Jenny the Military Spouse

RECON: Comic Relief

2012-01-06T15:35:00.003-06:00

Here's the new link for the RECON: Comic Relief program I did in 2009. My segment starts at 7:25 but don't be afraid to watch the other cartoonists (after you watch mine, of course). Cheers! ~ j

"PCSing...it's a Spouse thing!" now 25% off with publisher's discount!

2010-12-20T08:43:00.014-06:00

Purchase PCSing...It's a Spouse Thing! at 15% off with coupon code RESOLUTION305. The book is currently reduced by 10% so that's a 25% savings off the full price!

Disclaimer: Use coupon code RESOLUTION305 at checkout and receive 15% off PCSing...It's a Spouse Thing!. Maximum savings with this promotion is $10. You can only use the code once per account, and you can't use this coupon in combination with other coupon codes. This great offer ends on January 15, 2010 at 11:59 PM EST so try not to procrastinate!

While very unlikely we do reserve the right to change or revoke this offer at anytime, and of course we cannot offer this coupon where it is against the law to do so. Finally, Lulu incurs the cost of this discount, so it does not impact the Author's proceeds of the book.

~ j

The First "Jenny" Book is HERE!!!

2010-11-23T17:39:00.007-06:00

"Jenny" is on hiatus while we suffer through yet another PCS. Please feel free to browse the archives located on the main page of http://jennyspouse.com to get your weekly milspouse chuckle.

OR...You can order the very first "Jenny" book ever and get your milspouse chuckle whenever you want! Just in time for Christmas, the book is located at: http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/pcsingits-a-spouse-thing/13835448

Selling for $19.95, it's the greatest gift you can get for any military spouse you know. She/He will see themselves among these 120 pages more than once.

Help yourself to a handful of books this holiday season. Don't leave anyone out! ~ j

Electronic Cigarettes or What to put in a care package...

2010-11-17T16:32:00.006-06:00

The Great American Smokeout 2010 is tomorrow, November 18. (http://www.ucanquit2.org/facts/gaso/default.aspx) This is the perfect time to help your loved one quit smoking.

I know it's tough but they don't have to go cold turkey.

My friend, @Michal Douglas, owns an electronic cigarette company and sells to a lot of military folks. He placed a small ad on my site and, as I do with everyone who advertises on jennyspouse.com, I want to send him a lot of traffic.

But I mostly want to help people quit smoking. So this is a selfish plug on my part. I really believe in this product.

Michal's company is called "America's Best Buys" and you'll get a 10% discount at checkout when you use the code MILITARY. He's doing this just for us so I hope you get over there and take advantage of it. (http://americasbestbuys.com/home.asp)

Michal and his original business partner started marketing e-cigarettes because the business partner was dying of lung cancer, directly related to smoking. I knew them briefly right before he died. It was awful. But the one thing that has always stuck with Michal is that his friend told him, "I wish I'd known about these things a lot earlier."

I can't explain how they work but America's Best Buys will tell you everything you need to know. Do it. Now. Before it's too late.

Why Should We Care About Prince William's Engagement?

2010-11-16T10:16:00.005-06:00

Because Great Britain is our greatest ally and our best friend. In order to nurture a friendship, you must take an interest in your friend's children and family. A sure way to kill a friendship is to show utter disinterest in her family's joyful moments and to ignore their milestones.

Because we've watched this boy grow up and have held him to higher standards than we've held our own children, judging his life on a global level like no other. We should celebrate when he's happy.

Because we know that one day he WILL be the King of England and it is in our best interest that he possess sound judgment and above-average decision making skills. One day every decision he makes concerning Great Britain will directly affect our very best friend and so affect us.

Yes, we should be interested in this and pay attention. It's important.

~ j

"Military Wives Matter" - Get Involved in a Study from Oregon Health Sciences University (OHSU)

2010-07-14T18:39:00.004-05:00

Militarywivesmatter.org is part of a nationwide study funded by the National Institute of Mental Health and centered at Oregon Health & Science University. The goal of the study is to get a sense of what issues bother military wives most and to provide information about deployment and how it affects families.

From Dr. Celina Oliver, Department of Research Psychiatry, "We really appreciate anything you can do to help us spread the word. We are hoping to be able to use this research to encourage policy makers to support military families more appropriately. Thank you!"

Announcement from the research team:

Has your husband deployed (or will he)?

We don’t have to tell you how hard it is.? But if you would like to know more about what to expect and how to deal with it, there’s a new website that provides information about a variety of topics military wives have said worry them the most..

Note: They definitely want to know about your depression and/or PTSD but, even if you don't feel that this applies to you, you can be useful in other areas. To find out more, go to http://www.militarywivesmatter.org and sign up for the study. Help OHSU with their research and you might even affect policy for spouses everywhere.

Hats Off to Volunteers! April 18 - 24 Ft. Bliss, TX

2010-04-24T14:10:00.036-05:00

I've just returned from my trip to Ft. Bliss, El Paso, TX, where I spoke at a luncheon for the post's volunteers. The program is headed by Army Volunteer Corps (AVC) Coordinator, Tephanie Hopper, and her staff from the AVC office located in the ACS Bldg. 2494, for those of you who want to join the legion of incredibly motivated volunteers at Ft. Bliss.

