Settling Into The Villa

They say getting here is half the fun. It can also be half the expense! Well, not really. But it did cost us $490 to take three days driving from upstate New York to Florida ($215 in gas, $178 in hotel, and $97 in food). We could have shaved $90 off by doing the trip in two days instead of three, but the would have been more difficult.

We spent most of today figuring out how we would like to set up the house to obtain the greatest domestic efficiency. There are workflows concerning getting ready every morning and shutting things down in the evening that work best under discipline and military-like precision. I stand in the kitchen with the task list on my clipboard making sure no one slacks on their responsibilities! The reward when done? The kids can have their electronics.


I am convinced that summers in Florida must mean rain. It rained yesterday. It rained this afternoon. And as I look at the 10 day forecast, it is unlikely we will get a day without rain! This is very similar to what we experienced last summer: the sunshine state is a thunderstorm capital! There was a tropical storm last summer that dumped rain on us. As luck would have it, Tropical Storm Arthur is building off the Atlantic coast this year! The guy from the maintenance company blamed us, saying we brought our New York Weather to Florida, but, I believe Florida is always like this.

We were gluttons for punishment because we returned to the social experiment called Walmart on Rt 27. Because the Walmart was so crazy yesterday we hit the eject button with only half our groceries. That made breakfast difficult this morning because we had no milk for our cereal. We are eating more at home this trip so our grocery list is crazy large. Now we needed to battle the crowds to obtain our remaining items. The crowd was lighter but the people were just as crazy. In one isle, a 17 year old boy was chasing his 14 year old sister, she was running while pushing a cart and slamming into everyone in attempt to get away. Also, everywhere we found opened and half eaten products. Nevertheless, we made it out of he store with all the groceries we could find and fight for. All the food, soaps, and paper products (some of which will last the entire month) for two days shopping was $500. This had better last a while!

I set my office up in the front bedroom today. One of the established goals of the trip was to give me an office with a view of the Florida neighborhood. That limited the kinds of villas we could rent, but we found the perfect villa! And all day a truck sat parked in front of the house blocking the neighborhood view. Just my luck! I hope the truck is gone tomorrow.

Linda has been hitting her head. No, not some Tourette's fit of slapping herself. She hit her head getting into the van hard enough to make the bells ring. Tonight she hit herself in the face when closing a cupboard door. She hit herself hard enough to nearly knock herself out. They say these things happen in threes so I'm waiting for the next big hit.

After dinner I decided to test my injured ankle with a walk around the neighborhood while everyone else went for a swim. My plan was be jogging around the neighborhood but the Father's Day Ankle injury has sidelined those plans. Maybe later in the trip it'll feel good enough to try a light jog. For now, I keep the ankle in a brace and try not to stay in shoes very long. I walked 3.2 miles on the ankle tonight and it held up well.

We finished the night drinking wine in the living room while watching the Magic Kingdom fireworks overtop the trees in the back yard. So far this has been an expensive trip and we have yet to step food on Disney World. Perhaps tomorrow after work.