My Year of Meaningful (2011)

Wait! Wait!!! 2010!!! come back!!!!

I feel like this holiday has gone so fast and I'm not READY. I haven't had any quality time to spend in my brain and just think about any New Year's Intentions or where to go from here. I'm almost kind of depressed because we've been so busy that it's all slid past me and I didn't get to *enjoy* the last week and a half... and I'm starting to feel anxiety about going back down to the bottom of the earth in just a few days.... shiiiiiiit!!!!

While having a few hours off from the craziness just now, using the excuse that LJJ has to take a nap & isn't feeling well (which she's not, she's a sick little puppy) I am grabbing a few hours to myself in our little housey to rest and just process it all while The Mr runs some errands & for once... NOBODY IS VISITING. I clicked over to my blog from NY's day a year ago to see what was going through my mind then and it says this (reminder that I was suffering a case of blood-poisoning at the time):

"So on to this year - I can't really be bothered making new years resolutions because I'm kinda draggin', but I've heard The Mr. say it several times over: the year of positivity, the year of happy, the year of casting negative vibes out the door. So with that I must pick up my ill and melancholy self, a little bit annoyed at some of the last days of 2009 and thoroughly annoyed with the last 3-4 months of 2009, and dust it off and do the C'mon Get Happy dance.

Good things to look forward to this year:
Cape in Feb.
Aus at Easter
World Cup Football 2010 South Africa
USA in July (?) - which, I've decided, with ample planning and effort CAN be as good as Xmas 2008!
Finishing my thesis and becoming Master Master
Being mindful
Being at peak fitness and finding a road race to train for
Being part of the Hash, a group of folks I have grown enamoured with & look forward to seeing each week
Seeing friends, seeing friends, seeing friends!!
Making time to talk to friends either online or on the phone
Harvesting the biggest buttload of home grown veggies out of my own garden, all year
Xmas 2010 in NL, which, with ample planning and effort CAN be *almost* as good as Xmas 2008!"

I notice that I was really fixated on Xmas 2008 which is when we went to the states and had a brilliant xmas and new years with friends, friends, friends including a semi-pleasant family christmas for the first time ever as well as hanging with the hometown crowd including bwuddaman, and did the fun New Orleans trip with Bella and Brandone and the fantastic cross-country drive with Jean and discovered that we really liked the mid-atlantic region...?
I don't really know how that makes me feel, upon reflection... I can remember writing those things as if it was just yesterday, so it's not surprising or weird or anything, and in general, yeah, that pretty much was 2010 for me. I guess I have no feeling whatsoever towards it. I will say that today I am heaving a sigh of satisfaction and relief that I *DID* manage to make 2010 the year of the pushups. In fact I'm going to go do my last ones for the year right after this. I'm not really sure what I have to say about that - I got massive triceps out of it, doing it everyday makes me feel good and I'm satisfied with the amount of time out of my life that it required and am satisfied with it being the most successful NY's resolution I've ever made and stuck to. But now what? Do I still do these things every day? If I don't, will my muscles dissolve? Is there ever any lifestyle change you can do "sort of"??? I wanted to think about these things, dammit, and the last 2 weeks have been so damn busy and frantic that I haven't gotten any quiet time in my head to do so!!!

I wanted to make a list of NY resolutions but again I don't feel like I've really had enough time to refine the list to make it just "the right" combination of "doable" and "worth resolving to do"-ish. If I learned anything from friends' lists of resolutions last year it's that you don't want to overshoot the moon or you'll just end up depressed over not being superhuman and achieving feats of greatness in 1 year. And, another thing: if 2010 was the year of the pushups, should 2011 be the year of the situps? Leg lifts? What do I do about the things I wanted to do last year that didn't materialize? agh! So I guess just to see it in writing here are my options that I am thinking about :
- everyday exercise (i.e. the daily 1-minute workout i'm already doing, but something different)
- train for Cape Town 2-Oceans 1/2 marathon in April
- the year of husbandly romance!
- the year of bluegrass and other music?
- attitude towards work... but what?
- write the LJJ storybook
- put more effort into looking presentable?

