* After almost one week at the apartment, it's hard to see a huge improvement or transformation. The kitchen is definitely transformed, but the rest of the place is still very dirty and has boxes and junk ALL OVER. It's all just really overwhelming to me. At times I feel like I'm making progress, at other times, I just lay on the bed and stare at the black spots on the ceiling because I'm too overwhelmed to do anything (hmm.... maybe that's why it's taking so long)
* I have way to much junk. I admit it. I should have thrown half of it away and not moved it. I unpack but have no place to put it.
* Dave is still eating BBQ beef from the wedding. I hope he doesn't die of food poisoning. I stopped eating it quite some time ago.
* Nearly every time we drive somewhere together, I fall fast asleep. What is my problem? I still feel tired most of the time, maybe just trying to catch up from the last several insane months. And driving in Warsaw is different - it doesn't take much time at all to get anywhere. Unlike here. So Dave will be talking to me and then look over and I'll be sound asleep. The other day I was dreaming as we pulled into the bank parking lot. At least I try to stay awake when I'm driving, which has been rare and not pleasant (the driving part). Without Lucy, I don't know where I'd be. Probably on my way to North Dakota or some such place.
* You know how I was griping about how we are just expected to know things, like our meter number and such. Well, we had been getting more and more annoyed at our landlord by the day because I would call and she wouldn't call back and we had no way to get our mail. FINALLY, we got a hold of her and she said to call the post office. After a couple days and attempts, we find out that the post office needs to be notified that we have moved into that apartment so they can change the key. And the only time you can get your new key is on Friday. Isn't this interesting information??? HELLOOOOO!!!! Had we known this, we could have called the post office weeks ago and then picked up our key the day after we got into town. But noooooo.... no one tells you these things. So today on the phone as I was talking to someone from the post office, I asked if there's anyway we could get it before Friday because we are waiting on important documents and such. The only thing she could suggest was try to catch the mail carrier. I always have everything closed up, (she had said between 1:30 - 2:30) but randomly at about 12 I saw a mail truck in our neck of the woods. I'm pretty sure I haven't moved that fast since ... I'll get back to you... anyway I went barrelling out the door and across the street and pleaded for mercy and the very nice (gasp - that's been rare so far in our dealings with people around here) lady said, yeah I'll get it for you. So I went back and watched and waited until she finally came, and ah sweet bliss, the mail it was there. Now we just have to wait until Friday.... That story became way longer than I intended.
* A lesson learned this week - high quality vegetable peelers will slice your skin as though it were butter. But it's only my index finger on my right hand, so thankfully, no one I use all the time or anything.
* Dave started school yesterday. Today he was gone all day while I tried to unpack and watch the ceiling and such. It's such an odd feeling being in a completely new place. Today I was all alone and it's just this odd feeling of... I know one person is this city. Just calling up friends and hanging out isn't an option. (So I call my old roommate cause we have free mobile to mobile = ) I'm sure it will improve as time goes on. Transitions are just odd.
* I'm not sure if there was anything else or not. I think I should probably go now and do something productive. Hope you are all having a fabulous week.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Thursday, August 21, 2008
another country heard from...
