Indie 500

It's almost exactly 500 miles to Indianapolis from Ames.

Last Wednesday, my friend Anjeanette and I headed there to find her an apartment. It isn't easy saying good-bye to a good friend, but if she feel called by God to go to seminary, and she does, the best thing to do is help her on her way.

She's been accepted into Christian Theological Seminary, with their best scholarship I might add, and will be moving there in August to start her education toward a masters in theology and possibly working toward a PhD. She's not interested in having a church (although that may change) but in teaching theology or something at a university. She put her house on the market and sold it within a week. She was a bit concerned that it might not sell quickly because it had been for sale for months and months when she bought it. She's put a lot of work into it, though, and obviously it shows.

Anyway, back to Indianapolis....

We left early (7:00!) and got there, with the time change, at about 4:30. We had to get there before office hours closed at the seminary in order to get keys for the guest house where we were staying. Neat place, the guest house. It was a big (BIG) old house, all redone inside and able to house probably 20 people. Nice rooms and each with a bath and, far as we can tell, free. We couldn't find anyone to pay anyway. I digress... The seminary grounds are beautiful, wooded, and well kept with walkway running through them and the chapel awesome. We walked the grounds a bit, went for some supper and then set about to get familiar with the area. She had made some appointment at some apartment complexes the next day so we located some of those just to see what they look like. The Indianapolis has some web site that you can put the name of an apartment complex in and it shows a map of the area around it and the location of any crime in the last 3 months. It even show what type of crime... crime against persons, crime against property, or "other". That was really helpful, especially since we didn't know the city.

The next day we started. The first one we looked at was a studio. She decided rather quickly that she could probably afford a one-bedroom after looking at that. Really, really small! We went lots of places. Most of them had sample apartment you could look at, but some didn't and many didn't know what they would have available in August. In Ames you have to give something like 4 months notice to move out, but in Indie it's only 30 or 60 days, depending on the place.

Anj had asked the woman who had the keys to our room at the seminary for suggestions on where to look. She told us about where she lives and that she really likes it, so that was one of the places we went. I was really nice... wooded with a tiny lake stocked with fish, geese running everywhere. Not a new place but well kept up and in a safe neighborhood. They didn't have any empty to show us, however, and didn't know if there would be any empty. They were willing to forgo the deposit, the cat deposit was returnable, the cat fee was the least of any we looked at and they would give her $300 off her first month's rent! She told us to call back, that there was a possibility of an opening coming up and, for $50, they would hold it until August.

Well, we kept looking. There was this one place, privately owned, ubber-friendly. The rental office was a hole and the owner took us into one where someone was already living - without any permission! He tried calling the lady, but when she didn't answer, he took us in anyway. No thank you. I think Anj was considering living there but I don't think, if it was me, that I would even consider it.

Anyway... Thursday afternoon, after much searching, she called back the one with the lake and they had had a notification that someone was moving from a one-bedroom. They had a two bedroom empty that they could show us just to get an idea of what they look like, and it was really nice so Anj gave them her $50. She feels much better, more secure now, knowing where she's going to be living and I feel better having seen where she's going to school and where she's going to live.

We were planning to stay until Sunday, if we had to to find her a place, but there we were, Thursday afternoon and all done with what had to be done. So we went to an art museum. There's this HUGE art museum really close to the seminary built by the Lily family. It's new and neat and we spent quite a lot of time wandering through it without seeing even half... we got hungry.

We got home Friday night in one piece, or maybe two pieces since there's two of us... anyway, it was nice to be back in Ames. My next big trip is the 23rd! Off to Richmond I go to help Matt and Kim and Benji move! This could get habit forming!