Well, happy post-holidays to everyone! Amazing, another year has flown by. I have been off of school the last week and we have had a very mellow and laid-back holiday week. We had a wonderful little Christmas on our own complete with a small Christmas bush and gifts from our families. We spoiled ourselves and ate homemade bread, soup, chocolate cake and eggnog for 2 days.
We have spent much of this break taking advantage of one of our Christmas gifts-a six month subscription to Netflix. We have utilized the "watch instantly" feature of the subscription (where you can watch the movies online and on demand-we watch everything on our computer anyway since we have no TV, so doesn't bother us much). We spent all of Christmas evening and the next day watching episodes of "The Office" from season 2 on; we finished season 5 yesterday. Don't even tell me how many hours that is...I haven't quite decided yet if the subscription is a good or a bad thing...
Other than escaping to the world of Dunder Mifflin, I have spent a fair amount of time studying for school this week. It has been a bit overwhelming. Our first major test is a week from tomorrow and the sheer amount of information we are responsible for is mind boggling. I think the next month and half is the most intense portion of the course; I know I will make it through just fine. Although I have done my fair share of school and studying, I am finding this to be a different experience because the way I am used to studying is with the primary focus of passing a test or getting a good grade (and learning some). However, with this, I desperately want to actually KNOW all the information upside down and backwards (and backside up and frontwards) because it will only make me a better massage therapist. Basically, I know I could pass the test without knowing everything in this way, but don't want to settle for that. This is a very good thing, but it is interesting to balance this desire with the need to pass the test (with so much info, not everything can be reviewed in detail); basically it means I will be studying after the test too...it's a different feeling as far as school goes, but makes me feel really good about what I am doing.
We rang in the new year on our own with a bottle of wine and chocolate chip cookies-what a contrast to where we were last year in downtown Sydney! We have been thinking back to a year ago quite frequently. It was the second of January last year that we took the L90 into Sydney and visited the Office of Births and Deaths to find out more about the logistics of being married in Australia. Over lunch at a Vietnamese cafe we decided to sign up and get married in one month and a day (the legal time required in Oz). One of the craziest, hardest, easiest, best, and most unexpected decisions I have made in my life up to this point!
2009 was a year of change and craziness. period. In brief:
January: In Oz with Noah at Kristen's house; bought a wedding dress; went on a roadtrip up the Australian coast.
February: Got married on the third in Sydney!! Flew home (finally) 7 days later, moved into mom and dad's basement with Noah. We started re-painting/cleaning up rental house to move into.
March: Started working the Junior Jazz program in Driggs (Noah ran the clock, I reffed); moved out of the basement into our own house; had a reception in Driggs with friends and family from close and far (thanks again mom and dad!!)
April: Submitted Noah's immigration paperwork to USCIS; completed a spring cleanse; took a 1 week vacation to Las Vegas with my parents; started working at Teton Valley Health Care.
May: Traveled to Walla Walla for my sister's graduation; turned a quarter of a century old; sat through several meetings of the TVHC hospital board...
June: Met my mother in-law and aunt in-law for the first time when them came to visit Driggs (thanks for coming mum and Auntee Gail!); Noah received his work permit and our interview date for his green card; managed to persevere through June snowstorms with frequent trips to the driving range when the weather lifted.
July: Passed our permanent residency interview!! Noah gets his green card!
August: Attend a Hansen family reunion in Leavenworth, WA and roadtriped all the way down the coast to the Bay area and home again with Noah over a 12 day period.
September: Visit Noah's friend in Albuquerque along with Santa Fe, Taos and the surrounding area; apply to massage school at CFMNH in Asheville; get accepted and decide to move.
October: Give 4 week notice at TVHC; visit Noah's family in London, ON for a long weekend over Canadian Thanksgiving (I get to meet nearly everyone for the first time!); begin training my replacement at work only to have her quite after 1 1/2 weeks; start packing; rent a house in NC.
November: Train a new replacement in 1 week; last day of work!! Ship all of our stuff out to NC; drive across the country to our new home; start massage school on the 31st of the month.
December: Survive Winter Storm 2009; start settling into our house; Christmas & New Years....
