Where to Start?

After Curacao, Phillip and I both started studying! Yuck…I also did laundry…another yuck! On the 8th, Phillip and I took a bunch of stuff to the 5th semester sale at school. We sold several things, so we were excited! Definitely time to start getting rid of stuff! So hard to believe though…doesn’t feel like very long ago that we were the ones walking around the sale trying to buy stuff we needed for our time here! Wow, time flies!

We sure wish we could have spent Mother’s Day with our Moms!!! It stinks being so far away…

After a few days, craziness settled in! Phillip flew to Indianapolis on Wednesday the 12thfor Lance’s wedding!!! That was an adventure. We somehow got mixed up with his class times. I was waiting outside AUC at 1:15 to pick him up. I already had his luggage in the car and everything. He didn’t come outside till 2:15 and hadn’t even realized that we had mixed up the time! I drove as fast as I could to the airport (that’s not very fast with all the pot holes around here!) and we ran in just in time to see the Delta lady starting to walk away. It was exactly an hour before his flight. Thank goodness she was nice and let him check in. Another minute and we would have missed her. His layover was in Atlanta. The customs computers were down and he had to wait in line for over an hour and a half of his 2 hour layover. Then he had to run through the airport to his gate, only to find out that they delayed his plane at the last minute! He finally got to Indianapolis late that night! His parents met him at the airport and spent that night and part of the next day with him. Then he rented a car and headed to Lance and Sarah’s wedding rehearsal. The wedding was Friday evening. I wish I could have been there too, but we just couldn’t afford 2 plane tickets!! Poor Phillip didn’t get back to the hotel till almost midnight and had to leave the hotel at 2:30am for the 40 minute drive back to the airport and to catch his super early morning flight. Luckily, he had much better flights on the way home and arrived mid afternoon, right on time! He was worn out, but was very glad he got to be there for Lance’s wedding! It all worked out ok!! (Plus, there were no classes Thursday, so he actually only missed classes on Friday…not bad!)

I was so happy to have him back!!!!!! It was WEIRD being here without him. He said “now you know how I feel!” (He’s had to stay here without me lots of times, but that was my first time here overnight without him!)

Vicki and I goofed off a lot while Phillip was gone. The first evening, we got Lal’s (Indian food) for dinner! Phillip would not eat there, so it was a great place to go without him! The next day, we went for a walk, swam laps, and went to the Greenhouse for dinner. YUM!!! Friday morning we got up early and went to Grand Case for sea glass! We found a lot that morning! Then we ate at the Lolo’s again…We love Sky’s the Limit! I even took a picture of the food…all that food for $8!!! Crazy delicious too!!

Sunday, Phillip spent the day at school studying and I went diving!!! I got my advanced scuba certification! Phillip usually goes along when I get certifications, even though he already has them all. But he went on these dives without me, the day after I got back from Florida. So he didn’t mind not going this time. We went on 2 dives in the morning, had a break for lunch, and then 2 more dives that afternoon. The afternoon dives were amazing! La Fusheng is a wreck at 110 feet…holy cow that sounds scary! It sure didn’t feel any different…hard to believe we were that deep! The second wreck was The Porpoise. They were absolutely amazing. It’s such a cool feeling to be exploring something that truly seems unable to be explored! Neat!!!

On Monday, Vicki, Willow, and I went to the grocery store and the gas station. I “topped up” Phillip’s Chippie minutes at the gas station. Usually we buy $10 phone cards for our cell phones. You put a code from the card into your phone and it adds the minutes on. When you “top up” you just enter your phone number into a machine and the cashier credits that phone number with your money. Well, Phillip still had lots of money on his phone, but the minutes had expired! So I only put one dollar on. Whenever you add money, it reactivates old minutes. Nice! Well…that same evening, his phone beeped for a text message. I read it and it said something about adding 54ANG to his phone!!! That’s $30!!!! Someone added $30 to Phillip’s phone! Boy I bet they weren’t happy when they realized they entered the wrong phone number! So now Phillip has a TON of money on his phone…I think I need to start using his cell instead of mine!

