Olympics!

I love the Olympics. I particularly love the Opening Ceremonies. I have always loved getting together with people to watch the event because its a presentation of what each nation loves about itself and wants to communicate to the rest of the world.

Tonight was especially great. I was having serious social anxiety about inviting my new colleagues over to watch the ceremonies. I had mentioned it almost a month ago (before I met anyone) on an online forum our class had established. Its easy to suggest events so far in advance but when it came down to this week I was being ridiculous about bringing it up again.

Training class is a little like a bubble. I am barely aware of the actual date or even day of the week sometimes; I just know what is on the schedule and what I need to be doing. However, the Olympics were always on my radar. I knew they were coming but quite a few people had honestly lost track of the dates. In my silly social anxiety I literally wrote the invitation e-mail three separate times and then closed the window because I felt silly.

After I finally worked up the courage to invite my whole class (90+ people) I was worried too many people were going to come. My apartment is a one bedroom and although its plenty large for me and Scott I was worried about hosting a large crowd. In the end about 25 people came and it was tight but it never felt too crowded.

I will reserve my judgement on the opening ceremonies themselves. I wasn't watching as closely as I usually would and I could barely hear the commentary most of the time. I will say, it was pretty interesting to think this was what Great Britain wanted the world to know about themselves. I have a Master's in History and I was pretty lost for a lot of the "historical" part. Also, there are a lot of scary characters in British fairy tales. And the Queen and James Bond? That was pretty awesome. I am going to youtube that later. Ok, so I judged anyway.

I must say, watching the Olympic Parade of Nations with my fellow brand new foreign service officers really brings a different element. In mere weeks we will all be assigned to one of the nations we saw celebrated on television tonight. We cheered for every country on our bid list and "awww-ed" at the countries we wish were on the list. The loudest cheer for each country came from the person hoping to be placed there.

At this point, we all just want to know. Where am I going to go? Which flag am I going to be holding on flag day? We really don't know. After some meetings today we have a better idea about where some of us might end up, but even then there are no guarantees.

No matter how Flag day turns out for me, I am going to be rooting for all the countries I hoped to be posted to, as well as the USA!

This moment

Oh so what am I doing right now? Just taking a short walk from work down past the Washington Monument and the Vietnam War Memorial wall. You know, everyday things.

(!) awesome.

Time flies

It is already the end of week two, which is just amazing. I have learned more in these two weeks than in an entire semester of grad school I think!

So far, it has been great. The people, both in my class and the others we've met, have all been amazing. I have not met a person that wasn't kind, helpful, and generous. I am sure I will not always feel this way about all the people I meet in this job but at this point I am hopeful! Haha.

Class is overwhelming but it's good. It is unlike any other job I've had. When I go home at the end of the day, I'm not done being a responsible government employee, which will be even more true when I'm living overseas at the grace of a host government.

Scott has been able to visit, which is nice, but only two weeks in and already it's not easy. He left this morning at 6am and if all goes well he will be back on Tuesday evening. And that will be after he worked a full day and then drove for 7 hours. We know this wasn't going to be easy but already I don't like it.

When he was training in Oklahoma we went three weeks without seeing each other. And although it was never fun we made it through just fine. There were a lot of Skype sessions where I just sat in front of my computer for hours and did homework and he studied. That is really not possible here so far. He works some evenings and when he doesn't work either he or I are out doing something. I'm glad we are out instead of barricading ourselves inside but I think we are already feeling the impact of not talking so often. We are the kind of people who speak on the phone multiple times a day even when we were coming home to the same house at night. Days without constant interaction are not normal for us.

I like to think this will get easier but I am sure it will be anything but. The longer we keep this up the more we will benefit financially (our hope is to go overseas as close to debt-free as possible). But at what point do we decide the sacrifice isn't worth the potential gains?

In other news, we are mere weeks from flag day! I cannot believe it is so close! Our bid lists are due soon and there are so many amazing places on the list. Each day a new one becomes my favorite and I wish I could make a list of all the places I hope to go to someday. Soon I will be able to focus on one of them as the location for our next adventure in life!

First week of A-100

Is over!

This is so crazy. One week of my orientation is already complete. Part of me feels like I have been here for a while but the other part feels like every day is still my first day. I am lost in the city and in the buildings but the amount of knowledge I have gained since Monday is staggering.

Got the bid list. Incredible. There are so many amazing posts and I feel we cannot end up with something we would really dislike. There are a couple unaccompanied posts but we are hoping to avoid those this time around. We are only three weeks away from Flag day, which is also crazy. I really think that is going to be an awesome experience because as excited as I am to see where we will be going I am already looking forward to finding out who gets all these other awesome posts.

I am so tired at the moment that I cannot keep writing. Suffice it to say this has been a great experience thus far and I am looking forward to more!

Washington, D.C.

We have arrived! Unfortunately we left Ohio a little later than I was hoping and arrived in Washington, D.C. around 1:45am. The drive was not too bad. We encountered a little rain in Pennsylvania but because Scott plans well not a single item in the bed of the truck was wet when we arrived. In case you hadn't noticed, he is pretty awesome.

