Visiting

Sorry I've been slow to post. Ricky's parents have been here since last Saturday and between entertaining and working, it's been crazy. They leave tomorrow morning. We've had a lot of fun--snow skiing, visiting the coast, touring King Estate Vineyard and Winery, visiting the Mexican market, taking a trip to the dog park, and eating out at some of our favorite restaurants. I didn't take my camera to the mountain but here are some pictures of the coast and the vineyard. Ricky has a few more that he wants to play with and then I'll upload those.

Mr. President

It wouldn't be a good blog if I didn't take a moment to reflect on my emotions in response to today's events... 

First thing this morning, I had a meeting on campus with Rob (i.e., very important researcher who makes sure I'm taken care of financially while in graduate school) to go over the results and implications of a study we recently completed. When I got to campus, I saw Cindy (my advisor) literally dancing down the halls... apparently elated with joy for the changing of Presidential guard. Several times during my meeting with Rob we were interrupted by the sound of "testing" computer speakers and staff popping in to tell us we were "missing it." Where at one point Rob matter-of-factly (you have to know him to appreciate it) said, "Well, it's not until 9am." "Yeah" Anne replied, "But you're missing all the build up activities." We completed our meeting, and Rob headed to the conference room to watch the activities while I headed home to watch with my hubby. I heard the oath "live" on the radio as I pulled in the garage, and then I re-watched the previous hour's events on the DVR with my hubby. I continued to remain glued to the tv until about 1:20 pm (Pac time) when I had to drag myself away and head to class.

There's just something neat about the history that our country made today. Don't get me wrong. I'm more conservative than President Obama, and I do not believe he is going to save the world by any means. I know I'm not going to agree with some (possibly many) of his policies. But he is a young, bi-racial man whose father, as he said, would've been refused service in many restaurants only 60 years ago. President Obama came from nothing, chose paths of service, and is now our President. I think he will fight for improved education and healthcare for those who need it most. And if nothing more, I'm amazed at the huge leap Our country took in overcoming its not-so-pretty history today. That's what brings tears to my eyes and keeps me glued to the t.v. President Obama represents a new face of confidence and a new step forward. He doesn't represent perfection, but he definitely represents change. It's exciting to be a part of history.

Friday

It's finally Friday. I'm officially surviving week 2 of the quarter. This quarter, as I knew it would be, is H.E.C.T.I.C. My days typically start before 8, and I'm never home before 5 (several days a week it's closer to 7 or 8 or sometimes 9). I enjoy the activities that make up my days--observing kindergarten kids, working with teachers, observing high school kids, working with other students in my program, teaching classes, teaching taekwondo, working out, and running the day-to-day errands. Needless to say I end up pretty worn out. I had some fun and not-so fun updates this week, and I'll add some pictures later... ;-)

My new macbook came AND I almost have everything installed on it that I want. I've been in close contact with Kyle who is teaching me all the cool tools and tricks that make macs so special. I love that he asks me, "Now where do you think you would go for that?" I'm going to have to learn to adjust to the jet engine take-off sound the macbook makes when reading a CD but other than that I think it will, without a doubt, exceed my laptop expectations. It was interesting to go pick it up from the FedEx ground place, which was completely surrounded by chain-link fencing and a call button for guests to be "let in." (I guess they take security more serious than UPS?) I'll be thinking of a name for the macbook...but I'm pretty sure the gender is female...Let me know if you have ideas.

I haven't heard officially about my interview, but I did get an email saying that they haven't forgotten me, that I interviewed great, and that they plan to check my references starting Tuesday and have the HR person contact me next week! I think that sounds like a good thing.

In other not-so-good (but in some ways not-so-bad) news, Ricky found out he was not accepted into the MS Athletic Training program. He hasn't taken physics (which wasn't required by his program but is a newly added pre-req for the Oregon AT program) and his GRE scores were a little lower than they like. While he felt rejected, we both know God has a plan. In some ways it opens up a lot of different doors for us. If I get the job in Portland area, he has some flexibility to decide if he wants to stay in Eugene at the high school or take the year off from athletic training to umpire and ref or if he wants to work part (or full) time as a HS athletic trainer in the Portland area... While it's exciting to have some options, I want him to decide what HE really wants to do, and if you know Ricky, you know that deciding what to have for dinner can be challenging. So, I know he's feeling some pressure with this new window of opportunities, but this time he gets to make the choice. Keep that in your prayers for us.

