Dear Arizona, please accept this $70 as an offering

I had my first no good, dirty rotten day in Arizona on Thursday. I won't go into too much detail describing it, because I'm sure nobody really cares and nobody really wants to be friends with a downer. So I'll just say that I had an encounter with a couple of difficult clients and difficult clients. I had to turn away a couple in the middle of a screening, just because they didn't meet one of our pretty insubstantial rules. It was heartbreaking. It was also just a wacky day in general, that didn't make a whole lot of sense. It was exhausting.

It all culminated in waiting at our bus stop at the end of the day and being crawled on by a bunch of fire ants. Becky and I boarded the bus, 31-day bus pass in hand, and sat down. We sat down across from a pretty talkative, albeit pretty creepy couple. I then started feeling pain in my foot and realized I had probably been bit by a fire ant. On top of that, the bus started leaking on me, because it had rained earlier in the day and apparently AZ buses aren't particularly prepared for such weather. It made for a stressful bus ride.

Somewhere along that ride, I managed to misplace my 31-day bus pass (probably dropping it when I bent down to look at my foot?). We got off at our first bus stop, and when we went to transfer to the second bus, the bus pass was gone.

Now, in the grand scheme of things I know it wasn't that big of a deal. But when you're already having a pretty bad day, it was just the final straw that broke me. I had been doing okay throughout the day, despite the crazy shi*t that had occurred at work. It was tiring, but I was handling it. But you know those days where they're just bad and the smallest thing is what FINALLY sends you over the edge? Yeah, that's what happened. And my "small thing" was this bus pass. Now, let me explain. These bus passes are actually $55, but CASS gets them at a discounted price of $27.50. And Becky and I got our first 31-day bus pass when we first arrived... and we got them completely free. It was scheduled to last us until Sept. 17th. So the major reason this misplaced bus pass finally broke my day is because I wasn't sure how I was going to go about getting a new one. CASS runs almost completely on donations and giving out bus passes everyday isn't something CASS can really afford. So I was dreading making the admission to my boss that I had already lost mine, within the first 2 weeks of work. Like I said, I knew I was overreacting. But... it was one of those days.

So. There you have it. That was my first dirty rotten, no good day in Phoenix. And I realize that it really wasn't that bad, and I'm sure I'll have far worse days. And I also realize that I promised that I would keep the description of said day brief, and I did anything but that.

Let me make up for it by describing my awesome day.

I think the cosmos felt slightly bad about the previous day, so they set out to make Friday pretty epic.

So since I didn't have a bus pass, I was fully prepared to pay $2 cash to ride the bus the next morning, until I could figure out the bus pass situation. I was kinda bummed because it was $4 down the drain, since I had to pay $2 the previous day for our second bus home (I know this is getting a little confusing, but I'm hoping you can follow it). Anyhow, I got onto the bus Friday morning, with my $2 in hand, and was ready to feed it into the money machine.

That's when the driver slammed his hand down over the money collector machine (what DO you call those things anyway?) before I could slide my 2 bucks in and told me, "Just go!" as he pointed towards the back of the bus.

No paying? Sweeeeet.

It was the start to a good day.

I then got to work and explained the bus pass situation to Stephanie. I told her what happened and how much of an idiot I felt like... and how I would pay for a new one, but I just didn't know how to go about it. I then mentioned that I was an idiot... again. She just looks at me and shrugged. "It happens," she said. "I've done it before too. I'll go get you another one." And she returned about 20 seconds later with a brand new pass in hand.

Win.

But the awesomeness of the day didn't end there. Stephanie came back into my office a few minutes later and told me that I was going toy shopping in one of the sheds at the shelter. Walking the block back from the shelter to the Case Management office with a huge black trash bag full of toys, I got honked at by a pickup trunk. "Hey Santa Claus!" the driver yelled. I think this is the first time I actually appreciated getting honked at while in Phoenix.

For about an hour, I had the sweetest office ever.

Then Stephanie came and took some of the toys for her office, but I still have a pretty nice collection of fun new toys.

So I went from a pretty crappy day to an awesome one, filled with fun toys. Naturally, of course, the list of bizarre Phoenix injuries continues. I managed to pinch my fingers in the handles of my scissors as I was opening one of the toy boxes and wound up with this beauty.

Pretty awesome, right? Blood blister created by the blunt end of the scissors. I've got talent, I tell yah. Be thankful, I'll spare you the details of popping it... ewwwwwwww.

