I'm still here

Sorry I didn't mean to drop off the face of the earth, but this has been a very rough week.
Tuesday night I wasn't feeling great, I thought it was just a cranky stomach, but after 8 hours of nonstop vomit and... other forms of stomach evacuation... I realized something was wrong. I am pretty sure I threw up more in 10 hours than I have in the last 10 years.
By 8 am I had been sick for 10 hours and I couldn't even keep water down.
I called the doctor and was told I needed to come in and be seen in urgent care.

So a dose of Zofran, 3 vials of blood, a 1 ltr IV, and 4+ hours later later I was permitted to go home. My diagnosis: nope not the McD's I had for dinner, it was Norovirus (stomach flu).  I had specific instructions to stay hydrated, drink pedialite, and not to even think of trying food for several more hours. The thing that really sucked? Paul left that morning for Great Falls, about once a month he does an overnight up there for work. So I was all alone for 2 days, with my bad dogs.

It was rough, on all of us. I unfortunately had to kennel the dogs almost all day, and I just took them out every few hours to potty. I spent the whole day trying to sleep, but mostly just tossing and turning, and counting the hours until I could take my next dose of anti puke meds. By the evening I could handle the dogs being out and we laid on the couch and watched some TV and I was back in bed by nine.
The next morning I ate my first sold food. 1 piece of toast and an apple. I always remember my mom taught me when I was younger, when you are sick you get the BRAT diet. B-Bananas, R-Rice, A-Apples T-Toast. My small amount of food was delicious, and it stayed down! Paul got home that afternoon and he played with the dogs, We had subway for dinner and my simple turkey sammich was great. I spent the next few days regaining my strength, and slowly adding more of an array food to my diet.
I am fairly certain I am back to normal. I also learned upon returning to work, that it spread through my store like wild fire, and a large percentage of the employees were out sick this week.
Also, have you ever thrown something up and then been totally unable to even think about eating it ever again? I am one of those people, I didn't eat chili cheese dogs from derWeinerschnitzel for almost a year after throwing them up once. Well, I don't think I'll eat McD's for a very, very long time.

My Favorite Vacation?

I've noticed quite a few bloggers are posting about vacations. One military blogger Flip Flops & Combat boots is even having guest posts posts on vacations.

It got me thinking about my favorite vacation. I don't think Paul and I have ever had a legit vacation, just the two of us. We've had lots of road trips, with specific intentions, like driving to my moms for my sisters wedding, driving to his dads to get his Jeep, driving to Jackson, WY for the Marine Corps ball, unit camping trips, numerous visits to family, just to visit. But I can't think of one single vacation, with the intent of just vacationing.
Paul is on the road a lot for work currently, and when he is home, he just wants to be at home.
I think maybe this summer, we'll have to go on a real, Paul & Alana vacation.

On our many road trips, or trips to visit family, we have certainly stopped to see the sites, although we are usually in a hurry to 'just get there'.

We have also had many 'stay-cations' where we visit the local sites and shit, day trips around where we live.

Natural History Museum, Washington DC

Cape Cod w/ my parents 

Rock climbing in Tucson, a short stop while PCSing on our way to Oki.

Bryce Canyon, UT on our way to Seattle to fly to Okinawa 

(tidbit- I am related to the guy that this park is named after, Ebenezer Bryce is my Great Great Great (i don't know how many greats) Grandfather)

Lots of beach trips were made in Okinawa. 

Lots of castle ruins were visited

Fun adventure parks 

Nago Cherry Blossom Festival

Here in Montana we've even had a staycation or two, this is hiking Mt Helena. 

I'd really like to go to either Glacier NP or Yellowstone NP this summer. I've never been to Glacier, and I haven't been to Yellowstone since I was 8 or 9. I think it would be so nice to just get away, just the two of us. Maybe with the dogs, or maybe we would kennel them. Either way I just want us to have a few days where we don't have to worry about work, or dishes, or what to watch on TV.

Don't get me wrong, I love the trips we have had, but they almost always have an ulterior motive. And they are rarely just about us, and fun. I'd really like to have a trip where the focus of the trip was the trip and not the destination.

Then I can have a great Vacation story to tell.

If anyone has a favorite vacation they want to share i'd love to post it here, just shoot me an email
alana mccawley at mac dot com

Bloggers In Your Area?

This is so cool.

Do you want to find bloggers in your area, perhaps for a meetup, or just to blog stalk?

Do you want to stalk bloggers for a place you are going or want to go?

How do you find bloggers, by location?

Try this!

It's a really cool map I found hosted by Latte Love. 

Check it out!

Add yourself! 

Fill in the blank friday

1.  Today is a good day because   I'm off work and I don't have to work tomorrow. We are going to invite some friends over, and relax!   .

2.   The best thing I did all week was     got some nap time :)   .

3.  The current weather is     very sunny but cool and windy       and it makes me feel     cold   .

4. The best thing about spring is     when it finally arrives in Montana, I think it's almost here, maybe another week or two .

5. A fashion trend that I'm dying to try out for spring is   I am terrible at fashion trends, I can't figure any of them out, I simply sport jeans and a teeshirt. I always look like a fool if I try to be fashionable .

6. A person who made me smile this week was    My Paulie pants, he's so sweet and understanding  .

7.  The most delicious thing I ate all week was   I ate like a pound of popcorn yesterday, it was pretty delicious   .

wow, i'm not too exciting this week.

Wordless Wednesday

Today was warm and fun for the doggies! 

Reenlistments? Promotions?

