the last week or so in review

1. Jimmy's mom, aka Bubby, arrived last Wednesday. We are very excited that she's here with us, and Mac is really enjoying her company since his Easter break started this week and runs for yet another week.

2. I celebrated my 41st birthday on Sunday. The festivities actually began on Saturday night, when we had a delicious family dinner at a neighborhood steakhouse. On Sunday, Mac, Bubby and I were spectactors at a big race Jimmy's office helped to sponsor to raise awarenesss for land mines. Colombia has the second highest number of land mines after Afghanistan, and the loss of limbs and lives is remarkable. Some photos from the event:
Even the President of Colombia ran the race!!

Jimmy just before he started running

There were so many inspiring participants. People missing legs, in wheelchairs or on crutches or with prostheses, all participating.




3. The birthday festivities continued on Monday when I got to my office and found it all decorated with balloons and streamers and "happy birthday" signs. I do love a good birthday celebration that never ends!

4. Jimmy left on Sunday (yes, my birthday) to go work the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena. The Summit doesn't actually happen until next weekend, but there are advance teams and site visits and plans to be made, so he's there now. He returns home on April 16. Nothing like an all-expense-paid vacation in Cartagena for half a month. (Only kidding, Jimmy, if you're reading this. I know you're working very hard in between all those nice dinners out and sightseeing trips.)

5. Bogota hosts a pretty amazing theater festival every two years. The festival brings in all sorts of live productions from all over the world. Yesterday afternoon I went with two friends to see George Orwell's 1984 as acted by members of The Actor's Gang and directed by none other than Tim Robbins. The production was held in a very intimate theater and was amazing and thought-provoking. And during the curtain call, we got to lay eyes on the extraordinarily tall (at least compared to the 6 actors who comprised the entire cast) Tim Robbins, which was pretty cool.

Tonight, Bubby, Mac and I are going to a contemporary dance production called Vertical Road out of the UK. I will probably understand none of this production, but it's an attempt to expose Mac to some culture.

6. I love living in a Catholic country because the holidays roll around so frequently. The embassy was closed yesterday and today, and it feels completely decadent to have two days off!

7. Today we realized how monumentally important Good Friday is to the Catholics. We went to the street market in Usaquen, which happens every Sunday and holiday. Apparently this holiday is so important that they even shut down the street market. We could only find two restaurants open in an area that is known for its restaurants. This city is quiet and empty today. It's a nice change.

Off to watch a movie before we go to the dance performance. Wish us luck!

a Papa John's travesty

Last night we called Papa John's to order in pizza for dinner. They were out of Italian sausage, ham, garlic sauce, and some other stuff that I didn't catch.

How can that be?

Then when we tried to order their version of the meat lover's pizza, which should have included the missing Italian sausage and ham, and asked that they include mushrooms in lieu of some of the missing meat, they said they could, but we'd have to pay extra.

How can that be?

I don't think Papa John would be very pleased...

the week in review

1. On Monday, we had family mani-pedi night. Mac got to go first and he really is living the life of Riley, which, according to Wikipedia, "suggests an ideal contented life, possibly living on someone else's money, time or work. Rather than a negative freeloading or golddigging aspect, it implies that someone is kept or advantaged."

"Life of Riley" in photo: tae kwon do uniform from extracurricular activities at school, hands being worked on and feet in the bucket soaking....

2. We had our friends over for a taco dinner on Tuesday night. Jimmy had an after-work commitment and her husband was traveling, so my friend and her girls came over. I love these people and am going to be devastated when they leave this summer.

3. On Wednesday night, we had a family dinner at La Biferia. We've passed this restaurant a hundred times but have never eaten there. It was de-lish. Mac had empanadas for his meal (and some of my steak) and Jimmy and I shared chorizo, baked provolone cheese, a salad, french fries (that were totally divine) and a NY strip. Very good, very reasonable for everything we ate and we will be going back.

