Bad Reviews

   Vanessa and I will be heading to our next assignment in Houston TX next week. We are very excited to move on, and continue our gypsy lifestyle.  We decided that we would have the company that she works for find us an apartment on this assignment, just so we don't have to deal with the stress of the search, and a couple of other factors that I'm not going to get into. A couple of days ago we were emailed the address of our new ( to us) apartment, which of course peaked our curiosity, which led to a night of Google searching.

    The first stop on our search was the apartments website which was a very nice site. It had pictures of the inside of an apartment, and of several amenities that they offer. To tell you the truth we were impressed by the things that they offered, and we started to get excited. Little did we know that when we began reading the reviews that excitement would soon be replaced with fear.

     Now I know that reviews can be deceiving, sometimes people are just angry that they didn't get their way, and take it out on a place of business by writing a bad review. However when a business has two good reviews, and over a hundred bad reviews, you start to feel a little uneasy. Now as we were reading through these bad reviews we read stories of rats, cockroaches, vehicle break-ins, home invasions, drug activity, and horrible management which quickly lead to us discussing how we could present this problem to the company, and ask them to find us something safer. As we were discussing the action that we were going to take, we came to the realization that it's not fair to the company to ask this of them, due to our unique situation of traveling with our large "aggressive breed" dog. we know from past experience that finding an apartment that is pet friendly to that extent is a very difficult process. 

      I thought over this situation most of the night, and this morning, when it hit me. I came to the realization that I have gotten used to a certain/safer way of living. I have closed my eyes to what goes on around us everyday. Break-ins, home invasions, infestations, and drug activity happen everywhere. Until recently in my life I have lived in gang, and drug infested areas I have made it out alive, I know how these neighborhoods operate, and I know how to, and have the means to defend myself and my family in these situations if I have to. 

     In conclusion, we are going to be just fine! Like I said this stuff happens in good neighborhoods as well. We are solely going off of reviews, and who knows it might not even be an issue. With that said I will leave you with this. Take reviews with a grain of salt, because most people only take the time to write bad reviews.  Thanks for reading! 

Get it, while the getting is good

   As most of you know, I'm kind of what you would call a "Tag Along". My wife and I travel to different US cities, where she works as an RN for hospitals that are under staffed. The first response that I receive when I tell acquaintances that this is what we do, is "Well what do you do while your wife works?" My response to this question did not come so easy in Los Angeles as it has in Albuquerque.
   In Los Angeles I found myself going stir crazy about 3 weeks into the assignment, and convinced myself that I was ready to put myself out there and find some work. I posted Craigslist ads in the gigs section, and started getting up earlier to browse through want ads. I felt pretty confident that I would soon be on my way to contributing to our finances. WRONG! After weeks of responding to dead end ads, and scammers taking advantage of my ads I was discouraged. I even went and sat at a Starbucks for  2 hours talking with a guy that was interested in using me to help him move into his new apartment, just to find out that the guy never intended to use me, he was just bored and needed someone to talk to. Needless to say Los Angeles is not the place for a Husband Of A Traveling Nurse who is looking to make some side cash, and the only money that I made there came from selling a used coffee maker, and a guitar on Craigslist.
    Albuquerque on the other hand, has been the exact opposite. I used the same strategy to find work as I did in Los Angeles only this assignment it paid off. Two days in to my search I received and email from a contractor who needed my help digging trenches for the concrete footing on a house that was being built, he then used me again to help pour the concrete for the footing. While we were pouring the footing, the homeowner who is also a contractor asked for my number, and told me that he would like to use my services for framing the house, and he kept me busy for about a month. Then I received another email from a elderly couple that needed help organizing their deceased relatives belongings for an Estate Sale. While I was doing that I noticed that they were accumulating a large pile of trash in the driveway. I told them that I have a trailer and for a fee I would haul it to the dump for them, which I did and it lead to them calling me back two more times to haul trash away.
    I'm not sure where our next assignment is going to be, but I will leave Albuquerque content. When I think about what it was that I did differently on this assignment compared to the Los Angeles assignment it comes down to this. While on assignment here, I found a Church home, I started reading The Bible more often, and I know some may think of this as a superstition but I Started tithing 10% of what I have been earning back to the Lord. Hope that you enjoyed the read!  Peace!