Life Day by Day

Well, my daily blog isn't so daily. :P A bunch has happened this past week, not to mention the weather has been a lot of fun with thunder and lightning everyday.

I have started taking Rain on a walk/run every morning and found that I really enjoy getting out and about in the morning. She does too, and now waits while I get dressed just looking at me patiently until I'm ready. It's cute. :) Speaking of Rain, yesterday she graduated her Beginner Obedience class! She has had something of a breakthrough the past couple of weeks and suddenly everything just clicked. The 'tricks' in her bag include sit, down, come, stay, leave it, settle, drop it (well, we're working on that one still lol), and she walks nicely on the leash. She is much easier to deal with now. :) We're probably going to enroll her in an intermediate class in September to keep her challenged and fine tune her a bit. After working with her almost everyday for an hour or so for the past 2 months, I'm so proud. :)

Tim got some good news from his work the other day...first, he found out that he was rewarded a CJR - Career Job Reservation. These are pretty rare and hard to come by in his field due to the fore-shaping of the Air Force, but, in my opinion, he earned it and certainly deserved one. Now, if we decide it's the best course for us, we can re-enlist.

Second, you know how I mentioned he had been passed up to get transferred out of the help desk finally because of the trade? Well, the guy who decides who is transferring talked to Tim's superiors - all the way up to his commander, and they all said Tim deserves the transfer whether this trade goes through or not so they should give it to him! So, thankfully, after all the hard work and responsibility Tim has shown, he is getting paid back for it and will FINALLY get to transfer out to a job he actually trained for! The week after we get back from Disney World, Tim will be transferring to Network and Communications Management. Woot!

As for me, I got the information package I requested from Eastern Washington University and have been looking that over. Hopefully (that word haunts me :P), if the trade goes through and we get Spokane, I can go back to college! I am looking really seriously at an art major...as in art education. It's still just an idea I'm mulling over, but I could see myself really enjoying the classes, and I could see myself really enjoying the job/career it would offer. We'll see. I wish they had some sort of degree that pertained to animals, but alas, they do not. Oh well, life is long and I can fulfill all my dreams given enough time. :)

Anyway, that is all that is going on for now. Off I go to check my emails.

Today I listened to a mini-sermon Mom linked to me, and I found it really interesting. Through it, I found a way to explain/describe my life. I feel like though I explain and describe my life to people, it never comes across correctly. This little mini-sermon on Ruth chapter 1 gave me a freedom to express exactly what I see and feel in my life right now.

"...the Lord's hand has gone out against me." (Ruth 1:13b) "I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty...The Lord has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me."(Ruth 1:20b-21)

I am Naomi.

I cannot express the freedom I feel to be able to say this. For always it has been said, "God brings good things into your life and opportunities. If you don't have good things happening in your life, it is your own fault. You are missing out on His opportunities." But what if every opportunity that is presented to you, you take, and it is all for naught? It crumbles in your hands! What if there is very little good in your life? Does that mean God has forsaken you? But God forsakes no one!

It is SUCH FREEDOM to say "The Lord's hand has gone out against me." Because then that means He is paying attention to me. He isn't just letting me struggle and stumble my way around life desperately fighting FOR a life, for direction, for happiness. But He actually has a hand in it - even if it is to deny me at every turn and set His hand against me.

Of course, my situation isn't has dire as Naomi's where her husband and sons have all died, leaving her destitute, but I can honestly say that I have seen the Lord's hand against me - holding me still, keeping me from moving forward, keeping me from any direction, from blessing.

I am also like Naomi in that she calls God "Shaddai" which is the name of God that describes him as a provider and, as the mini-sermon said, "the God who is at his best when people are at their worst." I have hope, and faith, that God will eventually "redeem" me like He did Naomi. That hope and faith has never wavered. I know things will get better, my struggle is that for right NOW, every hope is dashed and every struggle lost, day after day.

So, like Naomi, I will continue to do the best I can. Breathe everyday, because time always goes by and one day, I will be "redeemed" like she was. Until then hope is my ally and my curse. It is what keeps me going, and it is what allows disappointment.

