We drove down to Cape D and Fort Columbia yesterday (which is where we'll be living). We got the keys to the new place.

Cape D is a huge park with lots of rental houses, yurts, etc, so they have a lady whose jobs is to clean them all between visitors. They put her to work cleaning our house (!). They also steam cleaned the carpets yesterday. She was really nice and gave us some curtains that she had bought for the yurts and they ended up not using, but they match our kitchen really well.

We're in a duplex, one of the smallest in the park, but it's really not bad (a million times better than the trailer at Potlatch!). It has a closed in entryway with washer/dryer hookups (but no washer/dryer :( ) and I think that is where I'll keep my inventory for Club NW/PV Power (it's a lot of stuff).

Then you walk into the kitchen, which the previous tenant painted a deep rich/red color. They replaced the linoleum with laminate floors, and the cabinets all seem new and nice. It's a pretty big kitchen, but it will get smaller once we add shelving for food and a small table (there's no dining room). It's going to be tough to feed company there, we only have room for a small table, and even if we get the kind that expands, there isn't room to expand it.

Next to the kitchen is a living room. It's fairly small (MUCH smaller than the huge one we have now!). Most of the rest of the house is painted in neutral colors, tans and blues and whites. The rest of the house also has light colored carpet, so I think we're going to do the no shoes thing. We're looking to get a new (from a garage sale) TV stand so that it can fit the TV, the amp my dad gave Lukas, and whatever DVR/satellite boxes we end up needing (no cable out there). We'll have the couch in here of course. And sadly, I think it will be time to leave the very comfy recliner behind. We're going to try and pick up a love seat instead. The wall has these protrusions, so a love seat will fit into the space much better.

Then there is the front door which leads to a giant porch (shared with the other half of our duplex). This has a great view of the Columbia River since we are up on a hill, and a view of the duplex below us.

Then we have an upstairs! Upstairs is a small bathroom, the only one in the house. For some reason, with each move, our bathrooms have gotten smaller! Our trailer in Potlatch had a fairly big bathroom. Here at Twanoh it's a little cramped, but OK, and the shower head is really high which works well for Lukas. Well the the one at Ft. Columbia is very small. The ceiling slants over the bathtub. No showers allowed :( It's much too small for Lukas to fit in the tub properly, and I am really not a bath person. The previous ranger had installed a shower attachment/curtain thing, and then there was this flooding incident, and now shower attachments are banned from these houses I guess.

Also upstairs are the two bedrooms. The smaller one will be our guest room/office. It will be a little cozy, but we should be able to fit both our desks and our spare bed in here.

The larger room will be our bedroom. It has a walk-in closet, which is a nice step up from where we are now. It's above the living room and has that same great view of the Columbia River! We're going to put our dresser and several bookshelves in here. Lukas wants to get a small table and two chairs and have them by the window so we can eat breakfast up there if we want. I don't see that happening too often, but I guess you never know.

Oh also, the ceiling of most of the rooms of the house is really cool. Lukas thinks they are cast iron. They are in decorative patterns and painted white. It's hard to describe, I'll have to get pictures :)

We went to 4 thrift stores in Astoria and Warrenton but did not find anything useful. Most of them were small and did not have furniture. One had a TV stand hat would meet our needs, but the top was cracked and it was missing a knob, and they wanted $12 for it!

So this weekend we are in Seattle for the beach vaults. We move Monday, then head back up to Seattle for the track meets. Thursday is Lukas's first day of work! So I think I will dedicate that weekend to trying to pick up the following items at garage sales:

Washer
Dryer
Rectangular Kitchen Table
Chairs
Shelving of any kind (we are going to need a LOT of shelving in this place!)
Love Seat

So if anyone has any of the above items they are looking to get rid of, let me know!

I'm not the type of person who attributes random little things to acts of God. While I believe that our heavenly father is aware of everything going on, and has the ability to do anything, I don't really think the Lord alters the natural course of things to help me find a good parking spot or that He has a preference which type of cereal I eat in the morning.

Having said that, I do have to attribute this stupid thing to a higher power...

My sister's big request regarding her car is that someone get a picture when the mileage changes to 123456. Easier said than done, as it's easy to forget to watch it.

