The Mother Land

So here I am, home again.  Back in Vermont for some R&R followed by who knows what...the world, once again, is my oyster.

I had a fantastic time in Florida, we went parasailing and watched dolphins play and got fake tattoos.  We visited the sponge docks (like little Greece!) where sponge harvesters collect sea sponges and hang them from their boats to bring in and sell.  We had lunch at a Greek restaurant that was DELICIOUS even if I did pronounce everything on the menu incorrectly.  We went out to see Footloose at the movie theater and I tried to wear Becky's high heels and failed miserably ("You look like a dinosaur!") and then got a little footloose myself and walked out of the theater barefoot.  The whole trip was amazing, I'm so glad I got to be there for Becky's birthday and hang out with her for a whole week!  I miss her terribly again already though...maybe I'll just have to move to Florida!

Next on the agenda after Florida was a night in Plattsburgh (my old stomping ground!) and I got to spend the day with Miss Jillian, whom I love dearly and really enjoyed seeing, but I wish I could have spent more time with her.  I met up with my lovely friend Jen in the evening and we met our other wanderful friend Merry out for dinner that night.  Then Jen, Merry, and myself attempted to do some dress shopping, I failed miserably but Merry, who had no occasion to buy a dress for at the time, found a beautiful red one that she HAD to get because it looked amazing on her and was on sale....so thus came about my formal Christmas party!  I'm going to have to throw a party this year so that she can wear her dress and I can wear mine, and hopefully so that I can see all my friends.  Plus, I can bake up a storm and we all know how much I love to bake!

Anywho, after Pburgh I headed back home to good old VT where I have been job hunting, semi unsuccessfully...yeah, I did get some positive responses, yeah, they are unpaid.  Why is it I can always land the jobs that don't pay but somehow can't get a well paying job for my life?!  You'd think with all my volunteer work I would have earned one by now...although I guess I did get one almost without trying and I pretty much turned it down because the good money is in the work I just can't see myself doing.  Case and point: oil field work.  Nope.  No thanks.  Not super interested.

So here I am, at home, taking pictures, baking bread, walkin dogs, applying to schools and jobs, and getting ready for a trip to Taiwan.  I'm so excited, this is going to be a blast!  And I get a sister (in-law) out of the whole deal so that's exciting...I've always wanted one of those!  Anyway here are some pics from VT so far, Taiwan pics coming soon (early December, when I get back!)

Full moon, long shutter speed, sweet tree!

Dog's head falls, where the dogs and I spent the 70 degree day we got this week.

Josey, cooling off after our 6 mile trek on the rail trail.

Rail Trail!

We've never been this far before, so many new places to explore!

Time Flies When You're Having Fun!

I'm not sure where September when, but today's date assures me that the month is pretty much over, despite my disbelief.  And with the close of September comes the close of my time here in St. Thomas.  I have made the extremely difficult decision to leave (despite several lucrative offers to stay) after completing a person budget and coming to terms with the fact that living here at this stage in my life is not a wise financial decision (damn you student loans!).  So, once again, it's home for a regroup and new plans coming soon.  This time, more than any other, I am seriously considering grad school as a possible option (because I obviously don't have enough student loans already...) and have even gone so far as to sing up for the GRE.  I'll be one of the very first lucky idiots to be taking the new revised test, so grad school admissions folks - if you are reading this keep in mind that scores ALWAYS go down after a major change in the test, I'm smarter than my score will most likely make me look.  Reassuring right?  Not.

So, here I am, as per my usual, standing at the precipice of some new big adventure, waiting for the fog to clear and show me just exactly what it will be.  For now it's memory sharing time, here are the things that St. Thomas allowed me to check off of my bucket list: 