Anyways, yesterday (Saturday) we fought our next battle with Chase bank, which is quickly becoming the Comcast Debacle of 2010... part 2. Hopefully, Chase has finally worked out our Casa Truth house account so that we can finally start receiving our stipends and finally be able to buy groceries, without having to get reimbursed.

Saturday also featured us upholding a Phoenix tradition: floating down the Salt River on inner tubes. Apparently in a city where there really isn't much to do, tubing is a favorite past time. Even the head of the shelter, who is my boss' boss, told me that he goes every year. And was giving me pointers on what to do and what to bring.

We probably should have listened to him a little more closely.

Casa Truth and Casa Bart had an epic time... mostly because we failed so awesomely. One of the pointers Ty (my boss' boss) told me was that we should bring coolers, but not styrofoam coolers. Well, we had 2 hard coolers... anddddd one styrofoam cooler, which fell apart within seconds of getting into the river. We were also instructed to wear "real" shoes, not flip flops. Since most of us brought only a fraction of our belongings, including shoes, we didn't have any real shoes that we felt comfortable potentially ruining in the river. So we stuck to flip flops and bare feet.

Bad idea. We did a lot of slipping and sliding on rocks. And we lost a couple of flip flops to the river. Thankfully, I did listen to the piece of advice where I was told not to bring nice sunglasses, because I WOULD lose them. Some of the other JVs were not so lucky.

Man down.

Man still down.

The worst of it was my fault though. Well, potentially, at least. I was the only person who brought a backpack (why? I'm not really sure). So I became un-official mom for the day and carried A LOT of everybody's stuff. Somewhere during the 2 1/2 hour ride down the water, I managed to lose my SCU Iron Bronco shirt, which was my swimsuit coverup, and two wallets. Thankfully, it isn't as bad as it sounds. One of the wallets was completely empty. The other was completely empty... except for the $70, which we were able to finally withdraw from Chase earlier in the morning. Phoenix, I'm telling you now, that is our offering to you; it's our offering, in exchange for a peaceful and enjoyable rest of our stay. Cuz we ain't getting that 70 bucks back, you Salt River jerk!

All in all, it was a great day, with a lot of fun had by all. Despite encountering some ridiculously intoxicated people (one so much so, that he was actually arrested), the scenery was surprisingly nice. Since the tubing route was outside of the city, there were some beautiful mountains and foliage. I wish I could say we had some pictures, but if we had brought a camera, it probably would have been lost to the Salt River gods as well. It was a lot of fun, even if nobody else in either Casa remembers Scott yelling in a British accent, coaching us along as we got stuck on a batch of particularly tricky rocks. "Don't give up now! That's exactly what they want you to do!"

Needless to say, the combination between the few hours spent in the sun, the river water and the, uh, "spirits," was enough to leave everybody exhausted.

Today (Sunday) several members from Casa Truth and Casa Bart partook in the Brophy "Sunday Fun Day" (I wish I was making up that title, but that's actually for real). Pretty much, Sunday Fun Day is just a high school version of Franktown's field day, although not nearly as cool because there are no water balloon tosses, tug-a-wars, or (most importantly) the Mr. O obstacle course. But there was soccer, volleyball, swimming, ultimate frisbee, and football. Casa Truth and Casa Bart kicked some Brophy ass and dominated in ultimate frisbee. And KOK (that's Katie O'Keefe) and I dominated two boys in a game of 2 vs. 2 soccer. The highlight of the day was jumping in the pool at the end of ultimate frisbee fully clothed and being able to take food home, which will provide sustenance for the next few days free of charge. Free food really is clutch when you have very little money in your wallet.

Oh, and one other thing. Our good friend Edward Cullen, yes Edward Cullen, picked us up and dropped us off this morning. He also has my phone number.

No big deal.

It's the small things

I have only 4 things to report.

1. Somehow, I managed to get a line of bug bites up the inside of my left leg. I got them Sunday night and they seemed like normal run-of-the-mill mosquito bites (in AZ? who knew?). Monday they were fine. Still normal, albet annoying.

Tuesday they swelled up into the size of welts.

A photo illustration which I've included below... cuz you know you have nothing better to do than look at them.

Pretty gnarly, no? That one right above my knee was torturous.

I was starting to get worried because my housemate Becky was talking about how Arizona apparently has this specific type of spider that will bite you, but the poison takes 2 days to kick into gear. And when it does, it burns off your skin. Now, this sounds like a far-fetched story... but we have children at Vista Colina who have actually been bitten by this spider and have needed to go to the hospital for treatment. Additionally, Vista Colina is having an issue with bed bugs. I didn't want to have anything to do with either creepy crawler, particularly when it has to do with my skin and the potential to burn off.

