Dentist, shmentist.

I finally went to have my teeth cleaned yesterday. I had been putting it off for, ahem, longer than I care to say. I was too lazy to find a dentist in Georgia because we were only there a year. Finding a new dentist is right up there next to poking my eye out with a sharp stick on my list of things I like to do.

Lucky me, I have a new cavity and another tooth that needs a crown. And lots of other ones that need to be watched. Part of the reason I hate finding a new dentist is because most of the time you have to take their word for what they see, and I think sometimes they’re in it to see how deep your pockets are.

But honestly, I didn’t get that impression from this dentist. He was recommended by someone we know who retired out here. My teeth are decent, but I have a serious problem with clenching and grinding at night. I wear a mouth guard (sexy, eh?) but it only helps so much.

It’s going to be a doozy of an appointment when I have it done. As a kid I had a fair amount of dental work done, but going never bothered me. I loved Dr. Pierce. He was a pediatric dentist, and I think I went to his office until I could no longer fit in the chair. As an adult, I have a lot more trouble, and usually resort to counting ceiling tiles and trying not to hyperventilate. I’ve never contemplated taking anti-anxiety meds before, but it sounds very tempting.

Being an adult really bites sometimes. Mostly because you don’t get the laughing gas anymore.

We’re here!

Ahhh, at last we have an internet connection! I thought I’d post today, to say that we’re here and we’re alive.

The journey out west was uneventful, we took our time, only driving about 450 miles or so a day. We stayed at mostly motels because of our dogs, but we did stop one night at Scott AFB (near St. Louis) and I have to say that if you ever have the chance to stay in their TLF (temporary lodging facility), you should do it. In a stroke of brilliance, they use old housing as TLF, so we were able to stay in a fully furnished house, complete with a fenced area for the dogs. It rocked.

Our SUV pulling the U-haul didn’t have any issues, which was one of dh’s biggest worries. My biggest worry was entertaining the dutchkid for endless hours in the car, since I had her with me. She did great, we’re turning that kid into a serious traveler. The only lasting side effect is that now whenever we drive somewhere she wants to know what state we’re in: “Are we still in Colorado, Mama?”

So here we are, in our beautiful new house. While I am glad to be here, I am feeling slightly overwhelmed by the sheer amount of tasks that must be done to get our life restarted. This is compounded by the fact that I have very few tools to accomplish said tasks because none of our stuff is here yet. I’m not a fan of being in limbo, and that’s really where we’ve been stuck this week since our truck driver is taking every last day he’s allowed (and one extra) to get here.

In other ways it’s been a nice week. It has given me time to sit around and just be with my family. We have been able to do some sightseeing because we really have nothing else to do. We hit the zoo and did a little hiking. I guess I should look at this week as time to “acclimatize”, just like those crazy mountaineers do for weeks at base camp before they attempt Everest. The trouble with that is the longer I stare at the mountain of my to-do list, the bigger it looks.

PCS life lessons

Nothing like a good old PCS to raise the stress levels. We are in full move prep mode over here. I’m a big believer in not tearing your house apart a month before the move, it just interferes with my quality of life. But there’s also the realization that so much of the prep I’m running around doing could have been done weeks ago…if it weren’t for the fact that I was in denial about said move. So it’s a fine balance.

I have learned things in the past few days that by rights I should have known already… like the autocraft shop will recycle old motor oil and transmission fluid for you, or that there is a dry cleaner right down the street but they take 4 days to process anything. Yeah, that’s me. I want to dry clean things that have been waiting for months right now.

Today I encountered one of life’s PCS conundrums. We have one trash day left. In order to clear housing, my trash can has to be hosed out and clean. So after early next week I can’t put anything else in the trash can. And of course, because both dh and I were in denial and procrastinating to boot, we waited until now to seriously go through my basement. My trash can overfloweth. And the trash men are zealous about not picking up stuff that’s not in the can.

Adding to this is the fact that most of my neighbors are already gone, which means that my fridge has been the recipient of everybody’s condiments. I’m going to have a ton more stuff to throw away. Argh. And I’m feeling guilty because I won’t have time to recycle the empties. I’m going to be knocking on random strangers doors and asking to use their trash can.

You would think that by now (I think this is move 7? I’ve lost track) I would have it all figured out. Valuable time management lessons, courtesy of Uncle Sam.

We have a winner!

We’re home, and we have a house to live in when we move this summer! 

I think this was the most painful househunting trip that we have yet to experience. They say it’s a buyer’s market? Why is it then that no fewer than THREE houses we wanted were gone before we could offer on them, and our house-to-be almost got away from us as well? (it had another offer in on it but thankfully our offer was better). I guess everybody is moving to the mountains.

Crazy crazy. Almost as crazy as taking your three-year-old with you to look at nearly 25 homes in 3 days.  Our realtor was fantastic, if you are moving out to Colorado, email me and I’ll give you her name.  She actually took the time to fill easter eggs, and when she would open up a house for us to see she would “hide” the egg so that the dutchkid could find it.   So sweet.  And she knows her stuff.  This is our 5th home purchase, so we’ve been around the block a few times with realtors, she’s one of the best we’ve ever had. 

In a bit of irony, after looking all over the place we ended up in our old neighborhood we lived in 8 years ago.  At first I was really resistant to that, just because it felt a little like we had been there and done that… but it’s close to dh’s workplace and well within our price range, along with having a great view of the mountains, a decent backyard and a newly renovated kitchen.  We only had our old crummy camera with us, and I’m too embarrassed to put those rotten images up here, so you’ll just have to wait until we get there to live and I can do it justice. 

