Friday, May 19, 2006

My big sister's wedding ...

... is tomorrow! Holy crap! How crazy is that?! I couldn't be happier for her! I mean, this is just so cool.

I'm obviously not going to win a pulitzer for this blog.

Her geek of choice (since all cool girls are dating geeks these days) is a really good guy - heck, the man is a developer. Can't go wrong with that! ;)

So there's tons of family that has been flying over here from Puerto Rico and Florida and Boston and ... wherever. Pretty exciting. I'm going to get to see family that I haven't seen in years - some of them I haven't seen since I left Puerto Rico 10 years ago!

So Felicidades, Vivian!!!

Now I have to go run some errands. This moron forgot to bring socks so now I need to buy some. *sigh*

Monday, May 15, 2006

I have a home!

Keri and I have found a place to live!! It's in McLean and it's a gated community called Avalon Crescent. To be honest, we were running out of time and might have had to move into an apartment we didn't like, but we lucked out with this one.

At a slightly higher price than was in our range, Keri had dismissed this complex and a couple other ones, but she liked them and had kept them around. So, as our options quickly dwindled, we took a look at them.

We didn't didn't like our second option, but by then we had already seen this:



A picture of the neighborhood
The best picture I could find.

Floorplan of our new apartment!
This is our layout: 'The Garfield'. It's 1,172 sq. ft.

It's great! As you step out of the foyer you walk into the living room and dinning room which is quite large and full of windows. It's gorgeous! Both bedrooms have walk-in closets and are attached to bathrooms. My bedroom is the one called '#1' in the lower-right corner of the floorplan.

Keri and I couldn't be more excited. We went from having little hope in finding a place we would like to signing a lease for what appears to be exactly what we wanted! And for a reasonable price!

I know this is such an average thing: I graduated so I got an apartment with my girlfriend. But it's the everyday, average events in life that make it all worth while!

So, friends and family, come and visit us!

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

This son of Borikén....

On BBC News:

Puerto Rico budget woes deepen


Anger has been growing over the financial crisis
Thousands of workers in Puerto Rico are threatening to go on strike after a budget crisis partially shut down the island's government.
read more...

There have been a lot of problems down there since I left 10 years ago. The standard of living has gotten worse. Just last month the government had to shut down to save money.

Last semester I went back with my family. I took Keri along with me. I was so excited to show her the country where I grew up. But from the moment we walked into my grandmother's condo, we were slapped in the face by the heat of the unconditioned air - the lights were out due to rolling blackouts that stretch across the entire island. Family members have had to buy generators because the electricity that they pay for is so unreliable. The island is plagued by corrupt politicians and is suffering from a parent country that does not listen to it.

Last week 95,000 government workers were put out and half a million students were sent home when the governement and its schools were forced to close in an attempt to resolve the deficit problem. Because of this action, Moody's, a credit company, downgraded PR's bonds, junking most of them. So now our credit is shot, making the situation even worse.

People in the states talk about how the economy is slow and how spending isn't what it should be, but what they don't realize is that places like Puerto Rico, which is a self-governed commonwealth of the United States, gets hit much harder than any of the states.

I read these articles and hear about the condition of my home country and I just want to get up on my feet and yell out a cry of HELP!!! PLEASE HELP!! My people are in need and we're just a passing story on cnn's webpage. There is so much wealth in the states. Most americans just don't realize how blessed they are. But here we have an entire island of american citizens - 3.8 Million of them - living in poverty.

Try to imagine if what is occuring down there would happen here. Imagine if Virginia or Rhode Island had to close all government building and send the kids home because the state debt was so high and the governmental coffers so low that officials couldn't pay for the government to run. Could you imagine the uproar? The media and the talking heads would declare a national disaster and Bush's poll ratings might actually go down even further. Thousands would call for federal aid and an investigative commitee would be assembled to determine exactly who is to blame for allowing such a state of affairs to develop. Yet their is no uproar for Puerto Rico. We're just a side note in the news.

And why should the federal government or the media care? We're not allowed to vote for the president. We have no congressional votes. We're just second-class citizens living in a spit of land whose military worth has been exhausted and its only value is as a tourist stop.

That's why the only uproar you will hear is my own pitiful cry.


Pictures from the articles that I've been reading:



If you want to read more about this, I have a few saved links: http://del.icio.us/HokieGeek/puertorico+crisis(one is in spanish)