What a year! Thank you for all those who were a part of it! We would not be where we are now if it weren't for all the love, support and help we have received over the last several months from everyone we know. May 2010 be just as wonderful.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Winter Storm
"I guess one out of three winter storm warnings in North Carolina need to be taken seriously." -Noah
Over the last few weeks we've had a couple "winter storm" warnings calling for snow and ice and winter disaster--the first two, we hardly even saw any snow from, but the last one hit us hard. If you have followed the weather in the East at all the last week, you will know about the main part of the storm that we caught a small corner of. It started to snow Friday morning (what fun! I actually enjoyed it!) and by the afternoon it was snowing even harder (2 inches per hour so I hear). At our house we probably received about 12" of snow by 8 pm that night. Everything shut down, it was great. We took this wonderful walk right before it got dark on Friday; it was so peaceful and quite and white. It looked like lights were on outside long after the sun "set" because of the glow from the snow covered earth. It was probably one of my favorite snow days in recent memory (in part because we were also warm and cozy, the army of heaters couldn't have arrived any sooner than they did).
Both Noah and I were looking forward to a cozy, relaxing snow weekend when we woke up Saturday morning. We had no where to be and nothing that had to get done and were hoping to revel in the feeling of being inside and warm while it was snowy outside. The snow was very wet and heavy so it was collecting on tree branches and power lines; three trees in the ravine behind our house came down during the night not to mention a countless amount of smaller branches all around us. However, the house was still warm and cozy and safe...until the power went out at 10:30 in the morning...
Noah borrowed a shovel from our next door neighbor to clear off the driveway and learned that 80% of our county was out of power. Our neighbor (Isaac) and his wife grew up here and said the last time a storm like this had been through was 1993. Isaac thought our street would get power back sooner than others because we are actually located in Mars Hill, but said even so, it could be a couple of days before it came back on.
Our house was loosing heat fast, so while Noah shoveled the driveway I piled all of our newly purchased house plants (thanks Dad and Val!) into the middle of the room and covered them with a couple of sheets in hopes they would not freeze if the power really did stay off longer than 12 hours. Noah called Steven (who owns the yoga studio in Asheville) to make sure he had power there. Steven said we were welcome to stay the night there if we had to. We packed up a some blankets and pillows along with books and computers and first went into nearby Weaverville where our favorite coffee shop-Wellbred Bakery-was miraculously open. We stayed there all afternoon in hopes the power would come back on at home. At 4 pm, we called Isaac to get an update and the power was still off. We drove into Asheville for the evening.
We ended up taking our self out to dinner at an Indian restaurant in town that we had been planning on going to for Christmas, set up camp in the corner of the yoga studio, watched a DVD of The Office and went to bed hoping that our house would have power in the morning. That dream was not to be. We drove back home to a cold house, called our friend Darlene who lives an hour north in Jonseborough TN, packed my school stuff and drove up to stay with her. It was wonderful to get to visit with her despite the conditions. The roads were clear and wet and the drive was actually quite beautiful.
I received a call in the evening from school letting me know we would be having class on Monday, but that it would start at 10 instead of 8. Just before going to bed, we heard from Isaac-the power was back on! (Yay! I thought, my house plants might just survive!-they did). Only about 2/3 of my class made it to school Monday, and we started late every day this week due to early morning black ice. Other than that though, the drama of the storm really ended for us after the power came back on at home, since we could be warm and cook and check our e-mail. It warmed up Tuesday and today, but all the snow is not yet gone. Some people in the area were out of power until yesterday or even today, which is crazy. It makes one realize how important alternate sources of heating are and just how dependent on electricity our society is.
All in all, the snow has made it feel like Christmas (although, just today we were commenting to each other that all the snow melting made us think it was spring...). But, we can now say we lived through and survived WINTER STORM 2009 when our grandchildren ask about it years down the road. We were tough-we packed up and left when the house dropped below 60 degrees...I will say the ratio of cold/snow/storm to warmer/melting/sunny has been about perfect for my winter weather storm threshold. Go North Carolina!
Over the last few weeks we've had a couple "winter storm" warnings calling for snow and ice and winter disaster--the first two, we hardly even saw any snow from, but the last one hit us hard. If you have followed the weather in the East at all the last week, you will know about the main part of the storm that we caught a small corner of. It started to snow Friday morning (what fun! I actually enjoyed it!) and by the afternoon it was snowing even harder (2 inches per hour so I hear). At our house we probably received about 12" of snow by 8 pm that night. Everything shut down, it was great. We took this wonderful walk right before it got dark on Friday; it was so peaceful and quite and white. It looked like lights were on outside long after the sun "set" because of the glow from the snow covered earth. It was probably one of my favorite snow days in recent memory (in part because we were also warm and cozy, the army of heaters couldn't have arrived any sooner than they did).
