Day 1387: Thirty-six weeks and counting
Check-in:
Spirituality! Has not been super great, but also has not been super terrible. Mostly my spirituality routines have been disrupted by the Great Eastward Migration, but in a new place I get a fresh start and for that I am pleased.
Fitness! Ha. Ha. Hahahaha. I just waddle slowly everywhere and always remind my husband to park as close to the front door of wherever it is we're going, please. He continues to tell people I'm trying to smuggle a beach ball under my shirt.
Tidiness! Actually going really well in the new place. New place always means a fresh start. Also we have incentive to keep it neat so we can get our deposit back. Also this place is smaller than our other place, so that helps a lot as well. And since neither of us are currently working, husband can really help around the house way more than in times past, and during the day we actually have the energy and motivation to clean. I made a little cleaning schedule and posted it on the fridge so we know what major chore we have to do every day, in addition to daily stuff like the dishes and tidying the kitchen at the end of the night and picking up after ourselves.
The Good:
We made it to New York! The drive went well. Cody's mom let us borrow her truck, so we rode much more comfortably. It has a camper shell, so the dogs got lots of space in the back, plus we could protect our road snacks from them. We listened to some Brandon Sanderson audiobooks for most of the drive, a series Cody had read before but that was a bit newer to me (I'd read the first in the trilogy years ago and I reread the first book in...about a day).
The drive was pretty chill. No bad weather despite reports of flooding and possible blizzards. The dogs did pretty well on the drive, and we stopped often for breaks (though Cody had to pee more often than I did, haha). We found pet-friendly motels the entire way, and that was good. Got to stop and see my law school mentor when we were in Omaha (she just had her first baby last summer).
Our apartment is nice! Bigger than we thought it would be. Fully furnished, which meant when we arrived we could pretty much just...go to sleep. We have instituted a new "no dogs on furniture" policy, so we purchased new kennels (the old ones were pretty bent out of shape) and some dog cushion bed things and we have sheets covering the couch and armchair to keep dog fur contamination to a minimum, and they're not allowed on the people bed anymore (which is good for when baby arrives and might be on the bed with us). There's a little dog park across the street for the dogs to run around in leash-free, the way they're used to from our old yard.
We had to pick up some settling-in supplies, like food and other household items not already present (there was no pasta fork), and we've been to Walmart pretty much every day since we got here, but so far it's good! The people are friendly and we're learning our way around slowly. Cody does all the driving (we discovered I couldn't reach the pedals in the van due to baby being in the way; jury is still out on the question of whether I can drive the truck) but I think once I get back in my own car we will be all right.
We've already gone house-hunting twice and have another house hunt set up for Monday. We've already got a favorite house so far, and someone has already made an offer on our old house, and we've accepted, so hopefully that will close before we need to make an offer on a new place. I got the dogs registered and licensed (the whole city-town-village system baffles me still), and we got our insurance (car, health) all squared away. Mail has started arriving in a timely fashion, which always makes me happy, because I love getting mail. So far our new home has proven hospitable, and we are making the best of our fresh start.
Getting used to being on a two-hour time difference from everyone we know has been an adventure, but it will work out in the end.
The Bad:
I am sick. I felt like I had a cold coming on the day before we left. I have been sick ever since. All things being equal, I don't feel too terrible - I've had much, much worse colds, and I definitely don't think it's the flu (though I had a 24-hour stomach bug I caught from Cody - he then caught the cold from me). But I have gone through about 3 tissue boxes and we had to buy three more. Made the drive kinda miserable sometimes. I hurt pretty much all the time, and half the time I need to ask Cody to help me with my shoes.
Also...it snowed here today. Not a super huge fan of that.
I haven't written in over a week, which kinda freaks me out. Writing keeps me sane. But hopefully I can get back into the swing of things again.
Oh man finances are scary right now. I got my last paycheck last week. Cody got his last paycheck yesterday. It's going to be...about four to six weeks before he gets his first paycheck at his new job? This apartment is super expensive - short term lease, fully furnished, pet fees, utilities included - and we had to spend loooooooads of money to get out here - on gas and hotels and whatnot (I think we might get reimbursed for gas a bit though?). But I am keeping an eye on things and we are hanging in there as best as we can. I think the initial move-in expenses are done. From here on out it's rent and food and fuel (and, okay, the mortgage on the old house till it sells).
Also...also baby is due in less than four weeks now. Still need to figure out when my mother will be coming to visit. Cody says his mom wants to be here when the baby is born, since it's their first grandchild and all. I foresee DISASTER with both our mothers here at the same time (also we have only one guest room in this place).
Also Cody's mother's anxiety has about driven me insane. Cody always says my mother is overbearing (okay, she had three greeting cards in the mail waiting for us once we arrived, and I called her every day after work, but that was because I chose to - she doesn't call me unless she has a question or something), but Cody's parents probably called us about ten times a day while we were on the road. As a kindness I put on location sharing on both of our phones for the duration of the road trip (because someone knowing where you are in the off-chance you get stranded in the middle of nowhere halfway across Wyoming and Nebraska isn't necessarily a bad thing), but the sharing ended once we arrived safely. I was informed that my mother-in-law was very sad that I'd turned off the location sharing (hint hint: turn it back on).
Nope. I'm an adult. I refuse to be lojacked. It's one thing for my husband and I to be able to see each other's phone locations (mostly for the purpose of helping each other locate misplaced phones) and another thing for my bosses to have my work phone lojacked (when I was receiving threats against my safety or going on a visit to somewhere rural in bad weather), but for my in-laws to track my phone? Nope.
Also she keeps calling and fretting about our homebuying situation. We did the math. We made a rational decision when we accepted the offer on the house (it was on the market for two days, shown have a dozen times, got an offer close to asking), and it makes sense given our current financial situation. Eventually she must have sensed that her fretting was annoying Cody, because she started texting me about the issue, and he told me to not answer her text messages. Haven't heard from her since. Poor woman has really bad anxiety. But sometimes it's rough dealing with her pouring it onto us (also it triggers Cody's anxiety, which sucks for him).
We left a really good neighborhood with wonderful neighbors. A lot of them stopped by to say goodbye before we pulled away. One gave us snacks for the road. I get the feeling we won't have neighbors within walking distance once we buy a house, given how rural this place is (and the nicer houses tend to be further outside of town).
I am pretty excited for how our fresh start goes. Hope to make the best of it.
Here goes!