I knew it was getting close, but the car wouldn't start on the way back from dropping a friend off at the airport the other day and I was quite distracted with that (turns out some security key got bumped loose! easy fix).

The next morning, I had a vague thought in the back of my mind that I had missed it, but by the time I left a few hours later, I didn't even think to check it before I hit the road.

Lukas and I had been driving for about 20 minutes or so, when I randomly glanced down and saw the odometer (I had NOT been thinking about it). It was at the hallowed 123456.

I started freaking out and looked for a place to pull over, but I was on a narrow stretch of Hwy 3, and there were not really shoulders. I knew I might only have a short distance to go until it flipped over.

Fortunately, I found a driveway and pulled in. I snapped a few pictures and we headed back out. Not 50 yards later it flipped over!





This I attribute to God.

Lukas called the manager at Cape D today to try and get some info on what's happening with us. He didn't even know Lukas had been hired, but seemed pleased as they are very short staffed (they are supposed to have 9 rangers and I think they only have 5 or 6 right now.)

We are going to be living at Ft. Columbia S.P. which is a satellite of Cape D, about 11 miles away. It's just 2 miles from the Astoria Bridge. We'll be living in a duplex, which means we'll share a wall with someone, but no shared living space. It's 2 bedrooms 1 bath.

So it looks like we're going to have to have 2 cars instead of 1, at least through the end of the summer while I am commuting up to Seattle *sigh* We'll just unmothball Lukas's car and buy his dad's, which means we end up spending a lot more money than planned, but Lukas will also be making a lot more money, so it all works out in the end.

The manager didn't seem to think it would be a problem for Lukas to start mid-July, which would be a huge huge help. Maybe next week we can make a day trip down there to check out the house and figure out which furniture to move and what to leave here. I am hoping there are a table and chairs already there, that would be a big help. Most of the rest of our furniture we'd be moving either way.

We'll have to move again in December, to Mt Vernon, while Lukas does the Academy that he was supposed to do last year, but at least we'll be able to leave a lot of our stuff behind since we'll be returning once the Academy is over in the spring.


Off to Seattle tomorrow for the all-comers meets Tuesday and Wednesday. Wednesday night we head back to Twanoh, then fairly early Thursday morning I head down to Eugene for USAs. I will be there through Sunday. See why I don't want to move by July 1st!

My car died last week. The transmission died. It started slipping on Thursday when I was in Belfair (well Lukas felt it starting to slip a few days before that and neglected to tell me!!!). Friday we cleaned it out for what we figured would be the last trip to Seattle.

I drove to Bremerton and made it to the ferry ok. Made it on the ferry. Made it off the ferry. Made it out of downtown. But failed about 2 miles short of the mechanic's shop *sigh* Third time Triple A has towed me in the past year or so (but the other two times were in Lukas's car).

Transmission was toast and it would cost way more than the car was worth to replace it. However, my parents spent a lot of money maintaining the car over the years, so most of the other parts of it are in good shape. The guy who owns the shop bought it off of me for $400, his son is going to fix it up as a summer project and then he will have a car. Win-win :)

So for right now we are borrowing my sister's car because my parents would prefer that over us driving Lukas's mothballed car (my parents own her car, she is in Alaska for the summer).

The next step is to sell Lukas's car. Then we are going to buy his dad's car. We've already been planning this for pretty much the past year, my car dying wasn't much of a surprise.

If anyone local wants to buy a Subaru, let me know.


Lukas interviewed Monday to be rehired as a ranger. The local regional manager seems pretty confident that Lukas got one of the jobs. We should find out for sure tomorrow. The big question is which park, because some of the openings are at awesome parks and some are at really crappy/far away/isolated parks.

Hopefully we can delay moving until after the beach vaults, I cannot add anything else to my schedule!!



All-comers meets are going well. I had 13 vaulters at the Tuesday meet, 6 in a special early competition yesterday, and then 32 in the main competition for a total of 51 vaulters. I pole vaulted from 3 lefts and made 8'6" haha. It was only my second time vaulting since last fall (last week I made 7'4" from 2 lefts).

I just got 4 new rolls of decorative tape for decorating poles, so I will have to hang out at King's next week and make more pretty poles. The girls will be pleased (they are very girly tapes). I think I will do the 11' series.

