Christmas Time OH Christmas Time!!

'Tis Christmas time!! YAY!

We had Christmas with my parents on Friday, currently at my grandparents' for today and tomorrow, gonna open gifts with grandparents Sunday... and then Christmas with hubby on Tuesday! :D

Less than 2 months to go until I leave for basic training! EEK! It's starting to get scary! lol I know I'm gonna do awesome on my APFT... at least the pushups and situps part, I know I'll PASS the run but I've only been getting like a 9 minute mile... and I haven't run 2 full miles in a while. I'm hoping that we'll do some serious PT at the next few future soldier training sessions, now that it's snowing I'm definitely not going out running for fear that I'll twist or break an ankle, at this point, if that happens I won't be shipping on time.

Today while we were traveling we had car problems (why does this always happen!) we drove from home to dad's building, cleaned the building, drove to the gas station... he had pulled up to the wrong side, tried to turn the car back on to move it and it wouldn't start... Dad came and jumped it and we drove it to an auto parts store and got a new battery which fixed the problem. Don't even buy a car from Bizzaro's... we just bought the car and, after getting a new battery, it is starting up WAYYY better so they had to know that the battery was on its way out. Anyways... got that replaced, thankfully we had cash in the bank account, if that had happened 2 days ago we wouldn't have even been able to afford it!

Well... I'm gonna finish this then because we're headed out to watch The Hobbit soon :D

Counting Down the Days!

Wow, time has been flying by! It's December all of a sudden... a fact which I noticed as I flipped the page on my calendar the other day...

I'm still working on getting my run time down and I'm praying that I don't have to do a APFT in the cold! Hopefully they'll just take my word for it that I can make the run in the allotted time... not betting on that though! I need to work on pushups and situps too but I'm not really worried about them... I've done a few here and there... banged out 70 pushups over the course of like 15minutes the other day whilst chatting with other future soldiers! I ran Sunday afternoon 'cause it was so darn nice outside. Went 0.61mi at an 8min/mile pace. Not too shabby! I almost died doing it though... DH says I need to pace myself better but I'm not really sure how to do that. I was planning on going running today 'cause it's a nice temperature, but it's been raining off and on. As soon as I'm done with this I'm gonna go see if it looks like the rain will hold off for another 15-20 minutes and then get ready and go out.

I did purchase new running shoes the other day! They were my birthday present from DH :D. I ended up getting another pair of UnderArmour ones, I just really like the way the fit! At the end it was between those and a pair of... I think Nike's... the ones with the knobbly sole, they are what he took with him and they WERE nice, I just didn't quite like the way they felt and they were the same price as the UA ones. I wanted ones that I was comfortable with.

I haven't yet found another 31E that's leaving at the same time as myself... Actually, I haven't yet found another 31E... I've heard that it's a relatively uncommon MOS, not sure if that's good or not lol. I'm not too worried about it though, I mean, it's about the uniform and serving my country, not so much about the exact job. Besides, I tend to be the kind of person who at least tries to see the best side of everything. I figure, if 31B wasn't available for me then there must be a reason for it. We shall see. I've also heard that we cross-train with the MPs a lot and I can always reclass when it comes time to re-enlist (assuming I choose to do so!). A few people that I've talked to say that MPs tend to stay with the Army until they retire, apparently they make more in the military than they would in a comparable job in the civilian world? IDK, but I suppose I shall find out!

OK... back to civilian life here for a bit before I close this down... We rearranged the house... DH is trying to see if we can get another couple (he works with the guy) to rent out the other half of the house... we have to get my parents on board with the idea obviously... The biggest problem is that there is only one shower (the other bathroom is only a 1/2 bath) and there's only one washer/dryer. The shower is in a fairly common part of the house (you'd just have to walk through one parties living area to get to it) but the other half the house has the washer and dryer and you have to walk through what is currently our bedroom and stand in what is basically our living room to use them... IDK, i mean, if he really wants to share stuff with them I don't really care. I'm not gonna be there for most of the time anyways and I know that it would be nice for him to have someone at the house sometimes. The other nice part is that when we move out that couple might actually want to purchase/continue renting the house (they were talking about buying one but they couldn't get the financing or something). So yeah... we might have roommates as of like... January. Again, we shall see!

Welp... I suppose I should go... gonna try to go on a run, then got a tiny bit of shopping to do, and then I have to clean the building 'cause DH works late tonight. Sooo, I shall (try) to post in a few days! I know... I'm terrible at updating this thing!!!

