Fort Myers and Such

So we’ve been in Florida about a week now, and there have been some interesting developments.

1.  I spoke too soon when I said that the dogs were perfect on the trip to Florida.  They were not.  We moved into our apartment last Friday, and as is custom when arriving at the apartment for the first time, we put the dogs in the apartment first so they don’t freak out in the car.  On the way to the apartment, we stopped for a little bit so they could do their business.  They did their business.  We got into the apartment and were wandering around, checking it out.  I hadn’t even gotten through the entire apartment yet when I stepped in a pile of Cooper’s poop.  It gets better.  Not knowing that I had stepped in the poop, I proceeded to track it all over the portion of the apartment that I had not yet seen.  I came out of the second bedroom to see a pile of turds on the floor.  At the same time, Simon said, “Eww…and someone stepped in it!”  It was then that I noticed the turds that were ground into the carpet.  Great.  So I’m pissed, because at this point we have nothing to pick the poop up with.  Everything is still out in the car.  So we’re sitting there, wondering how we’re going to get the poop off the floor and out of the carpet, when Brie decided this was also the perfect time for her to crap on the floor.  I about lost it.  She got quite the spanking for that one.  Fortunately, I saw her pooping and wasn’t stupid enough to step in it.  They were locked in the bathroom for the remainder of the moving in period.

2.  The apartment is…interesting.  It’s definitely not the worst housing that we’ve had, but it’s a far cry from the best.  The washer and dryer are tiny…minuscule…able to wash one lap blanket and a towel at the same time.  Knowing that we were going to have our own washer and dryer in Florida, I hadn’t done laundry in Burlington for about three weeks before we left.  Honestly, it probably took me about 10 loads of wash to do what could have been done in about 4 or 5.  Seems like kind of a waste of electricity and water.  Oh, and the washer doesn’t have a vigorous enough spin cycle to open the Downy ball, so now I’m using dryer sheets for the first time in my life.  It’s actually rather pleasant.  No idea why I didn’t use dryer sheets before this…way easier than the Downy ball.  

3.  I still have yet to see a gator.  I wonder if there are actually any around here.  We live right next to a “lake,” and there are all kinds of birds, turtles, and fish milling about, so I’m guessing that there are no gators in our “lake.”  And I say “lake,” because that’s what it says on the website.  Anyone from Minnesota, or anywhere that has bodies of water larger than the average backyard swimming pool know that this is not a lake.  It’s a pond…at best.  There are some nice fountains to add to the over all look of the water, which is a nice touch.  I think the No Swimming sign is unnecessary…I don’t know anyone that would swim in that water.  You’d have to wander through a field of duck poop to get to it, and by that time would probably lose your excitement for swimming all together.  There is a nice sized pool with some nice looking lounge chairs, so I’m sure we’ll spend our water-related apartment activities there.  The apartment itself is average, at best.  We’re lucky in that our door and windows face the lake, and we’re at the end of a sidewalk so there aren’t people walking by all the time, which is good because we’re on the ground level.  I wish the people on the corner in the ground level apartment were more aware of the fact that they’re on the ground level and that people are walking by all the time…we’ve seen the man in there several times sitting on a kitchen chair with no shirt on.  He’s not thin.  Of our two bathrooms (more on those in a minute), one has horrible water pressure, and the other smells like a litter box.  We’ve determined that either there was a mouse problem, a cat that couldn’t quite hit the box, or some extensive water damage that was covered up by a thin layer of sawdust under the sink.  In any case, no amount of air freshener has been able to free us from the stink.  The location of the apartment kind of sucks, in that we’re sandwiched between two six-lane roads, neither of which have sidewalks along them or leading up to them.  If we want to walk the dogs, we either walk around the apartment complex or we throw them in the car and drive somewhere.  The closest dog park is 11 miles away.  The beach is about 15 miles away.  Work is 10 miles away.  Everywhere we want or need to go is about 10 miles away (except for Target…that’s only 1.5 miles away, but we always have to drive there because there are no sidewalks).  I guess you could say we’re “in the middle of everything,” while at the time being in the middle of no where.  We are, however, within walking distance of a KFC, if for some reason I ever find the desire to get The Diarrhea.  A quote about our apartment complex from a review found on the internet: “If you like to party, live like a pig and urinate in public this is the place for you.”  I haven’t seen anything to make me feel that way about this place, however we’ve only been here a week.  More to come, perhaps?

