Finally.... We're (Empty) Homeowners!

Well, our long national nightmare is over.

We closed on our house on Wednesday after a long and arduous battle with the not-so-fine folks down at USAA Mortgage Dept in San Antonio. They seemed hell bent on keeping us out of this house, but we persevered---not w/o a few battle scars.

They tried all the tricks in the book. They refused to answer our calls/emails, paired us with an incompetent mortgage processor, refused to answer our calls/emails, fired said mortgage processor and didn't bother to inform us (we found out via a telephone extension that no longer worked 4 days prior to our closing date), refused to answer our calls/emails, sent ALL of our paperwork to the wrong title company (in Pennsylvania) on the day of our closing, refused to answer our calls/emails, missed our closing date, refused to answer our calls/emails, missed the day AFTER our closing date, refused to answer our calls/emails, missed the day AFTER the day AFTER our closing date, refused to answer our calls/emails while the semi's w/ our household goods sat idling at our curbside waiting to unload, nearly missed the day AFTER the day AFTER the day AFTER our closing date, etc......they suck.

Anyways, we're homeowners. We're over it. We're happy.

Our house will be empty until next Friday, so an extra 10 days here on Ratsville Lane. USAA took full responsibility for all the screw ups. They requested we submit them a bill for all of the charges we incurred. The charge for the movers showing up and not unloading was $660 alone. They seem like they're just going to pay whatever we submit and forget the whole thing happened. That's what happens when I let the pitbull (JoAnna) off the leash and tell her to "Attack!"

We have tons of extra room so everyone is welcome to come visit.....2 hours to Tahoe, 90 mins to San Fran. Our new address is 985 Tiburon Way Plumas Lake, CA 95961.

Baby on Board!

Big news: we're going to be parents! We are expecting a new bundle of joy this summer---June 4th to be exact. We couldn't be more excited.....or anxious or alot of other things, but most of all thankful. We are 11 weeks along, almost done with the 1st trimester already.

So far our journey has had its ups and downs...good days and bad days both. Jo has been a trooper  throughout---even ponying up to do a 8.9 mile hike yesterday. She has already been busy stockpiling baby clothes, baby books, baby toys, etc. Finding bargains is somewhat of a game to begin for her--so now its like she has a whole new challenge on her hands. She works Craigslist pretty hard....she's well known at the Latin flea market and of course she has drug (or is it dragged?) me along to a ton of rummage sales.



(Jo thinks the baby looks like a squirrel)



We only had the opportunity to tell Kelsey, Mom and Jager in person so we did so last weekend. We picked them up from the Sac airport and brought them by the new house (we close this Friday by the way) to check it out. Part way through Jo, Jager and I snuck into one of the spare bedrooms. Jager held the ultrasound in his hands and when Mom and Kelsey walked in he said "Pam, this is going to be the baby's room."......followed by 5 seconds of silence and bewilderment on their faces....followed by Jager repeating his line....followed by hugs and congratulations.

It will be an exciting road ahead for us. And Jo will have a sympathetic ear to turn to in Kelsey--they're due 5 weeks before us...that'll be fun.

Our New Abode (hopefully)....

At last...... we have found a house! We found this house (located in Plumas Lake, CA) about 2 weeks ago and went into contract last week. We will be reunited shortly with all of our wordly belongings that we haven't seen since July. Our closing date is Nov 19th, so we should be all moved in by Thanksgiving----cannot wait.

Plumas Lake is a new development (circa 2004) with a unique set up. Imagine if you took your average suburban sub-division and airlifted it out into the country and dropped it down next to a state highway---that's Plumas Lake. The neighborhood is great....very quiet, very clean, lots of parks, lots of running/bikings paths. There aren't any retail stores in sight other than a Walgreens, so shopping/dining will require a drive into Sacramento or Lincoln.

We will be located about 20mins straight north of Sacramento and about 15 mins south of Yuba City/Marysville where we are now. It will be a 15min drive for Jo and 25 mins for me to base.

985 Tiburon Way Plumas Lake, CA 95961

I WANT a PUPPY.......and now I have one!

As many of you know I have wanted a dog FOREVER......at least for the past year plus. I have spent many hours trying to convince Josh that a dog was and is a good idea. I have tried being sweet, loving wife and I have also tried the tears and the more devil-ish behaviors too. I think it may have been the overall persistence, but regardless I GOT A DOG!





