So we’re moving.

Again.

Across the country.

Again.

Shortly after moving here, the company James worked for was found floating upside down in the fishbowl, and the job went away, forcing us to subsist on my art income for several months until James picked up some contract work. (There’s nothing quite like having painted frogs the only buffer between you and the street, let me tell you…) But we managed, and he got some contract work, and we have been limping along–can’t get ahead, managing not to get too far behind, plenty of you probably know exactly what that’s like.

And lo! Like a beacon, hope shines on us, as James just got a job (from a company that will remain nameless for a bit longer, although the paperwork has all been signed, which is why I’m finally writing about this) in North Carolina. It is a good job. It pays a fair amount of money, which will presumably increase with time, and the benefits package made me drool all over their nice stationary–finally, full medical/dental/vision! Finally I don’t have to live in fear of getting appendicitis and going bankrupt! Yay!

So this is good. And they’re paying for relocation, including flying us out next month to find an apartment, which is also very good. We do have to leave the desert, which I love passionately, to move to the not-that-deep-South, which is less good–I doubt it’s 75 and bone dry in December there–and we have to move AGAIN, now that I’ve thrown out most of the boxes, finally, so that’s crappy, and I have to get a slew of art done in a real hurry before the move next month, which is hectic, and I am really gonna miss my dad and stepmom, whom we’ve only gotten to know these last six months and who have been fabulous, so that’s a bummer. But overall, it’s a really good thing, and a long-awaited break, and James and I have been wandering around in a sort of bouncy haze and randomly hugging one another going “I can’t believe I/you got the job!” for a coupla days now.

So! Anybody in North Carolina? What does someone who’s never lived in the south need to know about, other than the bit with ice tea tasting like sugar ant vomit, and those grit things? What’s up with hurricanes? (We’re in the Research Triangle area, so they tell me the hillbillies aren’t as thick on the ground there…)