4. On Thursday night we went to a Night of Art that was sponsored by the American Society. There was one painting out of I don't know how many that Jimmy would have bought had I encouraged him early on. By the time I encouraged him, it had already been sold. Needless to say, it did not have the price tag of $75,000 USD that was attached to one wall hanging that appeared to be gold lame to me. I'm pretty sure that one didn't sell. Afterwards, we went to a new-to-us sushi restaurant with another couple and had a great dinner with great company.

5. I got my final delivery of clothes from my tailor today. She came on Tuesday afternoon and delivered a couple jackets that she was taking in for me as well as the pants to my new suit. Today she brought a blouse that she'd worked magic on and the jacket to the suit. I cannot wait to wear the new duds to work next week. I loved everything so much that I ordered a black pantsuit (with a skirt to go with it). That should be ready in a week and a half.

6. We have a long weekend this weekend as Monday is a Colombian holiday to celebrate St. Joseph. I don't know what we really do to celebrate him but I am thankful that he has a holiday in his honor. We all needed this long weekend.

7. To celebrate St. Patrick since today is his day, I am going to a salon this afternoon and having a hydrating facial. I think St. Patrick (and St. Joseph for that matter) would approve.

Happy St. Patrick's Day to you. May the luck o' the Irish be with you!

Back from the proverbial dead

Last night I spoke with the Giginator, aka my mom, for Valentine's Day. She asked why I hadn't updated the blog lately. No excuses really except that life got in the way. Now that I have this thing called a J-O-B, time is at a premium around the old homestead. How I miss the days when my only time management problem was how to play tennis and have time to shower before meeting the girls for lunch. Boy, do I miss those days.

Now if had to blog about my life, it would read something like "get up at 5:15; shower, dress and wake Mac up by 6; practice drill sergeant routine to get him dressed, fed and out the door by 6:24; go to work; make decisions that could cause a jail sentence; realize that my 2pm headache might be from lack of lunch; tell people who come into my office at 3:47 to speak fast because they have 6 minutes to talk before I have to leave to catch the shuttle; ride home on the shuttle with people who talk incessantly about their pets' bowel movements; get home by 4:45; do battle over homework that results in one of us in tears; figure out what to throw together for dinner; eat; act as drill sergeant so Mac gets into bed at the right time; collapse in chair; move to bed; collapse into fitful sleep. Rinse and repeat and do it all again."

That's the daily drill these days. With that said, all is well - if not a bit tired - on the homestead. Just not a lot of excitement to report. But I shall make a better effort to find something interesting to report, if only to the Giginator.

Now to leave you on a higher note... One of our dinner topics always, always, always revolves around what Mac had for lunch. It starts something like this:

Jimmy or Susan: so what did you have for lunch?
Mac: guess.
J/S: chicken (this is the correct answer 98% of the time)
M: what else?
J/S: carrots? (he's required to have 3 things on his plate and carrots are usually a safe bet.)
M: what else?
J/S: lime slice? (sadly, this counts as his third item more days than not.)
M: no.

(This is where last night's conversation veered from the norm).

J/S: hmmmmmm. Cucumbers?
M: no
J/S: hmmmmmm. Bread?
M: yes. Guess what kind?
J/S: baguette?
M: no
J/S: slice of sandwich bread?
M: no. Do you give?
J/S: yes.
M: croutons!!!

I am so happy that my hard-earned money is going to pay for what amounts to a very expensive school lunch (and mandatory - bagged lunches are not an option) of roasted chicken, carrots and croutons. (For the record, there are other options but my picky child, who has always thought school lunches were the best thing ever, now hates school lunch.)

Tomorrow is a new day. Will it be another Groundhog Day of the same old, same old or will there be something new to report? Stay tuned... If the suspense doesn't kill you first....

NYR 5-14-11 - a day of family

Last weekend was pretty hectic - a lot of fun but fairly nonstop. So this weekend we made a conscious decision to lay low and just hang out together. Today was the epitome of a "lay low and hang out together" kind of day. We started the morning with 2 hours of tennis classes, shared between Jimmy, Mac and me. Then we ate lunch at Burger King. Then we went shopping to buy the most fabulous fire pit EVER for our terrace. Then we came home and hung out until Jimmy cooked us chicken wings. We watched one of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies and went to bed.