It has been hot, hot, hot here this past week. Yesterday it was 104F and today it is already 80F with no clouds in sight. Being outside is oppressive - it takes a conscious effort just to walk faster then a slow stroll. Inside, even with our air conditioning the humidity is so bad that if I do anything - wash the dishes, laundry, vacuum, I find I just drip sweat. Yuck! Lol.

Today I'm going to be doing laundry and battening down the hatches around the house so it's ready to wait for us this weekend. I am SO looking forward to seeing new sights. :) It will be nice just to hang out with Tim with nothing to do but explore and enjoy ourselves. I know I'll be worried about Rain the whole time, but I'm sure she'll do just fine. She's a good dog and pretty tough.

Wow, our cat is going ballistic today...running around, jumping up walls, meowing and scratching on our carpet(!). She's a weird one. She'll have the house to herself this weekend, though, so I'm sure she'll be relieved not to have to watch out for Rain all the time. :)

We bought our tickets for Disney World and Universal Studios, and reserved our condo. We're going to be heading down there September 9-15 and staying at the Silver Lake Resort which is right next door to Disney World Animal Kingdom. It is really nice because through the Air Force Vacation Club we got a whole week at the condo for only $329. Usually it's $190-$230/night! Quite a deal. Our basic schedule will look something like this: Sunday, the 9th, we'll drive down and check into our condo and then hang out the rest of the day. It should only take 5 1/2 hours to get to Orlando from here, so it will leave a lot of time for swimming and just relaxing from the trip. On Monday (10th), we'll be going to Disney World Magic Kingdom, Tuesday will be the Animal Kingdom, Wednesday MGM Studios, Thursday Universal Studios Islands of Adventure, Friday we'll go find a nice beach, and Saturday we'll drive home. :) Fun.

Well I gotta get laundry started. 'Til later.

Well, we found out today that Tim didn't get staff sgt. It's pretty rare to get staff this early in an enlistment so we aren't really surprised, but what is frusterating is that there was a couple people who made it who Tim had actually trained...So we don't know what happened. The only thing we can think of is they have been in service about a month longer then Tim. Who knows?

Also, they are finally trading some guys out of the Help Desk and they wanted to give Tim first choice since he's been there so bloody long and he's the best troop there, but since Tim is working on the trade, they passed him over. So even if the trade does not go through, he's still stuck at the Help Desk.

The trade hasn't moved forward at all, so no news there.

Tim has been throwing around the idea that if we don't get the trade, he may volunteer for deployment because it is so, SO miserable here at work for him. Deployment was hard, but it's far and away better then life now.

Yesterday I went in to get a yearly physical and pap test. The physical went well, everything is normal and healthy. My next appointment, for the pap test, was cancelled (though they didn't call me) so I had to reschedule again. This is the second reschedule I've had to do on the stupid appointment. I was joking with Tim saying that at this rate I would die of cervical cancer before even being tested for it. :P

Anyway, I am looking forward to doing something fun this weekend and head up to Charleston, but other then that, there really is nothing else going on. 'Til later then.

Wow, I just checked the temperature and it is 99F at 10:30pm!!

WAY too hot!

Today was one of those boring, normal days. I did laundry, and dishes, straightened the house, exercised Rain, and tried to stay cool in the upper 90's.

Tim had to work, and he found out that his supervisor Sgt. Johnson got chosen for re-training which means that Tim may inherit some of her jobs. He really isn't looking forward to it because it is pretty intensive and on top of being his shift's leader, it would keep him overly busy. Unfortunately, it is likely they'll give him her jobs because he's the only one on the help desk that knows what he's doing and is responsible. Tim is also worried because if the trade isn't approved before he inherits those jobs, it is likely they'll deny his swap application because he'll be indispensable to them. Yuck. Yet another glitch to worry about.

