My Year of Meaningful (2011)

So there's no doubt about this one -
Probably one of the most meaningful birthdays of my life last week. Partially since I was so deathly mournful about turning -gulp- the big "mid-30-number", and then it turned out to be so fantastico. I remember when some of my older friends turned "that number" and how back in the day I used to think to myself "wow, that's old! That's like... so adulty!!" Well, now it's my turn and I'm thinking... uhhhhhh.... am I really that old? No! It doesn't feel old at all! I keep forgetting I'm not 25!!! Until I realize all my employees are like, 25 or thereabouts and I feel like they're just babies. It's a freakin mental roller coaster, age is. I know it doesn't matter and you're only as old as the woman that you feel and all that, but still. You can't change your birth year... it's still glaring at you on your passport, driver's license, CV, residence permit, etc.... and it just starts looking outdated every time these new young whippersnappers keep dropping in their cover letters & CVs that say "DOB: 1980-something.... or even 19NINETY-something!!!!"

Anyhoo, so the long and short of it is that I was dreading the day, and of course it started out as most of my Maun days do (or as Brandon calls it my days in "AssCrack-istan") with a 5am wakeup, schlep into the airport, schlep into Maun on a bumpy-ass flight, and then a full day of full-blown Kalahari sun, asphalt, workboots, long pants, knee-deep sand, and shadeless, waterless, sweat-filled hard and frustrating work. This particular day was one of our monthly project meetings and I had started a lot of shit on the site over the past month so I had a lot of yelling and followup to do (otherwise I may have opted out and sent my apologies and just not gone since it is such an anti-birthday way to spend a whole day). Then as usual, I end up not getting home until after 7pm, tired, airsick, sweaty, covered in sand, and uncomfortably full of MSG (the Chinese contractor on site always feeds us for lunch there and it's always backdoor on-site cooked Chinese food).

So the majority of what I just described came to pass, only lightened up a little by the number of messages and phone calls and emails from people who care. My expectations were that I would fly home as per usual, and then The Mr. would meet me/surprise me at the airport (sans LJJ) and we would go out for a fancy-pants dinner, at which point he would tell me that we were going away to such-and-such a place for the next couple of days (he had told me before that I had to keep the rest of the week "free", but with no indication of what that meant). I had all sorts of expectations of where that destination could be, but nothing concrete to go on.

As it was time to get back to the airport and fly home, Tendayi, my lovely and gorgeous Zimbabwean colleague/friend on the Maun job pulls up next to me and demands to take me for one quick birthday drink before I go back. So I gather my stuff, get in his truck and was handling a work issue on the cell phone, when all of a sudden Tendayi starts cranking up the radio outrageously LOUD and I start getting pissed because I can't hear my phone call. And he is acting sketchy and weird because he is normally not the kind of guy who would be BLASTING the stereo while you're on the phone right next to him. We pull up in front of the bar by the airport and run inside (as it's lashing down with rain, cats & dogs like) and as I do, a 4x4 pulls around the corner and parks RIGHT in front of us. Thought nothing, just trying to get out of the rain. Once inside, I see a white girl with dreads getting out of said car, and my thoughts were "hm. Looks like Petra". Still nothing. Then a second later I realize, it *IS* Petra! (For the record, I'm talking about our BFF from NL who used to live here when we first moved here but then moved back to NL a couple years ago and who is currently in BW on a 3-week holiday, but was SUPPOSED to be in G-city, not Maun!) What the hell is she doing in Maun? Oh... what? That 4x4 she's getting out of..... is MY OWN VEHICLE!? Oh, and who's that in the driver's seat? It's The Mr.!!! WTF!?!? And so then I realize they're wrestling to get something out of the back seat while the rain is dumping buckets on them (LJJ), and then they run inside and it's all "surprise, surprise!s and WTF are you two doing here?s" and so on. So apparently Tendayi was in on it all and the whole blasting-the-music thing was because Petra had been on the phone with him telling him he needed to stall me because they were running a little late and knew if I showed up at the airport to check in and realized THERE WAS NO TICKET HOME IN MY NAME available "she's gonna go ape shit!" (which is 150% TRUE). This was because The Mr. had cancelled my return flight, in consideration of what he was planning (to drive up and kidnap me). And it would've set me on FIRE and the (not) kind ladies at the Air BW check in counter would've received the verbal lashing of their lifetime as I could absolutely NOT tolerate such nonsense ON MY BIRTHDAY.

