Interesting Article

I stumbled upon this article today on CNN.com. It's no news to me, as we've been told for over a year that communication in Afghanistan is primitive, certainly when compared to the communications that troops have had in Iraq and on ships in the Persian Gulf. No Skype, little email, few phone calls...it seems unthinkable on one hand. But on the other, this is how people communicated to their loved ones for war after war! I'm hoping it won't be too painful for me, since I don't have another deployment to compare it to...it's not like I'm used to getting calls from halfway around the world every day, unlike other wives whose husbands have been deployed recently. 

Anyway, I'm all about educating people on what this life is like, so I thought maybe some of you would find this interesting. Lesson here: send Greg (and any one else you know who is or will be deployed) a real live letter - they will love it!

The Article: "Letters Precious to U.S. troops in Afghan outposts"

Superdog

As some of you may know, while I was spending much needed time with family and friends the past three weeks, Mr. Rocky Rockstar Gehring was attending "K-9 Bootcamp" here in California. It sounds a lot scarier than it is - K-9 Companions, the company that runs the program, is all about positive reinforcement, not about being scary! They've actually training many LA-area athletes, actors, and other celebrities (they're located in Riverside, which is halfway between Yucca Valley and LA). Check them out: K-9 Companions.

I dropped Rocky off on my way to the airport on July 1st, and had my "pick up lesson" with him this morning. Basically, after three weeks of training Rocky, now the trainers had to train me to practice everything he's learned. Right away, I could tell he's learned SO much! Most importantly, he no longer only obeys when there's a piece of food dangling in front of his face (admittedly our fault for getting him on this habit). Secondly, it's as if he's discovered how to use his ears. He's mastered sit, stay, come, down, heel, and knows not to come into a certain doorway if I tell him that. 

It was actually really hard to learn how to talk to him. For example, I'm only supposed to say his name when saying a command, such as "Rocky, heel." I'm not supposed to say "Bad dog, Rocky!" or "Rocky, no!", because then he thinks of his name as a negative thing, and will stop responding to it. Interesting. I now have to work with him for 20 minutes a day, six days a week for 90 days, to reinforce this behavior. After 90 days, I might be able to train him to do these things off leash. 

The Boot Camp program also consists of an in-home visit by the trainer a week after the boarding part. The trainer will come out here next weekend, and teach us (hopefully Greg will be home by then) how to train him in the house. After that, we have monthly visits to the kennel for a full year. 

He definitely still has a ways to go, but this is a huge improvement! He seems more confident, and just the fact that he's listening to me is amazing. Now that the ball's in my court to keep him so well trained, I feel nervous! Hopefully we'll keep it up!

California Here I Come

Tomorrow, after three weeks in Maryland, I am heading back to California. I have a massive head cold, and all I want to do is sleep and try to clear out my sinuses, so the two flights between Maryland and California are not looking so appetizing right now. Hopefully my ear won't clog as badly as it did yesterday, on my flight back from Boston. I can't wait to get home and sleep.

It's been wonderful being home and catching up with everyone. I've definitely gotten a great dose of Maryland summer, eating steamed crabs twice, lots of crabcakes, and soft shell crabs! I've also gotten out on the boat several times, and have soaked in enough humidity to last me until next year. There's nothing like being home in the summer!

After I arrive back in California, I have a little less than two weeks until Greg gets back. We are over the halfway hump by now, which is great, but it seems like he's been gone forever! I wish deployments consisted of just leaving one day for 8 months, but instead it's several 2, 3, and 4 week training sessions building up to those 8 months. It might as well be a year! After he gets back, I get two weeks with him, then he heads out for three more weeks. Let's hope the next two weeks go by fast, and the two weeks after he gets home go by as slow as molasses :). 

Wish me safe travels tomorrow!

