Mandatory March post

It's been crazy here in Nac and it's only about to get worse! Last week we were on our way back from 5 days in Alabama. It was so nice to see all of our loved ones! It's strange how I haven't seen some of them in over a year but it seems like just yesterday we left Bama on ths crazy adventure. It's also strange how some friendships seem strained and awkward, others pick up right where you left off, and some stay the same daily. 

Of course, my body does not do well with long distance traveling so as soon as we wake up on our first day back in Nac, I have a cold. I'm glad it waited till we got back to rebel. But today is the first day I have my full voice back! 

Today Bud and I went to the opening day for a new Ren and Piratical Faire. It was so much fun. There was a falconry show that I tried not to volunteer for when the crowd asked for volunteers, yet still got picked. Me and five other people lined up  three on each side, while an Australian auger flied between us then held our arms up as it flew between our arms. I can not lie, I was extatic! There was funnel cake, wild boar, axe throwing, absinthe making, leather working, and JOUSTING! Now it's certain. We have to go to mideival times for our birthdays. 

We haven't had a full date day in a long time. So after getting home we ate a super nice (expensive) dinner at Union cafe. It was so worth it. Now I have to keep my sun burned ass (not literally) awake till 8 to go meet some former and current SFA grad students for reunion drinks. Whew! 

This next month (which is only a few days away) I have a seminar presentation on the first, a poster at the Big Thicket conference SFA is hosting, field season work will start on weekends in the middle of the month, another poster (or the same from TCTWS) at the bright ideas conference that is school wide, registration for 2 more conferences (one at the end of July and the other in November) and a proposal to finish so I can start sending it out for edits. Whew! Not to mention any homework for my stats class and maybe trying to do more stats for the data I've already collected. 

I am exhausted from the sun and today's fun activities along with everything else I've been cramming away at. But, to tell you the truth, our trip back solidified how much I love being away. That sounds horrible. I love that I am getting out there, seeing more of the world than just sweet home Alabama. I would say we, but Buddy was a long distance truck driver for the longest so he's seen all of this. I love that I'm learning more about this field that I'm in, I'm learning more about and meeting other people, and learning more about our marriage. And in turn I'm learning more about myself. Yes, it can be scary as hell thinking about not having a safety net of friends and loved ones if something (gods forbid) happens. But it's a good kind of scary. A self reliance, self sufficient kind of thing. It only took 32 years but better late than never, right?

Here are some pictures from the last almost 2 months! Enjoy and as always, blessed be!

Tufted titmouse right before it started snowing!

Female orange-crowned warbler. First time I've seen one!

SPRING!

Grandma's goats

Swayback trails in Wetumpka 

On the way to mobile

New Orleans

South American black hawk-eagle

African auger

Jousting

Tip break!

Holiday woes

I honestly do not know where last month went. Between the school work, take home tests, learning TWO new modeling programs (which I still don't know how to use well), Dragon Age: Inquisition, and everything in between, November came and went in the blink of an eye.

Now it's December, finals are over, and Christmas is around the corner. I am not a holiday person by any means. I do not like surprises, I don't get excited over carols, trees, or decorating the house. I don't remember getting excited about these things except for when I was little, but it still gave me panic attacks. The list of things I do like around Christmas time is short: other people's Christmas lights and making sweets. That's it. The end. Bah Humbug. I know, I'm a scrooge.

But this year I haven't seen my family and friends in almost a year and I'm awfully homesick. I have tried to figure out how to make it home for the holidays. However, with classes not starting back and my loan money not coming in until the end of January, hotel and registration fees for a conference in February being due in January, nicer clothes for that conference and another in January, and being able to have tuition for this summer's classes saved....it's just not going to happen.

I was so ready to leave Alabama and now I would give almost anything to go back for just a few days. Don't get me wrong. I love being out here. I love the anonymity, not having to look over my shoulder when I go out for someone I know and don't want to bump into, not having the same questions being asked "what are you going to do after school", "when are you going to have kids"....

I know it's just homesickness and I'm sure it will pass, but I'm just so bummed right now. How do you deal with homesickness and missing those that you love?

Gosh I had a lot of pictures to post! I hope you enjoy, have a happy holiday, and blessed be.

early November when the leaves were still green

I've been trying to get back to taking "first light" or sunrise pictures

Normal kitty business here

There's two of me!!!

This November was how I remembered it when I was growing up: cold and drizzly

I was a little drunk, but I love it

Anniversary #6

It seems like so much was different six years ago. 

I was working third shift at East Alabama Medical Center in the lab and Buddy had been working for Auburn's transit for a few months. 

Our wedding party consisted of people we barely speak to now. One is on purpose because she is an idiot, some are due to me being a hermit (I'll explain eventually), and the others are due to life I guess. 