I am staying in the apartments paid for directly by the State Department and so far it has been great. The night security guard was amazingly helpful and walked me through the check-in process despite my being half asleep. He then got us a luggage cart to unload the truck and replacement keys for the apartment when the door would not open.

The apartment itself is pretty great as well. It is completely furnished including awesome artwork on the walls. There is even a fake tree and you know a place doesn't feel at home until there is a fake tree. I look forward to hosting some visitors on the hide-a-bed in the couch! (hint hint to all of you)

Tonight was the meet-n-greet hosted by the 166th A-100 class. There are so many people in my class that there was no way I could meet them all in two hours. However, the people I did meet were fascinating. I keep thinking that at some point since I was invited to this class they are going to call and rescind my offer and tell me this has all been a big mistake and they never meant to extend me an offer. And after meeting my fellow classmates I am expecting it even more. Everyone has such interesting stories about their lives and their experiences; I cannot wait to meet everyone else and learn their stories as well.

Tomorrow is my first day and I have a lot to get together before I will feel prepared enough to go to sleep. Hopefully it will go well and I won't forget anything important!

Goodbye Ohio!

The day has finally arrived. I am packing and getting all the last minute things together this morning and when Scott gets home we will be heading out to D.C. This still does not feel like it is actually happening right now. I do not feel like I am going to be sleeping somewhere new tonight. I also do not feel remotely ready. 

Even as I sit here and type this there is so much I need to do that I have not done. But I needed to eat breakfast, so I figured, "I can type while I do that!" Nope. I read some news stories and watched a couple videos and now that my cereal is gone I am typing this. This does not bode well for my day.

My sweet Belle knows we are packing and does not want us to leave without her. Even after we made her get out of the bag I'd turn around and she would be right back in. I had to close it to keep her out. Little does she know....

We went through everything in the basement in an attempt to organize for a future pack out. The dogs, who have previously refused to go into the basement because they were afraid of it or something, came down the stairs and watched us move everything around just to make sure they were not missing something. 

Although my time in Ohio was a lot shorter than I anticipated it has actually been really great. I am so thankful for the people I met while we were here. 

I am thankful for the friends we made at Ontario Christian Church who took us into their lives even though they barely knew us. It made such a difference to feel like someone cared about us in a town where we knew no one and invited us over on holidays. It makes me realize I should have done the same when I was at a church where I knew everyone. I never understood how difficult it was for new people to get acquainted and become part of a group. I feel so blessed for everyone who reached out to us and I hope to do the same for others!

Zephyr and I outside of Grandpa's Cheesebarn!

I am also thankful for Grandpa's Cheesebarn and all the people I met there. I feel so blessed to have been able to keep working there even after they found out I was leaving in a couple months! The atmosphere was welcoming and the people I worked with were kind and fun to be around. I actually looked forward to going to work (and not just because I love cheese. Although I do love cheese, that should not be understated).

Although my time in Ohio was much shorter than I anticipated I am thankful for it. Now I look forward to new adventures, new people, and a plethora of other things I will soon be thankful for!

Tune in next time for reports from Washington, D.C.! (Haha, I know, that was so cheesy. Did I mention I love cheese? I really don't think I can say that enough).

The mess

My poor dogs know what packing is. Having moved three times in the last ten months, they understand the meaning of the suitcase.

I was trying to figure out why they were being so clingy this afternoon. I figured MeiLi's problem was that age had been stung by a bee and was therefore not feeling well (I had the flick the honeybee off her leg). But Belle was inexplicable.

However, as I started packing all my clothes this evening I figured it out. I couldn't walk into the other room without my little companions right at my heels. They know I'm packing and they think they are going to be left behind. Oh little dogs...they have no idea what is in store for them.

They had to be right in the middle of my mess. Also, this picture makes it look like I own a lot of pink. I do not. These are probably all the pink clothing items I own, except for the shirt I am currently wearing.

Its all coming together, or apart...

By this time next week I will be in the midst of my first day with the State Department. I will be getting my picture taken and getting all sorts of new employee paperwork and tasks to complete. This does not seem real at all. Sometimes I feel like Scott and I are a little in denial. Even though we are preparing, packing, and getting everything done I still do not feel like I will be living somewhere different on Saturday night. But then again, what is it supposed to feel like?

You think Scott and I would be used to this by now. The other day I figured out that in the past ten months we have only spent one full month together - May. Starting in October 2011 and coming to this July one of us has always been gone. He was in Oklahoma from October to January and then I was living part-time in Colorado February, March and April. May, we were finally together and even went to Canada as a little celebration. June I was in Chicago for a few days and now here we are in mid-July I will be on my way by the end of the week. This will be much easier than Oklahoma was though. A 7 hour drive is much more manageable than a 10+ hour drive.

The house looks crazy and a little sad. Even though Scott is not moving out yet we took everything off the walls and off shelves to put in piles for the eventual pack out (he didn't want to get stuck with all the moving duties, again). So now our house looks much like it did when we first moved in just six months ago.

