NCSU

We will be moving to Raleigh, North Carolina! We're stoked. I hope to make it to NCSU's MBA program and Jeanann is excited about NCSU's residency. Before leaving I'm trying to raise funds to improve the infrastructure for a local high school/mechanic program. Check it out here: http://igg.me/p/316531/x/2157372

New Year 2012

Happy New Year!
The island life is something, that's for sure. With it comes beautiful ocean views, quiet beachfront frolics, salty breezes and a general content'ness with less. It also comes with challenges. In some cases we wear the outsiders scarlet letter... which looks like a bullseye to some nefarious folks. In any case, we are less than 4 months from repatriating ourselves back to the good ole U.S. of A.

This year has been eventful. For me, I've travelled to Florida a couple times. I've witnessed Julie's wedding to her new man! I've even made it to Utah and Las Vegas to visit my other family folks. There're a few I've missed. I haven't seen my oldest brother Larry in quite some time along with a few cousins and uncles. I'd like to see Larry, he has to be balding more than I seem to be.

The kids are getting bigger and bigger. They both can speak pretty well, asking for things in full sentences. Brylee can handle her business almost entirely herself, which is a huge plus. It's crazy thinking back to when we first started this foreign journey with her in diapers. I really feel this experience will be good for them. I think we've done well to support their development while protecting them from learning some of the less savory behaviors some other island kids have out here.

Looking forward we can't wait till Jan 18th. We should find out where Jeanann is accepted on about that date. I've been accepted to NCSU's MBA program and we both hope we end up there. It's a good spot and seems to have everything available that we'd like for our family. I'd like to attend NCSU's MBA and use it as a catapult to accelerate my career and professional development in the health/business world. I'm open minded to what opportunities it may bring. My expectations are pretty high...

Jeanann's excited also. NC has a pretty developed lab animal culture along with a couple opportunities for her to look into. Guess we'll have to see.

Happy New Year! I hope to drink 1 too many, and I hope you will all celebrate with me whether you plan to drink or not! Salud!

Sometimes I find myself getting so caught up with all the stress that's going on with school and forget about what's important in life; it just takes a little one to open your eyes. Tonight, I kiss the kids and reluctantly say my good-byes for another stretch of a very long 3 days of spending 18hrs/day at school. I give Nate a bit of a long kiss and turn around to see Brylee smiling in our direction. She says: "Daddy kissed a princess, let me show you", she walks us to our wedding picture on the kitchen counter..."See, Mommy is a princess and Daddy is her king".

Finals are rough. Especially when you have to actually pass one of them (Small Animal Surgery), so you don't have to spend 4 more months and 30K in school loans on this island. I'm sure 5 years from now I will forget what this kind of throat-closing stress feels like; but I'm sure there will be new stresses to endure. Nate and I are going to do the transition back to this blog and away from Facebook - it's a big time-waster. I'm going to help him out with posts this time, I promise ;)

Last Summer in St. Kitts

I haven't edited this blog in awhile, and am not sure I'll keep it up to date. BUT, quite a lot has been going on down here in St. Kitts and I figure a quick update is in order. Jeanann should be done with this portion of her vet education at the end of spring 2013. Then our destiny will be in the hands of the stateside vet schools willing to accept her for her last year. We hope North Carolina will accept her since I've been accepted to study business there at the graduate level, but nothing is guaranteed. If I don't get that opportunity I'm sure I'll attempt to find new ones, although I would be pretty excited to study an MBA there. My MS program is nearly complete. There are a few hoops I need to jump through, and a another couple classes to finish. I may be done by this December, or may take an extra class or two next Spring. The kids are bigger than any picture on this blog. Time is flying. The more Jeanann and I study, the more we want to learn. It can be a challenge balancing our professional aspirations with raising two decent kids, but so far it seems to be working out. The kids aren't bullies or poop heads (like other peoples kids!) and seem to be caring thoughtful kids for the most part. Lots of work! Some people say they need more hours in the day. I say we need more hours in the night so we can sleep more and somehow get that extra boost of energy to get through each day. Seems that boost comes less frequently as I get older. Next week the kids will visit Grammy in Florida for a few weeks. It's a vacation of a lifetime for them! They'll have an awesome time I know. (poor grammy is probably going to get worn out) And I get to go out west and see my older sister get married and visit some family I haven't seen in a long long time. It'll be good but I'll be juggling a bit of school work while I'm out there, and Jeanann has some serious finals around the corner as well. Just another day in our exciting life! Time to move across the island before my flight leaves in 2 days!