In better news, Ricky was accepted to the state (or region?) collegiate umpire's association, which is exciting for him. He's headed to Portland tonight with a couple other guys for tomorrow's meeting. Should be exciting. I have the house to myself... Wii here I come! ;-) (feel free to laugh at the sight of me playing wii and the dogs enjoying the show)!

The Plunge

Ricky and I just made a decision. A BIG decision (for us, anyway). We are taking the plunge. No longer will we sit in the world of PC and wonder about the world of mac. We will now straddle the lines (our home computer is a PC). Today we purchased a macbook. It's beautiful, 13" and aluminum. More than anything it comes with 3 years peace of mind aka apple support. It should arrive one day next week. We've been looking at macs for a long time but didn't make the purchase because much statistical software isn't made for macs. Now, however, I can just purchase windows and bam--problem solved. I'm sure I'll be looking to my mac friends for support on the "how to's." But we're excited.

In other news, I had my internship interview yesterday. It went great. I didn't feel nervous, just prepared. I met with a school psychologist and the director of special education. They asked lots of great questions, and I felt that I had pretty good answers for them. I think they are two people I could definitely enjoy working for/with, and I was impressed at the types of questions they asked. It tells me they know what they are looking for and that the job is a good fit for what I'd like to do in the next few years. I should hear within the next week or two (they still have to check references and such). I'll keep ya posted. Thanks for the prayers and well wishes.

Catching up

Enjoying time with Laura... I think this one captures "us" well. :-)

Ok. It's finally time to jump back on the blog. I've really been wanting to do this for days but have been waiting for things like a spare minute and for Ricky to get me some pictures in a format I can use for blogging. (He likes taking pictures in .raw format so he can edit them, but I need them in jpg format for blogging.) So without further ado (I always wanted to say that), here are the highlights...



Granny is too much fun!


Susan and I on Christmas day.

Christmas. We so much enjoyed our time with family and friends at Christmas. We had an amazing Christmas eve dinner at Ricky's parents' house, enjoyed more time with Ricky's extended family on Christmas day and had a great time hanging out with my parents and sister. We enjoyed spending time with Chris and Susan at their house (and at my parents' house), and savored every minute with Kyle, Laura, and Abby as well. We didn't get to see everyone we would've liked to see, but we made the most of our hectic trip.


Abby in her baptismal gown and then in her "Monkey" hat that Ricky picked out.


Enjoying quality time with the godbaby. She's just as amazing as Laura says!

Traveling. Air transit was definitely an experience we'll never forget (but wish we could) this holiday season. If you thought we couldn't be any unluckier traveling on the way home than we were on the way out (see previous blog post), you were kind of incorrect. We were scheduled to fly out of Little Rock at 5pm on New Year's day. By 5pm, our flight was delayed until 6pm and at 6pm our flight was "pulled" due to faulty aircraft. There was another flight out of Little Rock that night, but we had less than .0001% chance of making the connection in Dallas to Portland, so we elected to rebook for the next day (early morning) and try again. On the 2nd when we arrived at the airport at 5:35 am for our 6:55 am flight, we saw that our flight was "delayed" until 1:30 pm. What?! Yep. It's true. They unknowingly rebooked us on a flight that was scheduled on the same faulty aircraft from the night before. Sigh. We ended up getting out of Little Rock on a 9:45 am flight (Yep, you counted correctly, 4 looooong hours in the early morning at the super exciting LRNA) and arriving in Portland about 2pm. Needless to say, I got to reschedule my internship interview again and am now planning that for this Friday.

