Well I can't think of a better birthday gift for my friend, Bridget.  Much to her horror, we have lived in the suburbs for the last 4 years, and yesterday, her 26th birthday, was our first day in our downtown apartment.  After a weekend of packing (and sleeping in the family room), several trips in Mom's SUV and David's "boat," we have almost all of our clothes here as well as our toiletries, most of the refrigerator and pantry.  As the place is fully furnished, we really don't need much else to get by day-to-day.  After reviewing our landlord's selection of cutlery, we decided we definitely need more (I go through the 4 forks provided in a sitting), and our coffee pot also made the initial move (the one cup pot provided won't get Joey out of bed).  I'm glad that we had to make this interim move because it's helped me mentally separate what things I want to take with us from place to place and what things of others I don't mind using. 

I think this move is also going to help us get the dogs trained before we leave.  Which is going to be a monumental task.  After the car ride over (they were all bucked in, much to their chagrin), George decided it'd be a great idea to shit on the entry rug.  Shortly thereafter, I caught Moe lifting his leg over the recliner where Joey was sitting.  Each spanking was followed by attaching a leash, fielding the other two dogs while trying to leave the apartment, trudging down two flights of stairs to "go potty outside."  I believe that's all the accidents we had yesterday, but the rest of the night I couldn't really concentrate on much other than the dogs who were sniffing every corner of the apartment.  Trying to get them to sleep wasn't too bad but Moe was up roaming every hour which just made me nervous.  So, needless to say, I'm exhausted.  When the dogs woke us up at 6, I took Moe and George outside, who decided to charge a Marine in the stairwell and a chihauhau outside.  Our walk to Gray's Lake (where we got a shout-out from Ashley in her Buick) was was diverted due to flooding, but walking by the sculpture garden definitely helped remind me how all the amenities down here are going to outweigh the royal pain in the ass that the dogs have already presented.  I just ordered "the indoor barking dog deterrent" too so between that and the twice daily walks, I think we'll get by.

Here's a few pictures of the place:

TPI Reports

So in case anyone who reads Joey's blog was wondering about my medical clearance, I still don't have it.  After all those trips to the Iowa Clinic (see earlier post), the government is not satisfied.  The first urinalysis had a trace of blood and so did the second (which is totally normal in runners as running on an empty bladder causes slight friction and seeing as I run almost every day it would make sense to find blood), so they required a cytology and visit to a urologist.  So after I peed the third time and the report revealed that (gasp!) everything was fine, I don't have cancer and there is nothing unusual, I was able to cancel my visit to the urologist (thank GOD). 
 
Unfortunately, the cytology report isn't enough to explain away that box I checked for depression.  Ugh Why Did I Do That?!?!  For future reference, for anyone who has to fill out government forms, lie lie lie lie lie.  If you are honest when you fill out the forms you are creating a world of pain for yourself.  So first they sent a TPI report.  Yes, for all of you Office Space fans, it is really called a TPI report.  We asked our friend Michon, who is the PA at Preventative Health (the clinic we used to have an interest in), if she would fill out the form for me.  Which is no easy task, by the way.  This freaking form is about twenty questions, each one of them dumber than the previous, about my treatment and diagnosis and support system and give me a freaking break.  At the bottom of the form it asks that the answers be put in narrative form and submitted to the government.  Well, the nurse from the State Dept contacted Joey and asked that I call her.  Apparently, even though it says so on the form, they do not want a narrative, they want the TPI report.  And they want it from every doctor, psychiatrist, psychologist and therapist I have seen in the last ten years for my depression.  I told her A) I do not have depression anymore B) I know how to handle it (avoid annoying people like her) C) It was caused by growing up, I feel good about myself, am not on medication, love to run and do yoga and I haven't seen a doctor for it in over a year so I'm not sure how the information they provide would be relevant.  Her answer?  "I really need those TPI reports."  OMG!  She just said that the nurses try to collect as much information as they can to get everything ready for the providers who make the decision.  I told her that it's going to take time to get into the doctor and then it's going to cost money because we have a high deductible plan and she just said, sorry that's they way it is and then she told me she'd email me the TPI reports again. 