The event I attended was called "WHATTAWEDNDESDAY" on April 21st. This was the second in a series of events planned for the volunteers throughout National Volunteer Week (April 18 - 24). The first get-together of the week was "Manic Monday" and featured a salsa class to help get everyone into the feel-good spirit of the week.

"WHATTAWEDNESDAY" took place in the Centennial Banquet & Conference Center and featured free massages, Reiki, makeovers, food and prizes. A local beauty school was in attendance to give free haircuts and manicures. They even did eyebrows and makeup!

The final event of the week was held Friday night at the Centennial. This was the official Fort Bliss Annual Volunteer Recognition Awards Ceremony. Awards presented by: Maj. Gen. Howard Bromberg. Their guest speaker was Brian McNamara of Lifetime Television's Army Wives.

Here is the information Tephanie sent me:

"Each year our nation celebrates volunteers during National Volunteer Week. The Fort Bliss community follows this great tradition established by President Richard Nixon in 1974. We have numerous activities to show appreciation for the volunteers who selflessly support our Soldiers, Family Members, and Retirees. The largest event is our recognition dinner hosted by our Commanding General. The recognition dinner is scheduled to be held April 23rd from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm.

Our theme is "Hats Off to Volunteers".

The following are some accomplishments of our installation volunteer

program:

2350 volunteers

155,000 hours

3 million dollars worth of hours contributed to the installation.

Volunteer Positions include:

Supporting our youth through coaching sports.

Teaching our family members through Army Family Team Building.

Meeting Soldiers/ Families as they deploy or return from deployment.

Family Readiness Group support

Supporting our Junior Enlisted Family Readiness Group

Soldiers mentoring kids through Partners In Education

Support advocacy walks

Tax Preparation

and MANY MORE!"

How could I say No to an invitation like that? I had a great time, got to meet some no-nonsense Army spouses, and came away with a feeling that this is a group of strong women I could definitely be a part of. I would go back to Ft. Bliss in a heartbeat.

I hope some of them will be in D.C. for Spouse Appreciation weekend, May 7 - 9, 2010. I sincerely hope to see you there or back in Fort Bliss.

You ladies ROCK!

~ j

Jewls' rules for Space-A travel

2010-04-16T12:48:00.006-05:00

This is a repost from April 2008. A lot of people have found it useful over the years so I wanted to post it again. I'll try to add some updates when I get the chance.

Disclaimer: These are my own tips culled from my own experiences which may not be right for everyone. I can't answer all of the legalities involved in Space-Available travel (also called "Space-A" or "stand-by") right now but I'm planning on doing a show with Wendy and Marie of navywiferadio.com where we'll discuss everything in much further detail and depth.

If you're interested in joining the world of Space-A travelers, please check with your local AMC terminal for complete rules and regulations regarding your personal situation and traveler status. And please keep checking back here for the dates of the show. We'll want you to call in and participate with your questions and concerns. Hopefully, we can get enough interest in the subject that Wendy and Marie will be able to get a qualified representative to come on a future show to address all of your issues.

Let us now continue with

jewls' rules for Space-A Travel...

Don't be a diva. In the Air Force, most of the airplanes available for Space-A travel are C-17s and KC-135s. Yes, these are cargo planes and air-refuelers. If you get one of these airplanes, for the next 8+ hours you'll be sitting in a jumpseat, most likely webbed canvas, straight-backed against the airplane's frame. You'll use the bathroom in a rudimentary version of an airline lavatory but without the amenities even that implies. For instance, the KC-135 we took to Hawaii didn't have a working sink in the lav but the crew was happy to supply alcohol wipes. Usually, one lav serves the crew and all of the passengers (we had about 44 men, women, and children on that flight, excluding the crew).

No open-toed or high-heeled shoes are allowed in Space-A travel and I would think twice about wearing a dress or shorts. The planes fly very high and it's very, very cold inside. Carry a jacket and a small pillow.

Travel light. Some airplanes have weight limits. Before leaving the house, my husband and I weigh everything, including carry-ons (laptops, cosmetic totes, etc.). Our magic number is 30 pounds total per person. Twice we've gotten the only two seats available on both a C-12 and a C-21 because the weight limit was 30 pounds per person (or 60 pounds total because we were traveling together).

My husband and I bought backpacks specifically for our Space-A trips: they're lightweight and small enough to fit in the overhead bins but long/tall enough to carry all of our stuff. They have special wet/dry pockets as well as clips inside the compartments for keys, etc. We bring just enough clothes to be tourists in. If you're planning on bringing dressy outfits, the backpack option may not be for you. If you shop when you get to your destination (I certainly do...after all, isn't that the point of the trip???), you can mail your items and extra clothing back home via the USPS at the nearest military base. All that's needed here is a little planning and time management. You might even get to use the internal mailing system known as MPS and send your package back to your home base for free. Ask your USPS clerk.
Be prepared to take lesser accomodations. Our trip last week was to Hawaii. We deliberately made no plans for a hotel because we wanted the freedom to take whatever was available. As soon as we landed at Hickam AFB, we started calling all of the military installations on Oahu, asking what billeting they had available. There were absolutely no rooms anywhere so we called a travel agency that ultimately got us a room at the Waikiki Resort Hotel located barely one block from Waikiki Beach (...and barely one block from Island Soap & Candle Works!). We stayed at WRH for three nights before deciding to branch out and see the other side of the island.

