Still Waiting...

on that phone call from homeagain pet chipping. I don't even want to deal with it right now. Maybe I will wait until after the new year to deal with it and take the holidays off? Hmm...Ok, I think I will. Happy Holidays to you all!

We met Chris and Cindy in Oki

So you all know I am way too nosey and curious as to sit around and wait for information to come to me regarding our upcoming move. So, I was able to find a couple named Chris and Cindy Ulrich who are stationed in Okinawa currently off of this blog site. They have a site under Chrisandcindyinoki.blogspot.com. They had a good bit of information and they have been to a few places around the island so I thought maybe I would contact them and see if they could share some information with us.

They were so informative and immediately got back to us offering to answer any questions we might have! It was wonderful. A few things like, don't stress about the doggie, it seems as though everyone will go out of their way to help get Cyrus taken care of. Work? They said I might have great options as a PX cashier! Ha, kidding! I will have to volunteer a bit and then I should have no problem getting on at the hospital. We will need two cars, driving is crappy, Stripes can go with very little processing on our part compared to Cyrus, and lots of other great info. Funniest of all is that Chris's grandparent's are from St. Louis! Crazy, huh? They are from around Tower Grove Park. Chris knew all about our local favorites like Gus's pretzels! That is so odd to me how you can meet people a half a world away and have common interests or places. His wife is a naval nurse in Okinawa there and they are expecting their first baby in July! That will be the freshest baby we will know in Okinawa! So sweet.

So hey guys, thanks for the help. Here's to you Chris and Cindy in Oki - The Hedrick's

http://www.guspretzels.com/

For sale or lease

This was Cody's house. He was our ER mascot that we placed in the ED to keep morale up. He was the cutest little betta you had ever seen! As you can tell I am writing about him in past tense because he didn't make it. When I left from work after getting him all settled in his new home he had "happy bubbles" (the little bubbles at the top of thier bowl) The pet store said these bubbles where a good sign that he was doing great. All was well. Came back to work on Wednesday and this is what I found! What the hell? Who killed Cody?

The story was he wasn't looking so good so they bought him a new home and transferred him without any changes in his condition. Now let me tell you, you can not have anything sick with a room full of nurses and physicians trying to fix it at all costs. I heard a few things that occurred that people attempted to do to help the little guy out like:

1. O2 can only flow at 0.5 LPM in a betta bowl per nasal cannula before the fish is swirled around and becomes dizzy.

2. Respiratory DOES NOT have masks or intubation equipment small enough to tube a betta. How much suc's can a betta get?

3. Supportive care is really the only thing you can provide to a fish who is circling the drain.

4. A ton of internet information regarding betta care is available on-line but there is minimal information on critical care for betta's in an emergent fashion.

Cody's time of death was called at 1442 by Dr. Kerry Florence on 12/12/o7.

He will be missed. RIP Cody.

Urg...bad news

Steve has a girl he used to work with that has recently gone to Japan and she actually ended up working with housing for the Marine Corps. We thought, "Hey, Great"! So he wrote her a little e-mail and told her we were on our way and ask questions regarding Cyrus and base housing. This was the response:

"Military Family Housing on Okinawa has a "Live Where You Work" policy. The housing office has to offer you houses nearest to your unit. So that means you will be housed on Courtney or McT. The problems is the majority of the housing up North are Towers. And towers are pet restricted (no dogs/cats). There is a 99% chance that you will be offered a the Towers"

So....this is not good, at all. How do we tell the kids? How do we tell Cyrus? I am really sad. Maybe this will all work out and we will not have to worry about it. I mean come on, how can we leave this sad little puppy face behind?

Customer representatives suck

Today I had to contact "Homeagain " microchipping company for animals to inform them that Cyrus's owner information has changed considering we adopted him at least a year and a half ago from a negligent family. The lady on the other line goes on to tell me that since we do not have any previous owner information that we will not be able to change his microchip info. and "There is nothing we can do except file an incident report" my next question was, "Are you telling me that because we adopted a dog from an owner that we don't even know there is nothing you can do to allow the animal to go with us to Japan?" and "Yes" was the answer I received! WHAT??? ARE YOU KIDDING??? I need to speak to a supervisor.

