on THE MOST DISGUSTING THING EVER

Everyone will be happy to know that we have successfully been living in Florida for three weeks.

Everyone will NOT be happy to know that THIS IS GROWING IN MY LIVING ROOM:

GROSS.

Excuse me while I hurl my guts.

Yesterday, Ricky spotted a lizard crouched under the edge of the lovesac.  Excited (we like lizards), we moved the lovesac out of the corner to capture said lizard, thereby revealing these lovely moldy creatures growing out of my carpet. We told the property manager, who seemed really unperturbed by the whole thing, and someone's supposed to be coming today to look at it.  In the meantime, every time I take a breath my brain convinces me that I'm sucking in super-deadly poisonous spores and my lungs will collapse at any moment.

It turns out that our washing machine connection was leaking in the lanai next door...which probably means that we're going to have to pay for the repairs.  The lanai is outdoors, which means the water would've evaporated if it wasn't so dang humid!  I'm hoping it's not as bad as it looks (because we're really quite poor), but we all know that mushrooms are a sign of a well-developed mold system, which means replacing carpet, floorboards, etc.  Feel free to send prayers our way.

If you need me, I'll be sitting here wearing a surgical mask.

EDIT: We never did find the lizard.

on playing catch-up

You know that feeling after you haven't blogged (or journaled) for a long time?  That feeling where you look at your most recent entry and realized all the stuff you've done since then?  Being completely overwhelmed at the thought of writing all those painful play-by-play descriptions of life events that will, inevitably, take hours to accomplish?  Procrastinating the inevitable blogging for that very reason?

Yeah.

Luckily, technology has provided a useful tool for blogging procrastination: the digital camera.  With this handy device, you can take pictures of everything you do, storing these photos neatly on your hard drive and telling yourself that this makes up for not writing about said life events....because look at all the pictures you have!!!

I looked at a picture on my computer the other day, and I had no idea what it was of or why I took it.  The only indication I had of its identity or value was the iPhoto album it was in, and that wasn't much help.  Cool, huh? 

As far as record-keeping goes, Katie's writing > Katie's picture-taking.

I realized this morning that I have been fastidiously updating my other blog and leaving this one woefully neglected.  So, utilizing my pictures (ha), here is a recap of the last month:

We went to Philadelphia!

The weekend before we left for Florida, we drove Ricky's car up to my parents' house to leave with them until my dad can drive it down to FL on Labor Day weekend. While we were up there, we decided to visit Philadelphia!  (SUCH a good choice.)

Ricky had a cheesesteak!  (I had a gyro.  I'm unconventional.)

We met up with Angela! :D (In line for the Liberty Bell...)

We saw the Liberty Bell!

Ben Franklin's grave!

The churchyard was closed, but when has that ever stopped someone from taking pictures through the gate?

We waited in a super long line to see Independence Hall!

We saw Independence Hall!

And the inside! 

These are the stairs from the musical 1776, which happens to be the BEST MUSICAL EVER.  A security guard was eying me suspiciously as I snuck away from the tour group to take this. 

George Washington's original chair! (Excuse the blurry--there was some crowd jostling.)

We saw Valley Forge!

We saw a free "Shakespeare on the Green" play (Much Ado About Nothing) at the Washington Memorial Chapel at Valley Forge!  (And it was awesome!)

And this, at the Washington Memorial Chapel used bookstore.  HAHA!

We took pictures with these right before we left BV for FL:

Really, we were driving the moving truck out of town when we stopped to take these.  How could we not?  And yes, I am wearing the same shirt from Philadelphia, but all my clothes were packed!

We moved to Florida!  

And man, is it beautiful or what?  You forget what the sunset looks like when you've had mountains in the way for three years.  Cameras never do them justice.

Whew.

Again, I know pictures don't do my life justice, but that's a whole lot to catch up on.  I'll try to do better from now on. :)  In the meantime, Ricky's first day of law school orientation was yesterday (yes, I did take a picture of it) and my first day of grad school orientation is TODAY!  Hopefully it'll mostly be students my age, because so far all the people Ricky and I have met are a lot older than we are;  surprisingly enough, all the law students that we go to church with are in their 30s...plus, they all have at least one child, so 24-year-old Ricky feels pretty young, and 21-year-old me feels practically like an infant.

While we're on the subject of Floridians, Ricky and I are also trying to find someone who understands our sense of humor.  Just one person would be great, really.  All the married-with-children couples here kind of smile politely when we, the Jensens, start some sort of verbal banter that the dear Bagleys or Ondriceks (or any of our VA friends, really) would pick up on.  It's like playing Wii tennis when the other person can never reach the ball in time to hit it back. 

In the meantime, I'm in the process of refinishing our dresser and finishing the apartment decorating.  And by "finishing," I mean "putting up stuff we already have," which isn't a whole lot.  Further decorating will come when I find a job, hopefully at a Books-A-Million or Barnes and Noble or Borders or something equally up my ally, and have a little extra money.  Between law school books, grad school books, and buying off doctors to give me prescription medication (a.k.a., spending $130 to sit in the room for five minutes, tell them what's wrong with me, and have them sign a piece of paper), we're not too eager to spend any more money.  Unless it's on dark chocolate ice cream, because I could REALLY go for some of that right now.