Wow, quite a bit has happened since I have last blogged. Erik and I went down to Tucson to find a place to live and get some things squared away with his schooling before he started. Just a few days before the 4th, I got a phone call from the principal at Sahuarita High School asking if I could interview the following Tuesday. I happily agreed and we decided to head down on Sunday the 4th just a few days earlier than planned.
We drove through the coolest lightening storm (the true fireworks) for the majority of our way down to Colorado City. We saw at least a dozen fireworks shows all going on at once. It was absolutely beautiful. Chuck, my father-in-law, has a property in Colorado City where we were going to stay so we could break up the 14 hour drive down to Tucson into 2 days. We got to the general area of the property late at night. That is when I realized the only tools we had to find this place were the headlights on our car (absolutely no lights in the area) and the vague directions of "its just past the bush and if you get to the brick house you've gone too far". Well there were lots of bushes and a number of houses spread out, so it was hard to tell if we had a ways to go or if we'd gone way too far. Erik finally got out and tromped around through the brush with a headlamp and found our "roadside inn". Thankfully Erik checked all the mouse traps before we went to bed that night. Below are some pictures of our set up :)
Onward ho! We headed out early the next morning in hopes to cross paths with Erik's relatives, Aunt Jan and Uncle John and Erik's cousin Amy. They were in Albuquerque and we were able to stop in and have lunch with them before they had to be on there way. It was really great to see them and to get a brief view of some New Mexico culture. We finally got down to Tucson and I started to prepare for my interview the following day.
Things we saw: dead rat that Erik stepped on at a gas station...Truth or Consequences, New Mexico....and a fireworks stand, on fire.
Tuesday morning we had time to kill since my interview wasn't until 11am. I went into the local Safeway to grab a few things before we drove down to Sahuarita. As I was fighting with the self checkout machine I got a phone call. ..It was Jody, the woman from my first interview. As she was apologizing to me for not getting back to me sooner, I was playing tug o war with the dollar machine at the checkout working hard not to mutter something regrettable. As my focus on our conversations was going in and out, something she said caught my attention, "I'm happy to be calling you to offer you the job." what?! I was stunned and stills struggling with the stupid self checkout machine. I got the job?! Wow, I was so thrilled. I thanked her and I ran out to the car.
Erik hugged and kissed me, then we realized it was an hour and a half before my other interview. I didn't want to waste the other school's time so we drove down to Sahuarita. On the way down there I saw our system of measurement change into kilometers. This second job may have been a little too south for me. So I am very happy I received a job from my first interview.
The rest of the day just got better and better. We went to UofA campus and we were able to get things squared away for Erik. He got his catcard (id card) and got his background check done. We even talked with a very friendly woman in the financial aid office about what our best options are for schooling finances. Once that was done, it was house hunting time.
We established a couple different walk through appointments prior to us arriving in Tucson. Prior to our first appointment, we drove around areas that we "thought" we were interested in. Let me tell you, pictures only tell you a 1/4th of the whole story. Some places that were decently priced were in some not so decent areas. All the ones we drove by were x'd off our list. Then we went to our first appointment.
This house was in a nice area and it was close to campus. It was a 2 bedroom 1 bath place with a big fenced in yard that had "grass". Now Tucson's version of grass is a bit different, not so lush and not so green. But it wasn't rocks and it wasn't dirt. We were interested in the place and quickly realized many others were interested in it also. So we decided to go with it and were pretty happy with the decision. So 24 hours from when we arrived, I got a job, Erik got set up with school AND we had a place to live. It was turning out very well for us.
For the rest of the time we were able to relax, go swimming at Reid Park, just a couple blocks from our house and even get a deluxe golf cart tour of U o f A Campus. Overall, it was a wonderful time and we are really looking forward to living down there...minus the hot hot weather and the fact that they moved all of spring training up to Phoenix...we are trying not to be bitter.
The sub at U of a is built so that the areal shot of it looks just like the USS Arizona. In fact the original mast from the USS Arizona is on the building and they even have dog tags used as wind chimes. Pretty cools stuff!
Next week, my parents are doing us a huge favor and helping us move all of our stuff down and helping us get settled in to our new life. More later. We hope you enjoyed all the pictures!
