Betty Crocker

Last night we had a Hail and Farewell to go to at the captain's house to say goodbye to the XO Chuck since he got orders for his shore duty, and to say hello to 5 new officers that have just signed onto the boat. Chuck and his wife (who is my good friend Julie) and their 3 kids will be relocating to Washington D.C. They will be here for a few more weeks, but he is officially done on the boat which as much as I think Julie would've been happy about that, I think she's tired of him being home. But I think that's how all of us military spouses feel at some point in time. We bitch and bitch about our husband's being out to sea, or working long hours, but then when they get a week or two off, after a few days we're ready to send them back. I guess it's just because we spend so much time alone, we're just used to not having to deal with them.

The new officers seem nice, and the ones that are married, their wives seem like they will be a great addition to our wardroom. I'm happy that there is one of them who doesn't have kids yet. I've been looking for a gym buddy to go to aerobics class with me, so I'm hoping that she'll be interested since she doesn't have kids. However, my time left with the boat is limited since we'll be heading to shore duty soon enough.

The party was fun and the spread that the Captain's wife put out was phenomenal! She had a good friend of hers make some party appetizers and it was the most incredible thing I've ever seen. Sumiko (the Captain's wife) is from Japan so she had her friend make sushi, but then she also had her make a lunch meat type sushi that didn't have fish in it for people like me who don't like fish. That was just one of the various things she had for appetizers. She completely outdid herself, but everything was delicious! My contribution to appetizers was a vegetable pizza that was super yummy. For dessert, I made a 2 layer strawberry cake with homemade icing and some brownies. Everyone raved about the cake and I'm guessing they like the brownies too since there were none left. So spending my Friday night and Saturday morning as Betty Crocker paid off.

There was much talk about our upcoming Halloween party which makes me that much more excited it. It seems like just about everyone is coming so we are going to have a very full house. I'm curious to see what some of these guys come up with for costumes, I'm sure it will be quite the sight. One of the guys Span asked if there was any sort of stipulations on what he could dress up as. I told him I didn't care if it was appropriate or inappropriate, just as long as he had a costume. I told the single guys if they showed up in regular clothes telling me they were something, I'd make them put on one of my bathing suits and a sash so they could compete with each other in the Miss Hawaiian Tropic swimsuit competition we could make up. They didn't seem to like the thought of that, so I trust they will come in a costume. With that being said, I've got a lot of things that need to be done this week so I guess I should start today!