JenneyMarie.net

Adventures in Traveling Occupatonal Therapy

Life continues to chug along here in NC. Luckily the weather has cooled off, so we can actually enjoy being outside from time to time. I continue to enjoy living next to the ocean by running on the beach every morning, but as is usual for me, try to stay away from it in the day time.Not too much exciting has happened lately, since I spend most of my waking hours either at work, or driving to/from it. We had a bunch of per diem staff these past few weeks that I really enjoyed, and the OT on maternity leave came back. So now we are fully staffed, which is unusual.

Yesterday we went to visit Bald Head island to check out life at a slower pace and see one of the famous NC lighthouses. This trip requires to ferry rides to get to our destination. Unfortunately after a late start and missing our intended ferry, and an oversight that the last ferry back leaves pretty early in the evening we only had about 1 hour on the island. So hopefully we’ll get a chance to go back, because it was absolutely beautiful.

Price’s Creek Lighthouse

Bald Head Island Lighthouse

We are gearing up for more visitors. We still have Chris for a few more weeks, but my friend Alice will be joining him this week, then my dad and maybe some aunts and uncles too.

As you can see I finally figured out the posting of pictures issue. So I hope you’ll look back a few posts.

Life continues to be fairly hectic. This week Jerad’s brother graduated from dive school, so since they were so close by his family came to stay with us for the evening. (His aunt, uncle and cousins also were randomly passing through so we saw them too the night before). It was surely a full house, but it was really nice. Especially all of his grandma’s home cooked food. There are fireworks every night at the beach so we went and checked that out.

Now Jerad’s youngest brother is staying with us for the month, so we have a long term house guest these days.

Well one thing I can say about living at the beach is people who say they will visit do it. We moved in 2 weeks ago to a great 3 bedroom at the beach. With one quick walk across a boardwalk over the marsh and we are in the sand. We have been taking full advantage by jogging first thing in the morning at the beach. It’s hot already at 6:30am but a great way to start the day.

Our first weekend Jerad’s brother Cody came to visit. We took our first moonlit swim in the Atlantic and it was SO warm. The next day we attempted to walk to walk on the boardwalk and go to the farmers market, but it was so miserable outside, that was short lived. That night we tried our first East North Carolina BBQ. All I can say is – hello vinegar. Not at all what I would want in BBQ and down right gross compared to delicious Texas BBQ.

My best friend Kirsten and her husband Eric came to see us this weekend. It’s hard to believe it had been their wedding close to 2 years ago the last time I saw them. We had such a great time at the beach and hanging out. It’s really nice to have friends around as this nomadic existance can get a little lonesome.

The boardwalk over the marsh between our place and the beach

Work is hard. If you take the limit of what is humanly possible for a therapist and then increase that just a little bit more, you have my work load. I was struggling at first but now I’m starting to keep the pace a little better. But in  they are already trying to convince me to stay, which makes 3 out of my last 3 assignments, so I guess I’m holding my own more then I think.

This place is cool because they have 2 PT gyms and an OT gym, so there is lots of space. Not so great because I love the company of PTs (I think I am one at heart ) and miss out on that some. It’s pretty darn hot, so I’m generally sweating by 10 am. And For 2 days the air conditioner broke so I had the joy of experiencing “floor sweat” or pools of water seeping up from below it was so humid. At least after my 50 minute drive home I’m at the beach and there is generally something in the works on the stove and a hug waiting.

Is coastal NC the future home we’ve been searching for? Not likely, but it’s going to be a really great 3 months I think.

… is hot. And humid. It’s so lovely downtown I want to go for a walk but after 10 minutes or so I need to head into some air conditioning. We’re been in Wilmington for a few days now. I did a 3 hour orientation at work. Everything is computerized. They even carry around hand held devices to keep track of their time and case load. I think it’s going to be a crazy amount of work here. Cross your fingers that I rise to the challenge.

Our first day here were drove down to Carolina Beach. We are heading out today to Wrightsville beach. Downtown Willmington is really great. Between the historic houses and the riverwalk. I just wish it weren’t quite so toasty.

We found an apartment down in Carolina Beach. It’s going to be quite a commute for me, but a really great place with room for guests!

