Ah, yes.  I did indeed fall off the face of the earth the last couple of months.

I truly didn’t do much in November aside from cook my first Thanksgiving dinner solo for only two of us.  Needless to say, I can’t cook for just two people so we ate for a solid week and a half.

Oh! We did get a new puppy.  We brought Audie home about a week before Thanksgiving from a rescue group here on Oahu. We were told he is a lab mix, but he has far more terrier and possibly a little hound in him.  He won’t be nearly as big as we were gunning for.  But he’s adorable and I’m loving the addition.

Other than that, November was fairly calm.  I took the Mister out shopping for the first time on Black Friday.  He was not impressed and told me he wasn’t going next year. Apart from that, we have our hands full with three fur kids now.  We are still working feverishly to get this little guy completely potty trained, but he’s doing well!

December was a little more exciting.

My family came for two whole weeks! I haven’t seen any of them in person since the week after our wedding.  My mother is essentially my best friend so I was truly needing her here more than anything.  I took them around to various places on Oahu–a good chunk of them new to me as well. I took far too many photos and have yet to get around to posting them (the family left on NYE and I’m still trying to cope/find my house). Once I do, I will gladly post a link.

I realized after dropping them off at the airport and sobbing the whole way home–NOT recommended as I was driving–exactly how cut off from everyone we know we are here.  His family is in North Carolina/Alabama, my family is in Nebraska/Iowa, and our friends span the entire contiguous United States as well as a sprinkling throughout Europe/Australia. We are the odd men out.  It’ safe to say our “honeymoon phase” for living here is over.  We have about 29 more months here…So I’m really focusing all of my energy back into finding a job–still unsuccessful, more on that later–and finding us a place that feels more like a home. With just us here, we really need to find something that connects us or we’re in for an ungodly long remainder of the tour.

As I said, the job market is abysmal. Since I have a degree, I can no longer just pick up a part time job willy-nilly.  I’m vastly overqualified, but I’m also incredibly bored and would LOVE something to occupy my time–if it happens to be the same job I had in college, so be it.  But other than that, it’s the extreme lack of opportunities on this island.  With the economy in the crapper still, I’m hard pressed to hop in anywhere, especially because I am not a local.  I truly feel like I am living in Georgia again–I am the minority. I’m used to working all the time, sometimes two or three jobs.  With nothing now, I’m becoming very rusty with communication and have a very low tolerance for some of the stuff I see while shopping in any retail setting. Not only that, but I’m a social creature.  I crave so much more than a few words with my animals/husband. I’m losing hope, but desperately trying not to.

In other news, welcoming in 2014 seems to be going smoothly.  I am hopeful for changes and clinging to whatever shred of positivity I might still possess.

Here’s to continuing on this path and seeing what happens next!

Cheers.

-A. xoxo