Hooray!!

I booked our hotel in Singapore!!!!!

Here it is!

Hotel Rendezvous - Singapore

Happenings in Japan…

Ha ha!  Not like much has happened really!  I’ve been sticking to my list with a slip up here and there.  It’s mostly the exercising I am slacking on and that is the one thing that I need to kick in gear!

Here is a good reason for me to step up the exercising:

I AM GOING TO SINGAPORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am going the beginning of August to meet Jay.  I am very excited for several reasons.  Not only am I going to a place that I never dreamed I would go or would even think about going too, but I get to see my guy!  That is going to break our time apart into halves mostly.  I only get to see him for 2 or 3 days but I will take what I can get!

I’ve been researching things we can do there and the safest places to stay.  I don’t want to stay near the 4 Floors of Whores or anything! (yes that is a real place, you can wikipedia it!).  I am most excited for the shopping and there is a bird park and botanic garden.  I’ve heard there a lot of other wives going as well.

My foster kittens are now in other homes and doing well.  Edward gave us quite a scare on Friday and had to be taken to the vet, but he is fine now.  For that matter all of the animals at the shelter are doing well.  Bumblelion the worlds most adoptable unadoptable dog is still here.  I haven’t quite figured out what to do with him yet.

I just found out that my very good friend Susan is moving in September, the end of the month, and I’m not too happy about it.  I am happy for her because she is excited to get out of here, but it still sucks a lot.

I am also preparing for Kim to visit.  It’s gonna be fun, but right now I’m in the process of getting all the paperwork done so that she can stay on base with me!!!

Jay is doing well and should get a break visiting Australia here soon!

Sometimes Life is a Jumble…

I slacked on my blog writing last week I know.  Jay was home for the weekend and I was consumed in all things Jay.  I can’t help it, it was the last time he would be home until September.  He left last week, and to be honest, things have been falling apart ever since he left.  Well at least the 2 days following his departure.  I thought that my husband leaving would be the worst thing that would happen to me that week but I was wrong!  Thursday night during our adoption hours at the shelter I went in to get one of our dogs Penny.  She is approximately 8 years old and a Golden Retriever.  She’s a sweet active loving dog.  Penny wasn’t acting right and I noticed her stomach was very very large.  The first thing that came to mind was Marley!  Marley from Marley and Me had Bloat!  Bloat is very dangerous and deadly.

We rushed her to the emergency Japanese vet as quick as we could.  Sure enough it was bloat and it was bad, although her stomach hadn’t twisted yet.  We had to leave her at the vet and wait for the phone call to give us the news.  We got the call that her stomach could be corrected with surgery but it would cost up to $6,000.  We couldn’t afford that, and her new potential family couldn’t afford it.  They had also found a small mass in her spleen that may have been cancerous.  We had to make the hard decision to put her down.  It was a really rough night.

The next morning my friend Mel called.  She is fostering kittens.  One of her kittens had passed away.  Talk about a crappy couple of days!

Since then things have perked up a bit.  We did a fundraiser for the animal shelter on Saturday by bagging groceries for a day.  The tips we got we got to keep for the shelter.  We made about $1,000!  That will just about pay a vet bill for a month!

I’m petsitting a new cat, his name is Charlie and he is a butt.  He scratches my couch and is just overall a jerk.

The kittens are going into new foster homes today.   I do not have enough time for them.  When I am home I just wanna spend time with my cats and not them.  That is not fair to them.  They are being split 3 and 3 and then they should get over their fear issues.  I’m going to miss them but it’s for the best.

I think that’s all for now.  I’ll update list stuff on that page!

Big Surprises

So yesterday Kari and I went on a routine trip to the Veterinarian.  Routine for us means taking 1 cat and 7 kittens!  That’s volunteering at an animal shelter for ya!  As it turns out the kittens we took in for testing are all healthy and that is a relief!  The older ones are ready for adoption and are healthy.  One kitten has the herpes virus which is common in kittens unfortunately….

Anyway they said they had kittens in the back that security brought in for us.  I said okay and we’d take them when we left, not thinking much of it, because this happens quite a bit especially this time of year!

When I went in the back to get them I was in for a big surprise!  There are 6 of them!!!  And of course we have no foster homes left so it’s all me.  I have 6 kittens in my dining room right now playing like crazy in a kennel.  They are around 5 weeks, but are the size of 3 week old kittens.  They are very petite and we dont’ know why.  They seem very healthy and happy.

I’ve named them after the Twilight books and here they are!

 

This is Esme

 

Jasper

Alice

 

Bella, Rosalie, and Edward

Everyone

 

 

 

 

A New Outlook

I’m sure I’ve been shoving it down your throats but I start my Day Zero Project tomorrow morning.  Of course I’m starting it on what will be one of the most hectic days I will have in a while.

I’ve got a busy week ahead of me preparing for Jay to get home.  He’s only going to be home for like 5 days so we’ve got to make the best of it!  He’s been working hard lately and not getting much sleep, so I’m hoping to cook him some delicious meals and provide some quiet time at home.  After he leaves this time we’ll be apart until at least August or September.