So anyway, there we all are at the bar, Tendayi, Petra, GG, Keith, etc. and enjoy a couple beverages laughing about all the people who were in on the surprise (apparently several guys on the consulting team in Maun, even). And eventually The Mr. lets me in on the rest of the gig, which is that Petra just rode up with him to keep him company and she's going to hang out in Maun and fly back tomorrow, and meanwhile he, me, and LJJ are going to this lovely posh tree lodge that we went to & thoroughly enjoyed a couple years ago outside of Maun, for 2 nights of R&R, before moving onto a second destination (which I only found out was this elegant old-fashioned tented safari camp as we drove up to it a couple days later) in the Makgadikgadi Pans for another 2 nights before returning home on Saturday.

So anyway, I would have to say that hands-down, this was a true no-brainer on the Meaningful front. I mean, how much planning had to go into this!? Loads!! I am so freakin lucky. The amount of love and organization that went into making my birthday a true surprise and truly special is mind-boggling. If you think about it, it wasn't an easy task. He had to book the venues, cancel my work flight, *PACK MY BAGS* for me (well, now that's another story all together.... one that ended up with me having to wash my hair without conditioner, not be able to comb said hair due to lack of comb/brush/etc., and wear pretty poorly-matched outfits, but who cares!), drive 8 hours with the foot down to beat me to the airport, manage LJJ all the way up, ensure that I didn't find out with anything out or worse yet, potentially ruin the surprise by scheduling some work-meeting or other conflict during the week (which he had to be VERY clued into what I was doing at the office to avoid this). Even right down to sorting out all my management issues at work to ensure that the things I was in charge of doing during that week were handled by someone else etc. And at the same time, not tell certain people who would've botched the surprise. He packed a red wine, a white wine, and a champagne so that we could have our choice of beverage to enjoy out on the veranda each night, and had written a very sweet card and insisted on doing every thing for me for the whole remainder of the weekend. Everything. Like, from feeding LJJ breakfast every day while I laid in bed, to walking back and forth between the main lodge and our chalet/tent each time I wanted something like a bottle of water or snack, etc. "It's YOUR birthday trip, let me do it"... was the mantra for the next 4 - 5 days. Honestly, this could possibly be the highest bar ever set by any husband in the world. I'm still in awe, as I think back about it a week later.

Then the presents were glorious too. My long-sought-after iPhone 4 was the big dog of them all of course, and then the 2nd most awesome component was that he had gone and PERSONALLY sorted out all the logistics for me to get my motorcycle license (FINALLY), which has been one of those nasty "hanging" things that has been loitering around on my To-Do list for like, years, but I've just been too lazy to get moving on. The credit "note" he gave me included a certain amount of credit hours training that you have to do (which is kind of unnecessary since I know how to ride a bike, but you still have to do it, and is the main thing that has been keeping me from getting through all this crap already) - all organized & ready to go, all I had to do was show up, as well as all paperwork filled out and submitted for both theory and road test exams, so I have to do NOTHING. Just show up on the dates and walk away with the license (which I've already aced all the training already this week, loving every moment of it, so will go for the theory test on Wednesday & then have the learners' license in my pocket, woo hoo!).

So anyway, regardless of what the chalet/lodges were like, and how awesome the presents were, and how sweet the thought was, I feel like the amount of sensitive planning and scheming that went into this whole thing was just like the biggest "I REALLY DO LOVE YOU" I could've ever got, and absolutely by all accounts, was one of the most meaningful presents I've ever received in my life, and will go down in history as possibly the best birthday ever, without a doubt.

Labels: Meaningful, The Mr.

OK, I accept I need to work on this 2-week-interval thing.... especially since that last blogger-misfire thing resulted in my 2-weeks-ago-post not even being posted! It has been *mentioned* and I have taken *note*.

My bad. I'm just full of second-guessyness.


The secret must be in not making the post too long, even though when something is meaningful, you have to explain why, and that can get emotionally involving. And thus, wordy.


I know there's more meaningful things in my life..... why don't they come to me? Why do I keep second-guessing the things that I do think about for a brief moment every couple of days or so?

Maybe I should sparsely integrate normal boring "this is what I have been doing with my life" posts in between the meaningful ones?



Anyhoo, another whopper of meaningful smacked me in the face the other night at the U2 concert.