Obviously there are some plain old "givens" that I need to concentrate on in terms of self-improvement. Working harder at the office, being a better friend, having more acceptance, patience & tolerance for things I can't control.... being a better friend WITH more acceptance, patience & tolerance for things I can't control.... keeping the positive attitude moving UPWARDS and not backwards. jeez, adulthood is hard. Living in the human community and not being a jackass is hard. It takes WORK, I learned this over the last couple years and I don't LIKE it. I guess the good thing is that New Years gives you the starting line that you need to take the deep breath and say "ok, HERE is where I'm going to kickstart it". I practiced some of the acceptance thing last night when Little Bwudda I.L. (in law) stayed back at our house after the "family drinks night" that we hosted here in our temporary digs for The Mr's family. He let lose some really intense fambly drama problems that he's working through at the moment and really wanted our "outside" perspective on it. God knows The Mr & I are always willing to give our opinions on this sort of thing but I made sure I really drove home the whole "I can talk to you about this forever, but just remember it's only one outlook on the situation and you have to do whatever it is that YOU want to do and only go by YOUR gut feeling, not anybody else's point". I tried really hard not to convince him to do what me & The Mr. would do, but rather just give him a lot of "here's how I/We feel, but don't forget we're all different people" reminders between every answer he solicited from us. Which is easy to forget to do when you're trying to "help". I had to remind The Mr a lot of times too because he is REALLY passionate about some of the topics that came up and some of the problems on the table being that it's his family. He has a tendency to emulate his father much more than he'd like to by doing a lot of (really loud) "this is how it is, and trust me because I'm right" advising when he gets swept up in the current. I suppose we all do including myself so therein is an area for improvement. -sigh- dually noted.

anyway, I'm not really feeling that comfortable in my own brain right now - so I should perhaps stop stressing about the year 2011 here in the last hours of 2010 and just let go of everything and wait to see what "2011" actually "feels like" before I turn into a "idiot" who puts too much "emphasis" on the "new year" and ends up going "air quote crazy" in their sentences.

I'll tell you one thing that is really ruining my concentration right now, though, is this DAMN trash-can-lid-blowing-up thing that is a really freakin' annoying New Year's tradition here in the countryside of The Netherest of Lands.... damn rednecks who fill garbage bins up with explosives and blow the lid off of them. driving me nuts. BANG!!! BANG!!!! BANG!!!! It's so loud you can hear it for kilometers around. While the Mr. and I were peacefully enjoying some speed skating (now THAT's another story all together!) in the beautiful peaceful snowy forest yesterday the local redneck teenagers were going crazy with the explosions. One thing is for certain is that if you're trying speed skates for the first time ever and you have to concentrate, this is NOT handy. And now it's not handy for sick 20-month-olds that are trying to sleep. ugh! arseholes!

LJJ has been a real trooper the past couple weeks. so much so that now she's sick. Lots of kissing funny relatives, lots of crazy kids running around, lots of dutch speaking (she's using her first dutch words though, so that's a good step), lots of being off-schedule, and thankfully lots of SLEEPING. The poor thing is so exhausted every day she's been sleeping from between 8 & 9 pm to between 9 & 10 am every day. She's just so over-stimulated by all the action and new people and people who want to love her and snuggle her and play with her that she's just knackered all the time. And the freezing bloody cold - this is the girl who doesn't own a coat and never wears shoes, let alone has to get packed into 3 layers and hand-constraining mittens and suffocating scarves every time we go out the door. No wonder she's under the weather now.

We have been seeing a LOT of people this trip. All the Mr's friends have come to visit us, even those who had to drive a few hours to do it, which is really nice. A lot of them have REALLY changed, some of them not so much. Most all of them have kids, some of them on the way. They range in behaviour levels from "totally out of control and jumping on the couch" to "really sweet and well-behaved". LJJ has a tendency to watch some of the WWE-style kids with her jaw on the ground and eyes as big as dinner plates, from the safety of the couch and NOT get involved. I really hope she doesn't pick up any violent and crazy traits. But then again what she doesnt pick up here she's probably going to bring home from nursery school with her come January, so I suppose I just better cross my fingers.

In the Friends WithOUT Kids Department, I think the highlight of the trip so far has been Marco & Corne's visit (& Jean's) on account of the massive amount of humor therapy that they brought with them. I really needed the 3 nights of non-family-obligations that were associated with those few days, and the Skip-Bo marathons that deteriorated into slap-happyness and gut-wrenching belly laughs. I really still feel kinda empty now that they're gone, even a couple days later.

