didja ever notice?

You never worry that you'll drop the sweater you're turning right-side out to wear until you turn it right-side out over a bucket of paint water.

holy cow, it's been a while

sorry guys, dial up has become my nemesis as it won't stay connected for longer than an hour (which is about how long it takes to visit two or three sites). So my blog has been more or less abandoned. Don't worry too much though, we're planning to get faster internet in not too long. Right now Logan and I are hanging out at his grandparents house up in Anacortes. They have fast internet :) i'm tired and my mind is bllllaaaaaaagh.......i'll write more later.

More to imagine

I have more decorations up now! (No more than the last time I talked to you Mom, but I haven't talked to everyone since I put them up) Realistic looking garlands around the top of my front door and my kitchen door on the inside with lights, snowflakes and red and green Christmas balls.

I looped another garland along my ceiling between my dining and living rooms that also has lights, snowflakes and a few small Christmas balls. It isn't realistic looking but it does have sparkley bits and I put wonderful green jingle balls on it. Jingle balls are like jingle bells of course, just bigger.

I also found my angel and my little skating penguin. All the decorations I've gotten to far, except the lights around the inside of my front door, are from my parents. Hooray for Mom and Dad! Now I have a jolly holiday house :D Hopefully I'll find the cord that lets me put pictures on my computer soon so that all you guys can see it too.

On a less Christmassy note, I decided yesterday that if I was a vandal then I would paint on a sign by the Shopko down the road. It was a pedestrian crossing sign that said "Watch for" with a picture of that little walking guy and a bicycle. Which I understood to say "watch for bicycles chasing people" (*smirk* obviously, right?). So I figured, should I become a hoodlum, I would paint devil horns and a tail on the bike and scared lines by the man's head. That way the intended warning would be more straightforward. It would also be more obvious that enchanted, unmanned bicycles are dangerous creatures and should be feared.

I would also paint on the arrow tree near the 512 on-ramp right by Denny's in Parkland. The silly thing is on a two lane, two-way road and points left, right and forward which just cracks me up. I guess the guys who paint on the streets were bored or had a bit of extra paint they needed to use up. I would paint another triangle on the bottom to make an arrow pointing backwards and then write the word "ONLY"


hehehe, only...

it's been a month... only two more weeks

I miss Logan tonight, I hate when I can't remember vividly what it feels like to kiss Logan. That's one of the worst things about him being gone so long. That and I miss talking to him, I got to chat with my father in law yesterday and as much as I love our all too infrequent phone chats I felt sad because Logan and his dad sound so much alike. It made me think about how much I miss Logan's voice *sigh*. Ha ha, I'm so melodramatic. I can get pretty ridiculous when Logan is gone. I really have to keep my head and my sense of humor or these times suck more than usual, which is pretty bad.

Ah well, a deep breath, a few fruit snacks, and a glass apple juice and I'll be right as rain *gasp* I may even have a string cheese in the fridge! Thank you, my friends and family, for being so great, supportive and available to lend wisdom and insight (even if it's just about Christmas lights and carpet pads) Logan and I wouldn't be able to survive the army if we didn't have you. We love you all :)

Christmas is coming...

I put my outside lights up yesterday, I'll have to try and get a good picture to put up here. Until then just imagine the most beautiful string of white lights, a few blinking, many shining brightly for all to see and four burnt out but moved around so that they don't look weird that you've ever seen on my new house. Just be sure to imagine them strung along the gutter and half the fence on the left side of the house when you're standing in the street looking towards the house... oh, be sure to imagine that you're watching for cars too.

My pets are so cute. They hopped up onto the couch with me and curled into little fuzzy sleeping balls of cuteness. I'm feeling a bit sleepy myself but I'm too busy playing with my new and fancy dial up internet :D it's not the fastest thing ever in my life but it's internet and it's 10 bucks a month (yay) so it's pretty great.

Now I just need to get a garbage can and figure out how to make Chaos stop trying to attack the cursor because she keeps stepping on the keyboard.

But first!! Spuuumoniiii!! mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

futile effort

hokay so... I was going to do a post but I'm just too tired so y'all will have to wait until tomorrow.

Hey, I can be southern if I want :P shoot me if it makes you mad ...... but not in a vital organ ok? Maybe the foot... or a toenail... I mean if you HAVE to shoot me, those would be acceptable places.... I guess. Of course if you do you'll have to be prepared for the wrath of Logan which I don't even want to think about because it would be swift and terrible. So maybe if you're mad you should not shoot me... the more I think about that the more I realize how stupid it is, just get over it.



oh, Joylynn just so you know I mean swift as in deadly fast, not cool.


