The Barkers

This blog is SO dead

2009-12-29T15:41:00.000-08:00

Ok folks, so I am currently thinking about so many things, and with the New Year coming I have some great things planned, goals I have set for myself, lots of changes, and lots of exciting things. One of the things that I have been thinking about is how I have two blogs. This one for our personal lives and adventures and my Joy Jill one for, well, obviously, my photography business etc. Since I started up my JJ blog I have been slacking immensely on this one. Not to mention there was one post that went to the JJ blog that was supposed to be on here. So reasons why I am ending this blog:

1) For me to accurately update my blog I cannot have two
2) There is no reason I should not post personal things to my JJ blog
3) Even if I want to keep business - business and personal - personal any slightly computer savvy person could easily find my personal blog anyway

AND 4) I am not that embarrassed by my personal life that I cannot share it with my clients and I am sure I will be better off making my JJ blog more personal and interesting instead of only posting shoots (cause as cool as that is it can get a little boring).

So the short story is I am ending this blog and if you want to continue to follow me online go check me out at my Joy Jill Photography Blog

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-25T20:43:00.000-08:00

So here are some pics from our Christmas :) We were SUPER lucky that Brian did not have duty on Christmas :) Last year he had duty on both Christmas and New Years so we had to celebrate one day late. This year though was great. We slept in, opened presents, Brian made breakfast (french toast and eggs) while I made some cookies and pies for later, started the turkey, then we got the house in order for later, went for a run with Shugo, and Brian went to get his camera and pick up some friends for our feast! Some pictures.... Shugo loves sitting in front of the heater, Twiggy (our friends dog that we are watching for a bit) likes to just stay on her bed.

Shugo clearly smelled that part of that box was for him...
He was happy! Thanks Chris and Tara! You have AMAZING timing! Your stuff always gets here just in time. I picked up the box on the 24th :)
Slightly out of order. This gift went down in history as the "best gift ever". Definitely won't be able to top this... He has been asking for a fisheye lens for bout 2 years now. He was surprised and VERY happy :)
Thank you Chris and Tara!
This was before he found the lens... he really enjoyed this little panda too, can't you tell? It's a special panda from Beijing, you puch a button and he sneezes.... no. Not really.
but Shugo wanted to eat him.
Breakfast with Tara's awesome rasberry jam! Tara your jams are AWESOME! And we also loved the salsa you sent Brian for his b-day.
This is the first apple pie I have ever made. Crumbly top.... not quite as crumbly as Ikeda's, but pretty darn tasty!

All in all, it was an awesome Christmas! Great time spent with Brian and great to have friends over to celebrate with :) Hope y'all's Christmas was just as good!

The Great Wall

2009-12-07T03:48:00.001-08:00

OK, let me start by saying, I am an idiot. I posted pics and stuff from Hong Kong, but I posted it on my photography blog thinking it was this blog. Woops. Not like it matters, but I never planned to post so many snapshots onto my photo blog, and definitely never planned to put a pic of Brian sleeping in bed on there... :) Anyway, it is already done. Here are some pics from The Great Wall! Above is some corn. The small town outside the part of the wall we visited had lots of corn and we had some cornbread with our lunch. Very tasty. Below is a very steep part of the wall. It looks like it just drops off, but it keep going. I timed myself and ran up it in 35 seconds. I then thought I might die and fall off the wall, but I survived.
The cool thing about our trip to the wall is on our way to the wall (we hired a guide and driver for the day) we got stopped at a toll road that they closed off due to fog. We sat in traffic for a while before we were able to make it out. Our guide suggested we go to another spot. She said it would be more hiking, but it is even less touristy than the area we were planning on going to, and less renovated. It was totally awesome cause we had the whole thing to ourselves. It looked pretty small town out there and almost 3rd world country-ish, but it was great and we had AWESOME lunch and the video of how it was made is below :) It was the best fish I have ever had. Absolutely delicious. Thank you Jesus for the fog cause we loved the area we visited :)
Kristan loved the wind :)
Awesome

Yahooooo!
Self portrait time
Another steep part :)

Yes, I did a handstand for crossfit :)

Below is the look we got from everyone. People are not ashamed to stare in China and that was a bit weird for me coming from Japan...

....And I'm Off!

2009-11-24T21:11:00.000-08:00

I know you've all seen this pic, but it just fit too well :) I am off to China! I leave tomorrow morning bright and early at 4:30am (leaving the house that is). Our flight leaves at 9am and we are headed to Hong Kong first. My friend Kristan is on a plane at this very moment (probably panicking, but hopefully sleeping) and we probably won't get to my house until 8pm tonight at which point I still need to throw my stuff in a bag, shave my legs (oh so important), do the dishes, and any other last minute things.

So we will be meeting Brian in Hong Kong traveling all around there for a few days, and then Kristan and I will continue on to Beijing without Brian... definitely wish he could be there, but no way that's gonna stop me from having a blast! I am SO excited to see the Great Wall. So excited. Not to worry (those of you who do) my brother-in-law's cousin lives in Beijing (though I just found this out a day ago), but we at least have a contact there in case Kristan falls off the Great Wall :)

We will have no internet (both our laptops are too old and retarded to be worth bringing) so there will be no updates or contact of any sort to any person. BUT please look forward to some great pictures coming your way! Farewell! And as they say in China... Adios!... wait... I don't know what they say in China :( So much to learn...

Yabusame!!

2009-11-23T03:13:00.000-08:00

Check this out!!! The saddle I thought was VERY interesting. Almost looks like an endurance saddle, and the stirrups are just something else. This is by far the COOLEST thing I have (and probably will) photograph the entire time we have been in Japan! I have never watched horseback archery before and definitely never seen Samurai horseback archery (Yabusame). It was really cool. Of course it only made me want to tackle one of those little Japanese people and jump on their horse to try it myself, but I thought better of it. Seriously though, it was awesome! And apparently Santa Claus is in Japan, he was trying to hide behind that flag though... Melody, this guy is giving your dad a run for his money :)
How cool is that Bridal and reins??
The samurai!
This I thought was awesome! Reminds me of MXC, and I can just hear the voice over... "Charge!"
Yes, even chicks are Samurai :) This might be my favorite... great colors. And look at her hat... it is tied on like a freakin' halter. Weird...
This guy looks like he is running with the horse... if he moves his arms like that the horse goes faster too :) Hahaa!

great details. I want those chaps. I bet dad would wear them too :)

This horse looks so nice and collected, but that is the trickery of a camera... he was actually limping on his front right. He was limping significantly (though I am sure it was worse because of the deep sand) but I was still surprised that they rode him.

This is me, Kahori, and Ryo... somehow my face looks fat. And they make me look really red... and not just my hair.

Of course though this horse looks nothing like Almond aside from the color, he still reminded me of him.... Almond! For all you in the states... be warned that I will be spending much of my time in March with my horse... though all are welcome to come along :)
Couldn't pass this up. The guy on the right actually spoke great English!
And Kahori... we are both officially samurai now :)
The end... that was my Sunday. It was cold, but SOOOO worth it. I would have gone in my bathing suit and got frost bite if I had to... it was cool.

Adventures!

2009-11-17T20:24:00.000-08:00

So much going on! I should be posting pictures of some sort, but I am posting from work... *Shhhh... don't tell!* Soooo, the latest is that I have been wonderfully busy with my job and photography work. If you don't follow my photography blog (shame on you) but I have been having a lot of shoots every weekend for that last month. It is definitely portrait season and I am SO happy for the first time in my life to feel like I am actually doing photography as a business :D I have never had so many photography gigs and it is really awesome. I know that it will taper off in January, but I am wondering what the spring will hold. If I continue to get as much work as I am (and more) I will probably have to quit my day job. I definitely would not have time to do everything if Brian were home now, so yay for perfect timing on the deployment!

On the horizon we have CHINA! Woohoo! Brian is going to be in Hong Kong for a bit and I am going to visit! I am SO excited! My beloved friend Kristan is flying out here to come along. We will be flying to Hong Kong to be with Brian for a few days and then we will be heading to Beijing for a few days. Lots to see and do. In Hong Kong there will be hiking, shopping, beaches, city, night photography and so much more! In Beijing we will have The Great Wall, The Forbidden City, Tienanmen Square, Hutongs, rickshaws, and again glorious photography! Kristan and I depart for this wondrous adventure on Thanksgiving! Great way to celebrate, AND I will be able to enjoy Thanksgiving with Brian in a foreign country :)... not like we aren't already in a foreign country, but it will be a new foreign country! We plan to go have a bird cooked Christmas Story style with the head still intact :) Should be fun!

Also, on the horizon are many more adventures, but we will have to wait and post pics of those things as they come :) I am excited for this weekend and hope to be able to gather everything I need for the trip and get any and all shoots from Saturday up online before we head out Thursday!

For those of you who like to read... a good story for you:

I got to work on Tuesday morning and my boss asks me, "Joy, are you taking a psychology class?" I instantly get slightly worried cause I had just signed up for this class while at work on Monday and printed my syllabus here (which I am not supposed to do really, they say I can print a few personal things though so I should be fine)... So I say, "Yeeeeaaaaah, why?" Tom- "Well, your stuff printed out to the Fiery printer on Tyvak..." Ah! The fiery printer is the one we use for BANNERS! and Tyvak is nice paper that is for the outdoors! I go over and say, "Hmmm, well, that's embarrassing..." as I quickly snatched up my seven feet of syllabus to roll up and throw in the trash... I realized I sent it to the Fiery on accident, but I thought that I had canceled the job. It was the end of the day, so clearly I was not there to do anything about it. Oops.

Vietnam

2009-11-11T18:04:00.001-08:00

So Brian emailed me some pics to post for him... This is from his time in Vietnam. He said it was pretty much like a 3rd world country. Took lots of pictures... here are a few to look at. I have no idea what he did other than playing a soccer game one day. He doesn't always send the most detailed emails... anyway, so here are the pics. Sorry they have not been color corrected or anything... I figured he would rather have them up fast than wait a few days (or even a week) for me to color correct. Not that it takes me that long to do, I just know I wouldn't "get around to it" for a while :) Enjoy!

These fish are disgusting with their ugly little mouths...

Doesn't he look like he's having fun!??

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRIAN!!!!

2009-11-11T01:06:00.001-08:00

Today Brian turns 33... HOLY CRAP!... I mean, Wow, Brian is SO young :) Well, for your birthday Brian, Shugo and I are celebrating even though you are not here. The pictures uploaded out of order, but as you can see he is getting his special extra large bone and it's not even the weekend :) Needless to say, he is happy. The picture above is Brian on the ship. This is his normal everyday attire :) No, not really. He was trying to be a frog, but had a bad face painter and no green clothes.... oh well, at least he looks super buff right?!! His face looks weird, but if you scroll down and chop off his head I think he looks pretty hot :)

Anyway, an ode to Brian... Brian you are not a frog, but that is good cause frogs are ugly and slimy. I think they live with mushrooms sometimes and that would definitely not be good for you. You are very simple and laid back. Always the LAST person to complain... unless of course there is nothing to complain about (you are just backwards like that). You can be friends with anyone and are always the "nice guy" and you are also just a nice guy :) You are the most humble and patient person I know (aside from the Japanese cause they are pretty humble...). You suck at telling stories, but it is great when you have a crowd listening cause it just makes me laugh. You are very giving and always willing to help out anyone. Never speak bad of people (even when it is due). Always seek to follow the Lord with everything. Your dedicated, hard working, always have a good attitude, content anywhere, adaptable, and SUUUUUPER!

Seriously, We've been through a lot of changes and done a lot together and we have MANY more years together, but so far Brian is pretty cool :) In case any of you haven't figured that out yet. I could go on and on about the great things that are Brian, but there is just too much. So, let me just give one favorite memory here... ok, this is hard to think of... there are too many... I am realizing that most of the funny memories are at my expense...

One time (when we lived in Santa Barbara) Brian was working late at Zodo's. His normal schedule was, start at 8-9pm and finish at 2-3am. So, let me lay out the scene for you. I was home, it was about 11pm and I was working on some images for class. I had just got off the phone with Lindsey and it was silent. Dead silent. Talented me, I can't do too many things at once and having music, telephone, and editing happening is just too much. So again, it's silent. The desk was in the closet ( I know, weird) so I am facing the wall and the front door (which is glass) is to the right. All of a sudden it swings open. My heart instantly stopped beating. I quickly thought, "Eh! How did that open?! Was it not closed all the way? Did it blow open? It can't blow open... is there an animal out there? Someone is there? What do I have to defend myself... nothing. Great. Where's the bat? The gun? A tripod!? Anything!?! Ok, if I go really quick I can close it and no harm will be done..." So I get up, I have to step outside to get the door to close it and as I stepped outside I saw someone crouching in the shadows on the steps. I wanted to yell, scream, attack, ask politely who it was, but as all this went through my head in an instant all I got out was, "Bleahhhhaaaah!" right as Brian jumped out of the darkness to scare me. The nerve. He got off work extra early and thought it would be fun to park the truck down the street (before I hear or see it) and come scare me. I was so freaked out (cause this all happened in about 3 minutes of time). It was enough time to get me so worked up that I was shaking and of course I punched him, but at that point there was no force in me to even come close to knocking the wind out of him. Terrible.

So there you have it folks, the lovely Brian Barker...

I got a Piano!

2009-11-06T16:04:00.000-08:00

This is me with my digital piano :) For those of you who do not know, I took piano lessons as a child. I loved it at first and I even think I remember being the one who wanted to learn initially. However, not long after starting I quickly lost interest... but mom thought it best to force me to continue for the next 8 years (literally). It is embarrassing to admit how long I took lessons cause I really suck, but seriously I don't think there is a person out there who applied themselves less. I would only practice for five minutes before each lesson (in a rushed attempt to memorize one measly measure. Seriously, it was bad. So now I wished I had tried harder cause I would love to be able to read music. So I am taking lessons on base and have bought this digital piano. I know digital pianos are usually a fortune, but someone was selling this little gem on base for $300 bucks and I jumped on it :) Maybe someday I will post a video of me playing... but first I will practice more :)

This is just a Test

2009-11-01T18:49:00.000-08:00

I am just testing something for myself.... sizing stuff adn how it looks online.

Officially ONE YEAR!

2009-11-01T03:45:00.001-08:00

So we have officially been here in Japan for one year... kinda crazy. I have not stepped on US soil for ONE YEAR. These are some pics from our long day to get here. It was a really long flight and I definitely do not look forward to doing it again... someday though I will. My favorite part on the plane was that near the end (about the third meal in) we started getting sushi... yikes!

Brian, guarding our bags... with that face who would wanna mess with him?
Me once we arrived in Japan... I don't exactly do well on little sleep, so this is my "I'm tired leave me alone" smile :)
The day after we arrived, we ventured out to see Japan. We didn't get far cause we didn't get any yen and were so starving we had to head back to base where we could use our American dollars...

