Year: 2011

MilSpouse Friday Fill-In #61

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The discussion continues on my latest SpouseBUZZ post: “Military Women and Military Wives: Enemies or Allies?” The comments section hasn’t completely generated into name-calling, which I’ll call a success, but I’m still far more interested in hearing possible solutions than more excuses for why two groups of adult women can’t be civil to one another. Got something to say? I’d love to see your voice added to the conversation.

All right, with “shameless plug” checked off my to-do list, it’s time for the…

A word that always makes me laugh is SCUBA. But that’s likely attributable to watching too much Venture Brothers.

If you looked in my refrigerator right now, the oldest thing you’d find would be mustard, probably.

CAP 70th AnniversaryIf I were written about in the newspaper today, on the front page, the headline would say “Local Civil Air Patrol Squadron Plans 70th Anniversary Gala.” But that would be an exaggeration; what with budgetary constraints and all, it’ll probably be more of a squadron pot-luck than an actual gala.  Still, it just dawned on me that I’ve got less than seven weeks to help put some plans together. Meep.

The last movie I saw was The Lion King 3D. Yes, I dragged Sampson, patient soul that he is, to a theater full of kids to relive my own childhood love of one of the few animated Disney films with no frilly princesses. Afterwards, I rewarded his indulgence of my desire by bursting into “Be Prepared” or “Hakuna Matata” at opportune moments throughout the next week. (You’re welcome, sweetheart!)

As we were getting into the car after the movie, I mentioned that I didn’t think that 3D added much to the movie. Sampson immediately responded, “Of course it did! It added three bucks to each ticket.” I stand corrected.

The best thing that happened to me in the last few weeks was getting to celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, in Annapolis with my husband, his folks, and a congregation full of other Jews who are connected to the military. There aren’t that many of us, so we often feel like a minority within a minority: Sampson is always one of the only Jews in his Navy squadron, and we’re one of the few military families at our local synagogue. It is as refreshing as a crisp autumn breeze to spend time with people who understand both Yiddishkeit and the military life.

Are you a military spouse/fiancée/fiancé/girlfriend/boyfriend? Hie thee to LTJG Wifey’s blog, snag the questions, and add yourself to the Mr. Linky for this week’s MilSpouse Friday Fill-In!

Military Women and Military Wives

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SpouseBUZZMy latest post for SpouseBUZZ is about the relationship between women in uniform and those of us married to someone in uniform. Hard-to-shake stereotypes on both sides can turn command social functions from fun opportunities for colleagues and families to get to know one another into ordeals fraught with tension and dirty looks. Are military women and military wives doomed to be adversaries, forever incapable of mutual trust and understanding?

The comments section had yielded some interesting discussion already. Naturally, everyone has a story about “that wife” or “that female soldier” which seems to justify the stereotype and makes it hard to give other members of a group the benefit of the doubt. What I’m really interested in hearing, though, is some idea about how we can alleviate that mistrust. What can military wives do to ensure we’re not treating all of our husbands’ female colleagues like potential homewreckers? How can women in the military avoid seeming to “look down on” military wives (an issue that was brought up by a few spouses in the comments)?

I would love your feedback on my post. I truly want to believe that people living different facets of military life, in uniform or out, can build a supportive community together, but it obviously ain’t easy.

MilSpouse Friday Fill-In #57

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I’ve been missing from the MFF ranks for a few weeks now, but there’s nothing like an early Friday wake-up (boo-hiss, flight schedule, boo-hiss) to inspire a jump back onto the fill-in wagon.

My plans for Labor Day included bottling our beer, but what really happened was the drive back home from my unplanned (precipitated by  Hurricane Irene) trip to Northern Virginia. I call it my HURREVACation.

Ecco the DolphinCall me crazy, but sometimes I just need to play old video games. I grew up with Sonic the Hedgehog and Ecco the Dolphin, and there’s still something magical about those games to me. Modern graphics and sound are not the be-all, end-all of the gaming experience.

One of the funniest things I’ve seen lately is my cousin’s three-year-old daughter dancing up a storm at a recent family birthday party.

It’s strange, but a haircut of Sampson’s that has grown out too much drives me crazy while his still-extant deployment mustache is perfectly fine with me! You would not believe the (good-natured) crap I have gotten for “letting” him keep the ‘stache this long after coming home. At this point, I think he should go ahead and keep it around for the next deployment so we don’t have to endure the awkward, sketchy-to-the-max growing phase.

One, two, buckle my shoe… three, four, shut the door — and hope they don’t have blasters.

Are you a military spouse/fiancée/fiancé/girlfriend/boyfriend? Hie thee to LTJG Wifey’s blog, snag the questions, and add yourself to the Mr. Linky for this week’s MilSpouse Friday Fill-In!

Brew Day

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Brewing Wort

Steeping crushed grains adds character to a wort based on liquid malt extract.

It’s been a long time coming, as my advisers Mrs. Wookie and Sespi are well aware, but Sampson and I have officially embarked on our homebrewing quest. Yesterday, we gathered up the supplies we laid in about a month prior, sanitized the hell out of them, and put them to their intended use.

Unfortunately, I committed the grievous blogging sin of only managing to take one picture of the process (a crappy cell phone shot, at that). Mea culpa. You’ll just have to imagine the bubbling cauldron of awesome, the zingy hops we added to to the wort, and the bathtub full of ice we used to chill it.

Anyway, we boiled up a delicious-smelling liquid that is slowly turning into porter even as I type. The English ale yeast (or as I prefer to say, the yeasty-beasties) ought to be chowing down on the malt sugars in the wort and giving us alcohol in return for the tasty meal we have provided.

At least, that is what I hope is happening. Our proto-porter is currently sealed up in a five-gallon bucket in the guest room, and I’m told that peeking is a no-no. There’s an awful lot of waiting in this beer-making business, I’m finding. You wait while the wort boils, you wait until it’s cool enough to pitch the yeast, you wait until the fermentation process begins (that’s where we are right now, waiting for the airlock to start bubbling), you wait to bottle, and then — perhaps most agonizingly of all — you wait to drink your beautiful bottled results.

If all goes according to plan, we could be looking at Bottling Day sometime during Labor Day weekend. That would make Tasting Day right around Rosh Hashanah. Apples and honey may be traditional, but I can’t think of a better way to ring in a sweet Jewish New Year than with a cold bottle of beer Sampson and I brewed ourselves.

Meanwhile, I’m off to go stare at my sealed-up fermenter bucket and try to divine if beer magic is happening yet. C’mon, yeasty-beasties! You can do it!

Knit, Bike, Drink

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This morning I did the dishes so I would feel justified in making a pot of tea and working on this…

…until Sampson gets home, at which point I will get on this…

…and he will get on this…

…and we will take to the neighborhood streets like a couple of kids on a summer vacation adventure. The only difference is that afterwards, we grown-ups are allowed to drink this:

Sounds like a good way to spend a Tuesday to me.