In the Family department, I really enjoyed Little Bwudda I.L.'s strangely bizarre and spontaneous 2:00a.m. deep & meaningful heart-to-heart with The Mr and I last night after everyone left. That particular L.B.I.L. was the one that we have never really gotten along with and who is the one with the loudest mouth and the most outrageous cold and unemotional opinions and outlook on the world. Turns out after last night I have a lot of empathy for him that I didn't before and I can see why he acts like such a douche sometimes. I think the truth is he does have a tiny little bit of humanity deep in his heart, he just is completely incapable of knowing what to do with it and how to act towards other people. Turns out he's also just very very nervous about change and new, different experiences. What I took from the whole experience last night was that he really does have feelings for us and that he values our opinions enough that when he's found himself in this really jacked-up pickle, he genuinely wanted to come to us to talk. That feels weird and yet endears us to him because we always thought he was just a big, cold jerk with no emotions or even fibre of softness in his body.

From the 3rd of Jan., The Mr & I are heading off to the island of Texel for 2 days by ourselves. ahhhh. salt water, posh hotel, no baby & NO EXPLODING TRASH CANS!!!! AGGGGHHHH

I guess if "The Year of Romance" is a good idea for me to do for 2011, that's where it should probably kick off. But I need benchmarks and small goals. What are romantical benchmarks and goals anyway? What would those be? Something to ponder. And what would the "year of bluegrass and other music" be? How do I realize that? How do I get that done?

Oh, and finally, I am reading "Freedom" by Jonathan Franzen right now and it is REALLY good.

I guess now is as good a time as any to go do those last pushups of 2010. Onwards. Breathe.

Labels: holiday recap, mi familia, The spirit of 2010

I don't have much time but feel like it's easier to do something quick now than have to write everything down when we get back!

In brief, I'm having a really good time here and the secret is definitely that we have our own house to stay in and all our visitors have to come to US rather than us flying all over the damn place to see everyone.

Marc & Corne were just here for 3 nights and it was HI-LARRY, we had such a kickass time playing skipbo and cooking and drinking and just staying in... they're definitely my favorite couple from The Mr.'s university days. Jean was here for 2 nights too and that was fantastic and fun as usual, and now The Mr's other posse of buddies from college are on their way too.

I have no discipline for food here. There are far too many amazing baked goods and fish and Indonesian foods and mmmmmmmmmmmm everything else.

The Family is the same, we're getting along fine, no drama to report, and moderate levels of interaction is working so well, although they want more LJJ time and so I feel sorry for them but they're still seeing her every day and we're leaving her with them plenty which means everybody wins. After NY's day, The Mr. and I then leave her with them for 2 days while we have our romantic getaway to the island oF texel and some peace and quiet. it's just been so bloody BUSY!!! Just like when I'm at home. Rush rush rush.

The snow is great and I'm really enjoying running in the cold. We've been doing it pretty regularly since we have babysitting opportunities and a beautiful snowy forest in our midst to run around in. Also to counterbalance all the damn baked goods. Running on ice is dangerous but fun.

Oh crap I hear The Mr. making more plans for us..... back to the rush!

I don't know when I'm going to collectively have enough to actually push "publish" on this but I'm just adding bits and pieces over the days because I am too damn scatterbrained and all over the shop to sit down and get it done right!

So last weekend was another big one again, with parties and gatherings and dinners and craziness abounding. There was a big fat traditional turkey dinner for Xmas at Mx and Soo's which also included Doc & Mrs Doc and Mx's nutty australian friend Nick & his even crazier (and I mean certifiably CRAZY) anglo-namibian girlfriend - that was on Saturday. Certifiably Crazy Girlfriend was seated next to The Mr. and basically latched on to him and droned away about everything from how she's not in love with Nick to how "if she is rowing her boat.... and someone else is rowing their boat.... and they can both row together in peace and harmony....." OMG I can't even remember how bizarre and weird it got. But anyway the fun part of dinner was that inside the christmas crackers that Soo had at each place setting, there were these "Table Talk" questions.... open-ended deep & Meaningful (sorta) questions that each person had to ask and the rest of the table discussed. It was pretty funny. And a new twist that I had never gotten in a Christmas Cracker before. Stuff like "if it was your last 24 hours on earth, what would you do?"