So... you might ask yourself... what have I learned being in Japan for one year? Am I fluent in Japanese? Let me tell you a few things that I have learned being here in Japan:

- Japanese people are very nice and polite
-They don't like confrontation, but once in a while you will see them honk their car horn (I make it my goal to drive obnoxiously to see how much it takes... no, not really)
-personal space is just not something they understand
-very artistic people in general
-extremely tidy/clean... they freaking sweep their gutters regularly, their gutters people!
-If you are slightly off in saying something (or if the English word is very similar, and you say it in English) they still won't understand you.
-They love dogs, but fear Shugo (in general that is... there are many people who LOVE Shugo).
-Though personal space is unknown here, shaking hands, hugging, and any public affection is rarely seen.
- They will always say they don't speak English (especially if you ask them in Japanese)
-They go out of their way to help when asked (which is sometimes awkward cause if it's not a big deal and they are still trying to help... and I just want to move on with my life...)

Anyway, there is so much more, but I must go. I know I have been slacking here. I have been really busy with work, Brian being home, and photography shoots. Now Brian is gone, and I can focus my energy into getting things done. I have no balance in life. When he is here, everything hits that back burner, and when he is gone, I overload to not be bored (which makes for a lot of stuff hitting the back burner while he is here). Has anyone out there found balance in life? Ever? Is it possible? I am still searching and someday hope to find it...

Things that Make me Laugh :)

2009-10-20T21:16:00.000-07:00

Ok, I absolutely LOVE talking with Japanese people and learning more about their culture. Last Saturday Brian and I had our friends Ryo and Kahori over for dinner. There English is ok, not great, but good enough to converse a little. It is SUPER fun to get to know them better and of course we both love to practice speaking another language.

First of all, I made enchiladas for dinner. They enjoyed watching me make it and even helped out a bit. At one point I had my hands messy with the sauce and asked them to open a can... apparently a Japanese can opener is pretty different than an American one. They couldn't figure it out and I definitely couldn't explain it to them. I WISH I had a camera cause it was HILARIOUS! They almost looked like the guys in Zoolander hitting the computer like a bunch of monkeys... ok, maybe not that bad, but it was pretty funny.

The best part though is email. I sent Ryo an email to say thank you for coming over and he replied that next time we should go to their house. Let me tell you though, his English really isn't that great and it is really confusing in email. Please read:

Hi,Joy

OK it's good.
Then we treat you to a traditional Japanese-style dish. I do not understand whether you are delicious,and please come to our house to play without hesitation when Brian is going on a business trip.If it gets a telephone, it is OK. We want to learn American culture, English, too and teach you Japanese culture, Japanese.

The Japanese stay was limited, too. Please absorb more it in things of short time

We do help.

Thanks,
Ryo&Kahori

Clearly, his English is WAY better than my Nijongo, and you can figure out what he is trying to say for the most part (there are seriously parts though that I have NO idea what he is saying), but so so funny. And I swear I am NOT making fun of him. It is awesome that they try so hard and I absolutely LOVE IT! It just brings tears to my eyes cause I am laughing so much :) It just makes me wonder what I sound like when I speak Japanese... what am I really saying?

Our Plan... as of Today :)

2009-10-14T19:19:00.000-07:00

Alrighty folks... YOU ALL need an update. There was talk of Brian doing EOD (Explosive Ordinance Disposal) and us moving back stateside in the next few months. However, as we are accustomed to in the Navy our plans have changed drastically. So let me just give you the rundown...

Brian's EOD package was approved by his command and sent off to the detailer. We were waiting on orders when we found out that the detailer denied it. This came as a surprise to us cause we didn't think it could get denied after being approved by the command. The reasons it was denied were 1) Brian's higher tenure, 2) His age (EOD age limit is 30), and 3) he recently dropped out of BUD/S. Apparently EOD is in the same boat as SEALs and if you drop out of one you cannot return to either until 2 years has passed. Though he is over the age limit his PT scores are great so I am not sure why that mattered. Probably because it was just one more thing (he would need a waiver). As for his higher tenure.... it does not make sense to me because though he is an E-4 it's not like he is behind the curve.

Regardless of these things the plan now is to resubmit the package when he advances to a higher rank (E-5). Advancing in the military is complicated and I don't feel like explaining it, but basically when he advances he will be resubmitting a package to EOD.

What does all this really mean? In a nutshell... A) When Brian advances he will resubmit his package, if it is approved we may be leaving by July 2010 (not likely to be any sooner). B) If his package gets denied he will finish out his time in the Navy here in Japan (so we will be here until Nov 2011).Does Brian plan to retire with the Navy? Good question! If he goes EOD, yes, he will likely do 20 years. If not, he will likely get out in January 2012.

So there you have it! That is our life plan as of today! It could very possibly change by tomorrow, next week, or next month. We just never know with the military. This is our basic plan for now, but who knows what will come up.... so sit tight everyone and if you want to come visit please do!

Typhoon

2009-10-12T03:43:00.000-07:00

So... we had a typhoon last week. What is a typhoon you might be wondering?? Well, basically it is a storm. Wind, rain, maybe comparable to a baby hurricane. And by baby I mean probably like a 1 day old baby who is sleeping after a meal... not bad. Everyone made a HUGE deal about this storm. We had one about two weeks ago and it was literally NOTHING. So this one, people were making an even bigger deal about and I thought I was going to see something exciting. I felt like I was wating for the world to end... There was a lot of wind and rain Wednesday night. There was, I will admit that. BUT Thursday, the base closed down as it was in TCCOR 1. TCCOR is a rating system that only the military uses (and it may only be the military here in Japan... I'm not sure) but they use it and #1 is the "worst". Apparently, our base (of all the ones in Japan) won't close for anything, but even our base was closed on Thursday so that is really saying something about the seriousness of this Typhoon. Which was cool for me, I got a paid day off. It was lame for Brian though cause he was supposed to be in port for three weeks, but because of the storm they had to pull out for a week so the ship wouldn't be damaged by the storm.... LAME.

Below is my neighbor Shin. He is super nice and apparently crazy because he had this tree propped up much too quickly... Another neighbor told me that this storm was the worst one in about 5-10 years... yikes, no wonder why they were all freaking out. Don't get me wrong it was a storm, but it really wasn't THAT bad. I think it hit other parts of Japan much worse...

Tokyo Weirdos...

2009-10-06T02:27:00.000-07:00

I feel like I should say something here, but there are no words...

Website Update!

2009-09-26T20:14:00.000-07:00

I have updated my website! This is joyjill.com version 3.0 Every time I update my site there is immediately something I want to change. However, as of this moment I am quite happy with it. There are some things that I would do differently if I was absolutely amazing in Flash, but I just don't care to take the time to do anymore to it. It would take FOREVER and be extremely painful to do the things that I would like to. Someday when I am making millions I will pay Randy to build me an awesome site with a custom blog, but for now I think this will do.... crap, just typing that I realize that I forgot to put a link to my blog.... suck!

Well, check it out and I will work on that one extra button I need :)

It's COMPLETE!!! Just so you know adding that button turned out to be quite the hassle (only cause I found other problems with it), and you are pretty much looking at version 3.7...

Keep Praying for Daisy

2009-09-24T17:42:00.000-07:00

Daisy is doing great! She came out of surgery and is doing well. They said...

"Praise the Lord!! We are walking in miracles!! Daisy is already awake!! They are planning to remove her breathing tube momentarily! The doctors are flabbergasted with the how well this is going!! Even the unsaved doctors are attributing it to the many prayers!"

They were able to remove the tumor all in one piece, and so far so good :) This little girl has SO many people praying for her, it is really incredible! Please go to the site they created for her! and read for yourself the healing that is going on. It is so awesome to see God's hand through this and to read the updates as they post them. Keep praying for them!

GOD IS GOOD :)

Can't Sleep...

2009-09-24T06:48:00.001-07:00

So, it happens from time to time while Brian is away that I cannot sleep. This is a very normal thing too as I know MANY military wives who have been in the same position. Somehow, I have been VERY lucky that this is only my 2nd time having trouble sleeping since Brian has been gone... which has been about a month now. Seriously, that's amazing. And actually no offense to Brian, but both this time and the last time, I don't even really feel like I miss him exceedingly, I just can't sleep. I do miss him, but there is definitely a difference between missing him and desperately missing him and somehow I have not reached the desperately missing him during this deployment. However, I am ready for him to come home and word is that may be happening soon :) Yay for me!

So for now I will post some pics that I just ran into. I don't have too many of Brian with his sis and in fact, these actually may be the ONLY ones I have, but I really like them :) I took them right before we moved to Japan. Tamara was pregnant so they were pretending to be pregnant together... like sisters *cough* I mean siblings do :)

Pray For Daisy

2009-09-23T02:39:00.000-07:00

My Santa Barbara Pastor Brit Merrick's daughter needs prayer. The doctor's say she has the Wilms' Tumor. She goes into surgery on Thursday at 7:15am, SO if you pray... PRAY, and if you don't pray... PRAY. You can get more info here

Joy Jill Photography Blog

2009-09-21T18:44:00.000-07:00

Alright everyone. I have created a new blog for my photography. It might be overkill and hopefully I will do ok with posting to two blogs regularly. I figure I will just make it part of my workflow so that a few of the top images from each shoot goes on the blog.

So go check it out! I have several shoots I need to post from this weekend, and MAYBE I will post shoots from before. I am mostly doing family portraiture here in Japan. It's more just a side thing, but I do consistently get several shoots a month, it's just not anything to live on. So, whether I am shooting for work or for fun (stock) I will post all photography related things to The Joy Jill Photography blog!

Brian's post

2009-09-15T09:21:00.000-07:00

I know it's been a long time since I wrote anything on the blog. It's hard being underway so much and when I have duty and watch and my regular Damage Control job it's hard to find time to write anything. I also couldn't remember Joy's password to log on so I had to ask her (again).

Well I've been to a few different countries lately. I went to East Timor which is a small, very poor country just north of Australia. I went to Bali, Singapore, S. Korea, and different places in Japan. All these ports seem cool but I would've rather been home with Joy and Shugo. I can't out right say where we are at this moment but the place we're at is apperantly the biggest exporter of fugu in the world. Fugu is the poisonous blowfish that people eat and could possibly die from if it's not cut right. Well the other night I ate some, I mean I'm in the fugu capital of the world, I had to. It's very expensive so me and two other guys had just a plate of it and that was about $48.00. A whole platter is $100.00 and up.

Joy mentioned earlier that we're moving to florida "soon" and that's because I submitted a request to go to Explosive Ordnance Disposal school and it got approved by my commanding officer. The 'soon" part is because we're still waiting to get orders but I'm not sure how soon that will be. I may get them in a week or I may have to wait a month. You never know with the Navy. But at least the hard part of that is over. I put together my package and did all the physical and medical checks and somehow got my command to approve it. My command has actually been very supportive of me leaving for EOD.

What are we Really up To...

2009-09-12T19:38:00.001-07:00

So, I put this pic on here, just cause I think it is super cute and I don't have any other pic to post right now. Shugo does look bigger than Brian in this pic, but Brian does actually weigh more than him.

So... what are we really up to here in Japan. Well, since June Brian has been gone a lot. His ship pretty much goes out for 4-6 weeks and is in for 2 weeks and then back out for 4-6 wks. So, when he is here we cram pack all our free time with exploring. So, when you see me posting all these things that we are doing, it's not that we do cool stuff all the time, it's just that we do a lot in a short period of time and I spread it out over several blogs.

I am working on base doing Graphic Design. It is very weird having a desk job, but it is definitely nice having a set schedule and a little better pay. So, when I am not working I am usually either working out or going on a hike somewhere with Shugo. I get in my outdoors time when I get home from work. I spend at least an hour playing with Shugo or taking him on a long walk or hike somewhere. The weather has cooled down a lot and it is really nice. We've had a bit of rain and it seems like winter is just around the corner.

As I am sure some of you know and have heard... we may be moving back to the states soon. "Soon" as in it's likely to happen in the next year. We don't have orders yet, but things are slowly progressing. We are definitely going to Florida when we come back cause Brian will be in training there for a year and a half. So, for those of you who thought we'd be here until 2011, we won't. But either way, Florida is on the other side of the country, so it's not like we are going to be within an easy travel distance anyway...

So that is an update on the simpleness of our lives. I know I usually post about all our adventures and craziness, but I figure I should give a normal life update for those of you that I don't talk to on a regular basis.

The Hayama Police...

2009-09-10T04:02:00.000-07:00

So yes, I had a nice little encounter with the Hayama Police. I was just thinking it was time for bed when I hear Shugo growling at the door. I look out the window and there is a police man in my yard, poking his head through my open door saying "Konbanwaaaaaaaaa". I, in my beautiful Japanese say, "Just a minute". Run down the stairs with Shugo trailing close behind ready to attack. They of course take one look at me and give a little sigh of, "Uh oh, hope she speaks Japanese". They say, "Boxer?" as they are looking right at Shugo. I say no, cause well, he's a mut really and he possibly has boxer in him, but we have no idea. They say some things in Japanese and I stopped trying to understand. I have been told that the police hold you to a different standard if you speak Japanese so unless you are fluent you are better off playing entirely dumb. So I of course followed this great advice. My favorite word is wakaranai (I don't understand) anyway.

So they called someone on their handy cell phones to translate. The basic story is that I left the sliding door open so Shugo could chew his bone outside. I went upstairs to jump on the computer and wasn't entirely paying attention to him. He came upstairs though not too long after me as usual and all was fine. I don't always pay attention to him cause he isn't always in the same room with me. I did forget the door was open downstairs and I think he went for a little walk... someone called the police and they showed up at the door.

So they asked if he has a collar and if I keep him on a leash. When we are gone we tie Shugo in the yard and at that time, yes he has a collar on. He also is wearing one when I take him for walks, but if we are just hanging around the house he is not wearing one. I told them this and how sometimes I have the door open while I am home so he can go outside. He must have gone down the road and I didn't notice...

One of the policemen seemed to like Shugo. He was petting him, but the other seemed a little scared. Any sudden movement though and Shugo dashed away and barked at them. He is so skiddish. I think he was more so because it was dark, but HOW FREAKING HILARIOUS IS THAT??? I asked if everything was ok and if I was going to get a fine. They said no. Someone just called cause he was roaming around alone. He didn't bite anyone or do anything wrong. All is ok, but they did take down all my info. My dependent ID card, military driver's license, and passport. Yikes... I guess it better not happen again. I am wondering if maybe he wanders a lot when I am not paying attention and whoever called just finally got fed up??? Who knows, either way it was a funny event. I really wanted to get a picture of the policemen with Shugo, but I figured it might not come across well with the language barrier...

THE Spider...

2009-09-07T04:17:00.000-07:00

HOLY CRAPPER! This was THE BIGGEST spider I have ever seen in my life! I SWEAR these pics don't do it justice... but seriously, have you EVER seen a spider so big even when it is dead? Blehhh!