Speaking of Jay working hard, I was sent a few pictures of him today.  Apparently the Media department has been dropping in on them recently because they are probably the only ones sweating while they are working on the ship!

I’m currently obsessed with taking pictures with my camera and it’s one thing I get to mark off of my list right away!!

I’ve got a petsitting job for this summer for about 30 days watching a kitten adopted from the shelter, his name is Charlie.  He is a little Typhoon and I’m not sure how I’m gonna handle him but hey it’s easy money!

I’m still not sure if I’m going to try and get a few english students here at my home for a “job” or if I’m going to get a real job on base.  I’ve got a lot of concerns about trying to balance a regular job and the shelter, but I”m gonna figure it out.  I’ve opted not to teach at english schools in the evening because once Jay arrives home I would be gone every night of the week and that wouldn’t be cool.

A Little Piece of My Heart Breaks..

As you all know I love Christmas.  I love Christmas more than any other holiday.  Sure halloween is fun and Valentines day is romantic but nothing has what Christmas has.  Christmas has cookies, decorated trees, presents, good food, christmas music, fondue, decorations, and most importantly Family.  This year I will spend Christmas with 4 members of my family, Jay, Stretch, Levi, and Hendrix.  While my husband and my furry babies are among some of the most important beings in my life, I can’t help but be sad that I won’t be with my family for the second year in a row.  It’s hard to have a 24 year streak and then all of the sudden be in a foreign country for the holidays.

There are so many things that I miss.  We miss having fondue dinner with everyone.  We miss waking my mom and dad up long before they want to be woken up.  We miss my dad’s homemade Christmas morning hot chocolate.  We miss reading our ornament poems out loud at the dinner table.  There are so many things we miss.

Nevertheless I can guarantee you that we will make the best of it.  We’ve got a tree (a fake one and I’m not too happy about it, but..) and plenty of beautiful ornaments.  We’ve got the music.  Although Jay does not seemed to thrilled with my Christmas music obsession.  I’m sure he’ll come around eventually!  We’ve got the gifts to send out.  We’ve got fuzzy loving kitties to cuddle up with on a cold night.

I’m not complaining.  I’m merely letting all of you know that we will miss you this Christmas.  We will miss you a lot.

Life on hold..but still in fast forward?

Hello All - 

Jay is still gone, and though it feels like he’s been gone forever it’s only been 3 weeks or so.  I’ve still got a month before he is hopefully home!  So in light of waiting around for my guy to get back home I’ve taken on probably more projects than I can handle in hopes of making the time go by faster.

I’m sure I mentioned it before but I am watching a friends pets, Roscoe and Nathan.  That has been great although I have to admit that I have not been sleeping well at their house on the nights I’ve stayed over.  I am used to sleeping with a fan and of course my pillows and blankets and it’s really quiet there!  And on top of that the dog snores very badly!  Other than that I am having a great time watching them.

I am also having a great time subbing for Susan’s english classes over in Zushi City.  Each class has 3 students.  The first class is 3 boys and they are a little rowdy but they are little boys so it is to be expected.  The second class are older so they are a little more together and they are very fun to teach.  They are very anxious to get the info and learn what they can.  I have 2 more classes with them before Susan gets back.

And of course I’ve been doing anything and everything with the shelter.  Recently things have been a bit hard.  We had a dog named Rocky.  Rocky was an 8 month old Chocolate Lab, beautiful with a lot of potential.  However his first owners weren’t really into exploring his potential.  They were into locking him outside for 8 hours a day and when they were around him and he tried to dominate them, they let him, by allowing him to jump on them and bite their arms aggressively.  We knew he had been kept outside when we took him in but we weren’t aware of his dominance issues.  After only 1 week of caring for him, we realized his problems were a little more than we expected and it resulted in one of our great volunteers getting bit by him.  She was understanding, as it is not Rocky’s fault.  As they say…no bad dogs….I think you can finish it.  Still we had to file a bite report and Rocky was on Quarantine for 10 days.  Over that time we had to consider our options.  There were only a few of us, one being myself, who would handle him without fear.  Being in a military situation it is too hard to find families who are willing to take in an animal with extensive problems like Rocky’s.  Most people around here want animals to come in, fit in, and never cause a problem…think of the predicament we’d be in if they thought that of their children?  At any rate we had to make the ultimate decision to have Rocky euthanized, which wasn’t what we wanted, but what was best for him.  We received a lot of criticism from volunteers and the veterinary staff, but in the end it was our choice, and I feel as if we made the right one.  I was one of the people who had to take Rocky in for that last vet visit.  I am confident that he is happy now, not confined, and he’s lost his need to always have the last word.  Nevertheless it has been a hard week for me and the other board members…

Right now I’m wishing I could fly home.  My dad is having surgery next week as most of you know and I hate not being there.  The whole idea of the hospital makes me nervous and I wish I could be there to keep him company and go to the hospital with my mom.  Instead I am baking him goodies and sending him fun stuff!

I think that is all for now.

