The Adventures of Janie

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

St. Thomas weekend!

We had off last weekend in St. Thomas. I went out on Thursday, so rested on Friday night. I had plans to go diving on Sunday, so I rested on Saturday night as well. The second engineer on the boat, Sasha and I went diving, and it was great - I hadn't been since my Austrlia trip almost a year and a half ago. Below are just a few pictures taken by Sash.

Sasha and I on the dive boat....getting mentally prepared to go under :)

Me trying to clear my ears - I wasn't ready for this shot!

The first dive was a sunken barge.

Going into the barge - I was having a bit of trouble staying down....didn't have enough weight.

Inside the barge.

This is a picture of us leaving St. Thomas. We left on Monday morning headed to Gib. We should reach there around the 13th or 14th weather depending.... Once in Gib I'll stay until the 21st working on the boat. Then the fun part.....a bit of travelling before summer school! :) Below are more pictures taken from the boat while departing St. Thomas.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Easter and St. Thomas

I arrived in St. Thomas two days ago. The first night I got in late and stayed in a hotel next to the airport. I arrived at the boat on Tuesday morning and started work immediately. The crew is super nice!! That night we went to dinner together. For the rest of the crew it was an end of season dinner, but to me it was "welcome on board." It was nice to have cocktails and dinner and get to know them the first night and get all the awkwardness of being the newbie out of the way. The next several days was just work work work until the weekend.

I'm in the laundry room, so it's my responsibility to do the laundry.....of course. I also clean the crew mess after each meal....that about sums up my day!!

Motor Yacht Jamaica Bay - my home until May 21.....

View of St. Thomas from the boat.

View of St. Thomas from the boat

The weekend before leaving for St. Thomas I took a trip home. I left New Orleans on Thursday afternoon to head to Natchez. Thursday night I met up with Tate at Bowie's then we met up with David and Devin Gammill at the vue. We had a few drinks then called it a night.

On Friday, I ran some errands. That night Tate came out to the house to eat steaks with us at the lake. Then he and I went back into town for a few drinks.

On Saturday, dad had a crawfish boil for us. Tate and I rode out to where his boat is docked and rode over to dad and christine's house. I went for a swim - my first lake swim of the season. After crawfish that evening, we rode over to the Stubbs' house and played Bacce Ball.

Yummie - the crawfish!!

Dad, doing his thing!

Monday, April 18, 2011

Picture update!

Below are some pictures from random occasions here in New Orleans. They are in no particular order - in fact the first picture should be further down after the ones of me on Tate's back.

This is a picture of one of the many battle wounds Tate and I got after he fell down with me on his back...on Bourbon street..... The pictures of of how this battle wound came to be are below somewhere! ;)

Wednesday at the Square - Lafayette square

Tate trying to get on my back.....obviously an unsuccessful venture.

Me on magazine after the first Wednesday at the square...

Karen and I at Lafitte's

Meaghan sandwich - Razoos

me and Karen at Goldmine.

Me on Tate's back right before he falls and hits his head on the concrete......this is where the battle wounds came from - but not to worry, we still made our way to the goldmine later that night

Wednesday at the Square.

Razoos

Wednesday at the Square.

Meaghan and I at Razoo's.

So, I went sailing yesterday for the first time!! It was awesome!! I should be getting pictures from that adventure later this afternoon. I will post them as soon as possible.

This weekend was pretty fun!! On Friday night, I stayed in and watched The Color Purple - an amazing film!! I cried like a baby!! On Saturday, I woke up, worked out, then drove to Covington. My friend Stacy works as a speech therapist at a neurological rehabilitation center in covington, and she has successfully scored me a student position under the OT there. I have a meeting with the OT tomorrow. I'm super excited about that!! Saturday afternoon Tate and his friend Brent came into town - they were there with a bunch of other kayaking Natchezians to work as kayak life guards in lake pontchatrain for the Iron Man triathalon that was on Sunday morning. That evening we went to Bourbon and drank.....of course.

On Sunday, the guys got a phone call saying the swimming part of the triathalon was canceled due to high winds - which i think was a relief since they had to be there super early. So, we went to have breakfast with Tate's parents and some friends of theirs and then went sailing! Sailing was fantastic. We each got our turn at sailing the boat.....it was really exhilarating. I loved it!! Yesterday evening we went to meet up with Tate's parents and their friends at Lucys, then went to have pizza on the balcony of their apartment! It was an amazing weekend.

Today, I'm not too busy - going to run to Wal-mart I think and go for a jog a bit later.....not too much on my agenda. I'll post the sailing pics when I get them!

Friday, April 15, 2011

Boats boats boats!!

I just got another job offer - a permanent position - on a boat. Thank goodness I've planned summer school!! I haven't paid for it yet, so it's not official....but I'm going to stick with it!! Can't shake the yachting industry to save my life....it just keeps creeping up. I can see how people stay in it so long without planning to.

Surviving in NOLA

So, living in New Orleans has been everything I hoped it would be! There's so much going on all over the city any day of the week. Since we've last spoken, I've been to Wednesday at the Square twice - each times were great. I find myself running into old friends from college that I haven't spoken to in ages. Ben and I also went to a Rebirth concert at Maple Leaf, and he experienced his first Jacques Imos meal - and loved it!! People have been coming to visit every weekend - you can't keep people out of this city!! Last weekend was French Quarter fest and JP and Ryan Brashier came to visit and Eric was in town and a friend from New York I met Mardi Gras weekend - all in town the same weekend.....too much goodness to go around......if that's possible! :)

Ok, so I've touched up on how fun the city is, not let's talk work. I didn't have any luck finding a job. I don't have any connections here in the oil industry, so it makes finding work a bit harder - which honestly is kind of a relief! I don't want to work in oil and gas. So, I've made the decision to go back to school for my masters in OT. I've got classes scheduled at UNO for the summer to get started on my prerequisites for the masters program. I also think that I'm going to start working in Covington at Stacy's rehab clinic under the OT there - which would be an awesome gig for a year or so. I was also trying to get a job at Jacques Imos, but one last boat gig came up for the month of May, so I'll start hard core selling myself to Jacques (the owner) when I get back from my boat trip.

So, let's the discuss the boat trip..... I got a month job on a boat that's docked in St. Thomas. It's a 200' boat, and I'm only going to be doing laundry - which is fine for a month. The boat is doing the Atlantic crossing, so I'm going to see the Med!!! YESSSSSS!!! Even though I won't be spending the whole summer there at least I will be able to say I saw it. We will stop in Gibralter, Spain, and that's where I'll get off the boat and fly back to NOLA!! Then I'll spend Memorial Day here and Lizzie will be in town!! Yay!! Then school starts the following week! I'm so glad I've got something to fill my time until school starts!! :) The pictures below are from French Quarter festival weekend!

Eric and I - he's my favorite!! ;)

Some of Meaghan's friend (Meaghan is the one in white, blue, and black). She's the girl I met the weekend of Mardi Gras who lives in New York - she is a New Orleans lover!!