Shugo did want to protect me, but I wasn't about to scare the thing off the wall and have him chase it around the house. It would likely jump off the wall right onto my head and then I would freak out and probably fall down my steep Japanese stairs. This is embarrassing to admit, but I had to get my neighbor to kill it. He came over right away and the freakin thing (just as I suspected) ran down the wall, jumped onto the stairs and ran down the banister, LEAPING off of it and almost landing on me! I almost had a heart attack. The second video is that one... and too bad you can't see it, but I SWEAR it jumped when it was mid-banister which is about 4 ft. up! What kind of creature does that!!?? It ran in the closet and died shortly after. I don't think I will sleep tonight... I will leave the lights on and have a broom in hand...

Last bit from Okinawa

2009-09-06T18:53:00.001-07:00

So these are the last bit of pics and stuff that I will be sharing from Okinawa... We of course went snorkeling while there. The water is SUPER clear and awesome. Beautiful beaches. We had a lot of fun using our underwater happy snap :) Although it is much harder than you would think to get a snap of yourself while underwater. Brian is good at holding his breath, but I really suck.

So serious...

Pretty beaches
There were A&W's everywhere! I am amazed at how many I saw... so of course we went to one for lunch. It was pretty funny to see the cashier's nametag that said "All American Place" and then her name was like the pound sign :) I wanted to get a picture, but wasn't sure how to go about that....
On our last day there, Brian got a lovely sun burn with my hand print. I put the block on his back and did one swipe on his sides... he was supposed to get his stomach. And below is a lovely video of a very weird stick bug. Brian made a friend...

The Aquarium

2009-09-02T04:26:00.001-07:00

So while in Okinawa we went to an aquarium... The Churaumi Aquarium. Apparently it is in the top three in the world. As some of you may know I really don't much like going to the zoo, so why would I want to go to an aquarium right? Well, I heard it was pretty darn cool and I figured if it is one of the best in the world we should probably go. It was cool, but not as cool as you would expect the "best in the world" to be. Obviously there was a dolphin show... below is a pic of the huge space they have. I think there were 3 of those huge whales in there. Tons of fish and that tank was pretty cool.

Outside there was a very nice park, with cool plants. Brian of course wanted to be fed by the mama birdie :)

I really liked the octopus. I thought it was pretty darn creative. These plant creatures were all over the place!

So this was one of our less exciting things we did. We were there for probably 2 hours and then went straight to the beach.... no funny stories from this place.

The Japanese Gameshow

2009-09-01T02:16:00.000-07:00

So Brian and I went to this place called Forest Adventure while we were in Okinawa. It was really fun. Apparently these things started in Germany. A lot of zip lines and then in the end there was a fun course to do. Totally reminded us of a Japanese game show as you will hear in our videos. We didn't get any good pics of it, just lots of funny video, so here you go... well, one of the better videos won't upload cause it is too big, but oh well, there is plenty more :)

Fujisan

2009-08-31T03:15:00.000-07:00

Sorry your not getting any good images... I really don't want to open them and resize and save to jpeg... to much time will be lost :) But up top is a pick of us at the very top. We found a place that blocked the wind and snuggled to keep warm. Brian bought this $4 Hot Chocolate and it was awesome cause it was a great hand warmer... tasted like crap though. We should've not opened it and just continued to use it to warm our hands. Below is a pic of us at the top. Yay for us. We took approximately 4 hours to get to the top, but that was with a 30 minute unnecessary break cause Brian ran into a friend from his ship and we stopped to chat. Average is 5-6 hours, and fast is 3 hours. I think we did good for our first time.

So there is much to update on, but I will have to do one post at a time, cause I am just not interested in posting about everything all at once... SOOOOO, to start... last Saturday (Aug 22) we climbed Mt. Fuji. It was pretty awesome. Everyone talks about climbing Fuji as if it was something they did once and will never do again. It usually rains on people and isn't much fun, but we lucked out on some great weather! It was pretty darn cold at the top, but we were fine.

A little Japanese for you.... When you meet someone they will generally call you Barkersan (Mrs. Barker). So when I heard people calling Fuji Fujisan, I thought they were funny cause we don't call our mountains Mr. Fuji. But actually San is also another way of saying mountain. So there you go.

Some wise words from a Japanese man on Mt. Fuji... As we were hiking up a man started talking to us in English. His English was pretty darn good and he said, "Hello Mr. Navy!" (Brian was wearing a Navy shirt). We asked him how many times he has climbed Fuji and this was his answer. "Ahhh, many times, yes. Many times. I think Fujisan like pregnancy. After pregnancy my wife say it is too difficult and she doesn't want any more baby, but then after few years pass, she want baby again. I climbed Fujisan many times and every time I climb I think, 'why am I doing this?' and I tell myself I won't do it again, but then the next year comes and I go again. So, Fujisan like pregnancy."

So there you go, wise words from a Japanese man on Fujisan :)

Off to Okinawa!

2009-08-19T02:55:00.000-07:00

Brian has finally made it back home this week :) I am happy to have him home even though it will only be for two weeks...

I am taking a class in Okinawa and Brian has taken leave so he can join me. We leave on Sunday, and my class starts on Monday. It is only in the evenings from 5-10pm and all day Saturday so that leaves the entire day for exploring! We will be taking lots of pictures and spending lots of time at the beach. I am going to stock up on sun block, and make sure I take a bath in it before we leave the house. It is freaking hot there and I will likely come back with twice as many freckles even after using sunblock :)

Other news... I got a new job today! I applied for this job in June... a long time ago. Anyway, finally today they called to say I was chosen for the position. Of course we are leaving town in a few days so I start as soon as we get back on the 31st! Which is actually really great cause Brian will be going back out to sea and this will keep me busy. It is a graphic design position on base with MWR marketing and I will be working from 8-4:30 M-F. AWESOME hours because when Brian is not out floating around in the ocean our work schedules will be very similar and we can have all weekend to go anywhere we please without having to ask for a day off. Yay!

Family

2009-08-14T19:48:00.000-07:00

OK, I just have to give a little rant about family from my perspective and the things that I have been learning. The reason why I am posting this blog is because I called home and of course there was yet another party happening. Mom said they were all waiting on Julie and her family cause they were late. Julie called at 6pm to say they'd just left the shop, they were working, but they were on their way.

First of all, parties at the Hicks' house are pretty much never for a "set" time, but there is a general... "we want to eat by...." Julie was late. Why? Because they were working. Respectable, BUT how important is that? Does the job have to be finished today? Is it so imperative that you put it before spending time with your family? Is anything that important? Should anything be that important?

Let me start by saying, I have also made this mistake plenty. I, just like many others, say that family comes first, but have done things differently at times. Having Brian in the Navy though has really put life into perspective for me, and I praise God for that! I see now how important time with family is and how much we need to cherish moments with each other. Life is breezing by and someday I do not want to look back and wish I had taken more time to spend with someone (ahem... Brian). I easily get caught up in saying, "Just let me finish this real quick..." Yeah... real quick. As soon as I am done, whatever was happening is done too and I missed it. If I don't set work (my job, school, photography...) aside while Brian is home we will never have time together. I have to soak up my time with him and enjoy every minute of it, cause he is only around for a couple weeks at a time.

I realize that in the normal world people have different situations and you are with those that you love all the time. BUT how much quality time do you spend together? Leave your work at work, turn off your freaking cell phones, and have fun with the people you love! We shouldn't have to be without someone to realize how much we love them or wish we had done things differently when they were here, but sadly it seems that is the way it is.

What would you do if you knew your spouse was leaving for 6 months? Wouldn't you cherish every moment? I have not gone through a 6 month deployment yet, and Lord help me when I do, but I know right now that when Brian is here I am going to enjoy it.

Ask someone who is older... maybe at least in their fifties (sorry mom, but it is considered older). Ask them what they remember from their younger years. Do they remember that job that so desperately needed to be finished that they missed the family camping trip for, and they are now glad they skipped it? From my experience, everyone I meet only wished they had taken more time to slow down and enjoy things. Enjoy people, enjoy relationships, don't let "stuff" take over your life. In the end, that "stuff" disappears and your family is still there, only now they are irritated with you because you have never taken the time for them! Seriously, this is the basic idea behind the movie Click. Watch it... it is sad, but good :) Also, this is a great song about this too. One of my favorites... yes, I love country :) Listen to it.

I am VERY grateful for this experience of being a military wife. It has opened my eyes to enjoy things that really matter. Especially because I know we will never be in one place long enough for my job to really matter much anyway, so even more reason to not poor every drop of my life into it. Please think about these things. What does family mean to you? Do you live your life that way?

Neighbors

2009-08-12T05:29:00.001-07:00

So it was getting pretty warm (up until today...) and a few days ago I was working on the lovely task of mowing the lawn. Brian and I do not have a lawn mower, but one nice thing about the military is you can rent stuff like that on base. Rent as in for free... more like borrow really. We have to return it the next day.

As you all know, I am quite capable with outdoor maintenance stuff (thank you Terry). I have mowed our lawn here plenty of times and for some STUPID reason was having a really hard time getting the lawn mower started the other day. I was giving it all I had. I would try try try and then go get a drink, try try try again and go get a drink. A blister burst on my pinky and I thought I should give it a rest and try again in an hour. So Shugo and I go on a walk... I return feeling ready and able. Failed again. I tried over and over and over and over and over. Another blister burst this time on my middle finger. Apparently my hands have gone soft... I figure there is no way I can get this damn thing started so I better go ask Shin (the neighbor) for help. In my lovely Japanese I said, "Takashite onagaishimasu" I have no idea how to spell it... anyway, so he came over. At first he looked like he was inspecting it and I thought maybe he thought it was broken. I tried to tell him I just couldn't start it. Language barrier... then all of a sudden he says, "Choku?" The choke! DUH! I completely forgot about these stupid things having a choke. Of course I look on the mower and it says in English "push to prime". Idiot. So I puh it and then Shin starts it no problem. Stupid American.

So I mow the lawn, pull a few weeds, decide it was too hot to continue and go take a shower. When I got out my doorbell rang and Hiromi (Shin's wife) brought me a icee thing! I took a picture of it. It was so hot that day, it was really nice of them to make me a shaved ice thing. It was really good too :) THEN... my neighbors are seriously the nicest ever... two days later (yesterday) when I got home, I noticed that all my weeds were gone. I was growing quite a lot... we have a bit of gravel around the side of our house, and you might have thought we had a garden... or our own personal forest. I saw Shin with a weed eater out behind our house a ways so I knew it was him. I of course thanked him. Seriously though, we have the nicest neighbors ever, a BIG step up from our SD neighbors :)

All American Rejects

2009-08-11T05:56:00.001-07:00

Yes the All American Rejects came to Yokosuka, Japan for us :) Not us meaning me and Brian... the military... Of course any of you who know me are probably thinking... "Yeah? Do you even know any of their songs?" Well, as it turns out... I did! I just never know who sings crap... now I will forever remember. So, cool thing about the military is this concert was free. It was shorter than a normal concert, but hey, it was free. Below is my friend Lauren. The pics are actually hers. She got a new camera and was going to town with it trying to get as close as possible.

So this video is actually really funny because when they started the main singer was laughing about how he had never seen so many kids near the stage. Young kids, we're talkin' babies. This is a family thing here... hence the "free". So at one point someone apparently lost their two year old and they gave a note to the singers to announce that whoever lost their kid... he/she was found and is over by the drink booth or whatever. He thought it was hilarious. He said nothing like that has ever happened before. I am sure it hasn't and I tried to catch a little video of his talk about it, cause it was pretty funny :)

Dear Mr. Smith...

2009-08-05T08:22:00.000-07:00

OK, I have a HILARIOUS story for you all. This is a good "welcome to the military" story. I will tell it as well as I can without making it too long...

I went to Okinawa to take a class... it is a week long and the main place to stay was booked so before the class I emailed the school site director about other suggestions on where to stay if your on a tight budget and she emailed other OU students about it. This man... "Mr. Smith" (we will call him) emailed me back and he was super helpful and got me a room at the Gateway Inn on base. He is a senior chief in the Navy and works there and was able to pull some strings. I met him when I checked in and said thanks, but I wanted to send him an email and say thank you again because I am going back at the end of the month and will need help again getting a room.

Well, apparently I did not email the correct "Mr. Smith". Oops. I got an email back from a MRS. Smith and she was pretty clear about wanting to know who I was and why her husband was getting me a room at the Gateway Inn.... yikes, who the hell did I email? The thing is I got an email from a "Smith" about a new address and thought it was his... I don't know any other "Smith". So I sent it to the "new address".... bad idea

We literally emailed back and forth about 10-15 times to find if we were talking about the same man. The problem is I don't know this guy's first name... I met him when I checked in, but there are only last names on uniforms. I realize now that we corresponded through his work email and there is no reason that changes unless you change commands, so clearly I should have used the same email... hindsight...

It turns out her husband is white and the guy I met is black... THANK GOD, what an easy way to clarify. I told her that I am a happily married and very loyal wife and that regardless of whether we are talking about the same guy or not, THERE WAS NOTHING FRISKY GOING ON. SHEESH! In the end she apologized and said she is just a new military wife struggling with it all. Understandable to a certain degree, but CRAP! If she has that bad of trust issues she is going to shove her hubs right into cheating... Yes, the military is very well known for its cheating, but not everyone cheats and not everyone has trust issues. It is a bad assumption. So for those of you who fall into that ignorant category... I hope this story helps clarify and educate you that such ignorance and assumptions are not very useful.

Long time no post...

2009-08-04T18:29:00.001-07:00

This is me surfing... I am GOOOOOD :)

OK, so it has been a really long time since I have posted a blog.... reasons why?? There are just too many. For a bit, I didn't have anything to post about, then I had stuff to post, but no time, then I had stuff to post, but didn't want to take the time... the reasons go on. I have been a little lonely lately and spending time on the computer only makes things worse, so that is another reason. Brian has been out to sea, back for a bit and out again. He was around for a good 3-4 months straight and it has taken some getting used to him being gone again. But finally! I feel back to normal without him... doesn't that sound nice :)

So what have I been up to?? I quit my job at the Teen Center. My last week there I got to go on the surf camp trip to Chiba. I learned to surf :) Yay. I did stand up a few times and for more than just two seconds. There just weren't any good photographers ready to capture it...

I went to Okinawa for a class for my degree. I didn't get a rental car cause I didn't want to spend the money. Well, the base was enormous! And it was REALLY hot. So there was not much site seeing while I was there. I will say though that the water is crystal clear and there are nice fishys... wish I had some goggles :) I will be going again at the end of the month for another class though and hopefully Brian will be able to come for a few days and we can explore together :)

I have lots of funny little stories of life that has been happening, but we are just so far behind I cannot update everything. I learned some Japanese though while on the surf trip. Takashite! means help me! Good to know. The reason why I liked learning this though was because I remember this lady yelling it once when I was walking Shugo. He got a little close to her wanting to say hello and she yelled help me about 5 times... it was pretty funny even when I didn't know what it meant :)

So that is my life lately. Sorry for keeping everyone out of the loop. Life is different here in another country. ESPECIALLY without my horse. I am ready to go back to the states and be able to ride anytime I want again. Too bad we are stuck here for a while though :(

Happy Fourth of July!