Lukas got a phone call today from someone at HQ that they are having a phone conference Friday to discuss the rehiring process and they are having interviews on Monday and Tuesday.

SO I guess we'll see what it all means. They posted a job for Ranger 2s on the State Parks website, but he isn't eligible because he hasn't done the academy and is not a commissioned officer yet.

I think Friday they will discuss which parks are hiring. There are ~45 ranger vacancies right now, but some parks are hit way harder, and they are not going to rehire them all at once, so I guess the worse off parks have priority.

I kind of figured we wouldn't be moving again until the end of summer. It could be sooner! This means if you want to visit our totally awesome place at Twanoh, you had better come by soon!

Some updates...

Friday, right before we left for Seattle, we walk down to the new mailbox and see the mail car pulling away. Inside is a check from the State reimbursing us for the $500 deposit we had on an apartment in Mt. Vernon (we were going to live there and then they laid him off and did not send him to the academy). Only took 4 months! The state attorney general had to approve it, the whole situation was ridiculous. But whatever, we finally got our money back.

Saturday, Lukas gets a call from one of the rangers, Stacy, here at Twanoh and they tell him they were able to get hours transferred from Belfair, so he can begin getting paid immediately as a Park Aide. Yay!!! He starts tomorrow :)

Also, over the weekend the legislature passed their budget, and they say no parks are closing. That is a little vague, because the Commission never uses the word "closure," they use words like "mothball" or "transfer." But Stacy mentioned there was an email to all staff saying no parks are closing.

So Lukas got laid off in December for nothing. They needed to save a couple bucks in the short term and they chose to make cuts to their most important position, the Park Rangers who are responsible for public safety. The Park Rangers that the State Legislature said are so important that they are exempt from the current hiring freeze.

There are 121 staffed parks, and about 244 ranger positions, with ~30-40 currently vacant between the layoffs and positions not being filled since last fall. So the average # of rangers per park is two, which means a significant number of parks are significantly short on their law enforcement officers.

Meanwhile not one person at headquarters lost their job during this time. They employ a dozen information technology specialists, and about 3 dozen fiscal technicians/analysts. But it is better to put public safety at risk instead of make cuts that might make it take longer for someone sitting behind a desk to get their computer fixed or note pads ordered. *sigh*

So anyway, of course we haven't heard anything yet about when they will be rehiring rangers. I am considering contacting our union rep to see what they think about it.

I would imagine that no new rangers will start before the next biennium, July 1st, but in theory they could start interviewing at parks before then. But of course I have no idea, those are just the theories in my head.

On the plus side, it seems like we ought to have our pick of parks. There are some parks we definitely DON'T want to be at, unless they are our only option, so we'll see how things work out. I am sure all of the other laid-off rangers will be able to return to the park they were at, if they want to, but we don't have that option since Kjerstin bumped us out, and there are no Ranger openings here at Twanoh.

So anyway, life is good. Lukas will be getting paid as a Park Aide beginning tomorrow. We're in a sweet house at a gorgeous park. It seems likely that he will be rehired as a Park Ranger in the next few months.

I could not have asked for a more beautiful day to move. Lukas's weather station says it is 75 outside and 71 inside.

I had to get up early this morning to be at the new house for the cable installation. I hate how they give you 4 hours windows of time. But it was fine, gave me more time to unpack the stuff we had already moved and clean more of the shelves in the kitchen. They've all had mice running through them in the past few years and I want to make sure we don't die of the hantavirus (I don't know how to spell that). Still haven't caught any mice in the 8 traps we have set out, hopefully it stays that way.

Cable installation went smoothly and I made it back to Potlatch just as Lukas and Ross were wrapping up load #1. They got most of the furniture on Ross's trailer and quite a few boxes. Ross has his 1-year-old baby and I got to hold him for a bit, but he needed a nap and wasn't as excited about it as I was.

They took off the door to get the couch out, so I am holding down the fort. There is still a lot of stuff that needs to be boxed up, so I am working on that. I am thankful that I am not allergic to tree pollen, the air is thick with it. My computer speakers are still here, so I hooked up my iPod. This part of the campground is closed, so there are no campers nearby for me to disturb, so I have it pretty loud. It's on my Beach Vault playlist, very energetic.

