House-sitting

We secured our apartment in the city after looking at a bunch of sort of ratty ones. What is considered "high-end" here is definately not what would be considered "high-end" in the States. But our apartment looks pretty nice -- modern kitchen & bath. Its a bigger one-bedroom and the location is perfect: right in the center of the city & no hills to walk. The current residents have it until Feb 10th so we are moving in Feb 11th. Until then we are house-sitting for a fellow physical therapist at Dan's school. The house is nice except it's up a steep hill from the city (about 10-20 min walk). We are watching the house and the owners' Jack Russell terrier, Scrappy who is very cute & tried to nibble on Pocket.

This is the view out the front window of the house we are house-sitting. Very raining today -- it is summer; the weather tends to hover in the 60-70s with wind so it's not really hot here. You couldn't tell by looking at people. All the girls dress like it's about 95 with sundresses and all. Maybe it's a college town thing. It is very green up by this house. The city has a Green Belt surrounding it -- the founders left part of the city green & undeveloped so that there would always be a green-way nearby. This house is just above the Green Belt so there are many nice walking areas nearby. The trees are incredible. Very big & lots of ferns and things. Also many many birds.

This is Pocket looking into the backyard. As you can see, everything is built on hills here, so lots of terracing. The flowers are doing really well with all this rain too.The hedges in back are English holly which was so funny to see after seeing only plastic versions at Christmas. We hung the clothes out back yesterday to dry as that seems to be what is done here. They have tumble dryers but they don't seem to work really well.

Another thing in Dunedin is the coffee thing. There are coffee shops everywhere but they are only open until around 3pm so no walking to the coffee shop after dinner. The coffee is very good - you can't just order a coffee with cream though. You order a "flat white" and get a little cup of brewed coffee with milk & foam on top (like a latte) and they usually put a swirly design in the foam. Very trendy & nice & not cheap. All coffees run around $4 and of course no refills. So I will be making most of our coffee at home. No one has drip coffee makers here. Everyone has the French Press style, or plunger style as they call it here. Which is good for me since that is how I like coffee. At the house we are at now there are only one cup size coffee makers which is a little odd & slow in the morning.

Dan just came back from school. Basically for the PhD program he is in he is mostly setting his own hours & doing his own work. Right now it is easier to do the work from home since we have internet and all the info he needs. Also not a lot of work for him right now as they are just setting up the study. He will be able to bike or walk to work from our apartment (and from this house). Dunedin is a walking city although some people bike and there are buses. Dan's bike is in the shop right now; the back shock starting leaking oil so no biking this week.