2009-07-04T06:31:00.000-07:00

Happy Fourth of July everyone! I had to work until 6pm, but after work, I went home and picked up Shugo. I was hoping that he would be ok with the fireworks cause I know dogs freak out with that stuff. So we walked around for a while, and then sat down. Once the fireworks started he was definitely scared. He got up and was trying to back away, pulling on me a lot. I pulled him close to me away from everyone else a bit so he wouldn't jump on them in fear. He sat with me and was shaking a bit, staring very wide eyed at the fireworks. After about five minutes though he settled down and was fine. He laid down and stopped shaking. In the beginning there were kind of a lot, but then they weren't doing too many at once. Every now and then they did a lot and he would start to shake again, but he did really good. I am really glad I brought him cause it was fun, and good training for him.

So now I am home and I just talked with Jonathan on Skype. Cami is so cute... she gave the funniest look while looking at the computer. So stinkin' cute. I actually think that face reminds me of David... we have that old Christmas video of him standing directly in front of the camera unwrapping a girlish gift that Jon gave him... he was not so happy and I swaer he had the same confused chubby look on his face. Awesome :)

I hope you all have a great 4th! Get out and see some fireworks! Just to clarify... obviously Japan does not celebrate the holiday and I was watching the fireworks on base :) just in case anyone was confused :)

A beard... only when he is gone

2009-07-03T09:02:00.001-07:00

So apparently on the ship they were selling these $5 you can grow your beard out thingys... Brian said he didn't buy one at first cause he didn't want to look sloppy even if it was ok, but.... then people were making it into a contest to see who could grow the best beard. Of course he could win... he' super hairy! So he bought one and look at it grow! I don't know, but something about a little scruff on a man is sexy.... and especially if they are in uniform :) Of course by the time he ever gets home he will, I am sure, be shaving. LAME.

I am not sure why but his nose in the top pic looks enormous... must be the lighting. But what did I tell ya about him "smiling with his eyes" Hilarious!

Three Years...

2009-07-01T19:54:00.000-07:00

Of course I have to throw this in here last... a little backwards, but one other super cool thing about Brian is he can grow a beard! (that is before he joined the Navy anyway...) By the way... I don't think I am really THAT short... he had to have been standing on a snowball or something.

Yes it is amazing! It has been THREE YEARS! Wow... time flys. So let's see... Three years ago we lived in Santa Barbara and got married. Since then we have moved around a bit and had ALOT of changes and even more adventures! I don't really feel like typing our long life story, so I am going to have a ton of pictures instead. Brian is out to sea right now of course so I am here with Shugo. I was going to go riding to celebrate, but it is raining :( But tonight I am going to dinner with a friend to celebrate. We have no idea when brian is coming back. There schedule is always changing. One day they might be coming home soon and the next they plan to be out for another month. So, no worries, whenever he decides to come back we will celebrate then!
Some great things about Brian that you all may not know are.... first he loves ice cream as much as I do :D Yay! I realize this is not ice cream... but somehow I don't think I have any pics of him with ice cream... I don't know how that is possible.
Of course he has to get along with my horse. Though he is not a rider, he will go out with me to ride once in a while and he has definitely done some stall cleaning and feeding :) And Almond seems to like him.
Of course we graduated together.... this was right before our 1 year anniversary. Yay, for getting our degrees, but we still have so much to learn :)
He jumps off a bridge when I tell him to :)

He likes to "smile with his eyes" (his words not mine).
He clearly always loved Sandy, even when she was wet and slobbery :)
He even risked his life to save hers once. This was on our failed first anniversary trip. It's a hilarious story... we wanted to go camping where we could be near a lake to swim in... of course me being new to SoCal I didn't realize how lame it was and that there were no lakes you could swim in. We ended up in freaking Nevada (In July) pretty much almost killing Sandy with 115 degree weather. Once we got to the lake things were better, but in the pic below... to the right there was some mud. ALOT of mud. Brian and I swam to the other side of this little spot. Sandy of course did not like to swim much so she was going to walk around. Well... little did she know that the mud there was like quick sand, and being a St. Bernard she sunk fast. The more she struggled, the deeper she got. Brian was very quick to rescue her though. He did a nice army crawl through the mud keeping low so he wouldn't sink in himself, and got her out. Some other people there at the lake also jumped in the mud to help out. It was the NASTIEST smelling mud you could imagine. SO BAD. But luckily we were at a lake and Brian and Sandy were able to rinse off and all was fine.
He likes to be silly and dress up once in a while for me :)
He is GREAT at mowing the lawn :)

And best of all! He hates mushrooms as much as I do! So yay for our three years of marriage. No kids yet and I HIGHLY doubt there will be any on our fourth year either.... it's at least not in our plans :)

Canyoning!

2009-06-19T07:29:00.001-07:00

OK, first of all this is not a picture of me... or my friend... I have no idea who this person is :) It's just a picture off the website SO! We went Canyoning last Sunday and had a BLAST! It was super super fun :) We went with a trip through the base. We basically put on these super thick wetsuits hiked up a mountain a bit (which is really hard to do when in a wetsuit), and then we go through little canyons and slid down waterfalls, jump off rocks, and float along with the water. It was a lot of fun, and sadly we did not get any pictures. They talked me out of bringing our little point and shoot cause it could've got squished by rocks...

So the highest part we went down was about a 40 ft waterfall. They lowered us halfway on a rope and then let us slide down the rest of it. Super fun! There were a couple spots where they let us jump off a bunch of times. I did my first front flip ever :) I actually did it 3 times, but Brian only saw once...

I have to say the first and last time I ever attempted it was at Ron and Cindy's house on their little diving board. Of course I was there with my brothers, Randy, and David (can't remember if you were there Jon). So they were egging me on to try a flip, and they told me to just tuck my legs. So what did I do? I jumped in the air and tucked my legs too much. I kneed myself in the face and got a bloody nose almost drowning myself in the process. I of course was not happy about it and the boys thought it was hysterical, but what else would brothers think? Do any of you guys remember that?

Anyway, this time... no bloody nose :) Yay for me! And on one waterfall Brian and I slid down together and backwards. Lots of fun aside from the fact that Brian landed on top of me and then I got pushed to the other side which meant I had to go behind the waterfall to get out... which should have been fine cause I did that another time, but this time, the waterfall hit me and pretty much landed on my eyeball and of course pushed me under and then I surfaced on the correct side of it. Fun Fun Fun :) I would go every day if I could, but it is kinda pricey... hopefully we will go one more time this summer.

Sad Story

2009-06-18T18:00:00.001-07:00

So last night I was walking Shugo. I have classes this week and am getting home late so it was dark. We are walking around and I see a little frog. He was so cute and neon green. Seriously, it was the greenest frog I have ever seen! Shugo is sniffing it and I am making sure he doesn't eat it. Then, I hear a scooter coming. We are on a very narrow road, maybe 6 feet wide. So I step to the side to let him pass and... squish! No more froggy :( I should've stepped to the other side of the road cause then he would've swerved the other direction and Mr. Frog would still be alive. I think he was trying to get to the rice field... so sad. I tried to take a pic with my phone, but the street light was not bright enough.

Vote for me!!! Never mind...

2009-06-11T07:26:00.000-07:00

OK so I entered this igoogle contest and I need your votes! I am not sure how much weight the votes carry, but just go vote anyway! I know they have there own judges, but there has to be a reason for the votes. So please GO VOTE I am not exactly sure where to vote, but if you go to this site it says come back to vote on June 11th. If I win I get to go to London and I also receive $7,500!! Which would be SUPER helpful in paying off some ugly student loans! GO VOTE NOW

Thank you!

OK so I just looked on the voting page and apparently I did not even make it to the top 36 which is lame cause a lot of them really suck and I should have at least made it to the top 36. It made me feel a bit like I was in Brooks again. Weird. So nevermind... I already lost :)

2009-06-10T16:41:00.000-07:00

So things are pretty slow around here. Nothing special is going on. No exciting news. No bike crashes, no getting lost, there's just not much to update. We are in the nice rainy season of June. Somehow, for the last three days I had the car (cause Brian was gone) and it was sunny the whole freaking time... now that I have to bike in to work it is pouring. Lame. So right now our lives consist of work and Shugo, eating, sleeping, and I am studying for my class. Pretty dang exciting. Actually, something to look forward to is we are going on a canyoning trip on Sunday. Yahoo! I am really excited and I think it will be tons of fun :) So look forward to pictures and stories of that :)

Since I have no story I chose a random pic that I had... no I didn't eat that. None of us did... ew.

The Doghouse

2009-06-01T17:08:00.000-07:00

So on Sunday Brian and I built a doghouse for Shugo. Here in Japan there are pretty much NO large doghouses. The one that I saw that might fit was about $200... who wants to pay that! So we figured we would make one ourselves. As you can see neither of us have done much building in our lives, but I like it! It is home made. I figure we could have made it a little wider so it wouldn't look quite so odd and tall, but oh well. Shugo fits in there perfectly, and though he doesn't seem to go in much now... he will when it rains (yes, it is still raining here). The only thing I am going to change is putting a new roof on that will extend out longer over the front and back, that way the ventilation doesn't let rain in... and we'll probably stain it or seal it or something like that so it doesn't rot. Yay! All that for only $100 and the bulk of the cost was the saw we bought which will be used for many future projects :)

Mexican food in Japan

2009-05-31T18:35:00.001-07:00

Brian and I LOVE Mexican food, and being that we lived in San Diego for 1 1/2 years we really came to like the good stuff. So we have been a little deprived here in Japan. There is a restaurant near base that is pretty close, but it's still not the same. So Brian has been telling me a friend of his on the ship know where a good place is in Tokyo. Well, I of course don't want to get my hopes up so I don't believe him. Brian says, "No, really he's Mexican and he knows what he is talking about..." So of course my response, "Who cares just cause he is Mexican doesn't mean anything, he probably grew up in Kansas" Ha! Well, of course we finally go to Tokyo with this guy and Brian has to tell him I said all that! Turns out he is the first generation to be born in America, and he does know good Mexican food.

So off to Tokyo we go. We finally get to this place (I can't remember the name... La Fonda something something) and they have been bought out for the night by a wedding party. Crap! So Roberto starts calling some people to try to find out where another Mexican restaurant was that he had heard about. While we are waiting for information we start walking towards Roppongi where we think this other restaurant is. Well, the minute someone calls with all the info we needed I look over and see Junkadelic. Hilarious! I took picture before we even decided to go there. It was really good food. It was definitely an adventure too. By the time we got there it was pretty late and by the time we left we were rushing to get back home before the last trains went. Of course we did not make it and had to catch a cab back home... I think we had about 20km to go, which we thought wasn't bad, but it was a bit expensive. Oh well.

I think Shugo loves Brian more

2009-05-28T16:31:00.000-07:00

I have no idea how it happened, but it really seems like Shugo loves Brian more. I guess he should cause technically he is Brian's dog, and we all know Sandy loved me more, but that makes sense when she only met Brian in her last few years of life. Anyway, Shugo is a bit popular here with the Japanese people. They all look at him and say... "Ah! Segoy! Oki!" Which basically means wow/awesome and huge! Brian, Shugo and Nichole had a day to themselves cause I had to work so they went to Kamakura and the beach. Brian of course had fun seeing Shugo jump really far. He is a great jumper and can jump pretty darn high.

And yes, this guy liked Shugo so much he was taking a picture of him.

So sweet

2009-05-24T16:20:00.000-07:00

Isn't he just so cute! Who needs kids when you have a great dog!
So I was sitting on the computer and Shugo was in the other room. I thought he was just sleeping, but then I heard some weird little noises so when I went around the corner he was in his house shredding his pillow. I guess he got a litttle bored :) Honestly though having it shredded in his house gives him a much fluffier, bigger bed. He really knew what he was doing.

Disneyland!

2009-05-16T17:29:00.000-07:00

Here is Nichole with my twin...
Me and Nichole... it all looks the same really...
She really liked me. I am guessing because we both have red hair?? Deep down though, I think she's asian...

So Nichole came here with Shugo and stayed for about ten days. She just left yesterday... While she was here the main thing she REALLY wanted to do was go to Disneyland. So we went. It was a lot of fun and hilarious to see all the same rides in Japanese.

We really lucked out and it only rained on us for about an hour and it was cool cause there was a double rainbow (although you can only see one in the video. Nichole had to dance in it though :)

And of course on the way home 11pm the train in Tokyo is PACKED. It's just the only way to truly experience Japan... Nichole was not too happy to be so close to strangers, it was a little awkward

And yes, the lovely Splash Mountain in Japanese!

Shugo The Beast!

2009-05-09T01:52:00.001-07:00

Shugo is finally here!! Yay! It was quit the trip... full of everything that could go wrong did, but by the time I picked him up at the airport he was feeling a little sick from the flight, but happy to be off the plane. He is SO ENORMOUS! Mom, Dad, you guys are completely crazy for telling me that he had not grown very much. I guess when you see him every day you don't notice, but he is freakin' huge! So let me give the quickest run down possible...

Dad drove Shugo and Nichole to the airport Wednesday morning only to find that there was no room on the plane for him. I called and made sure a million times that the size of his kennel, his weight, and everything would be fine, and they said we were set to go. Apparently they did not look into the size plane cause his kennel would not even fit through the doors. So they told them to drive to San Fransisco to catch the transfer flight and go from there.

On the way, they had to go by Home Depot to get some bolts cause they said the kennel was not up to their standards (even though I asked about that too). They had all kinds of hassles including having to go back to the airport after leaving to get some paperwork that the lady accidentally hung onto. Racing to San Fran they made it on time for Nichole to miraculously get through security in 45 minutes with a dog on an international flight. All this to get to Japan and have to sit on the plane for one hour while everyone gets checked for Swine flu and then to go through more swine flu checks and then customs, and the dog check... all for her to walk out with a very stinky dog.

Poor Shugo saw me and didn't even wag his tail. He was feeling pretty sick. He had diarhea on the plane and then once they got him out he threw up in his kennel. Nichole said when she got off the plane and went through customs she didn't know where to get him, but then she saw his kennel with a bunch of Japanese around it with mops. He was pretty stinky I must say, but we got him home, washed his kennel, gave him a bath, and let him relax.

By the time Brian got home he was feeling better and Brian got a much better greeting than I did. We are SO happy to have him with us! THANK YOU dad and Nichole SOOOOO much! I cannot get over his size, and I absolutely love it! My neighbors thought he was pretty cool too. So out of all of that we got some good vouchers cause they knew they screwed up. They gave dad and Nichole a couple of vouchers and they gave me a voucher when I called and chewed them out over the phone. And then Shugo got to fly for free. Yay!

Brian and Shugo after we gave him a bath. He was happy to relax :)

This was me and Shugo once he was out of his kennel. Even though he smelled of dog barf and diarrhea, I couldn't help but hug him!