1. Live on an island.  Self explanatory, awesome, enough said.
2. Take a picture of a lightning bolt.  We all know I'm a photography nerd so this was a very exciting development for me.
3. Snorkel in the Caribbean.  Spotted eagle rays, brain coral, sea turtles, starfish, tropical fish, urchins, and awesome-ness.  
4. Night Snorkel in the Caribbean.  Bio-luminescence is amazing, underwater flashlights are fun, and big shiny silver tarpin fish are not sharks.  Phew.  
5. Island Hop!  St. Thomas, St. John, Jost van Dyke, Tortola, and more.  Boats are fantastically fun toys in the islands.  
6. Enjoy fresh Coconuts, straight from the tree.  And watch very talented West Indian Rasta guys scale palm trees like they're playground toys.  
7. Experience a tropical storm/almost hurricane first hand.  Exciting, except not, when you work at a hotel these things usually mean canceled flights, equating to a very busy night in the office checking in disgruntled travelers in howling wind and pounding rain.  
8. Hiking to gorgeous views and plantation ruins, read about the history of the ruins and the islands.  Did you know that slavery was abolished in the USVI several years prior to it's abolition in the states, but several years after it was abolished in the BVI (British Virgin Islands).  Brave souls used to build rafts, steal away in boats, and some even swam the short distance from St. John to Tortola; anything for freedom.  
9. Share this adventure with my mom!  Very cool for my mom to get to come down here and experience this crazy place with me, it's the first time on of my immediate family members has been able to visit me on my travels and it was a really neat thing to share.  
10. Ride a ferris wheel on top of the world.  Or so it felt, swirling around on the edge of the steep hill that is paradise point.  
11. Night swimming; swimsuits optional.  Late night skinny dipping on secluded beaches with silly friends to cap off a fun night out?  Count me in!

I'm sure there's more but I'm too lazy to continue - the point is, I've had a very good run here.  Nothing sad about it ending, I'll come visit again someday and for now I have nothing but new and exciting things to look forward to.  I'm a lucky lucky girl.

 

 

Me, Myself, and Irene

Time for my monthly blog update - St. Thomas + me + blog = failure.  I just can't seem to update this thing regularly, despite the fact that I'm sitting at a desk in front of a computer for close to and sometimes over 40 hours per week.  Anyway, here I am now, halfway through a grueling 12 hour work day with almost nothing to do at all, and I thought maybe I should put some time into updating this thing.  By the way, when did it get to be September?  My goodness where is this year going?

A lot has happened lately, happy and sad.  Irene came ripping through Saint Thomas and all my friends and family up north were calling and emailing to make sure I was alright, then, not even a week later she hit the north and I was emailing and calling all of them.  Somehow I thought down here in the warm Caribbean waters I would get the worst of the storm but it seems she was just getting started down here and she really did her damage far to the north.  Fortunately my family is all fine, and none of their homes were destroyed.  Unfortunately my friends in NY were not so lucky.  The town of Keene was hit very hard and had significant flooding.  The AuSable River, normally flowing at about 220 cubic feet per second this time of the year, reached an incredible 48,500 cfs in under 18 hours (check out the impressive hydrograph here).  The damage was catastrophic.  In Keene roads were wiped out, the fire station was washed away, homes were lost or buried in mud, families were stranded as their roads and driveways washed out.  In Willsboro power was lost and roads were washed out.  In Vermont entire towns were flooded, homes lost, downtowns under water.   My dad is up in Waterbury for the day volunteering and I dearly wish I could be there to help him.  If you'd like to help him, or folks in your town, here are some places you might look:

In New York State:  The NY Red Cross is coordinating volunteer efforts in all the towns in desperate need, contact them to find out more: www.nyredcross.org

In Vermont: You can always contact the Vermont Red Cross (http://www.redcrossvtnhuv.org/index.asp?IDCapitulo=44W8UXGL8L) but my congressman also sent me this great little site, a blog created to coordinate volunteer efforts and offers of housing, ways to donate, etc: http://vtresponse.wordpress.com/

As you may have guessed from my time in Peace Corps and AmeriCorps, volunteering is a really big deal to me, and it's killing me that I can't be there for my friends and neighbors to shovel some mud and haul some sand bags.  Since I can't, I am begging those of you that can to help in any way you choose.

I don't think I ever thought I would be sitting here in the beautiful Caribbean dreaming of shoveling mud back home, but life surprises you sometimes. 

Outside of that I have had plenty of other little excitements.  My mother came down for a whirlwind birthday weekend of fun and we adventured around the down town, spent a day in St. John, and laid on the beach.  It was such a pleasure to be able to share my new home with my mom, I've never had many visitors at all the crazy places I move to so this was a particularly special treat.  Somehow the place seemed more magical when I was explaining it's virtues to her than it ever had before. 