The good news: the swelling has down a lot today and the bug bites are back to normal-ish size.

2. I'm a little late to the band wagon, but Arrested Development is fantastic. I'm watching a couple of episodes every night before I hit the hay. I'm blaming Casa Bart for getting me hooked, but I'm glad they did. No touching!

3. I am exceptionally tired, beyond the point of exhaustion. What's that called? Yeah, whatever it is. I'm there.

4. I got my first real page over the walkie talkies yesterday. Yes, there is a difference between a real page and a fake one. First of all, just to clarify, a page over the walkie talkie is when the front desk at Sunnyslope Family Center calls over the walkie talkie to let CASS know that we have a client so that we can come let them in through the locked doors to the wait area. For the past week, I've only heard, "Stephanie (or Mike), you have a client." Now, on Friday. There was the first, "Brittany, you have a client." I was over-the-moon excited. Turns out, it was a page for the other Brittany -- the one who comes in once a week to do counseling sessions with some of the clients. Total let down.

But like I said, I got my first real page yesterday. It was, in fact, actually clients who came in with the sole purpose of seeing me. Yes, that is completely narcissistic, and yes... I loved every second of it. :)

Oh yeah, and my phone has my name on it now. NBD. Narcissism score: 2.

"Esta es por este"

My Spanish isn't that great.

Every here and there I can pick up a phrase or two from a mixture of high school Spanish (Gracias, Seniora Hinkle) and phrases that sound very similar in Italian.

I do know what "esta es por este" means -- "this is for you all." And it's NOT something you want directed at you when you accidentally walk into an all Hispanic/Latino nightclub from a man singing Spanish polka karaoke... which is exactly what happened Friday night for our first REAL weekend in Phoenix.

But the weekend didn't start off that exciting.

I got off of work at 5 p.m., just in time to sit on a bus for an hour and a half, attempting to get to a soup kitchen in Southern Phoenix to help out my casa mates and our support staff (made up of former JVs) before the dinner service closed. Our support staff suggested the idea the very first night we arrived in Phoenix; we'd go down to a local soup kitchen and all of us would help serve the clients. All of Casa Truth thought it was a great idea, but there was the issue that all of the casa mates get off of work at different times and may not be able to make it to help set up and serve by 4 p.m. In fact, me and Eddie were just attempting to get there before the entire event was over.

We didn't. Eddie and I arrived at the soup kitchen's location only to be picked up in front by everybody else -- whisked away to get some pizza instead. We wound up at this mom and pop owned pizza joint that was a pretty fun environment -- down to the music, which was conveniently performed by mom and pop's college-age son. The kid had some definite musical talent, but he probably should not have picked such classics like Imagine, You've Lost that Lovin' Feeling, and Tiny Dancer to remake right in front of us. He was good... but he ain't that good. While all of us were silently grimacing in pain, every single one of the people on our support team was eating it up, loving every second of it. But like I said, he ain't that good. Just as an example, half way through the dinner, he decided to play Every Rose Has it Thorns. I sent a quick text message to my casa mate Greg, who just happened to be sitting right across the table from me, wedged between two members of our support team. "Somewhere Bret Michaels just had another aneurysm," I wrote. My phone buzzed ten seconds later with his response.

"Somewhere I want to hang myself?"

All kidding aside, it was a great dinner. And we got to know our support staff a little bit better. I found out that Lynn is a Santa Clara grad, so we reflected back on our glory days. It seems like just yesterday... oh wait.
After dinner. We parted ways with our support staff and Ms. Krystal, who had kindly donated her night to a Brophy lock-in event. Meanwhile, everybody was ready to hit the town and drown away the stress of the entire previous week.

We drove around for a loooooong time as Greg tried to find alcohol that fit his high standards (he used to be a bartender), eventually winding up at home. Now Mom, before you sit there and wonder what happened to my good Christian values, I will proudly say that I volunteered myself up as Designated Driver. Seriously. You can ask any one of the housemates and they'll vouch for me. Really. Okay, stop laughing.

I drove us down to a bar that was recommended by former JVs. It wasn't bad, but the bar started to empty out around midnight, and we thought that probably wasn't a good sign.

Then somebody mentioned that there was a bar right down the street from our house, less than a mile away, so we could try that one. If it was a complete disaster or really lame, it wouldn't be that big of a deal because we could just head home and crash.

