A Whole New World

The title of this post is an obscure reference to Disney (always have to throw a little in there). Anyway -- yesterday was my first full day living in the Florida panhandle. Jamie has lived in our house here, off-and-on, for about 3 years. Yesterday was the first time I ever stepped foot in it. The house is situated in a small town called DeFuniak Springs. We're about an hour east of Pensacola -- sort of in the middle of nowhere. Lindsey helped her dad move into this house and she's been back down here one other time when she and some of her girlfriends came to Florida. I think both Lindsey and Jamie were very nervous about my reaction to living "in the middle of nowhere," considering I'm used to living in a large city. I was pleasantly surprised with the house. It's smaller than our house in Columbus (no basement, of course), but it's very nice.

We took a drive down to the airport near Ft. Walton Beach yesterday to retrieve Jamie's car out of long-term parking. There's lots of trees and green here in the panhandle. Very pretty. We are a short distance from Eglin Air Force Base and we learned yesterday that the base will very soon be bringing in tens of thousands of military men and women and families as part of a base realignment effort. Base housing is or soon will be full, so there should be lots of people looking for offsite housing. I'm hopeful that someone will want to buy this house so we can get on with our plan to move to central Florida. We got very lucky in that the guy who lives next door is in the air force and knows a lot of military folks who would love to have the furniture that's currently in our house. We weren't quite sure how we were going to get rid of all of this stuff before our furniture and other belongings arrive here from Columbus. So, we shall donate pretty much everything in this house to one or more military families and that will be that.

Because Jamie had been back in Columbus for over a year, with a short trip back to Florida before we moved down here, a lot of basic maintenance issues have gone undone at the house for quite some time. The yard is a disaster -- more weeds than grass, and a lot of overgrown brush and bushes. The vinyl siding on the house was filthy (seriously, disgusting) so today we got up early and powerwashed the house. It's amazing what a little bleach and a powerwasher can do. The place looks practically brand new. I can't wait to get the edger and the lawnmower going. Now might be a good time to buy stock in a popular brand of weed-and-feed, because we're about to spend a few dollars on a large supply in order to bring this grass back to life.

Anyway, things are going well. Aside from the fact that I miss my girls and other family and friends, I'm very happy. I'll post more later.