Since D & Mrs D and The Mr. and I carpooled, those of us who were "Not The Mr.", who was on driving duty, when a little spastic and made plenty of merry with the wine. Doc even "went missing" after dinner was over for a couple hours which we found out later ment that he took "The China" for a quick "Drive" and found a nice spot on the living room floor for a wee "nap". And by "China" I mean "toilet" and by "Drive" I mean "puke" and by "nap" I mean "passed out". Yes I am SO good at innuendo, I have to do it twice.

It all started around 5 that afternoon when D & MrsD came up to help us with another coat of paint on the cornhole boards. I supplied very nice Bombay martinis garnished tastefully with lime peel, as that is clearly the beverage that one enjoys with paint fumes. When we had to leave to go to Soo's, we transferred our drinks out of the lovely martini glasses (which I never get to use, hence any excuse for a martini, painting or no painting) and into plastic travel cups durable enough to bounce through the bush over to Dinner. Then there was of course champagne for pre-dinner, wine with dinner and poor old Doc was just coming off a 24 hour shift (and had to work at 7am the next day) so I think he just went hell for leather early in the evening and hence we lost him around 9pm or so.

Anyway fun was had by all! Soo found out the next day that she's preggers (AGAIN! Damn, It's like their current baby was just cranked out yesterday!!!) so there goes any more of these big hoo-has at their place til September. Bummer.

Sunday I can't remember what took up my whole day but I think it may have been relaxing & involved some sort of playing catch-up with the DVR. Then that evening the G-village 6 (us, the Docs - minus Doc that night though since he was working, and Jac & Mar) caught up at J&M's place for a lite pre-christmas gathering since M was leaving for Holland this week, to say bye-bye before we all go our separate ways for the Festive season. It involved playing cornhole (with our new not-quite-yet-painted-but-still-usable boards) and eating Filet on the braai and just general hanging out. Our OTHER young neighbours (we'll call them Christoff and Daisy) whom we never socialize with but who are pretty cool and our age too and live just up from the Docs also came over and while they are not exactly a party in a box, they're nice and humoured us by playing bags with us too.

This week has been troublesome in the work department mainly based on the fact that I had to go up to Maun AGAINST MY WILL on Tuesday which entailed waking up at 5am and then getting brain-rattle-syndrome in the plane because of horrible weather which is spanning the country at the moment, and then wasting the rest of my day on site. Not to mention being delayed in the shithole airport for FIVE HOURS because of some unexplained "technical difficulties".... nice. PLUS my cellphone network was blown up so i couldn't even use the phone. But thank god for wifi because I used it to catch up on email and gchat and skype and phone calls or should I say belly laughs with Brandon which was fun. But I still didn't get home til after 11pm and that SUCKED.

In protest after having such a bad-ass horrible day on tuesday, on Wednesday... I just didn't work.

In other news The Mominator is back up to her old tricks again, this time complaining that the photos on our "other Blog" don't reflect her, for the segment that THe Mr. did about our trip back home HALF A YEAR AGO. She also casually mentioned how maybe she should go check in with her friend whose daughter is FB friends with me and see if I've put any photos of our trip back home "including grandparents", up on FB. :-o
Really?
Psycho?
Really?

I wrote back a very clear and simply worded email saying "If you don't like our photo selections, make your own photobucket or put more on your own shutterfly.
If you want to stalk us on facebook through Sarah, I am happy to de-friend her and block her from my account since I only really use it to keep in touch with my FRIENDS that we never see. If Sarah wants to use it for "Family networking" that's her perogative, but I feel like I have enough ways to keep in touch with my FAMILY without some stupid social networking site.
You don't have to read our blog if it upsets you because we don't have enough photos of YOU on it. It is not compulsory. It is hard enough to keep it updated without you demanding that now we go back and "correct" the photos that were taken over six months ago. Please drop this line of inquiry because it is getting old and again I don't feel the need to apologize for which photographs from our private life make it out into the public domain, and we don't have time with a 3rd world slow internet connection to upload all 350 photographs taken on holidays. Don't ask me why The Mr. selected the ones he did but you really need to stop hassling about it because he's saying maybe we should just shut it down entirely."