I parked the car in the parking lot and it became immediately clear that this was going to be interesting.

Becky got out of the car and her first words were, "I have a good feeling about this one!"

Er...

As we walked up to the establishment, we were met with two things. 1) Loud polka music that could be heard even outside. All the lyrics were in Spanish. 2) Hardcore bouncers. As me and Becky were getting ID checks, Greg started chatting with the bouncer who was patting him down (yeah, patted down. Like I said, hardcore). "So... we're not going to fit in here, are we?" Greg asked. The bouncer just started laughing.

That probably should have been the first sign.

Now, there is no way to accurately describe what happened next. But if you've ever seen Animal House and the scene where the group goes into the Dexter Lake Club, you have a pretty good idea about how we felt. (This comparison was not my own, but after it was mentioned, I realized it was dead on) We walked in and immediately every head turned our way. Thankfully, the music never faultered, but you know, we did have the polka singer dedicating his song to us. So which one is worse, you be the judge.

Now before anybody gets upset, this happened all by accident, and by no means am I trying to diminish the reputation of this establishment. All I'm saying is that we felt very out of place there, which is probably a good experience for every White person to go through... more than once even. It lets us, as people in the majority, understand what it feels like to be in the minority, even though it was a very abbreviated taste of the experience. And I'll tell you what. It was really uncomfortable and not something I'd like to repeat. I give any sort of immigrant or any sort of under-represented population in this country a lot of credit, because this is not an experience I could repeat on a daily basis.

But I'll give off of my JVC soapbox for the time being, noting that it was a difficult experience, but probably one that I needed.

Anyway, thinking it would probably be more embarrassing to walk in and then do a quick pivot to turn right out the door again, we decided to take our chances and walk up to the bar.

The bartenders immediately started whispering to eachother. Eddie ordered the "smallest beer you have" and was comically delivered an 8 oz. Bud Light. It sat on the counter next to Becky's 12 oz for the next 10 minutes as everybody quickly gulped down their drinks, despites the stares directed our way.

We left pretty quickly.

And cracked up the entire way home.

Oh, and we went to the Rockies game on Saturday. We were unfortunate enough to see Jimenez get rocked by a last place team.

But the four hot dogs I've eaten the past two days were delicious.

Hit and run

I pick up the bus at 7th Ave. and Camelback.

... There just happened to be a fatal accident at 7th Ave. and Camelback.

A pedestrian was hit by a car driving 90 miles an hour on Tuesday night (which hit two other cars and the side of a building before stopping). I'll skip the gruesome details but it basically resulted in them closing down 7th Ave. and Camelback from 10 p.m. Tuesday morning till about 11 a.m. Wednesday morning. Except nobody bothered to tell me. Sometimes I wonder if it's really a good thing not to have a well-functioning television in the house. It's nice because it's not an easy distraction, but it probably would have been beneficial to watch the news Wednesday morning.

Anyway, I walk about 1 mile every morning to get to the 7th Ave. and Camelback bus stop. On Wednesday, I walked that 1 mile, only to find that the street was completely blocked off by barricades and police vehicles. As I stared down the street trying to figure out what was going on, a man came up to me.

"There ain't no buses running," he said.

I noticed.

After excitedly pointing out the blue tarp in the middle of the road, something I found to be quite morbid, he then tried to direct me to the nearest bus stop  for any bus that would travel north. He recommended I go all the way back to 15th or 11th Ave., which isn't particularly close.

So, I called my boss to tell him that I was going to be late -- on the third day of work. I feel like that has to be a mark against me of some kind, even if the roads were blocked, there weren't any buses, and I have no idea how to get around in this city. It was still the third day of work. And I was going to be late. Fail.

I started desperately racking my brain to see if I could remember what our tour guide said on Friday about the grid system of the city and how the street numbers worked. I finally decided the best option was to backtrack a street to avoid the road block and then just walk north a few blocks to get around the police barricade -- somehow get back to 7th Ave. and another bus stop that was on the route I usually took.

Turns out, I ended up walking about three miles in order to find said bus stop.

I started off my morning with some intense exercise. And I only managed to be about 20 minutes late. Semi-impressive, right? But three miles in 103 degree weather was brutal (and nastily sweaty). I walked into work and immediately needed to use the bathroom in order to clean myself up a little bit.

