Settling In

Dear World,
So, I made it home. Finally. Most of the trip was uneventful. I saw a bullfrog at Columbia's airport:

Later on, I was slightly delayed in San Juan, PR because their electricity went out. Not the plane's. The airport's. However, I still made it home, and had the pleasure of sitting co-pilot on our tiny, 10 person plane ride. Here's the crappy selfie I took of that:

Sooo many dials. The pic doesn't do justice.

And now for the bad news. My carry-on (a backpack) had to be stowed because this plane is comically small. While that was happening, somehow my good camera stopped working. So while I could be running all over the island taking awesome pictures, I am now trying to figure out the warranty on this thing, as I bought it about two months ago. -_-

In other news, there is a bird here that sounds like a cat. It is very confusing to me. It caws/meows, and I think "OH MAN A CAT" and then I realize it isn't. Which is disappointing. We do have a cat here, however, and we feed her (I think its a her) outside on our porch every evening. I think she helps keep mice away, which is awesome. 

Other than that, there isn't much to report. I was hoping to use my camera to make a sweet YouTube video giving everyone a tour of the property, but I guess that will have to wait! More updates to come soon.

Stay tuned,

Steph

Memorial Day Weekend!

Dear World,
My Memorial Day weekend was pretty stellar. I spent all day Saturday in Oak Island, NC. The journey began well enough. We rode on the ferry from Fort Fisher over to Southport, and then drove in to Oak Island.

 

During the ferry ride, we saw your run of the mill seagulls, pelicans, and blackbirds hanging around:

On the drive over to Oak Island, we saw a bunch of people pulled over on the side of the road hanging out with ginormous turtles. So we pulled over to check it out. Turned out they were African Tortoises. 

I think this guy looks like Lord Voldemort:

This is how big these dudes were.

Anyway, so we make it over to Oak Island to visit with friends, and I met an alligator. See if you can spot the little guy in this picture:

Here's a closer look at him:

We finished up our day hanging out on the beach.

Now, if that wasn't enough critters to indulge my curiosity for the weekend, there's always the seal. There is a seal in the Carolina Beach, NC area that has been hanging out molting (I had no clue that seals molt) over the weekend. Evidently it is a harbor seal and they don't usually come this far south. In fact, it is supposedly the furthest south this kind of seal has ever been seen naturally. Ever. 

So, Mom and I tracked him down. We spent a few hours hunting around Carolina Beach and Kure Beach for him, and then we finally decided to check the North End. The North End of the island is where the land is cut off with a man-made river (Snow's Cut). The cool part about the North End is that you can drive your car on it. There are few places around here where you can drive on the beach, so it was rather exciting. I threw the Jeep into 4 wheel drive and boogied on up the beach. We were starting to give up on this seal business, but we finally saw him right where Snow's Cut begins. He had police tape around him so people wouldn't get too close, as well as two officers standing guard. So here he is:

Open wide!

D'awwwwwwwwwwwww.

Anyway, I'm pretty exhausted from pretending like I'm a NatGeo photographer, so I'm going to drink Malibu and watch the ocean now. 

Love,

Steph

Two Weeks to Go

Dear World,
I finished reading a pretty cool book today. The title is An Embarrassment of Mangoes: A Caribbean Interlude by Ann Vanderhoof. It was written by a lady who spent two years cruising around the Caribbean with her husband in a sailboat. It was full of really interesting information about living on a boat, the Caribbean cultures, and the cuisine they encountered along the way. The ending was really sad, obviously, because they had to return to Canada after spending two years living a tropical life. I almost cried out of pity for her. I can't think of anything more depressing than having to live in Canada. (I'm very American.) I'm glad I read the book though, because it helped me to realize something. I have been really whiny about having to move. Like, REALLY whiny.
I have been a Negative Nancy lately because I can't find a job yet. And while that is pretty stressful for me, I realize I need to be a little more excited. (And laid back. I need to be SUPER laid back to survive the Virgin Islands.) I'm moving to a place that everyone calls paradise. There will be no winter. (I hate winter.) The rum is cheap, there are many sites to see, and the flora and fauna are beautiful. Most importantly, I will finally be living with my husband. So naturally, the good outweighs the bad by a long shot.
So, no more whining about jobs. Now, when people say "Oh, you're so lucky to be moving!" I will respond with, "Yeah. I really am." There are worse situations I could be in, so I need to go with the flow, adjust to island time, and learn how to lime.
Until next time,
Steph

Hey y'all. I got a new camera.

Dear World,
So this blog entry will be mostly pictures. I try to post a lot of my pictures on my Pinterest, too..so look at that. CHECK OUT MY BOARDS, BRO
Anyway, I got a new camera at my parents' place over the weekend because I wanted a cool excuse to get outside. It worked. I even got to drag Dad along. :) Here's the cool stuff I saw:

Bumble Bee getting all up in some Jasmine.

"OMG you guys I just got a perm..do you like it??"

Seagull enjoying the breeze.

The pier at Kure Beach.

Feeling about two feet tall under some cypress trees.

Catching a Cardinal mean muggin me.

Cool bridge in Greenfield Park, Wilmington. 

Hiss!

Squawk!

Chomp!

....and that was my weekend.

Love,

Steph

Dreamin.

