We really suck at this thing...

-Jon

One Week Before Christmas :)

Hello! Jon Here...

So there is one more week till Kasey and mine? Mines? My? I? Anyway, one more week till OUR first christmas together :) I've finished my 2nd week of break and it's been going well. I have organized A LOT of photos and hope to be done by the middle of next week. Then I will start on other things. I've also been watching a lot of Star Gate SG-1... very fun TV show.

Kasey has had the last 2 days off and is enjoying them to the fullest :P We both stayed up till about 3 am both nights! As a result Kasey slept for about 13 hours today :P Well earned rest though. Yesterday we had a web cam date with Jamie :D Really fun talking to her and seeing her. She stayed up till about 2:30 am in order to talk to us so I guess we owe her something, but then again seeing our faces was probably good enough :P

Now that Polly is ring worm free we have now opened our bedroom door for her to wander in and out. Although she usually stays in. Last night she slept near Kasey's head, but sprawled out on my pillow. I woke up and I was literally on the edge of the bed and my pillow and Polly was stretched out on it. So I showed her who was boss and pushed her over and used her as a pillow.

Kasey has to go back to work for one day tomorrow where the students will just be taking exams. And then she goes back for Monday and Tuesday for exams and THEN she gets 2.5 weeks off. Right now we are watching the movie Elf. We have decided that Elf will be a "classic" christmas movie later in life.

As you have probably guessed I have run out of things to say to you so I am just blabbing on now...

Thank you for your prayers and please continue for God's provision and our relationship to Him to grow.

December!

Jon Here...

Wow... do we suck at this blogging stuff or what?! I guess a lot of stuff has happened since we last posted. Polly died (the ring worm took all her fur off, and then her skin started falling off... very sad and disturbing, but we dealt with it). All the volunteers except Kasey and like two others were kicked out of the country. And part of the wall that we live near was bombed and there have been HUGE fights and guns and the army and I'm just kidding. None of that stuff is real... tee hee.

Life has been pretty good here :) Kasey and I finally got settled (after a good 1.5-2 months), our new apartment is very nice and safe. We are actually going to get to go to IKEA when Kasey's break starts! So we will get more stuff and make it more "our style". The people that live in here after us are going to be very happy with the way it looks and all the stuff they are going to have :) But don't worry, we don't plan on giving all our stuff away for free :P

Polly loves Kasey and uses me for my heat. She is a little heater herself so it's nice to have her lay on you. She has gotten very accustom to putting herself inside our hoody's and fall asleep there while we do work or watch TV. It's very cute.

Since my last and final Field Study I haven't been able to post any pictures on facebook because the connection has been SO slow since I got back from Jordan. If you look on a map of Israel and look to the east side of the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea and go to the right of the Sea of Galilee and move your finger all the way down to Petra, then that's how much we saw (or traveled). It was a fun field trip, but if I had a choice to do it again I would not. It was a lot of money and out of about 11-12 sites only 3 of them were specifically related to the bible. So it was kind of shock to do all that stuff and have it not related to biblical history in a deep way. But it was really fun regardless and Petra is fantastic.

Since my last field study I have pretty much been studying for final exams. AND I actually just finished my last one yesterday! It was for Archaeology and it was worth 100% of my grade. SO every single student was extremely nervous about it, especially after hearing horror stories about the final. However, me and this other guy actually asked the teacher for a study guide and he said yes and gave us the essay questions for the first time in JUC history. So I'm pretty proud about that fact :P

Now that I have completed the first semester I now have two months off! So I bought my textbooks for next semester and am going to summarize a chapter a day out of my books in preparation for next semester. I am going to be redoing a bunch of my maps and organizing all my pictures I took (that will be a long but fulfilling process). And of course I will take up my role as "house wife" :P Because Kasey only gets about 2-3 weeks off during my two months. So she will be well taken care of during this time. And Polly and I will get to know each other much better.

Next semester will not be nearly as busy as it was this first one. Apparently the first semester of this degree is the hardest because they are trying to weed you out. So I will have weekends off next semester and will only go on 1 field trip at the most I believe.

This December Kasey and I have decided to stay home for the break as Kasey only has 2 weeks off. So instead of going to Egypt this month we want to go during the summer when it will be hot and we can spend our time swimming and eating :) We might do something with one of my friends from JUC and his wife. Don't know when, but we probably will during the christmas break sometime.

Food update! Kasey and I have started to make fresh Guacamole, and it SO good :) we are quite proud of ourselves :) And we found that "just add water" cake mix for only 10 shekels ($2.50 USD) so we have a good collection of cake mix in our cupboards to help our sweet tooth. AND we haven't had Macaroni for about 2 weeks now, which is kind of strange and I think it needs to be fixed soon.

