i've got my spine, i've got my orange crush

Looking for an apartment is an incredibly frustrating endeavor, particularly since I start back to work in three weeks and want to spend the last few days of freedom doing anything but viewing potential dwellings. It doesn't help that the rental market around here (and by here I don't mean Berkeley, which is where I am, but rather Palo Alto/Menlo Park, which is where I want to be) seems to be in complete meltdown -- I saw lots of 'for sale' signs and v. few 'for rent' signs, which I assume is tied to the mortgage crisis. The very apartment I lived in six months ago is available now -- for $220 more than what I leased it for. And of the two apartments I saw today, one was tiny, and the other was built in the 1960s and apparently not updated since then. The tiny one was $1725, and the old one was $1950, which does not give me a lot of optimism.

I made a bit of progress; I have calls out to several landlords and am waiting to hear from them about appointments, and there are a couple more people I want to call tomorrow. I'm also keeping an eye on Craigslist, and indulging in some internal debate on what percentage of my income I'm willing to spend on rent; coming from Iowa is probably exacerbating the situation, since I would be in a great position to buy something there and yet am contemplating spending twice as much money to rent something here instead. Lame.

But despite the frustration, it was a good day; I had lunch at Stacks while I perused Craigslist on my laptop, spent the afternoon driving around (and therefore not really helping out the Spare the Air campaign), and then spent some more time on Craigslist while drinking a lime italian soda at Cafe Borrone, my favorite place in Menlo Park. I talked to my parents on the way back to Berkeley, and then played some Rock Band. It's insanely addictive, but I did pretty well; of all the songs I played, I only failed one ('Bite the Hand that Feeds' by Nine Inch Nails) -- but I failed it repeatedly, which led to a feeling of ridiculous satisfaction when I finally got it. Yes, I need to get out more.

Tomorrow I'm taking a break from apartment hunting to go to San Francisco for a meeting, followed by tea with Claude and Vidya if Vidya will ever make a freaking decision about when we're meeting. Then the weekend is back to the apartment wars -- wish me luck!