Weekend. On Saturday, Ricky had to work a wrestling tournament all day, and I spent most of the morning cleaning and catching up on laundry. About 1pm, I headed out to run a few errands and about 4pm returned to quite a surprise. Cooper was sitting in the hallway surrounded by shiny chocolate candy wrappers looking quite proud of himself. Upon further inspection, I realized he found the stash of left over stocking candy (in a ziplock bag) in one of our suitcases (that I had planned to finish unpacking after errand running). Not only were there chocolate wrappers in the hallway but they were also in the living room and in the office (where the suitcase was). Cooper had consumed A LOT of chocolate (which can be toxic for dogs b/c they can't break down the theobromine and it affects the central nervous system, as well as the heart of the dog, throwing their system into panic which often manifests in the form of epileptic seizures). Chip, if you are wondering, slept through all of Cooper's chocolate consumption on the couch! Three hours and a trip to the emergency vet later, Cooper had vomiting induced, charcoal consumed (to get as much chocolate out of his system and neutralize any other), and sub-cutaneous fluid injection and was home feeling fine. We monitored him for "hyperactivity and trembling," which he commonly does both when not on chocolate. And worst of all, we weren't supposed to feed him until morning (he was starved and loooooves to eat). Sigh. Sunday went much smoother, but I obviously didn't feel rested by Monday.

Week 1. Well, I am officially ending "hump day" (aka Wednesday...middle of the week) of the first week of the quarter. My days have been really long and my dissertation is starting to go, so I'm tired but excited. I enjoy the "newness" of a fresh quarter of school but hate that it takes a couple of weeks to get into a routine, which makes me exhausted. Anyway, that's it for now. I'll fill in details related to school/work updates later. Pray that my interview on Friday goes well. I'm excited--the weather is supposed to be mid 40's and sunny! ;-)

Escape from the "artic blast"

Packing to head to Portland/Arkansas.


Chip wants to go and then wonders if we saved room for him.

Night 3 at the hotel: Ricky hanging out in the lounge.

We are the lucky ones. We made it out!! After three days of waiting at the hotel and multiple flight cancellations, we woke up yesterday morning to a non-canceled flight. That, in itself was progress, so we showered and got ready to head out, constantly checking flight status for that dreaded cancellation message. We checked out of the hotel and caught the shuttle to the airport where the experience began...

Our CR-V (second closest) the day we caught the shuttle to the airport.



Experience 1: Shuttle Ride
So, after over a foot of snow, our hotel was still offering shuttles to/from the airport. Because our hotel is one of the closest ones to the airport, we weren't too concerned about the fact that we'd seen the same shuttle driver every time we went through the lobby in our hotel for the last three days (so we were pretty sure the other drivers were snowed at home while he was snowed in at the hotel). It was supposed to be a quick trip. Supposed to be is key...When we got on the shuttle, he informed us that we would be going by the Comfort Inn to pick up some people who were stranded because the Comfort Inn's shuttle got stuck somewhere in the snow. Sigh. Another stop, but we had plenty of time (we just got a message our flight was delayed). Just as we were about to pull out of the hotel parking lot, the driver got a radio call that he forgot someone who was scheduled to leave on our shuttle. The driver was annoyed and recklessly backed up and turned around in the foot of snow. We thought for sure he was going to slide into some of the cars (including ours) parked in the lot. After the turn-around and pick-up, we were off to the Comfort Inn.

Did I mention that our hotel was super close to the airport but the Comfort Inn was not so close AND that the Comfort Inn's shuttle got stuck in the snow between the Comfort Inn and the airport? Well, after a crazy, scary, slippery ride, we arrived at the Comfort Inn and ultimately at the airport. It was scary.

Experience 2: Airport Arrival
While we booked our flights with American Airlines, we were scheduled to leave on a code-share flight on Horizon/Alaska airlines yesterday morning. We arrived at the airport 3 hours early. The Horizon/Alaska area was SWAMPED. I have never even seen anything like it, even on a movie. The line wrapped through the typical check-in area, all the way around past the stores, to the security gate and looped back a couple times! Whoa! We found a man who was answering questions (but may have actually been on his way somewhere because he was pretty impatient) about where to go and flight status. I had my iphone and was constantly refreshing our flight status. It said delayed but not canceled. I asked the guy to double-check. He told me it was canceled. Canceled? I double-checked my phone and the monitors both said delayed, so we got in line and Ricky went to find someone else to ask. So far, flight was delayed--not canceled.