I called the Iowa Clinic for my records - I have to come in and sign a release and then it will be 7-10 days for their Medical Records department to get them to me.

Oh the frustration!

One more week at our house!  Technically, we don't close until June 25th, but we take possession of our apartment June 15th, and seeing as that has furniture, we are so excited to move in.  Now that the shower is over and I don't have anything else to occupy my mind, it's suddenly become a lot more real.  Today I also met with the manager of the Starbucks downtown, who agreed to let me transfer to his store, which will be very convenient - only 2 blocks away from the loft.

Invitations to the August training class have all pretty much been sent out, and since Joey's clearance is scheduled to be finished tomorrow, we are 95% sure that September 13th is our official start date in DC. Having an actual date makes things a lot more real too!  We are also about 85% sure we have found a place to live in DC.  Actually, its in the "urban village" Shirlington, which is very close to Arlington, VA, which is where Joey will be training/working.  We're really excited about the place - its this super cute newly renovated apartment complex called Windsor at Shirlington Village.  It has a shuttle directly to the metro, and I believe where Joey works is right across the street, so this is clutch given DC's notorious traffic.  It also has its own 7000 sq ft exercise facility and is right by the running trail that takes you into DC (it's only 3 miles).  They usually only take 2 dogs per apartment (I've been confronted with this restriction at almost every one of the million places I've inquired) but Windsor agreed to make an exception!  Here's the link for the apartment if you're interested: http://www.windsorcommunities.com/apartments/northern-va/shirlington/


Another perk is the nearby Shirling- ton Village (see picture), which has tons of restaurants and cute shops and is apparently very dog friendly.  Also, two dog parks are within walking distance which will be crucial given the three dogs living in a 900 sq ft apartment.  Apparently Shirlington is also home to many other FSOs as well as other young professionals, which is really exciting because hopefully it'll be easy to make new friends.  It definitely makes it easier to move knowing where we are going is neat - be it downtown Des Moines or Shirlington, VA.

The garage is finally clean!  After 4 hours Saturday and another 5 Sunday of sorting, trashing, sweeping, hosing and deck brushing, our garage is ready for a party!  I can't believe how much stuff we have accumulated in our garage alone (and we cleaned it out last year too).  Luckily for us, our neighbor took most of our gardening materials off our hands, and after a truckload to Goodwill and another truckload to the dumpster, we only have a few things left to get rid of, all of which are listed on Craigslist.  One of which was our grill - last year, our neighbor, Jake, bought a new grill and gave us his old one - a really nice stainless steel Amana grill.  It worked fabulously until one fateful day I grilled some chicken and then left the burners on high on a full tank of propane...all night.  Yes, I realize we are lucky the siding wasn't burnt, let alone the house, but the poor grill was toast.  So we listed it on Craigslist as free yesterday at 1:40 pm.  Within 2 hours literally 30 people had emailed about it.  Anyway, we called the first guy to come get it and this hillbilly in cowboy boots rolls up in this twenty year old beat up rusted out compact car.  He told Joey to just put it in the trunk, tied it up with some twine and away he went!  Now we just have to sell an electric trimmer, lawn mower, circular saw, lawn spreader, and 2 pink doors (I don't even know), and a vacuum.  If anybody's interested...

St. Jude

I decided that I needed something constant to keep me balanced during this process, and on the same token, something to look forward to.  So I've been running.  Dam2Dam is only 2 weeks away (ahhh!), then I'm running the Twin Cities 1/2 Marathon on the 4th of July.  And, since I had such a great experience with the Des Moines half-marathon last October, I decided to run the Marine Corps Marathon (MCM) in Washington, D.C. this October.  I'm really excited about it as we will be living right there for one of the top marathons in the world!  Not to mention it's my first marathon and it goes right by all the inspiring monuments.  And, with the pace I've been setting lately, my ultimate goal is to use it as a qualifier for Boston.

