Weekend Update

...but not with Chevy Chase...

Our top stories tonight: Kathy & Phil saw two new places yesterday, AND Kathy and Ben got a nasty cold.

New Places

First we visited a unit in a converted farmhouse. This is actually the mirror image (the Alps-facing side) of the unit Kathy saw previously in Echenevex (the Jura-facing side). The current tenant showed us the place, and fortuitously she also lived previously in the other unit. Compare and contrast...

The Echenevex (pronounced, depending on who you talk to, "ESH-ne-vay" or "e-SHEN-e-vay", or with a "vex" on the end instead) place is a two-level unit with kitchen and living room and bathroom on the main floor, and three bedrooms on the upper unit, with a balcony facing the Alps off the master bedroom.

The second place was in Gex, just a stone's throw away. Gex reminds me of a Colorado ski town. There actually is not a ski resort in Gex, although the skiing is not far away. But being situated right at the base of the Jura gives it that feel. This place was a three bedroom apartment on floor 2-1/2. It had balconies facing both the Jura to the west, and the Alps and whole Lake Geneva valley can be seen from the balcony facing east.

Compare and contrast (video tours of the two places are also posted at dropshots):

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# Rooms
Echenevex	3 large bedrooms, living room is smaller, kitchen is bigger
Gex	3 smaller bedrooms, kitchen is smaller, large combined living room/dining room
Expense
Echenevex	Good rent, but heating is expensive
Gex	Even with less expensive heating, total is 100euro/mo. more expensive, at the top of our scale
Availability
Echenevex	Available on Feb. 1 of next year, perfect for us.
Gex	Landlord wants tenants immediately. We could move in immediately, but it isn't convenient or financially expedient. We'd have to pay full rent over our U.S. 4-week holiday and scramble to find the appliances we would need to live.
Layout
Echenevex	Split level - creates problems for communication, watching Ben. Bathroom and WC are not on same level with the bedrooms
Gex	All on one level. Floor-to-ceiling windows make for fabulous lighting. But bedrooms are smaller.
Finish
Echenevex	Nicely finished by current tenants (the man is a carpenter).
Gex	Would require us converting one bedroom from kids room to master room (it has Winnie the Pooh wallpaper that's peeling, but it's barely the largest room of the three. The landlord wasn't willing to do this for us.)
View
Echenevex	Nice, view of Alps from master bedroom balcony, although the foreground is a fallow corn field.
Gex	Unparalleled! Views of both the Jura and the Alps.
Appliances
Echenevex	Need to buy most (fridge, dishwasher, washer), but at least the gas oven/stove stays.
Gex	None. A "semi-equipped" kitchen means it has cabinetry and counter space...Not enough counter space.
Location
Echenevex	The town is a little ways away, but it's a sleepy hamlet. Awkward commute to work, difficult for walking, biking.
Gex	Great ski-town kind of feel, very charming. Also much better for walking and biking to Point 5 (although longer commute to Meyrin office. However...)
Light/Noise
Echenevex	Fairly quiet, no light pollution.
Gex	High-rise apartment and proximity to trafficked road means nonstop road noise - particularly in the summer, when you want to have your patio doors open. At night the nearby grocery store is all lit up.
City Apartment vs. Country House
Echenevex	House, has a lawn, on ground floor. More isolated however.
Gex	Balconies are quite cozy close to the next neighbor. Potential smoking/music/noise problems in a high-rise in the summer. No lawn, but shared green space...The elevator is a closet; sizable furniture/appliances go up the stairs!

Kathy particularly has started to have second thoughts about the split level home. She expressed to me today that she's reached the end of her rope looking for places. She's seen almost a couple dozen places now, and we had been expecting some sense inside us when we found the right place, but it hasn't happened yet...

The Nasty Cold

It started first with Ben as a fever, as high as 102degF at 3:30a.m. on Thursday morning. His temperature went down the next day, but then other symptoms started showing up. Last night (Friday), he woke up with very noisy breathing - our first medical "crisis" as parents - what to do? Drugs! Give him Tylenol...by the time we got around to calling the doctor, Ben had calmed back down, and went back to sleep. Today however, he woke up with a scratchy throat and greatly diminished vocal capacity. It certainly helped, with all the crying he ended up doing today. His volume was way down.

Kathy also came down with it. She's had a hacking cough all day, and both Ben and her stayed home from church to get better. I've posted a video on dropshots of a subdued (subdude?) Benjamin taken tonight before being put down.

-PKBD