A Baby Monkey Nipped Darren

July 8, 2014

Darren and I got back from our 10 day trip to Puerto Rico and then Carribean Cruise to: St. Lucia, St. Thomas, Barbados, St. Kitts, and St. Marteen last week and things have been insane!  Everyone assumes that since I'm a teacher I "relax" in the summer, but I haven't even had time to catch up on the THREE episodes of the Bachelorette.

This summer I'm doing 3 jobs.  I'm teaching a education class Monday and Wednesday nights at Concordia University. The majority of my days involve hours of prep and planning to make sure my 3 teaching hours are as awesome as possible.  Starting today I will be scoring teacher portfolios from home from 8am to noon everyday until the end of the month.  I'm still teaching Spanish online too!  I'm actually more busy than I am during the school year.  The day we got back from vacation, I had 24 hours to get ready for my first class!  I'm actually looking forward to August (my last university day is August 6) and I'm in two of my best friend's weddings so it should be more fun.

Back to the monkey that bit Darren.  This was by far my FAVORITE part of vacation.  The whole trip was perfect.  Sunny days, balcony room, unlimited food and dessert, gorgeous beaches, getting to spend 24/7 with Darren, etc.  But one day at breakfast I overhead that in St. Kitts you can get your picture with a monkey when you get off the boat.  I looked at Darren with a stern look and said "I'm doing this."  (He usually is opposed to anything that has to do with wildlife and actually dropped my new S5 when I was trying to get him to take a selfie of us both holding pigeons).

When we got off the boat at St. Kitts, there they were.  Tiny little monkeys (in diapers) and some even in dresses!  They are the pets of somewhat "shady" locals who origiannly wanted me to give him $10 to take 3 pictures with my cell phone!  As you are negotiating the price, they literally start putting the monkeys on you...I guess get you more excited?  We agreed on $5 for 2 pictures (eye roll).  Darren followed the rules and only took 1 picture of me and the monkey isn't even looking.  But the real treasure is the pictures (notice plural) I snapped of him.  The locals constantly feed the monkeys (I'm assuming to keep them from biting) but the little monkey was starting to slip on Darren's arm so he boosted it back up...which in turn, made the monkey think he was trying to touch his food, so he nipped him.  For some reason, every time I rethink the scenario of Darren getting bit by the monkey I feel really happy, amused, and to be honest, a bit jealous.  What a great story for those ice breakers where you tell two truths and a lie??

Last summer at this exact time I was gearing up for transfer #3.  Today is a weird day in regards to Jude and Brinly and their frozen siblings at OHSU.   July 8th, 2013 exactly one year ago was when my triplets made it to 5 day blasts and were transferred into me.  This being our 2nd full blow egg retrieval, we had 9 make it to 5 or 6 day blasts-the best two and the lowest score were the 3 we chose to transfer.  So from that cycle we froze 2 single embryos 4AB/4AB, a set of 4ABs and then a set of 6 days blasts-they joined 1 set of 4ABs from our first IVF cycle.  So crazy the start of J and B and all the other frosties was a year ago.  I'm grateful for the "hope on ice" that are waiting for me when I'm ready.  Next step is to plan Jude and Brinly's memorial for the end of the summer/early fall.  I think although sad, it will be another step towards healing and another step in this messy thing called grief.  They are in our hearts every second.  I wrote their name in the sand in the Carribean.

I read a long time ago at the beginning of my blogging that wearing red underwear on New Year's Eve helps increase fertility.  Any one know if monkey bites help?

Formal Night on the ship!

My handsome husband enjoying the balcony

View from our room!

Orient Beach

I was way happy about feeding pigeons in Puerto Rico.



 Best for last, this is the 2nd picture I took, right before he bit.  You can see the look in his eye.