For the next couple of nights, we stayed on the USMC post, Kaneohe Bay, on the Windward side of the island. One of those nights was spent in the BOQ (Bachelor Officers' Quarters) for $40 a night. The building was WWII era with hand-crank windows and thickly-painted closet doors but it was all part of the charm. (A lot of Hawaii's WWII military buildings are still in use and some of those on the Schofield Barracks Army post still have strafing marks all across the fronts and sides of them from the Japanese attacks.)

Be aware that many military billeting facilities only have internet available in the lobby or "commons" areas. Don't be shy about showing up in your jammies, with your hair up in a towel...nobody expects you to be beautiful in these places (remember, they're all paying $40 a night, too!). Take your laptop and affect a look of deep concentration and nobody will look at you twice.
Be prepared to take more expensive accomodations. Our last night in Hawaii was the worst for finding a place to stay. It seems Spring Break doesn't occur all at once in the U.S.

The first week we were there, everything was booked because of Spring Break. The second week we were there, everything was still booked because of the second wave of Spring Breakers.

So we decided to go to the MWR hotel - The Hale Koa - right on Waikiki Beach and take anything they had...even if it was a closet with a Murphy bed inside. Turns out, they only had one room, oceanside, overlooking the beach, the pool, and the courtyard. Darn the luck! Of course, we took it. It cost us $179 but ended up being worth every penny. At sunset, we sat out on our deck above the palm trees and the ocean and watched a flotilla of sailboats move lazily past. It was quite romantic.
Be prepared to have NO accomodations. We met a young spouse who was traveling back to Okinawa from her Space-A trip to the east coast, stateside. She told us she and her baby had slept in the AMC terminal at Travis AFB because there were no rooms to be had anywhere. She didn't make a fuss about it. She knew the Space-A ropes and just shrugged her shoulders.
The trip home. "Space Available" means just that: Space Available. Period. Military aircraft are not obliged to carry passengers. It's their perogative and our privilege. You may or may not get the flights you want, either coming or going.

The military flights from Hawaii to Japan, or even to Guam, had dried up during the last few days of our stay. We finally had to buy a commercial ticket on Saturday to get out of Hawaii (we were sad to go but, after a week of tourism, our vacation money was running out). We flew back to Tokyo because there were no commercial flights to Okinawa for another week (fallout from the ATA closure). We checked into the Kanto Lodge at Yokota AB and started working on getting a Space-A flight home which means we packed our stuff and trucked over to the AMC terminal every single day until we got lucky on the third day.

Old School travelers see it as a game. They laugh when they don't get a ride and then they stake out their position in front of the schedule monitors that hang from the walls of the terminals, telling each other which flight is likely to go and which "TBD" flight will drop to "0" under the PAX column.
Space-A Speak. Some buzz-words to know when you're in the Space-A rotation are: Show-Time for Roll Call or simply Show-Time (this tells you what time they'll call the names of the lucky few chosen to be on today's flight...show up early and get yourself checked in or they won't call your name at all), Seat-Count (how many passengers will be allowed on the flight you want...this number is listed under the column usually called PAX on the schedule and more often than not says "TBD" - To Be Determined), and Weight or Weight Limit (how much weight you will be allowed...a combined total of your checked and carry-on baggage).

When you're stranded in the terminal after your show-time of 0400 has been delayed, these are the topics that will be discussed over and over by everyone around you. Use your new buzz-words and join in on the conversations. You'll learn so much about how to be a successful Space-A traveler that you'll be "hopping" every chance you get.

My husband is somewhat of a guru on how to find obscure information on every subject imaginable so he gave me the following links to share with you:

spacea.info - everything you wanted to know about Military Space-A Travel
takeahop.com - how to sign up online and more.
pepperd.com - Derk Pepperd's Space-A message board
spacea.net - John D.'s Military Space-A Travel Pages

I hope you've enjoyed this article. Please share it with others and please keep checking back for the date of the upcoming navywiferadio.com show on Space-A travel.

~ jewls

Attention Macon Residents! Vote for Comics!

2010-02-16T14:36:00.011-06:00

The Macon Telegraph is running a comics contest.

They recently ran a "favorites" poll and only received 1500 votes, resulting in SSDD (Same Shit, Different Day). The favorites were:

1. Blondie
2. Beetle Bailey
3. Family Circus
4. For Better or For Worse
5. Zits
6. Garfield
7. B.C.
8. Snuffy Smith
9. Andy Capp
10. Hagar the Horrible

Now they'd like us readers to vote on comics to ADD to the line-up above. No word on whether they're keeping all of those golden oldies but I say "Let them go!". It's time to give the younger, more contemporary voices the exposure they deserve.