Thankfully someone there has a little bit of common sense and was able to inform me that the "Incident report" requires a little investigation and communication with the headquarters of Homeagain but really is not a big deal. They will contact me within 24-48 hours to handle everything. Now that is customer service baby!
Here I am,
Patiently awaiting their phone call...

Ooops

Ok, So I thought that I had everything all under control with the whole dog vs. vaccination thing but I was so wrong. Upon dragging the kids and a 100 pound (leash untrained) dog (whom I had forgotten to grab his chest harness) to the Vets office at Scott Air Force base appx. 80+ miles away from home I was told that his Rabies vaccine had expired! EXPIRED - 11-27-07. I missed it by 11 days!! 11 days means that I have to start the whole process of rabies vaccine and quarantine all over again. If I had not have missed the expiration than I could have started quarantining him for his 180 days today, but I did. Ooops!



Poor Cyrus! He really will not have time to get a "Clean" bill of health before we go. He will have to hang out here in the states until we have a home on-base then he can come. He can quarantine in home if we are on base but who knows how long that will take to get a place. Oh! and the Gecko needs a health certificate also before he can go. I have to check with the embassy to see what Gecko's desiring to enter Japan need for acceptance to the country. He will be geckoneese! Ok - Gotta go to work, I've gotta puker....grrreat!

I'm going to miss my home

I was just sitting here with my candles lit watching the soft glow of the light onto my walls, kids at school, nice Christmas music and looking at our pretty tree thinking how much I am going to miss our home. I wonder if our next home is going to feel "as home" as our current home? Really going to miss it. I have bittersweet feelings, I'm excited to go but also a little anxious. I am not saying our home is perfect, by far, but it is a work in progress and for some reason I always get motivated to "do things" right before we leave. I have all sorts of great ideas! Recently I ordered wall words for my walls one that says: Family (be true to who you are and the name you bear). The other for Jav's room says: Boy;n: A noise with dirt on it. Well... to say the least 70 dollars and 42 cents later I will not even get to use them anytime soon at all.

Anybody need wall words?

Web orders have arrived!

So...we officially have them! The conversation went something like this:
(I was at work when the news came)
Steve: Do you want the good news or the bad news?
Me: Um, not really sure, kinda having a bad day. Is it going to make me cry?
Steve: Not sure, I'll wait til' we get home to tell you.

Well you all know me too well to know that I COULD NOT wait until we got home to hear what was so important.

Me:Tell me now, I can't wait!
Steve proceeded to tell me he was not eligible for re-enlistment and his papers where denied. I really could not even think as to what to say. I think a million thoughts went through my head like, the house,the bills,the kids,the cars, health insurance. OMG! What are we going to do?

Then Steve soothed it all by saying "Just kidding,I was approved for re-enlistment. I got orders too, We're going to Okinawa! In February!! Holy Cow! The questions that went through my head like, the house, the bills, the kids, the cars, all the same questions!

To say the least It was quite a shock for both of us. February? How the hell are we going to get out of here by February? After it all sunk in the kids and I were ready to hit the road by planes trains and automobiles but Steve being the voice of reason in our house explained we were gong to pull back to May/June to allow the kids to finish school. :(

So I have realized after a week or so to process this all that it is going to be harder to get our dog into Japan vs. the kids! Rabies, Farvars titers, quarantining and everything else, Oh my! I so hope I don't get them confused and take the kids for their rabies shot although the quarantining might not be so bad!

Cyrus goes for his first vaccination tomorrow, I have not told him yet. I will break it to him in the morning!

Well, I hope this will keep you all posted as to how we are doing on our work-up to leave for our international move. I may have to refer back to it myself a few times! Javan is just excited he will get to learn "Javaneese"!

Oh! I almost forgot, if any of you are interested to see some of the local culture and information I found a great website- WWW.Japanupdate.com This is their local paper for Americans.