1 Year, 2 Months in St. Kitts

St. Kitts, what a wonderful island paradise!

Jeanann is working hard at vet school. So far so good. She has been doing pretty well this semester although the lack of sleep and marathon study sessions drag on her at times. Her espresso machine broke the first week of school this semester. It's slowed us both down a little I think. She will be applying to NCSU to finish up her schooling. It's a pretty slim chance, but she's excited about the chance considering some of the classes they offer there, that are not available at Ross. In the meantime she's learning quite a bit.

The kids are getting bigger. Just last year Brylee was still in diapers! Bradyn's turning into a little boy. Grammy bought him some cowboy boots for Uncle Jakes' wedding and he wears them almost every day. I think they've started something that'll probably last a lifetime. Brylee is a princess. She's still a little reserved but she's talking more and more all the time. Jeanann has been singing with her and sometimes Brylee will be singing some of the songs to herself. They can both be a handful, but they're pretty good kids.

As for me? I'm addicted to Bloomberg. My MSPharm program is coming along. This last class was a challenge and a bit outside of my core skills and interests. We spoke about different systems of healthcare. One thing which stood out to me was learning of some tools pharmaceutical benefit companies can use to improve healthcare. Some of those quality control type measures will come in handy no matter which industry I may end up in. I've applied to NCSU and UNC's MBA programs. If Jeanann gets the transfer and I get in... great! If not.. well at least we tried!

We're crazy, and working crazy hard! We're feeling more comfortable on the island, despite the many challenges. It'll never be home though. As of now, Jeanann is half way through this portion of the program. We both plan on working hard until we get to where ever we want to be.

6 Months in St. Kitts

In a few days Jeanann will have been a Vet student for 6 months. If all goes according to plan she only has another 660 days to go or so. That may sound like a lot of time, but we're about 20% finished with our time down here. It will not be easy, it seems only 2/3rds of the students make it all the way through, and of that 2/3rds a big portion have to repeat at least 1 semester. Almost 20% of her first semester class has failed or is repeating first semester already.

The island has it's challenges. It can be a tropical paradise. It can also be a tropical pain in your 'pair of dice' if you know what I mean. I've done a crappy job logging our adventure down here, so here goes a little list of things that has changed in our lives.

Infrastructure. The roads are either made of some less durable mixture, or haphazardly poured onto sand in some drunken attempt to build roads. I'm exaggerating some, but the wide, clearly marked, lighted streets of the 'old world' seem awesome. Some roads barely fit two cars... which can be fun when you add in some hills and blind curves, pedestrians, and speeding locals... or worse, speeding ross students who probably couldn't drive well on U.S. roads.

Parties. The gas station is the spot. They have a DJ on fridays, and we hear the party from our house. It's the only place I've been where you can fill up your car at the bar.

Theft. Lets face it, poor people that have not, will sometimes be tempted to take stuff from people that have it. Unfortunately there are plenty of people here that just don't have much. Since we've been here there have been a number of Ross student related incidents. A staff member dealt with a home invasion, while they were home a few weeks ago. A students sons bike was stolen just the other day. Luckily I'm often home and I pay attention to who is walking up and down our road. And we don't live in a neighborhood that is considered touristy I don't think, so maybe that helps.

Politics.. or theft continued. Man I hope that the U.S. political process is better than this one. I want to puke when I hear some of these politicians speak on the radio and tv, trying to tell people the dumbest things. And these people are voted into office! The last one I saw was a politician who was trying to blame the increase of food prices on something other than the recent 20% tax they imposed... on everything. "It's not the 20% tax we passed on everything that is making life more expensive... it's because the cost of business has been increasing!" Utter bull puckey from vomitland. Poor suckers that live here man... No wonder they rob white people.

Kids. The kids are growing up. The impact of spending their first few years here will be hard to valuate until we make it back to the U.S. and get to see how different they've become. I hope it's a good thing, but I'm sure it will come with a few challenges. They will be in 'daycare' for another year. Even Bradyn, even though he turns 4 in November. The daycare is a great daycare, but they suck compared to the $1200 a month per kid schools we've paid for in the past. Here they don't spend much time learning numbers and letters, not until they reach the next class anyways. It's sad, but that's how it'll be. Bradyn and Brylee will probably be shocked to see American life when we finally get back to it. The land of plenty, where so much is always available.