That day flew by so fast. I am so glad for pictures because it feels like I just blinked and it was gone. 

We have been through a lot these six years: from loss of jobs, loss of family members and friends alike, to me going back to school an getting my bachelors, new friends, moving three times (once with my in-laws), new jobs, car troubles, new (to us) cars, family drama, loss of furbabies and anything in between. 

My husband is my rock, my solid ground. I tease him occasionally by saying he doesn't get excited about things (which he doesn't), but I believe it's this trait that keeps me grounded when I think everything is spinning out of control. Occasionally it is frustrating when I try to surprise him with something I think he might like. But we all have our little quirks that our significant others finds frustrating, right? 

We spent our day lounging around, watching football, and eating not so healthy queso, like we wanted to. He loves my queso and I don't make it often. Our teams lost both yesterday (Alabama) and today (Texans). I think it's cause it's the first year our anniversary fell on a game day since the day we were married. That day we were blessed with a narrow win over Kentucky (I was wearing team colors, which I don't do any more) and an Auburn loss to Vandy. So in 6 more years when our day is on another game day, it should be better again. I know, I'm superstitious....but this I only football. 

To celebrate our anniversary, here are some of my favorite pictures from that day six years ago and one from this mornings walk with Luna. I hope you all have a great and blessed week! Get outside and enjoy fall!!!

We were up before the morning glories. 

Gracie

Gracie was one the many pet names I had growing up. The only difference between it and the others was I came by it honestly. 

Clumsiness runs in my family. Well, at least my female cousins and I are by far the most clumsy of the bunch. I pretty much have scars on almost every part of my body from some accident or another. This includes my face. 

Last night I had another case of the clumsies when I was walking to my side of the bed from turning off the light. My middle toe hit the leg of the bed and either the bed or my toe make a cracking sound. It hurt so bad, I immediately put my face into the mattress to holler in pain. My hollering eventually turned into hysterical laughter cause that's what we crazy clumsy people do to push through the pain. I swear if I ever have children, everyone in the delivery room is going to be confused. 

I eventually pulled myself into the bed and turned on the flashlight of my phone to look at my toe. It was already swole a little but it didn't look broke. So I tried I curl my toes. If you can move it then it's not broke, right? At least that was what I was taught growing up. I tried some more and eventually it didn't hurt to curl, but hurt like a mother fucker when I straightened them out. (And yes, this kind of pain warrants a mother fucker or two.) 

Taking Luna out to potty this morning proved difficult in flip-flops, but the swelling was about the same and there was only a slight lavender hue to the toe joint. So, I put on my tennis shoes to go to school and even walked across campus to get Panda Express for lunch with some lab mates. We had been planning on Panda Wednesdays for a week now and I was too excited to pass up the first one. One of my lab mates found some ace tape in her desk (from a previous owner) so I taped my toe to the larger neighbor to help stabilize it. Boy did that feel so much better! I even passed my step goal for the day! 

However, come 230 my tennis shoe had to go. Every step hurt. I only put my shoe back on to go to the bathroom (gross) and even left the building for the day with my socks on. Buddy had to cut the tape of my toes cause I couldn't stand the pain of unraveling it myself. Quick aside here: I know this all makes me sound like a pansy, but I seriously have a high pain threshold. Usually I can push on through. But this, this is brutal. Ok, back to what I was saying. Once the tape was off, it was evident that my toe is broken. It's not black and blue yet. Just still this nice dark lavender at my top toe knuckle and down the side of my toe. So I've got a few days of hobbling ahead and it's really quite pitiful. Even for a Gracie like me. 

Serenity update: Ne-Ne finished her meds last week on the 3rd and we had two days of no peeing on the floor afterwards. I was about ready to call the vet again when the urinating started again, but I thought maybe I need to give the special food more time to work. I have now converted the white board on the fridge to a pee chart so I can keep up with pee free days. I've also been cleaning the litter box everyday to keep up with how many times she has peed in a day. So far it's been twice. I don't know if that's good or bad, but the monitoring will continue until it becomes as frequent as it was when we took her to the vet. The food is making her super soft an I don't know if it's related or not, but she's also been super talkative. She even woke me up this morning. 

I don't have many pictures to share from last time I posted, but here they are. Blessed be and have a great week!!

Jungle kitty

This little male ruby-throated hummingbird aggressively defends the two feeders I have on the porch. 

Wow. I kinda fell off the face of the Earth for a while huh? Let's see, last I posted anything was the 4th of July and here it is nearing the end of August. A little and a lot has happened since then.