Busy and Lonely

Yep!  That’s me, busy and lonely.  I try to stay busy so that I don’t feel lonely but it doesn’t always work.  Oh well.

Once again the apartment is full of vagabond kittens.  Four this time to be exact.  They will only be here for four weeks but I’m loving them just the same.  They have been getting in a lot of trouble and Hendrix does not seem to mind leading the pack.  She’s realized that she is bigger than them and they will do whatever she does.  So far they can’t be left unattended because they chewed up my headphones and I wasn’t too happy about that.  Jay wanted to name them after King Arthur legend, so here they are…

 

King Arthur

Lancelot (beige) and Guinivere (tiger)

 

Merlin

 

Aren’t they cute?  I have just realized that my text size changed and I have no idea why or how to change it, so I guess deal with it.  So…the good news is I sort of got a job.  My friend Susan, as I mentioned before is going away and I am going to be covering her class with an older woman who is learning English better.  Susan also works for a small English school for kids and needed a substitute and as it turns out the school needed an on call sub anyway, so I went in and chatted with the lady and I guess I’m going to be subbing Susan’s class next week!  I’m a little scared, but also pretty excited.  I think it’s going to be a really good experience and pretty fun once I get the hang of it.

It seems like I have a million things to do but I’m hoping that is a good thing so that I don’t have to sit around and think about Jay not being home all the time.  It sucks.  I’m going to try really hard this weekend to get some new pictures put up that I’ve taken.  However they are probably just of cats and you won’t be interested.  Hey, I say go with what you are good at.  I’m good at animals.  ha ha!

Here is a picture of Levi and Stretch in case any of you were wondering how they were getting along?

 

The boys sleeping

Oh and don’t forget Hendrix’s ears which make a cameo in that photo.  They don’t let her lay with them because she simply isn’t cool enough.  In their defense she is kind of a dork…and in her’s…well….nevermind, she’s a dork.

Single Again…

 

 

 

Jay loving on the Kittens at the Shelter

So Jay is gone again, yippee skippee.  I thought I would share this nice picture of him in his utilities uniform loving on the kittens at the shelter.  He hates animals so much I don’t even know why he goes there!  He won’t be gone as long this time and hopefully, fingers crossed, he will be home for Thanksgiving.  That would be extremely nice since he hasn’t had a real thanksgiving in over 2 years!  As for me I will be trying to keep busy.  My writing job is good, but a tiny bit slow lately.  It’s partially my fault since Jay has been home I was a little distracted.  I set a goal last night though that I’m going to make it a point to do more of my own personal writing while he is gone this time.  I haven’t quite figured out how I’m going to do it yet but I’ve gotta work out some sort of schedule for myself.  I promise I’ll put it up on here when it happens.  I’m just gonna start writing, no editing, no second guessing myself, that will all come later!

I’m also going to be covering a teaching job for my friend Susan while she is gone this month.  It’s just for 2 mornings but it should be fun!  I will also be petsitting Susan’s animals while she is gone during October.  I’m pretty excited about that.  She has a great dog named Roscoe, and a really cool cat named Nathan.

Hendrix hating the fact that she was Leied!

Speaking of cats, do you like this one?  Well Jay and I all hope that you do because she is the newest member of our family.  Crazy cat lady me if you will but the fact is that I just don’t care!  I love my pets more than anything in this world, and sometimes you just know when it’s right to bring one into your life.  I have known that I wanted Hendrix ever since she was about a week and a half old.  She was special and beautiful, and she still is.  Her eye still isn’t healed and she will probably have to have surgery on it.  This will probably happen when she goes down to be spayed which will be in November or December.  We wouldn’t have made this decision if Jay were going to stay in the navy but as it stands right now he will be getting out and we will be moving back to the states.

Thats all for now…

Not so great news

Well as most of you know Jay is home for a little bit.  He just had his first day on the George Washington.  One of the first things he wanted to find out were the possible holiday leave dates for this year.  On the Kitty Hawk there were 4 separate sets of leave dates and we were counting on this ship being similar or the same.  We were counting on taking leave in February so we could go on a real vacation together to Key West and then head home to see family and for Julie and Matt’s wedding.  When Jay asked, he was told that the last leave period went until the end of January, and where on the KH they could take up to 21 days off, the GW will only let him take up to 14 days.

Yeah you guessed it.  There goes our Key West vacation.  I got myself all worked up over nothing…we had a hotel picked, the trip planned, but now it isn’t meant to be.

We now have to have our fingers crossed that when he puts in for 2 weeks of leave for February it will be approved even though it isn’t within the times they offer.  He was told by a chief that he could put it in and he should get it, but that is the farthest thing from a guarantee.  Needless to say I will be home for the wedding no matter what, but our time is going to be cut short, and we aren’t even sure if they will grant Jay the time or not.

We are fairly certain that the GW hasn’t taken into account the fact that 14 days really isn’t enough time to take a trip to the states and back and actually have a nice time.  I guess they are still in a virginia state of mind.  Hopefully they will come around and get their heads together for the sake of the rest of us.

We’ll keep you updated as soon as we figure out what the heck is going on….