Reporting In . . .
Oh, all right. I supposed I should let friends know what is going on (most of the family already knows).

I accepted a postdoctoral position at Tulane University in New Orleans in April. Had more interviews and campus visits in May and June. Decided that Texas was completely uninhabitable for the_overqual and me, and that Puerto Rico would not work for the_overqual's career prospects (he was whining something about not being able to speak the language ;) ). Decided that parts of PA -- alas, not the notable city parts (would love Philly) -- weren't quite worth follow-up interviews. Regretted having to say "no" to a beach in Florida, but Tulane is a good school and it is early in my academic career.

So, we decided that Tulane would definitely be It, at least for a year or two, and I told my current employer in June. I have been busily working and starting the whole moving process ever since. the_overqual and I just got back from a frantic trip to New Orleans to secure housing (success! success!). We will have a travertine shower, a claw-footed bath, a countertop stove separate from the oven, and an oncologist, her husband, and their 2 small children living above us, the only other tenants in a very large house.

We're getting excited. :)

And -- despite the scariness of Bourbon Street -- we are growing more fond of New Orleans. It will be very difficult to leave DC as we love it here and have come to think of it as home, but we were both feeling much more this time that New Orleans will be "do-able." When we first visited, back in April, we saw much of the desolation along with much of what seems to be typical Southern appreciation for decay. This trip we could comprehend better some of the beauty of the decay, and noted a lot of the construction that was taking place, and that a lot had taken place since we'd visited three months previously. It was clear to us (well, to me at least, but I think to the_overqual, too) that the city is re-building. Slowly, and it still has a long way to go, but it is re-building and it does have much beauty to it, especially in the Uptown, University, and Garden District areas in which we will spend the vast majority of our time (I know, I know, those are the affluent areas that really didn't flood . . .).

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On another note, I just spoke with my mother and discovered that a tornado and straight-line winds struck my small hometown area (New Trier/Hampton) in Minnesota this past Thursday. All of my relatives escaped unscathed, outside of lots of tree damage, crop damage, some damage to structures (significantly damaged sheds, and one aunt and uncle with a tree that fell on the house but didn't -- thankfully -- cause much damage to the house), and the inconvenience of a lack of electricity. I'm glad everyone is okay. It sounds like my grandparents were a bit shaken, but that is understandable -- I'm a bit shaken, and it is days afterward! A tornado hit my college my junior year, and even before then I was terrified of them (so much so that, both before and after, tornadoes feature[d] commonly in my nightmares). One of my first questions in New Orleans in April was "how common are tornadoes here?". Hurricanes at least you can predict and evacuate for. One of my strongest irritations out here is that tornadoes are getting more common, and the region really doesn't have a good warning system in place (i.e., no sirens). But, thankfully, MN does have a good siren system.