Today I went to a local hair salon.  And now I have no desire to ever get my hair done in America ever again.

If there is one thing that irritates the SHIT out of me, it's hypocrisy.  I hate self-righteous losers who can't manage to climb down off of their high horses, but more than that, I hate self-righteous losers who can't manage to climb down off their high horses while they scold other people for the same offense.  It's even worse when they are scolding people who aren't even guilty.

Who'd have ever thought that I'd come to Japan and have the best ITALIAN food of my life?

I want to go to Shikinaen for Valentine's Day.  And today I called a local sling-maker about getting Cadence a carrier.  I am looking forward to wearing her to the grocery store and around the house.

We made it to and from Hedo Point without me going into labor yesterday!  Though I did contract all the way there and back.  They weren't painful or anything, but they clocked in at right around 6 minutes apart for the bulk of the day.

This weekend we are planning to go to Hedo Point.  It's at the northern top of the island.  I had no idea what it was but now having seen the pictures I'm pretty darned excited.  It looks beautiful.

This is a common sight in Okinawa.  People walking around in surgical masks.  At first, the concept was trivial to me, because it seemed...  well, odd.  Honestly, who walks around wearing a surgical mask all day?  It's almost a tad creepy at first when you notice someone wearing a surgical mask out in public and then there's the language barrier which prevents you from having the opportunity to ask them why.  But after some research I understand that it is common practice here to avoid the spreading of germs from the mask-wearer to "healthy" folk.  And that makes it seem downright polite.  And significantly less bizarre.  If only people in America were so considerate, hm?  It's pretty clear that not everyone wears the masks in Japan, otherwise we'd not be in our current predicament.  I'd be fine and dandy and Amaris wouldn't be up all night coughing and crying and "sounding like a dying cow," as Mark so eloquently put it sometime after midnight last night when the poor girl was alternating between coughing and moaning miserably.  But in Japan's defense, I'm fairly certain that this particular germ currently running rampant through our house is all thanks to other Americans on the bases.  Who obviously don't wear surgical masks when they are sick because they're afraid to look like Michael Jackson.

I am easily annoyed.  But honestly, enough's enough.

I'm noticing that people in Okinawa are cuh-razy.  I'm not talking about Okinawans.  I'm talking about the American community on island.  I don't know what the deal is here but a huge portion of the people here are full of negativity and are just plain bizarre.  It's like the branches of the military scrapped together the most bizarre-o bunch of families and stuck them all on this beautiful little island.

I am not being overdramatic when I say it's beautiful here.  This morning I watched from my balcony the most amazing cloud formation reacting to the day's new sunlight.  And I was totally breath-taken.  Seriously.  I could barely manage to grab my camera and snap a few pictures of it.

My newest dilemma is sweet potatoes. I was looking forward to cooking some delicious Thanksgiving sweet potatoes this year, and didn't really want to use the canned variety. But sweet potatoes here in Okinawa are... well, purple. Really purple.

And purple yams just doesn't seem Thanksgiving-y to me. In fact, it seems downright weird. Ah... Every day is a new adventure.

For once in my life, I feel like I've been consistently in the right place at the right time. I mean, knock on wood, but how cool is it that I got a free crib yesterday and today while I was checking my mail when a lady said, "When is your baby due?" I said, "February." She said, "Is it a boy or a girl?" I said, "It's a girl."

Out in the parking lot, she gave me a bag full of newborn girl clothes! She said her little one had just outgrown them and they were on their way to the thrift store.

I mean, holy jeez! I had been seriously suffering on the baby clothes front and now I've got a real live start! In that bag were several onesies, 3 t-shirts, a few hats, socks, booties, mittens, and a couple of sleepers. Everything Carters brand and in GREAT condition. They are tumbling in my dryer as we speak.

Amaris and I went with my neighbor and her son to story time at the library here on base this morning and we had a really good time. Amaris is such a social little thing (just like her daddy), she loves every opportunity to hang out with other kids. Afterward we went to their house for lunch and the kids played a little more. It was a really nice day. And, as an added bonus, I got Amaris to take a real live nap! She has, for the past year and some change, refused to take naps for me. She'll nap if daddy's watching her, or if she is with anyone else, but NEVER when I'm around. Today, she was in a bad mood and I got her snug in her bed, turned on Backyardigans and pulled her curtains closed. Within 20 minutes she was sound asleep, and stayed that way for a good solid 2 hours. It was seriously a miracle. And she woke up in the BEST mood. Score.


I feel like overall, things are really looking up lately and I am so grateful.

Yesterday, Mark went to the jungle. He'll be there through the end of the week. I have the car. I very rarely have the car.