For perfect days from start to finish with my peeps, I'm truly thankful.

NYR 3-4-11

I was soooooo tired after my group tennis lesson today. I think because it was for an hour at noon, and I was starving, it just sapped all my energy. I came home, ate, showered, and fell into a hole. When Mac got home from school, I let him build a fort and watch as much tv as he wanted from inside the fort while I sprawled out in the chair with a good book. Jimmy got home and asked if there was a carbon monoxide leak in the house because we appeared so out of it.

For a lazy afternoon, I am truly thankful

my wake-up song

We have Direct TV out of Puerto Rico and while we get a lot of Caribbean weather reports by a man in a Hawaiian shirt with a fake parrot on his shoulder and a lot of commercials for drugstores in places like the Cayman Islands, the early morning news is from the network affiliates in New York City.

Every morning since the Discovery Space Shuttle launched, the NBC affiliate plays a little clip of the song that NASA plays to wake up the astronauts who are currently docked with the International Space Station. NASA actually held a voting contest and I guess the top songs are being played during the mission. The winning songs include such hits as "Blue Sky" by Big Head Todd, the Star Trek Theme Song, "Magic Carpet Ride" by Steppenwolf, "Countdown" by Rush, "Over the Rainbow" by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole.

As I've heard the news of the wake-up song and actually seen the footage of the astronauts stirring to the music, I started thinking that it might be nice to have my own wake-up music other than that awful, harsh beeping of two alarm clocks. (We obsessive-compulsive Type A personalities always set 2 alarm clocks in case the batteries die in one overnight.)

So then I thought "what could be my inspirational, get-up and get-moving music playlist?" I googled "theme music for housewives" and do you want to know what I got?

1. Desperate Housewives Theme Song
2. The Real Housewives of Atlanta Theme Song
3. The Real Housewives of New Jersey Theme Song

I took out the "theme" and just googled "music for housewives" and got a hit for the "Music for Lonely Housewives" CD and "Music for Desperate Housewives" CD.

Then I saw a top 10 list of "songs for housewives" that was just created in late January. You want to know the list (as copied exactly by one "dunmurry" on About.com? Prepare to be depressed:

10 The B-52´s - Housework
9 Lady Madonna - Beatles
8 Leiber and Stoller's "I'm A Woman"
7 Help me- Sonny Boy Williamson II.
6 Shake Rattle And Roll - Loved Ones / Bill Haley
5 Dust My Broom - Renee Geyer / Elmore James
4 Stan Rogers - Lies
3 My Little Town - Paul Simon ['....hanging out shirts in the dirty breeze'
2 Semi Detached Suburban Mr James - Mannfred Mann['.....hanging things upon the line as your life slips away .....'
1 Dreams Of The Everyday Housewife - Wayne Newton [best version IMO :)]

The astronauts get "Over the Rainbow" and I get "Dust My Broom"???? Are you kidding me?

I'm just sticking to the beeping alarm clock.

are you sick of highly paid teachers?

- I borrowed this from Facebook because I loved it so much. To all those great educators, including my mom, who taught and continue to teach, you rock!

Teachers' hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or 10 months a year! It's time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do - babysit!

We can get that for less than minimum wage.

That's right. Let's give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That would be $19.50 a day (7:45 to 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and plan-- that equals 6 1/2 hours).

Each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children. Now how many students do they teach in a day...maybe 30? So that's $19.50 x 30 = $585.00 a day.

However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!! I am not going to pay them for any vacations.

LET'S SEE....

That's $585 X 180= $105,300 per year.

(Hold on! My calculator needs new batteries).


What about those special education teachers and the ones with Master's degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage ($7.75), and just to be fair, round it off to $8.00 an hour. That would be $8 X 6 1/2 hours X 30 children X 180 days = $280,800 per year.

Wait a minute -- there's something wrong here!