I commend The Telegraph on some of the new additions they're proposing: The Knight Life, Get Fuzzy, F-Minus, Frazz, Cul de Sac, Retail, and (my favorite and the only entry by a female cartoonist) Rhymes with Orange, but the examples they include don't show even half the talent and genius behind these strips.

For example, the Rhymes with Orange entries were notated "Hil is on vacation" and were drawn by guest cartoonist Mo Willems. Are readers judging whether they like Hilary or Mo? Hil's faithful readers will "get it" but newcomers might not. I fear these particular samples will knock her out of the running.

The F-Minus entries are dull and don't show Tony Carrillo at his best. I encourage readers to catch up on the F-Minus archives in order to get a better sense of Tony's very special style and humor.

The Telegraph gives us a total of fifteen strips to choose from but we're only allowed to select FOUR. That's right. Only 4.

If you live in the Macon area, go to this link from macon.com. Please read all of the entries and judge them fairly and wisely.

Help upgrade the comics pages from Same-Old-Thing to Smart, Progressive, and Finally Funny.

That is all.

~ j

Update: I don't know why they even held this contest. The only ones they chose from the list were Frazz, Get Fuzzy, and Rose is Rose. And those are only available online. They're not running them in the paper. Maybe they're going to insert them on Sundays or something. Still, they don't even have a link online to F-Minus or Rhymes with Orange. I don't get it. :-(

This week's "Jenny" comic is UP!

2010-01-10T11:45:00.008-06:00

This week's "Jenny" comic is UP!

"The Newness" from Chandra's Handbook. Enjoy!

Don't forget to go to the archives at jennyspouse.com and vote for your favorite Jenny Comics from 2009...

Saying "So Long" to the Big Dead Tree

2009-12-24T08:14:00.031-06:00

The Big Dead Tree

Ever since we moved into base housing (July '09), we've been surrogate owners of a big dead tree in our front yard. It was somewhat embarrassing because all of the neighbors could see it.

After all, it was big. Bigger than our house.

The neighbors, well-meaning souls all, would stop and render their opinions, "Your tree is dead", and their advice, "Hang some plants from it, dress it up a little". We always thanked them but there wasn't much we could do about it.

The ultimate decision was made by others, of course, and so it was that, on Monday morning, a truck equipped with a cherry-picker pulled up in front of the house and released two men determined to bring down The Big Dead Tree.

I felt sad. The Big Dead Tree hadn't been bothering anyone. Anyone at all.

Except, of course, my husband who kept having to drag the branches off the roof and out of the lawn to the field across the street. The Big Dead Tree dropped branches day in and day out. Some of the bigger ones crashed to the ground with a vibration that made the house shudder but most of the smaller ones fell unnoticed and simply lay quietly in the yard. Not bothering anyone at all.

The two men rode that cherry-picker basket up and down all day long, the incessant noise from their chainsaws threatening to explode the contents of my brain, until The Big Dead Tree was stripped bare.

Limbs and branches had been falling falling falling, booming against the ground in angry, noisy protest. Our house shook and trembled in response throughout the operation. When the sun set, the men left and The Big Dead Tree stood cold in the yard as if finally accepting its fate.

It was now a tall, bare, stump.

The next day, more men came and took their chainsaws to its body. The tall, bare, stump was cut into sections that boomed to the ground. The windows shook when they hit.

Soon, all that was left of The Big Dead Tree was a pile of logs lying in a mound of sawdust. It was the last time our yard would be littered by the old nuisance.

The men cleaned up the yard and took all signs of their activities with away with them. They left the yard clean as a whistle...

...no more Big Dead Tree. No tree at all, in fact.

Now that's sad.

******
~ j

All I want for Christmas is a Fern Glade beret

2009-12-21T12:48:00.011-06:00

This is the Christmas present I made for my daughter. It's a slouchy hat from the pattern Fern Glade. You can find it at knitty.com, my favorite site for alternative knitwear patterns.

I've used this pattern twice before and absolutely love it. I'm looking forward to making another one for my mom.

My yarn of choice is the bamboo-blend, "Spa", from Naturally Caron. The color of this hat is 'naturally 0007'. I've used 'ocean spray' for this pattern but I also have 'rose bisque' and 'soft sunshine' in my stash, patiently awaiting their turns.

The only adjustment I advise for Fern Glade is to take out the K1 stitch on Row 14. (Now that I look at it again, the editors have struck that stitch out and all is right with the world of Fern Glade.)

If you decide to knit this one up, you might want to use a stretchier yarn than I did. Knitting the headband too tightly or loosely can backfire if your yarn can't compensate and bounce back.

Lastly, I don't use circular needles. Just can't get a good rhythm going with those things. So I use dp needles. No matter which you choose, you'll need U.S. sizes 3 and 6.

I hope you enjoy creating Fern Glade as much as I have. You can find the author of the pattern, Megan Marshall, on ravelry.com or at her blog, I saw her STRANDing there.

Happy Knitting! ~ j

Fort Knox creator and USO team up for Military Kids

2009-12-18T15:04:00.006-06:00

WASHINGTON, December 17, 2009

Fort Knox cartoonist Paul Jon has created five special pieces of line art for a USO coloring contest for kids. The art features the Fort Knox characters, Major Joe Knox, his wife, Jane, and their two boys, Donald and Wesley, as well as typical scenes of USO events for kids. The top entries will be featured on the USO's blog site throughout the week of December 27th.