For the record, The Mr., myself, Doc & Mrs Doc, and another couple (friends but more on the "acquaintences" end of the spectrum than the Doc & Mrs Doc end), we'll call them the Morgs, went down to The Big Smoke (Jozi) to watch the U2 concert. It also happened to be Valentine's weekend. Not sure why that's noteworthy but it is.


Well, in an attempt to keep this from being an hour's worth of writing, I will try and be less wordy than usual. Here goes:


So, The Mr's and my "Song" has always been a U2 song: "In a Little While", off of the "All that you can't leave behind" album. I always have been of the opinion that it's important to have "your song", mainly because music is my THING and all songs conjure up feelings inside me when I hear them, and I think it's important to have one that conjures up nothing but you & the love of your life together. Something of a "feature song" on the soundtrack of your life together. And that's "our" tune. It's the song that we danced our first dance to at our wedding, and it's the song that plays in the background of the "3-minute-slimmed-down version" of our wedding video. Actually - That whole album was big for us because it was released in 2000 (I'll always remember that - and I am HORRIBLE at remembering album release years that aren't 1969 or 1976 for some reason, or aren't released by The Band or The Rolling Stones). The whole album was really huge in our lives when we met back in South Africa that year, as it was getting a lot of airplay, we were both U2 fans, and we had several assorted "moments" during our ownership of that album together. One including a particular morning when we were hopped up on Extacy and had the damn thing on non-stop loop/repeat for an uncountable number of hours, during which the activities that took place I will refrain from translating into words for the sake of my reputation.... BUT ANYWAY. Our first dance at our wedding was to this song, and it has always given me goosebumps to this day to hear it because it fills me with oceans of emotions and love, love, love.


Anyway! So there we were, the 13th of February, 2011, 11 years later on, in the nosebleed section of FBN Stadium in Soweto, not expecting anything other than the latest tour's setlist material and some standard throwback hits from this one of the world's greatest bands massive catalogue... and I was already chuffed that they had already done a song or two off of "our" album... and all of a sudden.... that tiny little guitar riff that starts out with a whole-step slide from the first note to the second.... Edge starts playing it.... and...... ohmygod


the tears!


I never in a million years would've guessed it. I mean first of all, it's not even one of their hits. Oh hell no, it's just some B-side level tune off of a 10 year old album that happened to stitch itself into the lives of US TWO.... really, no one else even knows it unless you're a big fan of that album. Or the fact that "we" started out as a couple in South Africa to this song, and here we were back in South Africa 11 years later having OUR song serenaded to us by Bono on Valentine's Eve...? Never in a MILLION years. How the HELL did that come to happen? I was so shocked, I just don't know if it was my shock or my emotions or the fact that we already were kind of in awe of this massive production that we were blessed to be a part of (reportedly the biggest concert they've ever put on in terms of number of attendees, and HUGE for South Africa).... but I whip my head around to Mrs Doc who was sitting to my right, and go "THIS IS OUR WEDDING SONG!" and immediately am engulfed in the arms of The Mr. and we proceed to slow dance (to the dismay of those seated behind us I'm sure ... as this was obviously one of U2's "sitter" numbers, but OH-to-the-WELL) through the whole thing, and these tear ducts of mine who have not been called to labour for hell, eons now, are kinda working overtime.


To try and explain in words the feeling that I felt in those 3 minutes or so, is just too hard. But I reckon every 9-year-old marriage needs that kind of "refresher" and HOLY SHIT moment where the tsunami of nostalgia and reminders and memories and emotion just washes over you and you're having a COLOSSAL heart swell. And I could see that The Mr. was overwhelmed too and just for one song we didn't give a shit about the people behind us, and just for one song it was just us and the 4 dudes on stage.... the rest of the 100,000 people in the audience just disappeared and there was nothing else in the universe. My heart was all swelled up to the size of Africa. Love flowed in from all directions and flooded every atom of every cell in my being. It was indescribable. And an extremely meaningful phenomena that I will NEVER forget for as long as I live.

Labels: Meaningful, The Mr.

Well!

I got my house back, after a week with the 'rents that was just so non-stop and full on that I didn't have a chance to breathe. Although I did have the opportunity to gain a whole 1.5kg.... NOT HAPPY.

