INTERNATIONAL HOUSE HUNTERS

Admission: For solidly half of 2015, Aaron and I binge-watched HGTV's House Hunters International nightly. It was a trite but totally addictive indulgence, and probably would've gone on much longer had Aaron not staged an intervention and declared that it was time to move on. I love real estate/home improvementy stuff; throw in a foreign country and it's all over.

We're not going to be D-list television stars (curiously, the House Hunters production team didn't get wind of our move), but Aaron and I are flying to Barcelona on Sunday to do our own international house hunt. After cringing at so many episodes of HHI, I'm slightly fixated on not becoming "those people" — the bumbling Americans whose average list of "must" haves is ten times longer than the international average, who won't even consider an apartment that lacks Old World Charm, who need both proximity to the city center and silence and serenity, who scoff at European bedrooms sizes and giggle at bidets. (Confirming the basis of my fears, our relocation agent assured us that we'd take taxis from apartment to apartment because she "knows Americans don't like to walk." Oy.) That said, who doesn't appreciate an American-sized refrigerator paired with a little Catalan flare, am I right? 

I've been stalking the Barcelona rental market for 4 months; we sold our condo in January and it's a way for me not to feel homeless. I've fallen in love with at least two dozen places since then, but where we'll end up is a bit of a crapshoot. We've got four basic criteria: a generous outside space, a washer/dryer, 3+ bedrooms, and maybe A/C. Our plan at this point is to have Owen and Eliza share a room and then save the third for guests (that means you). Other than that, who knows. Much as I've tried, marching the little Google Street dude around the neighborhoods of Barcelona just doesn't cut it.  I'm sure we'll know it when we see it.

We land back in the U.S. on Friday, April 29 and our movers are taking away (almost) everything we own on Monday, May 2. We'll see it all again in 4 to 6 weeks at a location that's yet to be determined. I'm surprisingly not that concerned yet; we'll see how that changes when we're all living out of a suitcase for 2 months.