We're Here!!!

I'm in Raleigh, NC!

Its been a while since I've written, due to lack of the internet, which I still don't have, but I'm picking up a signal from one of my neighbors right now, and it comes and goes.

I have lots of pictures to post from my trek across country, but they will have to come another time. It was a long journey, and West Virginia was by far the worst state, but I will write more about it all later.

I just wanted to post a quick update letting everyone know I'm here! The bugs are terrible in the southeast, as well as the heat. It's not so much hot as it is terribly muggy. THe birds and bugs together along with the humidity make you feel like you are in a tropical jungle or rainforest. The bees are the size of my thumb, and like to dive bomb your head, but I'm told they are "non-agressive" unless you bug them. (Yeah right.) There's cockroach problems in the entire state, but I guess if you are clean you don't have to worry about them too much. There's these bugs that are locusts I think that are the size of a tube of lipstick. And they make really loud buzzing noises. And the spiders are very VERY fast.

The only bug I've seen that looks like the ones in Oregon are the sugar ants, and I was hoping that I'd finally be somewhere where they were non-existent. Thank god for tupperware! All of our food, sugar, rice, anything opened has been placed into tupperware containers in hopes to keep our townhouse bug free. An exterminator comes once every other month and sprays inside our house, and I guess they spray the outside once a month, but from what I've heard bugs are very PREVALENT in this darn city.

The other thing that really sucks is the prices of food. The "cheap" store we were told to go to turned out being more like a Safeway, which has good deals but all in all not realy that affordable to your average college student. I don't understand how this state can have high sales taxes and a really low minimum wage, and have food so expensive. The first night we were here we went to a place called Harris Teeter, and man....talk about spendy/trendy. It was awful. I am missing Winco more and more everyday.....

Rick starts school on Thursday, he got moved from a teaching assistant to a research assistant, which is very impressive. I'm proud of him. A research assistant is much more prestigious than a teaching assistant, and the project they have assigned him too could turn out to be a PhD thesis.

I will write more later, when this darn internet keeps booting me off!!

Sincerely,
Kailey