Dear World,
So the official moving countdown is underway. I move on June 7th. One day after my last day of work. I have a house full of stuff to get rid of, I am throwing away/giving away over half of my clothes, and I am frantically visiting family members to squeeze in a little more time before I go.
So I went to visit my siblings, the Lawsons, this weekend down in Georgia. We had a blast, as usual, which involved copious amounts of white zinfandel. Early Saturday morning, we went to Keegan's karate thing, where he moved up to an orange belt.

It's kinda blurry, but you get the picture. Kowabunga, d00ds.

Kowen and I got bored after watching Keegan do his thing, so we went outside and picked 180 dandelions. (Yes, we counted.)

Also, during my grand tour of the neighborhood, we found some fish bones. 

So on to the main highlight of this post-- I'm thinking my generous amount of libations, along with moving anxiety, led to some INTERESTING dreams!

Crazy Dream 1:

Friday night I had a dream that I was walking down College Street on USC's campus, where I saw Darius Rucker dressed in a chef uniform (complete with crazy print pants). I was stuck on the phone with someone and tried getting them off the phone so I could get my picture taken with Darius Rucker! Meanwhile, all these people kept passing by and yelling out "HOOTIE! WHASSUP HOOTIE!" and all the while I was thinking I know his real name! I need to just get off the phone so I can impress him with the fact that I know his real name.

After getting off the phone, I went to pull up the camera on my phone, which was painfully slow. By the time my camera was ready, he was gone. My heart was broken. I want to get a picture with Darius Rucker.

Crazy Dream 2:

In this dream, I was on the islands and I was desperately trying to find a job (not much of a stretch, really). I was sitting in a school library with the principal and some other lady, who were interviewing me. Everything seemed to be going fine so far, until I asked about the curriculum. 

"Do your teachers have the freedom to design their own curriculum?"

As an older and wiser teacher, this is something I always ask, so I don't get stuck with some stupid scripted program.

They exchanged glances and looked uneasy as the woman blurts out "Our Language teachers administer mandatory spelling tests every week." 

CRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP.

My face must have crumpled because the principal firmly stated, "This isn't negotiable. It is mandatory. It is required." 

I start sputtering. "Spelling tests are quite pointless if you are not teaching students the meaning of the words and emphasizing that over mechanics. Knowing how to spell something is not essential to student success-- it is how to use the words in their writing and to figure out their meanings in their reading that is important."

The principal stopped me by putting up his hand, talk-to-the-hand-style. 

I'm never going to find a teaching job in this backwards island.

...And that concludes my crazy dream segment. More to come!

Love,

Steph

Shakira, Shakira!

Dear World,
In an effort to brush up on my Spanish, I am listening to Shakira, Selena Y Los Dinos, and whatever else Pandora is suggesting for me. I'm really into learning this way. (And dancing along.) This also ensures that my neighbors will soon realize how crazy I am.

However, they say that St. John is the world's largest open-air asylum, so I'm fitting in just fine! So now, I'll regale you with my cool adventures of the week:
Our landlady brought a bottle of champagne over as a wedding gift. We drank it with our next door neighbors on Friday, hearing tales of their travels around the world, and getting some great advice for island living. (I'll take everything I can get at this point!) Turns out, neighbor lady is also very interested in the arts, so I agreed to be her art-event buddy. Our husbands seemed to be very okay with that, so long as we leave them alone. After staying up until 3 AM with our new friends, we went to Honeymoon Beach again on Saturday. We sat around on the beach reading, and took a cool dip in the clear waters of the Caribbean.

Later on, we met Thomas, a drink expert at the Our Market Smoothies stand, and sipped on fresh fruit smoothies while he gave us "Life Lessons." We then moseyed over to the Barefoot Cowboy, where they were roasting a whole pig for the weekend. I feel so at home here, coming from South Carolina. After our long day of fun in the sun, we came home and I made peanut butter chocolate chip cookies.

In other island news, I heard back from the Jaywalk with Jumbies folks and it looks like I will be leading ghost tours around St. John! I'm really excited about this. We will work on the tour over the summer (it is just being created) and it should be ready for tourist season in November!

So much going on, so little time! I need to get back to being productive.
Until next time,
Stephanie

PS-I'm going to miss the beauty of St. John.

Iguanas are hilarious

Dear World,
Week 1 of my St. John adventure has been a success. Every day here I see something cool. The other day, I was flooded with lizards! I looked out into our courtyard and saw a gaggle of iguanas running up a tree. (Including a pair that were mating!) They scurried up the tree very quickly as I ran for my phone to take a picture. I finally got out there and chased away most of them, but this little (he's actually the size of a cat) fella must have thought that I wouldn't see him if he stayed very, very still:

I saw another one running and wish I had a video of it. He got up on his hind legs to run, which made him look like a cartoon character. I promise I will try to catch another one doing that on film, because it's too funny not to share.

Later on, it rained and a bunch of little brown lizards flooded my cabin through the cracks in the floorboards. I saw at least four of them in the house yesterday.

These little guys are absolutely everywhere. I can walk out my front door and see dozens of them. They especially like this nifty little pond outside our cabin:

The weekend was full of excitement, as we spent Saturday visiting Honeymoon Beach to snorkel and lay around eating ice cream. Easter Sunday was filled with torrential downpours of rain, so it was a lazy day to watch the storms, and old eps of X-Files on Netflix. Thus far, island life is treating me well, and I will post more pictures soon!

Love,
Steph