Settling in

I finally have internet in my apartment! This makes my life considerably easier, but I'm still slightly stressed with an assistantship application due Monday and I still need a letter of recommendation to be sent, and I need to finish the essay part. But enough about that.

I'm exhausted.

5 a.m. on Monday morning Mom and I left for Orlando International Airport, and flew to Phoenix at 7:30 am. I forget the exact times, but we spent about an hour in Phoenix before flying out to Long Beach.

Long Beach Airport is the CUTEST little airport I have ever seen. You walk off the plane onto the tarmac, just like in South Africa, and the baggage carousel is out front and about twenty feet long.

Mom and I had a hard time balancing all four suitcases, Mom's rolling carry-on bag, and my backpack, but we managed to get everything to the taxi stand a hundred yards or so away and the nice man in charge of ordering taxis got us a huge van that actually fitted all of our luggage. The drive to my new place was interesting, and the taxi driver drove right past my place because he didn't see the number on the side of my building.

The first impression of my apartment was a little scary. I knew it's 600 sq feet, but a substantial portion is taken up by kitchen, closet space and the bathroom, and the bareness of the room was pretty crazy. Now that it's furnished I love it to pieces, but Monday I wasn't sure if it would all come together.

I have a corner unit which is a minus because I do get some traffic noise, but a plus because I have an additional 10 ft window that lets in a ton of light. That window has a huge tree in front of it, not sure what kind, with papaya-like leaves and funny green fruits.
My kitchen is narrow, with limited counter space, but it's MINE, and I'm enjoying that so much. I'm still nervous about the gas stove, but I've figured out how to keep the pilot lights lit, and I'm sure if other people can cook on a gas stove I can too.

Monday was spent waiting for my car to turn up. We got dropped off at the apartment by the taxi at a little after noon. The car was supposed to be delivered at 2 pm. It was eventually delivered at 9 pm, because the truck driver's delivery buddy was busy moving herself and "wasn't available" til late. What blew my mind is that she didn't find someone else to be her delivery driver considering her friend's move is personal, and my car was BUSINESS. When Mom and I first got there we occupied ourselves by opening all the suitcases and putting away what we could.

Finally we got so ragingly hungry and convinced ourselves that the car wasn't going to turn up so we walked down the road to see what restaurants we'd pass. We intended to go to a Californian fast food restaurant called Carl's Jr, but after half a mile we saw a diner named Rascal's and decided we were too hungry to go any further. It turned out to be a good choice, because we each got a cheeseburger and fries, and got a curry to share, and all were utterly fantastic. We couldn't finish more than the cheeseburgers, a few fries, and a couple forkfuls of the curry, but we got doggy bags to bring the fries and curry home.

I just realized it's midnight and I want to get into the habit of getting up at 8 am. To be continued!