Welcome to the Army...

If I had a dollar for every time someone has told me that, I wouldn't be so worried about getting quarters to do laundry. 

So when John and I got to Texas we decided to make a pact that no matter what happens we wouldn't take our crap out on each other because we were all we got. So instead of loading more crap onto him since I know he's stressed like crazy right now, I decided to vent some frustrations on facebook since I have a lot of other friends that are Army wives and have been there done that, and was trying to figure out how they handled the situations we're about to face..instead.... 

Apparently, I'm not allowed to complain about anything ever.  Because before I could get any such advice from anyone my family and people who think they know what John and I are going through jumped all over and used this as an opportunity to try and make my problems seem small.   I should be thankful for what I have because:

"A home is what you make it"
"Would you rather him not have a job?"
"You know, he could be deployed right now, you should be thankful."
or my all time favorite... "get over it."

Trust me, I'm very thankful my husband is not deployed, but what I said didn't have a whole hell of a lot to do with that.  So if that's the only thing people can say...I rather they wouldn't.

So in the spirit of welcome to the Army (which I'm not sure why I'm sharing because everyone on this planet who isn't in the army already knows what it's like to be in it, or be a spouse of a person in the military.)  I hate to alienate friends on this but just because you have a friend of a friend who served in the military and was over seas does not mean you put up with the red tape and had to watch every move you make as if you're 12 and asking if you can go hang out with your friends.  I'm 25...I don't need rules for the sake of having rules, if I'm old enough to drive, vote, and drink, live on my own, pay my bills, I do not need someone else to play mommy and daddy...I already have a mom and a dad...I don't need another one.  


So here is my welcome to the army story:

Upon coming to Fort Hood, we were instructed to not go near Rancier after dark.  One guy says he carries a gun in his glove box and still won't drive down there.  Apparently they have what some might call a little bit of a gang issue. All the apartments I could find online in Killeen were off of this street, and I was super not looking forward to being alone all day in the ghetto. So we waited a little longer for housing, in our crappy hole in the wall hotel, if you could even justify it being called that.   We had been told they usually almost always over estimate the time it takes to get a house, and most people I've talked to were put in a house in about 2, even 3 weeks at the most.  So in this shanty the ceiling fan was ready to fall off every time were turned it out, it was 85 degrees outside and there was no A/C.  For the first day we had no hot water.  For the next week we neighbors that blared their TV, the speaker phone on their cell so I could hear both sides of the convo through the wall, and 2 screaming children.  Everytime the guy burped I thought he was throwing up and it scared the hell out of the cat. 

So John begins his in processing.  2nd stop, housing.  "Oh you don't have any children?  Well it's about a 6 month wait for a house on post, here's a list of places to look off post.  You can also continue to stay in temporary housing, but we will only reimburse you for 10 days of your stay.  It can also end up taking longer because more people are scrambling for houses because people are coming back from Iraq and some units have even had to scrap plans for deployment, have a nice day."

So since John and I took precautions for the fist 5 years of our relationship and he didn't irresponsibly knock me up when I was 18, we're basically screwed out of getting a house because people who have kids need a house more than we do.  We started off at number 140 out of 240.  By the end of week one we were 146 out of 247.

I did the math and figured out with our car payment, cell phone, car insurance, our credit cards, plus our hotel bill.  We would be making -587 (yes, negative) a month if we continued to stay in the hotel.  This doesn't even include groceries, gas in our car, food for the cat, etc. 

So we did what any person with a brain would, we took in upon ourselves to go through the list of places they gave us at housing plus this nifty little apartment finder flyer that was in the laundry room of temporary housing.  So we let the googling commence.  Everytime we found a promising place we could afford, we google street mapped it...next to a creppy auto body shop, strip joint, or bar.

So then I found this place in the flyer we were given.  It was brand new with the first people just moving in back in June.  I wasn't even going to bother calling because the last apartment I had just got off the phone with wanted over 1200 a month.  (Granted it was furnished so we could stay there until a place on base opened up.)  But I called anyways.   Brand new, never lived in by anyone, almost 1100 square feet 2 bedroom 2 bath for less then our BAH and still have money left over for the utilities...the catch..John would have to commute a 30 minute drive.  None the less, knowing if we stayed another 2 weeks in temporary housing we'd be pretty close to flat broke (not to mention the army frowns upon being in debt) we went to look two days later, and then moved in the next day.  

So we spent all weekend making it at homey as possible with no furniture and an air mattress.  Almost got a kitchen table but it was too big to fit into our car, so that didn't end up happening. Thankfully we did jam some necessities into our car when we headed out from Michigan, so we have silverwear, dishes, pots and pans, cups, tv and xbox. 

We spent close to 500 dollars on groceries, cleaning stuff, toiletries and some extra bath towels so we wouldn't have to wash them every 2 days.  But seriously, when did wiping your ass become so damn expensive?  So we hung up our clothes, unpacked our undies, got the cable and internet hooked up and have been having a jolly time making the best of it...

Then comes Tuesday, where one guy in John's unit gets chewed out for living in the ghetto.  And then it's John's turn.  He gets yelled at for living too far away somewhere nice and safe so his wife isn't scared to be home alone all day.  Then after being held over late, they were instructed to bring a copy of their LES and get a haircut and get a PT belt all by tomorrow morning.  Luckily everyone has printers.....hahahahhahaha.  So after being told how much a belt cost, then going to pay for it and spending almost triple, then running to get a hair cut right as the place closed (even though he just had one 4 days ago tops) and then running to the one place there was supposedly a computer lab and finding that to be closed John did not have a great day...and did I mention he was only 3 1/2 hours late for dinner?  


/rant.  :o)
~~~

On another note the laundry room at this apartment complex totally sucks.  It's 1.50 to wash a load, then it's 1.50 to dry a load...and it only gets like half dry unless you dry like 3 things at a time.

Kitchen table vs Washer and Dryer...looks like we're going to be enjoying a few more dinners Asian style.