All things begin somewhere

Given the fact that Nate and I seem to be terrible at staying in touch with everyone, and that the number of people who we would like to stay in touch with is quite large, we have decided to attempt to reach as many people as possible across cyberspace. We will be updating here as often as we can, and welcome questions from anyone about what we're up to or how things are going!

October has been busy. Things are starting to get cold, so we're trying to find time to shore up the house as much as possible, but just haven't found time to do so yet. Our plan is to put rubber stoppers under the doors to prevent drafts, put plastic over the windows, and ideally place a cat door in the basement door so that the cats can go down to the litter boxes without losing so much heat to our concrete basement. All of these things will happen, maybe tomorrow, hopefully soon.

In the meantime, we've just returned from a visit to MSU vet school, where we got some not-so-great news; one of my evaluators got their reference in late, and so I am not eligible for next year. This may or may not also affect some of the other schools I have applied to. We were of course disappointed, but looking on the bright side. Nate really enjoys his job here, and it would certainly not be a bad thing for me to work full time for a year, to get our finances closer to where we would like them to be.

School has been a trial this semester; I am taking three difficult sciences (biochemistry, organic chemistry, and physics) as well as a literature class. Three are going well, but our biochemistry professor is new, and the class is interesting. We're not sure what our grades are at this point, but he keeps telling us 'not to worry.' This does not soothe my nerves. Organic chemistry and physics are functional, though I fully agree with the idea that at least 50% of the class is learning the professor. My literature class has been a godsend; the professor expects us to be adults and treats us as adults (surprisingly rare), and the literature and discussions are interesting.

Nate has been keeping busy with things as well, and says 'hi' to everyone from across the couch. He's been designing using photoshop for various causes. This month he designed a logo for the animal shelter that I am involved in, and entered a poster contest about wastewater care. We hope to win a 4-gigabyte iPod from the latter, but regardless it was well done and will go nicely into his portfolio. In all of his 'down time' he has been working on programming a game. Its extremely interesting to see how all these things work, and how much work goes into every little step. He describes it as 'exciting' with a spattering of 'frusturating.'

Our household continues to fluctuate. Currently we have our animals, four kittens and two dogs. We've really come to love Boomer, the American Walker Coonhound, despite all of his quirks. I'm going to try to get a picture of him and Cricket (the papillon) together; they hang out during the day, an interesting pair.

Attached pictures are of current and recent fosters. Cricket and Boomer both make an appearance; it is easy to see how well Cricket, Rufus and Hannah, get along, sleeping together. The Honda love was from MI, and the picture was just too good to pass up. Gray kitten is Gemini, brother is Gaius, both living here with us for the next month or so. If you visit, please leave us a message and let us know you've been here. Feel free to ask questions, we will be happy to reply!