Portland Bound

Portland Bound!

As the title suggests, we're heading up to The City of Roses to live out the early days of our burgeoning professional lives, and I (we) couldn't be more excited. To keep family and friends in the loop, we thought it'd be a good idea to start up a blog to track the journey and see where it went. We've got a crazy couple of months ahead of us, but I am confident that everything will turn out. It has to!

Fun Facts about Portland:

• Portland gets about 40 inches of rain per year over a span of about 155 days. This breaks down to about 1/4 inch of rain per rainy day.  For comparison, San Rafael gets an average of 34 inches of rain per year over 68 days, or about 1/2 inch of rain per rainy day. 
• Portland is home to the massive Forest Park--at 5,000 acres it is the largest urbanpark in the United States.
• Powell's City of Books lives here, and it is the largest used bookstore in the world.
• Over 28 brewries in Portland--the highest brewry density of any city in the United States
• The city is separated from Washington via the Columbia River, which is 6 miles from downtown Portland. By the way... no bridge tolls anywhere.
• Portland has been named The Greenest City in America by Popular Science Magazine, and Second Greenest City in the World by Grist.

Before we go, Katie must heal from a major surgery she had just 4 days ago --a Pectus Excavatum (concaved chest) repair. We're hoping she will be out of the hospital tomorrow and ready to finish her recovery at home. She's doing great so far and is starting to manage her pain well. Not bad for having a metal bar fastened to your ribs! Here's an image of the Nuss Procedure she had.

So it looks like we'll be heading up to our new home at the beginning of the new year! We will be opting for temporary housing for the first month or two while we look for jobs. I'll be applying to banks and financial advisory firms, and Katie will be finishing her Master's Thesis. Busy times ahead, and we couldn't be more thrilled with the possibilities :)

-Nick