Three Months After Moving Off Base

This coming weekend will mark three months living in my house, and I couldn’t be any happier.  After moving out of the barracks on Fort Carson to a house located in a town south of the base, it did take some getting used to.  I mean, I’ve been living on bases for seven and a half years, being used to the bugle calls, inspections, and other random garbage that comes to living in the barracks.  One thing I didn’t like was that I got really sick for the first couple of weeks living there.  I don’t know if it was an adjustment sickness, or just the Army crud leaving my body.  Anyways, I started getting better late in April and continued to do some of the processing out that I missed.  I didn’t have to be in too big of a hurry because for one I was staying in the area, and I was getting medically retired, which put me in the same situation as twenty-plus year retirees.  I ended up finishing my processing out in the middle of May, got my DD-214, and waited till my ETS date to turn in my CAC card for my retirement card.  As I was waiting, I started to organize some of my possessions at my house, putting my things where I want them as I start to get furniture for the place.   Also, I began my routine of taking care of my house and property by killing weeds, mowing the lawn (which I had to borrow my neighbor’s mower for), trimming trees on what I can do with the limited tools I have, and picking up leaves and branches after bad storms.  There was a bad hail storm that came through my town in the middle of May that took down some huge branches from all of my trees in my yard.  The good thing that came out of the storm is that now I have firewood for once I get a fire pit, but the bad thing is the town doesn’t have a brush pickup service so I have to cut the branches down little by little to put in my garbage can for pickup every week.  As a result, I have a pile of branches in my backyard that slowly shrinks every week when I cut them for the garbage.  However, I’m going to try a place to dump the brush before it starts getting really cold here in Colorado.  

Quite nice, I do say 

In late June I went back to Illinois to visit my parents and some friends of mine for about two weeks.  The main reason for the trip was to discuss with my folks on how to bring some access furniture they have that was going to be given to me over to my house.  After much planning, we decided to do the shipping in September or October, around my birthday.  But it was good to see my parents and friends during my stay in Illinois, I got to go to a White Sox (the first time in ten years), I saw some friends I haven’t seen in many years, and along seeing the areas I grew up in and around.  I am still sad and angered at how Illinois is right now.  When going by areas hung out in, I saw the deterioration of neighborhoods that used to be very nice when I was younger.  I left Illinois to go back home after the Fourth of July, I loaded my car up with as much of my stuff as possible from my parent’s house and went on the road.  My dad drove out to my house as well, with his truck filled with some of my things along with what my parents gave me.  The trip took two days, only because my father wanted to stop at a hotel.  When we got to my house, I showed him around the place.  My dad was very pleased, he loved the house and the neighborhood.  Then, to my surprise, my mom was coming out to see me as well.  She ended up flying to Colorado for a weekend stay in the area.  To my surprise, my mom liked the house but made a lewd comment about the population in the area, which resulted in me not having her meet my neighbors.  My mom ended up flying back to Illinois on Monday and my dad left a couple days later.  In the end, it seemed to be good that my folks came to visit.  To my surprise, I ended up getting quite a few things from them, like a lawnmower, television, bed, air compressor, washer and dryer, lawn chairs, an outdoor grill, a new garage door opener, and even a printer for my computer.  Now, as I continue to organize all my possessions to where I want everything, I now have to start finding some furniture, preferably shelves so I can start getting my books off the floor, and also get my sports card collection in a nice storage area as oppose to the floor.  There’s a lot of work that comes with a house, and surprisingly enough, I don’t mind it one bit.