I have also begun the job hunting process once again.  It seems I'm always "starting a serious job hunt" for about a month or 6, right up until I find something else temporary and exciting that distracts me from growing up and getting a big kid job.  That being said I'm (hopefully) once again on the big kid job hunt, so if you find anything feel free to send it my way.  I am being picky about my jobs this time around - #1 I want to be outside as much as possible at work.  #2 I like to work hard, in fact I love it if I am completely exhausted at the end of a day at work.  #3 I would ideally like to find a job I can feel proud of - something to do with helping people, animals, or the environment would be best, but I'll settle for one that avoids hurting any of those things if I have to.  I have had a lot of jobs I did and didn't enjoy and I think my travels and transiency have taught me a lot about what I want in a home and in a job, so even though the job market is still pretty terrible I think I'm going to take my time and be picky.  I have plenty of wonderful adventures to keep me busy in the mean time.

Anyway that's my life at the moment, a little Caribbean island hopping, a little momma visiting, a little beach laying, a lot of hours spent in this office.  Not half bad. 

Son of a Beach

Another month later...

Updating my blog regularly is harder than I had thought it would be in St. Thomas.  Not because I'm so busy or even because I'm away from my computer or anything like that, in fact I'm quite far from busy and I'm on my computer at least a time or two a day.  Its not even from a lack of things to write about, that is not the case at all.  Since my last entry I have: witnessed carnival in St. John, seen a sting ray snorkeling, eaten my first genip and fresh (literally directly out of the tree) young coconut, had two friends visit from home, attempted a boat trip to Virgin Gorda (and ended up at Jost Van Dyke because of weather concerns), gone late night skinny dipping on the rocky shores of hull bay, gotten stuck in the sand in my friends jeep, been smashed by a giant wave on Magen's point, seen dozens of rainbows, faced off with a baby iguana, and that's just in the past month.  No, I don't thinks it's from lack of content that my blog is suffering, I think its from the island seeping into my blood.  I move slower, I nap more, I spend a good portion of each day just relaxing.  I'm sleepy right now actually.

My life is so utterly chill most of the time here that I lose track of time, days slip by without me really even noticing.  I've already been here for 2 and a half months?  When did that happen? 

At any rate its time to wake up, there is a storm brewing off the coast that could at any moment turn into a cyclone (read: hurricane potential) and preparations are necessary.  I am working a double today (in the office from 8 to 8, not my favorite way to spend a day but I chose it so that I can have the next day off) so I'm just sitting here at this computer refreshing the NOAA Hurricane Center website even though its not going to update again until 2.  Its kind of exciting and kind of scary to know a hurricane might be headed your way but this building has been here a long time and I have no reason to believe it will blow away this time.  An interesting side note, if this does develop into a tropical storm or hurricane the next name on the list is Emily.  I know that might mean nothing to you, but to me it means that this is my fault.  You see, yesterday was my good friends and former Peace Corps sitemates' wedding, and I decided my financial situation was such that I could not go, despite the fact that I realllly realllllllllllllllly realllllllllllllllly wanted to be there.   Today there is a big storm fixing to swirl its way right into Hurricane Emily and yesterday I skipped Emily's wedding.  I'm sorry Caribbean, I have brought down the wrath of Emily on you all.  All that I can do now is grovel and apologize and hope she calls the whole thing off. 

The stormyness of late has made for some fantastic sight-seeing off of the Mafolie Restaurant Deck and the other night I snapped a photo that I am so very truly extremely proud of, lightning in action.  Check it out below and let me know what you think!  See you on the other side of Hurricane Emily!

sandy toes and island blood

Obviously I have not been keeping up with my blog like I should, but I return from my brief (month and a half long) hiatus refreshed with new stories and a new home to write from.  Since my last update on Mother's Day a few big things have happened:  first and foremost, Father's Day happened, just this Sunday, and while I'm not home in the lovely green mountains to cook my pops the kind of fabulous breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert that he deserved, I did send him a "card" of sorts and lots of love via the telephone.  In other news, I moved to the Caribbean just over a month ago and have been living on the US Virgin Island of St Thomas ever since.  I live in an apartment with the best harbor view I think I have ever seen in my entire life, and probably the best I will ever have the pleasure of living in front of.  I work at a beautiful little boutique hotel where I meet all kinds of interesting people.  I play on white sandy beaches and snorkel over coral reefs in 70 degree water.  Life's rough.