Tonight our friends from Kasey's work have invited everyone over after church to make christmas decorations, have treats, and watch A Christmas Story and National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation! :D I have seen A Christmas Story way too many times so I'm not too excited about that one. But Christmas Vacation is good every time :) I actually "borrowed" Christmas Vacation and The Polar Express from JUC for my break... I guess I totally forgot that it was a two month break... oops :P

Kasey is doing Extremely well in her job :) All of her students say that she is one of their favorite teachers at that school. AND just to brag about my wife a bit, the students have not made another newspaper featuring "Teacher of the Month" since they did one about Kasey. At least I haven't heard about it or seen it. Soooo, my wife is awesome.

Thank you all for your prayers! Please continue, after we are done in Israel then you can stop :P Just kidding. Merry Christmas! We will post more on a regular basis now that things have settled down a bit :)

Quick update

(Kasey here)

Recovering nicely from the bronchitis. Headed to the doctor in the morning for a follow-up.

In other news, I have 7 new mosquito bites from last night: 2 on my left thumb, 2 in my left elbow, 2 on my right... tricep? The back part of my upper arm.

It sucks.

But at least my bronchitis is going away?

Kasey's got the bronchitis.

Sunday night

Hello all,

Jon here...

Kasey is sleeping right now (sleeping away the sickness). So I thought I would make a post.

Kasey's "ring worm" is dying down. We got some medication to put on them (only 3) and they are healing up fast. So thank God, but continue to pray. Polly seems to be getting more which is gross cause her hair is falling off in circular patterns where the "ring worms" are.

For those of you who don't know what Ring Worm is; it's not a "stomach worm" as I thought it was when Kasey first told me. It is a fungal infection, it has nothing to do with worms :P Pretty much Kasey just has to put this cream on them (they look like a bug bite, but with a distinct ring around them...very weird) and this cream pretty much just suffocates the spot and kills it. It seems to be working :)

My field trip went very well last week. I have posted several pictures on facebook which give you an idea of where I went and etc...but we stopped at Beth-Shemesh (near the spot of Samson's birth, then we went to the coast, then Lachish, then Beth-Sheba, then Arad, then En Gedi (where we swam in the Dead Sea) the to Qumran (where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found). This took 3 days. We stayed in two different hotel like hostels (very nice and they gave us breakfast). It was fun because we got to know each other as a group. The majority of us master students all live off campus so we don't really get to know the people in the school except for field study days.

Our next trip is this Saturday-Tuesday (October 24-27) and we are going up to Galilee. Traveling in Israel is not as long as one would think. The whole country is about the size of New Jersey...so to get from the Mediterranean Sea to the Dead sea it would take about 1.5 hours...maybe less depending on traffic. So when we go on these field studies we literally travel all over Israel. I don't know the specific spots we will be going on for this next trip, but I'm sure it will be fun.

The trips we make are so full of information...it's ridiculous. My favorite parts of the trips are going to the location of a biblical spot and reading the story of what happened there. There is however a lot of other information about different excavated sites of really old cities, what it's history was, who built it, who excavated it, etc...these are nice, but to be perfectly honest they are cool at first but after seeing a bunch of them they all start looking the same "oh, a brick wall, oh a house, oh a pathway, etc, etc, etc...once you've seen one excavated site you have seen them all in my opinion. As you can guess I would not do well as an archaeologist :P

I only have 4 more weeks of this semester and then I'm on break. The semesters only run for 3 months...but o my gosh these months are jammed packed with stuff...sheesh. God willing I will make it past the first semester of studying, then I have 2 months off! What am I going to do in those months?! I figured I would study my books and prepare for the next semester AND possibly ask Kasey's school if there is a part time job I could take for those 2 months (fixing stuff or whatever), just something to keep me busy and make some money while Kasey is teaching.

Today I made a video of our apartment so those of you who have facebook will be able to see our new apartment and us as well :)

It's about 5pm right now and I'm getting hungry. I think I will make us Rice and chicken...or maybe Macaroni and hotdogs. I don't know which one sounds more appealing right now. But we have been downloading the 6th episode of the Office and coughAmericascoughnexttopcoughmodelcough which we will probably watch after I make dinner.

You are all waking up right now, or are already starting your Sunday. Have a good day, and please continue to pray for us :)

Peace.

Sickness

(Kasey here)

The past couple of days have been AWFUL. Thursday night Jon came home from class early because I emailed him about the ringworm, and then we watched a movie and had something to eat. We didn't wind up getting to bed until after one, and we woke up the next day at about 5:30 to take showers.