I’m finally more excited about getting out there!  I still have to make a decision on the school situation for the dutchkid, but it feels like everything’s coming together.  As the saying goes: “Pikes peak or bust!”

Dusting off the rose colored glasses

I’m in the honeymoon phase of living here. The phase before the pain of really preparing for the move, but I can see the end of our time here rapidly approaching. I can’t believe tomorrow’s Friday, and we’re already halfway into March. I didn’t get anything constructive done, like take some stuff to the thrift store to be consigned, or go through the boxes in my basement from the last move. Maybe I’ll just leave the junk in them and sort it all out when we get there. Or better yet, just get rid of it, except I just know I’ll need something as soon as I throw them away. Plus, you know, we’re moving back to colder climes, so we might actually need some stuff we haven’t in a good long while.

The weather here is beautiful, warm enough to enjoy being outdoors without breaking a sweat by virtue of breathing. I catch myself counting the things I’m going to miss about living here. We have found a rhythm and I’ll be sorry to see it go. I am looking forward to the new place, and I’m hoping that our upcoming trip out there will really get me excited… but I didn’t think I would get so attached to here. Weird. Soon enough I will be anxious to get about the business of getting moved, but for now I am content with where I’m at. This is new and uncharted territory for me. Normally the military makes my roots shallow and I’m all about how good life will be whenever we get to where we’re going.

But what if my expectations are too high? What if (I can’t believe I’m actually typing this) I actually miss it here while I am living in Colorado? That’s just wrong. The overwhelming pollen here must be addling my brain.

Serenity now!

I feel better this morning, it’s amazing how sleeping on something makes it more manageable. My subconsious must have been hard at work last night.

I just couldn’t leave that last post on the top of the blog, although I don’t have much else to say about it.  I will wait as gracefully as I know how.

So for this morning, I will give you my favorite quote:

Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. But today is a gift!  That’s why they call it the present.

And it came from Kung Fu Panda, of all places.  I am now reduced to finding my inspiration from cartoons.  But it’s a good one, no?  Someone famous probably said it first, although I don’t know who.  So if you know, please enlighten me.  

Pick your poison

I am throwing my personally imposed OPSEC out the window today, because I need to process this. My dh called up to branch today to see what they had to say… and the guy said that things were still being finalized, but basically getting one of our top three was highly unlikely. However, if my dh chose Korea or Germany (both choices on our list, but nowhere near the top) that he could give him either of those. Or we could wait and take our chances to see how it all shakes out by next week (meaning we could get lucky, or totally get stuck with something not on the list).

My dh quite wisely told them that he had to discuss it with the Household 6 (sorry, that would be ME for my non military readers) and that he would let them know tomorrow. He is really leaning towards Germany, because now accompanied tours to Korea are 3 years instead of 2.

Seriously? Germany wasn’t even on my radar. It was dead last on our list. I am feeling like my reality just shifted, it really blindsided me. And I feel like an idiot because after 10 years (almost 11) of experience with the big green machine, I should know better than to trust them to do something according to what I had planned.

Germany sounds fantastic, right up until we get to the part about him deploying for a year (or more) whilst I am in a foreign country. It’s not that I can’t handle that, it’s more about choosing that… especially when I know in Korea he would be somewhere on the peninsula where the dutchkid and I could reach him by train. Plus Korea is familiar to me, we got married there and I’ve been there twice. Then again, three years is a long time to be a 15+ hour plane ride from home.

Or after all this we could get something else. I HATE THIS PROCESS.

Four random things

1) Since it has now officially been February for three whole days, I have been anxiously awaiting the word from the Army on where we are moving. I can’t restrain myself from asking my dh several times a day if he’s checked his AKO (Army email). He’s reached the end of his rope and has given me the password so that, for the love of all things holy, I will quit asking him about it.

2) I can’t get this song out of my head. And I would like you to know that it is totally and completely Lala’s fault, since she linked to it and I am nowhere near hip and wid it enough to have found that on my own.

3) I am feeling better, and actually slept last night!

4) I spent an embarrassing amount of time today picking out valentines for the dutchkid to give to her little class at preschool next week. I thought surely somewhere in this town they would have retro 50′s style valentines. I went to FOUR different stores before I found something that I decided I would settle for (Hello Kitty). I just sort of get stuck on an idea and feel like I must exhaust all possibilities. I don’t know why, particularly when my child would have been happy with just about anything.

So there you have it, a little bit of my crazy to make you feel sane and balanced.

The damages

We are now mostly unpacked, I think this is a my new record for SLOW. I am to the point where I am getting to the things I enjoy about having a new house. We planted the flower beds yesterday and I finally got around to measuring our windows and starting to hang curtains. I have quite a bit of sewing to do, since the windows here are bigger than in my previous modern houses not very many of my curtains will work as is.

So far I have been amazed by the lack of damage to our stuff. Our previous move was our worst ever (where they broke among many other things, my beloved kitchen table). We don’t even have enough to file a claim on for this move:

1) my favorite hat was crushed (an elegant wide brimmed number that I love to wear to outdoor ceremonies, just because)

2) the dutchkid’s 99¢ pail and shovel broken into pieces

Seriously. That’s all I’ve got. Not a single dish, picture or knick knack. Most importantly the table and my piano came through unscathed. I should be grateful, but they didn’t even give me anything good to write about, dangit!

I am here…

…but trying to dig my way out of all the moving paper and boxes. We were in denial all weekend. So instead of starting to unpack after the moving truck was divested of its contents, we chose instead to stay at the hotel and pretend we were just visiting. The fence for the dogs went up today and I have legal internet instead of piggybacking on my new neighbors’ wireless. I will try to come up with some funny stories about the move to regale you with… soon.