4.  The bathrooms…those of you coming to visit will love this.  So Simon and I were pretty excited about having two bathrooms, since we’ve never had two before.  We decided that one bathroom would be the peeing/showering bathroom, and the other would be the poop bathroom.  For those of you coming down here, the guest bathroom happens to be the poop bathroom…sorry about that.  We’ll poop in our own bathroom when you’re here though, unless you don’t mind us using your bathroom for that purpose.  There’s reading materials and spray in there, in case you were wondering.  The peeing bathroom is the one that smells like litterbox…it’s so freaking nasty, I can barely stand it.  The smell permeates into the little hallway that leads to our closet and to our bedroom.  Sometimes I can even smell it from the kitchen.  Gross.  Guests will be spared that.  However, the poop bathroom (and this was poor planning on our part) is the one with the terrible water pressure in the toilet.  We’ve had a few scares.  There is also a good reason why one of our first purchases at Target was a plunger.  

5.  When I first checked into this place, the woman in the office was super bubbly and friendly.  She even said that she had lived in the apartment directly above us when she first moved in here.  I thought that was cool…I always thought it was weird when people that worked at hotel complexes didn’t live there…they must get a discount, right?  So anyway, she’s telling me about how great this complex is…on and on, and I’m eating it right up.  So then the other day, Simon and I were walking to the mailbox when I see her giving a couple girls a tour of an apartment, and I hear her say, “This is the exact apartment I lived in when I first moved here!”  Wait a minute!  How many apartments has this woman actually lived in?  I find her little story about living in the apartment above mine suspect.  Or maybe the one about the other apartment suspect.  Hmmm.  She probably tells everyone that.  She probably doesn’t even live here…and quite possibly never did.  

6.  So as I was unpacking the kitchen and putting things away, I discovered that we have about 15 pint glasses here with us.  All of them are stolen from random bars…La Crosse, North Carolina, Little Rock, Burlington, Minneapolis, Denver, Boston…I may have a bit of a problem.  However, as I was looking at all of them, I was insanely proud of them.  I remember where each of them came from…they basically tell a story of where I’ve been.  I think it’s kinda cool…not that I’m saying that stealing is cool, but having all those little souvenirs and stories to along with them…that’s pretty cool.  

7.  So the other day as I was toting tampons around and being a bear about it, I pondered this thought to Simon.  Supposedly, women get periods because that’s our punishment for Eve eating the apple back in the day in the garden.  That and difficult childbirth, which I hope to never experience.  Anyway, so the point I was pondering…Adam ate the apple first, why aren’t MEN the ones that get periods?  I believe my exact question to Simon was something like, “So why don’t men get the get periods?  What’s their punishment in all of this?”  Simon’s response:  “We have to hear about it.”  Touche…

8.  My dog Brie has always been one to watch TV.  She gets very upset when there are dogs on TV, or when there are people or animals running across the screen.  She’s been known to launch herself off the couch and fly at the TV in a rage.  When said object on TV is unattainable, she paces back and forth in front of the TV with the hair on her back raised, growling the whole time.  When Simon and I were in Burlington, we had cable TV for the first time since we started travel nursing together.  It was a treat…most of the time.  We found out that Brie’s hatred of things on TV has expanded.  It not only includes dogs and people running…we found that she also hates Paula Dean, Li’l Wayne, and the Shake Weight.

9.  While we’re out on assignment, not only does our company find our apartment, but they also hire people to bring in furniture.  Usually it’s pretty nice.  The furniture that we have right now is no exception, except for the kitchen table.  It’s a glass-top table and it looks really nice…however, the table top is not connected to the legs, and there have been a few instances where I’ve been leaning up against the table and the whole tabletop almost topples to the floor.  I think I’ll be lucky if I make it to the end of the assignment without some sort of mishap.  Maybe I should shove the table into the corner so the top can’t fall off.  Or maybe I should try to be less clumsy.  I think we’d be better of just shoving the thing into the corner.