Each morning, as I drink my cup of tea out on the balcony, watch the iguanas climb to the tree tops to bask in the sunshine, and do a bit of yoga before it gets too sweaty to move, I reflect on everything that has brought me to where I am.  I've had a pretty crazy ride, and I'm just starting to truly appreciate the places my rather impulsive decisions have brought me to.

The island is fabulously beautiful, the views absolutely breath-taking, photo-ops abound.  I'm learning a lot about the inner workings of a small hotel, and we all know how I love to collect new skills.  My thousands of bug bites are just starting (knock on wood) to dwindle down to an acceptable level; I have been told that the bugs on the island love fresh meat and will bite and bite and bite new kids on the block. I definitely found that to be the case, but what is even more surprising is that they seem to be backing off a bit now.  It could be that the whole population is decreasing, but I can't help but wonder if its because I'm no longer "fresh meat."  Is there some change that happens after you've been here for awhile that makes them bite less?  Some islandy-ness that gets into your blood?  Do I have some St. Thomas in me now?

People keep saying to me the same thing they said in Tahoe - "I came here temporarily too, 20 years ago."  The thing about living in paradise is its pretty easy to get stuck, and that's okay as long as 20 years later living there is still making you happy.  Only time will tell how long I'm going to last in St. Thomas, but for now it's home.

Life's a Beach

Dusk on the Pool Deck

View from my Balcony

i've done it again, missed a bunch of days....but I did take a picture for every day and so i will post them all now.  

First...the cheesecake!  It came out great (in my opinion....) and it didn't look half bad either...

(this ones for wednesday)

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Next is for thursday, which was the CTC 25th anniversary party on commons beach, where I snapped this shot:

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next is today, sunsets and sand.

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surveying

Today I learned to survey cross sections on Trout Creek.  I snapped this shot through the viewfinder of the autolevel across the creek and into the willows.  

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Happy Birthday Mom!

Gotta start with a Happy Birthday to my Momma!  I wish I was home so I could bake her a big fancy-schmancy cake!  Another Happy Birthday goes out to my former co-worker, Miss Sara!  Hope it was wonderful!

I have been working so much lately with my bug sampling finally in full swing I hardly have time to take a photo of the day, so heres a work photo because thats my whole life these days.  This is the river I spent 9 hours playing in today...not so bad when you consider most alternatives (cubicles don't hold a candle to this!):

 Next I have a semi-recipe for you...well its a whole recipe really, but I just used it to jazz up left-overs.  So a few days ago I made that big bowl of pasta (recipe posted here) which I was hoping would last me through the week so I wouldn't have to worry about any more cooking.  Well it has, but I'm getting a little tired of the same thing for one to two meals a day and I had some left over ingredients I needed to use up to this is what I did:  I sliced and sautéed the remainder on the onion in olive oil, when it was translucent I added a splash of wine and some of the left over veggie broth from the pasta.  I tossed in the other bag of sun dried tomatoes I had bought and let it simmer for a few minutes to soften the tomatoes.  After that I added another can of chopped olives and one of sliced mushrooms, and a fresh farmers market eggplant sliced and then quartered. I poured it all into a wok and added the rest of the chicken broth, cooking it down until there was very little left.  This was good on its own, and would probably make a good side dish, but instead I tossed mine into the leftover cold pasta and tadaaa!  Same flavors, so it all fits, but just different enough to be new.  Also, I dusted it with some crumbled goat cheese just like before and yumm...it did not disappoint.

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feather

Found this at work today, when we were bug sampling in the Upper Truckee River.  

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Aloha!

Today we hiked from Echo Summit trailhead to Lake Aloha in the Desolation Wilderness and back, around trip total of about 10 miles.  Aloha is beautiful and I recommend the hike to anyone; coming in from this trailhead is not only beautiful but also less strenuous then the Glen Alpine trailhead and MUCH more beautiful, skirting Upper and Lower Echo lakes for the first 3 or so miles.  We did hit some bits of rain and passing thunderstorms on the way out as well as the way out, but magically, the sky cleared up when we got to the lake and the sun shined for our fabulous swim in those blue waters.  The best part: swimming in Aloha, for sure.  The worst part: the aptly named "mosquito valley," a shaded and moist area where you will be snacked upon by dozens of mosquitoes!