I guess it wasn't such a futile effort, at least this is a post... not informative in the least but this isn't a bulletin board it's a blog. How could anything called "blog" be that serious, really....

I am adventurous

Adventures on which I am to embark soon:

• vacationing in Portland awaiting house vacancy
• turning 21
• moving into our first house
• having kittens and a puppy
• job hunting

Adventures on which I am embarked:

• having Logan at school in Georgia
• moving out of my first living place away from home

More adventures to which I look forward with great excitement and anticipation:

• making my house mine with paint and decorating and all that fun stuff!
• Logan coming home for Christmas!!!!!

Hi guys

I bet you're all wondering what wonderful adventures I've been up to and why I haven't posted... or maybe you just assume that I am busy, that I have a life... hehehe, a life...

Well I'm not all that busy, unless you count preparing to move as busy. I guess I don't really because it's just one thing with a bunch of parts. I'm sure I'll feel crazy busy tomorrow and Sunday when we're actually physically moving everything out of the apartment. Then not busy because I'll be in Portland (yay!) then busy again in a week and a half or perhaps two weeks when we (being myself and whoever of my family and friends is free and willing to help) move everything into the house.

As for now I'm just sitting at home, about to maybe heat up left over Safeway soup from the fridge, and being really frustrated with this U Haul business. It's actually a great deal it's just that when someone from "my local" uhaul place called me this afternoon I forgot to ask which one they were and they didn't say :P so we know we have a trailer rented at a uhaul somewhere in or around Tacoma we just don't know where to go. On top of that we don't even know if we can get a hold of anyone this late. I found a number to call... I'm on hold... I've decided that voices that sound like an attempt to soothe any frustrated customers most likely only antagonize them to hang up or else be very angry once they do connect with a human being. They say things about how they're doing everything they can to get to your call as fast as they can, and that you'll be helped in no time and amazing flying ninja cats and turtles are racing through the streets of Tokyo helping everyone who called before you to make sure you can talk to someone soon!!! well maybe not the last bit exactly....

Hokay! I talked to someone! I talked to a national person (I guess) and they told me which uhaul I was supposed to get my trailer from. So I called Logan, who was about 25 minutes away (in good traffic) and he said he and his buddies would leave right away. I called the place just to make sure they'd be good to head over there and the faithful employee (who, by the way, didn't sound all too sure of himself but I'd like to think that he is a faithful and dutiful employee) said, "that isn't 'till tomorrow" :P but when I talked to the lady this afternoon SHE said I could pick it up today and she'd give me an extra day free! Alas, the proud U-haul employee informed me that they shut down outside operations at quarter 'till. So I guess we'll get it tomorrow...

In the mean time adventures shall ensue!! A couple of Logan's buddies are hanging out at our apartment tonight (fun!) and at midnight Logan and I are going to drive to the airport to pick up yet ANOTHER buddy! Why are we gallivanting around so late the night before we embark on a weekend of moving? You may ask... this may just be the flying ninja cats and turtles talking but it's be good times.

And that's just the way things go! In Taaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaacoma!

oh, one more thing. An update on Max, the poor little guy is hiding underneath the couch, he got neutered today (we have impeccable timing eh?) He'll probably just chill under a table or chair somewhere while everything is going on tomorrow. I'm not quite sure...

Adventures

Okay Mom, here's the whole grand tale.

On Sunday Logan and I were heading home from our weekend trip to Portland, everything seemed to be in order but something went wrong. Clearly, the title wouldn't be "adventures" if we just went home and drank juice. The first bit of irrationally dumb obstacles we encountered was the fact that I-5 was closed from SR 500 to the onramp from I-205. What compounded the madness was that when we were kicked off of I-5 (which I actually didn't believe would happen, I was sure that it was a mistake and that they certainly wouldn't close I-5 on a Sunday... but they certainly would) we didn't know where to go to keep going north! So we called my dad and he told us where to go. Of course just before we got onto 205 we saw a sign that told us people who were trying to go north on I-5 could get there on I-205... why there weren't ANY signs like that on or near I-5 we couldn't guess.

We finally got going where we wanted to be going all along, north. We stopped at a rest area for coffee and the obvious. But when we started out the truck made terrible noises. It was kind of like a clunk, but not a normal clunk, it was like a clunk on steroids, with super powers trying to rip off our front axel... but only when we turned the wheel. Nothing was obviously wrong, which was extremely frustrating. So we called parents for advise and Logan looked under and around the truck but we couldn't figure out what the crap was wrong so we called for a tow.

