home away from home

I just made my first meal in Fort Collins!  Pasta with olive oil…not exactly fancy, but better than cereal and milk.  I think the next 6 weeks are going to be simple eating, and cheap.  Driving out here cost about $350 in gas, plus all the driving once I got here and the beers/meals out.  I’m now in "money saving mode", which means no shopping (sad) and lots of biking.  The biking part should be easy though; everyone bikes!!  I feel like there might be more bikes than cars.  Bike racks are everywhere, and all the roads are bike friendly!  It’s also beautifully flat (unlike Raleigh) and cool weather so far.  The roommates don’t seem so bad, and a couple of them are actually really awesome people.  3 of the roommates are engaged, and the other is in a relationship. Haha, at any given moment we have 9 people in this tinyyy house, but I think it’s gonna be okay.  I actually find it pretty humorous that they are all in relationships…and then there is me, just hanging out with the couples.

The house I’m in for the next few weeks is small, but do-able.  It’s cheap rent, so I’m getting what I pay for and I’m totally okay with it (for now).  I’ve been here since Friday afternoon when Ben and I drove from Buena Vista (about 3.5 hours).  I tell ya what, I was NOT feeling it when I first got here.  I cried the entire hour before getting into town, then I cried for the next couple hours being here.  It definitely was the breakdown that I knew had been coming on since leaving Raleigh, and now I had  just slowed down enough to really think about things.  I really wanted to turn around while driving into town and go somewhere, anywhere, but here.  I had been having so much fun the last 6 days traveling around and vacationing and I didn’t want to face reality yet.  I didn’t want to stay put for any amount of time, and I knew I had to.  I also cried because I was nervous and wasn’t sure what I had gotten myself into.  I was about to live in a town where I didn’t know anyone, where anything was located, or what to do with myself.  My room is in the basement, and it was full of cobwebs and spider webs when we got here.  I was uneasy, to say the least.  I do not like spiders.  I just stood around, kinda in shock, while Ben started cleaning it up for me.  He got a piece of paper and a pen and started making me a list of things I was going to need.  It was so weird, my mind felt kinda frozen and I was so emotionally overwhelmed.  I just wandered around for a little while like a lost puppy.  Even walking around Lowe’s and Target, I didn’t know what I was doing.  I honestly do not know what I would have done if Ben wasn’t with me.  I might have actually turned around and gone somewhere else.  We went to the library for a couple local maps and event calanders, and I requested Panera Bread for dinner so I could get some comfort food (mmm…broccoli cheddar soup).  

Then we went downtown, and I had my first beer in Fort Collins!  An Eclipse Brown Ale.  It was an interesting bar…the people in there seemed like a mix between what you would find at the Ugly Monkey and Mitch’s Tavern.  Downtown Fort Collins is also an interesting place.  There are a lot of weird people, and everyone seems to be either 13, or 30.  I kept looking for normal people, and honestly, we had a hard time finding them.  Between the freaks, straight-up hookers, “bums,” rednecks, and people old enough to be my parents, I couldn’t figure it out!  It was really odd.  

 Saturday morning Thomas came up from Colorado Springs to hang with us for the day.  We went to Odell Brewing Company for a brewery tour.  Goodness, NC folks, you are missing out on some FANTASTIC brews.  We ordered one bottle of Hiveranno which was like a blend of a couple leftover IPAs (I think), had special propagated wild yeast added to it and was bottle conditioned.  Our first sip and all of us were blown away and left speechless.  Then the guy that gave us the tour came by with a sample of Woodcut No. 5 for us to try and again, we were left totally speechless.  Seriously, those were the best beers I’ve probably ever had in my life.  And everything about the brewery was really awesome.  They try to be an environmentally friendly place and just installed some sky light tube shaped things so they can get natural light.  They also are one of a few breweries that clarify their beers by centrifuging them, which concentrates the flavors in all the right ways.  When the weather drops below 41 degrees, the refrigeration units turn off and start pulling air from outside INTO the units.  How cool is that?!?  The three of us pretty much spent the entire day drinking around town and eating out.   

We also went to Coopersmith’s, a local brewpub and ended up bar hopping downtown the rest of the night.  Again, what is with all the strange people around here??  I’m searching for the hipster scene (similar to Raleigh folks) that I’m so comfortable in, and I can’t find it!  Ben, Thomas, and I are certain there is another part of Fort Collins we’re missing or something.  The people we kept seeing were rednecks who drove obnoxious trucks, high schoolers that dressed like they were in the 90’s, “cougars,” and in general, no one cool?  Again, another odd night.  We did, however, get free beer and pizza at one restaurant!  The manager just decided to give us dinner for free!  It also happened to be some of the best pizza I’ve ever had and I will be going back to BeauJoe’s. 

All of us got up at 4am to get Ben to the Denver airport around 5:30am Sunday.  When we walked out to the car at 4:30, the sun was rising and it was fairly bright outside!  At 4:30am???  The sun was totally up by 5:30am, and the sunrise over Denver was gorgeous.  All of us were beyond exhausted, but the sunrise was still nice to watch.  Dropping Ben off was kinda sad for me.  :( He’d been my travel buddy and my security blanket this entire time, but you gotta break the ties sometimes and step outside your comfort zone.  Thomas and I then drove all around Denver at 6am looking for some kind of park to take a nap in that wouldn’t be sketchy, but we were unsuccessful.  We did stumble upon the Denver Zoo though!  We didn’t pay to go in, so I got a picture outside of it and bought a couple pencils at the gift shop instead.  Still battling totally exhaustion, we decided to try some breakfast and lots of coffee.  After breakfast we found the Denver City Park downtown!  It was such a nice park and the perfect one to take a nap in…except for the 2000+ people running a 5k through it.  Hahaha.  So Thomas watched and cheered the runners on for a while, and I laughed at them trying to avoid the geese crossing in front of them while running.  It was absolutely HILARIOUS.   Cause the geese didn’t know why all these people were running towards them either!  Around 10am it finally quieted down enough to take a nap on the grass!  Yay!  

 Haha, and then we went to the Denver Art Museum, but again, didn’t pay to go in so we just got coffee at the gift shop, and I got a picture in the broom/dust pan sculpture out front! I was really excited to go to the Denver Library too, but it wasn’t open when we walked by!  :( We just spent the day lazily wandering around Denver and discovering all kinds of neat things.  I really like Denver.   

Eventually, we made it back to Fort Collins…only to take another nap.  Thomas left around 6pm to go back to Colorado Springs and I was officially on my own in Fort Collins.  But right as Thomas was leaving one of my roommates and his fiancé walked up and invited me to the climbing gym with them!  Yay!  That was so awesome.  The gym is biiiiig, and it includes cardio and weight equipment, plus climbing stuff too!  I also made a friend there!  First friend in FoCo!  Now I can’t wait to join that gym and find a job!