I am so thankful for the friends we have made so far and the support we have received from other rangers. I would prefer if Lukas were still employed as a ranger and we were saving up money instead of the opposite, but it doesn't affect my happiness. Lukas and I are both really happy all the time. The layoff has given him a lot more flexibility with his schedule, so we have been able to go home more often and travel more easily.

I will try and take pictures of the new house when I get a chance. Lukas's parents visited on Sunday and got to see both parks. His mom got a picture of us in front of the new house, so you can see that if you are Facebook friends with me.

Did you know that Wal-Mart doesn't sell normal light bulbs anymore? In the name of green energy, they have converted to only selling weird wattage light bulbs. Instead of being able to buy a 4-pack of 60w light bulbs for $1, the only option is 52w light bulbs. It's like that for all the other wattages too.

Sure you can get 60w light bulbs, but only if you want to pay 3x as much for the fancy REVEAL ones.

Note to self, go to local hardware store in Hoodsport and try to find 60 watt light bulbs. Supporting local businesses FTW.

There is a mouse in the future house that appears to have committed suicide. He is dangling from a pipe in the basement, it appears that his foot got trapped and he couldn't get out. There is a mouse on the floor of a room in the basement that Lukas stepped on last time we were there, and it's kind of stuck there, I couldn't sweep it with the broom. I set out 8 mouse traps - 4 stick and 4 snap. I have determined that Lukas will be in charge of removing dead mice. The sticky ones are baited with a heavy peanut butter scent, I think they will be a big hit. I smeared peanut butter on the snap traps too.

The peppermint extract and red food coloring got into a fight. They both appeared to lose, the evidence both visual and olfactory. My fingertips lost as well, they now look like easter eggs.

In other news, I am heading to Seattle tomorrow, plan to be there until Monday. I am running a track meet Saturday, lots of work.

We found out today at the ranger who is transferring here wants our house in two months. So we have to move out by May 5th.

Went down to Olympia today with Lukas to speak at the State Parks and Recreation Meeting. I did and it went well. I just shared our story briefly. I mentioned that we were volunteering at our park but that we would be kicked out soon and had nowhere to go.

After we had the group that might take over Lake Sylvia SP take down our info, and they said they would be interested in having us live in that ranger house (as volunteers). Then one of the commissioners came back and gave us his contact info and said he was interested in helping us (though he didn't seem to have any specific ideas). Then the manager from the Belfair/Twanoh area came over and talked to us.

Darrela had mentioned earlier that Twanoh had a house or two open, but we had pretty much decided against it already, because the parks are supposed to be closing in May/September and we didn't want to go to the trouble of moving only to immediately get displaced again.

Anyway, so the ranger there said he had two houses open at Twanoh and that we could probably work something out if we wanted to move there. We asked about getting displaced, and he said the reason he had two houses open is because both of the rangers live off-site. So they are not empty spots just waiting to be filled. One of the rangers could be bumped around if parks are closed, but the other ranger has been there forever and doesn't need to worry about it.

So we'll see how things shake out. Twanoh is kind of in the sticks but it's only 30 minutes or so from Bremerton and 45 minutes from Gig Harbor and an hour or so from Olympia, so he could possibly find jobs in those places.

Anyway, it's been a pretty crazy day. We definitely need some time to digest. The Twanoh guy won't be back in the office until Monday, so we'll give him a call then and try to find out more. We'll probably stay here until then since this park is way short staffed. We'll see. This could all change in a moment.

Today Lukas did not have any scuba diving... so we got up even earlier than before. 6am! We got up and headed out to the beach to catch the sunrise. People get up pretty early to reserve the beach chairs, but at 6:15 or whatever AM only a few had been reserved so we got our pick. We chilled for a bit and took pictures, then read for a little bit. At 7am we headed to the buffet for breakfast, then back out to our chairs for more relaxing. We both stripped down to swim suits and napped with our heads in the shade and bodies in the sun (thoroughly covered by sunscreen of course).

After a few hours of this I went and did yoga for the first time ever and then we headed over to archery and I tried that for the first time. I even hit the target about half the time.

After archery we went back to our chairs for another hour or so until we had enough of the beach action. So we removed our towels and left the chairs up for grabs. We headed to the dive shop for Lukas to schedule his final dive, then we went back to our room and ordered room service. After that we mostly just napped (Lukas) and surfed the internet (me).

