The time has finally come. Catherine and I are looking for a house in Virginia. Sometime in the not-so-distant future, we will be making the move to suburbia. Oh God, we've finally fallen victim to the human nesting instinct. I'm not going to apologize. We've done our stint in the city and it was good. But we've lived in tiny apartments together for too long now - 8 years to be exact - and we're fed up. We're ready to embrace the charms of a slightly more rural existence. We used to look at a house in sheer terror. The lawn that needed (ack!) a lawn mower! And multiple stories and extra rooms that required (yuck!) new furniture! All this was outside our brain's ability to process in any sort of meaningful way. Just give us two rooms to fill in an historic building in downtown DC close to some bars and the Metro and we were happy.

But something inside us has changed. Maybe it's all the lead we've ingested over the last couple of years. Or the fact that, even though I've quit smoking, my lungs breath some of the worst air in the United States on a daily basis.

I now look at a lawn and reflect fondly upon the Sunday afternoons of my adolescence, mowing our corner lot in Houston (4-5 jumbo bags of grass per week in the summer) followed by a cool dip in our pool. These days, something like that might lead to cardiac arrest, so I'll have to ease in gradually. But I'm in awe of the idea of owning a lawn mower now. The lawn mower is one of the most sacred of contraptions if you're from Texas. Particularly the sit-down and ride 'em type. But I'll never have enough lawn for one of those. I'll probably go for some sort of self-propelled push mower. I hope they still make the Lawn Boy!

And multiple floors? Not such a big deal to me anymore. I'm particularly interested in having a basement. Oh yes. A basement sends chills of joy down my spine. Imagine the possibilities. It might make a fine office, for instance. Or, it would also be an ideal place to put a giant hot-tub filled with pudding.

Don't get me wrong. We still enjoy living in the city and taking advantage of what it has to offer. I think a part of me will even miss the noise. I actually have a soft spot in my heart now for sirens. (When I got home from Austin last week and heard that first familiar siren, it brought a tear to my eye.) But the time has come to move. It may not happen tomorrow, or next week, or even in the next six months. But know this much: the hunt is on.

And why Virginia and not Maryland? Easy: Virginia is prettier. And since you're forcing me to go there, it's just all around better. (I say this even though I was born in Maryland.) Virginia is home to the Blue Ridge, one of the prettiest mountain chains anywhere. And Virginia is for lovers, which is such a great 1969 slogan it virtually reeks of marijuana. And perhaps most importantly, they have an efficient DMV, something I have come to appreciate.

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