The USO reported an immediate, record-breaking response, with more than 130 downloads of the art in the first two hours the contest was posted. You can read all about the contest on the USO's web site

Fort Knox Cartoonist Paul Jon is a military brat himself, and he approached the USO with an offer to help military families. The USO came up with this project to give children something fun to do for the holidays.

Paul Jon is the son of an Army colonel whose tours of duty included Fort Leavenworth, Fort Jackson and Fort Knox. In addition to his daily and Sunday Fort Knox duties, Paul Jon runs the creative services department of a software company, and his artwork has appeared in newspapers, magazines and online publications across the country. He earned his B.A. in journalism from the University of South Carolina. He is married and has two beautiful goldfish.

"Jenny" picks up two more papers!

2009-11-22T12:38:00.014-06:00

Beginning November 13th, "Jenny" will appear in two more newspapers: the Eglin Flyer and the Hurlburt Patriot. The following write-up appeared in both editions on launch day:

By Kenneth Books, Managing Editor

Beginning in this issue, the Patriot will feature the comic strip,“Jenny, the Military Spouse.” Written and drawn by Air Force wife Julie Negron, the strip follows the day-to-day life of a young woman thrust into unfamiliar surroundings as the new wife of a young Air Force lieutenant fresh out of flight school. She finds herself having to adjust to new surroundings, new terminology, new ways of doing things and a new breed of people—airmen and their spouses.

The strip is often found in so me unsuspected places. Look closely at the refrigerators in the Lifetime TV show “Army Wives” and you’ll see “Jenny” hanging there.Negron started her comic while her husband was stationed on Okinawa. According to an interview published Oct. 7, 2007, in Stars & Stripes, “Negron, a self-taught illustrator, started her drawing career creating editorial cartoons for an Oregon newspaper when an opening suddenly came up. The previous cartoonist had just died.

“I read about it in the paper,” she said sheepishly. “And I went down the very next day.” She was hired the same day after a brief interview. She worked at the paper for a couple of years, drawing cartoons on assignment. When Negron moved, she drew cartoons for the base newspapers wherever her husband was stationed.

Inspiration for the strip comes from things that have actually happened to her as a military wife and from suggestions from readers. In addition to Jenny, the strip is populated by Cassie, a blonde, beautiful and somewhat bubbleheaded wife of a fighter pilot, Patty Lynn, the spouse club president with a near-psychic ability to obtain information before anyone else, Jenny’s husband, “DH,” a slightly nerdy and sometimes clueless foil.

According to Negron, Jenny will always and forever remain a new military spouse, childless, naive and often lonely for a husband whose service obligations frequently outweigh his marital ones. She’ll always be surprised by what she sees and what people say to her.

And she’ll be in the Patriot every week from now on.

Sounds good to me! ~ j

"Preparing for Severe Weather"

2009-11-12T16:03:00.006-06:00

On a dark & stormy night, in a modest little house,
the only one up was the military spouse.

She was restricted to quarters under TC1E,
thanks to a storm called Typhoon Man-Yi.

She watched it all night but no damage was dared,
for not even Man-Yi can beat a spouse well-prepared.

This is not a drill: Preparing for Severe Weather
or “How Kadena AB’s Military Spouses took on Super Typhoon Man-Yi”

The night Man-Yi’s outer arms found the island of Okinawa, none of us slept. The noise of the typhoon was immediate, persistent, loud, roaring, and all-encompassing. The constant gusts sounded like steamrollers slamming into the houses.

By 0230, I was up. I had to check and re-check: Did I do everything on the typhoon preparedness list? Was the patio furniture still secure? Were all of the windows shut, locked, and sealed tightly enough? And what was that banging noise? Oh, just the vent. Nothing I could do about that but would it stay connected or would I end up with a gaping hole in the roof – an open invitation to as much water as Man-Yi wanted to deliver?

I made the rounds again at 0400, even though I knew I’d done everything correctly and completely. The sound of the typhoon raging outside was so powerful… I was nervous and couldn’t lie down. I padded down the hallway, making sure we still had electricity (we did), cable TV for the emergency channel (yep), and the Internet – notorious for its instability even during a lazy summer shower.

The Internet was up and running like a champ so I logged on to four or five of my favorite weather sites and monitored the oncoming behemoth that was Man-Yi.

The width of the storm was equivalent to the distance from Canada all the way down to the California-Mexico border. This was not a drill.

********

I first heard about it four days earlier, on Monday, July 9th, which was – naturally – the day after I’d dropped my husband off at the airport for a weeklong TDY. An e-mail from our squadron commander’s wife said the storm would probably arrive Friday, July 13th. Typhoon preparedness was already underway across Kadena AB…this one was going to be a doozy. And, by the way, our squadron’s active-duty members were evacuating with the airplanes. So, I wasn’t the only one facing this alone.

Even if a storm might not hit us, the airplanes can’t risk high wind conditions so they leave the island and their crews go with them. As military spouses living on an island, we take it in stride and wait for worst while hoping for the best.