It was a pretty decent trip as far as the parental unit and I go. No fights, no yelling, no pouting or storming off on anyone's part. Which is always an achievement in itself. Only one incident that had the potential to go pear-shaped, but I sucked it up and moved along albeit begrudgingly. And of COURSE it was the most typical, had-to-happen-sometime token induction into the world of grandmother/mother relations... basically, I had my own idea of what LJJs grandfather would be called, and so did Her Royal Highness The Matriarch. But rather than coming right out and saying: "we all know it's ALL ABOUT ME, so therefore I would like him to be referred to as 'Grandpa'", I had to OVERHEAR her bullying Grandpa into submission regarding what HE SHALL BE REFERRED TO AS, period. Obviously Gramps the ever-diplomatic voice of reason put up his best rebuttal ("but...." The End.) and I (boiling over on the inside) broke in and called the spade a spade (bullying) in a reasonable and polite tone, and was dually informed that thanks to my *%&$! INLAWS getting to choose what they would be called by the grandkid (The Mr. was naive enough to explain that we had no choice in the matter), that she too would be in charge of making the decision for both of the Maternal grandparents.

Ah-ha, Touché, madre, touché.

But aside from that particular brush with anger and spite, it was a success all around. Everyone behaved, we took them Hashing on Monday (where they got to witness their daughter being installed as Grand Matress), The Mr. and I celebrated our anniversary on the Tuesday with the 'rents and our new Belgian friends C&H from the 'hood, with a big braai and drinks in the garden.... the grandparental bonding with the youngling was a success.... many presents were given (and to my amazement all in compliance with my '1 toy rule').... much love was spread around, etc etc. I even got the first "with-family" b-day celebration I've had since I was a teen living at home, complete with cake, brandy alexanders, and my choice of homecooked dinner. I took my pops up to my work site in the North on friday as his early father's day present, so he could do some exotic-location birding while I worked, and he kept carrying on about how it was the best gift anyone ever got him. So all in all, yes, a success.

Saturday, we exhaustedly put them on a plane, and came home and crashed. Boy my parents are high-energy. I keep forgetting that. They're all-singing, all-dancing, all-talking, all-enquiring, all-doing folks. Dad is up at 5am every day, wandering the neighbourhood, binoculars pasted to his eyeballs.... mom is constantly conversing.... dad is asking to get dropped off at the sewerage ponds for a wee day trip.... mom is pleading to take you shopping.... dad wants to clean the pool, mom wants to check out the local schools, both want to get adequate exercise in their daily agenda, and wouldn't we please like to join them? etc etc etc.... crikey! It's like going from the sublime to the ridiculous when you compare the inlaws and the outlaws in this family. The Mr's rents just want to sit around all day and stare off into space while drinking beer.

Anyway. This whole birthday thing has been seriously extensive now. Having the family 'do on Friday, then yesterday getting my first present from The Mr. (a piano! a dream come true! but more on that later...), going out for dinner with C&H and the Swedes to celebrate last night, and now today (the actual day) having a nice lunch with The Mr. and I'm sure plenty of drinks with the Hashers tonight.

OMG chalk one up for LJJ in the "firsts" department - last night - and it isn't a goodie. Baby's first embarassing public explosion. The worst. The biggest nightmare ever. OK so she's teething at the moment and basically decided that last night, at the restaurant with our mates, would be the night she would absolutely lose the plot and morph into Monster Baby for one and all to see. Cry, cry, cry. High maintenence. Didn't want to sit. Didn't want to be held. Didn't want to eat. Didn't want to drink. Didn't want NUTTIN. aggghhhh!!! And to top it all off, when we were finally driving home with C&H in the car, she decided to do the whole blood-curdling scream thing (which honestly I had never even HEARD before)... I wanted to die! I told her she would be promptly sold on the street for 10 Pula as soon as we got home. OK I know in the Spirit of 2010 I should be saying well, at least there was no one else in the restaurant besides us, and yeah, we're blessed that this is the only time this happened, and true, C&H are some truly chilled out Belgians without a care in the world about this stuff.... but DANG!!! I even woke up today going "You. Monster. Doghouse." Serenity now, serenity now.

And further in The Kid Files.... get this! BOY AM I CHEESED OFF ABOUT THIS ONE.
(These people should really not screw with me on my birthday like this)
So I get this email from the Aussie HIGH (cuz that's what they must be - on CRACK) Commission stating that they have received our application for LJJs visa. Now could I please provide them with copies of
1. Me & the MR.'s passport
2. Her birth cert "with your names on it" (like what? her bc with Elmo and Big Bird's name on it?)
3. Me & the Mr's visas.
4. Me & the Mr's return tickets (copies).

