So it has been two weeks since I officially signed on the dotted line for my house, and not coincidentally, about two weeks since I provided a decent blog update.  Anyways, I'm pleased with how things are going at the new place.  My mom came down the day after my closing and stayed for four days, helping me get all the essentials that would've taken me months to figure out I needed ... cleaning supplies, kitchen stuff, shades, etc. 

The place is still a little sparse on furniture, though I did order a couch and larger bed which will be arriving in a couple weeks.  For now, I am sleeping in a guest bedroom in my little old bed.  DirectTV came this past Saturday, and I also bought a desk from Walmart that I actually used my VERY limited handyman skills to piece together.  So right now I guess the main two rooms of use in my house are the basement, which has my computer, tv, and weights, and the kitchen, which has the food.

Outside the house itself, I'm really liking the area.  The air is definitely cleaner, I have a view of the mountains, and I much prefer the small town feel over endless suburbia and strip malls.  The town itself has everythig I need - supermarket, pharmacy, liqour store, etc.  Nonetheless, its still not that far a drive to get back to civilization, as Winchester has everything any suburb a little closer to DC has.  It's also a lot cheaper to go out on the weekends.  I went out both Friday and Saturday last weekend, and spent about $30 total each night to get pretty loaded up on drinks and even grab a late night meal.  Plus, my friend from work I already know out here hangs out with some really cool people, so I'm already meeting a lot of folks.

It's not all fantastic though ... the commute is pretty damn long, although I knew this going in.  At least we can take the HOV lane which saves lots of time.  It also hurts the efficiency of MindSay a bit, since we can no longer just have a quick chat in the dining room when we need to figure something out.  I'm sure we'll work that out fine though.  I'm also on dialup Internet at the moment ... I want to get my first month of expenses all sorted out before I drop the money for DSL.  

I was also pretty pumped today when I went on Realtor.com to see what houses in Strasburg are selling for and found that Townhomes in the same development that I live are already LISTING at $10k more than I got my place for.  And that's without any of the options, that can run you another $15-20k.  Pretty crazy that in a MONTH since deciding I was going to buy this place I'm up $10-20k, which is probably a tad more than I've made in the stock market in FIVE YEARS! 

So I guess the move is working out pretty well so far ... big screen TV arrives Saturday ... to be continued ...