House Bertrand

I’ve never gotten around to posting pictures of our house, mainly because for a while there we were planning on moving out of it. That never happened – a combination of us resolving the issues with our landlady and me not liking change. So we’ve been in the same place our entire time here.

I feel the need to explain, before I begin, that houses on Statia are not like houses in the US or Canada. So when I say our house is 'nice', I mean relative to the island. We would never live in a home like this in America, but we consider ourselves lucky to have lived here during our time on Statia.



Our propane tank, at a perilous 30-degree tilt away from the house. No one sneeze.

The past few days we’ve been welcomed home by this ample smattering of blood across the entry archway:


And up above:


And on the tile:
We have no idea what died or how, but it makes me feel better to think it was a very large lizard that got killed by a cat, and not a human that was bludgeoned to death on our porch.


Here’s the porch, washing machine, and laundry line. We have a real line out back, but it’s been overtaken by trees and spiders. Plus, our washing machine is so tiny that one full load easily fits on our makeshift line, so we don’t really have need for more space (as long as I keep on top of the laundry).

Looking the other way on our porch, the front door.

Kitchen and front door, from the bedroom. Tiny fridge, tiny stove.

Table and bedroom door, from the kitchen.

Living room and the French doors we never open because they’re not screened.

Our bedroom. This is as made as the bed ever gets. The swimsuits and bras hanging off the doorknob are typical.

Our closet and makeshift hamper

The hallway to the spare bedroom and bathroom. Our house has a really weird layout and you have to walk through one bedroom to get to those other things. Wouldn’t you just love to see them? Too bad. Both the bathroom and the spare room are absolutely awful. We close the door on them and try to pretend they don’t exist except for when it’s absolutely necessary that we enter.


And that's our home. It holds our stuff and keeps most of the rain out. The end.

PS - Our landlady writes "House Bertrand" on the memo line of our rent receipts, so apparently that's the house's name. A first for me for sure, living in a named house.

beach bums

I'm obsessed with this picture Jon snapped of Pearl and me at the beach today. Sidenote - A few weeks ago she (completely unprompted) started exclusively calling me "Jess" and it makes me die of cute every time.

I've been blogging like crazy, but I'm still behind! This is my last month on Statia so I'm trying to cram everything in before I go. Stay tuned - there's a lot more where this came from.

I know! That was my reaction, too!

The Perfect Hardboiled Egg

I've been on a four-year mission to figure out how to cook the PERFECT hardboiled egg. My mom taught me to boil it for six minutes, cool it, then peel it - I love you mom, but you're WRONG. It's always ringed with green. Other sources said "Bring just to a boil, kill the heat, cover for 20 minutes..." - WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. They never turned out how they were supposed to, and my shells always seems to fuse to the egg (which I've heard has something to do with the freshness of the egg, but I don't completely buy it and I'll tell you why later).

Well today's your lucky day, because thanks in part to Rachael Ray and trial and error of my own, I have discovered the ONE TRUE WAY to cook a perfect hardboiled egg.

First - Put your eggs in a pot.

Second - BARELY cover with room-temp water.

Third - Place the pot over high heat (do not cover).

Fourth - Bring to a boil.

Fifth - BOIL ONE MINUTE. No more, no less.

Sixth - Kill the heat and COVER.

Seventh - Let sit for TEN MINUTES. No more, no less.

Eighth, and this is where it gets really exciting - Drain the hot water and shake your eggs around in the pot to get them all smashed up. This step is important, I promise.

Ninth - Cover eggs with frigid water.

Tenth - Allow to sit for FIVE MINUTES, replacing the water as it warms up.

Eleventh - Peel.

The importance of breaking the shells before cooling is this: The water gets in there and makes them easier to peel! So following these instructions will not only result in a perfectly cooked egg with no green:

It will also allow you, too, to do this with the shell:

Therefore, I firmly believe that the ease of peeling has more to do with cooking method than freshness of the egg. DO NOT CONTRADICT ME.

It's all fun and games until someone falls on their face.

These pictures date all the way back to the turtle hatching. We went early to spend a couple of hours on Zeelandia beach and Lianna and I happened to be wearing matching swimsuits. This, of course, resulted in a photo opportunity (jumping/frolicking on the beach pictures, what else?)

Of the dozen or so pictures Jon snapped of us, only one turned out semi-normal...

...and the rest are an absolute train wreck. You're welcome.

Q'est-ce que c'est?

I was convinced these were "scotch bonnet" shells until I learned yesterday from my favorite shelling blog (and subsequent research) that scotch bonnets are a very rare find. So either A) Statia is a previously unknown breeding ground for them, B) I'm just really really lucky, or C) More likely, they're not scotch bonnets at all. In any event, they're pretty to look at.

My two favorites. I know the one on the right is really worn down, but I love love love the calico coloring.

If anyone out there can enlighten me, please do.

Not a baby iguana

Lianna and I were sure this was a baby iguana, but Jon glanced at the picture then looked at us like we were simple.

(Scroll down, I posted like a hundred times today.)

The usual

Photo dump!

Pearl asking complete strangers for beach toys.

My favorite dog! Lately she's been following us all the way to the beach to play.

Digging a tunnel with Lianna

Lianna's parents are visiting!! Their house was my second home in back in high school. Best thing ever - they're both named Lyn(n), so we lovingly refer to them as "The Lynns". Makes me laugh every time.

There was once a time when I knew the name of these creatures, but that time has passed. Super cool and prehistoric looking. I sure wish this picture was in focus.

Frisbee - Lianna and her dad

Nice catch

Squids! Hard to see, but they're there.



Pearl, kite, Zeelandia



I used to tell myself I won't miss this place when we leave, but I'm starting to realize that I was horribly mistaken. Six weeks to go.

Virtual Snorkeling

Our little underwater camera takes decent videos, though I've never had luck posting them to my blog. They always turn out grainy and awful, even when I don't compress the quality. Does Blogger do that automatically? Anyway, here's an assortment of videos I've taken snorkeling the past few days that hopefully aren't a complete eyesore.

Huge school of blue tang? I think? Watch for a lurking puffer fish at about 17 seconds:



The sea turtle! These are of the first one we saw, on Monday. In this first video, things get weird partway through because I dived down for a closer view:






Moray eel! I think. We'll just call it that, because it was an eel, and it had a really ugly face (photo in a future blog post). Beautiful color though - purple and yellow:



Trumpetfish! First one I've seen.


I looked up info on this thing and found out that trumpetfish are closely related to cornetfish. Go figure.

Guess who's having the best! week! ever!

ME!!!

This happened on Monday:

In the grips of an internal struggle. "It's so close I could touch it, but I won't, but I want to, but I won't"

Oh yeah, and Jon was there. We swam with it for over a half-hour. It would be no exaggeration to say it was one of the highlights of my life.


Then this happened on Tuesday:


Then this happened on Wednesday:


Also on Wednesday:


A BLUE BEAD. I finally found a blue bead!!! After only a year and a half of looking.



I can now die happy.

A Week of Sunsets

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

Sunday

Of course, the week I finally succeeded taking a photo of each sunset was the most cloudless week of the year, and everyone knows that clouds = the best sunsets. So maybe I'll try again another time, but no promises, because this was sort of a giant pain in the butt.