There is a lot going on in our household right now. One of the bigger and possibly life altering things is Reenlistment. Paul is due to reenlist this fall, and with all the stupid shit of being on recruiting duty and being over an hour from the nearest military installation with doctors, and Paul being over 8 hours away from his command, he's been having one hell of a time getting his docs in order. We are getting down to the wire and I am told they have cut slots for reenlistment this year. I am highly concerned about it, I worry almost daily if come october Paul will still have a job. Part of me can't imagine him not being able to reenlist then there's the part of me that always thinks the worst. I'm not ready for that shit. 

Another big deal this year is promotion. 

Paul is up for E7 Gunny. It would be amazing if he made it. I am not sure exactly how the promotions work, there are zones and only a certain number of slots per job. But Paul is due. According to the information google found for me I'm thinking we should know around July if he gets promoted. 

That's all the big news for today kids, it's a pretty nice day here in Montana, a bit windy but temps hanging around the mid 60s and hopefully a bit warmer tomorrow. 

and then cold as balls again on saturday... 

Today I went to the library for Japanese lessons, it was fun. The teacher Miho is great, but she is about to leave for 5 weeks to visit Japan. So the class will be meeting without her and be sort of self teaching. Maybe that'll give me time to catch up. I am going to try to find all my Japanese langugae paperwork from when I first got to Okinawa and bring it to class next week. 

Naughty Doggies, Getting Schooled.

It's not a huge secret that I have two unruly dogs. 

They pretty much run the house, they do what they want, when they want. 

They don't listen much, they beg, 

They are redonkulously annoying when it comes to toys (AIKO) 

They run amok in the middle of the night (RENJI!)

They eat things that aren't food, and as I write this I just pulled two rocks out of Renji's mouth. 

But they are cute, and I love them with all my heart. 

Well my naughty doggies have never had any formal training. 

I got some training with Aiko when she was a babe, but I didn't keep it up. When we got Renji most of Aiko's training went out the window. She still will sit, and sort of stay, but that's it. 

When we have company over thats when it's most embarrassing. They jump and nip, and claw and climb all over guests. 

I have told myself a thousand times that I want to sign them up for classes. But I have been procrastinating big time. 

But today I did it, I took a big step forward in the schooling for my dogs. I signed them up for classes at Petco. The dog trainer is a regular over at Hastings, where I work. So I know her a little. She is really nice and she has met the dogs when we bring them in to get dog food. 

We start next Sunday and the dogs don't know it yet but I am sure they will be excited to go into town once a week and play with another human. 

Aiko has some social anxiety, you'd never know from seeing her in the house, her domain. A few times we have brought her to Petco and she gets all excited when people pet her and she has peed on the floor. She also hate tile. Petco is all tile. She gets really shy in public so I am hoping that she does well and that the prior training I have given her will shine through. 

*really mom? but I don't need no training*

*I'm plenty smart*

Mixed Emotions

I sort of lied when I said I don't have much going on right now. I actually have my mind running like crazy, but I don't know where to begin.

I've gone back to brown, I don't know if I mentioned that.... 

I am really homesick.
I really feel stupid missing Okinawa as much as I do. I think because life was just so simple there, and that it was rarely cold. I am having a hard time adjusting to the exact opposite.

April 7th, 2010

That picture was two years ago, and I'm sweating my balls off. Today, here in Montana, I am cold, and it's about 39 outside  with a possibility of sleet and snow for the next two days. 

Also Tuesday I met a girl downdown, who had seen my "I (heart) Okinawa" bumper sticker and stopped, the girl had lived in Okinawa last summer through a program in her highschool. It made my day. She was heading to the library for free japanese lessons. I am going to try to go next week. 

Also I am trying to get my shit together and get back into school. I submitted all the paperwork for financial aid in January, hoping to get into spring classes and I never heard back. Of course it's my own fault for not following up. So now I am hoping for summer. I finally got our taxes done and I am really hoping to get into at least one class this summer term. I am so close yet so far from finishing my degree, I think I can get through the rest of my core classes at least by Fall session 2 so I can focus on my major. 

I've been trying to get my fitness on with Zumba and I've been walking. Trying to eat responsibly, and take better care of myself, Paul and I both need to re-evaluate our diets. 

Prairie dogs from my walk yesterday.  

Work is going well, for both of us, although it doesn't leave much time for activities. Most of our ventures out of the house consist of going out to dinner. Which is part of the aforementioned problem.

I think this weekend I need to plan something for us to do that gets us out of the house, but takes in to account the possible shitty weather. I need a touristy guide book for Helena. 

The dogs are good too, not to jinx it, but we haven't been to the vet for an urgent care, or emergency visit in MONTHS!  I am so proud of my little boogers for being so good. 

I just can't decide how I feel, I certainly have the winter blues, and I am horribly homesick, but I am overall pleased with the way our lives have been lately. I just can't wait until Recruiting Duty is over and we can have our lives back. I'm ready to move on from here.

workin on the blog

I just went through and added tags to all of my posts for easy reference. 

out of 669 posts maybe 100 of them needed tags. But it's done now! 

Also I realized that this blog is almost 5 years old. It's birthday is in about a month! I'll have to have a birthday party or something :) 

But not much else exciting to report here. 

I sewed a seat cushion thing today for my sisters birthday. But no pictures yet because you can't see it before her.

It's still cold, possible snow this friday.

Okinawa is nice and warm, although wet, but warmer than here. 

Or Tucson, my home town, mmm nice and toasty.