Looking back at Upper and Lower Echo Lakes

The beautiful Lake Aloha, yes there is still snow at this elevation, no it did not keep us from swimming.

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beach?

Today was a fabulous day of work, involving floaties and measuring the depth of a pond on a property that we had to hike out to.  Then lunch at the beach and a quick swim (to get all of the pond scum off) and then back to south lake to take ground water readings at another project site....but unfortunatly I took no pictures during all of that SO you get photos of the beach where my roomy and I rode our bikes after work:

I love that this is a 5 minute bike ride from my house.  Tahoe is Awesome.

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Project Tour

Today at work I spent the latter part of the day on a project tour, looking at upcoming and completed project sites.  This picture is a successful restoration project; the creek you can see had been diverted when a sewer line was installed in the meadow.  The water pooled around the manholes and created such a draw that it dried out the whole meadow.  This channel was completely constructed and has raised ground water levels and restored the meadow to its original moisture content and therefore vegetation, habitat, and hydrology.  Very cool!

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long day!

I'm sorry, I forgot.  I didn't send the flower photo to myself but PERHAPS I will remember tomorrow!  To be fair, of the 10 and a half hours I worked today, I spent only about 45 minutes of it in the office.  All the rest was out "in the field" as we like to call it.  I spent the day mapping trails on a CTC parcel and working on estimations of volume of fill needed to repair a badly eroding trail.  The bright side:  the trails led to the top of a rock overlooking the lake that was downright gorgeous.  The down side:  I probably hiked the equivalent of climbing that rock 4 times in my efforts to GPS all of the trails on this particular property.  Anyway, because I have forgotten again to get a hold of yesterdays picture, today you get a bonus picture; because 2 is better than 1.  Here are TWO lovely photos from my day, taken from the top of Eagle Rock overlooking Lake Tahoe.

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Suzy Lake

This morning Reyna and I hiked up to Suzy Lake in the Desolation Wilderness.  It was a beautiful hike to a beautiful lake that was a lot more secluded than Lake Tahoe.  The best part?  We packed in Reyna's inflatable raft and small hand pump and floated around in the lake on a little boat!

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Blue

Today I spent all day in the office (this might be the first time thats happened since I got to the CTC, so all in all its been a pretty good run so far...) but it didn't make for very good picture taking.  Then after I went to a "Mother Blessing" party (like a baby shower but with no gifts and no cheesy games, just good food and happy thoughts and matching bracelets for solidarity until the baby is born) which was really nice, but again, I didn't take any pictures.  Sooooo here we are, 9:30 pm and no photo.  I'm a make-do grand champion though, so heres an "abstract" shot of the inside of the tiny spray bottle i keep in my room to keep the cats off of my bed.

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rebel!

today i'm going to bend my own rules....since I left my camera in the possession of my helpers today out in the field and crossed the river channel to help create soil profiles, I have lots of pictures of me at work and none actually taken by me...sooooo here is a shot of me at work.  My roomy picked it out, she calls it the "big straw one" because I am holding a stadia rod (for measuring depth) that looks like a big straw;  I spent the morning measuring depths to clay layer, slip-sliding all over the clay banks of this stream, and tossing that stadia rod back and forth over the river like a javelin (and sometimes chasing it down the river when it didn't quite make it across).  That was the morning, so naturally I spent the whole afternoon damp, clay covered, and pretty tired.  All in all it was a great day at work though!

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ps. oh and you also might have noticed that my blog has a bit of a new look, I felt like it was time for a change.  I settled on grapes for now but I might change it up again soon, because new is fun!

top 10 reasons to visit me in Tahoe!

Got up for sunrise this morning (after a nearly sleepless night thanks to the two large dogs outside my bedroom door barking their little hearts out at the howling coyotes outside...all night long...) and my roomy and i hit the road for Emerald Bay to watch the sunrise...here are some of my favorite shots from the morning:

Ten:

moonshine and waterfall

Nine:

Emerald Bay

Eight:

all of Emerald Bay

Seven:

little lighter now...

