Everything that happens is from now on...

Comedy of errors. That pretty well sums up moving day.

It would have been tragic if it all weren't so completely ridiculous!

Admittedly I really wasn't in the cheeriest of moods. Okay, so I was cranky. All things considered and knowing me, I think it was to be expected.

So this apartment complex is huge, so huge that they have "orientation" for all new residents. This is basically a session where all new residents are taken to finish signing their leases, pay the rest of the money they owe (did I mention that this place is INCREDIBLY overpriced?), and learn the rules and regs of the place.

I don't mean to sound terribly small town or even racist here, but I was the only white person in the orientation and a good majority of the male residents that were there are SIU athletes. I was surprised as I had been told by the leasing agent that this complex caters specifically to graduate students - just one in a string of things I was "mislead" about. Anyway, after I had been led through my lease and introduced to the "community" (where literally they said - if you're having people over, invite your neighbors and if you BBQ, make enough for your neighbors, WTF?) I got my key.

Yes, Key, singular. Because my mailbox key had not come in from the Post Office yet, even though I signed my lease and paid my deposit on JULY 6. Okay, no big deal.

We check out the apartment, but the U-Haul with my stuff wasn't here yet. I did the walk-through with the leasing agent. I wasn't happy with the state the apartment was left in. It didn't really look clean, the carpet is messed up, the air conditioning didn't work, the vinyl in the kitchen hadn't been changed as promised, and the sink upstairs didn't work.

We left and got lunch and by the time we got back the U-haul was here and we were ready to begin.

Except, oh yeah, Dusty had left Peoria at 11:15 and should have been here by now, but he called and said he got stuck in construction for 45 minutes and was going to be late. No matter, we weren't moving yet. We had to go haggle with the leasing agents in the office because the state of the apartment was so bad. They were in the midst of replacing the sink, but the air still wasn't working. After a half hour back and forth, they agreed to re-clean the carpet and put in new vinyl in the kitchen and a new toilet stool upstairs (it was disgusting) but not until Tuesday. Fine. I'll be back home then so I won't have to deal with it.

Time to start moving.

Not yet.

The new sink's in, but oh, lovely, now there's a leak in the downstairs bathroom... the ceiling is dripping. Maintenance has to come back out, they look at it and add it to the list of things they have to fix on Tuesday. But the AC still isn't working.

So the leak's going to get fixed, turns out they have to REPLACE the whole AC unit, fortunately they got it replaced and working within about an hour and a half. And from there things went just swimmingly.

Except that it was so freaking hot, we had to move heavy boxes and furniture up a bunch of stairs and Dusty got stuck yet again in traffic and didn't make it here until AFTER we were done and my parents and grandparents had headed back to MO.

Oh well, my mom and step-dad stuck around and we all went to B-Dubs for dinner. It was a good night, Dusty really managed to get my head in the right place (like always) and things are looking up.

I spent the day unpacking, slowly but surely and pretty much got the whole downstairs done. Upstairs is another story. But I think it's going to have to wait until I get back here for school.

And now, I've got to go pack up for my trip to STL tomorrow (so excited to see Britt and Annie AND '500 Days of Summer') and then home for a week and a half. It's going to be really hard to leave again in two weeks, but now that at least a LOT of my apartment is put together, it will feel more like coming "home." Though, I'm still not comfortable calling this place home yet. Maybe in a few months.

It's going to get better, I know. I drove around a little today and I still don't love this town - it's kind of just run-down, there aren't any really nice areas and there really isn't a lot in the way of retail, restaurants, entertainment and whatnot... but I've got my fingers crossed that once school starts things will start to come out of the woodwork.

One thing I do know, Illinois drivers SUCK, and traffic is going to get SOOOO much worse in 3 weeks when school starts. Parking is going to be SUCH a pain!

But, I'll make it.