Snake River Rams

My family, plus Sam Johnson, were camping at upper Two Corral Creek on our third day of our annual Snake River trip. My dad and I had been in the boat fishing for sturgeon when we heard a pack of coyotes yipping, howling, and barking. It was incredible to watch them chase chuckers across the steep canyon hillside. While watching the drama unfold I noticed a large ram laying on the edge of a cliff right above our camp. My dad rowed me back to the shore and I grabbed my camera. Aaron, Sam, and I crept up the cliff and to within about 12 feet of these three bighorn rams. It was amazing.

March Ketcham Update

Hello friends and family! I realized that I haven't written an update for several months - I believe the last one was sent before Christmas.

We had a wonderful trip down in CA for Christmas (we drove and took "our girls" [our ferrets] with us). We spent about 10 days there, mostly in Santa Barbara, visiting friends and family. We spent New Years in Klamath Falls, OR with Dan's family for a few days.

I'm proud to report that Dan finished his first term of college in December and we received the great news that his grades made the Honor Society! He's almost done with his second term now - he has 2 weeks left until finals, then a week of spring break, and then the spring term begins. He's still doing really well with his classes and enjoying school, although he's looking forward to a week of fishing and relaxing down in Klamath Falls for his Spring Break.

In the middle of January we got plugged in with a small group from our church, which has been really nice. There are three couples (including us) and a total of 10 kids (each couple has 2 biological children plus 3 foster children). The kids are really good about entertaining themselves during our 2-hour time each week. It's been really nice to meet other people in town and we're really appreciative to have these new friendships.

At the end of January I interviewed with Lincare, a nation-wide, home-based respiratory company. I got a job offer and accepted and my first day working there was February 14th. I've really enjoyed my 3 weeks there and hope to make it a long-term job. I'm really fortunate to work 3 miles from our house, which is wonderful (I go home almost each day for lunch!). I am in charge of setting up patients CPAP/BiPAP machines (machines that help people with respiratory sleep disorders), fitting patients with correct masks, doing in-home check-ups for patients, and other aspects of their respiratory care. Sometimes patients come into our center and sometimes I drive to their houses. I spend a few hours each day doing office work, which I enjoy, and the rest of the time doing patient care. It's been a great mixture of both, which I really like. We have two wonderful women who run our office, schedule my appointments, put out "fires", and generally make life a lot easier. They are a wealth of knowledge and are great resources for me. I have a conference I have to go to in Portland this Thursday. I have to give a 5 minute presentation on a drug (Spiriva). There will be a total of 10 of our centers there (with about 3 people from each center). I'll be the only one there from our Albany center - nothing like throwing the new girl in the mix quickly! It's been an adjustment for Dan and I for me to be working full-time, but we're getting used to it. One of the great things about working this type of Respiratory job instead of working in a hospital is the set hours. I work M-F, 8am-5pm and I am on-call every-other weekend (which I haven't started yet since I'm so new), but I don't have to regularly work nights or weekends and I have this set schedule which means we know how many hours I'm working in a given week. It's nice to have that consistency while Dan's in school.

Last weekend (February 25th-28th) my old roommate, Alex, flew up to Oregon and we drove to Idaho to visit another old roommate, Katie, who is pregnant (and due in a week!). Katie had no idea we were coming (we'd set it up with her husband) and she was definitely surprised (we got the surprise on video - it's great!). I haven't hung out with Katie in over 2 years, so it was nice to catch up in person instead of over the phone or in an email. It was funny to see her pregnant - she's due in a week, so she's pretty big (but only in her stomach). The baby (Elijah) moves a lot and it was kind of fun to see her belly move around when he moved. It was really wonderful to spend the weekend sitting around talking. It was so fun to spend so much time with them - we lived together for over 2 years down in Camarillo, CA and we've been really close.

Dan is down in Klamath with his family this weekend to go goose hunting. It's the last weekend of the 3-week season for this particular kind of goose and they've been doing really well. He left around noon Friday and will be back tomorrow evening. He's having a good time and last night they did great in one field, but today his brother is helping guide some people from CA and Dan could only go for a few hours early this morning, so he's been just hanging out this afternoon. I've been enjoying having a quiet weekend since I don't have a lot of down time during the week anymore.

When I got this new job we got a rental car for a month (for those of you who don't remember, my SUV broke the day after we arrived in Albany last July and we've been a 1-vehicle family since then). We've put more then 3000 miles on rental car so far (we've gone to Salem several times, to Eugene twice, and we've also been taking advantage of the great gas mileage and have taken a few scenic drives on the weekends). I bet they'll be surprised when we turn it back in with so many miles! We've got unlimited miles, so we're good. We will be spending next weekend car shopping.

Our weather has been interesting - last Thursday we got 3 inches of snow, which is pretty unusual for our area. Just a few days later it was 55* out. We were fortunate enough to have 2 weeks of no rain last month. We even saw some sun! The weather is back in "winter" mode, with at least a little rain each day and gloomy skies. We're looking forward to spring - I can't wait to see the sun and wear flip-flops!

I hope you've all been doing well! We miss all our family and friends and think about you often!

~Jen & Dan

Holiday Travels

Left: Dan & Me with the triplets I used to nanny for (they'll be 5 this month)
Right: Dan & Me on the bluffs behind my parent's house
Bottom: Dan & Me at my parent's house

We traveled for Christmas (again) this year. We've only traveled for Christmas 2 years now, and I'm already looking forward to the day when we can put up decorations (because we'll actually be home to enjoy them), have our own tree, and have everyone at our house.

We spent 2 days in Klamath Falls (OR) with Dan's parents, then a week in Santa Barbara (CA), then another 4 days in Klamath Falls (over New Years). It's a 4 hour drive from our house to Klamath Falls, then an 11 hour drive from Klamath down to Santa Barbara. We used our rafting dry bags to keep our luggage, etc. dry on the drive to/from (snowed/rained a lot of the way). On the way back from Santa Barbara to Klamath Falls we had a run-in with some ice. Luckily we were only going about 35mph, there was a guard rail, and no oncoming traffic. We slid around, slammed into the guard rail, and ended up facing the opposite direction in the opposing lane. We were a bit shaken up, but we're fine (and so are the ferrets, who traveled all over with us). The bumper needs work (but the brand new headlights I got Dan for Christmas were unharmed)...

Being in Santa Barbara for the week was awesome - it was the right amount of time, we got to see all our family and most of the friends that we wanted to see, and the weather was nice for us several of the days. Being in Santa Barbara also has made me really homesick, which is something I haven't experienced before.

As soon as we got back I started applying for RT jobs in the area. There aren't really any. I have applied to 10 jobs this week, and only 1 of them was an actual RT job. The rest are jobs branched off an RT license (such as, working in a sleep study lab, doing home health care, etc.). Job hunting is frustrating. No one ever emails to say that they've chosen someone, so move on. It's an employers market. I'm trying to be positive - I know the right job for me will come along. The lack of human interaction (besides Dan, who's at school half of each day) is really getting to me. I've been out of school for 9 months, we've been here 6 months. I need to get back into a routine (besides laundry, cooking, taking care of the house, the truck, our ferrets - that's all fine and good and I enjoy doing it, but I need to interact with people).

In other news, Dan started school again on January 3rd. He did really well his first term (3 As and 1 B) and likes his new classes, so far.

Happy Day!

~Jen~