10.  I feel like I instantly acclimated myself to the climate here…either that or there’s a Floridian hidden inside me somewhere.  Hmmm…that doesn’t sound very good.  I can hear Simon right now:  “that’s what she said!”  Back on topic…so we’re down here in Florida.  It’s at least 70 degrees everyday.  Right now it’s around 80.  When we left Burlington, it was in the high 20’s.  So riddle me this…when it drops below 70 here, I’m freezing.  60 degrees and I’ve got my winter coat on.  What’s up with that?  I honestly don’t get it.  I remember one day in Burlington, the temperature got to 30 degrees after a recent cold snap.  I went out and about in a hooded sweatshirt and mittens…I didn’t even wear a coat.  And now I can’t even handle 60?  I don’t get it!  My mom says it’s because of the humidity…and maybe it is.  I just feel like a giant wiener running around in my winter coat in 60 degree weather.  I’m from Minnesota for crying out loud…I shouldn’t get cold until at least 10 below…right??

11.  So we’ve been doing some driving around Fort Myers lately, and I think I’ve figured out what it is about this town that continues to bother me.  We came from cute, quaint little Burlington, Vermont.  I felt like everything in Vermont was very quiet, local, and they were extremely proud of their state and all that it had to offer.  Fort Myers is a chain-store cesspool.  I’m so distracted by billboards while driving down the road that I’m afraid I’m going to get in an accident…I have to make a conscious effort to pay attention to where I’m going because there are so many distractions.  I don’t know if there’s anything local here.  I think the only place where anything is halfway original is down by the beaches, and even then I think the locality of it could be called into question.  And maybe it’s difficult for things to be local in Florida…I’m sure the environment here is conducive to growing only a few select things.  At least that’s what I have in my head…I really don’t have much of an explanation for why this town is the way it is.  I guess I just feel like there’s no culture here, there’s nothing that Fort Myers has that is original and its own.  It’s definitely taking a longer adjustment period than usual.  When I first moved to Burlington, I was a bit taken aback by their lack of chain stores, but I really learned to like it and most of all, appreciate it.  Hopefully with a little more time and some creative exploring, I’ll learn to appreciate what Fort Myers has to offer too.

12.  And finally, I still have yet to see a manatee.  I was looking at a picture of one the other day, and for some reason it reminded me of a pug.  Maybe because it’s round and bumbly, and doesn’t appear to have a whole lot of intelligence.  They might be very smart, I have no idea, but they just don’t look like they would be.  Kinda like pugs.  Maybe that’s why I’m so enthralled with manatees…they remind me of the stupid little dogs that I love so much.  Can’t wait to see one…I know it’ll happen before we leave!

Gator Bait

1.  Florida is headquarters for the active senior.  I honestly couldn’t tell you how many motor homes we passed on our way down here.  We basically followed them…had we left Vermont without any directions, I’m confident that the motor homes would have led us to within a few miles of our destination.  I seriously have never seen so many old people wandering around in all my life.  And they’re not the slow and frail variety…these are the old people that strap bikes to the backs of their motor homes and actually ride them when they get here.  These are old people that zoom around in BMW roadsters.  Old people that run up and down the beaches…or casually walk, holding hands with their equally cute and active little spouse.  It’s very uplifting and encouraging…that could be me and Simon someday!  At the same time that it’s uplifting, it’s also kinda sad.  No matter how active they might be, they’re still up there in years, and someday the annual trip to Florida will become a thing of the past.  They’ll be stuck in Minnesota or some odd place in the north, looking out the snowy windows of their nursing home, thinking about how they used to go to Florida every year where it was warm and sunny.  Depressing…but at the same, it’s motivation to enjoy life as much as you can, while you can.  You just never know when you’re not going to be able to do the fun stuff anymore.