We went to JUC and on the walk, my chest started seizing up and I wasn't able to take anything more than a couple of shallow breaths a minute. We sat down a while until my chest relaxed, and then we went slowly the rest of the way. After Jon went to class, it took almost a full 2 1/2 hours for my breathing to become normal again. I spent a bunch of the time with my arm resting on a styrofoam cup filled with ice -- I have a HUGE spider bite on the same arm where I have the ringworm; ice was the only thing keeping me from going insane. Because of our lack of sleep I was completely exhausted. I had an ugly headache and my eyes hurt from how much I'd cried the night before. When Jon was done with class he had planned to take me to the Wailing Wall, but it was SO hot and I already wasn't feeling well, so we wandered through the 'upper room' that symbolizes where the Last Supper was held, went past David's tomb, and then went home.

We got home a little after noon and called Mrs. Eula (an older volunteer lady who works at the school and who is our designated driver) and asked if she could take us to the pharmacy. She was just getting out of the shower and needed to do her hair, so we had to wait about an hour and a half. Jon got on the computer to check facebook and talk to his dad, and I fell asleep sitting on the couch next to him.

Mrs. Eula brought us to the pharmacy, and the women working there gave me a cream to apply to the ringworm and an antibacterial soap that's good for skin infections. When we got home I applied it, and Jon gave Polly a bath with the soap. Poor kitten was all traumatized again. I kept her wrapped in a towel on my lap, head covered and all, while Jon made dinner -- chicken and mashed potatoes. om nom nom.

We watched Zombieland and ate until we were WAY too full. We'd been invited to a movie night at the Robert's (volunteer) place with him and Julie (english teacher) and Jeff (her husband) and a few other people (all volunteers), so we headed over... Julie and Jeff brought us a full Shabbat dinner -- shepherd's pie, potato salad, hulas bread and grape juice for a communion, and butter cookies and m&m cookies. Jon and I were kind of disappointed that we didn't know there was going to be food. Why feed yourself when you're going to be fed for free?!

We all ate and hung out and it was nice to just be relaxing with everyone. Most people left before the movie started. We let Jeff and Julie pick, because they were the only ones who hadn't seen our collection before. Julie saw Bewitched in our folder and said was "So raunchy!" which... isn't true whatsoever. But she picked Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, so that was acceptable.

I was coughing a lot during the movie. About a half hour from the end, all of a sudden the muscles in my chest and back, around my lungs, seized and I couldn't breathe at all. Every attempt was extremely painful. I asked Jon to rub my back and showed him where. After he'd been massaging the muscles for a couple of minutes, they relaxed, but my chest was still tight. I was glad that the movie was over -- we packed up, thanked Julie and Jeff for the food, and Robert for having us over, and left right away.

We were in bed by 10. Jon rubbed my back until I fell to sleep and then made sure I laid flat on my back most of the night. We figured that the combination of the ringworm and all the insect bites, my immune system had been weakened and I'd gotten a cold, so my body was just a big disaster and that's why I felt so awful.

Today I was supposed to go into school to supervise the PSAT, but I felt SO gross when I woke up that Jon called Shane and asked if I could stay home. I felt sick to my stomach and dizzy and had a headache. I kept alternating between being way too hot and shivering I was so cold. Jon said I felt the same as last night, when my skin had been burning up.

I feel a lot better now that I've gotten some sleep, but I still feel under the weather. A little while ago I lost my voice and I sound exactly like that guy on 30 Rock who's speaking to Jack Donaghy and says, "You have to leave GE."

"What?"

"Visiting hours--were over--some time ago. You have to leave GE. Geriatric Extended Care."

"... what's wrong with your voice?"

"I was struck by lightning--as a child. They made a movie--about me. You have to leave GE."

Ugh. The older ringworms seem to be clearing up. The one on my hand seems to be drying out, which is how Marian said they have to go. And my spider bite isn't swollen anymore. By tomorrow I hope to be okay, and definitely completely fine by Monday. But I REALLY hope that breathing issue is gone forever. I don't know how asthma feels, but I'd guess it's something like that.

Tonight is church and there's going to be pizza afterward. Kind of sucks that I won't be up to eating much because I was REALLY looking forward to chowing down on pizza. At least at this point is looks like I'll be able to make it there.

Prayer requests:

• My health -- that I'd feel all better soon and that the ringworm would go away with a reappearance.
• Polly's ringworm -- it's a big deal for us to be able to get someone to drive us to the store, let alone the pet clinic on the other side of the Old City. Hopefully this soap we're bathing her in works. She had another bath today.
• Jon's health -- hopefully he doesn't get any infection or anything from all of this.