Having the car yesterday earned us one free crib! That's right, boys and girls, no more wondering where baby girl will sleep, the crib has arrived. Another Marine wife on another base was trying to get her "spring cleaning" (in November!) done and didn't need it anymore, so she advertised it on JapanUpdate - the major local source for classified ads. Yesterday afternoon, Amaris and I embarked on our biggest Okinawa excursion together since arriving here. I got us all the way, safely, to Kadena Air Base and we picked up the crib - which I intend to paint, I am not a big fan of honey colored pine - and $200 worth of groceries. All by myself. Seriously, this is a big deal for me.

And then we drove home, and got only moderately lost. But we made it! Hooray!

We climbed into our bed last night (Mark was polite enough to wait only moderately impatiently for me so we could do it at the same time) and it was like God had put a cloud in my room. I laid there, staring at the ceiling, and then proclaimed that it felt weird to be so CLOSE to it. Mark agreed and said it was like the room had gotten shorter. Then we laid there a little longer, and I said, "Can this moment just last forever?"

Yes, having my own bed, my old sheets (which actually somehow SMELL like "home"), all of it back in my possession was really THAT good. I slept almost entirely through the night for the first time in nearly 3 months, and I didn't freeze at any point during the night. I'd call that a massive success.

I had some further drama last night trying to hang pictures on the wall. Several of the major walls I wanted to use for picture hanging seem to be solid concrete and completely worthless. You can't even get the entire tip of the nail in past the paint before the nail bends. Miserable walls. I haven't entirely given up yet, but I am frustrated with my worthless perpetually blank (except for the ink and pencil marks I keep making on them to guide my nail placement) walls. Today I managed to hang a couple of Amaris' shelves in her room, and a couple of pictures. So that's a good sign and I feel like I've at least accomplished SOMETHING.

So far I think the only thing missing from our shipment is one bedside table lamp. Which is an odd thing to go missing. Perhaps the NTS movers packed it by mistake? I will have no way of knowing the answer for the next three years unless it magically appears here somehow.

Anyways we're about settled in, we're making it work.

My bed is taller than I remember. Amaris' furniture is pinker than I remember. My home phones are mysteriously not working. My vacuum is dusty. The TV is in a makeshift place.

I'm elated. And tired. Thank goodness it all made it here safely. Finally.

Yesterday we went out and bought a bunch of crap to fix the place up with our household goods arriving soon. TV wall-mounts, shelves, etc. I was so excited to get things functional. It took me over a week to hang Amaris' bedroom curtains because the wall next to the window where the bracket was supposed to be installed seriously had the consistency of Papier-mâché and screws, anchors, nails, whatever all just literally FELL into the wall. It was the most irritating crap ever.

So after a week of debating, and having her brand new, beautiful curtains hang awkwardly from cabinet handles above her closet, it was while I was at the computer that I had the epiphany. I looked up and saw, to my surprise, curtain hooks. Mounted directly onto the metal window frame. Of course!

So we bought a drill. And we made holes in the window frame. And we put her curtains up with success. They look fantastic.

I was motivated last night to do the remaining DIY projects around the house. Get the brackets up on the walls to mount the TVs, hang the shelf over the computer desk for the printer to sit on, you name it. But Mark was in the mood to have a "lazy day" and we put it all off till today. Which would have been fine. Except today everything turned into a total disaster and failure.

We found a stud in our living room wall and went to drill into it for the plasma mount. But that thing is some kind of solid. We determined that it must be a metal stud. After looking it up online, we learned that mounting a heavy TV onto a metal stud is not a good idea at all. So I put the mount back into it's box, thoroughly disappointed and quite frankly upset.

On to the next project. We moved everything out of the way to hang the shelf on the wall above the computer. Only to discover that the entire wall is chock full of the same apparently metal material that our studs are made of. I am assuming this is because the wall backs up to the kitchen - specifically the area where the stove is - and I would suppose the exhaust from everyone's units above and below ours are utilizing some sort of central exhaust system encased in this wall. No shelf for me.

Finally, beaten down, I thought the bracket in Amaris' room HAD to work out. We tried two studs to no avail (those metal bastards mean business) and then I said something along the lines of... Why do I need to use a stud anyways if I have these huge-ass anchors?? So we managed to get the "huge-ass anchor" into the wall, but to my dismay when we attempted to screw the bracket into it, the anchor fell, with a clatter, into the wall. Leaving a dime-sized hole in Amaris' room.

I cried.

Seriously, can't SOMETHING go according to plan here? Are these walls doomed to be forever blank? I'm frustrated and disappointed and depressed. And, okay, we can blame a good chunk of it on my hormones, but the truth is I just wanted to have SOMETHING accomplished. And instead, I've got nothing. Nowhere to put our TV, nowhere to put the printer... The house looks exactly the same as it looked last week. Except for Amaris' curtains. Which look great.

I give up.

It is finally November. I wish I could say that the leaves were turning and the air was getting crisp, but that's one of the adjustments we're going to have to make living in Okinawa. Where in California, the running joke is that there is no fall, here in Okinawa it really seems that there isn't one. Unless I just haven't seen it yet. But I am doubting that is the case.

