twenty-something years of "what have you been up to?"

  • bits of catch up

    The health unit has had some strange patient complaints beyond the usual, “Can you cure my cold?” There are some challenges. But people are genuinely sincere and respond well to TLC. So I’m winding up some cables and getting ready for another trip to Ouaga this week. There was a problem with my return flight. I was hoping to get back on Friday night which meant booking a flight on Air Burkina, a 20 seater (probably with a lawn mower engine) which was alright by me. The flights were booked a while ago so when I asked for my itinerary, our travel agent told me Air Burkina gave my seat up since we didn’t buy right away. Would have been nice to know. So the soonest I can fly back is Sunday.

    My sister Helen is planning a visit with her son, Elliott and my niece Ana. They will be here for Christmas. We are all so excited. Because of the cost to fly, we really didn’t expect anyone to come.

    It’s been four months now since Pheobe, our cat died. She was hit by a car just before I left for R&R. We’ve been sort of looking for a replacement. She was such a great cat. Her mother and sister had a litter of kittens. Today, Dina took us to visit another young cat who needs a home and hanging around a friend’s house. She’s a bit shy at first but once you hold her for a minute, she calms down. We’ll get a picture of her up shortly (once she comes out of hiding under the bed). Still thinking of a name that suits her.

    Great news from home! Our niece Natalie had a baby boy! We are very happy for them. Bob and Valerie are elated and so are the great grandparents. Watch out! Here comes the next generation!

  • bid list, 2007

    In order of fewest bidders to most bidders:

    Kyiv
    Moscow
    Yerevan
    Quito
    Brasilia
    Tokyo
    Bangkok
    Beijing
    Budapest
    Cairo

  • gonna be good eatin’

    About a year ago I asked our gardener Pierre if he could put in a banana plant (Jim, your plant expert, says don’t say tree, it doesn’t have wood so it’s a plant.) He came to the house with two small, small plants that had just a few leaves each. I was a little disappointed. Now one tree, I mean plant, is at least twelve feet tall, waving its fronds–I think they are fronds–way over our nine feet tall walls. The other plant is a different variety I think, and is about five feet tall. Both made huge flowers when we arrived back here in September. We check on the progress almost daily. The plant grows fast, but the bananas take forever to ripen.
    Banana

  • happy 232nd

    Marine_ball_3

    Sargent_ham

    Marine Corp Ball time. We have a girl marine here, and I really like her. She is adorable, but also as tough as the boys. I grabbed my dress from the online sale rack at Anthropologie–I think it is so diplomat’s wife, 1950s. The music during dinner was great, Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, and matched my dress perfectly, but the dance music was chosen by the marines who were all born when I was in college. I think we need to have an eighties dance party. Thanks for the good time, Marine Security Guards, Detachment Niamey, Niger.

  • solid gold

    At the beach in LA, in the late 1930’s, my mom’s best friend, my Aunt Irma, saw a boy at a French community picnic and said, "There’s the man I’m going to marry." Aunt Irma introduced my mom to one of her boyfriend’s five brothers. My parents dated in high school and talked about getting married. My grandfather didn’t want my mom to marry a future accountant who was Catholic. He wanted her to marry someone reasonable, someone he had picked out for her: someone in the circus.

    My mom dutifully broke up with my dad and married the trapeze flyer and traveled circus to circus–with a train load of animals and the Flying Wallendas–but ended up moving back home with her parents in LA after a couple of years. If you ask my mom what she did while with the circus, she will tell you: "Washed tights." My dad married the mother of my sisters Janet, Jill and Carol, and joined the Air Force during WWII. He was wounded by "friendly fire" in India–he was shot in the hip, arm and hand by a machine gun at short distance–and spent two years hospitalized. He will happily point out that he later passed a typing test with a finger that had been shot. (And in spite of not really having a hip, he later taught me to swing dance.) My mom married a man with the LA police force and had my sister Valerie.

    A few years later, with three troubled marriages and four kids between them, my parents ran into each other in line at the bank. My dad asked my mom out for coffee, and over coffee proposed. Almost twenty years after initially dating, at the Chapel of the Pines in Las Vegas, they got married. That was fifty years ago today. Happy Anniversary, Mom and Dad!

    Mom_dad_50th
    Carmel_breakfast_on_patio_cropped

  • Happy Hot-o-ween II

    Camille_myriam_pirates

    Tiger

  • winning the hearts and minds of first graders

    Jeudi

    Cpb

    I helped carve pumpkins with Stefan’s class at the French school. Ahhh… the universal appeal of Halloween: costumes, candy, jack-o -lanterns, screaming “trick-or-treat.” I know Americans didn’t invent Halloween, but we did make it into the goofy thing that it is. To me, this school celebrating Halloween shows something about how easy it is to embrace American culture. Why do do we celebrate Halloween? Because it’s fun–that’s reason enough for Americans.

    Snacktime_3

    Pumpkin_guts

    Jack0s

    Stefan_nika

    As they say in French: Appy Alloween!

  • and it’s only Thursday

    Monday, Peter’s bid list had to be in. Hopefully it all got sent in right and we won’t be sent to Ickystan by default. Hong Kong and Domincan Republic were last minute options that we decided against. Let the bidders remorse begin. “Anywhere but Africa,” was Camille’s request. Stefan wants somewhere with snow. Check back for the actual ten-city bid list, which we will be posting soon.

    I have a bunch of dolls done and plan to open a store at Etsy.com. I’m really excited about this prospect.

    Last night Peter was up all night giving IV fluid to a patient with amebas.

    Stefan’s teacher said that she asked if any students could describe Halloween. Stefan’s waved his hand wildly, was called on and announced that it’s really weird, but it hurts when he pees.

    Today we went and demanded restitution from Air France for the ill-fated lost bag. First they have to make sure it isn’t in their lost and found in: Dubai. We really felt like we had accomplished something, just getting to Air France and talking to a person.

    Our 400-pound consumable shipment arrived and kids ate three kinds of cereal for lunch.

  • due 11/11 and 4/4

    Mt_shasta_knitting_2

    Camille is playing at Bethany’s house, Peter and Stefan are swimming, Leopold baked us two of the biggest loaves of challah I’ve ever seen. it’s Saturday, I’m knitting. The sweater I started in Davis and was working on here in Mount Shasta is finally being blocked. I am so in love with Frog Tree alpaca that I ordered more today.
    Sweater_blocking

    Here’s my inspiration, my gorgeous nieces, Alison and Natalie. Pretty soon the one that’s round will be skinny and the skinny one will be round.
    Natali

  • camille/camel and some hate/love

    Camille_camel

    Baseball tournament at the Embassy this weekend. As we are driving in, Stefan sees the teams on the field. “Baseball is like tennis, right?” he asks.

    Our favorite part of the tournament: camel rides.

    On the way home from school yesterday Stefan says, “There are three people at school I hate, Adam, Walid and Abdoul-Karim.” Peter and I start in on a short lecture of how “hate” isn’t a good word to use. “Oh!” Stefan says, winding down the window and waving manaically at someone like a friend he hasn’t seen in one hundred years, “There’s Abdoul-Karim! Hi! Hi, Abdoul-Karim!”