Magical Philadelphia

I hear people use all kinds of words when describing Philadelphia, but "magical" isn't usually one of them.

And yet, whenever I describe my experience here over the last few days, the word "magical" somehow appears every time. Everything is just lining up... magically. :-) It starts with the way I met my first Philadelphian friend, Seth, back during the interviews for this program. We didn't spend a lot of time together, but I liked him and hopefully he enjoyed my company too and, when it became clear that I'm coming to Philadelphia, he offered that I stay in his spare bedroom for as long as I needed.

As if that wasn't enough, he then connected me with a friend of his who lives in a totally different part of Philadelphia, who has a house and a dog - and needs somebody to house-sit and dog-sit for the 6 weeks he's away. Right up until August. Which is when I'm going to Israel.

So everything is lining up magically, as far as scheduling goes, and I have plenty of time to look for a place and plenty of opportunities to sample different neighborhoods at my leisure. I'm thinking about buying a duplex and renting out a half of it. I'll need to get on it pretty quickly, if I'm hoping to have a place to live in by the time I return from Israel. It's one of those things, like buying a car of finishing my dissertation: I analyze too much, freeze, become intimidated - and then, at some point, I decide I'm just going to go for it, and I do, and all of a suddent I'm rolling and it's done and it's good. So, time to start looking for a place.

I bought a digital camera yesterday. I did a bunch of research to decide which model I want, and decided to go with an "ultra-portable" camera rather than a super-fancy one - I like the idea of taking lots of pictures easily. I eventually decided on a specific model, and then went to check craigslist, to see if somebody was selling it in Philadelphia. There was one post from the previous day - great price, perfect condition, a bunch of accessories. I got in touch with the guy and we met the next day. He and his fiance were incredibly nice, we ended up talking for more than an hour, and plan on having dinner together soon. Camera, one offer, new friends. Magic.

It's been raining over the last couple of days - warm, humid, monsoon rain. I kind of like it. I kind of like Philadelphia, almost to my surprise. It's very... varied. It feels like a bunch of different towns strung together. There are very urban areas (downtown, upscale residential, slums), but also wide open green parts, a huge park, three different rivers, and of course a whole bunch of academic campuses.

Neat.