Turtle, the love of my life, was born on June 28th 2010.

Actually, she was born June 29th, but the 28th is easier to remember since Josh and I started dating on the 28th. She was an ad in the Sacramento Bee. We picked her up just before she turned 3 months......









She melted my heart.....she was an active puppy who needed some lovin', exactly what we needed! And then......we HAD a dog.





She definitely keeps us on our toes and sometimes (often times) at our boiling points. BUT, she is soooo cute, loving and fun to have around. Here are some of the things we have been able to enjoy with her since she joined the family......


1. Hiking - Empire Mine State Park......in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains

2. Bridge - One of the longest covered bridges in the US

The bridge was absolutely beautiful. Turtle went for her first swim in the river down below.....no, she didn't fall into the water, we walked her down to the river.

3. Swimming - we took turtle for a few laps in the pool in the backyard. I guess this rental isn't so bad......wait a minute. I just forgot our furniture includes two beach chairs and a crappy cot, we have a roomate, and we have some kind of nasty rodent living with us still. GRRR.

4. Bath time





What we didn't realize when we picked up our little girl is that she was FULL of fleas and round worms....yuck. So, these round worms look like spaghetti and are likely the reason she didn't seem to gain weight the first week we had her. At one week I took her to the vet and made sure she was treated for EVERYTHING. Poor little thing.



And now I have gone to putting her in the shower with me.....no I am not crazy and I am not comparable to Angela on the office and her cats ( she literally licks them clean in one episode...one nasty hairball). It was much more effective to keep the Aveeno body wash on her skin and moisturize for 15 minutes as the vet suggested. Is this too much information?

Turtle has forever changed our lives.......definitely for the better!

Unsolved Mystery

 So as Jo alluded to earlier, we have an unexpected roommate/critter running around the house that we're renting. It's driving me nuts. It will eat any food we forget out on the counter tops at night. I feel like Carl Spackler (Bill Murray) from Caddyshack trying to catch this thing---it's eaten more fruit than I have in the past 2 weeks. I really want to catch it badly. Not so much to kill it, more to find out what it is.

Each morning we rise and jump out of bed like little kids on Christmas morning to go "check the traps." Never any luck, occasionally another clue---but the mystery remains.

Here is the list of failed plans:

1) Mouse trap. This thing shed a mouse trap with ease---clearly larger than a mouse.

2)Sticky trap + mouse trap. Again, we brought a knife to a gunfight. However, the sticky traps gave us our most promising lead to date. Left behind in the stickiness was short gray/white fur. This helped us rule out any flying animals (we briefly considered bats.)

3) Sticky trap in the bottom of a cooler positioned so that it would have to jump onto the sticky trap to get at the food. Failure again, no attempt made to get the fruit. This lead me to believe that it is a fairly smart animal (i.e. squirrel, less likely a rat.)

4) Rat trap. Escaped again. At this point we slightly worried for our safety given its apparent size and intelligence. We began wedging a towel under our bedroom door at night---- just in case.

5) Varmint Trap. TBA, no luck yet. I checked out a large cage style trap on base from the vet clinic. As of yet it hasn't worked nor has any bait been disturbed. Maybe the run-in w/ the rat trap scared this thing off?? I really hope not. We've come too far to not get closure at this point. It can eat all the fruit in our house just so long as I get some answers.

6) Cat. Our landlord's mom lives 3 houses down and has offered the services of Mittens for a night or two. We haven't taken her up on it yet mostly b/c I don't want to see the Discovery Channel played out all over the living room carpet some morning before work. If we get desperate we'll eventually call Mittens out of the bullpen.

Here are the Vegas odds at this point:

Squirrel......2 to 1 odds. Clearly the favorite given the fur, the ability to get up to the counter, its apparent intelligence and the rat trap escape.

Rat........1 in 4 odds. Can a rat make its way up onto a counter top w/o assistance from a chair? Also, you would have to believe that a rat trap would catch a rat, right?

Possum-    1 in 7 odds, the Dark Horse. According to Judy (Jo's mom) they love fruit and are stealthy.

Raccoon.......1 in 40 odds. It hasn't made a go for the trash yet and we haven't heard anything, but the fur is a match.

Please call us at 701-641-1162 w/ any leads (and yes, you may remain anonymous).....

