Texas, I'm heeeere!
After sufficiently depleting my savings account to move to the great state of Texas, I'm finally here, partially moved in and driving a little silver mini car. I drive 22 minutes to work and I'm really enjoying most of the people so far.
It's hot down here. I mean really hot. And its (thankfully?) rained about every other day since I've been here. I'm counting my blessings about that however my hair is thinking something totally different.
My apartment is great. I swore I'd never live in another one but as far as community living goes, this one is pretty great. The smoke alarms went off intermittently at 7:40am the very first morning I was here. I was paranoid that they were waking up all the neighbors and called the maintenance guy (who is very nice but wasn't so happy about me waking him up on Sunday morning) who told me to remove the batteries in them. I was under the impression that they were electric and not battery operated. The trouble was that I couldn't reach them due to the high ceilings and my short stature. The smoke alarms ended up dismantled completely and finally the alarms and beeping ceased.
I drove to Austin last Thursday to take my provisional veterinary exam which I'm relieve to say went well. I passed and learned that I had to get registered with the Department of Safety before I could prescribe any drugs to my patients. So I leave downtown Austin with the appropriate paperwork and get caught in a downpour a block and half from my $7 parking spot. I finally find the DPS office only with the help of my GPS and still with great difficulty and attempt to choose between a whole alphabet of buildings and manage to arrive at 4:44pm worrying that I will be turned away 500 miles from home with no license. Building E was the ticket and I got my license successfully. I drove a total of more than 1000 miles in the rain, braved Dallas morning rush hour traffic and Austin evening rush hour traffic and I made it - only slightly worse for the wear. The bad news was that I have to make a repeat trip in October to the campus of the University of Texas to take another exam over the same material to get my final license. Hopefully, it won't be raining.
I proceeded in getting acclimated and into a routine at work. I was driving down my parkway to go home two days ago and my truck made an awful sound. I smelled burning rubber and saw smoke. I checked it out when I got home. This was not good and it was 7:30pm so all the garages were closed. After a mercy ride from a colleague's brother I made it work - vehicleless. I drove the vet truck home and arranged to take my Yukon in and pick up a rental car. Once I got back to the house I learned that the vet truck was too long to fit in the garage and had to park it three spaces over in the only vacant spot and run an extension cord across the lot and sidewalk to plug it in so it wouldn't be dead in the morning. Up at the crack-of-dawn this morning I dropped the truck off yet again (they didn't have the rental car last night) and had the dealership take me back to my apartment. I drove the vet truck back to work and arranged for a shuttle to pick me up from work - a total disaster and entirely a story of it's own. I made it back to the dealership about 7pm and awaited my rental car. It was supposed to be a Malibu since the service representative couldn't get me a truck. There waiting for me was the most awesome tiny, scratched up, silver Kia Rio that smelled like smoke. I think a scooter would have been equivalent. But hey, it runs and they are paying for it. $1600.00+ later we'll see how it goes.
Wish me luck! Tomorrow it's venturing to get my Texas driver's license! I'm really about licensed out.
It's hot down here. I mean really hot. And its (thankfully?) rained about every other day since I've been here. I'm counting my blessings about that however my hair is thinking something totally different.
My apartment is great. I swore I'd never live in another one but as far as community living goes, this one is pretty great. The smoke alarms went off intermittently at 7:40am the very first morning I was here. I was paranoid that they were waking up all the neighbors and called the maintenance guy (who is very nice but wasn't so happy about me waking him up on Sunday morning) who told me to remove the batteries in them. I was under the impression that they were electric and not battery operated. The trouble was that I couldn't reach them due to the high ceilings and my short stature. The smoke alarms ended up dismantled completely and finally the alarms and beeping ceased.
I drove to Austin last Thursday to take my provisional veterinary exam which I'm relieve to say went well. I passed and learned that I had to get registered with the Department of Safety before I could prescribe any drugs to my patients. So I leave downtown Austin with the appropriate paperwork and get caught in a downpour a block and half from my $7 parking spot. I finally find the DPS office only with the help of my GPS and still with great difficulty and attempt to choose between a whole alphabet of buildings and manage to arrive at 4:44pm worrying that I will be turned away 500 miles from home with no license. Building E was the ticket and I got my license successfully. I drove a total of more than 1000 miles in the rain, braved Dallas morning rush hour traffic and Austin evening rush hour traffic and I made it - only slightly worse for the wear. The bad news was that I have to make a repeat trip in October to the campus of the University of Texas to take another exam over the same material to get my final license. Hopefully, it won't be raining.
I proceeded in getting acclimated and into a routine at work. I was driving down my parkway to go home two days ago and my truck made an awful sound. I smelled burning rubber and saw smoke. I checked it out when I got home. This was not good and it was 7:30pm so all the garages were closed. After a mercy ride from a colleague's brother I made it work - vehicleless. I drove the vet truck home and arranged to take my Yukon in and pick up a rental car. Once I got back to the house I learned that the vet truck was too long to fit in the garage and had to park it three spaces over in the only vacant spot and run an extension cord across the lot and sidewalk to plug it in so it wouldn't be dead in the morning. Up at the crack-of-dawn this morning I dropped the truck off yet again (they didn't have the rental car last night) and had the dealership take me back to my apartment. I drove the vet truck back to work and arranged for a shuttle to pick me up from work - a total disaster and entirely a story of it's own. I made it back to the dealership about 7pm and awaited my rental car. It was supposed to be a Malibu since the service representative couldn't get me a truck. There waiting for me was the most awesome tiny, scratched up, silver Kia Rio that smelled like smoke. I think a scooter would have been equivalent. But hey, it runs and they are paying for it. $1600.00+ later we'll see how it goes.
Wish me luck! Tomorrow it's venturing to get my Texas driver's license! I'm really about licensed out.
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