Both Noah and I were looking forward to a cozy, relaxing snow weekend when we woke up Saturday morning. We had no where to be and nothing that had to get done and were hoping to revel in the feeling of being inside and warm while it was snowy outside. The snow was very wet and heavy so it was collecting on tree branches and power lines; three trees in the ravine behind our house came down during the night not to mention a countless amount of smaller branches all around us. However, the house was still warm and cozy and safe...until the power went out at 10:30 in the morning...
Noah borrowed a shovel from our next door neighbor to clear off the driveway and learned that 80% of our county was out of power. Our neighbor (Isaac) and his wife grew up here and said the last time a storm like this had been through was 1993. Isaac thought our street would get power back sooner than others because we are actually located in Mars Hill, but said even so, it could be a couple of days before it came back on.
Our house was loosing heat fast, so while Noah shoveled the driveway I piled all of our newly purchased house plants (thanks Dad and Val!) into the middle of the room and covered them with a couple of sheets in hopes they would not freeze if the power really did stay off longer than 12 hours. Noah called Steven (who owns the yoga studio in Asheville) to make sure he had power there. Steven said we were welcome to stay the night there if we had to. We packed up a some blankets and pillows along with books and computers and first went into nearby Weaverville where our favorite coffee shop-Wellbred Bakery-was miraculously open. We stayed there all afternoon in hopes the power would come back on at home. At 4 pm, we called Isaac to get an update and the power was still off. We drove into Asheville for the evening.
We ended up taking our self out to dinner at an Indian restaurant in town that we had been planning on going to for Christmas, set up camp in the corner of the yoga studio, watched a DVD of The Office and went to bed hoping that our house would have power in the morning. That dream was not to be. We drove back home to a cold house, called our friend Darlene who lives an hour north in Jonseborough TN, packed my school stuff and drove up to stay with her. It was wonderful to get to visit with her despite the conditions. The roads were clear and wet and the drive was actually quite beautiful.
I received a call in the evening from school letting me know we would be having class on Monday, but that it would start at 10 instead of 8. Just before going to bed, we heard from Isaac-the power was back on! (Yay! I thought, my house plants might just survive!-they did). Only about 2/3 of my class made it to school Monday, and we started late every day this week due to early morning black ice. Other than that though, the drama of the storm really ended for us after the power came back on at home, since we could be warm and cook and check our e-mail. It warmed up Tuesday and today, but all the snow is not yet gone. Some people in the area were out of power until yesterday or even today, which is crazy. It makes one realize how important alternate sources of heating are and just how dependent on electricity our society is.
All in all, the snow has made it feel like Christmas (although, just today we were commenting to each other that all the snow melting made us think it was spring...). But, we can now say we lived through and survived WINTER STORM 2009 when our grandchildren ask about it years down the road. We were tough-we packed up and left when the house dropped below 60 degrees...I will say the ratio of cold/snow/storm to warmer/melting/sunny has been about perfect for my winter weather storm threshold. Go North Carolina!
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Heating Soap Box
Wow! So Christmas is this Friday. Crazy. Sometime life feels like it is on slow motion fast-forward or something like that. This is my fourth week of school, making my first of 6 months gone. We will be on Holiday break for a week before returning, which is a bit of a relief. I will definitely be spending a good part of the break studying! I am loving every minute of it though--even the not so fun minutes (basic muscle chemistry anyone?) and cannot yet believe that I will get to make a living doing this after I am done. It makes me feel very lucky.
So, moving on to my soap box/rant. We have had a major run-around with our property management company and the heating system(s) at our house over the last month. It is nearly resolved but far from over at this point in time. Our house has been cold since the day we moved in and, after learning the costs and logistics involved with getting kerosene and/or propane for the house (everything was empty when we arrived), we had decided to see how long we could make it with a few electric heaters. About 2 weeks ago it started to get cold enough that we decided to break down and buy a new propane canister for the upstairs propane heater ($110-the canister here is one of those 100 pound ones that is considered "portable" but I would beg to differ). We brought it home, finally figured out how to hook it up only to discover that the heating unit inside didn't work. We went back and forth with property management for about a week before getting them to confirm this malfunction ("we've rented this house for 6 years and have never had an issue with the heating system..."). They also informed us they would not be replacing it because they didn't think it would "make much of a difference" in the house temp...