We also had our first house "Spirituality Night" yesterday. I led Mandala's for the house, which started as very insightful and then turned quickly into a conversation about Disney, its disgusting empire and how it copies its own stuff. It then evolved into a heated discussion about old-school Disney Channel and about how awesomely awful all those shows were -- Lizzie McGuire, Even Stevens. We started comparing our resume of watched Disney Channel Original Movies.

So much for an insightful reflection period.

So that was yesterday...
*****

Today went much better transportation wise, aside from the bus being about 10 minutes late.

But the day quickly turned really interesting.

I received a tour of the apartments finally, and got to see the digs all of the clients are living in. They're nicer than 1130 Alviso Street, and I think the "landlord" is a little bit more accomodating... just sayin'.

But things got REALLY interesting when Stephanie and Mike accidentally scheduled their own individual appointments at the same time. Awesome, let's leave the new girl alone so she can accidentally torch the building. I'm currently sitting alone in the office and it's been absolute madness (and yes, this is Sparta).

I'm not sure why it's Murphy's Law that everything starts to pick up immediately as Mike took one step out the door, but it did. Crazily. And I'm a total newb. I filled out a series of referalls (and don't worry, I don't know what those are either, and I was the one who was supposed to be filling them out). I ran around with a broken walkie-talkie on my belt, telling me every two seconds that "Mike (or Stephanie), you have a client." I struggled to figure out how to use the fax machine for a client (it was my first time using it ever and probably not the best time for me to learn). I made out money orders (something Stephanie had showed me the abbreviated version of right before she left). I told several people over the phone that we were completely filled to capacity and then listened to their hearts sink when they learned there was no room. I tried to geographically direct a potential client across a city I don't know. And... all around ran around like a chicken with it's head cut off.

I guess that's ONE way to learn.

But now things have started to calm down a little and I have had time to write a quick blog. Yep, things are slowing down.

... Oh look! There's Mike. And Mr. Murphy with his law.

And what the hell is that smell?!

There's one thing they forget to tell you about monsoon season. It smells like a toilet.

Really. It would be just as efficient to stick your head in a toilet and take a big whiff as it would be to walk outside for a little "fresh air."

It's pretty nasty.

I'm not sure why I'm attracted to cities that smell (to which I direct your attention to my Italy blog), but it seems to be a growing trend.

I'm just hoping that the sky of toilet water doesn't decide to rain on us tomorrow...

***

This is gonna be a short post. One, I'm honestly too exhausted to write a lot and, two, I don't want to keep boring you to death. Is anybody actually reading this?

Anyways, second day of work. Had to walk about 2 miles to get to the bus stop at 7 a.m. this morning. Ain't life a kick in the head?

Work was craziness. There's three case manager total, myself included. Stephanie, my boss, is also a case manager, but is also taking classes to get her degree. So she has some weird work hours. For example, she didn't come in today until 1 p.m. This left poor Mike (the third case manager) left with all the clients, phone calls, walk-ins, and the newbie who didn't know anything.

I felt so useless watching Mike try to carry out a screening while he sat there with his phone ringing back to back. And I just stood there. Literally. I had no clue what to do. I was supposed to be observing, but I felt like I should be doing something to help instead. I felt useless, answering a phone call whenever I was ever lucky enough (and the clients were unlucky enough) to have dialed my extension instead of Mike's.

That is until Mike walked into my office (my office?! I still can't get used to saying that) and told me that I would be running the next screening.

Hold the phone. I'd observed maybe three of them yesterday, but I was actually going to be running my own today? Right this second? My second day of work?

I'm not ready for this.

Mike spent the next 30 minutes correcting me in front of the client, patiently. "What she meant to say was... fill in the blank." The poor client. She must have heard Mike say that about 5 times.

Good news: the second screening went much more smoothly. And neither Mike or Stephanie felt the need to observe me. So I must not have tanked the first one as badly as I initially thought.

Other than that, can say that I have anything to report. A mother came in with 11 children today, and I'm not even mad... I'm just impressed.

... Did I mention it smells like toilet?

"Coffees bad for me."

So... I might be a little premature in this statement, but I really love my job.

And I really hate HR (but don't HR that I said that, cuz that might come back to bite me in the butt with, well, HR).

Today was a pretty surreal day. My alarm went off at 7 a.m. and all of my casa mates were pretty much all gone already. Their jobs make me feel lazy that I don't have to be at work until 8 a.m. Just as an example, Greg has to be at work by 6:45. Yeah, that's nasty. But that's beside the point. I was talking about surrealism, kinda (that's probably a joke only Art History majors would get). Anyway, it was pretty strange waking up this morning knowing that I was finally going to be heading to the job for which I've basically been preparing myself for the past 7 months. It was all building up to today.