2.  Easiest road trip ever.  I remember insanely dreading the drive in the days leading up to the trip.  Seriously, I felt like this was the fastest trip ever, even though it ended up being the longest.  I think it’s because we gave ourselves more than enough time to get here…we were on the road for three days total, but not three full days.  The first day we did 14 hours of driving, the second day we did 9 hours of driving, and the third day we did 3 hours of driving.  We stayed overnight in a hotel after the second day of driving, which was a dream.  It was so nice to be out of the car and into an actual bed.  We checked in before it got dark, Simon went and worked out (I stayed on the bed…no way was I going to work out!), and we basically just chilled.  We ordered some Chinese food which was awesome…the lo mein was made with spaghetti noodles.  I’ve never had it that way, but it was really good because the noodles weren’t mushy, which is the way they arrive about half the time.  The only downside is the lo mein seemed to act as some sort of bowel cleanser the next morning, which was all right, I guess…got to come out sometime!  Whatever gastric issues might have ensued, I still find myself constantly craving Chinese food…hahaha!  The only negative part of the drive was that there were a lot of cops on the road, especially in New York.  It was probably a good thing that I was pulling the trailer…I definitely drive slower when I’ve got that thing behind me.  Maybe I should just pull it around all the time.  Or not…I think we got about 10 miles to the gallon on the way down…if that.  Let’s see…we went about 1600 miles, I’ve got a 16 gallon gas tank on my Jeep, and we probably filled up about 12 times.  You do the math…I’m scared to.

3.  It was interesting to see the landscape change on the way down.  We left a land full of mountains and bare trees, only to see the land get flatter and flatter the further south we came.  It was funny…a lot of the leafy trees didn’t have leaves for the majority of the drive…then all the sudden it was like we crossed some sort of line and all the trees were green and leafed out.  The grass is kinda brownish-green, which makes everything look a little dull and sad.  I’m assuming it’s the same type of grass that they seem to have everywhere in the South…it doesn’t get green until the temperature is at least a solid 70 degrees everyday.  I think that’s so weird!  We saw our first palm trees in South Carolina, but I don’t think they were naturally supposed to be there…they only seemed to be around overpasses and rest stops and whatnot.  I really don’t think we saw palm trees in their natural state of being until we got close to south Florida.  I absolutely love palm trees.  They make me think of Phoenix, which is weird because palm trees don’t naturally grow in Phoenix, yet they’re everywhere.  They just remind me of sun and warmth and not having to wear mittens and hats.  

4.  This trip also marked the best behavior on the part of the dogs thus far.  Simon and I were very impressed.  Simon even went so far as to call Brie “cute” at one point.  I think she’s finally breaking down his shell!  Cooper didn’t stink up the car with his breath, there was no sharting…even the random toots were kept to a minimum.  I wish they would behave like that all the time.  Lady did have a piece of napkin hanging out of her bum that Simon had to pull out…that was unpleasant for all involved.  Ick.  But other than the napkin, there were no issues.

5.  Fort Myers…we haven’t seen a whole lot of it yet.  I don’t even know how to describe it.  So far it isn’t as pretty of a town as I was expecting, but like I said, we haven’t seen much of it yet.  We live off one of the major north/south roads in the city, so of course both sides of the road are crowded with stores, shops, and more billboards than I’ve ever seen in my life.  I don’t know what it is, but it just looks like kind of like organized chaos.  That and everything is painted in pastels, which looks pretty gaudy and a bit tacky.  There are power-lines everywhere.  I think what I was expecting was more like Tempe and less like Mesa, AZ (for those of you that have been there, you know what I’m talking about).  The land here is very flat which almost gives me a feeling of overexposure.  There are no hills, no mountains, nothing on the horizon at all.  I don’t know how else to explain it but to say that it feels like the sky is very high up.  I know that sounds weird, but when you have hills or mountains to break up the horizon, it seems like the sky isn’t so far away.  I think I’ll get used to it pretty quickly…it just feels weird after living in Vermont, North Carolina, and Minnesota during the past year.  But…I’m trying not to be negative.  I’m sure there are some very pretty parts of town, we just haven’t ventured out enough yet to find them.  We did go to Fort Myers beach today to wander around, which was very pretty.  The waves were so little and calm!  I think I’m going to like that.  I enjoyed battling waves when we were in North Carolina, but it did get a little scary sometimes.  I can’t wait to see Sanibel Island…I’ve heard nothing but wonderful things about it.  Supposedly it’s one of the top three sea-shelling beaches in the world.  How crazy is that?  I didn’t even know they ranked beaches on a sea-shelling scale.  I’ve seen pictures of it, and the beaches almost look like they’re covered in shells rather than sand.  Can’t wait to check it out.

