ZONKED

Well, I got home from Raton last night around 9:30pm. The drive back took 14+ hours, and seemed to go alot faster than the drive up. THe drive up sucked for the most part because I lost my air conditioner before I was even close to being out of Texas. For those of you who have never experienced Texas summer heat and humidity in a vehicle, you just will not understand. So the drive up was interrupted various times to stop, get out, pour water over my head and Teddy, and resume driving dripping wet to allow the very hot wind coming through the windows to dry us off. 100+ degrees does that rather quickly. So, the drive up was 16+ hours, I left at 9am, and drug into Raton at 1am, roughly.

Raton is a shitty little down-on-it's-luck town, with not alot of prospect for work unless you work for El Paso, which is the town's biggest employer. They will not allow any stores like WalMart in, although they have the crappiest Big K I have ever been in. Didn't go to the supermarket, but mom tells me the produce is pretty bad. It has two chinese places, but no sushi. *le'sigh* I can't get away from K-Bob's though, there is one there. Maybe they'll have better steaks than the one here. I'm hoping since it's in real cow country and not longhorn country. There is a difference. Really. The rest of the town is falling apart, the little shops and such look really rundown. All in all, not too impressed with the town, but perhaps it will grow on me.

It has good points. The people are really nice and friendly. There appears to be a mystic shop on mainstreet that I did not get a chance to explore but I am so going to when we get settled. The neighborhood where our new house is seems to be very nice. There's a catholic school across the street. Public pool a couple of blocks away. Everything is built into the mountainside, so there's lots of hills and stuff. I'm going to get into the best shape of my life walking the dogs and bikeriding. I'm excited about the climate, because I actually WANT to get outside and do things there. It's so nice. Even 90 degrees (the hottest it got while I was there) feels good. It was sooooo nice to sleep with the window open at night and feel shivery when I got up in the morning because the temp had dropped to 50 overnight. The sheets stayed crisp and cool, and I didn't sweat at all. Oh...bliss.

Our house is...giganormous. It's easily the biggest house we have ever had. Mom is freaking about not having enough furniture. I've already picked out my bedroom, and it's soooo nice. The office upstairs has so many windows. It will be light and airy all the time. The library needs a bit of work to it. Someone (not the current owners) had painted over the gorgeous dark wood, so that paint needs to be stripped and the wood polished again. It was a working fireplace, which will be nice and cozy in the winters. The house was built around 1900 by the same man who built this huge hotel downtown, so it has alot of history to it. It feels great though. I can't believe we got it. It will be worth every cent. Oh, and did I mention hidden rooms? It has hidden rooms, the kind you find when you bump a knob and the wall falls back. *grins* So cool.

And no bugs, besides grasshoppers and ants, that I could find. THANK YOU! I hate bugs.

Some of the best horseback riding country I have ever seen. It's beautiful land, right in the foothills of the mountains. Of course, Ted Turner owns most of it for his ranch, but...there's still some out there that he doesn't own. Now all I need is a horse, and the money to board it at the stables. *snicker* Not gonna happen, but it would be nice to go riding again. I've really missed that. It's been almost a decade since I last rode horseback, and I used to ride every day for hours at a time. Not to mention competition. Ah well. We make sacrifices, and that was mine. I still have nice legs because of it though. *wink*

Anyway...that's the up and up on Raton. I'm psuedo-happy with it so far, and looking for the good stuff to outweigh the bad. Oh, one last thing...the c-stores sell unsweet Lipton's tea. That's worth it, in my book. *grin*