and purple rice deeply satisfi ed our hard-earned hunger.
Living near Portland also
opens up new opportunities
for entertainment, which I
discovered by seeing RZA
of the Wu-Tang Clan per-
form live. My fi ancé is a hip-
hop head, and Wu-Tang is
his favorite, so when I stum-
bled upon an article in the
paper that the RZA would
be in town that weekend
and that tickets were al-
ready sold out, I turned to
StubHub (free). Thanks to
resellers, StubHub made
it possible for a superfan
(plus me!) to score tickets
to a sold-out show the day
before and have great seats.
We were close enough to
reach out and touch the leg-
end himself, the one and only RZA, as he entered and exited
the theater. (I didn’t touch him, but we did make eye contact.
It was pretty cool.)
To further explore the great city of Portland and get to know
the streets of Vancouver, we’ve employed ourselves driving
with Uber Eats (free) and DoorDash (free). In little more
than a month, I’ve been to some of the best restaurants the
city has to offer, knocked on the doors of fl oor-to-ceiling glass
mansions on the hill, gained network connections at late night
restaurants, and even found our new apartment while deliver-
ing for Uber Eats.
Danny and I are a deliv-
ery team, so workdays and
date nights have become
a full-on date life. Although
it’s lots of fun and freedom,
being self-employed also
requires responsibility, dis-
cipline, and record keeping.
Thankfully, my fi ancé down-
loaded the Stride Tax (free)
app a few months ago for
a different job, and it has
been an easy and effective
way for us to keep track of
expenses, miles on the car,
and even the food we eat
on the job. If there’s a day
(or a week) where we forget
to input our data, we can
add the info later and back-
date it. I’m told the app will
come in handy for tax time.Off the clock, we’ve in-
vited our friends out for a
couple of double-date movie
nights. Since I have a VIP
account (for free) with the
Fandango (free) app, I was
happy to pay for all four tick-
ets for our fi rst movie night
because I knew I’d earn $5
for the next time. When
we ordered our tickets to
Avengers: Endgame, we
upgraded to the cushy living
room section of our local
theater for free by using my
Fandango rewards.
Although moving to the
Northwest has been an
eye-opening, heart-
healing experience, it’s also
a somber one because
we’ve moved away from
old friends and family. I’m no longer on Facebook, so it’s been
helpful to have an iPhone to FaceTime (free) with my iPhone
fam back home. For my loved ones who are Android users,
Google Duo (free) has been priceless. To see their smiling
faces in real time, hear their voices as they tell their stories,
and sometimes share tears of love and pain; these apps offer
me the opportunity to be a part of their lives, even from afar.
Despite all that I’ve left behind, I’m grateful, because I’ve
gained opportunities to grow, to learn, to experience, and to
love. That’s what life is about. So whether you and your signif-
icant other love nature or movies, live shows or ordering from
home, allow your iPhone to support and connect you along
the way. ѶMelanie has been writing for as long as she can remember, and she loves using
words to express ideas, convey emotions, or educate an audience. From speeches
and journaling to poetry and screenplays, writing has guided Melanie through vari-
ous experiences and continuously expands her intellectual and creative horizons.Get a FREE
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