As the week wore on, the typhoon grew nearer and we (the spouses) started calling each other. “Do you need help bringing stuff inside?” “Do you have enough food and supplies?” “Do you need someone to stay with you?”

********

“Don’t you know we’re in TC-1C? Everything’s closed.” The spouses here know the current weather conditions as well as we know we’ll be left alone to contend with the worst of them. We weren’t born knowing this stuff…we learned it the hard way. Below are some tips from military spouses who’ve “been there”:

When you live in a volatile location with severe weather such as typhoons, hurricanes, and tornadoes, your life could depend on how well you prepare. A preparedness checklist is invaluable during storm season and should be in your welcome packet when you relocate. Ours explains Typhoon (Tropical Cyclone) Conditions. For example, TC-4 means calm. TC-1E means “Emergency” and the air base is in lockdown mode. We are restricted to our quarters until “All Clear” is declared.

Consult your preparedness checklist well ahead of time. If you live on a military installation, these checklists are guides that tell you what to expect from severe weather in your area, what items to keep on hand, and how the installation enforces emergency procedures. Your emergency contact numbers should be written in there and updated often. If you don’t have some sort of severe weather guide or checklist, ask your family support center for one.

Bookmark Weather Web Sites. The Internet has weather sites coming out of its ears. In our area, we use Typhoon2000 and Kadena Weather, among others.

Prepare to be prepared. Fill a sturdy, sealable box with the following: bottled water (enough to cook with and drink for several days), flashlights and fresh batteries, a battery-operated radio, extra batteries to accommodate the different sizes of your equipment, candles, matches, canned foods, dry foods, pet foods, toilet paper, female hygiene products (because that never happens at a good time), and all baby needs such as diapers and formula. Buy a portable cook stove and extra propane (or dry charcoal and plenty of lighter fluid). Fill up your bathtubs with water for flushing toilets and other cleaning needs. Make sure to have plenty of towels for unexpected leaks and extra trash bags for waste that you can’t take outside. You may need plastic sheeting to cover windows. Get some duct tape, too. Some spouses throw in new toys for the kids to use as a distraction during the storm.

Don’t wait until the last minute. Bottled water and diapers disappear from the commissary shelves the minute a Tropical Depression is spotted out in the ocean.

Ask for help. Not only do spouses have to maintain the family “typhoon box” or “hurricane kit” but we also have to stow all of the lawn furniture, tie down the trampoline, bring in the toys, and collapse the awnings all by ourselves. After that, you have to count kids and pets. Sometimes it just gets overwhelming. If you need help, call a senior spouse or your unit’s contact person. They’ll send someone to help you.

Spare your friends and neighbors from the dangers of your personal property becoming projectiles – secure your belongings. Sandbags are free at Kadena AB, although you have to fill and tote them yourself. We put them in and on anything that can take flight such as trash bins, trampolines, patio tables, and dog houses; we pile them in front of doors that might leak and anyplace else that could allow water into the house. Find out where to get sandbags in your area and stock up early.

Pay attention to your local news stations for special announcements. The Navy hospital got on the radio Thursday and summoned all mothers-to-be in late-term pregnancies (over 37 weeks) to the clinics to prevent them from going into labor while trapped in their homes.

********

Typhoon Man-Yi hit us even harder right after I made my last “rounds” through the house. By 0630, the winds were sustaining 144 mph with gusts of 178 mph – my steamrollers. We took another six or seven hours of punishment before that awful howling began to subside.

At about 1800 hours on Friday night, Man-Yi finally began its exit to the north. Even though we were still experiencing the very active tail-end of the storm, Typhoon Condition 1R (Recovery) was declared. Emergency crews were allowed to begin assessing the damage.

We spouses remained restricted to quarters until Saturday morning but our own damage reports were already filtering across the base.

Power was out in some neighborhoods; water was out in others. Patio furniture, thought to be tied down, was gone – lifted from a porch at some point by the winds of Man-Yi and whisked off to an undisclosed location. Somebody’s house was flooded. A barbecue grill was seen traveling across the grounds of a four-plex, propane tank still attached, with the owner running after it during the worst part of the storm. A family on vacation who didn’t have anyone watching their house lost their trampoline and some lawn furniture. A couple of satellite dishes flew away and someone else watched their neighbor’s windows shatter.

Some of those things were preventable, some were not, but we’re learning from our mistakes. The point of preparedness is to make both the duration and the recovery as smooth as possible. Achieving total perfection is impossible for anyone but we now know how to prepare for the worst. We can, and probably will, do it again.

Next time, though, Man-Yi is gonna need a bigger typhoon.

Julie L. Negron
Creator, Jenny…the only comic strip about life as a military spouse
jewls@jennyspouse.com

My Old Editorial Toons

2009-09-22T18:10:00.006-05:00

I found these in a box of old photos. They're two of my editorial cartoons from the late '80s. They're somewhat yellowed but still fun to read.

The backstory is that I'd just given birth to my daughter and was approaching my deadline. So, naturally, I wrote about my maternity ward experience. The editor received a ton of feedback, both good and bad, and asked me to make the next strip about him taking the heat for the toon's content.

