Oh, and....

When we first moved to Tucson, I'm talking, when we drove in with all our stuff to our new apartment, we got off the freeway at Ruthrauff and when passing La Cholla Rd, we spotted this beauty of a sign.


You're going to have to click on the picture to appreciate the full beauty of what it says. If you don't have time for that, I'll sum it up:

LIQUOR
FAMILY FOODS
COFFEE - SNACKS
BEER - CIGARETTES
SODA - LIQUOR

That's right. Liquor's on there twice. Ah... Tucson. But I digress. We no longer live in Tucson. We live here:

far away from the FAMILY FOODS of Ruthrauff and La Cholla. Purchasing this house has been an interesting (and frustrating and expensive) process. I say expensive and you probably think, "you bought a house, what did you expect?" I get that. No, what I mean is all the stinking set-up fees. It's $12 a month for garbage service with a $30 set-up fee. Thirty a month for internet with a $20 establishment fee. And so on and so forth with the gas, electricity, and water as well. Thirty dollars for you to put my name into the computer? Twenty for you to click a button? Good grief! And, I just got a notice in the mail that informed me that my property taxes do not cover a fire department, so we have a private company to which I must pay $600 per year if I wish to avail myself of their services. Does that mean if I don't pay, and my house is on fire, they won't come put it out? I'm not sure.



At least I have this cool mailbox with a little flag on top. I've never lived in a house with a be-flagged box before. Actually, I haven't lived in a place where I didn't need a key to get the mail in almost 9 years (if you count when I lived on Ferinni Rd where the lock was broken and you could just lift the door). I was so excited to teach Lillian how to put the flag up when you put mail in the box, but she was way more interested in a lizard on the sidewalk. She's got to get her priorities straight.


Our house really is a mess at the moment, so I haven't really taken any pictures of it yet.


Well, I took these two. Mostly to show off the view from my bedroom window. I put a little corner of my bed in the shot to prove that this is what I see when I wake up. Notice, I don't have any curtains. I loathe interior decorating in any form (mostly because, in my experience, 'cute' and it's sister 'fabulous' cost money and I have absolutely no talent for it whatsoever) so I have put off purchasing window treatments, and probably will put it off for as long as possible. I can imagine a future where Tyler gets fed up and finally strings a blanket over the window and it stays there for three years because I'm too lazy to change it. No, lazy is the wrong word. How about, 'repulsed by the idea of shopping for window dressings'? Yeah, that's more like it.


This is the spot where there is always someone fishing... except for the moment when I took the picture. It's a pretty big lake and for whatever reason, if there's anyone fishing, there's someone here. Which can make for an awkward morning, what with the lack of blinds. We moved in on a Saturday and I thought all the people fishing were just there because it was a Saturday morning and were looking to relax. But, no. They fish all day, every day.