Our friends Brittany and Tia made the long trek from Alabama to spend a few days with us. We were able to show them some of the cool stuff around town, taste some of they yummy food, and use the opportunity to be tourists ourselves. Although we have been here for six months, we really haven't ventured out very much. It was pretty neat to learn some of the history of this little town.

Other than our visitation adventures, it's pretty much been the same 'ol same 'ol 'round here. Most days I feel like I'm running around in circles with my project, but I know I'm doing it to myself. I'll be reading along, making headway and then BAM! I've got to see if there are any other articles about this topic. Next thing I know it's almost 5 and I've managed to download 20 more articles to read. Same thing the next day only it'll be, "what if I did this?" or "maybe I could run a chi-square test on this data" and next thing I know it's almost 5 and I've managed to give myself a huge headache and realize that everything I did was completely unnecessary. This week was, "let's cut birds with a distance greater than blah amount" and "let's do a third cut with a distance greater than this other amount", then "well, now I have to do corrected occupancy sheets for each of those", followed by "well I guess I just can't count so I need to recount the first list so I can correctly count the second and third lists." Hi, my name is Libby and I like to create more work for myself. Oh yea, and I can't count.

On the bright side of this week, Buddy had an interview and had a drug screen. Granted he is not sure how many people this company is looking to hire and there were multiple people interviewed, but we gotta hold on to hope.

This coming week I start my first classes as a grad student! I'm kinda stoked cause I'll get into a better and earlier routine. As the temperatures started getting higher I've been slacking on my walking and I can tell. I don't have as much energy as I did when I got back from field season and my clothes that were starting to get loose on me have now started to "shrink" again. It doesn't help that I pulled something in my back this past Friday (now a week ago) during my stressful tirade around campus trying to figure out why I was not "meeting requirements" for my financial aid that would be coming in the following Monday. I've been trying to take it easy, but that is not easy for me since I don't like to sit still. It's MUCH better than it was during the week! Getting up still hurts, but once I'm up and moving I'm ok. Hopefully with this new schedule (8am classes Tuesday and Thursday) I'll be able to get up earlier on the other days and get back to my hiking routine. I know Luna would be thankful.

I've also got to get back into blogging again. I've got some ideas floating around in my head such as "bird of the week" posts where I blog info about certain birds of interest, or even "animal of the week" with information on animals in the news, or some combination of the two. Also, I'm going to get a little more personal on here. Right now it's pretty black and white and there are a lot of things that I would like to share that weigh on my heart and that other people can relate to.

As per usual, here are some photos from the week...er month between posts. Blessed Be.

"We'll be ok. I do this all the time."

One of the many historical houses in Nacogdoches.
This one is also a B&B

The elusive yellow-billed cuckoo and I have developed a relationship.

Weekends are so hard here

leaf-footed bug in the rain

It only took 3 years, but they are so sweet to each other now!

Maybe because it isn't a "light" beer, but it's decent.

kitty model, Serenity

August sunset in Nacogdoches

Wish you were here

It has now been five months since we made the move from Alabama to Texas and today is the day of the biggest party of the year back home. While we had offers to help us out to get to it, I turned them down. I don't like accepting gifts, especially cash, that I feel like I don't deserve. Call me crazy (I know I am), but that's just how I feel.

So the last couple of days I've been feeling pretty sorry and just down right depressed. I knew we really don't money to splurge right now, but I needed an adventure. Just something to get us both out of the apartment, into the fresh (cooler than normal) air, and do something together. So we played the hand of god driving game until we were still in Nacogdoches after over half an hour. Then we just decided to drive down 59 until we used up a quarter tank of gas and had a drive thru lunch. 

On the way back, Buddy wanted to find lake Nacogdoches. We are looking for signs for where the lake is (we used NO GPS today!) and a memory pops into my head like it was just yesterday. 

"The roads are getting more hilly and twisty. That's a sure sign we are getting close to water." Buddy gives me a "yeah right" look and I explain that's what my grandfather used to tell me when we were headed to lake Martin and I would ask if we were there yet. "Are you sure he didn't just say that to make you shut up and quit asking him questions?" I concede that it was a possiblity, but soon enough there was a sign for the turn for the lake! Boom! Grandaddy for the win! 

I've been thinking of him lately and I'm not sure if it's just because of the 4th (his favorite holiday behind Christmas), or I've been stuck head down in my work, or cause I've been missing everyone from back home. Whatever the case might be, I thought it was neat enough to write about. 

Here's some photos of the week. I hope everyone has a great and safe holiday weekend and drink a beer for me! 

4th of July moon rise. 

4th of July sunset

Random county road the signs told us to go down during our hand of god game today. 

I asked for a small water for Luna, but the sweet people at Whataburger gave us a medium (yes that's a medium!!) and a small dish for her to drink from. This was easier.