So I send them.

Now I get an email. And this is NOT the cliff's notes version. This is 100%:

"Dear Oh Wayward One.

Can you provide copies of the adoption papers.

Ms. Offensive Assuming Cow."

Can you believe this crap!?!? I don't know what I'm more pissed about - the fact that her BC has our names on it and yet this PERSON has just ASSUMED that there are 'adoption papers', or the fact that this is 99.9% surely based on the fact that our black & white passport photos look... exactly that. Black & white. COME ON PEOPLE. Where exactly does some bovine in Visa Processing get off with this??

So let me just finish this little backslide into 2009 by saying: THE HARDEST. HARDEST. HARD-EST THING i HAVE EVER, *EVER* HAD TO DO is probably what I just did, which is to click "send" after attaching a copy of my baby's adoption order to an email WITH NO TEXT, that will hopefully be the final piece of CRAP that I have to hand over just to fly across the ocean and spend my hard earned money on a DAMN holiday!!! UGH!!! It was hard, because I was chomping, CHOMPING at the bit, mind you, to pick up the phone, call up the supervisor of whatever VISITOR VISA PROCESSING dept and say something to the effect of "do you often make prejudgements on whether or not a child has been adopted based on the color of their skin in a black and white photo? is this your typical M.O.? because I think it SUCKS!" or, "can you please tell me what relevance my child's adoption papers have to whether or not she can come into your country and eat, sleep, and poop for approximately 14 days?" OMG! I'm absolutely SIMMERING over here, like!!! I don't know how to explain it, but I think the tone of the email (and lack of even considering to use the word 'please') and fact that it was no more than an ASSUMPTION that provoked this issue, is what really chapped my hide more than anything. I mean what if I had been raped & inpregnated by a black man? What if The Mr is my 2nd husband and my first & biological father of LJJ was a fine Herero Prince who was viciously murdered in cold blood by terrorists? What then? Do I owe it to Senora Nosey Pants to delve into the horrific tragedy and strife that resulted in me just happening to have a chocolate baby???

To be honest, I did pick up the phone and dial the number. But it was busy.... 4 times. I said to myself "ok, God, give me a sign - if the number is still busy on attempt No. 5, I will not press it further and will resign myself to sucking it up and playing the game and hitting "send" on this email WITHOUT using the words "offensive", "assumption", or "supervisor". And it was still busy.
So yes, even though I say it was the hardest thing I ever had to do - I almost didn't even do it, which I know I need to work on. Sometimes you just gotta play the game, and suck it up. I know in my gut this is one of those times (also having The Mr tell me "NOOOOOO! God NO don't do that!" didn't hurt in thwarting my attempt at satisfying my internal need for what *I* perceive as justice).

So anyway, before I get even more stirred up, back to the land of positive and encouraging.

**sucking - it - up**
***head down***
****teeth clenched****
MOVING ON!

The Mr. has really done it this time - somehow managing to trump his already immortal status as best-husband-ever from the last birthday when I got my iPhone from him. And not only by buying me my adulthood dream of a real live piano, but by the sheer love and effort that he put into the process. It was a toughie alright. We live in a country where pianos are neither made nor sold 2nd hand. So he had to somehow sneak off to South Africa and sneak home a giant behemoth of a musical instrument without me being the wiser. And not to mention hide it in a temporary hiding place for over a week! And him not being a musician and all, I was just overcome with amazement at the research he'd done and the decisions he had to make regarding what to buy and where, etc etc.... taking into account climate, brands, new vs. refurbished vs. old banger, country of origin, shape, look, style, and so on. OK not only has he officially redeemed himself after this Christmas and anniversary present debacles, but he has also upped the ante on how awesome any one husband can be when it comes to the art of making your wife happy by taking her mind off how old and decrepit she is becoming. I am simply in awe.

Labels: mi familia, The Kid Files, The Mr.

So the last few days have not been so hot for The Mr. 

He got sick just before the weekend (sore throat, cold, etc), but being that A & J were coming up, he didn't quite have the self-discipline to reign in his inner party boy, and stay off the hooch.  So it kinda just kept getting worse, consistantly throughout the weekend.  Late nights, lots of beers, too much Rummikub, you know the tune.

