a view on the world...

and so here i am, my first official blog post about my time as a grad student at UCSB. i've only been living here for 2 full days, but i feel pretty well-settled and (so far) well-adjusted. of course, it could be, as my new classmate heather mentioned, that i'm still in the 'honeymoon phase,' so we'll see how things go once training and orientation begin.

i drove down on saturday, which was an adventure, since the longest drive i've ever made is from san francisco to palo alto. my sister rode with me and my parents came as well in the van, which is good because there was no way i could've fit all my stuff into the back of truck. i spent the first couple of hours on the drive constantly checking my rearview mirror to make sure the garbage bags filled with stuff shoved into the back weren't flying off, but once i was pretty sure that they were well-entrenched, i could relax a bit. (i should've take a picture of all the plastic bags. there were at least 8 in the back of the truck, and then a few more stuffed into the van along with all my luggage and everyone else's bags)

we pulled into santa barbara around 5:45 or so, and after doing a preliminary move of bags and such, i helped the parents' check in to their hotel. they stayed at pacifica suites, which i would really recommend to anyone coming down to visit. the grounds were beautiful, and while i didn't get a picture, the website is here: http://www.pacificasuites.com/. they gave an extra discount for AAA and for being affiliated with UCSB, which was super useful, so if anyone's interested, give me a ring and i'll see what i can do.

as it was mom's big birthday, i made reservations at a cute restaurant downtown, opal's, that has an awesome drink and dessert menu (the dinner entrees were also divine and to die for). it was super nice -- dad had the paella, which looked amazing, jaymie had tomato linguini, mom had the crabcakes and i had the world's most amazing warm seafood salad, with all these steaming chunks of salmon, scallops and other yummy things, topped with a creamy garlic sauce (i'm making myself hungry just thinking about it, yum!). for dessert, mom and jaymie went all out and had the 'like water for chocolate' special, which is basically raspberry ice cream inside a dark chocolate shell, while i really couldn't resist the dark chocolate jack daniel's creme brulee. mom's plate was decorated with chocolate sauce, and she even got her own candle to blow out:

on sunday, the family left and my roommate and i did some more settling in. luckily, chan had her own apartment in LA before she moved here, so she's got a lot of stuff to furnish the apartment with. as a result, i think our space looks pretty lived in, though of course there are things that we're still looking to do. we ran a few errands sunday night to check out bed bath and beyond, michael's craft store, rite aid, trader joe's, all the usual suspects. she's heading up to sf this coming weekend (she's originally from san jose and has family in san francisco), so she's going to make an emergency trip to ikea and target (two stores that i am sadly missing) to pick up a few extras.

i've taken a few pictures of the place, but it is in flux. here they are:

the living room, which i honestly think looks better in person than in pictures. the sheets are on the windows because we haven't yet received our drapes, which are supposed to be coming on thursday.

luckily, we've also got crazy high ceilings in the living room, one of the awesome perks about being on the top floor. the ceilings have wee windows in them that let in even more light.

the kitchen is small, compact but cute, and we've got a huge fridge. i've already cooked a couple of meals here, and i love the way that it feels.

our wee breakfast nook/office area, where we'll set up a shared bookshelf and a printer. chan also bought a basil plant and a potted rosemary/thyme/oregano plant, which will be the beginnings of our 'urban garden.'

i vacuumed the place today with the use of the roomba my parents let me bring along, since no one at home was using it, and i really couldn't resist putting a wee video of it up here. it occassionally gets stuck under the sofa and makes sad little noises, but it's so much fun to watch it putter around the place like some mini r2d2.

my bedroom, which still needs work but is coming together. i face the mountains, the practice soccer field and the soccer stadium, and the view is really lovely.

in the afternoons, there have been children's soccer lessons outside. today they were joined by a group of boys playing ultimate frisbee, which was lots of fun to watch. :)

anyway, tomorrow there will be photos of the beach, and more stories about the people i'm meeting. i'm pretty much just bumming around, relaxing and trying to catch up on my rest before the madness descends upon me on friday, though i think i'm looking forward to being occupied again. i really don't know what to do with all this free time.


that's all for now!!!