One afternoon during my less than thrilling state of unemployment (see part 1) I got a call. To my shock it was a HR person at Orion Telescopes. They asked me a few questions about my work at Edmund and what my duties were there. 

This call was a shock because while I had sent a letter to the then-owner of Orion Telescopes, I really had not much hope of anything going on there. My suggestion had been to start a local Orion store in the area and that I had been willing to help out in that regard. Apparently my skillset had struck a chord, and his main product development guy had seen my comments on the Astronomy USENET groups lamenting the sale of Edmund. Both of them had wondered if I might be of use to their company.

So after a phone interview with HR, I got a call from other people there. I made a mistake in saying I should be in marketing because that was the place I was in at Edmund, but really I should have gone with the development department. 

In any case, after another phone interview with the head of marketing I was on a plane to California. I landed at San Jose and there was a limo waiting to take me over the mountains to Santa Cruz - or rather a town near Santa Cruz as Orion is actually in Watsonville. I checked into the motel that Orion had arranged for me, went awkwardly across the street to grab some dinner, and went to bed early by local time. 

The next day I was met at the hotel by the head of marketing  (Terry) and driven to the company. I had interviews all day with the heads of departments and the owner. It was a full day. I recall going out to lunch with all of them and they plied me with so many questions that I didn't get to eat until the President forbade anyone to ask me any more questions until I had some of my food - they had all finished and I had a complete sandwich on my plate. 

Once the interviews were over I was taken back to my motel. Terry said she was would drive me around Santa Cruz county to evaluate possible living locations the next day. Things were going quite well and it looked like they really wanted to hire me. Having the evening to myself I decided to walk to the beach that was only 1/4 mile from the hotel...a very hard 1/4 as it is all steep stairs. I got to view a California beach on a damp, dreary California winter day. The beach in question had an odd little feature as well - the concrete Palo Alto ship was moored there permanently back in the 1930s and sat there to this day as an odd, eroding tourist curiosity.

I went back to Philly (after a long layover in Vegas) and less then a couple of days later the job offer came in. Very soon after I was flying back to CA to hunt for an apartment. I had to work fast - I really only had 2 days to find a place. Terry helped by leaving me relevant newspaper sections at my hotel - but the warnings were plain as day about this area: real estate was a at a premium - even with the web economy tanking over the hill in Silicon Valley. I managed to see and view a dozen apartments in that time - some on schedule. A couple of times were appointments where almost a dozen other people were looking at said apartment (most of the UCSC students). 

Eventually I applied for two apartments and was accepted by both. I chose to go with what was effectively a house that was part of a triplex. It had a lot of space and a backyard. It would have been snatched up quickly but it had one major issue: It was literally a stone's throw from the main highway through Santa Cruz. Many would consider the noise intolerable (my neighbors used fans to block the sound) but I was from the city and noise really was not a big problem to me. 

So with an apartment selected I had to pack up to move. This was a lot different than moving to another apartment in the same area. I had to get quotes from moving companies, I had to figure out how to transport the car, and I had to figure out how to get the cats out there.  The good news about using a moving company is that you just have to pack stuff - they do the lifting. So I arranged to have the cats transported by an air service, and soon the moving people packed all my stuff in the back of an 18 wheeler. I was at my apartment with 2 suitcases full of clothes and nothing else. 

One of the sad aspects of this move is that when it happened my parents were on vacation in Italy. I slept at their house since I had no bed. But their absence meant they could not see me off. Instead, I had a friend come with me to the airport to see me off. 

I had left Philadelphia and thought I would never be back except for visits.