With our options running out and the weather getting colder, we turned to plan three: the kerosene heater in the (unfinished/unused) basement. We had fought against this heating system because there is no duct system, the space is unused, and the part of the house that needs the heat is two flights of stairs up. It struck us as a terribly inefficient way to heat the house. This combined with the minimum $300 delivery fee was not our favorite, however, we had been left with no other options. We had the tank filled up last Monday only to come home, try to turn on the heater and discover that...it DIDN'T WORK! Noah basically went to the property management office and refused to leave until they scheduled someone to service the unit for later in the week. During this sit-in, one of the maintenance men basically admitted that they knew the person who lived in the house for four year prior (a student) never called when there was a problem and just stayed at a friends, meaning they basically knew the house was not up to snuff and could have cared less about it before renting it again. Ugh.
Thursday morning I was home when the kerosene repairman came to service the unit. After initially observing the set-up, he came in and said to me, "well the problem is easy, there is no kerosene in the tank." What?!! I'm screaming in my head They took our check, I have a receipt from the oil company for refilling it!!! I called the oil company and confirmed they made the delivery. The repairman suspected the tank or line had a leak in it, but since the ground was still frozen, could not be sure because we couldn't smell the kerosene. Overall, he said the set-up of the whole system was terrible and didn't even know how it had passed code. On top of this, he discovered that the unit in the basement was also broken and that it was so old the parts for it were no longer even made...I thanked the repairmen and asked him to tell property management everything he had told me and then started looking up online what my rights as a tenant were in North Carolina, ready for drastic action if necessary.
Fortunately, property management called after speaking to the repairman ("You've just had the worst luck with that house...are you sure the tank was filled up?"). She said they had contacted the owner and that we would be reimbursed for the kerosene. To make a long story a little shorter, they agreed to bring us up a few extra space heaters that day to help get us through until a new heat pump system could be quoted and installed, skirting around the possibility of compensating us some for our extra electric costs. But, whatever.(Thing is, when the heat pump guy came to quote the job, he said the house set up was not conducive to an easy/cheap system...we still have not heard back from property management what will happen next, for now at least we are warm).
With the extra heaters, we were happy to wake up to a truly warm and cozy house Friday morning for the first time since moving in, which was perfect because it started to snow, and snow, and snow...but that's the next post. Thanks for letting me rant about the ineptitude of our property management company and our "adventure" with heating systems, it's been a big deal the last few weeks.
So, moving on to my soap box/rant. We have had a major run-around with our property management company and the heating system(s) at our house over the last month. It is nearly resolved but far from over at this point in time. Our house has been cold since the day we moved in and, after learning the costs and logistics involved with getting kerosene and/or propane for the house (everything was empty when we arrived), we had decided to see how long we could make it with a few electric heaters. About 2 weeks ago it started to get cold enough that we decided to break down and buy a new propane canister for the upstairs propane heater ($110-the canister here is one of those 100 pound ones that is considered "portable" but I would beg to differ). We brought it home, finally figured out how to hook it up only to discover that the heating unit inside didn't work. We went back and forth with property management for about a week before getting them to confirm this malfunction ("we've rented this house for 6 years and have never had an issue with the heating system..."). They also informed us they would not be replacing it because they didn't think it would "make much of a difference" in the house temp...
With our options running out and the weather getting colder, we turned to plan three: the kerosene heater in the (unfinished/unused) basement. We had fought against this heating system because there is no duct system, the space is unused, and the part of the house that needs the heat is two flights of stairs up. It struck us as a terribly inefficient way to heat the house. This combined with the minimum $300 delivery fee was not our favorite, however, we had been left with no other options. We had the tank filled up last Monday only to come home, try to turn on the heater and discover that...it DIDN'T WORK! Noah basically went to the property management office and refused to leave until they scheduled someone to service the unit for later in the week. During this sit-in, one of the maintenance men basically admitted that they knew the person who lived in the house for four year prior (a student) never called when there was a problem and just stayed at a friends, meaning they basically knew the house was not up to snuff and could have cared less about it before renting it again. Ugh.