Tuesday was Phillip’s 30th Birthday!!!!! I spent the morning baking! I made a funfetti cake…that’s one of his favorite kinds! I made dark chocolate brownies with oreo icing! I even made a fruit/sprite/cake…healthier version of cake! At 2:30, Vicki and I headed to school with decorations, cakes, and sodas. I had reserved the multipurpose room. We decorated a table and even spread out mints. At 3:00, Phillip’s class got out. One of his friends distracted him while everyone else rushed into the multipurpose room. We were trying to surprise him…but he figured it out! Oh well, it was still fun! Everyone seemed to love the cakes! Phillip especially loved the brownie one…I think I’ll have to make that again!!! It was a quick party, then everyone went back to studying. But at least Phillip got to celebrate with friends. We truly are blessed…we have amazing friends here!!!!

One of Phillip’s birthday cards really made us laugh! “Admitting you’re 30 isn’t easy. It takes courage. It takes confidence. It takes a positive attitude…It takes 5 or 6 years!” hahaha!!!! It is hard to believe he’s 30!

I spent most of Monday and the rest of Tuesday (after Phillip’s party) reading a book for Rescue Diving Certification! Wednesday, I went to Grand Case to begin my Rescue Diver class. The owners had actually asked me to join this class because they only had one person signed up and they said it’s easier to teach if you have 2 people. I was pretty easy to convince! (Plus, Phillip was thrilled about me taking this class!) We practiced skills and how to know when to do what. We rescued each other from underwater, from the surface, responsive, nonresponsive, breathing, non breathing, etc. We practiced towing each other out of the water. Great skills to know for any time you’re around water, not just for scuba diving. I was WORN OUT after that day!!!! I went to bed early because I had to go back to finish the class the next morning! Vicki went Thursday morning also. She watched while the other guy and I rescued our dive instructor from 2 different scenarios. She even helped the dive instructor play out one of the scenarios! She was a snorkeler waving us down because there was a diver underwater not moving! Our instructor did not help us that day. We couldn’t ask him questions or anything! We had to figure out what to do, when, and why. It’s harder than you would think! While towing him back and giving rescue breaths (ok not really…just had to pretend, but still had to blow air right beside his face to simulate actually doing it), I was so out of breath! It’s hard work! While we were trying to pull him ashore, a wave knocked us down and I scraped my knee on a rock! Ouch! Not bad though…barely even bled, but for some reason it hurt like crazy all day!!

After the water portion of the class was finished, I had to take a test! I passed! So now I’m a rescue diver!!! Woo-hoo!!! After the test, Vicki and I went to Sky’s the Limit for lunch again! We LOVE that place!!!! Then we went back to the area where we had been that morning and snorkeled because we saw sand dollars that morning! Vicki found several, so she was super excited! We also saw a ton of starfish!!! We laughed about a book that we found on the bottom of the ocean…made for some funny pictures!

I spent all day studying today! Guess it’s about time I started studying again huh? I’ve been goofing off (diving mostly) a ton lately! But I’ve LOVED it! I figure I might as well take advantage of it while I can!

I seem to go through spells where I don’t drink much caffeine and then suddenly I start drinking more. Well, that habit got worse here for some reason! I realized lately that I would have a headache if I forgot to drink caffeine one day. Not cool! I was drinking 1-2 sodas a day. I know that isn’t a ton, but too much for me! I seriously did not like that I would get headaches if I didn’t drink it. I didn’t like admitting I was addicted to it!!! SO I QUIT CAFFEINE! Yep, the first day, I only had half a soda. The next day…none. I had a headache for 2 days! That’s it! I was super excited because I was afraid it might be longer. I’m quite proud of myself…no caffeine for almost 2 whole weeks now!!!!