Wood Stoves and Xanax

Living in this trailer is like living in the twilight zone. The windows don't close all the way, so it gets chilly at night. The windows don't have any screens, so the bugs fly in and out all night. There is no skirting along the bottom outside of the trailer just randomly placed pieces of wood, so animals often scurry in and out of the underside of the trailer. The kitchen sink (until 3 days ago when our landlord replaced the faucet) boasts water even Henry is afraid to drink, yellow/brown and smells of iron. There is no hot water in the kitchen for dishes. There are several holes in the floor patched up with some duct tape and covered with rugs. I often step into them and fear I will eventually fall through the floor. Water damage everywhere. Smells musty, and no matter how often I burn the nag champa incense, it still smells the same. The oven doesn't work, and we have to light each individual burner with a lighter when we turn it on. The wood stove is great, but the chimney is very rusted. I'm also pretty sure that the chimney hasn't been cleaned ever, which is scary and makes me never want to use the wood stove for fear of a chimney fire. And let's not forget that I came out of the bedroom a couple nights ago to find a rat running across the floor and into the wall. I can't wait to move out.

We've been told that we cannot afford much of a mobile home either. Sarah has great credit, but a very short history, so they will not lend us very much. New mobile homes are roughly $30,000 more here, than their equivalent in Michigan. Fuck California. So now, we are looking for a very cheap mobile home. We cannot afford to buy new, which was the original plan. We have found a company that will finance an older mobile home, but will only finance us up to $35,000. In California, that is the price equivalent to a 30 year old single wide mobile home. In Michigan, that would be a brand new double wide. This is why I say Fuck California. So with these parameters in mind, we hunted for some homes in our price range. We found several really great looking homes, but as we drove by most of them we realized they are almost all in senior only parks. FUCK CALIFORNIA. All of the homes that we really liked, that were bigger, or double wides are in senior only parks, and those senior only parks are everywhere. We have only found 3 parks with places for sale that would accept us. Apparently people like to retire here. There are 3 senior parks to every 1 family park. It's been really frustrating.  So, now we only have 2 places that we are planning on looking at, and it has come down to one or the other and we really don't have much choice beyond that.

We took Henry to his 2 year vet check up. He did much better than he ever has at the vet. He normally growls and barks at the vet. He received updated shots, and a clean bill of health. Our vet decided that it would be good to put him on some anxiety meds because his separation anxiety has gotten worse since the beginning of the move. She put him on Xanax. Funny thing is, the stuff doesn't even touch him. We came home yesterday and he had torn the towel we drape over his crate to shreds. He's been injuring himself when we leave too. He tried to get out of his crate and ended up scraping his nose badly enough that there was blood all over the crate and he gave himself 2 giant scabs. He just needs a tranquilizer.