Okay, so I guess it's not another country, it just feels like it. And people do speak another language around here that is very difficult to understand. Anyway, HIIIIIIIII to everyone. So nice to meet on here again. I don't really know where to start. I could post 900 pictures of our fabulous trip, but we don't yet have Internet at the homestead so that will not be happening for awhile. I'm sitting at some random computer lab at some very large campus doing things online while waiting for my hubby to finish whatever he's doing. So I thought, hey what's keeping me from updating my blog? And I could think of nothing. So that's what I decided to do. I can try to give you a few highlights of the last couple weeks. Gatlinburg, TN was amazingly gorgeous. We had a cabin I guess you would call it, but it was more like a really nice house, in the mountains - a hot tub and balcony with a stunning view of the mountains. some fun stuff we did -- went mini golfing at this place where we got to ride up the side of a mountain (or maybe really big hill would be more accurate) in a cable car like thing, and then golf up there and ride down. It was nice and shady and cool and lots of fun. Hey, come to think of it, I don't think we ever added up our score, but he beat me, this I know. We also rode over 2 miles in a much bigger and more secure cable car to this park area. The view was awesome and the car went right by our cabin. After watching it go back and forth all week, we really wanted to ride it. We also spent some time one day in the Smokey Mountains National Park - did a bit of biking and saw a nice waterfalls and pretty scenery. I was expecting more places to be able to see the mountains, but honestly, the best place to see the mountains in Gatlinburg was from our cabin. (or the cable car) We also spent some time in downtown Gatlinburg wandering in and out of shops. Honestly, so much of the stuff was very tacky, glitzy, airbrushed non-sense (I feel so old and mature using that word) but then here and there we would find really nice, tasteful places, you just had to look a little harder. We went to a really nice Thomas Kinkade um... I don't know what you call it - a place that had a bunch of his paintings. Also, we splurged a bit on things that, well, I've been saying - when we get to Baton Rouge, no more ice cream whenever we feel like it - we're eating salad and exercising every day. So yeah, there's good ice cream in Gatlinburg. Also, there are tons of fudge shops. That's something that I see from time to time but never buy. Well I thought to myself (and to Dave) it's our honeymoon, dang it, we're buying fudge. (this is probably hideously boring to some of you, but maybe some of you will find it mildly entertaining) So the idea was to buy 3 little pieces and share it with Dave's aunt and uncle. Well, we got 3 "little" pieces and then the guy says if you buy one more you get another one free. Well what good Mennonite can resist a deal like that? So I said sure and then one of those ended up not being very little and we walked out of there with an obscene amount of fudge, some of which is sitting in a Baton Rouge apartment. And in case you are wondering - maple, choc. peanut butter, coconut (ugh - that one was for Dave), gatlinburg mud (which was a wonderful concoction of vanilla fudge with choc. and carmel), and choc/carmel/cashew were the flavors of choice. Yes, you might have gained 5 pounds just reading that.
From Gatlinburg we headed to Asheville MC to spend a day there. And here were all the amazing views that I was missing in Gatlinburg. Oh my. There's this road where there are lookouts all over the place and it's just awesome views of the mountains all over. took tons of pictures. The next day we went to the Biltmore house which was fun and neat to see and again, have lots of pics. Then we headed to Dave's aunt and uncle's place in Georgia. Some might thing it odd to spend time with family on one's honeymoon and I sorta did myself, until the time came. At this point we were starting to feel like the only humans alive on the universe (other than the ones we were giving our life savings to, of course). And I had been feeling sorta sad about going to Baton Rouge and opening wedding gifts all along without any family around. Well, dave's car with all the wedding gifts had been parked at their place so we ended up hauling them all inside and having a big gift opening party with them. It was so much fun!! wow - what a party. So then we spent the next day driving and arrived in Baton Rouge last night. Wow, it sorta feels like a year ago. I could go on and on about all our adventures and mishaps since being here, but let's see, what are the highlights.... well, we arrived at 10 to a pitch black apartment. The power was supposed to be turned on, but we didn't have any. I called the power company on the way into campus to take care of some things. When I FINALLY talked to someone who could help, she said, oh, you just need to turn on your main breaker. Easy enough. So we got a few groceries, went back to the apartment, and flipped everything we could find with a switch. Still nothing. So I called back. Finally got through to someone and she said, oh, you need to turn on your meter (it's an apartment building, there's meters all over the place!) and gave us a very specific number that belonged only to us, followed by specific instructions of what we were supposed to do. HELLO!! Now you tell me, how in the hiffalump we were supposed to know that??!!?? I mean, this would have been very useful information to have been communicated to us before 10 that evening. Anyway, we got power around 1 I think. I was so fried I could barely function. Dave very very graciously unloaded both cars (which contained a lot!) while I slept. Yeah, what a sweetie. And in the middle of that mess, I was stumbling around the apartments saying... I hafta pee, and do you think we have toilet paper... no, of course not... so he runs to the store to get some... only to find that we did have a little bit in the place. ANYWAY, this is getting very long and boring. We arrived to an apartment that was, um, shall we say, quite filthy and not exactly what we were expecting. I was hoping to be able to get right to unpacking, but I'm about to even start that until certain parts of the place are scrubbed very good and proper. And I refuse to use either of the showers until they are cleaned (and have a shower curtain... ) so yeah, I probably smell really good about now. There's something about someone else's dirt that really grosses me out. In the kitchen for instance, between the stove and counter top, there's too much of a space, and there's tons of crud on both sides. It just grosses me out. So we're hoping to pull out the stove and scrub it down. Yeah, that's what's waiting for us when we get back, which might have something to do with the fact that we're sitting here on the computers. Anyway, I wish some of you could just swing by and help me! = P The places just looks hopeless right now, but I'm sure in a week or 2 it'll look better. Congratulations if you're still reading. Come see us sometime, eh?