Thursday morning I was home when the kerosene repairman came to service the unit. After initially observing the set-up, he came in and said to me, "well the problem is easy, there is no kerosene in the tank." What?!! I'm screaming in my head They took our check, I have a receipt from the oil company for refilling it!!! I called the oil company and confirmed they made the delivery. The repairman suspected the tank or line had a leak in it, but since the ground was still frozen, could not be sure because we couldn't smell the kerosene. Overall, he said the set-up of the whole system was terrible and didn't even know how it had passed code. On top of this, he discovered that the unit in the basement was also broken and that it was so old the parts for it were no longer even made...I thanked the repairmen and asked him to tell property management everything he had told me and then started looking up online what my rights as a tenant were in North Carolina, ready for drastic action if necessary.
Fortunately, property management called after speaking to the repairman ("You've just had the worst luck with that house...are you sure the tank was filled up?"). She said they had contacted the owner and that we would be reimbursed for the kerosene. To make a long story a little shorter, they agreed to bring us up a few extra space heaters that day to help get us through until a new heat pump system could be quoted and installed, skirting around the possibility of compensating us some for our extra electric costs. But, whatever.(Thing is, when the heat pump guy came to quote the job, he said the house set up was not conducive to an easy/cheap system...we still have not heard back from property management what will happen next, for now at least we are warm).
With the extra heaters, we were happy to wake up to a truly warm and cozy house Friday morning for the first time since moving in, which was perfect because it started to snow, and snow, and snow...but that's the next post. Thanks for letting me rant about the ineptitude of our property management company and our "adventure" with heating systems, it's been a big deal the last few weeks.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Back to School
In a nut shell, after week one, school is great. The course is very condensed and will be intense, but will be manageable. I am in school from 8-5 both Mondays and Tuesdays and from 8-12 on Wednesday. In the morning hours, we are learning Anatomy and Physiology (starting with the musculoskeletal system). In the afternoon on Mon & Tuesday we are learning Swedish massage, with about one hour of lecture and the rest actually time "on the table." I must say, I already feel much smarter and more knowledgeable than I did last Sunday. Our first round of exams will be January (musculoskeletal) and February(Swedish & Anatomy and Physiology). We will start actually doing massages in the clinic the end of February. Six months will sure go quickly!! I do think I will be making new friends here by finding volunteers to practice massage one...
There are 20 students in my class from almost every background imaginable. Ages range from 18 to late 40s. Several people are commuting quite a distance every day (as much as 1-2 hours) and some are here just for the 6 months the course takes. Get this though, there is one other girl in the class who has lived in Driggs for the last 6-7 years! She was the first person I met Monday morning and we both couldn't believe it. We had never met before (although, determined we had likely seen one another in passing at a few places). She and her boyfriend moved out in August so she could take the course. She even had her Big Hole Music sweatshirt on...small world times two.
This week the studio Noah is at (Pilates Fusion by Stephen) had a "soft" opening for yoga classes. I think as far as weeks go it was a little up and down for him since the classes had little to no attendance (which was almost expected). But, at the same time, he met a lot of current clients, did a few private mini-classes for people coming by, and started getting the feel for the schedule etc. The plan now is to do a big grand opening the first of the year, with a modified schedule (from the one he has now), and lots of promotion. The owner of the studio is an extremely good guy and has put everything into his business and, although it is a start-up operation, we have a good feeling about the situation. (Check out how good he already looks as part of the Pilates Fusion team at http://pilatesfusionbystephen.com/2452/2494.html)
We had a Winter Storm Warning here the last couple of days-a chance of 3-5 inches of snow...it didn't pan out, although it sprinkled snow a little bit, which was kind of fun. It is getting colder though, but hey, it is winter after all. In fact, it will be sort of fun when it does actually snow a little here. For driving purposes though, I hope it chooses to do so on the weekends...
There are 20 students in my class from almost every background imaginable. Ages range from 18 to late 40s. Several people are commuting quite a distance every day (as much as 1-2 hours) and some are here just for the 6 months the course takes. Get this though, there is one other girl in the class who has lived in Driggs for the last 6-7 years! She was the first person I met Monday morning and we both couldn't believe it. We had never met before (although, determined we had likely seen one another in passing at a few places). She and her boyfriend moved out in August so she could take the course. She even had her Big Hole Music sweatshirt on...small world times two.