Either way, I'm okay. As long as October is over with and we're a little closer to having a mattress, my tunnel vision is satisfied for now.

It was funny, yesterday we went to Jusco and on the way out, the smell of Starbucks was so intense and delicious that we had to stop. Had to. It was our first time going to Starbucks since arriving here. I hardly glanced at the menu before I started begging. Pumpkin Spice Latte! Please! No. No PSL here. I almost cried. Instead I ordered a Chai Latte. Which didn't taste like the Chai Lattes in America, but it at least smelled right so it was okay.

We went to the Churami Aquarium on Saturday, which boasts the second largest aquarium in the world:

It was a lot of fun, but it was hot! And sort of crowded. I guess the heat can't very well be avoided here in tropical Okinawa, and supposedly at this particular location, the crowd isn't to be avoided either. Which, honestly, is okay. We had a good time despite the heat and the sardine-can effect. Amaris loved it - she always loves seeing fish. This aquarium is part of Ocean Expo Park, if I understand correctly. Which is a bunch of different things all in one spot - a couple of beaches, one of them boasting white sand (and if we'd been wearing our swim garb we'd have gone there... I'm telling you, it was hot), sea turtle exhibits, a dolphin show, manatees, tons of fish exhibits, a couple of restaurants, some concessionaires, and gardens for your viewing pleasure.

That huge aquarium pictured above had THREE giant sharks in it - don't remember the particular species, but they were massive. We admired them a while, and thanked our lucky stars that we weren't on the menu for lunch... (Interestingly enough, humans can observe these sharks while eating lunch - there is a restaurant just off to the right of this photo where they serve various sandwiches, rice and noodle dishes. The glass panels are literally floor to ceiling. We did it, and it wasn't even all that intimidating to eat in front of them.) and then we saw one of those average sized sharks swim by, you know - the ones that are probably around 6' long and are grayish in color. Mark said, "Oh, look, there's an actual shark!" I laughed my head off and said, "Good, I'm glad we got to see an "actual shark" too because those giant spotted sharks just weren't "real" enough for me."

That guy can be such a dork sometimes. I love him, what can I say.

We got annual passes to the aquarium so I'm sure we'll be heading back several times while we are here.

Today we got a big package in the mail from Target.com - the first part of our shipment from an online shopping trip. (It was 10% off rewards time!) It was fun to go through the package, and almost a little weird because there were several "baby" items in that box - a changing pad and cover, bottles, drool rags, a drying rack... all things I bought myself off of my registry (or, as I like to call it, the shopping list. Since generally baby #2's don't officially get baby showers.) Amaris had a lot of fun "helping" me to wash every bottle, and now they're all hanging out on the rack, waiting to be put away. A part of me still hasn't acknowledged this pregnancy as "real", and it's kind of exciting and weird to have baby bottles in the house again. I kind of feel like it's a reality check. The other day at the commissary, we picked up a can of formula. My ending total reflected that can in all it's craziness, but putting it up in the cabinet was sort of surreal. And then I realized if I am going to start stocking up on formula, I should probably also look into stocking up on diapers. It's a long, expensive road ahead for that first year - I remember! Even moreso here in Okinawa where we have no Sam's Club. We'll survive.

I still havent been to the 100 Yen store. Or the Japanese grocery stores. I keep hinting at Mark. He'll catch on soon.

Well, not every light, but certainly every appliance. Except the oven. I can change that if you'd like.

I finally conjured up some motivation and did some housework I was behind on. The dishes are in the dishwasher, a load of laundry in the washer and one more in the dryer. The place still looks the same, unless we're talking about my sink. Which is due to be shined.

I have heartburn. This little girl had better be born with as much hair as her sister had.

Also on my list of accomplishments today is that I found an amazing photographer here in Okinawa! I'm super excited, I had been worrying about Christmas cards this year. Worry no more! We are meeting up with Kimberly on November 8. Score one for the team!

I feel like I've accomplished a lot more than that, but now that I'm thinking about it all rationally, I guess I really haven't. I bought myself a pair of slippers and new Christmas stockings for the gang. Both of those things are on their way from America to my FPO mail box. I've also been doing some serious Santa brainstorming. I didn't realize just how hard it could be to shop for a 2-year-old. What I really want to get her is a bunch of stuff she could probably care less about - most of which would have something to do with the new decor I have been eyeing for her bedroom. (It matches her Ikea Mammut furniture PERFECTLY - God help me!)

I am undecided, though, about whether or not I should go the "dress-up" route for her Christmas gift theme, or the "doll houses" theme. There are a couple of things Santa has picked out for her stocking already, but her toys here so far are slim pickings, and I'm starting to feel completely guilty about my child being bored all the time.

Tomorrow, we're making another attempt to go to the Churami Aquarium, so hopefully that'll be a good time.

Amaris is whining and saying "Help me mommy, pooooor baaaaaabyyy...." Over and over again now so I think I am going to go ahead and toss her dirty little butt in the bathtub.