The June Seven.

1. We learned that we have a raccoon who makes regular visits to our backyard area. I am not a fan of the raccoon, but I haven't reported him to the authorities yet. I just watch him and give him the evil eye and take his picture. None of this has deterred him.
   
2. Olive (dog) might be responsible for a giant abcess that slowly formed on Sydney's (cat) head. It was the size of a ping-pong ball and the vet couldn't see us for a few days, so we called Jonathan's dad and he talked us through minor surgery. Abcesses are full of puss. It was disgusting. But we managed to slice him open and fix the problem and it was all healed by the time the vet saw him.
   
3. We discovered that Olive loves the high-dollar, all-natural chicken jerky called Mellow Mutt. It's how we trained her to get in her crate on demand. We also finally found a non-rawhide bone that will last a while: the Purina busybone. Yay us!
4. Chelsea has been spending a good deal of time by or in the pool, reading library books only somewhat related to school. Though at times it makes her feel guilty for not doing schoolwork. she tries to remind herself that the endless hours of work will soon return and it's okay to relax. However, the lazy days are quickly ending with two summer jobs picking up next week, helping a colleague with her dissertation, working on a manuscript... ugh listing it is already making her tired.
   
5. Jonathan and Chelsea decided on somewhat of a whim to join a fancy-pants gym known as Life Time Fitness. They had a special on the joining fee, and we have 30 days to decide if we like it. Well, I mean, we love it so far but 30 days to decide if we can really afford it ;) I've been at least once every day since we joined and my goal is to go at least 5 days a week. Yesterday we had our fitness assessments (body mass, % body fat, VO2 max, strength, flexibility, etc.) and tomorrow we have a session with a personal trainer. After that session, we probably won't keep the trainer since it's an additional fee. But we can have the fitness assessments done any time for free to track progress, and we can meet with a nutritional counselor for free whenever we want as well. Fancy-pants indeed.
   
6. Jonathan suvived a second round of layoffs. Good for our survival, but painful when you know people being let go.
   
7. We have almost reached our one-year anniversary of living in North Carolina. Have yet to see these alleged mountains we hear so much about, and realized that there's a much faster route to the grocery store than the one we've taken for 9 months.