Aktau, Kazakhstan

David spent 5 weeks in Aktau, Kazakstan this summer. Here are some pictures he took while he was there.

The Caspian Sea:



This is called Ploff, and it's very common in the Soviet Region. David said it was "pretty good".

And a Camel, of course:



Statues on the way to the airport is Aktau:

The balcony of his hotel, complete with his homemade clothes line:

And the airport in India:





Jodie's 25th Birthday!

First off, let me just say that I can NOT believe I am already 25 years old! That quarter century flew by.

As luck would have it, David flew in from his trip at 2pm on my birthday. I picked him up at the airport in New Orleans and then we headed over to the French Quarter for lunch at Bubba Gump's.

We had a great time. There is a gift shop with all kinds of funny and cute things from the movie, and the dining room is decorated with lots of posters and memorablia, including the actual clothes they wore. The food was AMAZING.

 I had Mama Blue's Fried Shrimp:



And David had Lt Dan's Drunken Shrimp:

We did a little shopping in New Orleans and then came home. As we were pulling into our subdivision I noticed all my friends were outside, and then as we rounded the corner I saw why. This is what our front yard looked like!

 I got FORKED!!! As I was standing in the yard laughing with all my friends (who were the culprits!) I remembered that one on them had a key to my house! About the time I realized this, David opened the front door and this is what we found inside...

I love my neighbors! These girls crack me up. I was finding new surprises for days, like the bows in the microwave, or that the confetti was TAPED to the floor. Or the most surprising, that the veggie sprayer at the sink was taped, so that it sprayed water all over me when I tried to wash my hands. Gotta love the "Nickel Loop Laides"!!!

And the sweetest part was that David had asked Andrea to have flowers waiting for me when we got back. It was so sweet that even though he was flying home from a foreign country, he was thoughtful enough to have flowers for me on my brithday!

It was a great birthday! Thanks to all those who made it wonderful!! And especailly David, I love you!!

78 Days until the movers come!

Our progress on the move has been fairly slow the last few weeks. David was out of the country for a month, and I went home to visit family. But we're both back now, and David is on leave all next week so it's time to get cracking. We've planned our yard sale for October 9th, and next week will be devoted to getting things sorted and priced for that. Once all of the yard sale items are out of the house, it'll be easier to see what we're working with. We've pretty much decided not to take any of our furniture. We'll be taking our mattresses, but not the frame, a computer hutch, desk chair, and bookshelf. For everything else we'll be using the government provided furnishing.

Our friends who are moving with us left yesterday to spend a month with family up north. They'll be headed to Japan in October! We're going to miss them for the next 3 months until we get there. But it does make us realize that we are getting closer too, and still have a lot more to do.

We've also been playing around with the idea of spending a week in Seattle. When familes PCS to Okinawa, they fly to either California or Seattle and wait or a MAC (Military Space Available) flight out. If we fly through Seattle, we're thinking about flying out there 3 or 4 days before we fly to Japan and doing a mini-vacation. Neither of us has ever been to Washington, so we'd like to do a little site seeing while we're there. Plus, in January they'll probably be snow, which we don't see much of around here and we definietly won't see in Okinawa, so that will be a lot of fun!

Y'all take care!