Since I haven't been able to start work, I thought I might take a spin on the old bloggin' site. Here is a little bit of what Josh and I have been up to......

1. We twiddle our thumbs.....yes Josh and I both have been held up by the credentialing process for work. The difference, Josh gets to go to work and I occupy space at the house, on base or at the county library. One more place you could find me = the base gas station where I heat up my frozen lean cuisine (classy)

2. We play foosball....and then play more foosball. Apparently Josh used to play foosball pretty competitively back in the day. Josh warned me prior to participating in our first match "I'm kinda of good at this game. No seriously, I'm really good."

3. People watch. At times we have almost had to glue our eyelids shut to keep from staring. Our favorite act......... a middle age woman squatting against a downtown business across from the police station mid-day urinating. Just doesn't get any better than that! Well, I guess the guy walking in the cross walk, on saturday morning, with his boa constrictor around his neck was pretty good too!

4. Another past time....hunting. Yes, we are on a big time hunt. For what you ask!? It seems that we are co-habitating with a large animal that likes fruit. To the date, we have not caught our furry friend.

The original trapping set-up. From this trapping we successfully caught some fur on the sticky mouse pad......the critter is still on the loose.

A super-sized rat trap was set last night........apparently it is smarter than both Josh and myself.

5. REI...finally we have an REI within reach. Saurday Josh and I spent about an hour and a half curbside waiting for the used gear sale to open at REI.

The results......

a. 3 pairs of hiking boots for Jo

b. sunglasses

c. 2 hiking long sleeve, uv protection, wickingshirts

d. hiking pants

e. hiking shorts

f. 2 dog collars......no, we do not have a dog.................YET

g. Toe shoes.....yes, I bought a pair of those goofy shoes

h. miner's light/head lamp

i. etc etc.

The damage......we purchased just under $900 of equipment and clothing for $175. It is unbelievable, this stuff is brand spanking new.

6. Hiking in Auburn.....need I say more!?

So, my favorite part of this day....good company and GREAT conversation.....

Josh: "Ouch, it hurts my chest when I run."

Jo: "Why?"

Josh: "Yesterday before I left the gym, I didn't feel like I got my pecks. I went to this new machine to work my pecks and REALLY GAVE 'EM HELL" (Of course Josh said this in an extremely serious face, until he saw that I was bent over and couldn't breath from laughing so hard)

Here's a brief collection of our pics from leaving MS/visiting in ND.......

Our final night on the Gulf Coast---we'll miss our long runs on Beach Blvd. for sure.

AEGD graduation.

Suite I!! These are my buds Tony (now @ AFB in England) and Peter (now @ AFB near Salt Lake) whom I shared an office with. The 3 clowns of the residency class for sure.

This story will inevitably be ingrained in JoAnna's memory until the end of time so that she can spout off about what an idiot I am to anyone willing to listen. At our temporary hotel at Keesler AFB there was one of those uber-sticky cockroach traps (classy joint, huh?) sitting in the corner that I obviously didn't see until after I threw a bunch of our dirty clothes on top of. "He's so unobservant. I swear he's an idiot 90% of the day."
{Notice the cockroach just above my blue shorts.}

Breding Auto's 100th Birthday Celebration in Powers Lake

We served free lunch for the celebration. Without RSVP's we had no idea how many people would show---we were expecting 40-50. When we rang the dinner bell 180 people showed up, haha. Somehow we managed to pull it off and feed everyone. I called it "controlled chaos." Jo called it poor planning with an idiot at the helm....that would be me :)

Limo ride to the casino after the celebration...

We went out golfing w/ my grandpa Vernie, 90. He golfs every weekday morning at 8:00 with his buddies. I hope to be able to do that when I'm 80, let alone 90. He beat us both, not kidding. Every shot goes 100 yards and straight down the middle....

This was his 1st shot from the tee box on hole #1. There is a huge coulee about 100-150 yards across. He gets pretty pumped up when he clears it---as seen here.

We took a trip out to my grandparents farm. Jo had never been there and I hadn't been out there in a couple years.

Of course we had lots of play time w/ Jager .... they had a grand time with their puppets and British accents. Who would have guessed a 3 year old could say "res-to-rant" like a young British lad.

Here's Jo with her new purchase---a 2010 Buick Enclave. We sold her car in MS and bought this from my dad when we got back to Powers Lake. Its super-nice. Tons of room for dogs, kids, camping, etc.  