6.  On our way into town we were cruising along, and suddenly on the side of the road was a little pig!  Must have been a little feral guy.  In any case, he was super cute and I wanted to take him with us.  I doubt he would behave though.  Someday I want to own a mini-potbelly pig…they’re so cute!!  I’m kind of excited and intimidated for the wildlife here.  I’m super excited to see a manatee.  There are manatee excursions here that we’ve been hearing about, so we’ll probably go on a manatee trip as soon as we’re settled in.  I don’t know why, but I just love manatees.  I’m going to try to find a t-shirt with a manatee on it.  I want to see a manatee about as badly as I don’t want to see a gator.  Although, I think it would be interesting to see a gator…just not up close.  When we were out on the beach, we saw a lot of dead fish, which I thought was kinda weird.  I’ve never seen so many dead fish along a beach before.  It made me wonder if they got stuck too close to shore during the tide or what.  Or maybe it was just natural causes and they just washed up there.  Who knows?  I can honestly say though that I had no idea what any of them were.  We might have to get a fish book so I can identify the little deadies along the shore.  We saw one that looked like a mini-barracuda, one that looked like a giant angel fish, one that looked like a catfish, and another one that looked like a giant fathead minnow.  Oh, and we saw a dead horseshoe crab too.  We did see lots of birds that were alive though…pelicans, sea gulls, osprey, and some sort of falcon.

7.  Since we got to Florida a little bit early, we’re spending a few days at the La Quinta hotel, which is about a mile from where we’ll be living when our apartment is ready.  Our room has two double beds, and we’ve designated one bed the dog bed, and the other bed the people bed.  Although right now Simon is on the dog bed and Lady is on the people bed…with her head on my pillow, of course.  I swear that dog thinks she’s a human being.  And, since the dog kennel is buried under a mountain of our belongings and we don’t have the motivation to get it out, we’ve placed a blanket in the bathtub and we put the pugs in there when we go anywhere…hahaha!  They’ve already learned to excitedly run in there when I say “get in the tub!”  And people tell me you can’t train a pug.  Honestly, I think they’re just excited because they know that as long as the blanket is the tub, they’re not going to get a bath.

8.  Next to our hotel is this big open lot with a few paved paths in it.  We walked the dogs in there last night so we wouldn’t have to walk along the main road, which is six lanes wide and very noisy.  We were trying to figure out what in the world an open lot would be doing in the middle of all the shops and restaurants and such, and we finally figured out that it must have at one time been a little RV community.  There were electrical boxes periodically spaced, concrete slabs, and an overgrown shuffleboard court.  It’s really a very eerie place, and once you’re about a hundred yards from the main road you can’t even hear the traffic anymore, which gives the whole place a feeling of post-apocalyptic quiet.  There were still a few random remnants and signs of past inhabitance…a broken lawn chair, beer cans, a length of rope, some old tires.  It was all very strange and creepy.  Of course it doesn’t help that there are turkey vultures circling everywhere…makes me think of death.  Pleasant, eh?  

9.  I’ll have to note that while on the walk through the abandoned RV park, it was 60 degrees out and I was wearing my winter jacket.  I must have already acclimated myself because I felt SO cold without it.  How did I make it in the single digits in Vermont?  Right now, I have no idea.  I’ll also note that Simon was making fun of me for putting it on before the walk, but when we were about halfway into the walk, he said he wished that he had his winter jacket on too…so it’s not just me.

10.  Last but not least, yesterday Simon and I made our first trip to Target.  It was very exciting.  I got out of there for just under $80, which is about par for the course for a trip to Target for me.  That place is such a trap!!  I love it though, I really do.  Oh, and we had burgers at 5 Guys today for lunch.  They were absolutely scrumptious!

Anyway, I guess that’s about it from Florida for the moment, looking forward to having visitors in February and March.  Feel free to come visit!