Natto

2009-05-03T19:21:00.000-07:00

So this is Nobuko's family... parents, sister, brother-in-law, and niece. We got to have dinner with them twice which was super nice cause we had never had a home cooked Japanese meal before. Lots of good food. However, below is a video of our very own Fear Factor. They were talking about all this food that foreigners usually don't like and of course they had to bring some out for us to try. So have fun watching the video :) In the video the reason why everyone laughs at the beginning is because the ume boshi is very sour and you usually just take a bite not put the whole thing in your mouth like Brian did...

This video below is the Nato. It is fermented beans.... not too tasty, although Brian seemed to like it :) Slimy beans, Yuck! Go Brian!

Hickville in Japan

2009-05-02T17:19:00.000-07:00

So we made our first trip across Japan to visit Curtie and his family. Pretty exciting trip ;) We drove around a lot and saw new places. Brian had never met Curt before so that was good to finally get to know more of the fam :D They had some real good bonding time going to some Onsens and such... So here are a bunch of pics from the trip... there will be more to come, but this is it for now.

Us at Hiroshima.... pretty cool museum and stuff. Nobuko is not in this pic cause she is taking it...

Yes, we of course had to go to a "Joyfull" restaurant :D Pretty good food I guess. Brian got some good free cofffee... he didn't know it was a coffee bar and that he had to pay first. No one noticed except Curt and Nobuko and they of course said nothing until after we left. Oh the innocence of foreigners...

Brian and Curt having some good bonding over smores on a Japanese BBQ. We had a cool picnic thingy at a park with all Curt's English students.

This is a bite mark on Luke's leg from his lil' sis Leah :) She really loves him alot!

Here's the video of the bite... pretty funny. I just wanted to get a video of them climbing the tree together. What a bunch of Hicks.... can't even climb a tree without having some sort of bting problem!

This was a very common occurence on our trip. Leah is in potty training so while we are driving if she says she's got to go we pull over and Curt helps her out... I thin here she got a little stage fright though (who wouldn't with a camera aimed right at you?)

This is just another Hicks spitting at the fish.... these kids may be half Japanese, and are growing up in Japan, but the Hicks blood runs strong through their veins.

Lint

2009-04-25T18:32:00.000-07:00

So our Japanese washer and dryer are a bit confusing at times. I saw the lint thingy a while ago, and I wanted to take it out, but I didn't know how and I thought if I pulled on it I might break it. Not to mention the fact that I generally do not take the lint out anyway. Not sure why really.... it's just something I didn't do all that often (and that drives Brian crazy). Anywho, so my friend Melody's family is visiting and of course they figured it out while doing there laundry one night.... I wasn't even at home. Pretty funny... that's about 5 months of lint backed up in there.... although I do try to avoid doing laundry at all cost :)

The True Story...

2009-04-21T23:35:00.000-07:00

Ok Ok, so I didn't quite tell the real story of how I crashed on my bike... I was hoping to get some good reactions and comments, but apparently no one cares... I really wanted a good reaction from my mom, but apparently she does not read my blog?? Thanks mom.

So the real story is that there was a red light and to go around the cars stopped at it, I was going to hop up on the curb. The curb was only about two inches high, but I guess I went at it a little too side on cause my tire did not like the curb and I went splat onto the ground. Although while I was falling my bike hit this little pole and so the bike went towards the road while I landed on the sidewalk. No near death experience... sorry to disappoint :) But things are healing just fine, and I do love the nice scabs.

On to other news. Brian and I will be leaving town Sunday night on our way to visit our cousin Curtie and his family who live on Shikoku island (south of us) in Japan. It is quite difficult for Brian to get time off of work, so we are very glad to be able to go :) It will be really cool to visit a new area of Japan and see some countryside here. And, I have only met one of Curt's four kids and I don't think I have seen him in about 4-5 years so it will be a great redhead reunion! Any other redheads out there are welcome to come! So you can look forward to seeing some cool new pictures and hear of new adventures soon!

I Crashed

2009-04-18T03:13:00.001-07:00

So, it happened... I crashed on my bike. It was quite exciting really. I was going full speed down this huge hill ( and I must ad that I always go super fast down this hill and always think to myself, "If I crashed now it would really suck...") when all of a sudden a car pulled out in front of me and I had to swerve right (I should have swerved the other way.... going right here is into traffic) So I swerved right and lost control and went sliding across the pavement while luckily the oncoming traffic stopped. My bike made it safely to the sidewalk, but I was still half in the road. I crawled and pulled my lifeless body to the sidewalk for safety. People don't honk much here and they also don't help much if you are hurting. So I gathered my thoughts, checked myself for broken bones (but there was only broken skin) looked over the bike (which was fine aside from the chain coming off the track) and hopped back on to be on my way to work. Just like that, I was ok.

My knee was pretty bloody. It dripped all down my leg by the time I got to base... as you can see
Yes that is a flap of skin among the blood there... Good times.
All cleaned up! Doesn't look so bad after being cleaned up, but I did take these pics with my phone so it really didn't do it justice. I raided the first aid kit at work and wrapped it up all nice. I kinda regretted it the next day though (today) when I had to rip it off as it was all stuck to it. Ouch! Although... it turns out Brian is quite brilliant and he suggested I take it off in the shower after soaking it for a bit. A much less painful way to go :)

Weird Bridge

2009-04-16T16:33:00.000-07:00

So we saw this weird bridge on our way to the airport with Melody's family. It made me think of high school in Geometry when we all made our own bridges out of Popsicle sticks.... remember that mom? I am sure you still have mine somewhere... anyway this is kinda sorta Tokyo area, and yes I was driving, but it was totally safe! It's not the greatest video, but there was this huge red part that went over it and all these cords were attaching the red thing to the bridge... very interesting.

Happy Easter!

2009-04-15T04:55:00.000-07:00

Happy late Easter everyone... so Brian had to work over the weekend so we did not celebrate on Easter. Our friend Melody is staying with us for a few weeks (a friend from Brooks who has been living in Tokyo for the last two years, but is moving back to the states soon...). Anywho, her family came in on Monday to visit so we picked them up at the airport and then we all celebrated together Monday night. We didn't get home from the airport until 6:30 or so, so I called Brian to ask him to start the potatoes... and he did. Good job Brian :) Apparently the poor guy has never made mashed potatoes before :)

Our House

2009-04-14T17:32:00.000-07:00

This is a video of our house. I rushed through it so that it would not be too long to upload. I have had many requests for this.... sorry it took so long :)

Driving in Japan

2009-04-03T05:22:00.001-07:00

So... I drove around Japan quite a bit this week. First on Monday I drove with my friend Melody up to Tokyo to pick up her stuff. She is going to be staying with us for the next month before she moves back to the states. It is nice having an extra person in the house, but both brian and I have been really busy lately. Not to mention the fact that as I write this she is locked outside the house and is likely sitting in front of it freezing to death (cause she gets cold WAY too easy) and thinking Brian is on his way. What she doesn't know is that he is still taking pictures at an event and will be coming home with me when I get off work at 10pm. So yay for her.... hope she stays warm. Sorry Melody! Wish we'd remembered to send you home with keys!

Anyway, so back to my driving story. Monday was not so bad. We got there super fast, but took the extra extra long route home... not sure how it happened but I know most of it had to do with the side roads we took instead of the toll roads. On Thursday though, I went riding (which was awesome!). I drive about 1 1/2 hrs to go ride. Well, some say it takes two hours, but with the route I took and the speed I drove I got there in 1hr 15min.... yay for me.

Now don't worry mom, I know that sounds like I must have been driving fast and well, let's face it, I was. BUT I was still going slow compared to others. First of all let me just say that the Japanese tailgate like it's a sport, and it seems they do it with no reason. So with that I was a bit confused when I was being tailgated for a while by this truck (which, though I say truck a Japanese truck is really small so no big deal), so this truck is tailgating me and I wanted to get over cause I was in the fast lane, but there was this car next to me and then the sign (in English) said to slow down cause we were approaching a toll gate. So I am not sure what to do, if I speed up I could pass the car, but I may blast through the toll gate, or I could slow down, and possibly piss this guy off even more, but then I could get over.... so as I am pondering what to do I am slowing down (opting for what I thought was the better decision), but to my dismay the guy next to me was also slowing down (on top of the fact that he was in the slow lane), and then I look in my rearview mirror to see this guy literally ON MY BUMPER. I swear he had to have been pushing me! And then as I look he waves his arm frantically like he has a dying person in the back of his car and me being in his way is killing him! So of course this drama led me to panic, I gassed it and got over ASAP only to realize that the toll road was far enough ahead that it was not a problem and that this man was only in a rush because he had a "I don't need to stop at the toll gate" pass.

SHEESH! I think he lost 60 seconds, but it must have been his life on the line... I even have a "I am a new driver" sticker on my car. He should have had more patience with me. So what did I learn? Asian drivers are NOT asian drivers in asia! Americans are the "asian" drivers of Asia. Does that make sense? Hope so, cause I am not going to explain it any more than that!

Let's eat!

2009-03-25T16:29:00.000-07:00

This is a pic from a while ago when we went to a Sumo tournament.... makes you wanna start eating right? We could all probably use a few more pounds on us.... how else can we be expected to be sumo wrestlers? Just one question for you.... don't you wan to get a diaper looking thong?

Mt. Fuji

2009-03-21T06:45:00.000-07:00

Well I finally got some pictures of Mt. Fuji at the beach near our house. Joy and I are hoping to climb to the top in a couple months. You can only climb it during a three month period in the summer because it's too cold and windy the other nine months of the year.

You may have noticed in the photo of Joy's last post that I have stitches above one of my eyes. A week ago I was wrestling around doing jiu-jitsu with a friend from my ship. I got him in a pretty good position on the ground so he tried to roll out of it by trying to throw his foot over my head but instead of going over my head it landed on my forehead. I didn't think anything happened but he stopped and I told him to keep going. He just sat there and said I should go look at it because it was bleeding. I said I don't care, let's keep going, but he insisted that we stop because I might need stitches. So it was worse than I thought and I went to the Navy hospital where a few very inexperienced young seamen got to "practice" stitching my face, luckily I only needed three. When I got home I questioned whether or not it would've been better if I didn't go to the hospital and just let my skin heal on it's own. Joy says the same thing.

Tokyo

2009-03-19T19:50:00.000-07:00

So it just took me forever to get signed in here. I created a new business email with gmail, and then when I went to sign into our blog my new gmail account was there, and I thought, "Hmmm that's weird. I thought I would still be signing in here with my other email". Well, I was supposed to continue signing in with my other email, but it took me a while to find that out cause everything was in Kanji and I didn't know what I was clicking on! Eventually I found a spot to turn it all to English... so here I am. SHeesh!

So last weekend we went to Tokyo to visit our friend Melody and do some site-seeing. We went to a couple of different places and this at this place in particular there were WAY too many people. It was fun to see some new places, but I am not one much for the city and crowds.... hence the reason why we don't go to Tokyo often :) Spring is pretty much here and soon all the cherry blossom trees will be blooming. We saw a few and they are quite pretty. Can't wait for all of them to bloom.... should happen in the next week or two!

Busy, Busy Busy!

2009-03-17T22:09:00.000-07:00

So I have obviously been busy lately... and I am still busy now so this is going to be short. The weekend before last we went rock climbing. Lots of fun! This last weekend we went to Tokyo to visit our friend Melody and had some more fun seeing the sites. I am in class this week and really enjoying it. I have had a LOT of people contacting me about family portraits and such. So here is a sample of todays work... really fun, and VERY easy doggies to photograph!

I had a photo session this morning and it went really great. This is just one of many great images :)

An Adventure

2009-03-03T16:01:00.000-08:00

So yesterday I had quite an adventure. I dropped my car off in the morning at the shop to get some work done, and they said it would be done by the afternoon, so I thought "Great! I won't have to ride home at night in the dark." SO in thinking this, I wisely left the bike lights in the car. Well, they call me later that afternoon to say they made a mistake and they won't have the car ready until tomorrow. Oh well, no big deal, I thought I would be riding my bike home initially anyway. I didn't remember until it was too late that I needed to get the bike lights out of the car. I didn't get off work until 8pm, it is dark, cold, and it has started to rain. Sounds like fun. It takes me about 40 minutes to ride home. Everyone I work with lives on base and none of them really have a car anyway. So I am stuck. I could take the train, but I would probably spend twice as much time walking in the rain if I did. So biking it is. I tied a plastic bag to my backpack and hoped for the best. I made it home in one piece, but it was freezing!

At first my hands went numb. I was trying to wiggle them often so they would work when I needed to use the break. Then, by some miracle they were warm and all was fine. But then my legs were freezing. I am getting soaked cause there isn't much of a bike lane on most of the roads here so I am in a ditch with water going everywhere. Then I realized that it is not just raining but it is freaking snowing! It wasn't sticking, but it was snowing and I was cold. It was interesting though. I made it home and I jumped right in the shower to warm up. I think the snot dripping down my face the whole time kept me pretty warm so hopefully I won't get sick. You can see in the video that my toes are bright red, and you can't really see how wet I am cause I was soaked all the way through. There was more snow attached to my clothing, but by the time I got the camera most of it had melted.

Snowboarding in Japan!

2009-03-01T15:29:00.000-08:00

So we went snowboarding on Saturday. It was SUPER fun! We went to Kandatsu, which is about 4-5 hours away. I worked at the Outdoor Rec Center up until last Friday and ORC does a lot of trips for the people on base. It is a bit cheaper to go with them cause if we went on our own we would have to pay a million yen in tolls. So we went and had a great time. It began with a small disaster. We got up the first lift and Brian goes to strap in and his binding broke... he went down the mountain to get new ones, but they didn't have the right kind. He was able to fix it himself somehow and went to strap in again and the other broke. Ugh. All the while I am with some friends who have never been before, trying to teach them how to snowboard. Finally around 10:30 or so we made it down one slope and found Brian and he had just fixed his board. SO off we went. The board worked good the rest of the day and we had a great time!

He's gooood.

Dog anyone?

2009-02-26T15:26:00.000-08:00

What a fun night this was... I got home the other day and whenever I get home I have to spend forever letting the dog out. He just likes to take his time. So, I come inside and I go upstairs. Well, the bedroom door is open, which is weird cause we just got home and I didn't think Brian had gone upstairs yet. I was right... somehow I did not completely close the bedroom door when I left in the morning. So I turn on the light and it looked like someone had been sleeping in our bed. The pillows were thrown on the floor, the blankets and sheets had been tossed around and what was that? POO! There was poo on my bed! And then I get closer and there was pee too! I could KILL this STUPID DOG!! I wanted to throw him off the balcony. Almost did, but Brian held me back. This bed is brand freakin' new! We bought it about 2 weeks ago and now there are two nasty stains. Ew. We were able to get most of it out, but seriously, what timing, right? I don't even know how he got up on the bed in the first place. He is like 6 inches tall and the bed is about 3 feet high. He has a hard time jumping onto chairs, let alone the bed... stupid stupid dog. Stupid dog! He is a weiner dog so we could make hot dogs out of him and eat him for dinner...

New Hair Cut!

