Arizona: One-week later

As many of you know, I arrived in Pheonix last week after a semi-grueling 1,755 mile, 26.5 hour, cross-country drive. Though it was tough to leave my family and despite seeing some interesting things a long the way, I’m happy to be here and it’s been one hell of a first week.

The Bachelor Life

For the next two-months I will be living out of a studio apartment and I have to say, after just one-week, I hate it. It’s boring and claustrophobic. The only change of scenery I have at ‘home’ is going to the john. I have no computer, no WiFi and am too cheap to upgrade from the free basic-cable. First world problems, I know.

At least there was that domestic disturbance the other day from around 4:30 in the morning until about 9:00 a.m. Some extremely angry woman hurled rocks and loud obscenities at a guy who was, presumably, her now former boyfriend. He was rather accommodating to her demands to return her stuff by throwing some of it over the balcony to her. It’s been awhile since I’ve heard that many f-bombs and other highly descriptive adjectives being screamed at 100+ decibels.

The Bachelor Life, Part II

Then there was the missing shower knob that prevented me from, well, taking a shower. For five-days I just figured I didn’t know how to turn the damn thing on so I took baths. I was actually embarrassed to call the property manager to ask how to turn on the shower. Fortunately the fix was quick and I can now clean myself without sitting down.

The Bachelor Life, Part II

Oh. There was also the laundry incident.

Luckily, the apartment complex’s laundry facilities are about 10-feet from my door which is very convenient. It costs $1.50 to wash and $1.00 to dry. Thus a very doable $2.50 per load.

So with my $5.00 pre-purchased laundry card (the machines do not take quarters) I was perfectly calculated for 2-loads of clothes and towels. After Load #1 was washed, I proceeded to put the wet clothes into what I thought was a front-loading dryer. It wasn’t. It turned out to be another washing machine.

Doing the math: $4.50 of my original $5.00 was spent washing three loads of laundry. I had nothing left on the card to pay for the dryer. And as luck would have it: the front office to where I could put more money on my card was closed for the night. I had little choice but to gather up all of my wet clothes and head off to the laundromat where I was forced to purchase another card for $5.00 and THEN add another $2.00 of credit in which to use their dryers.

My laundry night should’ve lasted an hour, tops, and cost $5.00. Instead, I had to drive a couple of miles and spend a total of two-and-a-half hours cleaning clothes that ended up costing $11.50.

Healthy Living

In the past seven-days I’ve exercised six times. This included a couple of runs through a park, a pair of visits to LA Fitness, a quick workout during lunch at the gym at work, and a hike up Camelback Mountain. Now this is something I can get used to.

I’ve also loaded up on chicken breasts, turkey burgers, and have reduced snacking a lot. I feel better, for sure. Hopefully I can keep it going and start to look better as well.

The Dry-Heat

Finally, the weather. This past week temperatures have approached record highs for this time of year ranging from 92 to 97 degrees in Phoenix. Coming from Chicago – after the worst Winter in history – this should be a bit of a shock, but it hasn’t been. It’s been nice, actually.

I’m really starting to get the whole dry-heat thing. Trust me, without the humidity a 95-degree day is so much easier to tolerate. Yeah, it’s hot but it’s not sticky; it’s not restrictive.

Then again, talk to me when it reaches 110 in July.