Pics from Cape Cod

View from the Hochs' house

Sweet 12-week old Bailey, the Welsh Springer Spaniel

The crew on the cocktail cruise

Our beautiful hostess/event planner, serving margaritas

Fun in Cape Cod

This past weekend, I traveled up to Massachusetts for a reunion with my high school friends on Cape Cod. I'd never been to the Cape before, and it was beautiful! It was great to visit the state where I lived for 5 years during the coldest, dreariest winters, only to this time enjoy it in the summer. 

As many of you know, I think my friends from high school are the best in the world. They are so supportive, funny, uplifting, and are always willing to go the extra mile to get together (even though this happens once a year, on a good year). Three of them came out to California to visit me in March when Greg was training, and we all decided to try to plan another reunion this summer when I was home, so we could catch up on happenings again. 

Everything about the weekend was beautiful. The weather was perfect - 75-80 and sunny every day. Even more beautiful was the house where we stayed, which belonged to my friend Caroline's parents. They were such wonderful hosts, and it was great to catch up with them. We also had beautiful and delicious food! I had the most wonderful sandwiches on artisan bread every day, Cape Cod chips (my FAVORITE! and they don't sell them in California), blueberry muffins, pancakes, and even a frittata one day for breakfast, and excellent dinners and desserts. Thank goodness I'm "eating for two" (shhhh! don't tell the psycho doctor on base!). 

We spent the weekend doing nothing but relaxing activities. We went on their boat for a cocktail cruise one night, traveled to a beautiful beach on the Atlantic Ocean one day (where I got a massive burn - oops!), window shopped in town, lay out on the lawn, napped, talked, and read. Even though I caught a cold there (not sure why :( ), it was still so relaxing. 

 As usual, it was great to spend time with my friends. I felt like I was able to catch up with every single one of them, and have my usual sidesplitting laughs and great conversations. I am so lucky to have them!

Pretty Annapolis

As most of you probably know, my dream town is Annapolis. I'd love to live there in the long run, and love its proximity to my parents' house and Greg's parents' house, the activity there, and the beauty/Maryland culture that it shares with the Eastern Shore. Katherine and I went to the Wednesday Night Races in Annapolis a few weeks ago, and the pictures I took just perfectly capture the town, so I thought I'd share them with you. Enjoy!

Baby Shower

Time for a long overdue update. Since the 4th, I've been keeping myself busy! Katherine, who came home for the 4th, stayed for two weeks, and we spent the entire time pretending like we were in the midst of a middle school summer. Meaning, we'd wake up in the morning and brainstorm some crazy activity that would launch us out of the painful summer boredom that inevitably sets in in Chestertown. Among our excursions: a trip to Annapolis for dinner and Wednesday night racing (sailing, for those of you who aren't familiar), another trip to Annapolis to buy baby stuff for my parents' house, shop at Whole Foods, and to eat lunch with Mary Chaney (Kat's sis-in-law) and her mom, and a trip to the craft store in Dover to cook up some crafts for the baby. We had a blast. We spent lots of time hanging out and catching up, which was wonderful because I hadn't seen her since New Year's. 

In addition to than filling up my lazy days with Kat, I attended a baby shower that she put together for me at my parents' house. It was so much fun! It was a small affair - about 8 people came, but it was wonderful because I got to catch up with everyone there, including Greg's mom, Greg's aunt, three of my friends from college, and my roommate from Richmond. Everyone was so generous, and I got more adorable pink clothes than I thought existed! Baby Caroline will be the most fashionable girl on the block once she gets here. The best part of the shower, besides the people, was the food! Kat cooked homemade BLTs, deviled eggs, gazpacho, salad, shrimp cocktail, and corn bread. For dessert we had peach pie. Yummy! It was such a wonderful Maryland summer lunch. 

Some pics from the shower: 

Three cheers and many thanks to Kat for all of her hard work! 

