Virginia Is For Lovers

We are pleased to announce that Dave has accepted a new job in Lynchburg, Virginia, starting in early October. He'll work for Limitorque of Flowserve, who manufactures industrial valves. The engineers there are looking forward to having him streamline and modernize their testing equipment, and they're hiring 2 junior test engineers to be under Dave. It will be a great new challenge for him.

Flowserve has lots of other locations and opportunities for career growth, and possibly international travel (Dave was drooling over a chance to work in Brazil.) They've offered Dave great benefits, an increased salary he won't have to work overtime for, a much bigger year-end bonus, and a nice moving payout. Another big reason for moving is that Lynchburg has 3 LDS wards in the same area as our 1 ward here in Florida. Yay, more Mormons! (And by more, I mean from .5% up to 1.5% Mormon.)

Dave put his resume on Monster at least a year ago, and got calls from headhunters asking if he wanted jobs like cell phone developer and beeswax quality engineer. Uh, no. About two months ago, 2 headhunters got him 3 phone interviews for test engineer positions, 2 of which turned into trips and offers. (The other offer was in Boston: only an hour from his sister, but very cold winters, smaller company, no new challenges, and a higher cost of living. But here's a nice picture from his trip.)

Lynchburg is in central Virginia, and was named after a Quaker surveyor, not lynching, I was relieved to find out.  The MSA has about 90,000 people, and is an independent city not in a county--a feature leftover from colonial times. It's right next the James River & Appomattox County, where Lee surrendered to the Union Army. It's an hour drive to Roanoke, a 3-hour drive to Washington, D.C. and Dave's Aunt Denene, and 10 hours from Dave's sister Melanie, who just moved to Connecticut.

We're only a short drive from the Blue Ridge, Appalachian, and Allegheny mountains and Shendandoah National Park. Camping here we come! (We haven't camped once as a family here in Florida. Dave hates camping in the sand, and I hate camping in the heat.) Central Virginia, though, is Johnny Appleseed country, has rolling hills kinda like Austin TX, cheaper to live in than West Palm Beach, and filled with hardwood trees, (which Dave is eager to chop down and turn into furniture.)

Lynchburg, VA courthouse, which overlooks the James River and a 100-foot high fountain spray.

The obvious downside, for anyone who knows Dave, is the cold winter: it's only a little warmer than Provo, UT. I love Florida winters, but I really dislike the humid, hot 8-month summer. But I tell Dave to repeat to himself: "Snow means fruit, hardwood trees, canoeing, and a garage." Because we're hoping to rent a real house, with a real yard, at least 3 bedrooms, and a proper shrine for Dave's tools. HOORAY!!!! We'll go house hunting the weekend of Sept 17.

Lynchburg is home to Liberty University and several other colleges.

There's really no way the bank would let us sell our condo here, or refinance, since we are upside down/our house value is tens of thousands of dollars below what we purchased it for. We may try a short sale or a loan modification--we still need to meet with a mortgage broker or lawyer. In the mean time, we're hiring a property management company to find renters and maintain our condo. The rent we get won't bring in enough moolah to cover the mortgage payment, so we'll just have to eat that loss. Bleh. Wish us luck. And I'm taking recommendations for moving companies.

Maybe this all sounds very factual, but we are giddy with the idea of moving! It's been soooooooo hard not to spill the beans, but it's Dave big news to announce, and we wanted to wait until we had officially accepted a job offer. We have had some good times here in Florida, and we hope many of you will keep in touch.  We have a lot to arrange in 3 weeks, but we'll try to keep you posted.