Rain had her training class today, and it was graduation day. Unfortunately, since Rain has self-control issues, she didn't get to graduate. Fortunately, the trainer is going to be working one on one with us the next couple of weeks trying to teach Rain some self-control, and then she'll graduate her. The trainer, Ruth, is really nice about it and seems to genuinely like Rain and respects her and her abilities, so that is good. :) Like I said in another post, Rain can be absolutely brilliant and she learns extremely fast. Her only problem is that she gets so excited that she loses all control of herself and can't focus on anyone or anything. We're going to be working that out of her. She's already getting tons better then she was, and hopefully we'll soon have a sane dog. This will be great since she weighs 66 lbs and is all muscle. Let me tell you, Tim and I are getting pretty buff having to deal with her day in and day out. Lol.

I just finished watching Dracula 2000. It was pretty good, other then it had lots of boobs in it. It had a pretty interesting twist on who Dracula was. In this theory, he is Judas Iscariot. I had never heard that idea before and it is pretty clever. The history of the vampire legend is so interesting. If anyone is really interested in actual historical legends about vampires, you should read The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. Like the stories of dragons, I definitely think there is something to them...every legend/lie/myth is based on some truth. Especially ones that have lasted centuries. It would be fascinating to know what the legends are based on.

Well, that is all for today. Off I go. :)

Today was another hot day...but luckily it didn't get up into the 100s. We had thunder this afternoon but no visible lightning and no rain.

Rain has been acting a little odd today...mostly this morning. She has been fine with me, but she seemed almost scared of Tim when he would call her or try to put her leash on to take her outside to go potty. It was really weird. She would do that wriggling, squatting, submissive dance dogs do and then roll over onto her back. She even submissive peed a little! She NEVER does that. We are a little worried since she only did this the morning after she was at a doggy day care - and she wasn't like that with me so we were wondering if there was a man who wasn't very nice to her there. >:( Either that, or she just is a little stressed from it still and is less comfortable with Tim and trusts me a bit more. Who knows? We'll be keeping an eye on her to see if she keeps it up or if she seems fine.

Tonight was our guild raid night on WoW. It was fun. We're a new guild with only 9 or so 70's, though we're growing really fast. We did Kara and did pretty well. The big excitement, however, (at least for me) was that a restoration druid topped the healing meters! :D Me of course, otherwise it wouldn't be exciting. :P Resto druids rarely, very rarely, top healing meters because their big heals are so slow and their heals over time just tick away and usually other healers heal over the top of them making them obsolete. But tonight, I beat out 2 holy priests and a resto shaman. :) I am excited.

Anyway, right now Tim is doing more WoW research (it really never ends), Rain is sleeping on the couch, Ginger Belle is curled up on her scratching post, and I am typing this and thinking about heading to bed.

I have also decided to start blogging here, as blogging on Myspace doesn't seem to suit the everyday "this was how my day was" type thing. Here it feels more private and with less pressure so I'm going to use it somewhat like a daily journal spot. :) Well...knowing me it won't be daily. :)

Yesterday was a nice day...we brought Rain to a doggy day care for 3 reasons - 1. I needed a break. She's like baby sitting 24/7 - a heck of a lot of work! 2. Our trainer suggests that people bring their dogs into day care 2-3 times a month to let them learn that you will always return to them, so it builds trust and confidence in the dog and also it makes them "think new thoughts". :) 3. We're going to be leaving here there to board when we go to Charleston the 17-19 so we wanted her to get used to it.

It was just nice to be able to get out of the house without having to worry about her for once. :) We did some shopping - we desperately needed new shoes and we got Tim some shorts. Today we're going to go back and get a pair of jeans and some shorts for me as well. We got burnt out shopping yesterday, neither of us is big on shopping, so we decided we'd split it up to 2 days when we started getting short fuses. :)

After shopping we came back and went swimming at the pool near our house, it was nice but way to warm! It was 102F yesterday and the pool felt like bath water. Not terribly refreshing. It was good to just float for a bit though.

Shortly after that we went and picked Rain up and then Tim made hamburgers for dinner. An all together very nice day.