USAs were today and I was all set up to do live updates and my *@#$% website went down. I couldn't call since I am in Mexico, but I filed an online support request, and before long it was listed on their website as a known problem. It was down for several hours, enough time for me to get several emails about it and to completely miss USAs. THANKS :(

Brian, the guy we sponsor through PV Power got second! Yay :)

Anyway, after much lounging around we got ready for dinner at the italian place. It was delicious, our only complaint is they just brought us dessert, we didn't get to order it. The table next to us got to order theirs! They also got their wine bottle on their table, we didn't and we only got two glasses of wine each. Oh well *shrug*

After dinner we talked about doing stuff but we just came back here and relaxed. We may be the youngest people at this particular hotel, but we have been early to bed and early to rise every day. We are always one of the first couples to arrive at dinner. Breakfast too this morning!

Anyway, still having lots of fun :)

Not much to write about today. Lukas was supposed to be scuba diving from 8 to noon on a two tank dive. Well a boat broke down so they only did one dive. I left to go work out and missed him, so he left me a note saying he would be diving at noon somewhere offsite and should be back by 4ish.

I got lunch by myself which is lame, and went to the beach briefly which was also lame when alone, so I just went back to our room (Villa) and move the table and a chair in the backyard so they were within reach of the extra long ethernet cable I brought and worked outside for a few hours.

When Lukas hadn't arrived by 6pm I was officially freaking out and was about to call the dive shop when he came running through the door. We had a 6:30 dinner reservation and just barely made it. He had barely eaten all day, so we went to the creperie and got a treat after dinner (even though we'd already had dessert haha).

Tomorrow we plan to get up at 6am to watch the sunrise and snag some good beach chairs.

No pictures today.

I have a few albums now up on Facebook. I think most of you are already on there (even Graham! finally!) so I won't post them here unless someone requests it.

Yesterday we had room service delivered to the room at 7am. We ate breakfast together and then Lukas headed out for his 8am Scuba diving.

I did some work on the internet, then headed out for a run. We are located in one corner of the resort, so my plan was to run the perimeter until I got to the beach at the opposite end which is where the dive shop is. So I did that. When I got near the dive shop, our guy from yesterday recognized me and waved even though I was pretty far off. I took off my shoes and started to walk up the beach when I noticed a boat load of scuba divers unloading. I looked closer and there was Lukas! He was supposed to be on a two tank dive and not be back until noon (it was a bit after 10) but I guess the conditions were too rough so they only did one of the dives.

So I waited around until he was all checked out, then we started walking back to the hotel. When we walked by the air gun/archery range, they were just about to get started with air gun, so we stopped there. There were probably about 15 or so people. They each got three roundswith three shots per round. Top 3 made the final round. Lukas had decent scores, but I didn't think he would make the final. He snuck into the final and actually ended up winning!!! So we were told we had to go to the pirate show that night to collect his prize (a t-shirt).

After that we headed back to the hotel and changed into swimsuits and cover ups. We weren't super hungry, so we headed up to the commercial center to get a taco and a crepe. Then we did some exploring of the other hotels in our resort to try and figure out where this pirate show was. We eventually made our way back to our hotel (so much quieter and nicer!) and went to the big saltwater pool. Got some drinks from the bar, relaxed in the jacuzzi awhile, and then swam around in the big pool.

After that we dried off and caught the tail end of the lunch buffet and ate a bit more of that. Then we headed back to the room and took an awesome little nap in the hammock. After that it was time to get ready for dinner! You have to dress up fancy for the a la carte dinners here.

Tonight was our night at the Japanese place. We got to sit at a Tepanyaki table (where they make the food in front of you) and meet new people. The food was awesome. After dinner we came back to the room to change, then went to the cheesy pirate show where Lukas had to go on stage with other winners and sing We Are the Champions.

:)

We are in Mexico!

I should back up a bit... when Lukas and I were engaged I entered a bunch of contest. We won one sponsored at AllAboutHoneymoons.com/Funjet/WeddingSolutions.com/Iberostar. I found out the day before the wedding that we won, but I didn't think it was real (most honeymoon sweepstakes are a scam).

But I followed up with it and it eventually worked out!