This week the studio Noah is at (Pilates Fusion by Stephen) had a "soft" opening for yoga classes. I think as far as weeks go it was a little up and down for him since the classes had little to no attendance (which was almost expected). But, at the same time, he met a lot of current clients, did a few private mini-classes for people coming by, and started getting the feel for the schedule etc. The plan now is to do a big grand opening the first of the year, with a modified schedule (from the one he has now), and lots of promotion. The owner of the studio is an extremely good guy and has put everything into his business and, although it is a start-up operation, we have a good feeling about the situation. (Check out how good he already looks as part of the Pilates Fusion team at http://pilatesfusionbystephen.com/2452/2494.html)
We had a Winter Storm Warning here the last couple of days-a chance of 3-5 inches of snow...it didn't pan out, although it sprinkled snow a little bit, which was kind of fun. It is getting colder though, but hey, it is winter after all. In fact, it will be sort of fun when it does actually snow a little here. For driving purposes though, I hope it chooses to do so on the weekends...
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Staycation
I've been hearing that the "staycation" is the new hip way to take a vacation, but have discounted the idea of staying at home on vacation as bogus. However, if you have just moved across the country, are in a new house, have only yourself, a cat & a loving spouse to deal with, and hours of sleep to catch up on, staycations rock.
The last two weeks in our new home has been one of the most relaxing vacations ever. I have slept more hours, watched more movies, taken more long walks, shared more bottles of wine (and bars of dark chocolate), drank more leisurely cups of coffee, and generally felt less stressed out over the last 10 days than during any other 10 day period in recent memory. This staycation has been relaxing to the point that I've hardly noticed my apprehension about money, starting school, and making a life here-not to mention the annoyance of hours spent on the phone with Verizon (tech support, billing, etc), organizing, cleaning, and driving/walking around new areas and/or stores feeling slightly lost(eg: I thought all Walmarts were organized the same. Not true! The Walmarts here match one another, but are totally different than any I've seen out West...). All in all, my first staycation has made settling in really quite enjoyable.
Despite the wonders of relaxing and starting to feel like this new house is home, I'm getting ready to move on. Last Saturday Noah and I both attended a six hour intro to massage workshop at the Center for Massage and Natural Health (my new school). It was a wonderfully reaffirming experience for me; the day went quickly, I enjoyed myself, absorbed the information and-according to Noah-gave a natural and yummy massage.Whew!
After the course, we drove up to historic Jonesborough TN to visit our friend Darlene who was my roommate at Yogaville (small world!). It was wonderful to see her again and fun to "get out" at least once during our staycation. We had dinner at this lovely little Cuban restaurant and walked around the quaint downtown area of Jonesborough, making a mental note to experience the annual storytelling festival next fall. Despite the trip being short and nearby, we were happy to return to our little house in Mars Hill Sunday afternoon and take a nap.
Thanksgiving felt just like the day before did for us, except the rest of the working world seemed to be relaxing with us. We had Minestrone soup, bread and pumpkin pie-about the best Thanksgiving meal I've ever had. Plus, we still managed to eat T-day leftovers for the next two days (the pot of soup was huge).
I continue to be thrilled with the weather, patterns here and, when we were supposed to get an inch of snow on Friday, I was almost excited for it. (It didn't snow though). I was a little unprepared for the barrage of Christmas music, lights and trees for sell that hit the day after Thanksgiving, but really shouldn't have been surprised.
Alas, as all good things come to an end at sometime, our staycation will be ending tomorrow morning as I head off to my first full day of classes. The studio Noah is teaching yoga at is kicking of classes tomorrow, with his first class starting Tuesday. We are both excited, nervous, happy, and ready to get moving on with life here in North Carolina.
It is crazy for me to think that only one year ago I was in New Zealand, heading to meet Kristin and her wonderful family in Australia. What a year! It is impossible to know where life is going to take us sometimes. I hope can manage to keep enjoying the ride!