We stood in the line and met people from all over who all had stories about where they were trying to go and how long they'd been waiting (3+ days) to get there. We watched as the Southwest airline agent (that line was almost as bad as our line and was across the aisle), told everyone in line that all flights before 1pm (it was about 9am) were canceled and there would be no new flights booked until after the 28th. She was saying, "If you have a flight before 1pm, it's canceled. If you're from here, go home. If you have friends here, call them. We aren't going to be getting you out of here before the 28th." I looked at Ricky wide-eyed and scared. What if that became us? How could it not become us? We saw people waiting EVERYWHERE. About 20 minutes later, we were moving through the line pretty well. I refreshed our flight status. Canceled.

Our hearts sank. Ricky went to check with a real person, and I stepped out of line to call American Airlines. This was it, we thought. But we were at the airport, and we couldn't really go home to Eugene (notice the pictures of our car), so we might as well check. I called the 800 number and prepared for a wait (it took 35 minutes the day before to get through to an agent). Someone answered before it even rang. I was so surprised I almost didn't speak. When I did, I told her situation, and she told us we could get on a 3pm flight from Portland to Dallas and catch a 9:30 pm flight to Little Rock, arriving at 10:35pm.

What? I could not believe my ears. She had to be mistaken. This was an even better flight than what we were going to take that just got canceled? And it was today?! I booked it and went to AA counter to check in. We were early but had nothing else to do. We got our bags checked. I asked the agent to add us to stand-by for the earlier flights just in case. Things were being majorly delayed and we knew it wasn't likely we'd make the connection in Dallas, so it couldn't hurt to fly stand-by. The agent told us not to bother with it. There were people who were waiting for days. Stand-by wouldn't be worth it. So, we checked in, went quickly through security (because only people who were actually booked on flights could get through security) and headed to the gate. When we arrived at the gate, I promptly asked the agent to add our names to the stand-by list, and we waited. It was almost 11am, when they started boarding the 9:25am flight. The airport let some flights out at 9 and then shut down the runway. Ricky and I were comfortable and prepared to spend the day. When suddenly, "Rodriguez party of 2 please make your way to the ticket counter." What? They had seats for us on the very next flight to Dallas?! They weren't together and our checked-bags wouldnt transfer to the flight, but we didn't care. We were as close as we could be to escaping the artic blast!!



This was one of the many frozen planes sitting at the airport. (Not ours!) The luggage trucks would get stuck, making it difficult to get bags in/out of the plane.

Experience 3: On the Airplane
We had a great pilot who kept us very informed of what was happening. PDX had shut down the runway and was going to re-open it at noon. We were first on the departure list, and he wanted everyone on board and ready to go at the moment the runway opened. We were de-iced and pushed back from the gate before noon. Wait, PDX was not satisfied with the condition of the runway, so it decided to let two circling planes land and then it was going to do more work on the runway. More waiting. Our de-icer was wasted (it only lasts for about an hour), and we had to get a new coat. Finally, at 2pm, we taxied off and were in the air. Everyone cheered. I was so overwhelmed, I didn't know how to feel. We were one of only four flights to Dallas that day. Only 13 flights departed the day before (over 450 arrive/depart on a typical Sunday), and we were sure less than 25% would make it out the day we did. We made a stop in Reno to get more fuel and de-icer off, arriving in Dallas in time to make the connection to Little Rock. At 10:35 pm we were on the ground. What an amazing feeling.

The amazing view of the horizon. Words cannot express how thankful we were to have this view.

All I can say is that God answers prayers. We had lots of people praying for our travels. If you would've seen the hundreds and hundreds of people in the airport going nowhere, you would not believe we made it to Arkansas. It was so overwhelming. We were "stuck." Four days in a hotel with nowhere to go and nothing to do except wait to see if our flight would be delayed. Yet, we were canceled and made it on a better flight within a few minutes. We definitely will not be taking this visit for granted. We are so thankful to get to spend this time with family. Our hearts go out to the many families that could not be together this Christmas. We came very close to being in their shoes. You are in our prayers.

Cancelled

Well, it happened. Got the dreaded text message around noon today. Our flight for tomorrow morning no longer exists. We have a back-up flight that is scheduled to leave at 11:15 am and fly through California...we'll have to see how that goes. It's looking a little blizzard-ish outside right now. And if the snow switches to freezing rain like they're predicting...it's not going to be pretty. So, for now, we're snuggled in the hotel room wondering what tomorrow will bring. Praying that we can actually get home to AR sometime in the next few days. I'd post pictures but, at this point, they don't do the winter weather justice.