The rest area was just about exit 54, nearly halfway home. Unfortunately, the closest tow company Logan's insurance found for us was in Longview. So after waiting for an hour or so the tow guy got there and took us back to around exit 36. Grrr... at least the tow guy was cool, Max went from barking at him when he first picked us up to standing on his lap trying to look out his window, it was funny. When we got to the Midas that we'd be told about by the insurance company it was closed, luckily they had a early drop off thing with envelopes to put your keys in so we put our key in and shoved it under the door (we couldn't find a mail slot). Then we called around to try and figure out how we were going to get home. After messing with the truck some more and just kind of sitting around in Longview we got a hold of my Mom. She came up and after some debate we finally decided to head north, she drove us to Centralia I think we got off around exit 82 (after getting stuck in heavy traffic due to an accident :P) and were met by one of Logan's buddies. We went to Fort Lewis and borrowed another buddy's car to drive home (relishing the heated seats :D ) On a good day it takes a bit more than 2 hours to get to Tacoma from Portland, on Sunday it took 9.

The next day Midas called and told us our transfer case was stuck in 4-wheel drive and we needed a new one. A new t case from the factory would run about $1,200 and labor would be about $200 on top of that. Fortunately the Midas guys (who were GREAT by the way) called around and found us one in Chehalis (just south of Centralia) for $450 and said if we could get it to them by around 3 they'd put it in for us same day! So Logan rented a car on post for cheap and we drove to the wreckers where the part was. We were running a bit late but were hoping we could pick the part up quick and get south by around 3:30. But no :P the wreckers said they would have it out by 5 (the Midas in Longview closed at 5:30) so we left grumbling and got ice cream. We finally did get it at 4:45 and got to Midas just before closing. On the way down I had a grand idea, I would stay the night in Portland if we could meet my parents somewhere and then perhaps have my Mom drive me up the next morning, which was when the best Midas employees ever said they'd put it in for us. The other option was Logan and I driving home to Tacoma and then back to Longview in the morning just so we could drive home again in two vehicles. So we called my folks and they said that'd be good.

So I slept over at my parents' house and in the morning we went to Midas and I got my truck all fixed and good and headed home. I only had one stop to make but it turned out to be a messy one. After getting lost and having to turn around at the next exit I dropped our old t-case off at the wreckers to get a deposit back. What I didn't realize when I got there was that they would take it out of the bed for me if I had only backed up to their gate. Instead I heaved it out of the truck and into the shop, the employees there had a chuckle and I just about covered myself in motor oil and dirt :P After leaving I decided I would stop by the Home Depot near our new house to get an application, I got all turned around again and THEN they told me they do all their hiring online. Fine, I'll apply online stupidheads.... Anyway, I was all flustered and annoyed because I'd gotten lost and I was covered in muck so I didn't write all this yesterday.

So there you go... more or less anyway... pretty long...

His name is Demetri Martin and he amuses me

This is my new favorite quote from a comic:

"To me swimming is a confusing sport because sometimes you do it for fun, but then other times you do it to not die... and when I'm swimming sometimes I don't know which one it is... I gotta go by the outfit *looks down* pants.. uh oh"

My dog is scared of the foot-locker lock

Logan bought me an airbrush kit a bit ago with paints and everything so I decided to paint his helmet. I've never used an airbrush before except to try it out when we first opened it and all that consisted of was red splotches on some scrap paper. Anyway, I was just playing around with it for a couple hours and this is what came out.


On this side I painted a side view of Pointe Du Hoc, it's where the 2nd Ranger Battalion scaled cliffs on D-Day to take out enemy artillery.






Here's a little detail of the spiderwebbing or whatever you want to call it. It was probably an accident that I thought looked cool, I'm not quite sure.






I didn't get a good picture of this side, if you guys really want to see it I guess I can get another shot and post it. It's supposed to be New Zealand but the angle is off because the islands were seperate stencils and Stewart island is too big. Logan said it's ok though and that he can tell it's New Zealand.



So there, my first attempt at airbrushing. Not all that amazing but I think it looks cool and the design incorporates two big aspects of Logan :)

I like art.

Good news!!

I didn't kill the keyboard! I just forgot to put part of it back in when I put it back together :) and I found pictures of Logan!!






here he is walking with little Max,




















and here he's playing with a slightly bigger Max, :)














no Max here, just Logan. My slow camera skills that day failed to capture him "boarding" down the rocks. Unfortunately rock boarding is fun for the briefest moment then your board stops and you don't. Nonetheless I've heard it's a good time.