Re-reading it I'm half-disappointed that I took the bait, but by the same token, I am tired and exhausted from one hell of a year and am just barely hanging on til Saturday when we leave for "that side". Seriously. I'm falling asleep in random places in public. I don't need a headache a la Mominator right now. Especially that same old "IT'S NOT ALL ABOUT YOU" flavor that we've been over 90 billion times before and just wears me down. I know why she feels like now is the appropriate time to bring it up: tis because she just deposited a whole bunch of $$$ in our bank account for ours & LJJ's christmas gift and so now feels like I won't have the balls to call her out on her nonsense. Well, I done did it. Now I gotta flee the country.

Speaking of fleeing the country, I am really truly looking forward to the big haul back to the land of the Nethers. I'm kinda bummed that I didn't get the results of my thesis back before the holidays but I'll just have to stop worrying/thinking about it and move on with The Great 2010 Recuperation. I keep checking in on the student portal but they just ain't postin'. So on to 18 days in the cold and snow and in our little cottage in the forest that we're renting (to avoid having to stay at La casa de inlaw) which by the by can be seen here: http://www.wellnessvakantievilla.nl/index.php?option=com_content&view=frontpage&Itemid=1
("Translate with Bing" or Google might come in handy)

There is a sauna and a hot tub and 3 bedrooms so we can have people over whenever we want and I'm REALLY looking forward to having Petra for a few days (my old BFF here in Bots who abandoned us a year and a half ago) and Jean of course who is coming for a couple days after xmas. Then the last couple days of our time there, we dump LJJ with the grandfolk and The Mr. and I escape away for 3 days of "adult time" off on one of the islands in the North Sea which will be blustery and freeeeeezing but at the same time romantic and ALONE! Indeed, I am looking forward to this trip to his turf for once.

I need to exercise.

Our office xmas party was last night and we went back to the Portuguese "all you can eat MEAT" restaurant with the guys. Our new PA, Neo, is finally the first ever L.E. employee we've had that actually drinks alcohol. It was fun to see if he would actually order a DRINK (knowing it's on the company) or not. And he proved to be a sensible little fella by ordering mango juice on the first round, waiting to see what The Directors did. The Mr. ordered a beer and I ordered a glass of red wine, and then lo and behold on the next round Neo ordered a beer. HAHA! I don't know why I found that so entertaining but I actively made sure the drinks orders went counter-clockwise with Me & The Mr. being last, because i wanted to see just how cheeky he was. heh heh heh.

Oh, and the Secret Baby still hasn't been discussed with me but last night at the dinner, Leto was forced to use the words "Maternity Leave" in a conversation that I was a part of, and let's just say the tension in the room got THICKE LIKE ALAN.

Tomorrow Doc & Mrs Doc and Jac are coming up for my 5-star spaghetti and salad and cornhole and maybe poker and basically another bye-bye friday night camraderie. Guiltily, I'm kind of glad Mar hit the road a few days earlier than Jac because this means more fun for us, and good old J-bird doesn't have to stick to his 3 beer limit & can relax a little without getting his head chomped off for saying/doing the wrong thing or otherwise. Or get scowled at for having a refill on wine. Or have to go home promptly at midnight. The Mr. and I have taken a few clues that we've overheard from the both of them as of late that this relationship doesn't have much longevity because of her inability to ever embrace the possibility of a life here in BW, and his similar anti-NL tendencies. But I respect the way he puts 100% into the relationship at the moment and really dotes on her and seems to genuinely care, despite probably knowing deep down that they're gonna hit a stale mate somewhere up the road. He's such a good guy. He just deserves a girl who can relax just a little bit more and not be so uptight at AGE TWENTY FOUR. eish. seriously she's younger than all of us but has this serious Grandma-syndrome that can really bring you down. c'est la vie.

So we leave on Saturday night, fly down to Joburg, then fly out to Paris in the evening and layover there for a couple hours. Then off to Hamsterdam where we will arrive on Sunday afternoon. woo hoo! Here's to holidays! Where hopefully the most complicated thing on my mind will be new years' resolutions. I've got a few ideas up my sleeve but need some quiet time to launder all the crap out of them.

Speaking of laundering.... our maids have the week off & wont be back til january. Now what the hell am I going to do about all this laundry???

OK this hodgepodge of nonsense has grown long enough now, and off it goes.

I am about to become a person of class, a person of taste, a tamale chef!

I've been cooking asian food for long enough now I need a new focus in the kitchen. So Tamales it is. I figure why not, I live in a country where it's too bloody easy to get corn husks... it would be a sin not to use this opportunity!