There sure is!

The average teacher's salary (nation wide) is $50,000.

$50,000/180 days = $277.77/per day/30 students=$9.25/6.5 hours = $1.42 per hour per student--a very inexpensive baby-sitter and they even EDUCATE your kids! WHAT A DEAL!!!!

Make a teacher smile; repost this to show appreciation for all educators.

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feeling a little sorry for myself

1. Jimmy "had to go" to Key West for a conference this week. The weather right now in Key West according to weather.com: 82 degrees and Fair. The weather right now in Bogota according to weather.com: 55 degrees and Mostly Cloudy. It would be "mostly cloudy" right now because there can surely be no water left in the heavens after what has poured down on this city in the last 24 hours.

2. God is apparently busy making more rain to replace those empty heavens because weather.com calls for rain all day tomorrow here.

3. Jimmy's in Key West, and I am not.

4. The whole country is flooded and has created devastating losses for a lot of people who didn't have a lot to lose in the first place. I realize I'm being entirely trivial about this so please forgive this rant in the midst of such devastation for so many people: the truck with our shipment out of storage was enroute from the port in Cartagena today (for delivery at my apartment on Friday), but the floods messed up a bridge and the truck can't get through until the bridge is repaired. There is obviously no detour route, and the truck has gone back to Cartagena to wait in a dry storage area. Which means the serving stuff I need for Thanksgiving won't be here by Thanksgiving. Again, this is absolutely petty in the big scheme of things - and I do understand that - but if you knew how we'd been battling against stupid people in Washington, DC who aren't able to do their jobs which means this shipment is arriving more than 2 months after it should have been here, then you might feel just a teensy bit of sympathy for me.

5. I think I have whatever that disorder is when you don't see the sun and it's rainy all the time and you get depressed and feel sorry for yourself.

6. Jimmy's on his third trip to the US in 3 months (and has traveled within Colombia at least once every other week since August), and I've left Bogota one time to go to Cartagena for 3 days. I might also have cabin fever besides the disorder in #5.

7. There is interminable construction next door and it's making me crazy. I hear a saw all day long from 7:30am to 5:30pm.

8. I have an earache in my right ear. This, of course, is undiagnosed but it hurts. Add that to ailments in #5 and #6.

9. Did I mention it's been raining nonstop and it's sunny in Key West?

But there are good things that I need to concentrate on:

1. I've met a couple awesome women recently that I love being around.

2. Mac is loving school. He also had a playdate with a new (non-school) friend that went perfectly. They played for close to 6 hours with nary the first bit of bickering or cross words. I thought I'd died and gone to heaven.

3. I cooked all day yesterday in anticipation of friends visiting next week and Thanksgiving. My freezer now has 10 cups of cooked chicken ready for stuff like quesadillas and chicken pot pie; 20 cups of homemade tomato sauce; and 30 cups of chicken broth. I can obviously make as much cornbread dressing and gravy as I want to for Thanksgiving with all that broth. Oh, and I made two cheesecakes for the freezer. I feel like eating one right now by myself.

4. I didn't have Spanish today, which, sadly, makes me inordinately happy.

5. Mac's 8th birthday is on Saturday and he is infectiously excited.

6. We have friends coming to town next week and we are soooo excited. They'll be here for Thanksgiving and Mac's birthday party and we feel so blessed to have them here for both events.

I'm going to eat some chocolate. That won't make the rain disappear but it might make me feel better....

it's the little things, right?

This post may be more than you want to know about me so you can stop reading now if you don't like TMI.

Today at Wal-Mart while shopping for essentials before our packout, it was as if the metal roof opened up and the sun came down to shine right on this:

I am the world's biggest fan of the Schick Personal Touch razor. Even after nearly 4 years living in Brazil, I'm still a leg shaver as opposed to a waxer, and the Personal Touch has been my razor of choice for 20 years. Personal Touches were eco-friendly before it became de rigueur; you just bought that big chunky razor and replaced the blades as needed instead of buying those orange disposable razors. We are talking smooth shaving that must have pulled the hairs out by the root because it took ages for stubble to appear. And it had a considerable weight and design that just fit in your hand right.