So the only problem is, since the MCM is such a popular race, when I went to register on April 16th (registration opened April 7th), it was full!  I couldn't believe that 30,000 spots had already been sold.  It said on their website that a limited number of charity registrations were available, so I found one through St. Jude.  Now I just have to raise some money for them, which is actually kind of cool because I feel like it gives my running a more selfless purpose.  For more information on the St. Jude's Heroes program, here's the link:

https://waystohelp.stjude.org/sjVPortal/public/displayUserPage.do?userId=473486&programId=401&eventId=106816

We finally got our hotel for New Orleans booked!  After hours (seriously) of searching haunted hotels and B&Bs and then looking at their reviews on TripAdvisor and then going back and forth with Joey, I finally found a place in the French Quarter that is haunted, not overly floral, and not overly expensive: the Omni Royal Orleans.  We got a room through hotels.com for half of the rate on Omni's own website! 

I also finally got another item crossed off my list today.  After one exam (including a urinalysis), three separate blood draws, a second urinalysis, an attempted pick up of incomplete paperwork and finally today's pickup of actually completed paperwork - yes that is 7 visits to the Iowa Clinic in the last 3 weeks - I can finally fax in my medical clearance forms to the government.  So is the government really that particular?  Well, yes, but really, the Iowa Clinic is just that incompetent.  My first visit I brought the paperwork in with me and explained that every test had to be performed and every blank filled out and apparently even though the doctor is considered capable of assessing my health, she is not capable of reading and filling out forms.   First they called me back for a second urinalysis because the first one didn't come out right (even though this was not actually something the government asked for), then they called me back for a second blood draw because they forgot a test, then when Joey went to pick up the paperwork half the blanks were still not filled in and the doctor had written in the margins about my urinalysis (again, even though this information was not requested by the government).  So yesterday I went in for my third blood draw (and we all know how much I love needles) and today they finally had the paperwork completed.  R -EE - diculous.  According to one of the books we bought, Realities of Foreign Service Life, this process is tame compared to the process for medical clearance when leaving some third-world countries.  They call it a "shit kit."  Oh the ways my life is going to change...

Today was a big day - we got rid of the last of our furniture. Our friends Kate and Matt bought our living room set, kitchen table and chairs and our bedroom set today. They were nice enough to leave us our mattress, box spring and bed frame so we don't have to sleep on the floor for the next month, but they took everything else! First we sold the patio furniture last week, then we sold the office furniture, then we sold the futon and now it's all gone. Thank God Mom and Dad were nice enough to loan us a few folding tables so we've got one in the kitchen on which to eat, one in the family room as our "staging area" (Joey suggested we clean out the garage and use that until I reminded him our house is empty) and one in the office. Joey's getting out the old lawn chairs now for the family room and he said "It's like 4 years ago when we bought these things" when we were waiting for our furniture to arrive in the townhouse! Kinda crazy how it's all come full circle.  Moe is totally confused. He really seems at a loss without the furniture. George and Max are loving all the extra room to play. I think I'm really going to miss my dresser tomorrow morning at 5:30 am when I'm scrambling to get to work on time and can't find my underwear.
It really does make things seem a lot more final. When we got home tonight from David's drum show and my cute counter table and chairs were gone it did make me a little sad but it is kind of cathartic and cleansing too - we are no longer going to be defined by our possessions I guess! The only piece of furniture we haven't sold is our settees/banquettes (whatever you want to call them). I can't decide what to do with them. I love them but I know I can't take them with me and I know I can store them but who knows if I'll want them when/if we are done with this adventure. Then there's the little things that I can't decide whether or not to take with me or store, like the art we bought on our honeymoon. If we leave it here and store it, we won't get to enjoy it but then we don't risk it being lost or damaged in transit. Lots of hard decisions!  Every time I move I'm reminded how much crap I accumulate.  Even after selling all the furniture and my parent's garage sale this weekend in which I sold a ton of crap, we still have so much stuff that we need to sort through.  I think learning to live with less is going to be a very valuable experience.