tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8885384159016667608.post3606309030506059708..comments2023-09-22T07:36:02.136-05:00Comments on Krista Phillips - Author: Lesson Learned: Good things come to those who wait!Krista Phillipshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10772828583379163612noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8885384159016667608.post-26351109157239093892013-04-11T22:50:42.426-05:002013-04-11T22:50:42.426-05:00Oh my goodness, this totally made me laugh!!! Yes,...Oh my goodness, this totally made me laugh!!! Yes, lesson definitely learned!Krista Phillipshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10772828583379163612noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8885384159016667608.post-65012144417082333052013-04-11T22:18:42.536-05:002013-04-11T22:18:42.536-05:00We'd moved and gotten a substantial raise to m...We'd moved and gotten a substantial raise to move and figured we could handle the cost of a nice apartment...nope. Cost of living on other things had risen in the new town, so we had to get back to something that cost about the same as where we came from..... but in the new city, I checked out every possibility in the one day I took off work. There were things like moldy floors and slugs and houses cracked all the way through and sitting right on the noisy interstate and I was about to cry, until I came to this last apartment complex. The interior was newly painted, dishwasher, nice carpet, nice exteriors, quiet dead end street and most importantly no slugs!<br /><br />I asked the landlord lady if it was a nice neighborhood. "Oh yes, quiet, family friendly. And I only have two apartments left."<br /><br />Told hubby that was our only choice. I usually make sound decisions, so I don't recall that he went and looked. Paid the penalty to get out of our lease and got the moving truck for the next weekend to avoid paying for two apartments and to make sure we didn't lose the new one.<br /><br />We moved in a snow storm on Saturday. When we got there, it was like a party going on in the parking lot. We had filthy little kids scoping out our stuff, music blaring from several different cars with their doors wide open, lots of people staring at us (we happened now to be the second set of Caucasians in the apartment complex....which I'm not complaining, the other white family was the ones we ended up most afraid of!) but having a white family move into your neighborhood did bring a lot of people out to watch us!<br /><br />And then after everything was in the house, if it could be possible, the noise got louder, the party outside got worse, there was a verbal fight outside and someone trying to get into our car....I called the landlord crying. "You told me this was a quiet place--this is a drunken party zone!!!! I've not even been here an hour, how can I get out of this???"<br /><br />Interestingly, she was not as nice and sympathetic and helpful during the phone call like during the tour. Of course, she wouldn't let us out of the lease--we could very well have been the only ones she expected to pay since I know several of them were squatters...and not afraid to trash up a place and sit outside daring the landlord to kick them out!<br /><br />We called it the Mexican circus because almost every night, the Hispanic part of the population would go out in their cars and open their doors and windows and blast traditional Hispanic music (but no one of course, played the same song at the same time!) so they'd turn it up to hear their own song choices....<br /><br />We had several arrests, our taillights were smashed out a couple times, my hubby became the local handyman because this apartment was not high priority. I can't tell you how many times my hubby fixed kicked in doors or fixed smashed in locks for free because there were kids inside, etc. And of course, we like quiet, so we were always the ones out at 2 am shouting for them to turn it down so we could sleep and go to work!!! The Hispanics thankfully did turn it down . . . some and usually with a bit of respect, but if we were ever to ask the white family below us to turn down their movie blasting from surround sound at midnight, we'd hear them cuss us out for the next hour or more after they turned up their movie louder.<br /><br />We slept with earplugs in for the rest of the time we were there.<br /><br />I now know not to take a landlord's opinion for truth and to visit the neighborhood we want to live in on a Friday or Saturday night.<br /><br />We woke up, randomly, years later swearing that we'd heard the "duh, duh, duh, dum dum duh, duh, duh" of the bass of traditional music outside coming back to haunt us.Melissa Jagearshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07439765292197683329noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8885384159016667608.post-20972187829967324582013-04-11T21:33:22.756-05:002013-04-11T21:33:22.756-05:00UGh!!! NO FUN! Yes, the things we suffer in the na...UGh!!! NO FUN! Yes, the things we suffer in the name of experience, huh!Krista Phillipshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10772828583379163612noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8885384159016667608.post-39606221255203536912013-04-11T21:32:49.385-05:002013-04-11T21:32:49.385-05:004 cars... *drool* I'd be happy with 2 working ...4 cars... *drool* I'd be happy with 2 working ones!!! (granted, I'm sure that sentiment will change with my kids get driving age...HA!)Krista Phillipshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10772828583379163612noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8885384159016667608.post-8384602636455842402013-04-11T09:45:20.956-05:002013-04-11T09:45:20.956-05:00Oh gosh...same vehicle experience for us. We were ...Oh gosh...same vehicle experience for us. We were looking for a truck. Instead of looking and waiting we jumped at a pretty red f250 diesel, which we payed cash for. Drove it 3 days before we had $3000 in repairing injectors or something like that. Then it died right in front of the school, had it towed and spent way to much on trying to figure out what was wrong. Finally sold it to some guy dirt cheap, who ultimately replaced the motor..Chalk one up to experience I guess.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8885384159016667608.post-63968988862979373472013-04-11T08:17:58.513-05:002013-04-11T08:17:58.513-05:00We are now a four car family. We were a three car...We are now a four car family. We were a three car family, and thought we really needed a fourth, but it wasn't God's timing. We didn't rush it. But then my daughter had a wreck in car #3. We were really up the creek. But we still waited. And guess what we got in the mail the next week. A note from a place my husband used to work saying they wanted to "get rid" of his old retirement account - wanted to roll it over to use, or whatever we wanted - so that they were no longer managing it. We had a vague idea that there was an account out there that someday we might get some money from when we were old, but never got a single statement, had no idea how much money was in it. Turns out there was $13,000 in the account! Enough to buy two very usable used cars and put back enough to pay the penalty for not rolling it into an IRA. (Maybe not the best idea financially to spend it, but we needed it, God provided it, and we figured we saved enough in interest by not having to make payments on two cars to be worth the penalty.) With one daughter in college two hours away, one who works an internship half a day in high school, and my husband and I on very different work schedules, it has been such a blessing to have 4 cars!Dinahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16626611175617012807noreply@blogger.com