When we got home from Brazil and after I used up my supply of replacement blades, I tried to find blades and there were none to be found. I panicked. Maybe there had been a recall? Maybe they put too much aloe in the little strip above the blade or something? I searched for a long, long time and could not find any replacements anywhere. My beautiful brown razor sat on the edge of the tub, unused, forlorn, and sad.

What I should have done was search the internet.

But alas, I did not. I mean, if Wal-Mart and Target don't have it, then surely it must not exist, right?

(That was tongue in cheek before you fuss at me.)

After obviously buying the necessary replacement razor (which has left me stubbly about 20 minutes after shaving and therefore unhappy), I finally threw out my Personal Touch after months of not using it. It was a sad day for me. In 20 years, I've owned 2 Personal Touch razors - I had to buy a second one when I worked for the FDIC because we were working at a bank in Myrtle Beach and I forgot to put my razor in my travel bag. Fortunately I had the two of them because one fell off a shelf at a dive hotel in Mozambique and cracked in half on the tile floor. In case you can't tell, it's been a real love affair - can you remember the history of all your razors over the last 20 years???

I had given up on looking for the replacement blades since I no longer owned the razor. Until today. My moment of bliss came in Wal-Mart of all places. I was trying to figure out how many replacement blades I'd need for two years for the pink, plastic, stubble-producing razor I'm currently using. The answer was too big to figure out without a calculator.

Then all of a sudden, I saw the Personal Touch replacement blades.

There was no Personal Touch razor in sight, but I thought to myself that surely I would be able to find one somewhere if they still sell the blades. I went to my old friend, Amazon.com, and I have now ordered a new Personal Touch razor from some store called The Razor Shoppe. I am so thrilled that I probably won't be able to sleep tonight.

I am not a hoarder by nature, but I intend to buy as many replacement blades as I can get my hands on. A future crisis must be averted.

possible end of the world as I know it

Two things happened today that may signal the end of the world as I know it.

1. I can't tell you about the first one because it's not my business to share, but suffice it to say that if you look out the window and see purple pigs flying by, don't even bother to call me because I will not be surprised.

2. Jimmy and his sister inherited a house at Folly Beach when their uncle passed away two years ago. When I'm not at the baseball field, I am at this house. We've got a contractor working on the inside, but Mom and I have been doing the outside work. Today we were working and a guy who has some tenuous connection with the next door neighbor stopped by on his bicycle. Once he found out my connection to Uncle Charles, he told us that he was one of the last people to talk to Uncle Charles. They had their first-ever conversation in the yard and then Uncle Charles died unexpectedly that night. Then he went on to tell me that he'd had other conversations with other people who live right around this corner at Folly and they'd one way or another, but rather unexpectedly and tragically, died. I told the man to stop talking to us because I'm really not ready to be part of the cursed corner. So if something happens to me tonight, find the Folly Beach witch first. He winters in Costa Rica, so he says, so you may have to look there first if he makes a fast getaway.

I hate to be Chicken Little, but the sky may just be falling....

I've cracked the safe

A couple months ago, I locked the combination for our little home safe that we've had for 11 years inside the home safe. This safe holds nothing valuable in terms of money, but it does have our important documents like passports, original birth certificates, vaccination records, etc.

How I locked the combination inside the safe was vintage dingdong Susan. The time before I opened the safe before the dingdong opening, I decided to leave the key in the lock and not turn the combination dial. That way, I could just open the door up next time I needed something. Even if somebody broke into our house, they wouldn't get anything except our passports, so what did it matter if it wasn't really locked?

Well that brilliant plan worked great. I turned the key and the door opened without my having to do that pesky dial turning. I always overshoot the mark and have to start over with those combination dials. It was great in theory.

So I got out whatever I needed, gathered up everything that I'd pulled out and put on the floor, put it all back in the safe, turned the key in the lock, twisted the dial and bam, it was locked.