Food on the brain here. Mrs Doc made these traditional Sinterklaas almond cookies for our big Sinterklaas party on sunday night and they are like MAGNETS to my MOUTH. Not really beeing much of a sweets person, this is really saying something.

And watching "Julie & Julia" a couple weeks back makes me interestedin taking on a real committed cooking project sometime soon. I am starting to see these things in years now - just like the pushups & situps regime from 2010... something you have to commit to doing every single day of the year in order for it to really transform your lifestyle. Like this idea of "half marathon" that I'm toying with for 2011. But I'm not sure a cooking project lends itself to someone who travels a lot and has to go away for work almost weekly, etc etc. So I'll have to see if I can find a way to adapt this idea. But I'm still going to master tamales.

This weekend was TOO MUCH!!! I had a stellar mccartney time but it was way too much! Gourmet Gals at my house on Friday was fantastical - all the instructions I gave them were spot on and the chicks (none of whom had ever cooked Chinese food before) got everything pretty well right. So we enjoyed a fabulous feast of Hot & Sour Soup, Dongpo Pork, Asparagus salad, and Caramel dumplings. And wine. Lots of it. Luckily they all helped clean up too after it was over. :) The only down side, well 2 actually, was that Mrs Doc was on call the whole time and of COURSE there were about 30 brain-emergencies (she's a neurologist) during the night so not only could she only drink 1 glass of wine, but she was also on the cell phone nearly the whole time and of course had to leave at midnight to go into the hospital and solve problems etc etc. Problem 2 was that The Mr. was in a right FOUL mood over his stressful week and was really put out that he had to abscond with The LJJ for the duration of the evening (he took her to poker night with the boys down at Doc's house) as well as help me setting up tables before the chicas arrived and all sorts of supporting acts, but yet didn't get to reap any of the benefits of the cooking being done! I said them's the breaks pal, welcome to husbandry! My mom used to kick my dad out of the house for her bridge clubs and bible studies and all sorts of what-the-what all the time. I only have ever had to do this once! And hostessing is STRESSFUL! I need HELP! Seriously, it took me all day to get ready for this - I didnt even eat anything all day (nor did I even REALIZE this fact until 8:30 at night when I tasted some snacks and was like "hmmm, that's an odd sensation in my belly...?")

Anyhoo, I didn't even get to sleep it off (so to speak) the next day because 1) I didn't drink enough water during the evening so I was feeling seedy at 7am and couldn't sleep anymore, and 2) I kept having these SUPER vivid half-dreams about people calling me the next day to say they were puking and foodpoisoned etc., and then another one where there were ants all over my kitchen and crawling around in the food.... hmmm, post-hosting stress maybe? And then 3) we had to get up and lay out the Hash for that evening's Christmas run. Plus I had all sorts of Grand Mattress responsibilities I had to see to before the big par-tay. So The Mr. and I and LJJ loaded up the trail-laying crap and went out to the ghetto to set it out. Then went and had a spur-of-the-moment lunch at Dros which was relaxing and well-deserved, and back home to get ready for a 5pm E.T.A. at the bar where the Hash was starting.

After a really good run, there was a really good xmas party, which saw me and Sting respectively in our posts as Mrs & Santa Claus. Turkey, ham, stuffing, potatoes and yadda yadda yadda for all! I had whipped up a few clever hash-themed christmas carols and Sting & I led one and all in a good-time sing-along. It was ace.

Then sunday it was a weeeee bit of a sleep-in, followed by a run to the shops by myself and Mrs Doc, to get fixens for the big Dutchy night. Out of the G-village 6, only 2 are Dutch (The MR. & Mar) but dammit the rest of us played ball, and good too. Everyone had drawn a name about a week ago, and presents were bought for that person.... which were then wrapped in mystery packaging, and poems were written for that person, and so on. Since I was hostessing (AGAIN!) I made fondue in 3 courses... a 4-cheese course for veggies & sausage, a peanut oil course for chicken and beef, and a chocolate course for fruit and cake for dessert. This time though, it was REALLY important to the Mr. to spend the whole day baking these little cinnamon/ginger cookies that are like THE THING you have to eat on Sinterklaas. The sweet thing, he was so cute baking all day. And they were pretty good I have to say! So when the gang came over in the evening, we ate the cookies, some hoursdovures by Mrs Doc, and then sat down for fonduage. We did presents staggered throughout the dinner, and it was really fun. I have this sneaky suspicion that Mar was insulted by the poem I wrote (I drew her name) but that's how the REAL sinterklaas poems are supposed to go. You're supposed to take the piss out of the person you draw. And of COURSE I draw the one member of the gang with no sense of humor. whatever! I thought it was a masterpiece because I mixed both dutch & english on an alternating-line basis.

