Alpena

So, my mom and I went up to Alpena yesterday and spent the night and spent all day today looking around the town and looking at a couple of rentals....The town made good impressions, its right on Lake Huron and is quite pretty, there is also a very nice downtown which is important to me and there are plenty of big box stores so really there isn't anything we would need elsewhere. As for the rentals, the first one we looked at was one that I found on Craiglists last night about two minutes after it was posted. We talked to the owner and he suggested we drive out and see it first and then let him know if we wanted it...so we did, it was small and we weren't totally impressed but decided we might as well see it. So today it was the first one we saw, and it actually ended up being the one we went with because the inside really made up for the lackluster exterior. It's two bedrooms one bath all new flooring, new bathroom, washer and dryer, will be a new fridge and a nice stove when he gets them put in. It has a one car garage which I will be loving in the winter and the landlord was really willing to be flexible on the lease terms and allowing our puppy! So it was a win-win situation and I'm looking forward to getting all of our stuff up there and getting settled.
From the other rentals we saw, one scared the heck out of us (smelled like cat pee and the landlady was not someone you'd want to meet in a dark alley!) and the other one was really neat. I loved the architecture of it (super high ceilings and neat details) but it was more of a house I'd want to buy and put time and money into rather than live there...it was a half a house so we would have people above us and there was no garage or washer and dryer. So we ended up with the first rental and I'm happy with it.
I'll be working in Traverse City on Monday and then spending the rest of the week working from my mom's house doing research on my communities and learning all of the policies for my new council! Then Friday I'll be flying out to Arkansas and picking up the rental truck and starting to get it filled, finishing that on Saturday, going to my friends wedding and spending some quality time with my friends before leaving bright and early Sunday morning! Gonna be a long trip, it took me about 13 hours when I did it, stopping only occasionally for gas/a walk break, but it's going to be quite a bit longer this time because of the rental truck and having to stop and give Guinness plenty of opportunities to run around and such....ugh two cross country trips in as many weeks...and then add on the 4+ hour trip to Alpena. But we won't be doing that until Monday...we'll spend the night Sunday at my parents house, pick up my car and then do that trek....
That's all for updates for now... :-)