The last two weeks in our new home has been one of the most relaxing vacations ever. I have slept more hours, watched more movies, taken more long walks, shared more bottles of wine (and bars of dark chocolate), drank more leisurely cups of coffee, and generally felt less stressed out over the last 10 days than during any other 10 day period in recent memory. This staycation has been relaxing to the point that I've hardly noticed my apprehension about money, starting school, and making a life here-not to mention the annoyance of hours spent on the phone with Verizon (tech support, billing, etc), organizing, cleaning, and driving/walking around new areas and/or stores feeling slightly lost(eg: I thought all Walmarts were organized the same. Not true! The Walmarts here match one another, but are totally different than any I've seen out West...). All in all, my first staycation has made settling in really quite enjoyable.
Despite the wonders of relaxing and starting to feel like this new house is home, I'm getting ready to move on. Last Saturday Noah and I both attended a six hour intro to massage workshop at the Center for Massage and Natural Health (my new school). It was a wonderfully reaffirming experience for me; the day went quickly, I enjoyed myself, absorbed the information and-according to Noah-gave a natural and yummy massage.Whew!
After the course, we drove up to historic Jonesborough TN to visit our friend Darlene who was my roommate at Yogaville (small world!). It was wonderful to see her again and fun to "get out" at least once during our staycation. We had dinner at this lovely little Cuban restaurant and walked around the quaint downtown area of Jonesborough, making a mental note to experience the annual storytelling festival next fall. Despite the trip being short and nearby, we were happy to return to our little house in Mars Hill Sunday afternoon and take a nap.
Thanksgiving felt just like the day before did for us, except the rest of the working world seemed to be relaxing with us. We had Minestrone soup, bread and pumpkin pie-about the best Thanksgiving meal I've ever had. Plus, we still managed to eat T-day leftovers for the next two days (the pot of soup was huge).
I continue to be thrilled with the weather, patterns here and, when we were supposed to get an inch of snow on Friday, I was almost excited for it. (It didn't snow though). I was a little unprepared for the barrage of Christmas music, lights and trees for sell that hit the day after Thanksgiving, but really shouldn't have been surprised.
Alas, as all good things come to an end at sometime, our staycation will be ending tomorrow morning as I head off to my first full day of classes. The studio Noah is teaching yoga at is kicking of classes tomorrow, with his first class starting Tuesday. We are both excited, nervous, happy, and ready to get moving on with life here in North Carolina.
It is crazy for me to think that only one year ago I was in New Zealand, heading to meet Kristin and her wonderful family in Australia. What a year! It is impossible to know where life is going to take us sometimes. I hope can manage to keep enjoying the ride!
Saturday, November 14, 2009
The North Carolina Arrival
Noah, myself and our cat buddy set off last Sunday morning after a final coffee at Pendl's and a farewell to my family. We shipped most of our belonging out the Tuesday before with a company called ABF U-Pack, which meant the car was nearly empty. Needless to say, the drive across the states was both interesting and boring at the same time. We stayed in Cheyenne, WY our first evening and ended up having an Australian who had fallen in love and married an American (and who had just received his green card a few weeks ago) wait on us at....the Outback Stakehouse (the only dinning option near our hotel). After he came by our table the first time Noah asked, “Do you think the accent is real or is he faking it?” How coincidental! We spent most of our second day in Nebraska which was empty and flat and flat and flat. We stayed our second night in St. Joseph, Missouri, woke up super early the next morning and made it all the way through Missouri, part of Illinois & Kentucky down past Nashville to a place called Cookesville, TN. We were in Mars Hill by the next day at noon! Whew!
We were extremely lucky with the weather and only hit rain the last 20 minutes of day two and a tiny bit of day four. Buddy was an incredible traveler and pretty much slept on my lap the entire way. Overall he has been adjusting surprisingly well for both a cat and himself (he is a super fraidy-cat sometimes). In fact, he's already ventured outside for a couple of hours at the new house. I kept telling him the mice were bigger in North Carolina...
We absolutely LOVE the little house we rented in Mars Hill—we were both afraid that something would be terribly wrong with it, but, other than a few issues with the heating system (that we are getting worked out) and some dust, cobwebs, a pretty poor paint job, dead bugs and uncleaned corners, we really couldn't be happier. There are so many trees around us that we can barely see the houses nearby—and most of the leaves are gone now! In the summer I imagine we will feel a little like we are living in our own private forest.