Winter is here...I think...

It is my believe that winter is here. The temps have stayed well below warm for quite some time now and there has been frost on my vehicle now for two days in a row. I am somewhat encouraged because, although the temperatures here are below freezing, the temperature in Oklahoma still is not. This means that I MAY have some chance of not getting hypothermia and freezing to death whilst in basic training. (Please note that I say "MAY", I'm pretty sure a person could freeze to death in any temperature below about 75). Anyways, this whole "frost" development probably means that I should invest in a snow scraper, yes, I live in Erie PA in mid-November and I do not own a snow-scraper. I swear I had one last winter... but perhaps it stayed at my parents house, I do not know. What I DO know is that I had better get a new one before my car is hopelessly and completely buried in snow.

The other thing that I have noticed about this whole winter thing is that when you run your heater, your gas bill goes up. This is a much more sad prospect than that of being outside to freeze to death because now, I'm doomed to die in my house. Either we run the heat and then are unable to afford the gas bill (although we are still in the trial run of the heater and trying to figure out exactly how warm we can be without going broke) or we keep the heat low and freeze to death. The bright side of the latter part is that we will have great credit 'cause we won't have any late payments.

Next week is Thanksgiving week. We will be traveling Wednesday and Thursday for sure because I work Monday and he works Friday. Now we just have to figure out if we can be gone Tuesday as well or if we need to stay at home so that we can do the cleaning at the building... I'm really hoping that we can head up to the in-laws on Tuesday so that we can have a little extra time up there. Worst case scenario we go up Tuesday night and get there around 8-9pm. That won't be too bad, I've done it before. We shall have to see.

I do not work Black Friday. A fact for which I am thankful. I have no wish to attempt to deal with hordes of pet-purchasing people. However, I will probably attempt to get my own black Friday shopping done... Assuming we can afford to... I definitely want to get some Christmas shopping done because I'm sure I'll find stuff that's on sale that I can give to some of my siblings. Most of whom I have zero idea of what I'm getting them.

Well, I was planning on also putting in here something about the wonderful food that I've been making in the crockpot but this is already getting long and I can't really remember if I already did a crockpot blog... SO, for now. I say adieu, I shall be back later. Good-Bye to all and have a GREAT Thanksgiving if I'm not back before then!

Parents and Kids Movies

So, today I told the parents about me joining the Army. They actually took it pretty well. So, I suppose that's over with. I feel a lot better now.

In other news... We are currently watching "Ernest Scared Stupid" it is quite hilarious.

Wednesday I went to the Future Soldier Training and it was OK. There were a bunch of us there... IDK... I'm gonna try to go when I'm not working but I usually do end up working Wednesday nights, so we shall see.

Cats

Soo... I posted a question about the pets and housing and traveling and all that jazz on MSOS today and it got me thinking about the cats...

I do not LIKE cats.
As a matter of fact... I think I verge on DESPISING cats.

They have destroyed my curtains. They have destroyed some of the wood-trim in my house. They have destroyed my couch and my chair. They sit on my counter. They drink from my glass. They try to steal my food off my plate when I'm not looking.

If there's one absolutely, fantastic, wonderful, AMAZING thing that may come of me joining the military I can honestly say that it's the fact that we MAY have to get rid of the cats. WOOT WOOT!! YAY! HIP HIP HOORAY!! No more cleaning litter boxes, no more Twig stealing the cat food and getting sick, no more having kitties on my table and my counter and ruining my chairs and my curtains.

I am now more excited than ever about joining the Army. YAY ME!

Now... to break the news to hubby....

I'm IN!

Well. MEPS was eventful... but it got done and I passed everything and got sworn in and all that. It's official!! I'm a Future Soldier! :D

Right now I've got until February to get all in shape and ready to go! Hubby it OK with it, family is gonna find out sometime this coming week. Wish me luck! lol

Out for now. Watching a movie with my man!

Rain SUCKS

So, I've done zero running for like 2 weeks now 'cause it's been raining and miserably cold. I have been doing pushups and situps every day for the last 4 days though. Started at 10push-ups and like 39 situps and I've made it to... er... 11 pushups and 50situps inside of 2 minutes!! I should actually go do some today... Perhaps I'll get hubby to time me :D

And... it's cold right now... Soooo I'm gonna go eat some food!