During the week in Carolina Beach

On a Saturday

From our back porch

The porch itself

After 1 more day of family fun time, it was time to head back to Austin. Following an exhausting red eye flight Jerad got me from the airport, we finished packing the car and were off. Our first night we stopped in Lafayette, LA at a bed and breakfast. We had an amazing seafood dinner and were entertained by locals dancing to cajun music. The breakfast in the morning was phenomenal and all that a B&B should be.

We headed towards New Orleans and stopped for a brief afternoon stroll and of coffee and beneighs.

With no time to waste (and my fear of a homeless person taking the clothes we have strapped to our roof, we were on our way again. Past LA, MS, AL and into Georgia where we stayed for the night. The next day it was SC and finally NC!

Driving over the bridge into Wilmington I couldnt believe how absolutely beautiful it is. I highly recommend a trip here for anyone interested in historical towns

Year two in our quest to find the most delicious root beer. The whole process was a little complicated, but for such important information as the best tasting root beer, it was worth the headache.  This year we went for mostly artisan brews. Here were the results:

4) Natural brew draft root beer (don’t bother with this one – yuck!)

3) Bulldog root beer

2) Sioux city birch beer (pink in color and strong wintergreen flavor, but pretty tasty)

and the winner…….

1) Americana root beer!!!

I still say Teddy’s (last year’s winner) is the best root beer around, but we couldn’t find it this time around.

Because I have a small window between the end of one job and the end of our lease I decided to take a trip to Seattle to visit my brother, sister-in-law and nephew. However it was then decided that I had to take care of some wedding details so I threw a trip to San Diego in too. Heres my itinerary

Wed 6:30am: fly to San Diego; Fri 10:30am fly to Austin; Sun 11:30pm fly to Austin: leave Austin midday Monday for NC. Crazy? Yes, but a lot of fun too.

In San Diego my time was loaded with cake tastings, a wedding dress fitting, wedding shoe shopping, wedding hotel booking, a wedding shower, and a stop in the salon. I also had a small slice of time to visit with my family.  My mom insisted I have the wedding shower, and while I initially thought it was silly to go to the trouble, it turned out to be a lot of fun and something I think I would have missed not experiencing. Plus I even got a little Malia time.

This is why people get married

Bring on the cuteness!

What a ham

Now I am in Seattle where little Sam is not so little any more and running circles around me.

He was “screw-driving”

Mom was super happy I taught him to spread weeds

Sam’s first fishing lesson

No one but Sam and me saw that bird coming. Jim was trying to throw not hand feed.

Last time I saw him he fell when trying to walk

The only rest I got was reading (luckily he loves to read). The same story. 200 times.

What a little heartbreaker

And similar to Malia, a total ham

So I finished up at work on Tuesday. It was bittersweet to go. I really loved the people there, but in my opinion long term acute is a really depressing setting and it was beginning to wear on me. We all went out to lunch on my second to last day. Good thing I’d never been to the place before because it had a killer milkshake and I for one don’t need any more of that in my life. I have been busy packing things up and being otherwise lazy, but we took a break to head out to the greenbelt. This is a really beautiful green stretch of woods in Austin with trails for biking and walking. It was a little rugged for my biking skills so I abandoned the bike.  Along the path runs the creek and numerous swimming holes. Some were overrun with people, but we kept moving until we found an empty spot. Farther down we found an amazing little santuary with small waterfalls and “rapids”. We turned the falls into our own personal jaccuzzi and I slipped down the rapids (which was rather painful). It’s too bad we only just discovered this Austin gem, because it was a perfect escape from the thick Texas heat. Now I have a short vacation before our next move.

So my next assignment has come through and we will be living on the coast in North Carolina. I’m mildly concerned that the SNF I’ll be working at has a 100% productivity rate, but I think it’s worth it. We are currently trying to find housing long distance to avoid the “crazy anxious cause I’m homeless” phase I seem to go through with every move. We are leaning towards a house near the beach and already have our fist visitor lined up. For real this time (not like all those people who promised to come to Austin) since both my best friend and his brother live within a few hours drive. The packing has slowly begun.

Austin continues to be wonderful, and most of my “Austin experience” checklist has been done. We took a trip a few weeks back to Fredricksburg, another heavily german influenced town. It’s fairly touristy, so we dig our tourist thing.

We stopped along the way at Pedernales Falls.

Unfortunately we couldn’t get very close to the falls because I had forgotten my sunscreen and the sun police (otherwise known as Jerad) wouldn’t allow me to leave the shade.