On our way to Morris we stopped in Fargo at our friends Jon and Lou Dahl's new house. We got to see their new house and their new baby, Charlie.


Life is good in California....no news on a house yet.

Welcome to Call-ee-phone-ee-ya....

We're here.

*The Terminator is our new governor (welcome to Call-ee-phone-ee-ya)

* It's hot--but not Biloxi hot. Back sweat has been kept to a minimum so far.

* The base is huuuuge in size--so far on base we've spotted fox, deer, turkeys, a rattlesnake, rabbits. JoAnna says we live in a zoo. Apparently they also let cattle from local ranchers pasture on base. And the speed limit is 50mph. At Keesler it was 25mph and I was once stopped for going 28 so it really feels like I'm breaking the rules when I drive 50 now.

* Jo had 2 interviews--both went well. The 1st place offered her the job, the 2nd place will get back w/ her but she suspects she'll be offered there as well. She's waiting to hear back on a cardiology position that she has her eye on.

* I haven't really started yet--I'm officially on house hunting leave. I stopped by 1 day and said hello to everyone. My boss seems cool and my new assistant is from Stillwater, MN and also a big Vikings fan.

*We looked at 21 houses and just today made an offer on the one we like best. Unfortunately its a short sale meaning it could take a while before we can close. We'll know a lot more in about 3 weeks after the banks assessor does his work.

The housing crisis nailed this area bad. Every single house for sale is either a short or a foreclosure. Some were 3 years old and bombed out on the inside--people just quit caring once they couldn't make payments anymore. It was really awkward to show up at a house and have the owner stand on the sidewalk as we checked the place out. Also not fun was seeing little kids' rooms and nurseries.

At one house the owners had a new Cadillac Escalade in the driveway and a very fancy bedroom set in the master bedroom but the kids slept on bare mattresses and the house was about to go into foreclosure. Odd.

On the Road Again....

A quick update from Casper, Wyoming. .....

We're currently on our big drive out to California, done with visiting everyone back home for now. 2 weeks went super fast but we were able to see almost everyone---pics to follow at some point.

We decided to stop in Casper, Wy last night b/c it was getting dark and we were seeing so many antelope on the sides of the road----i bet we saw 500 total last night.

We did something very uncharacteristic of ourselves and decided to splurge a little and hit up the Super 8 instead of our bread and butter Motel 6. There is definitely a difference in staying at the cheapest motel out there and staying at the 2nd cheapest motel out there.

Motel 6 has provided us with some unbeatable rates and unbeatable stories. We once stayed at one in Champaign, IL that was so trashy we didn't even sleep under the sheets---we just brought in a comforter from the car and slept on top of their sheets. Also, there was a biker gang in the parking lot breaking beer bottles and yelling at each other.....

Today we're off to Salt Lake for the 1st time ever and will see the Lake, the city, the Mormon Temple and most importantly our friends the Frandsens. I'll go out on a limb and predict that Hotel Frandsen will be a step up from both the Motel 6 and Super 8---can't wait.

California by tomorrow!

Travelin' Time

The movers come in 3 days to box up and move all of our belongings except what'll fit in the Caddy. Since it may be October until we close on a house/see some of this stuff again we're trying to wedge as many things into the Caddy as we can (who's laughin' at my big grandpa car now JoAnna?). We'll be back up in ND/MN for 2 weeks then off to California. Here is our tentative schedule for those who care (i.e. Judy and Pam).

Tues Aug 3rd---leave Biloxi post-graduation and travel all day.....stay somewhere along the way.

Wed Aug 4th---travel all day (mostly I-29) and arrive in Fargo or possibly Minot if we're up to it.

Thurs Aug 5th-Wed Aug 11th----North Dakota time for 7 days (Breding Auto celebration Aug 6th, early b-day party for Jager??)

Wed Aug 11th---travel from ND to MN

Wed Aug 11th - Wed Aug 18th-----Minnesota for 7 days (Zimmer wedding Aug 14th, hopefully see Barry before he leaves, DeGrote get together Aug 15th)

Wed Aug 18th---leave MN, drive all day, stay along route

Thurs Aug 19th---hopefully arrive Salt Lake City, stay w/ our friends the Frandsens in their new home

Fri Aug 20th---drive to Cali, report to Beale AFB.

Subject to change, but we're hoping to stick to it---that's all.