2009-02-15T15:57:00.001-08:00

So I chopped my hair! Yikes.... I REALLY chopped my hair! I have never had it so short and I wanted to see what it was like since I felt like it was already sooo short. Well, it turns out my hair wasn't so short before, but it sure is now. I wasn't sure I liked it at first, but I really do like it. I am not sure I like so much that I will keep it this way for a while. In fact, I am sure I will let it grow right back, I just wanted to see what it would be like since I have never cut it so short before. Brian is always asking me to cut it short so I figured I would surprise him. He was definitely surprised. When his ship pulled in I was still at work and he came in and didn't recognize me. He walked right by me while I was in the front office.

The only problem with having it short is, I cannot just roll out of bed and go... I wake up looking real crazy, so much so, that I do not even want to exit the front door to take the dog out to pee in fear that I might frighten the neighbors... I am sure this will surprise none of you, but I don't own "hair products" and I need to go buy some gel and stuff so I can "style" my hair.... yikes! What is happening to me! Eh! Is it Japan? Is it my husband being away? Is it a lack of horses and animals in general in my life? Oh dear... what to do, what to do...

Back to school

2009-02-14T04:50:00.001-08:00

"Back to school, back to school... to prove to my dad that I'm not a foooolll...I've got my lunch packed up, my boots tied tight, I hope I don't get in a fight! Ooohhhh, back to school..." Anyone know where that song comes from? You should.

So, yes, I am going back to school. I NEVER thought I would be interested in getting my Master's degree, but things change and now I really want to. Here in Japan on base the "Navy College" has different educational opportunities for people. Basically, certain schools have contracts with the Navy and they have small campuses on base. The grad programs are very limited, but of the two they have I actually am quite interested in one of them. So, after researching it and thinking about it for a few months I put in my application and will be starting classes soon :)

I am going to the University of Oklahoma to get my master's degree in Human Relations. In this degree I plan to direct my studies more towards working with "at risk" teens. It is an interest I have always had and kind of forgot about for a while. I don't think I want to do counseling exactly, but I have always wanted to work at a horse ranch/rehab center. I know that getting this degree will open more doors for jobs in the future and hopefully it will help me work with teens in some way.

The program is pretty straight forward. It could take as little as 15 months. The class is not set on the normal semester schedule, but I will have regular classroom classes (which was what I absolutely wanted). it won't even cost that much. However, both Brian and I have a lovely mountain of debt from Brooks that we are trying to pay off, so this is going to be all out of pocket. If I have to take a semester off to save up for another class that is what I will do. I do plan to apply for many scholarships so if any of you know of any good ones, pass the info on! Any scholarship information would be VERY much appreciated! Free money always sounds like a good idea to me... so if any of you have any advice I am all ears.

Horses! Yay!

2009-02-12T04:57:00.000-08:00

So I had a super fun day today! I went to Tama Hills (an Airforce base about 2 hrs away) and I had a great time! A new friend, Brook, went with me and we both really enjoyed the horses. I was really trying to build some relationships with the people there and I think we did a good job of that. They had a lot to do today because they have some kind of inspection tomorrow so first we helped paint two arenas, had lunch, finished painting and then rode. Not only did the director buy us lunch, but we also got to ride for free. They said they need volunteers to work there so I am sure I will be going at least once a week to get in my riding time. I am not sure that I will always get to ride for free, but it was nice to do it today.

Basically, on base is the Outdoor Recreation. I met the man in charge of it today, and he is American (and a civilian). Outdoor Rec contracts certain things out so, basically the people running the ranch are Japanese (some speak English, but the main guy in charge does not have such good English). So the ranch is funded in part through the military, but it is totally run by this Japanese man. He gave me a mini lesson today and I gave my friend a mini lesson. It felt SOOOO good to be on a horse again, I cannot even explain. They do ride English so it was interesting riding English for the first time in probably 3 years, and after not even been on a horse in 4 months. Either way, I think I did alright. I know I looked like crap at first, but then I got used to it again and felt better.

I am very excited to go there regularly. It will be nice having one more place where I can regularly work on learning Japanese and I definitely needed a good place to ride. It is now just one more thing to add to my weekly list of things to do, which seems to be filling up quite quickly... and now Brian will be back soon, what will I do then? Brian is supposed to be back sometime early next week. I am SUPER excited to have him back, and am really hoping that the ships' schedule doesn't change. As much as I try to not get too excited because I know things can always change, I am already excited. He has only been gone four weeks, but it always seems like so much longer here in Japan. Time is going by quickly and yet the time that Brian and I spend apart does seem like forever. Such is life I suppose. He is coming back, and his ship is going into drydock, which means that he will not be going out to sea for a good 3-4 months (no matter what)! So that will be quite nice having him around for such a long time without a break... in fact, I might end up getting sick of him... maybe I will have to live at Tama Hills half the week with the horses.... Ha! Yeah right.

I got lost

2009-02-08T02:56:00.000-08:00

So this video has nothing to do with me getting lost, but I figured it is a good story to post it with. This is near my house. They were doing road construction on this sidewalk for a bit and it was kinda weird to see their itty bitty machines (Randy and Jon, you would have appreciated this). This video really doesn't do it all justice.

So we have our own little craigslist kinda thing out here and I posted an ad on it for pet sitting. This lady only needed me to take her dog for a walk 3 times. I followed her to her house to meet her dog and everything. Well, there are a lot of turns on the way to her house and not as many landmarks so I knew I would need her to give me written directions as well. A week later it is time to go take care of the dog. I get off work at 6pm (it is dark) and I get in the car to realize I left the directions at home. I figure I will be fine cause I had been there before... how hard could it be? I live about a 30 minute drive in the opposite direction and I really didn't want to go home first. So I head out. I did all right, or so I thought. I find myself in Japanese suburbia-land. I drove down every freaking street hoping to find her house (that I knew I would recognize). I thought of going home and getting the directions, but that would take me SO long to do! I could do this... wrong. I spent a good 1 1/2 hrs driving around only to go home to get the directions, and then go back to walk the damn dog. Ugh! By the time I got to the house it was past 8:30pm. The poor dog was so excited to see me. She was so good, no pee in the house :) I felt bad so I took her for a 45 minute walk instead of 30 min (which is what I had agreed to). So after all of that, I got home about 10:30pm. It was SUPER frustrating and in the end, the place I was driving around (when I had no directions) was kinda close... and yet totally not. I definitely would have never found it without the directions... it sucked. One thing I learned is that Japanese road construction at night looks like a freaking amusement park. Lots and lots of colorful signs and flashing lights.

Heaven... in Japan

2009-02-04T17:52:00.000-08:00

So I went and saw horses on Tuesday! It was so stinkin' awesome. I wish I could've rode, but they were busy and they require everyone to take a few lessons first so they can evaluate whether or not you are capable of riding on your own. One of the programmers at my work, Tetsuya, went with me and it was great because he was able to translate for me and I could ask all the questions I wanted. It is VERY expensive. Over $100 per 45 minute lesson. Not to mention the fact that they do not speak English so it wouldn't work out so well. BUT Tetusya is VERY nice and offerred to go back with me so I could take a lesson :) YAY! Not like I want to do it all the time, but it will be quite fun to get a lesson from a Japanese person through a translator.

They all ride English, and luckily I was able to learn English a bit while living in SB so I won't look too bad. I saw one guy riding and he did not look very skilled, but he could have just been some random rider. Hopefully he was not a trainer. Either way though I am SO excited! I know you all think I am crazy, but imagine doing something about 5 days a week for the last six years and then just not doing it at all for 4 months! I went 3 months without even seeing a horse! That is freaking crazy! I LOVED going. The smells, sounds, petting the horses... it was so good. I really look forward to my return:) The video is of one horse who was particularly cuddly and sweet. The stalls are quite small tohugh as you can see...

Recycling in Japan

2009-02-02T15:43:00.000-08:00

Wow, ok so Japan Japan is crazy about recylcing. Who doesn't like to take out the trash? Yeah? Well, don't move to Japan. I get to take out the trash just about everyday of the week. First of all, I have no garbage disposal, which isn't so bad. This is not the first place I have lived with no garbage disposal. BUT I live in the city and there is no place to toss nasty chunks of leftover junk, so it goes in the trash to stink it up.

I have 3 trash cans and that is not enough. Even with my three trash cans I have two piles sitting on the floor. The trash has to be sorted and you take out certain types each day. There is burnable, nonburnable, cans (not just soda cans but bean/veggie cans too), cardboard, pet bottles (that's what they call water bottles), and glass. Sound like fun to you? It IS! Loads of fun :D With all this sorting my trash doesn't quite fill up enough to take out every week, BUT for the burnable stuff... that gets stinky so I can't handle not taking it out every week.

At first I was very nervous to do something wrong. Our trash goes in a "community cage" at the end of our little driveway, so of course if I screw up they know who's trash it is cause I am the only one with American trash. At first I took my trash on base (which I could totally get in trouble for, but on base they only do burnable and nonburnable, they pay Japanese people to wort the rest). So about a month ago (or maybe more) I put my trash out there and I did something wrong so my neighbors brought it back to me. See, at the time I had no calendar of what goes out when. I would go look at the other trash and try to guess which I should bring out. Apparently, if you bring the wrong trash out they will not take it. So it was a bit embarrassing when my neighbor comes over with his daughter (who speaks better English). They are carrying my trash and a schedule of what goes out when. Then, as if that wasn't enough, he starts to pull some of my trash out of the bag and explain what should go where, ew. I was quite embarrassed. All worked out in the end though. I have yet to screw up like that since.

Just so you all know, it is difficult at times figuring out what goes in which trash. The Japanese apparently have little signs on their stuff to tell them what kind of trash it is. We Americans do so much recycling *sarcasm* that who knows whether some of it should be considered burnable or not?

A test

2009-02-01T19:01:00.000-08:00

So this is our foster dog Dexter... I think I have told you about him. He was my model this morning. I have a photo session set up for next Sunday and I wanted to test out my living room studio. I have some great windows and great light in there so I bought a large piece of fabric to use as a backdrop and this is what I got. Well, the green backdrop is actually a rug, the other is a piece of fabric. I have a photo shoot set up with a woman and her 4 month old baby soon. So this is my studio, let me know what you think! Dex was a great model... he doesn't much like the camera, but I gave him a lot of treats so he was fine :)

Nomi Network

2009-01-31T02:33:00.000-08:00

Alright this is a plug for my friend Diana Mao she has started a non-profit organization called Nomi Network to help girls who have been trapped in sex-trafficking. She has presented her idea to idea blob and is a finalist for the $10,000 prize. This money will really be able to get this thing going so please vote! Today is the last day to vote so PLEASE go now! It takes only 3 minutes to register and vote. Think of the lives you could help change in only 3 minutes! I know we are all busy, but 3 minutes out of our lives is NOTHING and especially when you compare it to the lives of these girls. Please look at her site too. Read what she's all about. This is an amazing non-profit.

Go to ideablob.com now! Vote! and then you can come back and read the rest of my blog :)

So, I got an email from a friend about this today. I thought it was interesting to get this email for two reasons 1) I actually already got an email from another friend about voting for this and I just deleted it cause I didn't want to do the hassle (even though I have plenty of time). Then, today at work some of us were talking about the red-light district and where it is here in Japan. One of the girls went out to dinner last night with a group and they walked past a "buy a drink bar" (which for those of you who don't know is apparently a place where guys buy a girl a drink and they can do anything they want with her, and I have no idea how far that goes). So this girl was saying how she has heard of these places, but it was kinda crazy actually seeing one. She said the girls were dressed just like hookers (cause they are) and the "dancing" that was going on was ridiculous. It is just so sad to me that these places exist. These poor girls... who knows how they got into this, but I am sure most of them feel trapped, some may be, and some may just think there is no other option. No matter the reason for their being there, it is sad. Abuse, neglect, trauma, sadness... it's a terrible sad way to live life. I wish I could just go there one night and take them all away from there... though I know it would never be that easy.

So after all this I come home to an email about my friend in SB who is starting Nomi Network. How awesome is that? The second email I have received about this and you can bet I definitely did not delete this one. I know most of you got an email from me and I really hope you take the time to go vote. Please know that Nomi Network is not going to reach every country (well, who knows someday it might), but I mentioned my thoughts on Japan, and every country has junk like that, but Nomi Network is actually specifically for Cambodia.

So anyway, hope you all vote! Go vote now if you haven't already! If you know people who will vote call them up and tell them to vote! This needs to happen!

VOTE!

Horses!

2009-01-30T02:09:00.000-08:00

So I am SUPER excited about going to a horse ranch on Tuesday! The guy who led the rock climbing trip I went on (Tetsuya) is a nice Japanese man, and I figured he must know the area pretty well so I asked him if he knew of any horse ranches nearby. He said yes and then he looked it up online (of course it was all in kanji and katakana). Apparently there is one pretty close, probably about 20 minutes from base! So I was very excited as he wrote down the directions for me. I was a little disappointed cause he said the price is about 8,000¥ per day ($80) and they have a monthly memebership that is some other outrageous number. BUT I am excited to go regardless. The BEST part is... he said he wants to talk with Steven (our manager) about putting together a trip for horse-back riding and so he offered to go with me to check out the ranch! Yay! I will not only finally be able to get to this ranch, but I will have my very own translator! I am really hoping that we can set something up where we have a horsey trip once a month and I can be the leader and go for free. That still would not fill my horse need, but it is a start. Apparently there are horses at another military base about 1-2hrs from here so I am going to check that out at some point too.

So yay! for Tetsuya being such a nice guy! Tuesday will not come fast enough... I am sure you all think I am crazy, cause I know I sound more excited about this than I do when Brian comes home, and to be honest I guess I am a little. But it's different. Imagine you doing something for 1-3 hrs 5-7 days a week for the last 6 years and the time before that just dreaming about it... that is kinda crazy to just cut it out of my life cold turkey, right? I am hoping that I can somehow go once a week. I could live off that. Once a week is all I ask. I will let you know how it goes.

Sandy

2009-01-27T03:12:00.000-08:00

OK folks, so this may be the longest post you'll ever read... Today my beloved Sandy died. Well, she died on Monday morning, and I found out this morning not too long after. Mom found her sleeping on the porch and she just knew something was different. They saw her earlier that morning and said she looked fine. It was just her time. She was old, and she lived a good life. The pic above is a fav of mine... that is, of the nice portrait ones I have of her. Below I have many great memories with her that I would like to share in her memory. She was seriously the best dog EVER. Thanks to you David for winning the bet, and thanks to you dad for following through with the deal. Dave... don't lose those golf skills man... they are handy :)

So I got Sandy when I was 13 years old and I spent all kinds of time with her. Good and bad. I trained her and taught her all she knew. I was the lucky one who got to clean up her pee when she was in house training... which is quite the chore for a St Bernard (one time I specifically remember Jon and Dave yelling for me to clean up one such mess and I seriously thought they had dumped a bucket of water on the ground. It was only after they yelled at me to get down and smell it that I believed them... and no I did not smell it.)
Sandy was wonderful to our new member of the fam, Shugo. She clearly did not like him much at first, but he grows on you like a weed and she quickly took the mother role in his life. Many times I caught her licking his head like he was her own...

