Well, ok not for hire… I’ll do it for free!

You see, my house in San Carlos is rented through September 2019, and possibly beyond that. So I continue to be homeless, even when I’m “home” in the Bay Area.

Upon returning from New Zealand, I was grateful that my friends (who happened to be in New Zealand traveling for a month) offered to let me house-sit for them at their house in Orinda.

While some folks in the Bay Area frown at “East Bay,” but I don’t mind the location at all. In some ways, I prefer it, since that’s where my sailing club and part-time employer, OSCS Sailing, is located. I have more and more friends moving to East Bay because of its affordability. Well, at least more affordable than many City or Silicon Valley neighborhoods.

While house-sitting, I mostly took care of long-overdue administrative tasks, like transferring photos and videos from camera to computer, and then backing up my computer to both online and external hard drive storage.

I had a stack of mail to go through, having been gone for 7 weeks, but as usual about 95% of it was junk mail. What a waste of paper and human resources.

I also did a few things for my friends who own the house. I climbed on top of the roof and cleaned out the rain gutters, which were full of leaves and dirt. Dirt, you ask? Yes, I think so. But it also could have been ash from the recent California wildfires.

I also played Santa, wrapping a few last-minute Amazon orders from the parents so that, upon return at the end of December, the kids would see the real Santa hadn’t forgotten to visit their house.

Lastly, I took care of the mail and garbage, too, like any good house-sitter.

The family (as well as my parents) read this journal, so I’ll leave out the details of the wild parties I hosted at the East Bay estate… :-)

In any event, it was great to have a house to call home for a few weeks. Thanks to A, M, B, and J!

I don’t have housing lined up yet for any of 2019. I’ll be in the Bay Area for Jan-Feb and Apr-Sep, so if anyone needs a house-sitter during those times, please let me know! (Unfortunately, with my Sailing Instructor schedule, I can’t offer to do daytime dog-walking.) Thanks!