Almost normal

So the major change happened needed for us to return to our fundamental way of life: we got our internet set up. It was a major hassle involving having our landlord come out and rewire the phones and us learning that we threw away the AC adapter to our DSL modem and... But it is done now. And I instantly realize how important it is for Alison and I to sit together in the living room playing on the internet on our laptops. Perhaps a little too important...

The new wireless router is quite cool, though. In addition to being extremely easy to set up (on the old one I could never get the security to work), we can now wirelessly print from the comfort of our own couch. Soon enough we'll also have a wireless hard drive with all my music backed up on it.
We have been trying to keep our expenses down until our finances are more in order. Most immediately, it has meant that we are trying to get cheap furniture. We have picked up a huge, ugly thing to hold my CDs and a nice old Victorian dresser that is seriously messed up. So we've entered stage two: home improvement projects (not quite having finished stage one: unpack the boxes). These have some urgency because without storage we can't finish unpacking.
We had a really nice night last night. First we to the local "A Taste of Africa" which is on the same block as us. Turns out it is a Cameroonian place. It has a great local eatery feel. After about ten minutes, there was only one employee/owner working there. It had a similar feel to this super cool Vietnamese place in East LA. Except the owner, Malong, was more talkative. It was a lot of fun and we struck up a conversation with the other people eating there with us. The food was... really good. Talking to Malong, it is clear that he is someone who really cares about food. He said that he changes the recipes a bit every day depending on how he is feeling. We had a veggie combo with black eyed peas, spinach, a sort of corn tamale thing, an okra dish, rice with a creamy spinach topping, and something else that is slipping my mind. All the dishes were great. Unfortunately, we didn't bring our camera. There will be pictures later.

Late at night we walked down town, about a fifteen minute walk. We stopped by Milano gelato before it closed at midnight. As with the last time we had it, it was great. Highlights included Fior de Latte (basically: cream flavor) and a burnt caramel.

I don't think we'll quite have the house in a normal place by the end of the night, but I think we'll be close. It is definitely feeling like home.