Dear Isabella,

My goodness; when it rains, it pours! First, we have no interviews or any interest for almost two months, then BAM! First Scott interviews at UCLA...he made the top 20 or 200 applicants. That sounds pretty good. Then Scott gets called by a company in San Francisco called Cloud Mark. They do anti-spam software. They were founded by one of his friends on IRC. Lots of really smart people there. They offer him the opportunity to work remotely from home. W00t. They fly him up there to interview and that goes very well. Then Scott hears from a start-up in Pasadena that is very interested. Hmmm...nice and close. Scott's friend from Cloud Mark in SF contacts Scott and asks what they would have to do to have us up in SF. Um...we don't really want to move to SF, but if they're willing to pay and move us, we'll surely consider it. Then UCLA calls and says Scott is in the top 3 and they want another interview. Wow. So many choices. What would be the ultimate would be for Cloud Mark to okay the telecommuting and let us move to Joplin. We want to move there and live cheaply so we can pay off our debt and get a house. There is really no use in us trying to buy something here in Cali. Just ridiculous home prices and what do you get? Not a whole lot. I think (and I had been of the same mind for a long time) that L.A. is the place to be. Why? Sure, it's culturally diverse. They weather is fantastic. There's lots to do. The mountains. The beach. I can go on and on about the pros of living in Cali. You know what? I think that there are things that are more important. Family is far more important. Now that my mom has moved away, and friends have moved away (both physically and emotionally), I find that there are compromises to be made. We are no closer to our goal of paying off debt and getting a house in a nice area and being near family where we are now. We have no real savings, and if we did, to use it to buy a condo or a town home for over $300,000 just seems irresponsible. The last thing we want to do is be married to a mortgage, and that's exactly what we would be if we try to stay here and buy a home. So, our goal is to move to Joplin...a great halfway point between my family, and be close to Scott's family. The problem is, we have not found squat in Joplin/Springfield area. So, I had pretty much given up on the prospect of moving out there for a while. Until...

Scott got an e-mail from the CEO of this company called Apex Radiology. They are a company that does mobile radiology services (X-rays, MRIs, PET scans, CAT scans, etc.) for patients that can't leave their homes for whatever reason or live in rural areas, far from hospitals. They are based in Coral Springs, Florida, but they're moving their operations to Columbia, Missouri. They need someone like Scott to build them a new Data Center in Columbia. The guy talked to Scott for a few hours on the phone and it looks like such an amazing opportunity for us. The company will pay Scott a California salary and will cover all of our relocation costs. They are flying us out to Florida on Sept. 27 to meet them. They are located 10 minutes away from my Mom, so we're staying with her for a few days. Now, we've been praying that an opportunity would present itself so we could move to Joplin, and this is just a few hours away. I had pretty much given up hope that we'd be able to move to Joplin any time soon. The weird thing is that Scott never applied for this job. The CEO of this company was looking at someone elses resume, came across a term or something that he didn't understand, so he went on Google to do a search on that term and Scott's resume came up. He looked it over and saw that Scott was from Joplin, so he figured he'd just send an e-mail to see what his interest level was. Isn't that crazy??? That just doesn't happen. So we're feeling pretty good about this opportunity, and we're happy to check it out. Plus, free trip to see my Mom. Cool, huh?? We just pray that we are making the right decision. However, so far, from talking to the CEO and his assistant in the last couple days, we feel more and more confident.

For whoever is reading this, check out their website: Apex Radiology and this cool profile about them on Apple.com: Science Profile.

We feel that this is truly God sent. It's too weird to be otherwise. So much has happened since last Thursday, that we've been walking around like zombies. Today, the Pasadena company offered Scott a position, and Scott told them about the possibility of moving to MO. They guy was very understanding and said that if that opportunity should fall through, to give them a holler, since he believed the offer would still stand. Wow. Today, Scott is having his 3rd interview with UCLA. And he just got a call from a recruiter for an interview with the Getty. MADNESS!!!