My editor was Pat Moser and the newspaper was the Hermiston Herald in Oregon. If anybody runs into Pat, tell him I said "Hey!"

~ j

Recon: Comic Relief

2009-09-16T13:25:00.003-05:00

Here's my interview with the Pentagon Channel. They were looking at the history of military cartooning. Lots of fun trivia and interesting facts here. At the end, there's a long segment on Basil Zaviski, creator of "Gunston Street".

Enjoy!

Recon: Comic Relief

Please share freely with your friends and families.

~ j

All About That Military Brat Comic Strip called Fort Knox

2009-09-08T10:43:00.011-05:00

I've got an Army Brat friend who created a comic strip based on his childhood and - guess what? - it got picked up by a major syndicate! So now he finds himself scrambling to drum up readership to prove to his new bosses that they weren't wrong in taking him on.

Which they weren't.

After all, how many people out there are Military Brats? I'm gonna say KA-Zillions, including me. (In fact, I've never really known any other lifestyle other than military...born into it, married into it)

I'm pretty sure we Brats can relate to my friend's comic strip in more ways than we can relate to a lot of the strips out there that are currently in full-tilt boogey.

My friend is Paul Boscacci and his new toon is "Fort Knox". You can see a complete run-down of it here: http://www.postwritersgroup.com/comics/fortknox.htm

The Facebook page is here: http://www.facebook.com/pboscacci#/fortknoxcomic?ref=share

Right now, Paul's working on placing his strip in the Garden City, Kansas, area. Please participate in the poll being conducted by the GC Telegram: http://swktalk.com/comics/ Kick back for a while and read through all of the strips. Each one of them is in danger of elimination so make sure you vote to keep the ones you like. Personally, I'm going to vote to keep all of them. After all, what makes me laugh might not make someone else laugh and vice-versa. :-)

"Fort Knox" officially premiers on October 5th. Give it a shot and give it a chance. And, remember, enjoy comic strips every day or they'll go away!

~ j

Rejection Notice, etc.

2009-08-17T17:14:00.019-05:00

Today, "Jenny" was rejected by the largest group of military newspapers available stateside.

Rather, today is when I received the actual notice of rejection, so I'm not really sure when the physical act of rejecting "Jenny" took place. I'm going to stick with today because it feels like it. In fact, it feels like just a few minutes ago after I checked the mail.

While the Rejection Notice is certainly par for the course in the life of a cartoonist, this one wasn't met with a sense of "Another one bites the dust" and blithely tossed into the file drawer.

This one is hanging right on the front of the refrigerator.

Let me explain. The source of the rejection was ATPCo, which is comprised of the Air Force Times, Army Times, Navy Times, and MarineCorps Times. They're a subsidiary of Gannett News (publishers of USA Today).

I've been trying to get "Jenny" into the "Times" group for nearly four years - whether online, in print, or both - and I've never once heard anything from them. In June of this summer, I decided to hit them hard: I got another cartoonist to go to bat for me.

Twice.

It still didn't work but they did finally tell me for sure that the answer is "NO". No explanation, just "NO". Therefore, at this point in time, "Jenny" will not be getting into the Air Force/Army/etc. Times group.

I hope my cartoonist friend doesn't suffer any repercussions from standing up for me because he really went out of his way when he barely knew me. He simply believed in the "Jenny" comic strip enough to go the extra mile for it. He is now a wonderful friend whom I respect and admire.

Thanks to him and thanks to all of the spouses and other readers who've asked over and over why they can't read "Jenny" in the "Times" newspapers. I'm sorry; I tried.

Don't worry, though, I'm going to keep working on it. I have more angles to work and lots of paper on which to type submission letters. And, of course, you can still read "Jenny" every Sunday overseas and downrange in the Sunday Stars & Stripes newspaper and, of course, every week at jennyspouse.com.

Have a great week and don't forget to go to jennyspouse.com (and stripes.com) for your weekly mil-spouse chuckle!

~ j

New PCS, New Life, New Post

2009-08-16T10:54:00.017-05:00

Hello! I've been away from my blog since May but it wasn't due to neglect. It was due to another PCS. We recently relocated to Robins AFB, Georgia, USA.

Life has been busy, as you might expect. Here's what's been going on at our house:

On June 1st, we put our house in Oklahoma up for sale and hit the road for a house hunting trip to Robins. My husband stayed at the base and I flew back to Oklahoma. He checked in at his squadron on the 15th and spent the next two weeks completing his in-processing while I spent the same two weeks packing out of our house.

Didn't I just "pack IN" six months ago while he was TDY? Seems like that's all I do lately.

So I got to Georgia on July 4th, celebrated my birthday on July 6th (Woo Hoo!), our furniture arrived on the 10th, and my husband had knee surgery on the 14th. For the next two weeks, he was on 'convalescence leave' and was in too much pain to help me unpack the house.

Meanwhile, a film crew from the Pentagon Channel's TV show, ReCon, came to our house to film a segment on how military cartooning has changed since the days of "Willie and Joe".