Editor's Note: Correction

As the wonderful Ms. Carly Humphrey pointed out to me, my pregnant mind has obviously arrived in full force. For some reason, both in my picture of her and my description of Jackie Naso's wedding, I called Carly Jackie. This is funny to me, since when we all first pledged KD way back when, I had the hardest time distinguishing the two of them, probably because they both had the same length brown hair. Other than that, they really don't look that much alike, but apparently part of my brain still confuses the two.

Sorry Carly - I will correct the post!

Pics from Last Weekend

Arthur, Katherine's in-laws' dog, enjoying the lawn at my parents' house

Jackie and Joey's beautiful wedding cake!

The gorgeous bride and handsome groom 

Three of the sweet KDs at the wedding - Elizabeth, Sara, and Carly!

Update from Maryland

I've been in Chestertown for a week now, and it has been quite hectic! Certainly a change of pace from my time with Rocky during the day in Yucca Valley. 

I arrived home last Wednesday evening. On Thursday, I picked up my sister in Delaware (logistical issue - her hubby Jacob was taking their car to Baltimore to see his brother, so I met her and brought her to Chestertown). Anyway, it was a great to see Kat, since I hadn't seen her since Christmas, and fun to have someone my age to hang out with around the house. 

On Friday I drove to D.C., where I met up with my friend Sara to go to a wedding. Our friend Jackie, who was in our pledge class in college, was getting married to her wonderful boyfriend (now husband - crazy!), who we all knew and loved in college. The wedding was absolutely breathtaking. It was in Leesburg, Virginia, at this beautiful church, and the wedding was at a breathtaking house in the countryside. Jackie had thought out every last detail, and everything was so tasteful! I think she definitely could have a second career in wedding planning :). 

Sara and I met up with two other girls from our pledge class, Elizabeth and Carly, who I also hadn't seen in forever. It was great to catch up with them, to sit with them during dinner, to revel in our datelessness, and to see what they've been up to. They are all doing so well, and being with these girls brought be back to the unparalleled comfort that I always get when I'm around people who really know me. People who, even if I wasn't always that close to them in college (or high school, etc), I can meet up with after years and pick up right where we left off. Sara, Carly, and Elizabeth all seemed to be doing so well, and the genuine happiness we all felt about seeing each other again and the support that I felt from all of them for what each other was doing was just so great. I'm so lucky to know so many wonderful people!

The next day, Sara and I headed over to the Eastern Shore to my parents' house, where they had a 4th of July shindig. My other sister Ann and her husband had flown in from Denver for the weekend, and Grammy and Aunt Ruth also came. Other guests were my parents' friends, who I hadn't seen since Ann's wedding in December. There were about 40 people there - it was so exhausting to small talk with all of them! I think I'm going to start giving a prerecorded answer every time someone asks about my life :). The party was still lots of fun - steamed crabs, corn on the cob, pasta salad, burgers, and hot dogs were on the menu, with strawberry shortcake, cupcakes, and key lime pie for dessert. Yummy! How I miss Maryland food when I'm in California! While we didn't get to see any fireworks, it was definitely a festive holiday.

The rest of the weekend I spent with my sisters, brothers in law, and Grammy, who stayed for a few days. It was great to catch up with everyone, and to have people to do fun summer activities like go out on the boat and kayak with. The house has slowly calmed down, though, as Grammy, Ann, and Tyler have all returned to their homes and Jacob heads back to Boston today (Katherine will hang out with me for a few more days, which I'm happy about). 

Other than hanging out with family, I've been busy practicing GMAT stuff (I took a practice test at the real testing center yesterday, and take the real test next Tuesday), and missing Greg and our pupster Rocky. I saw Carlo, Greg's roommate from Navy, a few days ago on his way back to New Hampshire, which was fun, but also made me miss Greg. On that note, Greg's friends have been so good to me - since I've been home, I've received calls from Ryan, Jared, and Kyle all checking up to see how I'm doing. I'm so lucky to have a husband with such wonderful friends that care not only about Greg but also about me! I really appreciate it.

So that's the longwinded update. I hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July, and are recovering nicely :)