From Gatlinburg we headed to Asheville MC to spend a day there. And here were all the amazing views that I was missing in Gatlinburg. Oh my. There's this road where there are lookouts all over the place and it's just awesome views of the mountains all over. took tons of pictures. The next day we went to the Biltmore house which was fun and neat to see and again, have lots of pics. Then we headed to Dave's aunt and uncle's place in Georgia. Some might thing it odd to spend time with family on one's honeymoon and I sorta did myself, until the time came. At this point we were starting to feel like the only humans alive on the universe (other than the ones we were giving our life savings to, of course). And I had been feeling sorta sad about going to Baton Rouge and opening wedding gifts all along without any family around. Well, dave's car with all the wedding gifts had been parked at their place so we ended up hauling them all inside and having a big gift opening party with them. It was so much fun!! wow - what a party. So then we spent the next day driving and arrived in Baton Rouge last night. Wow, it sorta feels like a year ago. I could go on and on about all our adventures and mishaps since being here, but let's see, what are the highlights.... well, we arrived at 10 to a pitch black apartment. The power was supposed to be turned on, but we didn't have any. I called the power company on the way into campus to take care of some things. When I FINALLY talked to someone who could help, she said, oh, you just need to turn on your main breaker. Easy enough. So we got a few groceries, went back to the apartment, and flipped everything we could find with a switch. Still nothing. So I called back. Finally got through to someone and she said, oh, you need to turn on your meter (it's an apartment building, there's meters all over the place!) and gave us a very specific number that belonged only to us, followed by specific instructions of what we were supposed to do. HELLO!! Now you tell me, how in the hiffalump we were supposed to know that??!!?? I mean, this would have been very useful information to have been communicated to us before 10 that evening. Anyway, we got power around 1 I think. I was so fried I could barely function. Dave very very graciously unloaded both cars (which contained a lot!) while I slept. Yeah, what a sweetie. And in the middle of that mess, I was stumbling around the apartments saying... I hafta pee, and do you think we have toilet paper... no, of course not... so he runs to the store to get some... only to find that we did have a little bit in the place. ANYWAY, this is getting very long and boring. We arrived to an apartment that was, um, shall we say, quite filthy and not exactly what we were expecting. I was hoping to be able to get right to unpacking, but I'm about to even start that until certain parts of the place are scrubbed very good and proper. And I refuse to use either of the showers until they are cleaned (and have a shower curtain... ) so yeah, I probably smell really good about now. There's something about someone else's dirt that really grosses me out. In the kitchen for instance, between the stove and counter top, there's too much of a space, and there's tons of crud on both sides. It just grosses me out. So we're hoping to pull out the stove and scrub it down. Yeah, that's what's waiting for us when we get back, which might have something to do with the fact that we're sitting here on the computers. Anyway, I wish some of you could just swing by and help me! = P The places just looks hopeless right now, but I'm sure in a week or 2 it'll look better. Congratulations if you're still reading. Come see us sometime, eh?
Saturday, August 02, 2008
I will never doubt again....
In case anyone is still checking this - it's been a crazy week of packing and most of my possessions are out of my house now. Dave is moving things down to Baton Rouge this weekend. We couldn't decide the best way to move everything and some options were way more expensive than others. We ended up renting a cargo van from Enterprise, which was way cheaper than a big moving truck. I must admit, when I saw that van, and saw my pile of stuff, I thought, there is NO WAY even half of that is going to fit in that van. Someone from my church came over to help us who's really good at packing things tight. and can I just say ... WOW!! About half way through we realized we had TONS of space and I ended up taking, in addition to everything that was packed and ready to go, my bookshelf, my beloved office chair, AND, my rather ample sized dresser. I hadn't planned on taking any of that because I assumed there was no room for it. It was just insane how much stuff could be packed in a space that size. So anyway, it's a relief to have that out of the way. Yesterday after the days of packing, the house looked like a tornado went through. So I was finally able to get that back in order and yeah, just waiting for the next round of chaos. Hope you're all doing well! = )
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