And it didn't disappoint.

I was picked up this morning at 8:30 a.m. (got to sleep in on my first day, epic win!) by a woman that reminded me scarily of Cousin Janice, except a little bit older and looked more like she belonged at the library than at a weight lifting competition. But she was one of the sweetest people I've ever met, who kept getting lost on the way to the main CASS campus. Bless her heart, she also had hearing aids, which I'm convinced were a little too sensitive, because lord knows I couldn't hear what she was whispering to me.

Now, just to set the record straight (not that anybody particularly cares), I'm not working at the downtown main CASS campus, which is a shelter designated for single men and women who are homeless. I'm working at the CASS Vista Colina campus, emergency housing for homeless families with kids, and technically I'm not even there. I'm two blocks away from that in the Sunnyslope (I keep wanting to call it Sunnyside 'cuz it reminds me of Toy Story 3) office building. The other two Case Managers and I are isolated away from everybody in our own little corridor of offices.

But I didn't even get to see my office (yeah, I have my own office, no big deal) until after 1 p.m. today. Instead, I spent the majority of my morning in the downtown CASS campus getting trained by a temporary HR representative who was too similar in appearance and personality to Holly Flax from The Office for my comfort.

Impostor Cousin Janice then drove us back to Vista Colina and I got the abbreviated tour of the emergency shelter and the childcare facilities. Then, finally, I got to see where I was personally going to be working.

Now let me tell you, I had about 5 minutes of down time when I got to the Case Manager offices. I walked in to find a binder with info waiting for me (thanks Eileen, I'm gonna need all the help I can get!) that I even really have time to read and I got my office keys.

Then just like that, I was getting called in to sit in on my first Screening. Lesson 101 in Case Management lingo, a Screening is when a potential client comes in for their first meeting with a Case Manager. The client comes in because spaces are opening up in the shelter and the clients are called in for an initial screening (get it?) to see if they are eligible for the program. The basic rules are that the clients have to be 30 days clean, have children, and not have stayed in any other family shelters within the past year. Basically, the entire meeting helps the Case Mangers get a feel for the client to see if they would be a good fit from the shelter and if they would benefit from being there.

If they qualify, they are placed on the waiting list. The clients have to call in every day to see if there's an actual opening that they can move into — it usually takes about a week for them to go from the list to an actual apartment.

That's all the nuts and bolts — the boring rules.

Most of that stuff, I was minimally briefed on before I arrived in Phoenix.

What I wasn't prepared for was real life.

Without giving out any specifics, I encountered pregnant women, some seeking shelter away from their abusive husbands; a grandmother who was a couple years older than my brother's age, who had a 15-year-old daughter who had a three year old and was expecting her next one any day now; and an alcoholic mother.

It was a lot for the first day.

But it was all made better by the kids. Every Case Manger's office comes equipped with a toy bin (including mine, so you know you wanna come visit), so the kids can hang out while the parents are getting interviewed/screened. The kids were most enthralled with an older-model phone that still had a curly cord and everything. Each kid called a different imaginary friend and was exceptionally disappointed when nobody answered.

However, the cutest kid award goes to a little girl with a rather colorful butterfly backpack, which she refused to take off.

At one point my boss got up from her seat, with paperwork in her hand and said, "Okay, sit tight. I'll be right back — I'm going to go make copies."

To which the little girl announced rather forcibly, "My mom says coffee's bad for me."

Copies. Coffee. It's all bad for us.

The first test

I have a cold.

In Phoenix.

The irony is not lost on me.

It's 103 degrees at 10:45 at night, and I'm all sniffles. I sound like a 40-year-old man; my voice is all deep and raspy. I could give Chad Kroeger a run for his money — lord knows I could write better lyrics at least.

Anywho, today was largely a lazy Sunday. We still had the last remnants of crap to go through in the bathroom, but me, Krystle and Becky tackled that task pretty early in the day.

But around noon we came to the sudden and harsh realization that there was no food in the house. So we finally had to bite the bullet and go shopping for the first time. Mind you, we've been hearing horror stories all week long from former Jesuit Volunteers (aka- FJVs) about their first outings to the grocery store with their new casa mates. The biggest problem is that each of us is only given $90 per month for groceries, not enough for us to sustain ourselves independently. So we have to pool all of our money together for the month... and we must come to mutual decisions on which items we want to buy on our $450. It might not sound that challenging, but you'd be surprised how nasty a fight over white or wheat bread can become — and don't even get me started on the milk debate (whole? 2%? 1%? skim). Needless to say, none of us were looking forward to the experience.

