neighbourhood that starts on the other end of the street are what you might call trailer trash. Not people you want to get involved with that much. For some reason hese people value old and somewhat sloppy houses that used to be inhabited by laborers in the days of old. These houses are small, cramped and generally not in a good shape. There's also been no sign of neighbourhood planning in those parts, so there's very, very little greenery. No trees, no grass, no nothing except for bricks and asphalt. Needless to say that's little incentive to go out on a hot day and take a walk around the neighbourhood. It's hot, there's nothing that's even resembling healthy living circumstances so my days are best spent underneath the airconditioning.

Then why is my life on the upside right now? Because Pauline got promoted. Or she will be, at least, come October/November. What her new function will be exactly, I don't know. I'm not too educated on what she does exactly, I've always associated it with boring office work but she seems to like it. In any case, she'll be a 'manangement assistant' soon. I guess that's something like a secretary, or at least that what she made it look like.

Of course I'm happy for her, she's been looking for a way to break into the higher echelons for a while now. Seeing how she has no diplomas beyond highschool it's quite a feat and I'm proud of her that she was able to pull it off. But for me personally there's good news in this too. We might be able to buy a house.

I understand that in the US it's a little different, but over ehre buying a house is a big thing. Houses are extremely expensive here and you need to have a good and steady income to be able to nail a contract. So right now we need to look into what kind of mortgage we can get for her projected future salary and we can go shopping. This means I'll be able to break out of this neighbourhood and finally choose a place where I feel happy when I look out the window. Someplace green, with people that are actually normal. Basically this means we need to get out of the south-side of town (the bad side) into the somewhat richer and better part of town, the north-side. I can't wait.

BTW, I've always been on the look-out for a nice job, as you might know. Pauline's mom yesterday told me that one of the pubs in town (which also happens to be the local concert hall) is looking for people to help out behind the bar for 16-20 hours a week. I'll be applying, even though I have no experience in that field this is one of those jobs that I'll be more than willing to do.