This past spring, completely defeated as to where we should live, I turned to Em for advice. I gave him a business traveler’s atlas I own. It features all major U.S. cities in the front and every U.S. state at the back. The front section features a couple of Canadian cities as well. I gave him the beat up, spiral bound atlas and said, “It’s up to you, Em. Where do you want us to move? Where do you want to live?” I figure it this way, if he chooses the place and we move there, whenever he inevitably complains about it someday we’ll tell him it’s all his fault.

But my plan did not work. Twice he opened the atlas. Both times he pointed to a map of Canada.

If Em had his way, he’d have us living in Toronto or Montreal.

Deduction: While entertaining for both you and the baby, using said baby like one might a magic eight ball doesn’t grant the best results. Unless you’re canadian.

Well, we’re looking at houses again after a two month hiatus. Last weekend we put all our baggage aside (tried to) and started looking at Trulia again, researching towns and crime rates, schools and distances to and from the city.

We use Trulia a lot. It’s actually a pretty awesome Web site if you’re looking for a house. We used it constantly last spring when we were looking in Maplewood, South Orange, Metuchen and West Orange. Between the two of us, that site was hit hundreds of time per day. And now that we’re trying again, it’s on heavy rotation. More often than not, Trulia is left open in the browser even when we’re away from the computer.

This Saturday, I walked away from the laptop to check on Em who was napping. When I returned I saw that Murray had once again taken a walk across the keyboard.

Written in the “Location” field on Trulia was the following:

Here’s a closer look:

Deduction: While answers seem a little LOLish and broad, letting your cat act as the magic eight ball (on his or her terms, of course) might not be such a bad idea after all.

But I’m not sure where or what LAK… is.