So yesterday we flew to Cancun. The flights went smoothly and our ride to the hotel went smoothly. Our hotel is part of a giant resort that has several hotels in it (I think 4 others). Our wristband gives us access to all of the other hotel areas, but our is off limits to the guests from the other hotels. Ours is adults-only. We'll appreciate this when we go to the beach! We walked the length of the beach today, and the general beach areas are very crowded.

It's an all-inclusive hotel, so everything is included. Our hotel has two buffets, 24/7 room service, and 4 a la carte restaurants for dinner. It's too bad Lukas and I aren't big drinkers because you can get _anything_ here. They have all of the top shelf liquors. All of the rooms have a mini bar that they can customize with whatever you'd like.

We are staying in a honeymoon villa, their nicest suite. We're basically in our own little building at the very edge of the resort. I think there are about 12 or so of them. We have a giant room with a canopy bed, flatscreen tv, etc. It has a hole in the middle of the ceiling where you can see up into the thatched roof and a cool sculpture made of hearts hangs down (and lights up!). We have fresh flowers in the room too :) Oh yeah and there is a hammock in our room!

The back half of our little building has the toilet, shower, two sinks, three mirrors plus a small mirror that lights up, a jacuzzi spa, bath robes, slippers, two closets, a safe, and more.

Then the extra cool part is we have our own private backyard! It has a table, chairs, a lounging bed thing, and a little pool. Sadly the pool is not heated, but it's still nice. There is a wall around the yard and it backs up against a wooded area so there is lots of privacy. I supposed if the neighbors were in their backyards at the same time we were and they were being loud we'd here them, but the walls between yards are very tall, so you can't see over them.


Yesterday we checked in in the late afternoon, and relaxed/unpacked a bit. We got dinner at the buffet (only one of the buffets is open for dinner) and pretty much went straight to bed after that. We were soo tired from the travel and getting up at 3am Seattle time. We were probably asleep by 9:30 (Cancun is in central time) here which is like 7:30 in Seattle haha.

We woke up around 6am this morning and lounged around in bed for awhile. Then we went to the other buffet and enjoyed breakfast. After breakfast we needed to head over to the dive shop to get Lukas's dives scheduled. He decided to try and get his PADI advanced open water certification while we are here. This costs extra, but it's such a great opportunity and potentially a job skill for him, we we decided to go for it.

So we went to the dive shop and ended up being there for 2 or 3 hours! It took a long time to get everything taken care of, there was a lot of paperwork to fill out, and then Lukas was going to do one of the dives this afternoon and he had to study up and take a short written test on that area first. After spending about an hour doing that, we ended up finding out that he couldn't do that dive today, he had to do a different dive first.

So by the time we got out of there it was 12:15, he still had to get his swim trunks and we had to eat lunch by 1. So we had quick lunch at the buffet and then he grabbed his shorts and headed out to dive. I made our dinner reservations for the week and have been relaxing in the room :)

I will try to get pictures uploaded to Facebook today :)

Lukas and I leave for Mexico a week from tomorrow!

We did end up having to pay almost $500 in taxes and fees on the plane tickets... which is a bunch of crap because the tickets themselves are probably only worth about $650, so I think we basically had to pay for the plane tickets.

The value of the trip is estimated at $5,000, so overall it's still worth it :) The hotel has the most amazing reviews on TripAdvisor.com.

2008

Good things:
- Got married!
- Covered the Olympic Trials in Eugene
- My friend Erica coming out of nowhere to make the team
- Ran two very successful beach vaults
- More than doubled the entries for the Spring Break Open
- Became team manager for Club Northwest
- Sent five vaulters to State
- Junior high cross country teams won state
- Boys track team won state
- Traveled to Reno for the USATF Annual Meeting
- Traveled to St. Louis for Mark and Jayne's wedding


Neither good nor bad:
- I moved four times
- I got my wisdom teeth out


Bad things:
- Scully's murder. Way worse than anything else on this list. I am in Reno and he was here last year and I will not forget.
- Lukas getting laid off
- Sinus surgery
- My great grandmother passed away and I couldn't make it to the funeral because I had class
- Not getting to go to the state cross country meet
- Had my credit ruined by the Seattle Public Library because they mistyped my address

The weather man says a convergence zone set up shop and that the southern end is over north Seattle. All I know is it means it is dumping snow right now, on top of the however many inches are currently on the ground.