She taught him the best place to sleep (of course right where you can see in the house and watch me 24-7). I would like to note too that this is only a few days after he had been with us. She did take to him quickly.
And as he grew, she continued to love him :)

During the summer in SD I would shoot horse shows and I would bring her with me. She would follow me around, find the closest shade as long as it was within about 15-20 feet of me and just lay down. Never any problems with her. It was great too cause people always knew who I was... "the photographer? Oh, that girl with the red hair and huge St. Bernard? Yeah, I know her..."
Yes, she rode IN the car. Everywhere. The ranch, the beach, the post office, the vet, the park, Auburn, Santa Barbara, Tamara's (Brian's Sis), anywhere and everywhere she loved to be with us.

Yes after the beach she would be slobery and wet, and though it doesn't look like it Brian still loved her even then... :) I always told him not to talk to her in the car... if you talked to her she wanted to get right in your face and give you a kiss. I always just let her do her own thing in the back and she never bugged me while I was driving.

Her at the beach... not always a good idea. If it was hot then she would like to get in the water, which is nice, but if she gets in the water she then feels the need to drink the water and then... well, then she gets diarrhea. Ew.

She LOVED the car. This is a St. Bernard folks... they are lazy, and they would seriously rather go for a ride in the car than take a walk. That was her outing everyday... a ride in the car and she was happy.

This is funny. She loved to lay in the exact same spot in our yard day after day after day. So, we decided (since we didn't want to pay whatever our landlord would charge us when we moved out) that we would put up a fence to keep her away from it, let it grow back and take the fence down... didn't work.

She is just so cute, I loved to get on the ground and just pet her...

Slobber and all... she was awesome

She loved to do this. If I was standing somewhere with my legs even slightly apart, she would come up behind me and squeeze her huge head and body between my legs so she could get through and sit on my feet and have me rub her back. Bad puppy habit that I didn't break... luckily she wasn't any taller cause she would have been taking me for a ride.

Fun pics while we were bored... this was while Brian was away and before Shugo... What else is a girl to do?

And yes... the last day, the last moment we saw each other. I was giving my hugs good bye and of course the cameras came out. For those of you who can't tell Sandy is the one laying down. Gunther is sitting, he is my parents' Saint, and also Sandy's husband. They had two litters of pups together. He just wanted some lovin' too. Notice Sandy is much redder than Gunther. When we got her the people we bought her from had actually nicknamed her "red"... funny huh? It was meant to be.

Seriously she was a great great dog. I will always cherish my memories with her and I am very grateful to have had her with us in SD for the last year and a half. I honestly kinda feel like she died a little sooner cause she was heartbroke that we left her. I know she was happy and very well cared for at my parents', but her and I had a special bond and attachment that will not be replaced. I know you all think I am crazy, but this is my dog, this is my life, I love my animals, you all know this. This may be the sappiest you ever hear me on this thing...

Below is one of my favorite videos of Sandy. In SD we would always leave our side door open so Sandy could feel like she ws a part of our life (we didn't allow her in the house cause neither of us wanted to clean up after all that slobber and hair!). I love how Brian gets in her face and I can just see what she is thinking... " Oh I love you too. Oh! Can I come in! Wow you love me so much! I will come in :) Uh Oh... you don't love me? I guess... um... ok I will go out." Yeah watch the movie you will see it all. And by the way, Brian does that to every dog. I think it's the best way that he embarrasses himself. He just sticks out his tongue and starts breathing like a dog, and then I give him that look like, "What the crap are you doing?" and he says, " What? They like it." Apparently Sandy did... we love her and will always miss her!

My climbing trip

2009-01-26T16:41:00.000-08:00

So this is where I went climbing... pretty cool view.

The water was really clear! I wanted to jump in, but it was too cold!

There I am! Climb away! I would have more pics of me climbing, but I had some strangers taking pics and they did a bad job... so this is the best I got.

See, look how clear the water is!

This was on the way back... very pretty sunset. There was a lot of open space and I tried to get some good pics, but my nice camera was under the bus so I was stuck with the point and shoot... still pretty though :)

2009-01-23T02:34:00.000-08:00

So these are from the same weekend as the snow monkey thing. We went to see the monkeys first and then went to this castle which was pretty cool. Nicer on the outside though. The inside is totally empty and we had to take our shoes off even though it was freezing cold, AND the stairs in this castle are the STEEPEST EVER. Anyway, it was fun, and there was a pretty sunset too.

Tomorrow I am going rock climbing! Yay! I heard that the location is really beautiful, some cliffs overlooking the ocean. So look forward to seeing pics from that! I am still debating bringing my nice camera though. I don't want to have extra things in my bag and I also don't want to hurt my camera... but I probably should bring it. Anyway, I have to be there at 4:15am so I need to get going.

Today I miss...

2009-01-21T03:34:00.000-08:00

Yes, I miss the awesome awesome burritos of SD. I took my Japanese friend to the military base for lunch today (she had never been to "little America" before) and of course she wanted to eat at Taco Bell and try "mexican food". Oh, if she only knew...
Seriously, does it get any cuter than that?
He will be with us soon enough :)
Click on it, and look at it closer, it's freaking awesome :D
Yeah, I guess I miss him too
I definitely miss this guy.... the first man in my life.
And yes, I guess it did get cuter. How could anyone not miss that?

A castle

2009-01-20T02:42:00.000-08:00

So on Monday I went on a tour with my friend Lauren. I can't remember where all we went. We stopped at about 3-4 places. I called it the strawberry tour cause the last place we stopped was a strawberry farm and we could eat all we wanted for about 20 minutes! Yum! The whole thing was a lot of fun. The castles are cool. GREAT photo place on the outside. The inside is totally barren with wooden floors and we have to take our shoes off. But there is always a nice view from the top.

My favorite part of this tour was at one stop we had some soft serve ice cream... the BEST EVER! Soooo good. I had vanilla/strawberry mix and it was incredible. I have had soft serve plenty of times here before, but this place topped all... or maybe it was just the flavor. Either way, it was AWESOME :)

Don't Judge me

2009-01-18T04:41:00.000-08:00

"Don't Judge Me!" These are the words I find most annoying in life. How stupid... don't judge me. First of all everyone judges everyone about everything. Right or wrong that is just how it goes. The way you dress, the way you talk, the way you walk, the way you smile, the choices you make, the places you go, the friends you have.... these are all things that people judge others about. I do it, you do it, we are all guilty. Honestly, I don't find too much harm in it. Of course it depends on how you express this opinion of yours. Usually it is best kept to yourself, but if you must speak it aloud so be it.

I bring this up because I clearly offended this girl that I work with twice today and I thought she just might poop out her baby 5 months early. I just laughed inside cause what we were talking about was so meaningless and I was not passing judgment, I was merely stating the obvious that eating McDonalds all the time just might kill you. She freaked out. "I don't give two #$%^& and a $@%^! what I eat, I am fat and I am pregnant and I don't care..." First of all she is fat, not because she is pregnant, but more likely due to her eating habits and hatred for exercise. Who cares! I DON'T CARE! I was just jokingly stating my thoughts of surprise how they eat McDonalds so often. I wasn't even thinking about the fact that she was overweight. The other thing I offended her about was even more meaningless... I can't even waste my time writing about it.

The thing is, later at my lunch break my manager asked how I was getting along with everyone. I said fine, and then mentioned that I had clearly offended this girl earlier that day. He said she had already told him all about it! What! She told him I am "so judgmental".... what?! This girl is psycho, sensitive, and sassy (3 bad sssss), and she is not this way because she is pregnant.

So my question is this. Am I judgmental? I know I always have an opinion. I am not sure that I would classify myself as opinionated, and I don't think I would call myself judgmental. I am critical and I like to set higher standards for people. Is that so bad?

Wild Snow Monkeys!!!

2009-01-17T03:33:00.001-08:00

So here are the Wild Snow Monkeys of Japan! No the one with red hair is not a monkey (I know you were thinking that!) We went to see these monkeys on a tour through the military. It was really cool. We took a long buss ride and when we got there it was snowing and the monkeys are just there, roaming about. We were told not to look them in the eye so that we wouldn't get attacked. I did not look them in the eye, but I wonder about my friend Carol in the pic below.... she said she didn't look it in the eye, but it decided to jump on her back anyway. It was pretty funny. It stayed there for a bit and eventually got off when the Japanese man who works there yelled at it in Japanese and started to run over there.
Brian with a monkey behind him. There was an Onsen that was built specially for the monkeys to relax in. They like it, although I have no idea how they can go into a warm cozy onsen and then just jump out into the freezing snow with wet furry fur.
I know there is no onkey in this pic.... but Brian looks good doesn't he? :)
This monkey looked a little cold... I thought it was a funny shot.
And us with the monkeys, yay. Please keep in mind none of these pics have been color corrected and they clearly need it so sorry for the snappish looking pics from the nice camera...

Busy Bees...

2009-01-16T02:02:00.000-08:00

So we have been pretty busy.... well, I guess I have been busy, Brian has been busy working ever since we got here :) I got a job working at the Outdoor Rec Center, Yay. So I am officially working about 40 hours a week with wonderful people... maybe not so wonderful. I think it is probably the same no matter where you are (military or not), but people just like to complain about life and it is freaking annoying. Not to mention the fact that all everyone talks about for the most part is going out drinking. I was thinking about it today, cause I know that it is not just the military. Most people no matter where you work do not like their jobs and they also love to complain about their personal lives too and people drink, they party, it's the "fun" thing to do.

I guess I just realized today that I have had very few "normal" jobs. Growing up I worked at my dad's gas station and Dairy Queen. I think those could be considered "normal". But I was young, and didn't listen much when people complained and always did a great job of staying out of it. After those jobs the only other "normal" ones were working at a restaurant, but I think it is easier to avoid people's comments and complaints in those jobs cause we are busy, you have your own tables, and you are working your own section, no need to interact much with other workers.

I dunno, maybe I have had plenty of "normal" jobs, it's just that I have tried to give people the benefit of the doubt and also not let them get to me. AND I just thought of this! It's probably also the fact that then I had other things going on like school, horses, pets... now I have a limited number of people to hang out with and the only other thing I really do is workout. Obviously I do other things and I am doing plenty of sightseeing, it's just different somehow. I feel surrounded by these people who are annoying!

Either way, things are going well, I just had to complain a bit.... see, they are already rubbing off on me! I am actually going to be switching jobs to work at the Teen Center in a month when my background check paperwork goes through, so that will be good.

Brian left today. He is supposed to be gone for 4 weeks. I am counting on 6wks (no not hoping, just setting myself up to NOT be disappointed when their schedule changes cause it always does). The nice thing is I now have a job and will be quite busy with that, teaching English (and trying to get more students), and trying to find photography work. Brian and I had a really cool weekend this past weekend and I have pics I need to post, but no time to go through them right now, so maybe tomorrow :) Just thought I'd fill you all in since it has been a bit.

"The face"

2009-01-06T15:07:00.000-08:00

So does anyone remember "the face"? When I was little I apparently made this "alien face" and everyone asked me to do it and when I did they would laugh. Anyway, this picture reminded me of it. I guess the face looked like an alien face, but I know that some friends from high school would call it a "seahorse" face... whatever that means. I know that only my siblings, maybe my parents and possibly the Rineers would remember this face. My memories of it are limited, but those are the only people I remember being around while doing it. So does anyone remember this? Or was it all a dream?

The Imperial Palace

2009-01-04T23:17:00.000-08:00

So on January 2nd Brian and I went to Tokyo to the Imperial Palace to see the Emporer wave at us... sounds exciting, but in reality it was a little boring. Basically too many people crowding around you (I don't recommend being in such close quarters with complete strangers... a little awkward) and then we waited forever. Finally, they come out, but they are behind some bullet proof glass so it's difficult to see. Though I am short, I didn't feel bad for myself because right next to me in this ridiculous crowd is this little Japanese lady who stands about a foot shorter than me. I thought Brian should put her on his shoulders so she could see, but with the language barrier we figured it would be best not to try to offer such a thing :)

Lots of flags, lots of people, very little personal space equals claustrophobia/anxiety attack interesting, but not something I care to experience too often. So that's it our trip to Imperial Palace was not too exciting though we did see the Emporer and family waving at us. Woohoo :)

Ahh... 2008

2009-01-03T03:06:00.000-08:00

Looking back last year was fast. Too fast. I feel like half of it was lost cause Brian was gone so much. So let's see... the year started with much anticipation.

-I was starting a new job at Bally Total fitness as a personal trainer (with no schooling or training... how did I even get the job).

-Brian joined the Navy in January, and was off to Great Lakes to start his Navy Seal training... finally.

-with Brian gone, I was living by myself for the first time ever. Boring at first, but after a few weeks I learned to enjoy it, and tried to make the most of our time apart.... a trip to Santa Barbara, riding, working, hanging out with friends, leaving water glasses anywhere I wanted to...

While brian was gone, I did get a little lonely. What's a girl to do when you go to a horse show and there is a really cute free puppy? We (I) got Shugo in May. Brian's first dog that is just his. I know he would have taken him home if he was there. I sent him pics and he named him, and fell in love right away.

July we had our 2nd anniversary. Brian wasn't able to make it home cause he was in BUD/s. So we celebrated on the 3rd. Went out to dinner and a movie... awesome!

Soon after that we were attacked by a bird sized moth. Absolutely ridiculous. I found him in the shed and next thing I knew he was in the house.
In July I got in my first accident. A fender bender gone bad. Stupid lady hit me so hard I hit the guy in front of me (and no I was not too close). Luckily the dogs were ok (they were in the back seat). The car was totalled so we got money for it and bought a new Toyota Tacoma.

Brian dropped out of BUD/s in July. Crazy, unexpected thing. But for the first time all year he was home every day (that was definitely an adjustment). We carved pumpkins for the last time in America well, not the last time, but you know what I mean.

Sexy Halloween costume huh? My job at the gym wasn't paying so well, so I started working at a restaurant.... Brian liked my apron :)

A last fling in San Diego.

A surprise visit to Kansas to see fam before I leave for a while...
Now in Japan! Traveling, speaking another language, getting lost, having culture shock (even when I am on base).
And of course the year went out with a bang! We celebrated by going bowling and out to dinner... lots of fun! I bowled the best I ever have! A score of 129!
Soooo 2008 was full of change and weirdness, fun and fast. I suspect more change and weirdness for 2009. Many great pictures, good stories and even more video!

Christmas! Yay!

2008-12-31T19:41:00.001-08:00

So I uploaded these in the wrong order but here was our Christmas! My favorite part is Brian's lovely old manish socks... In the pic is our friend Melody from Santa Barbara... she has been living in Tokyo for the last year and she visited us for the holidays since she didn't go home. Brian had to work at noon on Christmas so we had a nice breakfast and then we had our good dinner on the 26th. Lots of fun!!
Don't you wish you were there for me to make you breakfast...?

Mmmmmm... tasty! Raw cinnamon rolls!

Christmas morning!

ipods! Yay!