Then I looked around for the piece of paper that had the combination written on it. I had the paper handy because I keep it in a zip-loc bag with the safe key.

Where was it?

Oh my. Did I gather it up with all those papers and put it in the safe, which was now locked?

Did I do this without having looked at the numbers at all since I'd so brilliantly left the safe last time so I didn't have to bother with that pesky combination? There was no recent recall from which to remember the numbers.

Oh my.

My first inclination was to have the door welded off. But that meant lugging a heavy safe out of the closet, down the stairs, out the back door, to the car and to a welder. Better just to order new passports.

My second inclination was to try to remember the combination. I knew I had 3 of the 4 numbers, but it was that pesky 4th number that I couldn't exactly remember. I tried every variation of the numbers that I could think of. All to no avail.

There had to be a way to get the combination back, right? A couple years ago, the brand label was coming off. I went ahead and pulled it off because I figured why would you ever need to know the brand name? ONLY IF YOU NEED A NEW COMBINATION AND NEED A STARTING POINT FOR THE KIND OF SAFE THAT YOU OWN?

So then I went to WalMart where we'd purchased the safe a decade ago to see what brand of safes they sell. They were Sentry brand and they were, of course, all fancy and digital now - not a dial safe in sight.

I went to the Sentry website, found a way to contact them about a combination and sent an email. A bit later, I heard from a woman there who said it was a Brinks safe based on the model number.

Well then the corn maze got into full swing and thoughts of the safe only surfaced in the middle of the night when I woke up in a cold sweat worrying about needing a a passport to go to England at Christmas.

So today I called Brinks. While on hold, I listened to this message that said you could only get the combination by sending a notarized letter stating you're the owner of the safe, etc. I was prepared to send the letter but wanted to make sure I had a real Brinks safe.

This nice lady helped me and after giving her the model number, key number, and serial number (minus one number that was partially scratched off after a decade of use), she asked if I knew the numbers of the combination. I told her the four numbers that thankfully I'd written down right after the unfortunately locking. I wasn't sure they were right since I had not been able to get into the safe with them but they're what I remembered from 11 years of using them. And guess what? I had the numbers right, but the number that I thought was 4th was actually 1st.

The safe has been opened and the passports are ready for the trip to England!

thank God I'm a country boy

Today after church, I dragged Mac and took a willing niece Hayley to see "Fame", the movie that's derived from the beloved tv show of my adolescense of the same name. Hayley is my "Fame" kindred spirit (when she got home, Charlotte could hear her in her room "taking it from the top") while Mac, after about half the movie, alternated between asking when it would be over and whether he could play the hunting video game in the lobby when we left.

The movie finally ended and we departed (without playing the video game). I hoped that "Fame" would inspire Mac to go home and practice the piano, but he wanted to go to Gigi's farm to play. So we went and he practiced his newest skill: driving a golf cart that my mom's friends have let us borrow for a few days. He drove me around the hay ride path and then practiced doing donuts in a big grassy field. He is 100% Berkeley County country boy!

random musings

1. I had lunch with an old Moncks Corner friend who visited us in Mozambique when she was in the Peace Corps in Cape Verde. Mac was a young 6 month-old baby when Liz and her Peace Corps friend visited. We reminisced about that visit (I'd totally forgotten that she learned how to drive stick shift in our big Land Rover while we were in Kruger National Park so I could get in the back seat to tend to a fussy baby) and caught up on life in general, but the real highlight for me was meeting Liz's very own perfect baby who turned 8 weeks old today. This kid is destined to be an NBA star. He was born over 22 inches long and I can tell you that I've never seen an 8 week-old baby who takes up so much length in a carseat. He's going to have to work on his bad-boy image if he intends to make it big in the NBA, though. During our 2 hours together, he never made a peep!

2. I hear and believe all these great stories of heroism and bravery and sacrifice on the part of the soldiers Jimmy's working with in Afghanistan. But somebody stole Jimmy's camera today. Clearly these soldiers need to make more money if they're stealing $200 cameras.