White Christmas FTW :)

Now if this would all magically disappear tomorrow, I think we'd all be a lot happier. Getting between my parents' house and the Peter's resembles sledding more than driving.

So Lukas and I had to take a short honeymoon to the San Juans because he was supposed to have weapons training the Wednesday after the wedding. Well that got cancelled a few days before the wedding. We were going to try and take a longer honeymoon in the spring, but he got laid off, so we need to save that money for groceries instead.

I got an email the day before the wedding saying I had won a drawing I entered (I entered a bunch of giveaways while we were engaged, there are so many out there!). I told her the wedding was the next day so I didn't have time to call, and to email me the fine print.

So she got back to me today... apparently I won this contest: http://www.weddingsolutions.com/honeymoon-sweepstakes/

She said that, "Airfare, transfers to and from the airport, accommodations, and all meals
and drinks are included."

Now that Lukas will be unemployed in a month, we should have plenty of time to take the trip! And lots of flexibility since there are blackout dates and such.

Anyway, it seems to be legit. I will let you all know what happens!

"I was more excited about meeting you than anyone else here today. Stephanie Hightower just cussed me out."

Well he said something like that.

A guy from New England looked at a picture I had printed of our track at King's and was absolutely blown away at how nice it was and that a high school could have such an amazing facility. We are all very proud of it :)

I thought I was going to die in a plane crash today, so I am very glad to be sitting in a hotel posting on LJ.

I was flying from Seattle to Reno. It's a nice direct flight that takes a little over an hour, one I have flown several times before. So we were cruising along at altitude, when I noticed my ears had to pop. And kept having to pop. We didn't seem to be descending, but sometimes it can be hard to tell when you are that high. But the ventilation system sounded funny, and the thought popped into my head, "OMG the cabin is losing all of its pressure we're gonna die." But then I told myself to chill out, because I think thoughts like that nearly EVERY flight and nothing is ever wrong.

So we're still obviously having some serious pressure issues, because I am popping my ears constantly (luckily I had no trouble to do it via swallowing/yawning). I can see one of the flight attendants pointing at her ears up front, and they are moving around up there, but it was hard to tell if anything was out of the ordinary or if they were just doing their normal thing (one of them came back to collect garbage).

Yeah and then the air blowing out of the vents got incredibly cold. Then it got incredibly hot. Then the plane turned around (at some point in there it had started to descend a bit).

Then the captain finally came on and said that we were having pressurization issues and that we had to turn around and make an emergency landing in Portland. We were well past Portland at this point, it felt like FOREVER until we got there.

Apparently there are two things that control the cabin pressure. One of them out, and while they were trying to troubleshoot that problem, the other one went out! At some point on our trip to Portland, they actually got them working again (they told us this later, I thought we were more comfortable because we were lower). As we got close to Portland there was a low cloud cover, so we couldn't see how close we were to the ground.

At some point in there I turned on my cell phone and wrote up a text message to Lukas and my parents telling them we were landing in Portland and I was scared and that I loved them. I wasn't actually able to send it until right before we landed, but it did make me feel better.

It got scary (scarier) at the end because the plane made a lot of turns for some reason, so we kept rolling back and forth. Fortunately we landed without incident.

If they don't know what made the pressurization system go out, who knows what else could have been wrong with the plane. I was figuring there was a decent chance that something that kept the plane in the air, or something crucial to landing would fail next!

So fortunately for us, when we got to Portland, there was a plane about to leave for Reno. So we got off our plane, got special boarding cards (there were only about 15 of us on the flight), and we got to board first on the next flight.

I'd like to mention that at no point did the oxygen masks drop down like they are supposed to. Granted we didn't completely lose pressure the way we would have if a door had blown off or something, but it was still pretty sketchy. While we were waiting to get on the other flight, the flight attendants asked us if the oxygen masks had dropped and seemed a little surprised they hadn't.

Anyway, the other flight made it to Reno without incident.

I have decided that when I die, I would prefer it be peaceful in my old age and all that good stuff. And if it's not, I hope that the Lord will take me suddenly and that I won't know I am about to die.