Our New Apartment

Okay, so ever since I left Texas in February I have been checking Craigslist and other websites for potential places to live once Nathan got back from Iraq. I am sure most of you know that this is pretty pointless because there is no way an apartment that is available in March or April is still going to be available in December or January. I didn't let pesky little details like that stop me from checking the listings every day. The only times I didn't look were during the summer on the days I didn't have Internet access and the 22 days I was in Florida on R&R. So as you can imagine I felt pretty prepared for my house hunting trip I scheduled for the 16th to the 20th of December.
The trip started off a little crazy. First of all I accidentally left my phone in my checked luggage which for me is a HUGE deal because that is my life line to Nathan. I was finally able to let him know I was okay, and didn't have my phone, with some free Internet in the Dallas airport. The next thing is I didn't really realize how far it was from El Paso to Killeen, and I didn't factor in how tired I was going to be after traveling for 9 hrs, and last but not least I didn't really realize how HUGE Texas is. I drove on I-10 for 9 hrs that night, pretty much heading due east the entire time, it was the most boring drive I have ever made. I made it as far as San Antonio that night and called it quits around 0400. I got up the next morning and drove to Killeen confident that I would easily find a place to live and then be on my way by the weekend.
Boy was I wrong, all that research I had done for the last 10 months pretty much went out the window because all the places I thought we would want to live were in crummy neighborhoods. So I resorted to driving around all the nice neighborhoods looking for For Rent signs and calling property management companies. I had a couple decent leads, but they ended up not working out since I couldn't see the apartments because people were still living in them which is a problem because I wanted to leave Killeen with keys in hand so when I drive all of our junk down in January I can show up whenever and just move in. Other places were way to far away from Nathan's work and we want him to be able to come home for lunch and not have to get up extra early when he goest to PT in the morning. At this point I was super discouraged and decided to drive around one more neighborhood and then call it quits for the night. I found a rental sign that looked promising and talked to the company they said it was unoccupied but I couldn't view it until Monday because they just put in new tile. So,I filled out an application, crossed my fingers and hung out for the weekend since none of the rental companies were open over the weekend anyway.
I got up bright and early Monday morning confident that I would be able to see the place, sign the lease and get out of there. Of course I was wrong again, I went into the duplex and it was disgusting, it was so filthy and still had people's junk in it. There was no way I was going to rent that place even if they promised to clean it up. The duplex I was looking at was a 2 bed 2 bath, but they told me they did have a 3 bed 2 bath also available on that street for only $25 more a month. I figured it wouldn't hurt to look at it. I went in a checked it out, it was everything we were looking for with a little extra space we don't need. I was nervous about signing the lease but Nathan was awesome and went thru the lease with me and then convinced that we should just do it. Unfortunately I wasn't able to sign the lease until 1700 so I had to stick around for one more day to turn on the water and electricity and pick up our mailbox key from the post office.
Like usual things didn't go as planned, but I was able to get out of Killeen with keys to our apartment, mailbox keys, the water turned on, and the electric scheduled to be turned on the 28th all by 1300 (I was hoping to be out of there by 1030 the latest). Then I set out on a 13 hour drive from Killeen, Tx to Alamogordo, NM. I am happy to say I made the trip in one day arriving in Alamogordo at 2345. Now all I have to do is enjoy the next two weeks hanging out with my brother Jimmie and his family.