The Mr. drew Jac's name and it was priceless because in HIS poem he referenced many different elements of Mar's stick-up-the-ass. Like how J. has a 3-beer limit allowance, and how he's not allowed to cook with chillies or leave the door open so bugs can get in the house, etc etc. We all laughed.

Anyhoo, we sat outside drinking and then did dishes and finally Doc & Mrs Doc went home around 1am and I had to be up the next morning to go to work and that was NOT fun. I honestly dont remember having been that tired at work for years. I literally kept falling asleep at my desk and then on the couch when I got home. Thank God we went to bed at 10pm last night so I could get the first decent night's sleep in days.

All in all, fun weekends are fun, but I sure am glad I have 2 weeks off coming up here in the next half of the month because dammit I need to lay around and do NOTHIN for awhile.

I just don't know what to do with myself! Overbooked! Underpaid! Through the rabbit hole! This is officially no longer the "silly season" it's the "freakin ridiculous season"!!!

Starting off today, I am supposed to be working at home but I REALLY need to go buy some presents. Then the Gourmet Girls (cooking club) is at my house tonight and I have to get stuff prepared! Of course this will involve copious amounts of wine which will probably affect my sleep as usual and I will be wrecked tomorrow, when The Mr. and I have to set out the Christmas hash in the morning, for the big run in the evening followed by the big party where I have to dress up in my North Pole elfin glory again and lead songs! And have boys sit on my lap! And drink more copious amounts of wine! Redundantical, I know!

Then the next day is Sinterklaas for the G-village 6 (Myself & The Mr., Jac & Mar, and Doc & Mrs Doc) which will involve feasting and gift exchanging and... go ahead and solve the mystery of what will be drunk in what amount... that's right, copious amounts of wine!! It's a shame we're all within walking distance of each other's driveways because otherwise I would probably use Sunday as a good excuse to "be the designated driver" and get some time off of liquid consumption. But alas it is not to be and I will just have to soldier through the fun and holiday merriment and make sure I up my water intake by 400%. A few Berocca wouldn't hurt either.

I am such a mainstream parent it is ridiclical. I am pretty sure my 19-month old is the only one on the planet with chores. But we've started making her feed the dogs every night. Responsibility and care-taking and all that. It's also something she likes to do because it involves dumping a can of something into a recepticle of some kind. Par-tay!

I still can't believe she's going to pre-school in January. It's really only just now hitting me, but we finally made the decision on which place, yesterday. She'll start with a 1/2 day until she's a bit older and then one of the good things about the place we decided on is that they have an all-day option, so she doesn't have to switch schools when she's old enough to go til 5. Bye-bye days of working from home and the peace, tranquility, bird-chirping and solitude of G-village mornings out my window every other day. :( Well ok, we'll still alternate every-other-day 1pm pickup/afternoons at home but it just won't be the same. An era really is over. Sad. But LJJ is ready to spread her wings and get out there with the other little people. My days at playgroup didn't last long (we went what, 7 times?) because quite frankly I felt that it SUCKED, and we're both too busy to enroll her & cart her around to proper extracirricular little-people activities like Kindermusik and what not. So nursery school it is. The one we picked is great, I think. While most of my friends with kids send theirs to the sister-school to this one on the complete opposite side of town, we're going with this one because logistically there's just no way we can get her to that other one every morning through traffic and all the urban nonsense. It's just not worth it. This one has the same management and philosophy and offers the same programmes etc etc etc. AND even though it's older and a little bit more crowded, it's closer to us. So she'll just have to make a whole lot of new friends. oh, there is a petting zoo there with goats and chickens and bunnies, so enough said! :)

Note to self to slow down as much as possible and enjoy this final & last month of this era that was being a work-at-home-every-other-day-moms. It's fading fast!

I don't remember what else I was going to write about so I'll leave it here and start gearing up for the massive weekend ahead!

Labels: The Kid Files