Sumter, SC

This past Thursday we decided to take a trip down to SC to actually check out some fo the rental property in the area. Ya know... since we had the time and since Ed STILL had no orders. He still doesn't, by the way, but they say he will have them within the next day or so.

And people seriously want the govt. MORE involved in our lives? Are they stupid?

Sorry. Didn't mean to go there.

Anyway... We loaded the boy up in the car and headed on down. It's really not that far -- only a 2.5-3 hr drive. That's kinda nice. My friends from NC could come visit. Columbia has a nice zoo, I hear.

Oops! Another tangent.

I had gone online to search for properties available in the area and then I got out my handy-dandy little map and highlighted where we needed to go. We had a plan and we were stickin' to it or somebody was gonna get hurt. :)

We got there and drove up to the first house on our map. It was a little out of our price range, but if ther is no availablity on base for Ed, then the military will be paying anyway. We wanted to keep our options open, ya know?

The house was super cute. Fairly new. In a nice neighborhood about 5 minutes from the base. There was a big yard and trees all over for privacy. As we wer backing out, the military couple who was moving out of that house pulled up. They let us take a peek inside. I fell in love and was ready to sign a lease then and there -- even with no orders.

Ed insisted we check out some of the less expensive properties on our list. Here's the thing.there was stuff that was waaaaaayyyy below what we could afford and stuff (like that first house) that was just out of our price range. Nothing in between. That made me nervous. And rightfully so.

We journeyed on to our next stop. We had to stop by a realtor's office to pick up some keys to a house we wanted to look at. We should have left immediately after talking to the receptionist. While I am a little country and many of my friend are very country, this woman was waaaayyyyy country. I almost could not understand her. Seriously.

I asked her if she knew about the area where this particular house was located. She kind of laughed and said, "I ain't never lived there. The girl who lived there before got a little boy, I think. They live there six months or so." (I can't bring myself to type exactly the way she talked, so use your imagination).

Her response should have been clue #2 that we should just skip that one.

The house was on a 1 acre lot and was only $450.mo. Ed had asked the realtor on the phone the day before why the house was so cheap. She just laughed and said ti was a small house. Too many people laughin' about this house, if you ask me.

We drove out there anyway. As we pulled onto the DIRT ROAD we justlooked at each other and hoped for the best. Then we had to pull onto the "lawn" to park. HA! I looked to the left of the house and saw that the neighbors had decorated their yard nicely. They had an old dilapidated boat, and a rusted out truck they were using for planters. Their lawn furniture consisted of a blue flowery loveseat and chair. I'm NOT kidding.

The actual house we looked at was not BAD, but it definitely was not anything I'd CHOOSE to live in.

So, we continued on. We drove by 4 or 5 apartment complexes that had woodpanels in the windows, broke down air conditioning units in the "lawn" and half-naked "ladies" getting dressed in front of the open window. These would be the places that were below our price range.

There was one apartment complex that was right in our price range. We got there and it was like really bad deja vu all over again. I was smack back in Daytona Beach.

The manager there had the same personality as the mgr. in FL. The look of the apartments was the same. Everything. We did get a key to check out a vacant apartment. As we walked there we passed at LEAST 20 or so dead roaches. These weren't jsut roaches though. They were those palmetto bugs. You know. The roaches that dive-bomb your head and that are about as big as Eddie's foot.

And once we saw the actual apartment, we decided that was definitely not hte place for us.

We did find one apartment complex that was SLIGHTLY less expensive than the houses on the upper end of the $$$ scale so we went there too. They were nice -- for apartments. Spacious. Clean. New. Quiet. Not in the ghetto. However, after the deposits and pet rent (grrr!), the apartments turned out to really not be that great of a deal.

So... Still no place to live. Still no orders. Lease still up on Oct. 31. Ed will be in Charlotte tomorrow with the Guard. Hopefully he will get what he needs then and will be on his way to SC.