It went surprisingly well, actually. We came to an easy agreement on wheat bread and skim milk. And as none of us are vegetarians, that was also another debate we easily avoided (Thank God! because Greg made this killer salad for dinner, featuring Jamaican jerk chicken).

We hit up the Fry's down the street, which had a minimal selection, since it's closing down forever in a couple of weeks. Then we drove home those groceries before heading back out to Costco. God forbid we leave the groceries in the car in this heat... It's the small things you miss about Colorado.

But Phoenix does have it perks.

I'm not sure what it is about Phoenix, but there were the shortest lines I've ever seen at a Costco checkout counter. Seriously, we were cashed out in under 5 minutes and the teller started a conversation with me about Captain EO, since I was wearing my t-shirt today. Pretty rad. Everybody in the house was more than thrilled to hear that I had a Costco card, although not everybody was a Costco aficionado. So it was funny seeing Eddie stop at all the sample carts and push the cart right past the lady who checks the receipts. She wasn't happy.

At the end of the day, we went slightly over budget. But this "simple living" is going to take some getting used to. And we bought a lot of items that will last for several weeks. So... if all goes according to plan, we should even out the budget next week.

Tomorrow is the first day of work at Central Arizona Shelter Service (CASS). I'm going to be working as a Case Manager at the Vista Colina campus, which provides emergency housing for homeless families with children. This is the company line I've been giving to anybody who's asked me what I'm doing. So... this should finally answer the question for all of you as to why I am in this sweltering city. But I'll let you in on a secret — I have absolutely no idea what I'll be doing in my position.

But no worries, I'm totally going to rock this... uh... case managing.

Sharp rocks at the bottom?
Bring it on.

Flight of the Phoenix

It's a frigid 97 degrees.


And it is the coolest it's been in Phoenix since we arrived on Thursday. But don't worry, it's supposed to reach 111 later tomorrow during the day, several degrees hotter than hell. We'll most likely be spending yet another day inside with the pleasant comforts of our air conditioner, praying to God that somebody else brings us food so we can avoid cooking for ourselves just one more night.

I have a bug bite that has swollen to the size of a bruise on the top of my right thigh. Yet, I'm pretty sure it's not a scorpion sting (the one thing in Phoenix I fear more than 100+ temperatures) because I have not died yet, but I'll keep you posted.

Me and my fellow casamates are finally settled into Casa Truth (aka Casa Sojo, aka Casa Sojourner Truth, aka Casa Supremo). After an intense round of late-summer cleaning, we have all successfully placed our respective articles of clothing in closets and dressers — minus the boys, whose clothes are still mostly strewn across the floor in the master bedroom, which is characterized by glow-in-the-dark stars that dot the ceiling and a master bathroom that is painted a refreshing shade of pink. The boys are ecstatic, obviously.

But I've already gotten ahead of myself.
First, a brief flashback to San Jose and Aptos, California...

I landed at the newly completed Terminal B (it only took you 5 years, congrats San Jose!) at 11:30 a.m. last Saturday and started the awkward first introductions with fellow volunteers for JVC (that's the Jesuit Volunteer Corp for those new to the game) at about 12:30.

After cramming 36 JVs and all of their luggage, most bags weighing more than or dangerously close to the 50 lb weight limit for checked bags, onto a school bus, we started the trek up the 17 towards Aptos.

The next few days are a blur — a misty fog (literally, what's up with all the summer haze, Santa Cruz?) of ice breakers, people from the East Coast who think Northern California is going to be warm all year round, small group discussions, a girl screaming in the middle of the night from night terrors, little sleep (partly due to said girl), and a lot of information being thrown at us. But in the end, we survived orientation and each of us set out for a year of service in our respective cities on Thursday.

With most of the 12 of the 15 JVC houses (accounting for about 70 of the 85 volunteers) in the Southwest region located primarily in LA, San Francisco, and Sacramento, the three houses in Arizona are the outcasts of the region. As a result, we were given the opportunity to choose between flying and driving to Phoenix. Having just made the drive in July from Santa Clara to Denver in Arnoldette, my 1991 BMW whose old-car quarks outnumber its horsepower, I wasn't eager to repeat the 15 hour drive. Me and six other JVs opted for the friendly skies, while Krystle, Greg and Scott were crazy enough to want to drive.

