Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Our Apartment

I guess sometimes I need to be reminded that you actually don’t know what is going on in Ash and my life… even though to us it may seem like mundane day-to-day stuff, you still don’t have much of an idea of what’s going on.  Thanks for the reminder of your daily checking the blog Char.

For the first month Ash and I lived in Queenstown we were living at a backpackers hostel called Hippo Lodge.  Because of work and other obligations we decided to move out of the Hippo into an apartment just down the road.  We are living with two other girls that we met at the Hippo, Dana and Tatty.  They are childhood friends from Maine.  We are really grateful to have met them because we have truly clicked.  Our roles so far seem to be the girls are like our younger sisters, and for some reason we were meant to meet and be together for this period of time.  Our mutual friend Tom was concerned and asked, “Is this a good decision to live together?”  So far it has been great, but I completely understand his concern because we don’t tend to get much accomplished other than “living in the now”.  The new joke is “I wish Tom could see us right now.”   This is especially said when we are productive, but is also asked when we are especially not productive. 
It all started on Thanksgiving.  We planned a pretty great feast, but first we decided Mimosa’s were merited.  Well Mimosa’s lasted longer than anticipated, and our Thanksgiving feast was pushed back a few hours.  Tom (a true English Bloke) witnessed the whole day first hand.   I am fairly certain he thinks we are ridiculous, but I am sure that he loved every minute.  He definitely only saw one side of our friendship with Dana and Tatty.  All in all Thanksgiving was a great day--- sun, friends, mimosas, and “thankfuls”.  The only way it could have been better is if you all were here with us.

It is funny to think that it is almost Christmas because it is about 70* to 80* most days.  It really feels like it should be mid June, I guess this is what we signed up for when we wanted an endless summer... that and the whole Southern Hemisphere thing.  Oh, PS I forgot that there are different stars here.  Yes, I remember we learned about the stars in the Northern Hemisphere vs the Southern in elementary, but sometimes I forget.

Back to my original train of thought, despite how the weather feels we splurged and bought Christmas decorations.  By splurged I mean we spent 13bucks at Salvation Army and spruced up the apartment.  I think it looks pretty chic, maybe shabby chic, but still chic.  We have the essentials a tree, lights, and tons of purple garland.  I know purple might not be the first color you think of when you think Christmas, but hey we were at Salvo and the choices were semi-limited.  It looks extraordinary, I promise.  We even made popcorn strands, but the microwaves here are tricky and we burned some of the popcorn.   I say it adds color, which is great since we can’t afford to buy cranberries for strand. Once again, “Eh, it’s good enough.” 

We live about a seven-minute walk to town, which is great for work and late nights.  It is in a nice area instead of our usual shady apartment in Anchorage.  Yesterday as we were all at work, Ash was home taking a nap after her shift, and had heard running water and thought, “Is someone taking a shower?” A few minutes later when she actually woke up she realized that no one was home, but the water was actually coming from the wall and ceiling.  Within the first week of us living in our new apartment we were flooded with 2 inches of standing water.  This would seriously only happen to us… which is why I think we were not surprised.  Our landlord is great, because he came over immediately and is fixing the problem.  As of now we are staying in an hotel (courtesy of Berry (Land lord) until the floor dries allowing us to move back in.  But at least we already decorated for Christmas.

1 comment:

bethany weaver said...

this post made me smile..

great to hear your little voice yesterday! love you mel.
b