S O O N  T O  B E  H O M E 

This past weekend Jeff and I flew up to Baltimore to go apartment/house hunting. 

It was...interesting. 

Luckily we have some friends that live there who have been super helpful.

I laughed when I saw this map, but sadly, it's pretty accurate. 

We started our day by driving to Johns Hopkins hospital 

to see how bad Jeff's commute would be in the morning.

We've heard to avoid living in the neighborhoods around the hospital. 

The hospital itself is very nice and safe, but surrounding area is not. 

The area is pretty rundown, but didn't look as ghetto as I thought it would be. 

I imagined seeing knife fights in alleys and people wearing kevlar everywhere, 

but there wasn't any of that...at least not during the day time : )

We then headed up toward Owings Mills, a place that is about 20 minutes outside of the city and is close to the metro. As we were driving I was just looking around a little disappointed, because I had 

imagined things a little differently in my mind.

It didn't help that everything looked like death, 

nothing is blooming yet, the trees are bare and the grass is brown.

I wish I could give a better description of Baltimore.

 It's kind of weird. There's not a dividing line between the good and the bad,

 the bad is scattered among the good. 

One block there are these awesome old brick row homes and buildings with tons of character and then two blocks down and you're in an area with abandoned buildings and pot hole streets.

Jeff noticed that I was a little down and said, "Are you depressed?"

I laughed and told him I was a little, but then we started cracking jokes and laughing about how moving from a lake house was going to be disappointing no matter where we went. 

For those that live in Utah, Owings Mills is equivalent to Midvale or Murray. 

We liked that it was close to the metro, affordable and had parks and grass for Garrett. 

We rode the metro into the city and it wasn't too bad.

 It stops in some sketchy places, but as long as you don't get off it seems like it would be ok. 

The Metro stops right by the children's museum and the aquarium downtown which would be great for Garrett and me, and it takes Jeff right under the hospital. 

We drove around to many more places, some were good and some we just got a bad vibe.

We looked at some row homes and some apartments. 

Downtown is made up mainly of row homes with street parking. 

You're lucky if you get a place that has a parking pad in the back and garages are rare.

We haven't made any decisions yet, but it was good to go and get a better idea of where we want to live.

I would love to live downtown in Canton, Fells Point or Brewers Hill, aka the bros area on the map above. 

The only problem is that they are VERY expensive,

but we have found some decent places in other parts of the city. 

We're only living there for four years, if I hate it, I can handle the four years. 

I don't think I'll hate it though. 

I think we'll have fun and enjoy our time there.