So off we went to Richmond for a job interview. I’d been there once (Karen had never been), and I wasn’t exactly in the best part of town. This time was much better, in part because we didn’t stay in the city; we were north of it in the Glen Allen area. (This info is for those of you who know it.)
Sam and I went looking for places to play. There was supposed to be an aquarium at a place called Three Lakes. Sadly, it was closed, but the park had three playgrounds: one for little kids, one for preschoolers, one for older kids. The middle one ("just right") was huge, and Sam had a ball.
Then we went to the Children’s Museum, which doesn’t look like much from the outside, but turned out to be the Coolest Place Ever — at least for Sam. It’s like the world’s best indoor playground, and then some. There were little scooters to ride around on, dinosaurs to climb, art stations to draw and stamp, a pretend forest for the kids to climb way up in, a water-play area.
In other words, this bodes well if we end up moving. I like Roanoke because, as my friend Miranda said, it’s like a city in miniature. It’s not crowded, and honestly I couldn’t care less whether or not there was a Banana Republic in town.
Richmond is, I think, about four times the size; it’s a real city. What that means to me is that cool new things are actually likely to make it to my town, such as Verizon’s ultra-high-speed Fios service. Of course, the trade-off is more traffic and a slightly higher cost of living, but I think that’s outweighed by the idea of getting something other than third-string bands to town.
More on the situation as it develops, of course.
Patrick Beeson says:
Sounds like things are moving along on the job front. Are you sticking with newspapers, or changing industries?