Food. Speaking of kids, they will forget what fast food is for sure. No McD's drive through or kids meals on this island. If you don't feel like cooking, it's a bag of chips or can of whatever for dinner. No convenience store here. It's good and bad. Good since the kids are probably eating less preservatives and hydrogenated oils and stuff. Bad cuz they're probably overdosing on Mac N Cheese and Hotdogs since Dad is the main cook. Their future eating habits are being set by me, and I suck pretty much. I don't give them enough fruit and vegetables... but they get vitamins and are definitely not starving, so good enough I guess. I'll work on it.

Dishes and clothes. No clothes dryer. No dishwasher. Add to that no drive thru's, and intermittent electricity and it just takes more time to keep life going here. The clothes sometimes just don't dry well enough. Sometimes a load of laundry just stinks. The humidity keeps it from drying and funk grows. Dishes suck... and the more effort you put into cooking, the more dishes you have to wash. It's a never ending cycle of suck. One most U.S. people don't have to deal with regularly. Even if you hang dry clothes or wash dishes by hand, most people have a dryer they can choose to use, and a dishwasher they can choose to use if they want to, or have other things in life to accomplish.

Internet/power. Well, it can be fast, but it's often slow. And sometimes the power goes out. If the power goes out in some other section of the island, sometimes it knocks the cable tv and internet out. Also, the power seems to surge or fluctuate almost constantly, which seems to cause the internet and computer to 'timeout' all the time. For websites like UF's online learning system, each time you 'timeout' it kicks you out of the website. It can make online learning difficult, or online anything not worth the trouble. I've heard of a few people who have worked online here, and have had to quit due to the unreliable connections. I'm crossing my fingers school will keep going well enough for me. Although it does suck knowing I'm sure to miss out on some of the information due to the troubles of accessing certain web pages. Some of those tuition dollars are going to waste probably. Also our internet phone. I keep my computer off so if the power goes out, my computer doesn't die. That's one reason we are hard to get ahold of. Anyone can call my island phone. I'll be sure not to answer, but I'll check the messages eventually and call back when I can!

Vet School. Jeanann loves what she's learning. I'm glad for her. Hopefully we can make it through this. It can be difficult. She studies all the time and has a good group of friends with her all the time. The kids are doing well with me, and know mommy goes to school all the time. I still don't particularly like animal hair all over the house and in my food. It's a fact of life I've had to accept. It's ironic that some of these poorer locals are living their lives in worse situations than many U.S. pets, and we're here for vet school. I remember Afghanistan where people would throw rocks (big ones) at little kids in the streets to keep them away from their storefronts, when the kids were just trying to beg for whatever. If Jeanann makes it to her goal of research, she'll be helping innovate new medicines and medical technologies that may impact the world. That's the difference between being born in the U.S. and being born in Afghanistan, or in many cases being born on St. Kitts. (unless you're a politicians kids probably)

Work. I have a job selling dog and cat food at the vet school. It's a cool 7-10 hours a week starting in August. It'll be good to be doing something I can call 'work' I guess.

Well, other than that, I still haven't figured out how to take advantage of this opportunity here. I'm growing my hair out. Why not, this is my only chance I guess. I've been close to cutting it since it's hot and spend most days sweating without A/C and with hair blowing in my eyes.. but I'm committed. Jeanann wants me to write a book. That thought doesn't sound awesome, but maybe I'll start trying to write more. It can't hurt, although my end goal will probably not be to write a book.

-I've thought of trying to rebuild a local park. It seems that idea hasn't gone over well with certain people. It may piss off the neighbors and bring some unwanted negative attention to us. F me for thinking of doing something like that. -I've hiked a bit, but not much. -I've made some awful music and music videos, so being a professional rapper is likely... out of the question
I could probably start some sort of business.. but I don't know what to do or where to begin.
I could try to work on some sort of shipping boat or oil rig... but I have to be here to raise the kids and continue on in school.

If you're still reading, you get a high five. I'm open to ideas on what else I can try while here. I do have time, but not unlimited time. Sometimes I feel like a single parent and it can be exhausting. The kids are doing well, and Jeanann is making progress towards her goal. The bottom line is, this is our life, and it's moving along as well is it can be at the moment. If you want to come visit, this place is pretty awesome to visit. It's a little more challenging to try to live here.