This Winter Affair

Okay, enough already winter gods and goddesses. Why did you have to follow us to NC? Couldn't you have stayed in Driggs where you belong? The rain/snow/sleet ("wintry mix") of the last several weeks is starting to get a little old. The weather is not extremely intense by some standards, but enough that everything around here seems to shut down and/or freak out at least 2-3 days a week. The local school districts have been canceled so many times that the kids are going to have to start attending school on Saturdays and longer into the summer to make up time...It makes it worse because I don't know how many times I have heard, "this is the coldest/snowiest/worst winter I've seen here in 5, 10, 15 yrs." Yeah, thanks weather gods/goddesses. Guess I couldn't expect to get out of cold weather that easily...

At least our heat works.

This week Noah started a new job! He is working for an executive search firm (a head-hunting company) that specializing in placing executives in the construction and financial sectors. We are excited about the potential for the job-although being successful will be a lot of work on Noah's end, so far he seems determined to make it work. The unfortunate part is that he is only paid on commission so, until he makes a placement...He is looking for part-time work nights/weekends to help support us until this happens and has a second interview for a photo company called Owen Mills (I think) this coming week. We are crossing our fingers! I am considering finding part-time work but am also looking into collecting unemployment for a short time to help. I will not have much free time when Clinic starts in two weeks and would rather save my time not in school or at clinic for studying, taking care of myself and keeping the other parts of our life together. Time will tell if we can afford this though.

Also this week, we celebrated our first anniversary! It is pretty hard/easy to believe that one year ago we were newlyweds still in Australia. After Noah got back from work, we drove to a nearby down called Hot Springs (about 40 min away) where there are-you guessed it-natural hot springs. However, the hot springs are not free to the public but have instead been siphoned into different hot tubs that you pay to rent for an hour. We used some anniversary money and treated ourselves. It was SOOOO worth going! The water was only about 100 degrees, but we were outside, in our own tub and still sitting in hot water for an hour; I had made bread and we bought some cheese and wine and had a late/dinner snack while we were there. It felt like a much needed vacation. Plus it made us miss having a hot tub next door/across town to use whenever we wanted to when we lived in Driggs...ahh, luxuries of being close to family.

School is still going well. We started our General Anatomy and Physiology course on Monday-it will go through the end of March and will cover a lot of complex information in a short amount of time. The teacher is incredible and easy to learn from though, plus the stuff is interesting, so I am not too worried. Monday will be the last day of our Swedish Massage class that has been going on since the first of December and is basically the foundation of the hands on part of our massage career. It's definitely a milestone, but I feel ready to move on! I will start working 1 day/week in the student clinic in two weeks and will do so until graduation in May. We finally received our own massage tables and we moved around the furniture in our spare bedroom/office to that I can set it up down there and use it. Fun, fun!!

Here's to a short but productive February ahead!