Where is the time going?

We just received our staging packet in the mail today! This is really exciting and provides details about the first couple of days of our newest adventure. Until then though, my life is going to be crazy!

'Why crazy?' you ask? I am leaving on Saturday to go to Columbia, SC to finish the work on my thesis. Other than leaving all my friends at work, I'm not that sad about leaving Jacksonville. But this thesis is killing me. I've only been working on this thing four-ever! (For those of you keep score at home, that is literally four years.) So, I'm preparing for thesisville until I leave on the 9pm Amtrak to Columbia. Once there (4am) I'll work my tail off to get a defensible thesis together and get it defended. Which will (hopefully) be on one of the two days my adviser has open in June, the 19th or 20th. That date range works really well for me, because after I pass (thinking positive) I'll have a day to two to get corrections made, get it printed, and submitted to the graduate school. Then, about the 28th, two days before we leave, I'll go home to pack for the next two years of my life. That's right, two days for two years.

Rachel has agreed/is being forced to take care of everything else. Selling our car, packing our stuff for storage, moving us out of our apartment, finalizing bills, packing up for Jamaica, and the five million other things that need to be done.

So, I'm going to be a basket case for the next three weeks. Then I'm going to get dumped into a totally new environment, culture, and language. That will bring a whole new set of challenges.

Seriously though, I couldn't be more excited.

50 days. . .

not that I'm counting or anything. Okay, okay, I'm counting! It seems like there is so little to be done right now. It is too early to pack, pretty much all the paperwork is done and I've read through all the information! Now what? Just wait, I guess. We should receive our staging packet near the end of the month or beginning of June. That will contain information about booking our flight and what we will be doing in Miami for 3 days.
Both of our jobs are now aware that we are leaving. Everyone took it well, it is hard to be mad at someone who is volunteering for peace:) Telling work cemented the fact that we are really leaving and made me start to think of all the things I will miss. Ya know. . . family, friends, hot water (running for that matter), the usual.
Can't wait for July 1st. . . really, I'm having trouble waiting!

Just waiting for July!

Just a few introductions. . . we are a married couple leaving for Peace Corps service at the beginning of July. We are both in our late twenties. Currently, I teach high school biology and Wayne is a GIS/RIS Specialist. We live in coastal North Carolina. Mostly, we are VERY excited about leaving for Jamaica!!!
We started the Peace Corps (PC) application process last June. For those of you that aren't aware, there is a ton of paperwork involved with PC acceptance. We were nominated for the Caribbean in August and worked to get all that paperwork done for a good 6 months. We finally received our invitation (means everything is official) in late February. That is when we found out that we would be serving in Jamaica. I will be under the heading of Environmental Promoter and Wayne is under Community Forestry Advisor. We only have very vague job descriptions at this point and will not find out more until a few weeks into training. We will not find out exactly where in Jamaica we will be until sometime in August.
We hope to keep this blog up to date with our current progress and once we get to Jamaica, exciting stories of our service!
(Above picture: Us outside of Monteverde, Costa Rica)