We purchased two Acer laptops with Windows 8 touchscreen.  What a time to learn a new operating system!

We’ve moved into the vacation home in Scottsdale on Saturday afternoon.  The property, exactly as shown in photos is not only clean but, in very good condition, equipped well beyond our expectations. 

Overlooking the clear blue water of a well maintained swimming pool, this older condo is located in the heart of downtown Scottsdale, navigable by a trolley we can catch only a short block away. 

We unloaded the car of the six orange Antler bags, the two carry on bags, clothes for here, clothes for cooler Las Vegas, two laptops and various household items, all in tact after my obsessive security precautions as described in previous posts.

It all worked:  the stickers on the windows warning of a upgraded security system, the indestructible Kryptonite bike locks securing 350 pounds of luggage together, the over-sized black tablecloth that covered it all. 

We never used “The Club” to lock the steering wheel.  We never felt it was necessary.  Still unopened, I’ll either return it to Amazon or sell it on eBay. 

Opening the orange Antler bags now is intimidating.  In essence, we could avoid opening them at all until after we leave the US in less than 60 days.  But, my goal is to repack everything resulting in one or two bags each with items exclusively to be used while cruising.  This will avoid us rifling through so many bags while in the tiny cabin. 

We plan to do the repacking mid December before we leave for our eight days in Henderson, Nevada over Christmas, returning here to Scottsdale on the 28th, heading to San Diego on January 1st or 2nd, to spend a night or two with niece Kely (yes, spelled correctly) and her husband. Dennis.

After unloading the car, a wave of exhaustion washed over me.  We had no food for dinner, had eaten little all day and I had absolutely no energy to go grocery shopping to cook dinner. 

Searching online for a nearby restaurant, we discovered the highly reviewed Citizen Public House, a charming gastro-pub offering a wide array of local brews with a somewhat small menu of uniquely seasoned and presented foods.

Not much in the way of beer drinkers, we each tried unusual ales.  Tom and I swapped our beer after the first taste.  Moments later, the ambitious and attentive server willingly traded in mine for a more moderate and traditional light beer. 

The food, cooked to perfection, couldn’t have been more perfect, mine buttermilk baked chicken breast with roasted Brussels sprouts and Tom’s, a liqueur seasoned meat loaf with mashed parsnips and smashed red potatoes. The service?  Impeccable!

And this condo, after two days, what do we think?  Although not considered upscale, it’s decorated with well maintained comfortable furnishings, acceptable towels, pots, pans and dishes, outdated TV’s (we brought a 32″Toshiba flat screen with us for this leg of the trip.  Good thing!).  With no Vikings games on TV here, we downloaded the NFL app to Tom’s phone.  We’ll plug the phone into the TV to watch it as it becomes available after the broadcast.

Also, the view overlooking the pool is scrumptious. But, the bed is hard.  It hurts my shoulder. Lots of tradeoffs.  We knew this going in.

The temperature was 91 yesterday and should be 93 today.  Yum!  Maybe we’ll grab a lawn chair by the pool one day. Ha!  Not so quick.  Yesterday, we purchased our two new Acer 15.6 Windows 8 laptops with touch screen. The learning curve for an entirely new operating system is cumbersome although both of us are grasping is fairly quickly. 

Here, I am writing my first blog on my new lightweight laptop while noticing a few features are missing and need to be discovered, i.e., accidentally delete a sentence and then normally left clicking for “undo” to put it back in place. 

Anyone out there know how to do this in Windows 8?  If not, I’ll find the answer somewhere online.  Where are the days of a tidy manual that provides all the answers?  Ugh!

Yesterday, when we purchased the two identical laptops at Costco for only $799 each, a steal with new Windows 8 touchscreens, we dismissed our original plans of purchasing more sturdy industrial type laptops. But, we decided lightweight laptops were more important than durability, especially now that we’ve had the experience of hauling the bags this past week. 

Today is a busy day.  We already visited Starbuck’s for coffee, had the oil changed in the SUV, arranged with the maintenance guy to repair the  problematic wireless connection (done!) in the condo, picked up the five boxes we shipped to the UPS store a few miles away and now, my task is to empty them putting everything in its place. 

Next task, go sign up at a health club and work out, doing my usual HIIT (high intensity interval training).  Perhaps after all of this, there will be time to begin the process of “chilling out” in this 93 degree weather.