So there you go! Turns out I didn't need ninja skills at all :D

oops.. my bad

ok... sooo.... I would put a picture of Logan on here but... I'm on the laptop and there are only old pictures of him on here. There isn't anything wrong with the regular computer itself I just kind of... sort of.... killed the keyboard. I tried to clean it and now it won't work... we may have to get a new one.

I guess I'll have to just take a new picture and put it onto this here lappy, hey! :) Good plan! No worries 'Rise :D I'll get you a picture of your brother in law, and it'll be a GOOD one, rest assured, even if I have to whip out my mad ninj4 sk1llz :D

Logan is gone, my only company for the past few days has been the dog... so I took pictures

This is my dog,
Mad Max,
he's a cutie.

and here he is licking the futon... I can't assure you whether it is a delicious futon or not. Perhaps if I were a bit more tired or if Logan were here (just to weird him out and get a laugh at his confused face) I may do more extensive research but alas I am no where near 3-in-the-morning tired and Logan is somewhere being fantasically maggotish, probably in the woods, and probably marching*. So, without further ado or knowledge of the tastiness of my couch, I leave you to gaze upon Mad Max licking the futon.













*I put the little starry next to marching because sometimes it's not really marching. It's just walking long distances with a lot of pounds of ruck sack on his back and a gun in his hands... sometimes.

Hungry hungry Alyssa... breakfast shall be soon :)

Update time!

The party was fun, we missed everyone that didn't get to be there. I'm sad that we couldn't be more accommodating by giving people a bigger heads up but life is crazy, especially when you're in the army. I just hope that we can hang out with everybody who didn't get to come soon. I will post a picture or two when I get them, we didn't take any on our camera but there are a few on my Mom's.

What are we doing now? Not much; vacation is over, Logan is working while I chill out with the dog whilst deciding where I should work when we move. Making many plans of painting, building things and decorating at the new house :) plans are fun but I'm a little bummed that we can't move until November :P stupid lease. Oh well, all in God's timing which is perfect and right and good and all that. Praise God that we get a house and can move at all :D Yay God!!!

Now it's time to eat! Hooray breakfast!

sorry for the delay

TA DAAA!!!







































































There you go, pictures of the front, the living room, dining room, kitchen, hallway and the back. I like the trees, the little window in the kitchen above the sink and Logan, cause he's hot :) the yard is fully fenced and is about 1/3 acre :D yay.

house house house

This morning Logan and I met up with Tony the inspector and took a good look at what will be our new place, hopefully, in about a month and a week. As long as nothing crazy happens... like rampant moosen...

That particular instance not seeming to be immanent we're in high spirits. Unfortunately blogger is being a butt and I can't get the pictures to load :( sorry guys. I'll try later and if that doesn't work I'll try tomorrow again... and if THAT doesn't work I'll print some out, stand on my balcony and hold them up reeeeally high. I'm sure if you have a good pair of binoculars you could make them up... I mean out, make them out... yeah.

hi guys

yeah Cherstuieseybug (that's a conglomeration of nickname, there, for ya) I'm in Portland. Logan and I drove his brother down here yesterday so we're hanging out for a couple days then we'll head back because Logan has to work. So... yeah, that's about it. Oh, and Mike Birbiglia is funny stuff.

Yay fourth

:) Hey guys, sorry about that silly pity party, (see: south and sad) it happens sometimes. But I'm better, thanks largely due to getting to be here in Sisters for some days hanging out with my Godsiff family (including a soon to be). Just so you know guys, they're best :D I love hanging out with them, especially when Caroline and I get to eat our best friends and get directions from nice landscapers.





I'll have to get a picture of the rest of these cool people at some stage but for now just the girls. Here's Caroline and I riding horses (superfun) you'll probably guess immediately who the photogenic one is eh. *cough* Caroline! *cough* *cough* I was riding Jesse and she was on Misty and all except for Misty being a bit shy we all look sensational!!! Yay us




I'm not sure what we're all doing down here today. Maybe finding a rodeo, maybe seeing fireworks.... if it doesn't storm on us... we'll see.

south and sad

I'm in Sisters now. I love Sisters, it's a great town. All except for the fact that I'm here without Logan. :P I don't know why but I'm being pouty about Logan being gone, it'll be at least 55 days (8 weeks) until I get to see him. I haven't figured out which description sounds like less but they both make me feel like I want to cry. Stupid school.... in stupid Georgia.... where I can't stupid see my husband....

I think I'm going to go curl up in a ball and be sad....