And yes, I know this was a horribly short, probably slightly annoying post... however, I promise I shall have something slightly better later... I'll definitely update you all Wednesday/Thursday after my test/physical!

Scheduled!

You know that weird, excited/terrified feeling you get sometimes when you're doing something you REALLY want to do but it still scares you? That "I wanna puke on your shoes" kinda feeling?

I've got that. Well not anymore... But I did yesterday... and I will on Wednesday and Thursday... Yesterday I went into the recruiters office, reserved a job (31E - Military Internment Specialist), and scheduled my trip up to MEPS. (EEEKKKKK!!!!!)

Totally gonna try to switch it to 31B (Military Police) when I get there but I'm not sure if it's possible... kinda gonna depend on whether or not the other job is available and what I get on the ASVAB. Hopefully I get a REALLY good score!! I'm not really worried about the rest of everything, I shouldn't have any disqualifying medical conditions... so we should be good!

Well, I'm gonna go do something productive.

Running. It's a Love-Hate thing.

So, my topic today is running... I hate running. I also love running.

So, in order for this whole Army thing to work I have to actually be in shape. Or at least I imagine it to be a good idea. I'm SURE there are people who head off to BCT in as good a shape (or worse) than I am right now, I'm just not sure it's a good idea. Seeing as I'd like to SURVIVE basic and EXCEL at it (jeez, I'd actually like to get to PICK my job once I'm through OCS, not just be handed the dredges!). So the hubby and I (bless his heart) have gone running a few times lately. OK, twice. Once last Friday...ish... and once last Tuesday... Yes, I realize that that's like twice in 10days, not the greatest for getting in shape, but we're busy people and I'm lazy. I am absolutely going to force myself to run Tuesday AND Thursday though of this coming week, whether or not he comes with me, because I WILL get in shape. I just have to figure out a way to not inhale icy air... It's killing me slowly, it's hard enough for me to breathe while running let alone when the coldness of the air is shutting down my lungs (yes, I'm a drama queen, deal with it or go away).

Anywho... the FIRST time we went he decided we were going on what he guestimated to be a 2mile run, when we got back and I mapped it (with this website), we found out that it's more like a 1.88 mile run. Anyways, we made it in about 17 minutes, so we kept up a speed of about 9:06/mile. NOT BAD! I mean, I thought I was DYING when I got back, but I did live, and I actually went out again with him the next week, so obviously it didn't scar me to badly. I was sore for about 3 days though, found muscles that I didn't even know I had and that I CERTAINLY haven't used in a while. We decided that for it being the first time he'd run in a year and the first time I've run since... er... Oh, I don't know... like 6years? We decided we did pretty well.

Tuesday when we went out we only went a mile... well, he "guestimated" that it was a mile... more like 1.1 but I won't hold it against him. He decided we were going for speed, uh? hello? I thought I was gonna die LAST time and that was at a slow pace!! I kept up with him for about 100feet and then decided I was going to run at my own nice, slow, pace. I managed to survive the 1.1 miles and I did so with a GLORIOUS 9minute 13second time. Which, for those interested, is about 8:20/mile. Basically, if I could keep that up for 2 miles (which there's NO WAY I would've been able to), I'd get an 89 on the running portion of the PT test. YAY ME!!! Honestly, even at my 17min two mile I would've gotten an 86 (and I only need a 60 to pass!).

So there you go. Running, my love-hate affair. I HATE the end results of running (the fatigue and feeling like I'm gonna die parts), but I LOVE actually running and seeing ANY improvement in my time (yes, I realize there isn't really any improvement yet as I just started) and I'm gonna LOVE getting my 100+ on my PT test! :D

Now, I must go and wake the husband, got places to go and people to see! Talk to ya'll later!

October. It is here!

So I realized the other day that it is October. This was noticed primarily because my manager put his spider earring in... yes, it's a spider, it's a cool blend of creepy and intensely cool lol. Of course it was also noted by the fact that it's freaking COLD OUTSIDE and I had to flip a page on my calendar.

Right now we've gotten rid of most of the kittens. I'm still waiting on two people to get back to me, I relist those two tomorrow. I can't and won't deal with keeping them. People are ridiculous, I've had half a dozen people ask me whether or not I'll bring them the kitten, NO! I'm not gonna BRING YOU your FREE kitten! Some people...