Six:

Sunshine!

Five:

professional photogs sell pictures that look like this in tourist traps all over Tahoe for like $100 a pop, and i'm giving you this one for free....you're welcome :o)

Four:

sometimes i have to pinch myself to make sure i'm not imagining how gorgeous this place is

Three:

a stop at the beach on the way home...6 am is the time to go, we had the whole place to ourselves!

Two:

footprints in the sand

One:

LT baby!  

Obviously those are only ten, and they may not even be the top ten exactly, there are definitely more...but anyway theres a taste!  I love weekends!  Back to work tomorrow, but today, I am free!

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fail

Whooopsy, i missed another one.  Sorry about yesterday folks, I spent all day at a training and completely forgot to take a picture!  I was so dissappointed when I noticed that I hadn't posted one for yesterday, but i am even more disappointed now, when I have to post the only one that I took today and its....well...its pretty lame. BUT I promise this weekend i'll make it up to you folks, i'm just dragging a little bit these days, too much to do, not enough time.  So without further ado, here is todays picture:

This is the eroding stream bank that one of the projects that i'm working on hopes to stabilize.  The very top/light brown is alluvial sands, next down is some finer sediment, followed by a clay layer that is folded and moved and bent and crazy looking, this layer was once upon a time the bottom of lake tahoe (when glaciers blocked the outlet and the lake filled the basin) and these deposits are found a few feet beneath the surface all over tahoe. Click to enlarge (if you're interested), its not a great picture, but the fresh erosion from high spring flows has made the soil layers very clear and easily distinguishable.  I think its very cool, but then again, i'm a bit of a nerd. 

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i'm baaaack!

I know that it has been simply AGES since I updated this thing, and seriously, apologies all around!  I have been working roughly 50 million hours a week and for my first month and a half here I had no internet at home.  I do now though, and as promised, I will continue my challenge!  it may be a little tough to get back in the swing of things but i'll do my best not to let you down again!  First things first, here is some of what you missed:

Early morning fog at our spring training down in Coloma, CA.  All of the pictures of flowers below are ones that I took at our campsite during our week of training:

Sunrise on our second or third to last day in Coloma.

The weekend after spending an 80 degree week in sunny Coloma, we were back in South Lake where we got snowed on some more.  On the way back from a trip down to Carson City, NV to do some shopping   I grabbed this shot of snow clouds over Lake Tahoe from highway 50.  

 I spent the snowy Friday before memorial day painting at Fredericks Cabin on fallen leaf lake.  I couldn't resist snapping a shot of a rather white Mount Tallac sticking its head up into the clouds.

A short hike up to a sweet waterfall and my favorite picture of the day is this little guy, who must have had good luck begging from tourists before since he was not afraid to show off his round little belly to us.  No, i did not feed him, in case you're curious.

The sunset at Fred's after our memorial day BBQ...still quite a bit of snow out there...

Nevada Beach in Stateline, NV.  No place like Tahoe to lay in 80 degree sunshine and stare at snow covered mountains!

This is how I get to work in the morning, or at least its how I had to go when high spring flows flooded the bike trail I usually use.  This is probably one of my favorite commutes ever.

Amazing waders for amazing ladies...somedays i quite enjoy this job.

Upper Truckee Marsh...just another day at work...

Last weekend I got to hang with TBI and go with them on their small plane trip around Tahoe.  I rode shot-gun in a 4 person plane and snapped a few shots of the mountains and Emerald Bay while I was up there.  

This one is the Tahoe Keys, the most unnatural creation I have ever laid eyes one.  Its a neighborhood in which every house has their own boat slip.  Interesting, but unfortunately not great for the environment.  

And finally this one, the beautiful Bear River at my friend Lucy's house, where we camped last night and swam this morning, so yes, as this photo was taken today, it can be considered my first "photo of the day" since I quit sooo soooo long ago.  that means its time for one of these:

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wow...its been so long since i've done that!  how very exciting!  Thats all i've got in me for now, I really should have been in bed HOURS ago.  I have a very very busy week ahead of me, but i'll do my best to keep on top of my photos!