Yay for silly Japanese ornaments!
and for Japanese shirts... what does it say?
Ohhhh... stockings.... :) Yay!

My New friend

2008-12-22T15:15:00.000-08:00

Yeah, it's true I got a rat... Well, he's not ours. He was at the shelter on base and they needed a foster home for him for two months while he recovers from heart worms. So! I volunteered! It is just too quiet when Brian is gone. Although I volunteered for this while he was gone, but we didn't actually pick him up until after Brian got back.... and now Brian is here for a month. Oh well. It's nice to have a little animal, even if he is just a kicker dog :) Don't worry I haven't kicked him. Wanted to, but haven't.

The Curry Festival

2008-12-22T02:21:00.000-08:00

So this is another video from a while ago... this is the Curry Festival. I went 2 weeks after I got here with some girls I met on base. Brian was gone so he missed out, but it wasn't that exciting so oh well. There were a lot of people. Honestly, I did not eat any curry... I had some curry at a restaurant the week before and it wasn't really that special so I opted out. I did try something that someone bought. Can't remember what it was, but it was weird. It was a little dough ball with some creature in the middle. Not quite a dough ball I guess, but a ball of some weird stuff fried together. It was edible, but nothing I would seek out again. This is just some random festival... I am a little nervous to go to a festival that is on a holiday. Can you imagine way more people than this? Eeks. As for the bus and train. The previous video is from the train the first week we were here. My story (Brian wasn't there) was about the bus. It's not always packed. Just certain times of day. The same thing as having lots of traffic in SD at 5pm. Most of the time I am on the train it is fairly empty and there is a seat for me. Don't worry though, if any of you come visit I will be sure to take you out at the proper time so you can truly experience the sardines!

Our first experience on a very busy train...

2008-12-20T16:49:00.001-08:00

This was two weeks after we got here... time is going by quickly. We were on a train and it was very busy. This was the first time it happened. It has happened many more times and much worse. I was waiting for the bus the other day and when it pulled up and the doors opened, there was literally no place for me to get on, and there were about 5-10 of us at the stop. It was pretty crazy, and somehow we al squeezed on the train. It took about 5 minutes for everyone to squeeze on and there was a woman with two small kids, I thought they might get trampled, but they lived! It was sardines before I got on, I don't even know what you would call it after we added 10 people to the bus. It was no fun at the next stop when people from the back were trying to get off at the front... it was quite the experience.

A new Car!!!

2008-12-19T02:28:00.000-08:00

We now have a car! Yay! I would post some pics, but it is too cold in the other room and I just don't feel like dealing with it right now. So hopefully there will be pictures tomorrow :) So yes, we have finally gotten a car. There are definitely places you can live here in Japan where you would not need a car, but lucky for us I chose one place that we do. It takes us 30 minutes to walk to the train station from our house. it's about a 15 minute train ride to go to base, and then once we get off the train it takes about 20 minutes to get wherever it is we need to go on base. So by the time we leave and get where ever it is we are going it has been well over an hour. Cause sometimes we have to wait for a train.

Needless to say we are very happy to have a car. Taking the back roads it takes 25 minutes to get to base. I could take the yoko yoko and get there faster (the toll road/freeway), but I am a little nervous that I might get lost. Not to mention the fact that due to the itty bitty roads by my house we almost landed in a Japanese person's car this morning. Brian cannot drive cause he has been gone so much he hasn't had a chance to get his license. So am driving him to work early this morning and clearly our roads are just too stinkin' narrow. As I rounded the corner and saw this car, my instinct said to swerve right... bad idea. I didn't really swerve right, but since I was thinking swerve right, so I didn't swerve at all, and then we just both hit our brakes and stared straight at each other (me and the other car). The roads are just small so you have no other option than to be in the middle. Don't worry mom, we are fine, I am a very good driver :) Even in these foreign lands... I think I should buy a wig to wear while driving cause I am sure this guy went straight to work and told everyone that he almost got hit head first by some crazy redhead. And then of course someday they are going to see me walking down the road and say, "Look! There she is!" Julie, David, Vanessa, Marisa any other redheads who are reading this... we need you here in Japan. This whole redheads will take over the world plan isn't going to work over here... Me and Curty cannot do it alone!

The Great Buddha

2008-12-13T02:06:00.001-08:00

Us and the big ol' buddha. Fantastic huh? This was our first real outing in Japan.
Good Close up. Come on Brian, your supposed to smile on three... we are still working on that one.
Much better. Look at all those people! Actually there really weren't too many people that day.
This is me... washing my hands with the "holy water" before I enter onto the big Buddha's territory. I wonder... where do they get this so special "holy water"...

FACT: Big Buddha has his own Big Buddha slippers hanging on the wall to his left. Sorry, thought it was kinda weird and a little dumb and didn't care to get a pic... if you look real close you can see them in the video when I look over at Brian. They are under the roof hiding in the shade.

Oh, the influence of movies...

2008-12-12T20:16:00.000-08:00

After watching the movie Dirty Dancing in the Navy Lodge we of course felt the need to attempt "The Lift". I just wanted to see if Brian could pick me up from my armpits... we didn't even try to do the jump/ hold from the waist thing.

Our first outing, Just outside the main gate of base.

2008-12-12T00:16:00.001-08:00

The flight...

2008-12-11T23:55:00.000-08:00

Food

2008-12-11T02:34:00.000-08:00

So since we have been here I have eaten a plethora of crap! Pleas do not misunderstand... there is great food here in Japan. But we can't afford to eat out everyday. So for the last 5 almost 6 weeks I have mostly been living on frozen dinners and quesadillas. It's a good thing I love quesadillas. Our stuff has finally arrived here. It all was delivered yesterday. Yay! However, I have not felt like cooking 1) because I have no one to eat with (Brian is still gone) and 2) There is just too much crap everywhere right now for me to feel like making even more of a mess just to cook a meal. Seriously, who cooks a meal when they haven't even unpacked yet?

So as I am eating my crappy frozen dinner, I felt like I might vomit. Surprisingly this is the first time I have felt this way. But I just could not finish it. I look in the fridge and there wasn't much there. No tortillas left. My bread has gone bad, and everything else would just not be good alone. The bread actually was an unfortunate event. I thought the last two times I had it it tasted funny. Almost like a banana, which is really weird I know. So when I pulled some out of the bag and took a whiff to make sure it was still good... it wasn't and I realized that the weird banana like taste from before was probably mold... I think my friend may have also eaten it while it was slightly moldy... sorry Melody! So after sadly taking inventory, I realized my only option at having a happy stomach would be to eat some ice cream and cookies! And it was quite fantastic!

It has been getting cold at night...

2008-12-11T02:10:00.000-08:00

The FUNNIEST thing I have seen in Japan

2008-12-09T00:41:00.000-08:00

So this morning I witnessed an event that I will cherish for life. Every time I think about it I laugh! Ha! So I am on my way to base to deal with some paperwork stuff. I am getting off the train, it's about 8:30am and there are tons of people everywhere. Luckily I was going in the same direction as the crowd.

As I am walking I look down and see a girl in some crazy pointy healed boots. Not unusual at all. I begin to ponder what life is like as a Japanese woman. Everyone is so fashionable. They look great, fantastic right? Not quite. Is fashion really so important that you must give up your own comfort. We aren't even just talking about comfort here, we're talking about real life feet problems, back problems, leg problems, all the crap that happens to your body when you where the oh so cute shoes. Don't get me wrong, I like heals as much as the next girl (well, maybe not as much), but there comes a point when you must stop and think, "Hmm, I am going to be walking an awful lot today, maybe I should be practical and where comfy shoes". Right? Shouldn't women think that? Don't they? Apparently not. Cause every woman I see (well, at least most) is wearing some kind of heal. And a lot of them are high ones, with the skinny end that you could probably use as a weapon...

So as I am pondering all these thoughts and just truly wondering how they can do it day after day so painlessly graceful... BAM!! The girl who's shoes I am staring at all of a sudden crashes to the ground (almost to the ground)! We were going down some stairs and she must have sensed what I was thinking, cause all of a sudden she trips, arms flail out to the side like she is preparing to take flight. Hits the next step, falling faster as she goes. Her arms reaching out to those around her to hold her up. She practically had both her arms around two men that were walking beside her, used them as support and somehow never made it to the ground, but finished the staircase still standing. She frantically apologized and said excuse me and the men just looked at her weird. Just imagine the staircase was packed. People everywhere. It's no wonder this girl never hit the ground, and it was good that she didn't cause she could've been trampled by the herd of Japanese people.

I couldn't help but laugh the whole way to base. It was really the funniest thing I have every seen. And what perfect timing as I was wondering why it is that they wear such impractical shoes... So graceful and yet not. Wish someone could've been there with me cause it was freaking hilarious!

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Treeee...

2008-12-06T21:11:00.000-08:00

Yes! We got a Christmas tree! Yay hurray! They were selling some on base and I had a friend give me and the tree a ride home. There is no way I would be able to take that thing on the train…. Or the bus…. Or walk it aaalllll the way home. Soooo good news… I met with the internet people today and signed the paperwork. They will be coming out on Monday to set it up! Yay! I will finally have internet at home and then I can actually post pics and video! Oh the long awaited pictures! I think I will need to start taking more now… Another good piece of news is that our stuff will be getting here next week! That is if it arrives on time. Hopefully we will have it all by next Thursday! Hope so! Finally I will feel settled! Can’t wait! And Brian is underway again and he will also get back next week! Woohoo!

Funny story… the other day I was meeting Brian at the train station. He had just got off work and we were going to go explore. Well, right as I called him to say I was there, this Japanese man walks up to me and starts talking to me. I don’t know what he was saying, but it is very rare for them to approach you without you first saying something. Very rare. Not to mention that this guy was invading my space! He was saying something in Japanese and then he says, “English?” I said yes. But then he would just say a few words in English and some in Japanese. NONE of it made any sense at all. Not one bit. He had a creepy smile on his face and he pet me, and ugh! It was too much. I said “Arigato” and quickly walked away to find brian laughing wondering what was going on. I think he was complimenting me on my hair, but I have no idea. I really think “his cheese slid of his cracker”. Definitely not a full deck of cards in that stack. Had a few tools missing in the shed. A few ingredients short for Thanksgiving dinner…? Ok that’s enough. Anyway, that was definitely a first. Though I do get some stares, I have never had someone approach me like that. Creepy.

After One Month in Japan...

2008-12-01T20:15:00.000-08:00

I have learned this:

-Japanese people are very kind and helpful when you ask for help
-If the first thing you ask someone in Japanese is if they understand English most of the time they will not help you much.
-The train systems are a bit intimidating at first, but very useful (and not dirty!)
-There is a reason why all Japanese people wear shoes that are easy to slip on and off
-The garbage trucks, when they stop to pick up trash instead of making a horrid beeping noise they play Fur Elise (Beethoven)
-Nobody shakes hands... just bow
-Japanese have an amazing ability to fall asleep on the train and magically wake up when they need to get off (doesn't work for American's, I tried and missed my stop by about four stops one time)
-Everyone loves a redhead, or at least they love to stare (even people on base, which is weird cause you know they have seen a redhead before)
-Everyone here is petite, and I don't just mean short cause some are tall. I used to blame it on the fact that they eat with chop sticks and it slows down the whole eating process, but they are pretty darn good with their chop sticks so maybe it's just genetics
-I have yet to fully experience this, but they are apparently all great artists, and from the few I have seen draw it is true.

Anyway, that is all I can think of for now, but it has been a good month. I still don't have internet at home, but hopefully by next week. I have an appointment to fill out paperwork on it on Thurs. Brian is back out to sea which stinks cause he just got back, but he will be here for Christmas so that will be great!

Happy Thanksgiving!

2008-11-26T00:54:00.000-08:00

Well Happy Thanksgiving to all you in the US! Brian got back yesterday from his 10-day out to sea that turned into a 16-day. We are going to have Thanksgiving tomorrow with some people he knows on his ship. Yes, we will be eating Turkey! This will be my 2nd Thanksgiving celebration here in Japan. I suspect we wil have all the usual Thanksgiving dishes. Here on base our grocery store is pretty much the same as in Ca, although I am sure the fish they sell is much fresher.

Today we ate sushi for the first time since we have been here. The most "fishy" we got was shrimp. I know, I know, we're wimps. It was a cool place though. The sushi is made and it goes around the whole place on a conveyer belt and you grab a plate as it goes by. Someday when we get internet at home I will be able to post the pictures and video...

Anyway, Happy Thanksgiving! Wish we could spend it with you guys! Eat a big bowl of ice cream for us! (that is definitely one thing I am thankful for... there is ice cream here in Japan!)

A Lovely Getting Lost Story

2008-11-23T20:40:00.001-08:00

This weekend I went to the Tokyo area to stay with a friend that I know from Ca. She was throwing a Thanksgiving thing on Saturday and I stayed the night and went to church with her on Sunday. Sunday night I got off the train at about 10:05pm. Kinda late. Before I tell you how I got lost I must say that I just moved into my place on Friday. I had walked to the train station only twice and had not walked home from the train station at all yet.

So, it's after ten and I knew I would probably get lost (expecially cause it was dark) but I figured I would find my way. As I was walking I came upon the first intersection. I felt confident in the direction I chose, and then not too much later I came upon another intersection. This one I was not sure where to go. I chose one way and after five minutes knew it was wrong. I turned around and went the other way. I walked on that road for a good twenty minutes hoping to see something familiar. Then a train passes parrellel to the road I am on. I immediately knew I was going the wrong way. I turned around and at this point was getting a little worried.

There were cars and taxis going by here and there. I thought of flagging down a taxi, but I couldn't do that cause I only had 500 yen (about $5). So there I was at yet another intersection pondering how I was to get home. I was trying to read the signs and then a car pulled up to a red light. I looked at the car and thought, "Maybe I should ask for directions..." I must have stared too long, cause the next thing I heard was the guy locking his doors. Great, I thought, I am scared of them and they are scared of me. I continued walking, retracing my steps, deep in thought. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a sign with a person on it. I thought it was a real person watching me, and I just about had a heart attack. Yeah, yeah, I know very funny.

I decided at this point I was not going to make it home unless I tried to ask for directions. Luckily I remembered the name of the road I live on. So I see men walking and of course I didn't want to ask them. Then, there was a girl crossing the street. So I said, "Sumemasen, Nagae Doko des ka?" (Where is Nagae). through her broken English and my broken Japanese and a lot of chirades we decided that I would walk with her cause she was going in the same direction. At the point where we needed to part ways she said to go straight and then I would run into the intersection for Nagae. At that point I didn't know where I was, but I was VERY grateful for her help. So I walked on. Maybe five minutes later I was able to recognize my surroundings and I made it home safely. I got home at about 11:40. It took me twice as long to get home since I got lost, but it was exciting!

I am very grateful for the kindness of Japanese people. And I am also very glad that this is such a safe country! Don't worry mom, that doesn't mean that I am not going to take certain safety precautions. I am slowly but surely learning Japanese and finding my way around! That way when some of you visit we won't be getting lost!