Also, Monday... I managed to shut my finger in the car door. I have no idea what I did to it but it hurts like a mf-er!! I still can't really use the tip of the finger and, of course, it's my right pointer finger. YAY ME!

In other news... I've got half a dozen letters of recommendation in hand, and a few more that are supposed to be coming. Which reminds me... I need to remind a few peoples... I'm probably gonna email my recruiter in a couple days and try to figure out when things are gonna start moving again... seems like it's all just stuck!

Well, I'm gonna go and work on reminding a few people and getting some info to one guy who wanted some so he could write a better letter...

I shall be back to write more in a few days! I'd say tomorrow but I'd probably fail!

Looking Up!

This morning we had MORE work done on the furnace. It's almost done!! YAY!

I also posted an ad on Craigslist to try to get rid of the kittens and it WORKED *shock* *awe*. I got like 5 hits while I was at work! :D One person came and picked up her kitten today already, one is picking up her two on October 1st and I'm taking one to her new home tomorrow morning! That'll put us down to only Ninja, Zorro, Jedi, Yoda, Foofy and Skittles (aka Skitso). Yes, I am aware that that is still a lot but it's HALF as many as we've been currently living with. Zorro is already neutered and I'm going to call and make appointments for Jedi and Yoda tomorrow. I don't THINK that any of the boys have gotten their momma knocked up yet *fingers crossed* but I'll be sending in her ESNIP application early November (I want to give her a full 6 months to recover from her last litter).

We also (seem) to have gotten a handle on the fleas. We've been vacuuming pretty much every day and I've treated every room in the house except for the cat room (I KNOW I KNOW! that probably should have been the FIRST room to be treated but the living room and the couch were more important to me!). We've also only treated about half of the bedroom... still need to move the bed and the dressers out away from where they are ad treat the rest of the room.

I've completed my essay, I'm not editing it anymore! I'm planning on doing the handwritten copy tomorrow, I'm going to write it out once and if it's good, it's good. I'm hoping that it'll only take one try but I'm so OCD about it that I'll probably be writing it about 3 times hehehehehe. I got a letter from one of my peoples but there were a couple of typos so he's gonna fix it and resend it to me tomorrow. Hopefully I'll get it by Friday, also hoping that I'll get a couple from some other people who said they'd get them to me but haven't yet. Perhaps I'll also resend my email to a few people who never responded.

Just wanted to update things! So far things seem to be going smoothly and Tim and I are starting to feel MUCH better! Seem to be conquering our cold!

I Hate Being SICK!

Soo, hubby has been getting sick since Sunday, came home early yesterday and called off sick today :( He slept all day today though so hopefully he'll feel better soon.

We're getting the furnace put in today... well, more work on it... i don't know if it's gonna be ready or not today... I kind of doubt it but we'll see.

There's a person in Corry who wants 2 kittens but apparently doesn't "have the gas money" to get here... *sigh* I told her we'd hold the kittens until she comes to Erie on the 1st. I'm so sick of these freaking kittens.

I've had 4 people tell me that they'll get me letters of recommendation but I don't actually HAVE any yet... One should be coming on Saturday, and I hope the rest get here by Monday... I'd really like to take a few of them into the recruiters office sometime next week.

In other news, I am also coming down with something I think... I've had a sore throat for all of yesterday and today... It's kinda going away though now, I'm hoping that I'm not still sick tomorrow 'cause I have to work.

I'm excited to have a new furnace though! It's been getting really cold at night lately.

Things are definitely moving forward on all fronts!

A couple weeks ago I got my 10cent raise (passed my 90day review at PetSmart) but my hours got cut a couple times... did manage to pick up hours from other people though.

Sunday I sent one kitten home with his new owners and a coworker picked out a kitten that she wants.

Yesterday someone texted me and they want TWO kittens, they're gonna pick them up either today or tomorrow.

One cat out of 6 has been neutered and I'm setting up the appointment for 2 more (almost half way there!).

And today I got my eye exam done so that I have a current prescription for my recruiter! :D
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Still to get done...
get rid of 2 kittens, type and write an essay for my OCS packet, get a bunch of people to write me letters of recommendation, and wait til my recruiter gets everything typed into his computer and calls me! I'm starting to get excited... Tim is starting to get worried... he's still hoping that there is something wrong with me that they find out at MEPS so that I can't go... I'm gonna be bummed if that happens but at least I'll know I tried.

