News...

After thinking vaguely about it for months, I finally decided to buy a house. As with almost everything else I've done in my life so far, I didn't shop around properly.

Norma, who has renovated fifteen or so houses in Eagan Park, including Ash and Carrie's house, built one new house. It is beautiful, and I was really taken with it. However, I also really liked Ash and Carrie's street, and their neighbours, and the new house was about 1/3 to 1/2 a mile away, and on a busier street. No big distance, and still really close, but not close enough to see people hanging out on the porch playing guitar and hop over for a beer. I explained my dilemma to Norma, and couldn't believe it when she offered to build me the same house on their street! I spent Friday afternoon in amazement thanking God for his ridiculous kindness, told everyone who would listen about it all weekend, and signed a contract on Monday. Norma says she can have it done by July 20th, which I think is crazy, since it's an empty lot right now. So yeah, I'm having a house built for me... crazy, huh?

I'm hoping to take a picture each week, so I can get that whole time-lapse house-building thing going on. And the full geek details (overhead hi-resolution ortho-photo from seamless.usgs.gov, GPS coordinates, etc.) will come soon!

Eagan Park is right next to the airport, but on the northern side, so the planes don't fly overhead - all the runways are oriented East-West. It's a small, self-contained little neighbourhood, with quiet-ish streets where kids can play and all that stuff. East Point is not huge, but it has several interesting places to eat - Bevin and I have tried a couple on Wednesdays before our small group, and it's not uncommon for the small group itself to ditch our scheduled programme and head out somewhere for a drink (the Corner Tavern on St Patrick's Day, and the Brake Pad last week). The wait-folk know Ash and Carrie by name - how sweet is that?