That same weekend we went for a great bike ride around the lake and visited the Pecan Street Festival, a bi-annual arts and crafts fair. I think since meeting me Jerad as far exceeded his quota for attending street fairs and farmers markets. But the most important part of the day was I ate alligator on a stick. Tastes like chewy chicken. We also visited the Austin botanical gardens.

This last weekend I took a continuing education course (I am now a certified senior strength trainer) in San Antonio, so Jerad came with me and after class we wandered around town and along the riverwalk.

We also stopped to see the Alamo.

Friday night a bunch of coworkers/friends and I had a female only party which was tons of fun. While I’m pretty sure it was a last minute adjunct to the original plan they threw up some balloons and decorations and called it my wedding shower.

It was really sweet since my other friends are so spread out  this is currently the largest group of people I know in one spot, so I’m glad I didn’t miss out on that part of the whole wedding process.

So I’ve started to get flack from my adoring fan about being lazy with the blog. But it’s generally a good sign if my life has gotten more interesting then an online photo journal. So much has happened at this point I hardly know where to start.

Work: Work is pretty great. It’s hard work in long term acute, and it wears on you. I’m enjoying myself and I really like my co-workers, but it’s nothing I could do long term. But I have nothing but respect for the people who can. I have recently discovered that my co-workers are also my friends and have started to attend happy hours, BBQ’s and even pole dancing lessons with them (it’s hardcore exercise, not a new career path). I love Austin and will be disappointed to leave, but even more now that I have this good core group of people I have gotten to know. The downside to making friends as a traveler.

tree out front at the hospital

Austin free time: We tend to spend most of our time in Austin, since, why would we go anywhere else when we are in such an awesome place. It’s the perfect time of year to be here, and the highways are exploding with wildflowers.

indian paintbrushes and other wildflowers along the highway

Bluebonnets are a Texas staple so we drove out to a field of them to take in the color (and scent, which you cannot experience from this).

bluebonnets

primrose

There is a lake/river that runs through the middle of Austin (very Portland-esk) and we went out one afternoon on a canoe.

Barton Creek

Jerad was very excited to show off his canoe skills he honed as a child trying to impress all the little girls at his grandparents pond.

Good thing because I was busy taking pictures of turtles.

huge turtles eveywhere

There’s a great running trail along the lake (this is all a 15 minute walk from our apt) that we don’t spend nearly enough time on. We drove up to Mt. Bonnell, a “mountain” at the edge of Austin that offers a great view of some of the richer area of the city along the lake.

lake austin

Austin is festival central. So far we made it to the kite festival and SXSW. The kite festival is pretty self explanatory. SXSW is a music, film and interactive week long festival which brought many of Jerad’s friends and co-workers to town, along with a friend I hadn’t seen since high school. My last roommate in San Francisco also performed.

Justine Bennett at SXSW

view from our apt complex

Jerad has gotten into kickboxing, while I have busied myself with bollywood dance, pole dancing and ever hula hoop making (which I am excellent at if you need a hoop). We have also started Hatha yoga together. To balance out this activity we like to each as much Texas BBQ as possible or catch a film at the nearby movie theater which serves you dinner right in your seat, including fried pickles my new favorite. They certainly fry a lot of food these parts. I am so comfortable here I have gotten very into cooking again, which is about as helpful to the waistline as the pickles.

greatest meringue of all time

yes i take pictures of my food when it's that good

Travel: This last weekend I headed up to Georgetown to check out the Poppy capitol of Texas (I have a thing for wildflowers these days).

poppies

Blue Hole

We also have been down to Gruene and New Braunfels, two german towns just south of Austin.

this picture doesn't do justice to the huge size of the windchimes

Gruene, TX

old dance hall

Canyon Lake

One of our first weekends here we drove out to Longview to visit Jerad’s family (and the cute baby cows).

I have a laundry list of places to see, as we are increasingly running out of time to go to them.

Wedding planning: We have been hard at work (well I have been and Jerad agreeing with whatever I want) planning our September wedding. To date we have the church and reception venue worked out. Jerad is being a good sport and going along with all of the necessary pre-cana preparation with me. I’m having fun but will definitely be glad when it’s all planned out.

My North Carolina License has come through, so hopefully we will get our next destination on the map worked out soon.