However, the best news ever is that Noah got a job teaching yoga today! He will be working for a studio called Pilates Fusion that is expanding to include yoga classes. He had the interview today although he had talked to the owner on the phone from Driggs. The scheduled date for opening the new yoga part of the studio is November 30. The details of the schedule etc are yet to be worked out, but we both have a good feeling about this opportunity.
For now, we are dealing with the mundane little joys and trials of unpacking, figuring out a new place and settling in to a new existence. I am so grateful that we chose to arrive a couple of weeks before my school starts (November 30 is the first day of classes, we are both doing an intro course on the 25th), it has made the whole experience a little less stressful. Every day we have taken a little drive and explored part of Asheville or other surrounding towns (a.k.a getting lost :)). We have already discovered a little cafe/bakery in nearby Weaverville that we are a fan of (and where I am using the internet from right now). In general, the countryside here is absolutely beautiful and, although it has rained a bit, I am loving the fact that I have on sandals and a skirt today.
I could go on forever about a million other little things, but will save some of the details for later posts. Hope everyone is well and happy and thank you to everyone in our life that has helped us get to this point!
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
From March's draft Folder
I wrote this back in the day and didn't post it for some reason, when I checked in on the blog for like the first time in forever (just now) and realized I had done this, I figured I may as well put it up although it's all old news....
Anyway, time has flown since we arrived back in Driggs. We spent the first few weeks doing a lot of work for my parents on a little house in town that they own as a rental and moved in here the first part of March. It is wonderful to have our own space that is only ours, especially because we hadn't ever had it before! I love the colors we've painted things and it feels good to have a home that is "ours," even if it is temporary. My cat Buddy, who was living with my parents, is living with us and keeps us both good company, although he is a little liberal when it comes to sharing his cat hair, but what can you do?
Winter is still hanging on here, which is not our favorite season by far. However, we were lucky enough to have a few friends give us a few free ski passes at Grand Targhee, so managed to go up skiing a few times (on a sunny day of course :)) which was really fun. I think everyone in Driggs is ready for spring and summer though, ourselves included.
The third weekend in March (the 21st) my parent's hosted a wedding reception/celebration for us here in Driggs which was absolutely wonderful. Some of my mom's family came up for the weekend, along with a few of my good friends from Whitman and plenty of local friends. We had the reception at the Lynn Ranch, located up near the base of the mountains in between Driggs and Victor. I got to wear my wedding dress again (smiles!) and it was great to see so many people and have everyone meet Noah. (We joked that it was his "coming out" party.)
In addition to the reception wonderfulness, my younger sister, Robin, was home for two weeks at spring break and she FINALLY got to meet Noah, which was way past due. Also, it was just great for me to see her and catch up, since I've missed her the last several months and there was just so much to catch up with!
For the last several weeks, Noah and I have been helping my Dad run the Junior Jazz program in the valley (little league basketball) by refing games and running the game clock. It's sort of fun/torture though because the kids can be so darn cute and have so much fun, but on the other hand, people take it too seriously sometimes (parent's mainly) and it is no fun watching the same teams loose week after week (that doesn't always happen, but there were a few this year). However, last Friday was the last game, which I think we are both thankful for, but will also miss it a little...maybe.
In general, we are in a position of being pretty free with our time (noah more than myself) which is nice, but also a bit challenging for us both individually and as a couple. It's something we both aren't very used to, but I think it is a good lesson for us to learn. This week we are doing a spring cleanse which involves a modified diet for seven days and yoga classes every night for five. Our first yoga class is tonight and it has been nice to know we won't be crazy working or anything for the week.
Right after the cleanse ends, we are heading to Las Vegas (of all places) with my parents for a week vacation in the sun. It's not the normal type of Vegas vacation though, that's not my parent's or us! The main draw is really cheap airfare hotel etc and warm, sunny weather, plus a week away from here. We are both looking forward to it, although keep shaking our heads in disbelief that we are actually going. I think it will be good for us though, apparently there is all sort of cool desert hikes to do around the area and I, at least, am down for the pool, some tennis etc.
I guess as hum-drum as that feels, it is a short re-cap on the last few months bringing us up to now! Hopefully in the future I will write more frequently (because I enjoy it) and then be in a position where giving the quickest summary won't be necessary!
Oh, and I guess, Happy Easter!
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