Deployment Life

What a week. It's been a roller coaster ride, quite literally. The week started off with some Key Spouse work. We had a meeting to go over our current and upcoming activities. Somehow I resisted the amazing caramel brownies one spouse baked. We also talked about plans for the deployment homecoming, which means we're on the downslope. I had a sushi date with another Key Spouse the next day at my new favorite sushi spot, The Slippery Mermaid. My job search continues with no real leads. I'm applying for jobs I don't really want, but I have to find something soon since my unemployment is running out. Once it does, I'm going to drive for Uber while I keep looking. Just what I always wanted to do with my PhD! I spent some time this week doing our taxes too. What a pain. Thursday I traveled to my mom's for my grandfather's celebration of life on Saturday. I'm really glad I was able to be there. A large group of his friends from the condo community came o...

I realize it has been 2 weeks since I posted a blog, although I doubt many of you really care. There just wasn't much to say. I'll start off by saying that Bryan is doing well. The pic above is of VP Mike Pence visiting some of his squadron at another deployed location. Bryan wasn't there. I didn't post it on my regular newsfeed because I realized "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all". I mean here he is, visiting the troops, trying to lift morale, while they are working for free during a government shutdown. So, while I recognize the unique opportunity to meet the VP, I just didn't have anything nice to say about him. Bryan also participated in a Spartan Race this past week. He said it was really hard, but fun, and he'd do it again for sure. If you look closely, Bryan is on the far right in the pics below. My job search is still pretty much a fruitless endeavor. I called Alteristic again and was told t...

Well. It's been another week. Today is my 14th wedding anniversary. It's the 5th anniversary Bryan has missed, and I believe last year it was me that was on a work trip, so we're obviously used to spending it apart. I figure, next year is 15, which sounds like an accomplishment, so we'll plan something big. If we can afford it. Which leads me right into the biggest issue in my life- My lack of a job. So, I haven't heard back from Alteristic. I have absolutely no idea why. I emailed a thank you a week after the initial interview. Then I waited another week because it was the weird week in between Christmas and New Year's when lots of people take off work. Then I emailed again last Wednesday asking for an update, and here's why. I had another interview on Wednesday for a training and development lead for Navy Federal Credit Union and it went really well. I got no response. However, VA had a winter storm last week, so maybe that impacted work? Anyway, I plan ...

It's a new year. I'm going to go into 2018 with optimism, cautious optimism, but optimism none the less. This week was definitely an improvement from last week. I usually wait until after New Year's Day to put away Christmas stuff, but It was depressing me so I put away all signs of the holiday a couple days after Christmas. I stuck with my gym routine and still haven't missed a day since I joined. I'm really loving the vibe there, but I'm feeling the need to take it up a notch so I may start running or riding my bike once it warms up a bit. This week I finally decorated my bathroom water closet. It's been an empty white shelf so I needed to make it pretty. I'm just waiting on my faux flowers for the big mason jar to complete it. The star lights up on a timer, so it's like having a night light. In addition to the bathroom, I also started to look for a backsplash for the kitchen. I'm not totally sure of my decision yet and want to look at a ...

Well, it's Christmas. I'm sitting in my empty house. Drinking champagne. Crying. The usual holiday festivities. Man, this blog is getting more depressing by the week. Hoss had a good Christmas. He got lots of treats, 3 new toys from Bryan, 1 from me, and 1 from our fabulous neighbors. This past week, I tried to gear myself up mentally for Christmas. I hit the gym hard every day. I planned what I'd do on Christmas eve and Christmas. It didn't help. I paid off my car, which is nice. It frees up a little bit of money each month. I went grocery shopping and I spoke to Bryan a lot. I even had a REALLY great thing happen, well, let's hope it ends up being great. On a whim, I decided to look into the Green Dot training the Air Force is currently contracting for sexual harassment and interpersonal violence training. I emailed their hiring manager to ask if they had any remote positions. I received an email back pretty quickly asking me to submit my resume, so I...

Well, it's been another hard week. I have continued to apply to multiple jobs a day with little to no response. This week, I applied for a case manager position for the boys correctional facility. I was called for an interview and it went really well. I even think I'd like the job. They'll be interviewing next week and then they'll get back to me. The pay is abysmal. And the commute is just about an hour one way. If the job was right down the street, I'd probably take it. But I just don't know if I can spend 2 hours a day in the car for the pay they're offering. I've got just about 8 weeks of unemployment left (not counting if they grant an extension), so eventually I'll have to take something, anything. My plan for backup is that if I don't get something and unemployment runs out, I'll probably take one of those easy work-from-home customer service jobs while I keep searching. I can tell you one thing for sure, we will not stay in thi...

Ok guys, settle in. This is going to be a long blog. I am going to detail our trip to Disney. If you are bored, this will give you something to read! I plan on posting this on another site as well (specifically for Disney) which is why I made it a separate post. Here we go!! Day 1: Saturday Our trip started out on Saturday, December 2. I drove with my mom and dog from Daytona Beach to Orlando (about an hour). Our first stop was the Best Friends Pet Kennel. OMG. They were amazing. The place was very clean and quiet despite being full of pets. We dropped Hoss off, chose some add on treats for him (extra walks, doggie ice cream, etc.) and headed over to Art of Animation resort. Art of Animation was abut 3 miles from the kennel and we arrived around 10:30am. We got in line to check in and guess what? Our room was ready. The hotel lobby was very pretty and decorated with sketch drawings from various Disney movies. The hotel is in 4 sections, each of which is themed: Cars (wher...