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The in-laws are coming up this weekend also... so that'll be interesting... they're bringing DH's older brother and his other brother's son. YAY! (I loves my nephew!!).

and so far only a select couple people know that I'm working on enlisting... so I think I'm good... I'm terrified of having that conversation with my parents... I know HIS parents will be OK with it and all our friends will be OK with it... just worried about my parents, they've never been supportive of my ideas of joining the military... Oh well. I'll deal with that when I get to it I guess!

I love my Hubby!!

So yesterday at work, I picked up hours for today... like 1-9 so ALL night long (and the entire time that he'd be home). I really NEED the hours which is why I took them, but we had other things tentatively planned so I was kinda bummed... and then he bought the most beautifullest card and put it under my windshield wiper for me for when I got out of work! :D

Fair Results...

The fair was FUN! and then I ended up having to ride the horse home on Sunday because my friend was having a problem with her trailer, then they went out at like 11pm on Saturday to pick up the horses and I didn't want to be out that late... It worked, took me just under 2 hours to get him home (and we made it before it rained!).

Friday we got 4th in Cutback (it's a confusingly patterned game...), 5th in Trail and 5th in poles. Not too bad considering that the judge hated my guts... she seriously like reprimanded me in front of the entire group because my phone accidently went off and I got seen turning it off. Like, seriously? It's the FUNSHOW!! and where did she want me to leave it? There was no-one else with me! Was I just supposed to throw it on the ground and hope nobody ran it over or stole it?

Anyways... I picked up Stevie yesterday! He's really, really cute and super tiny. He's not even as long as my thunb (his body WITH his tail). He's really cool though, he kinda just chills in his little container, gonna have to get him some sort of a heat lamp though because the house is cooling off a little too much for him at night I think.

Today I'm going to drop off Zorro to get neutered... the first of several cats that I need to take in! Thankfully there's a program here where I can get them done for virtually nothing. I'm not sure yet if they're gonna charge me for flea meds (probably since they ALL have fleas) but I can't really do anything about that, I've been TRYING to get rid of the fleas... Oh well, I don't really care, this is gonna save me like $50 a cat to get them done. 50 bucks which we don't have to spend on cat neutering right now!

Hopefully everything goes smoothly with that though, not really worried except that I'm pretty sure he shoved the door into the cat food open and ate a little bit, which he wasn't supposed to do, BAD KITTEH!! lol

Fairgrounds and Geckos...

So Tim and I have talked about it and we've decided that we're gonna get an Eyelash Crested Gecko! I can't wait! He's really cool. Hopefully gonna pick him up this weekend, I've got everything ready for him except for food... Still debating whether I'm gonna feed him mostly fruit and Eyelash Gecko food (yes, they make such a thing!) or whether I'm gonna feed mostly crickets. I'm thinking I'm probably going to feed crickets like MWF and gecko food the rest of the week. We'll see.

While I was at the fair yesterday I got 5th place in Keyhole and Poles... utterly failed at the Break and Out and got 6th (beat out by like a tenth of a second) for Barrels. Hoping for a little better on Friday but not unhappy with how my old man horse did.

I shall be back with another quick update later this week! Thanks for reading!

Updates are good

So I decided to start a little bit of a workout plan this fall... for no particular reason... :D Anyways... I found a couple of cool sites that inspire me with hope. 100pushups.com and 200situps.com they both claim they can take anyone and get them to 100pushups or 200situps (depending on the site obviously) within 6 weeks. We shall see. I did the initial test for both of them today and.. uh... well, I squeeked out 5 pushups before I died and 16 situps. I probably could've gotten one more pushup but that would have put me into a harder workout schedule and I want to actually succeed. I'd rather take an extra week to reach my goal instead of giving up 'cause it's too hard or risk hurting myself. I want to start running too but I'm gonna wait until after the fair (so I'll start next week) because there's no way I'll keep up with a running plan while I'm going back and forth to the fair. The pushups and situps I can do while watching TV in the evening or right before bed or after I get up.

I've had a lot of things change since the last time I posted... Tim and I have a house now! YAY! We're just renting from my parents but it's a nice little house, only 5 minutes from work! Also, I'm working at PetSmart and he's working at both Dicks Sporting Goods and Advanced Auto.

Well, I should go! Gotta get go shopping for spurs before the horse show tomorrow and I need to pick up my paycheck!

TTYL!