And for seemingly silly concerns:
What shoes will I wear on my first day? I don't have them yet. I know all the shoes I currently own are either not dressy enough or will not allow me to last the whole day without being in pain. Where are my comfy dress shoes? I am beginning to think such a thing does not exist. I know you are probably asking yourself, who the heck cares about what shoes they are going to wear? Well, ever since my foot surgeries I cannot mess around with shoes that are not just right and for all the walking I am going to be doing all over D.C. and Virginia, I need good shoes.

And for serious concerns:
The State Department has yet to receive my transcript with my master's degree confirmed. If they don't receive if before Monday my pay has to be downgraded as if I did not possess a master's degree. I called the school and it was sent June 27th. They cannot help me any further. I decided to order another and pay for a rush order and the website timed out so now I cannot tell if it has been ordered properly or if I still need to pay for it. All it says is "pending." That is a very unhelpful word.

And I still don't have my amended travel orders. Not that either of these are huge concern, they are just not helping my already semi-stressed self get stuff together. What justifiably stresses me out: possibly fraudulent e-mails saying I am delinquent on a student loan I never took out for a University I never attended.

I think from the time I sat down and started writing this to the time it is now has been about 2 hours. I have had to make a lot of calls, write a lot of emails, and wait for webpages to load this morning to make sure I have everything in order (and that I am not getting my identity stolen). I am ready to go but I am also not ready. I have so much to do before I feel ready. Speaking of, I really need to get going.

4th of July fun!

Ok, this one isn't from the 4th of July but I wanted to include it. Its a picture of the balloon glow from Ashland Balloonfest. 

We went to a friend's house to enjoy a cookout, fellowship, and some 4th of July fun. She has some property so we were able to set off fireworks which was nice. Had we been in Colorado this year we would not have been able to set off anything.

The impressive array of fireworks. This was actually a little crazy to me because some of these fireworks were big and went pretty high. You can't get stuff like this in CO and the only time I'd see regular people get to shoot those off was in China. And Scott was in co-charge of this display. I was a little nervous....

The crew. Don't worry, we all moved back when it came time for the big ones.

Pretty impressive for guys just setting them off in the backyard!

And then there was a bonfire. This was crazy to me as well. People in Colorado cannot just have fire in their backyards (and our neighbors in the city have fires all the time, for no discernible reason!). It was a huge fire. I don't think I had been around such a large since my days at Camp Como.

The fire was absurdly hot. I am trying to roast a marshmallow on with an extension on my stick because I could not bear to be any closer. I am actually trying to shield my face from the heat too. Everyone laughed at me until...

they tried to roast marshmallows too. It was hot and as close as Scott is in this picture, he did not stay there very long!

We had a really great time with our new friends. Who knows where our next 4th of July will be!?

Take it, Leave it, Store it?

The question of the day: do we take this item, leave it here (sell it, donate it, whatever), or send it to storage for the foreseeable future? Thanks to this line of thinking, our house is in utter disarray.

It has been hot here. Really hot. 90+. Now most of the time that is not really a big deal, but in a house that has no A/C (and possibly no insulation), that is really hot. Usually we can get our house to be between 5 and 10 degrees cooler than outside, which is not saying much. And then add the humidity. Needless to say, its very difficult to get the motivation to do anything inside the house when its that warm.

We should have buckled down and worked on packing this morning before the heat really took over but I just could not get moving. So Scott worked on the computer and I watched a movie and went through the rest of my clothes in the one room that does have a window air conditioner - our bedroom. I only ventured out to get more clothes or put them away.

However, after realizing that we did not accomplish enough on our precious day off together (one of the few we have left) we decided it was time to just put a few things in order for the future pack out. Instead we attacked the living room, dining room, and office. It may not sound like much but that is at least 60-70% of our possessions. I found myself parting with things that nine months ago I was sure I needed in my life. I imagine that in the near future I will find myself doing this again. We want to downsize but at the same time there is no reason to get rid of everything just because we don't want to take it overseas.

We have some heirloom dishes, antiques, Chinese artifacts, and various other items that are not going to make it if we haul them around the world. But really, there is no reason we can't just put them in storage and leave them for years if need be. Its funny, but Scott and I have attached different meanings to different items which makes it difficult for us to let them go. For instance, there is a painting I absolutely love that we bought from an artist in France. Scott feels bad about the painting because he feels that he haggled with the artist to harshly while I love it because it was so difficult bringing it home without it getting ruined. For these separate reasons we will not let it go. It is an interesting time for us actually; learning what certain objects mean to the other person.

We did take a break to go see a fireworks display but a thunderstorm shut it down. Sorry about that Ohio. The 4th of July rain apparently followed us from Colorado this year. Instead we hung out with our friends for about an hour and then returned home to continue the packing. It is now 1am and we are calling it a night.

In other news, we had a wonderful 4th of July on the 3rd and Scott set off all kinds of fireworks with some people from our church softball team. I have some great pictures I will try to put up if the heat doesn't chase me out of the office. Tomorrow we venture to Canton to run some errands we cannot accomplish in this small town and visit with a friend we haven't seen since we were last in Colorado!

Its crazy. I have about a week and a half left here. I feel like I have so much to do and that I am walking  into a future I don't really know anything about. Should be quite the trip!

Happy 4th (now 5th, sorry!) of July!