Friday, July 31, 2015

Things I Miss

Of course every time you move, there's things you miss. Your favorite restaurant, your favorite grocery store (shout out to Publix...we're coming back to the south for ya one day!), the cute corner coffee shop. The kinds of things we miss here are more like any other restaurant, any other grocery store, and any other coffee shops...because we have pretty much one of everything. (Note: we actually have a few "restaurants" but they are open at weird times and on weird days so we can go ahead and say that at any given time only one or maaayyybe two is open)

Here are a few things I'm missing right now:

1. Farmer's Markets and our CSA box. In Virginia, Jim and I started getting crop shares from a local farm and picked up a box of veggies and fruit every week. In San Diego, we lived so close to the North Park farmer's market that I could walk there with my (nerdy? Maybe...) rolling cooler and pick up our weekly veggies. How cute is that?! Here, I try to go to the commissary very often to make sure I catch the produce aisle when the barge comes in (twice a week usually) but you still never know what you're going to get and where it came from. It makes dinner planning a little less planable because they don't always have what I want, but I'm getting better about working with what I can get!

2. Internet. The Internet at our house is a joke. Sometimes during the day you can get something done, but in the evenings when everyone's at home, you can pretty much forget about it. It is super slow and cuts out fairly regularly. Sending pictures and downloading small things like a song takes forever and we can't watch videos, FaceTime, or stream things like Netflix at all. There are a few places where you can go to get faster internet like the library or the coffee shop. I save up any book downloading, bill paying, online shopping I couldn't complete, and go to the library once a week or so to get some things done. Or sometimes if you start something before bed, it will be done in the morning. I think we're doing alright getting used to it, but I can't decide if it's good because we spend less time sitting around on our iPads, or bad because we spend more time since it takes longer. Either way, annoying, but not the end of the world. 

3. Specialty cheese. Back to food again real quick...cheese other than Kraft style is a hot commodity around here. Obviously there's not any fancy, fresh cheeses here, but we get pretty excited when the commissary gets things like Brie, fontina, or mozzarella which leads to cheese hoarding. All food hoarding is pretty extreme here since you never know when you might see it again, but I think cheese hoarding may be the most intense. I may or may not have a very large selection of mediocre cheese in my fridge drawer at this moment with no plans except that they had it, therefore I needed it. 


So, everyone please visit the speciality cheese aisle and farmer's market and make a cheese/fruit plate (with wine) and spend some time on your super fast internet in honor of me this weekend. 

And so we end on a positive note: something I don't miss about the states:
Not being distracted by my phone all the time. Since we don't have cell service, my phone is just for wifi, which means I don't carry it with me anywhere and it stays at home. It's nice to be connected and get texts and emails on my phone, but it's also really nice to not have everyone on their phones all the time talking or texting everywhere I go. Now when we're out with friends or each other, nobody is on their phone and we can all just be together like one big happy phone-free family (except that all the doctors have pagers and work phones and Dr. Ripple happens to get paged sort of often) but still...

And because these posts are boring without a picture, here's Jim and me kayaking this week

 
Happy Weekend!
 



Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Beep beep, Jimmy got a Jeep

Exciting news in the Ripple household, ya'll...we are once again a two car family! 

Here's the deal with cars here: the military paid for us to ship one car. There is the option to ship another car, but we have to pay for it and it's a pain. Also to note, the max speed limit on base is 35 mph, but the majority of roads (both of them) are 25 mph. Also, there's no Pep Boys around the corner to buy parts or have things fixed, everything has to be ordered online and I wouldn't say we have any real qualified car maintenance workers. 

A lot of people buy and sell cars on the island. There is a market of "GTMO beaters" - old beater cars that people pass around. Since this isn't real Cuba with the embargo and all, there are new cars that people have shipped here. It's not like an episode of Cuban Chrome or anything, but there is definitely an increased number of old, ridiculously painted, barely running cars. Back to our story...

So we decided to sell a car. I had a Honda CR-V and Jim had a Chevy Camaro. One of these is a teeny tiny bit more practical. I will never forget the time Jim told me he couldn't pick up our CSA box of veggies from the farmers market because there wasn't room in his car. And the time he told me we could easily fit one or two car seats in the Camaro, so we wouldn't need to get rid of it for a long time as it was just fine as a family car. So this was obviously my chance to get rid of the ridiculously small, however very nice Camaro. (Love you, Jim) 

For the last few months, we've been sharing the CR-V. And by sharing I mean either Jim riding his bike to work or me dropping him off and picking him up from work so that I have the car for errands and things during the day. I bike some too, but my cute little bike basket just doesn't work for grocery shopping, pets to the vet, etc. It worked ok, but Jim wanted some freedom, and a Jeep. A friend Jim worked with was leaving the island soon and had a Jeep she was selling, so he was in luck. And now we are the very proud owners of a 15 year old red jeep! 

Izzy and Jim are both very excited as you can see. I like it too, it's nice for carting around scuba tanks and things, and when you want a little wind in your hair. 

In other news, this week I celebrated a birthday! I had a great day. Some friends and I had lunch out and got pedicures and Jim cooked dinner at home because our "nice" restaurant is only open weekends. I also had a super fun cocktail tasting party over the weekend. Lots of friends came over and everyone brought a fun drink to try. I tried to take a picture of our cute tasting set-up, but the lighting and cinder block walls didn't do it justice, so here is a picture of me about to blow out allllllll those candles. 

Hope you all had a great week! 

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Meet Mango

 
Surprise! Jim brought me home a little bundle of joy! He was on a walk on one of the trails around here with Brad and Ann Marie when they heard this little guy in some tall grass all alone. Jim brought him home, and as soon as I realized it was a cat and not some other strange animal Jim had picked up, I was in love! I may even love Jim a little more since he has tried to tell me for years that he doesn't like cats and now he brought one home!

We were looking for a good gtmo name for him, and while it wasn't Jim's top pick, Mango started to stick. There are a lot of mango trees around here, and thanks to some sweet friends and neighbors who have trees, we have been getting lots of great mangoes and I'm becoming a tiny bit obsessed.

Mango moved in with us just over two weeks ago now, and he is adjusting well. The first few days he was so scared and shy we weren't even sure if he could walk. He quickly proved to us that not only can he walk, but he could also jump out of his temporary Rubbermaid box home. Now he is constantly underfoot and climbing up things. Jim still tries to act like he's not a big fan, but I think they're getting along ok...

 Izzy and Admiral are not the most thrilled to be adding a pet, but they are doing well. Big bro Addy seems old-man annoyed with him sometimes, but for the most part just doesn't pay any attention. Izzy wasn't sure what to do at first, but they have been playing together (read: fighting over toys) lately, which is SO cute! I think we should just get Izzy kittens to play with instead of her usual ball.
 
Our first vet visit went great, and little baby Mango was only 14 oz. They think he was about 4 weeks when we found him. He lets us know when he's hungry with super adorable screams, so he is plumping up quickly will be fully ready to play with the big dogs in no time!

We go back to the vet tomorrow, where I'm sure we'll find out he has gained 5 lbs. with all the food he's been eating. Check out this pot belly!
 
 
He's already become so much more playful and feisty, I can't wait to see what he's like when he gets a little older. Jim can't wait till he's through the kitten bites phase. It's really not helping my "aren't you glad we got a cat!" argument. Ok, I hear you...enough with the cat talk, a real update is coming soon. I'm on my way to becoming a crazy cat lady now.