3. Mac drank the Kool-Aid tonight and is now officially a Tiger Cub Scout. His largest concerns at the moment? When do we go to the Scout store to buy the uniform and does he have to eat the fish they catch when they go fishing? When I answered "soon" and "no", he was happy as a clam.

4. The second piano lesson was today. Mac announced at dinner that he thought he needed to give up piano lessons because they're "boring". He's still stuck on black keys but he learned half and quarter notes today, so we're moving forward. And no, he's not quitting piano lessons after the second lesson. We just got the piano tuned, so he's got to take for a bunch longer than that to justify that poor piano tuner's time for so little money doing such HARD work. You have no idea how bad that piano sounded before!!

the finish line

From the September issue of Charleston's SKIRT magazine:
I loved this today and wanted to share it with you in hopes that it'll give you as much food for thought as it did me.

another hot item from our resident trash collector

As I was buying more Scotch tape today, I remembered that Mac never lets me throw out the used plastic tape dispenser. I would like to think he's a budding environmentalist and wants to recycle, but he just likes to play with it. What can its purpose be except to dispense tape???

passing along of a weird genetic trait

I love having a place to put things in. I'm talking boxes, crates, little containers, filing cabinets with neat rows of files, etc. I'm sure this has to do with my Type A personality where everything needs to be neat and orderly, which allows me to find exactly what I need when I need it because I know what box in what closet it's stored in.

I have apparently passed down this love of containers to Mac. His obsession clearly isn't for the purpose of keeping everything neat and orderly; it's just because he loves containers, particularly small ones that really aren't very useful after their original purpose is complete.

He likes to buy Tic-Tacs not because he loves Tic-Tacs, but because he wants the little clear plastic box with the fliptop afterwards. Jimmy got a new iPod a couple months ago and it came in this nice little plastic box. Jimmy was ready to throw the box out but Mac said it was a keeper. Last night in the bathtub, Mac played with 2 empty shampoo bottles that he refuses to throw away because he can shoot water out of them. Any little gift box is like a gem to him.

He is a trash collector extraordinaire and I'm quickly approaching the time when I've got to clean out the trash so we can pack up. This may provoke a battle, but I refuse to knowingly ship garbage to another continent. I mean we can buy Tic-Tacs in the States, right? Go north young man! Another continent of trash awaits you!

a little orchid story

I love orchids but had never really bought them before Brazil because they're so expensive in the US. They're a lot less expensive here so I have bought probably more than my fair share. When we lived in Brasilia, quite frankly I treated them as annuals: they bloomed, the blooms fell off, I looked at the leftover greenery and decided there would never be any more blooms, and promptly threw the whole plant away.

Then we moved to Sao Paulo and I heard discussions among my friends here of just setting aside the past-bloomed orchids on your balcony and leaving them. You can still enjoy the greenery and the orchids will eventually re-bloom. So I studied a little bit on where to cut off the stalks after the flowers died, and I had a nice little collection of sort of straggly-looking plants on my air conditioning unit on the balcony.

I went out on the balcony a couple days ago to water all the plants, and wouldn't you know that one of the orchids has got new blooms on it. It's my favorite orchid, too, so I think it wanted to show off one more time for me before we leave and I have to give it away.

I also think this is God telling me personally the Easter story of the resurrection. We give up on something, thinking that it's dead, and then there's new life. It wasn't the thunderbolt message that I might have heard faster, but it's so appropriate for the week after Easter that it now seems louder than a thunderbolt.

unnatural gait

My calf muscles are so sore today that when I first stand up to walk (even if I've only been sitting for 20 seconds), I can only walk with my knees bent. Is this natural? I think not.

my birthday party

Jimmy threw me a fantastic birthday party last Wednesday night at the Hilton. I had such a great time celebrating with friends here; I wish I could have a party like that at least every other week. We had great food and the most delicious chocolate cake ever. Jimmy even thought to order chocolates from my favorite chocolate place as party favors for the ladies! How lucky am I?