Found It!

After learning the hard way and letting a great little one bedroom on the Upper East Side slip through our clutches, we realized apartment hunting in NYC is not: "oooh, good option! Let's gather five or six more and weigh pros and cons before we decide." More like: "I could live here. Could you live here? Great. Quick – offer them our first born.”

So we were thrilled when we looked at approximately 15 apartments one afternoon, settled on one *if memory served* we liked best, negotiated an even lower price (score!), applied, got it and went back to find… ah, we really did like that one after all.

Yesterday afternoon, our bodies completely devoid any semblance of rigorous physical activity for the past four weeks, we decided to run to our new place to get the keys from our super. We wanted to check out a rug for sale at 92nd and 2nd, so we ran that direction from our current spot in Hell’s Kitchen first before making our way back to our new pad in West Harlem. If you are familiar with Manhattan, you will know this means we rock. Six miles on the heels of a full month’s inactivity. It doesn’t hurt, however, when that route means cutting through lovely Central Park twice and the fact that the tiny north/south blocks make counting blocks much more interesting than my run home in Salt Lake… “tttthhhhhiiiiirrrrrrrddd, fffffoooooouuuuurrrrtttthhhh…”

I won’t bore you with too many apartment details, (clearly, I have reserved that right for recounting boring running stories) but I’ll give you a run-down of the stats:

Newly remodeled (new appliances, paint, floors)
New bathroom, new kitchen – implied in the remodel, but worth mentioning twice because, hello, new bathroom and new kitchen. Are there many more sanity-saving things on this planet?
2-3x the size of anything we’ve seen
Least expensive apartment we viewed. Period.
Huge bedroom
Closet space
Full kitchen
Top floor
SUNLIGHT
Plenty o’ room for guests (that, ahem, means you)
Great neighborhood
Parks
Free aerobics at the recreation center nearby
Cheap(er) grocery stores in the ‘hood

As we sat catching our breath on the floor of the apartment yesterday, I realized we’d better get used to those seats for a time. Thanks, Mom and Dad, for the inflatable mattresses for Christmas – because at least we will have something to sleep on. But this is going to be a pretty vacant space for a little while.

Pictures are forthcoming. But if you shut your eyes and imagine a big empty room, off to the side picture a big empty kitchen and on the opposite side imagine a big empty bedroom and bathroom. There you have it. Home sweet home.