New home

We arrived safely in GA, and are getting settled in. It's been interesting in some ways, mostly because it was way harder to find a place to live than it has ever been for us. Before, when we moved, we were military, and at Thak's rank, at least 75% of the listings in any city we went to were in our price range. Now, out of hundreds of listings, we could count on one hand how many we could afford. Most of them were disgusting. Nothing was over 1000 square feet. Some were in the ghetto. A lot were in trailer parks. Trying to find a place to live like this was interesting to begin with. Now consider that a lot of people didn't want to lease to us because we are civilian. That we both served doesn't matter. They want a chain of command to rat you out to if they don't get their money, and we don't have one.

After a while, we came to a few realizations:

1) We weren't going to be able to live in a convenient location. We pretty much had to choose between the middle of nowhere and the ghetto. The middle of nowhere is safer, of course, so that's the obvious choice.

2) We would not have three bedrooms and two bathrooms. It simply doesn't exist in our price range. We could have a tiny 3 BR with only one bathroom, or we could have a 2 BR with similar square footage, that has two bathrooms.

3) If something decent came along, and the people were willing to lease to us, and not charge us a ridiculously high deposit for being civilian, then we needed to jump on it. (Yes, some places charge civilians really high deposits. This one totally hideous house we almost leased was going to charge is a $1500 security deposit on a place that leases for $575 a month. The deposit would have been $500 if we were military.)

After a week of searching, we found a very decent apartment complex in a small town across the swamp from Thak's airfield. The downstairs units have privacy fenced yards almost the size of our yard in TX. They were 2 BR/2 BA apartments, but they have separate living rooms and dining rooms, and again, nice big yards. It's a small complex, and kind of on the edge of town with nothing but woods out back. It was well within our price range, so we submitted an application and hoped for the best.

Thankfully, they didn't discriminate against civilians, and we moved in two days later after paying a very standard deposit. Yes, five people, 2 BR apartment. I know. We got Erin and Orren some bunkbeds, which we go pick up today, actually, and then their room will be all set. Chai is in with us, and our room barely fits everything, but we are doing our best with it.

Not having a garage, after years of having a really big one, is proving most interesting. There is really not much storage in this place, and we have a whole patio full of stuff (like floor to ceiling) to figure out what we do with. We just got our stuff in day before yesterday, so we haven't had a lot of time to sort through it all yet (and by we, I mean Thak, because it's pretty much all his) but it'll happen soon, because I'm not about having my backyard looking like an episode of Hoarders.

So otherwise, this whole small town thing is interesting. With both of us being from small towns, it didn't seem like it would be a stretch for us to live that way again. I didn't know how city we had become, though! I walk down the street with my double Valco stroller, and people stare. We pretty much live by our iPhones, and few people here even have them. Erin has a slight Spanish accent compared to the other kids at her school. But in general, this place is good. Erin's school seems great so far. She loves it because there are no uniforms, and she's getting all the help she needs for her issues. The kids are really nice, too. There's only one kid her age in our complex, but he's really

nice, and they get along great. Erin is also really enjoying riding the bus. All in all, we are liking our new home in Pembroke, GA.

I'll post some pics when I figure out how to do it from mobile. We still don't have actual Internet here, so it's all iPhone for now. I think Thak is going to try to get us Internet on payday (tomorrow).