For those of us who chose to fly, we found ourselves with a lot of time on our hands.

Everybody was out of the retreat center by 11 a.m., with Arizona JVs drawing the short straw yet again and having to clean up. But our flight didn't leave until 4:30 p.m., so we found ourselves in San Jose with a surplus of time to kill. So we did the only thing any rational person would do — we went to In-N-Out. Many East Coasers who were in California for the first time were also In-N-Out virgins, which needed to be remedied immediately. A few double-doubles later and we found ourselves still killing a couple of hours in the newly completed San Jose terminal. I'll admit, it's a pretty epic building. I highly recommend it, if you have the means.

But alas, finally we set foot on a plane... and then landed a short hour later in Ontario for our brief layover.

We finally made it to Phoenix at 8 p.m., having been beat home by those crazy kids who decided to drive straight through from San Jose. Earlier in the day, Nora, our program coordinator, informed us that we would have a ride waiting for us when we arrived at the airport. One of the placements we would be working with was scheduled to pick us up in a 15 person van, big enough to accomodate 7 people and their luggage. Walking past security, we were surprised to find a woman from a different placement who was there to give a ride to two of us... and ONLY two of us. The 8 others were SOL. Luckily another woman arrived a couple minutes later to give another two of us a ride... and ONLY two of us. By those calculations, three of us were still screwed. In the end, one more driver met us at baggage claim several minutes later. And, you guessed it, he was there to pick up two of us... and ONLY two of us. Luckily, he was kind enough to give the lone straggler a ride as well.

Finally, the moment arrived — the second when we would be able to see the house we would be living in for the next year of our lives. There are two JVC houses in Phoenix, each with 5 people. The boys are in the minority in both our house and in Casa Bart (aka Casa Phoenix One). In each house, the girls out number the boys 3 to 2. The houses are about 1.5 miles and a 5 minute taxi ride apart, unless you're our taxi driver from last night, who "accidentally" got lost in Phoenix's easy grid system and added another 5 minutes and 2 bucks to our taxi bill.

We walked into the house to find brightly painted walls and a fresh lasagna waiting for us. The lasagna was a gift from one of our generous support people, who cooked us dinner for our first night in the house. The brightly colored walls seem to be the gift of the 2003-04 group of girls that lived in the house. These girls had a talent for picking fun colors, but NOT a talent for painting (pictures will be up soon to illustrate this point). We also found desk chairs strangely stacked ontop of book shelves and floor lamps lying on our couches, the direct result of the floors being replaced after last year's tenants left last week.

We inaugurated the year with a fun get together at our house with Casa Bart. And, when Casa Bart went to start their recently donated car at 1 a.m. (also from one of our placements) to get home, everything turned on except for the engine. Radio, air conditioner, lights, everything. No engine. They ended up taking a taxi home.

The next day, Casa Bart and Casa Truth actually WERE picked up by a 15 person van and given a tour of the city. We were driven past our placements so we would know how to get to them come Monday.

There is no way on earth I'll remember how to get to Central Arizona Shelter Services on Monday morning. But I can tell you that the art museum is just down the street from the ball park... if that counts for anything.

Anyways, when we were picked up in the morning, the driver told us we would be treated to lunch, much to our delight (like I said, we're holding out on this cooking thing). He asked us to make a group choice to decide between Mexican food and sandwiches. Fist to five (inside joke, I'll explain later), we all went with the Mexican option, eager to try some authentic local cuisine.


We went to Baja Fresh.


I'm still secretly hoping that our next encounter with "authentic Mexican food" results in our arrival at Chipotle. Don't tell my casa mates that I passed along this anecdote. I've been complaining for the past two day and they're sick of me still bringing it up.

Anyways, last night concluded with an epic inauguration of Casa Bart's year — an inauguration that I will admit out did the party the night before at Casa Truth.

Much of today was spent in recovery from said party. Another large part of the day was devoted to our first ever Agenda Meeting, in which we decided a schedule for the house chores. Most of today was spent, however, in cleaning. Casa Truth, although newly minted in name (the artist formerly known as Casa Sojo), has a long history with JVC, which includes a lot of JVs leaving a lot of junk behind because they could not fit it in their luggage once they returned home. We spent most of today sorting through some of the strangest objects I've ever seen.

Not only did we stumble upon prom dresses from the 1970s, but we also found a frame with several photos of a little girl in braces who is an absolute stranger to all of us (and probably most of the JVs in the past few years).

Naturally, she is now keeping guard over our living room.