Still looking for a place

I haven't written in a while because I have been very busy trying to work a job and half and find a place to live.

I thought I had found a place last weekend. It was beautiful, brand new, three bedroom townhouse. The only problem was that it was pretty expensive. I had figured my budget poorly while I was back in the States, thinking that the exchange rate meant something about the cost of goods and services over here. WRONG. The exchange rate is simple how many pounds they'll give you for a dollar (or actually, how many dollars it will take to get a pound). The actual price of buying things here is only slightly less than it is in America, which means stuff is almost twice as expensive here.

For instance, in America, a 20 oz bottle of Diet Pepsi is about $1.20 in a vending machine. Here, a .5 liter bottle (which is a bit smaller than 20 oz) is .95p (pence). Which means for a slightly smaller bottle actually costs $1.90. You get the idea.

Well it's only worse with real estate. Rent is through the roof here. But I made a bad mistake. I signed the lease paper before I was 100% sure I could afford it. After sleeping on it and talking more to Kelly, we decided that it was too much. I called the agent as soon as I could and talked to him about it. Unfortunately, the landlord had already bought furniture to put in the place and it was being delivered today. When the agent's boss heard that I was backing out, she called me directly and chewed me out (very politely, of course. This is Britain, after all). She got all snippy about it, pointing out that I should have decided all this before I signed the contract, and that the only way to deal with this was to go through with it.

Fortunately, I hadn't actually given them any money yet. One of my colleagues at work who lives here, said that he was pretty sure that in Britain you have up to 14 days to change your mind on any contract. I'm going to check with a lawyer tomorrow and see if that's true and that will put me at peace on this issue.

I have another appointment to see a flat on Saturday, hopefully that will work out well.

That's all for now,
Dave