So, now that our first week in town was over, I had to catch up on "Jenny" comics...and the blogging continues to remain on hold.

I also attended a meeting with the Southeast Chapter of the NCS and, ever since, have been extremely motivated to get together a marketing packet full of new material. This means creating new material, however, so that keeps me even busier.

So...to make a long story short, I've been away from blogspot for over two months because my life has been really busy. I realize this simply repeats what I said in the beginning of this note but, this time, I added really for emphasis.

BTW...I do have a new essay written but I haven't typed it up, yet. I write all of my essays in long-hand. Helps me think better when I have the creative connection going on with my hand and pencil.

So that'll be posted soon.

I gotta get back to work. I emptied out about four boxes of office stuff and forgot that I don't have anywhere for all of it to go so now it's just laying all over the floor. It's not an attractive look plus a pile of stuff on the floor makes it hard to get to the kitchen for more coffee.

Have a nice Sunday.

~ j

Military Spouse Appreciation Day

2009-05-07T23:13:00.023-05:00

Happy Military Spouse Appreciation Day!

This is YOUR day...NOT Mother's Day, NOT Father's Day, NOT my birthday......I mean, YOUR birthday...!

This is the day that your family should take a moment and truly understand what you've done for them during your active-duty military spouse's career.

For instance...

Did your a.d. spouse ever sit with restless and rowdy children for hours on end, waiting for medical clearance to that overseas base, wondering if you were going to be disqualified because your youngest had "something"?

Did your a.d. spouse ever wait on the porch all day for the packing crew that never showed? (...while the movers did?)

Did your a.d. spouse ever sell Pampered Chef or Party Lite products because they couldn't get a job because local employers don't HIRE military spouses?

Did your a.d. spouse quit every single job they ever had because they had to PCS (sometimes after only six months)?

Better yet...did your a.d. spouse ever put their career on hold for YOU?

?????!!!!!

Okay, maybe I'm getting a little out of control here but...one last question...

Did your active duty spouse ever watch the news and wonder if you were on it?

Celebrate yourself. Not only on May 8th but all year long.

Go to jennyspouse.com for this week's comic.

~ j

Celebrate what you've loved all of your life!

2009-05-06T01:57:00.003-05:00

This article found at Mahalo.com:

May 5 is National Cartoonist's Day each year, the celebration sponsored by the National Cartoonists Society to honor editorial cartoonists and comic strip artists, because it is the anniversary of the day the very first color comic strip, The Yellow Kid, was published in 1895.

However, the economic downturn and lack of interest on the part of the cartoonists has led to a reduction in events or even special cartoons. On May 5, 2009, of the national cartoonists, only Wylie Miller's Non Sequitur had a reference cartoon.

http://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur/2009/05/05/

Cheers! ~ j

What's on YOUR mind, Facebook?

2009-04-19T13:30:00.013-05:00

I love when Facebook wants to know what's on my mind. Is it really that interested in me? Apparently not because, when I told it the following, it wouldn't take it. ha.

Here goes...this is What's on My Mind right now:

Penny the Puppy wants me to Get Up! from the computer. There's a lake in our backyard from the storms last night and she's dragged in something gross. The vacuum cleaner is sitting in the middle of the livingroom, chillin'...'cause it knows it'll be awhile before I get in there. All of my websites, "friends", and other annoyances are updated... except my nemesis, The Archives at jennyspouse. (2009 is STILL not posted!)

The cat, Miss Kitty, is sitting right in the middle of the diningroom table, shedding, leaving pawprints, checking her manicure, and giving me the stink-eye.

The electricity went out last night and I need to go around the house resetting the clocks or I'll be late for work tomorrow. I have a bunch of writing to do but the house needs cleaning first or I won't be able to concentrate.

I think I bought the wrong gift for my mother-in-law yesterday for Mother's Day so I may have more shopping to do.

I need a bulletin board in here.

I slept wrong so now my knee is stiff.

How's that? (I think I'll deal with Miss Penny first and see what she wants...that should distract me from everything else I have to do today. She's real good at that.)

Hmmm...I wonder why Facebook wouldn't accept what was on my mind? :-)

Cheers! ~ j

PS...This week's "Jenny" is UP! "Living in TLF"

:-)

This week's "Jenny" is UP! "Anniversary 2009"

2009-04-02T22:44:00.006-05:00

This week's "Jenny" comic is UP! a little bit early.

Our 10th anniversary was actually April 1st (yes, April Fool's Day). We usually take a trip or rent a B&B but, alas, he's at P.I.T. this year.

So I'm heading down to San Anton' this weekend. We've got a room on the Riverwalk and we're going to connect with some old friends for brunch on Sunday at Randolph's O'Club.

That's why I posted this week's "Jenny" a few days early.

Enjoy!

~ jewls

:-)

Mike Lynch Cartoons: The 2008 National Cartoonists Society Awards Nominees Announced

2009-03-24T16:55:00.002-05:00

Mike Lynch Cartoons: The 2008 National Cartoonists Society Awards Nominees Announced

Mike Lynch has posted the list of nominees for this year's Reuben Awards ceremony in May.

Head on over there and see if your favorites are listed.

Cheers!
~ j