"Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam, be it ever so humble, there's no place like home." --John Howard Payne

Thought I'd take this opportunity to give you all a little virtual tour of my new apartment! Photos are courtesy of my cell phone, so they're not the best quality, but neither is the apartment, so it evens out. I'm still missing some furniture...we have yet to pick up the couch(es) and kitchen table and chairs that a friend is loaning me. But other than that, I'm all settled in. Its really great to have my own space, although I'm learning that my sense of transience has less to do with where I'm sleeping than I thought. The above picture is the house, now divided into four units. Sufficiently terrifying, no? =) I especially like the foreboding clouds in the background of this picture. It looks like it should be haunted, but so far, its not. At least not my section. You can see why its being torn down in a few months. (Also note, they're already starting construction on the apartments that will be built in this spot. They're filling the whole block behind the house with apartments, and during my one day off every week, I usually wake up to the sound of tractors and jack hammers.) I live in #4, a basement apartment, which entrance is on the far left of this picture. Here's a close-up of the entrance:



Here's part of the living room, the view to the left when you walk in the front door. I'm really pleased with the lights and garland, although you can't see the effect very well in this picture. The craft store was having a 50% sale on fake plants and Christmas lights, and I decided that ambience was a good investment.



Here's the other half of the living room. A little bare without furniture at the moment, but the movie star collection and lights look nice here too. This was taken from the bedroom door, so that's the front door on the right.



Here's the kitchen. The kitchen door is right across the living room from the front door. For the record, I don't think anyone realizes how much they use a microwave until they no longer have one.



Here's the other half of the kitchen. Its not very interesting, except for the fact that it looks like my fridge doesn't have doors. The "handles" are actually just indents in the sides of the doors. I'm still not used to it, and find myself grabbing at nothing more often than not.



You may have noticed this in the previous two pictures, but the flooring in the kitchen is pretty spectacular. I had to give you all a better look, because this is actually one of my favorite parts of the apartment. When I first saw it, I thought "Ew. What fantastically ugly linoleum." Then I stepped onto it and realized that its NOT linoleum, but rather really short carpet, patterned to LOOK like linoleum! Really impractical for a kitchen, but so quirky that its endearing. I think its hilarious.



Here's the bedroom, as seen from the living room. You can already see how small it is, but since its just me, I find it just right.



Here's a better one to illustrate how small the bedroom is. My queen-size mattress (which I bought second-hand for $40, by the way) takes up ALMOST the entire room. It's kind of fun having it on the floor. And I like having a big bed.



Oddly enough, the bathroom is one of the biggest rooms in the apartment relative to its purpose. For the record, although you can't see it, I have a RAD, tacky, jungle-themed shower curtain. And that white square thing on the left? That's my WASHING MACHINE. Although I don't have a dryer. But the previous renters were kind enough to leave behind a package of clothespins.



So that's my new home! I enjoy living by myself, although I'm finding it puts me in an odd social place. I'm so used to having to work for my alone-time. But now that I have that anytime I want, I'm finding that it takes a lot more effort to work for social time. You don't have an automatic social world set up for you by roomates...you actually have to go out and visit people and call them and stuff.

I think that's part of my current sense of lacking any feeling of belonging anywhere. When you're with roomates, you don't think to call the friends that aren't with you at that moment to go on adventures. So between that phenomenon and going to bed at 10pm because of work, I find myself missing out on a lot. Which is LAME.

But to close this entry on a lighter note, especially when it comes to my social life, I've made a handful of new friends this semester that I'm really enjoying hanging out with. My good good friend Carrie recently got back from her mission and is back at school here in Rexburg. Through hanging out with her, I've befriended a Mandy, a Dusty, a Scott, a Ryan, a Nathan, and a handful of others whose company I really enjoy. I'm still kind of shy around them, just because I still feel like I haven't gotten to know them well enough to COMPLETELY open up, but when I do in little ways, I feel comfortable and appreciated. It takes me a good long while to really get comfortable enough with people to not have ANY sense of self-doubt (or even awareness), but I feel like I could get there with this group. Even though the other thing is that I can tell that they're all a lot wealthier than me, and although I HATE that something like that makes a difference, it does to me...I'm intimidated and uncomfortable with people who are richer than I am. Which is a lot of people, but only sometimes am I keenly aware of it. But I like that everyone I've met in that little group appreciates my sense of humor, and that I appreciate theirs. I also have similar interests with them that I don't share with some of my other friends...like having dance parties and going hiking! I look forward to continuing to get to know them and spending more time with them.

I'm very grateful for the wonderful friends I've been blessed with, and between social adventures, work, and moving in, I feel like the summer is starting to fall into a routine. I need a second job as soon as "Faustus" closes, or a different job, but in the meantime, here's to new apartments, new friends, and new seasons!