All the discomfort and tiredness was worth it. The babies are happy again, the apartment is more amazing and bigger than I remember (Asma was totally shocked; she didn't imagine it being the way it was even though she saw pictures), and we still had the entire day to do household things.

We're already feeling at home here, East Bay especially (at least around Oakland and north of it). I haven't seen much of the Bay area yet, but from what I have seen, East Bay is totally our thing. There's a good mix of people, interesting neighborhoods, tons of restaurants, and an overall alive feel. San Francisco is cool too, but East Bay really has a soul to it. Silicon Valley is pretty sterile and kind of lame, in comparison. I can't ever imagine us living there. Maybe that's a bad choice professionally for me, but maybe I need to change professions too. Hah.

DC is pretty lame now. I'd be surprised if we ever moved back. I'd be surprised if we moved out of the area. We'll see in a few years, or a few weeks, I guess.

For now, I'm loving it. It's in the 60s right now. And we live next to Chinatown. And we don't have to spend ages browsing through Yelp wondering if there's a place with good vegan options. Most places here seem to. I've been to a few great and cheap restaurants so far and they've all had yummy vegan things. You cannot just do that in DC; the restaurants there are all hit-or-miss, and not many good cheap eats in the first place. Sad.

We were dying last night. I've pulled all-nighters before, but this was the roughest of them because of all the physical activity it involved in the errands we ran in the afternoon. I couldn't make myself go into Trader Joe's (our last stop), so I feel asleep in the car. One guy knocked on the window to check if I was okay. I should've reclined the seat to make it obvious, instead of how it probably was: head back and ackward, mouth partially open.

Mona is visiting us for the week. She's flying in tonight. That'll be fun.

Decorating and furnishing the apartment is going to be a long process. We cannot buy shit anymore. Plus, the apartment is stylish. It'll look so pretty when we fill it out. Asma's our chief of interior design.

I have so, so much work to do. I might freak out in a few days.

But basically, we left at 7:00pm on Monday and, 48 hours later, we've covered 1330 miles.

The babies are miserable, the most being the chins. Penelope seems pretty good, though. Happy bird.

It's almost midnight, August 10, as I write this. On August 11, if everything goes well, we'll be on our way to California. It'll be me, Asma, the five kiddies (three of which are now members of the Timothy Club), and essentials for the road and the first few days in the new apartment.

The apartment is surprisingly emptied. The past few days have been intensified purging of the apartment. We just mailed off eleven box (six through media mail). As for furniture, we sold some of it and my in-laws took the rest (along with a lot of our other junk). But all these stragglers lying around keep making me feel like there's still a lot more to do as far as packing.

We haven't really addressed the cleaning and painting issue, either, and we've got plans to hang out with the family and a couple of friends tomorrow. I really think we'll be leaving Tuesday, but Asma thinks we can take care of everything by tomorrow.

So it's finally here. We're only a couple of weeks off from the ‘end of July’ timeframe I mentioned back in April. I feel like the last few weeks have been focused more on getting prepared for the move than anything else. Outside of the apartment, for me, much of that also entailed winding things down at AARP, even though I'll still be working remote for the next three months (perhaps until the end of the year or beginning of next even). As much as I actually look forward to working remotely, I'm sadder than I thought I'd be at knowing I won't actually be seeing anyone for some time. And I haven't said proper good-byes to some people, nor will I be able to.

I'm so bad at posting that I didn't mention I was in the Bay in early July for a week. It still feels like foreign land. And I'm surprised at how much like home DC is now. And California is beautiful, but so is Maryland if you just drive out a few miles. It's more lush here, maybe that's the best way to describe it. The greens are richer. California has tinges of desert to it.

There's probably a ton of things we never took advantage of living here. But maybe we'll actually do more in DC when we visit.

The move will be good, though. Aside from being a friendlier place [in theory] for our lifestyle, the packing process has exposed all the useless junk we've accumulated over the past four years. It's disappointing when you start to tally the dollar value then and how much of a burden it is now to find a good way to get rid of it (short of throwing it away). With this fresh start, we're hoping to buy things we'd want to take with us on our next move.

Gotta get back to packing. I hope I don't exhaust myself too much before the trip. Our first stop will be at my parents' house.

Wish us luck! And hopefully nothing bad will happen during the drive, but I love you, my family and friends, and I apologize pre-mortem for not keeping in touch.

Flickr updates will be coming throughout the week, maybe?