So Wednesday he had to do a public meeting in P-town (2.5hrs away), followed by another public meeting in (our favorite) L-town (a further 3 hrs away from that).... on Thursday (today.  So as Wednesday grew closer, he was NOT getting better and was starting to Dread-with-a-capital D- the whole agenda.  You know when something is looming on the horizon that you REALLY REALLY REALLY don't want to do, and you start fearing it and dreading it so much that it makes you physically crazy? That's what we're talking about here. I couldn't really help out (although I offered to) because I had one of my big airport meetings on Wednesday... I said I would get Jr. to do my meeting and I could do his Wednesday one (but I couldn't do his Thurs. one b/c I didn't even know what that one was about).  He turned my offer down, but continued to writhe in displeasure about the situation.

And, as usual we are not keen on spending the night apart, but 5 and a half hours is a long way to drive for a 9am meeting (on thursday) so it looked like something was going to have to give, and he was going to probably stay somewhere between the two on Wednesday night.  Which would suck royal donkey balls for us.  SO, the plan was that I would go to my big meeting on Wednesday morning, and then drive up and meet him in S-town (3hrs away) and we would bunk at the Rhino Sanctuary that night, then on Thurs morning, he would drive to L-town, and I would make an early morning drive back to the office.  Night of separation avoided!

Until on Tuesday night around midnight while I was helping him prepare his presentation, we realized that he hadn't checked the lights on the truck.... so he did, and the break lights were indeed not working.  Which is illegal here, so whoever would be driving it on Weds (ME!) would likely get pulled over and have it confiscated.   Crap!!

So to make a long story short, I spent the late morning after my meeting yesterday, pulling as many strings as I could, to get some mechanical electrician to look at the truck and make it "pass the mustard" as I like to say in just enough time to get me on the road before it would be too late to arrive in time before the Rhino Sanctuary closed its gates & wouldnt let me in to spend the night with Ye Olde Hubby.  Well, I made it! Just barely!  And after a whole lot of stressing and cursing and rushing around begging people for favors, dropping Billy off with Leto (who would be doggysitting), forgetting the checkbook and having to turn around and go back, etc etc etc, myself and the wee pooper were on our way. 

So a 3hr drive later, we pulled into KRS just in time, passed a few kudu & other assorted animals en route to the cabiny-thing, got to eat dinner with The Mr. & Edwin, come back to our little cabiny-thing, enjoy a bit of our xmas present from the Chinese contractor boys (a nice bottle of red), read a chapter in our books, and pass out from exhaustion.  Then it was up at 5am to hit the road again.

Now me & The Kid are back in the office after swinging  by the house to feed the other 2 pups, and I feel like I've already worked a full day but it isn't even lunch time! zzzzz.... 
Oh well, the things we do for love!  And would do again & again, naturally!    

Labels: The Mr.

Cake, cake, cake.  That's all there is out there... nothin' but a big bunch of cake!

This weekend was great but i think i gained 2kg.  And didn't exercise at all.  Well except for gym on friday. But anyway...

Greek night on saturday night was fantastic - we sat with some other couples from the Hash, saw a bunch of people there we know, and ate a bunch of delicious food, cut a rug on the dance floor, broke some plates, and listened to Mr. Bouzouki play his li'l heart out.  Oh and the belly dancing girls (to which there is no Greek relevance whatsoever, but they were there) were quite entertaining.  The best bit was that there was free babysitting on the premises and the JooJoo Lady had the time of her life getting pawed by a bunch of clucky 5-year old "big girls" and 2 babysitter ladies who she charmed the pants off of and got held all night long.  I saw a bunch of my clients there and that was weird because obviously they were getting loaded and that was just awkward but hey, now I have the mental image of them shaking their booties on the dance floor to take to all those meetings with me from now on.  There was baklava.  mmmmm....

Sunday we had to be up at 6 (BALLS!) to get to the Animal Peeps walk-a-thon and work there til 11 or so, which was fine, because given our disability (the Joo) we got the prized station that is the registration table, along with Soo who's 9 months preggers, so that was less work and more fun than flipping sausages or corralling kindergartners or project managing a bunch of bouncing dogs.  And of course as is with all of our Animal Peeps events, there was coffee and cake.  lotttts of cake.

Then it was straight over to our swedish friends' daughter's 1-year-old birthday party.... now that was bizarre.  A bunch of adults our age who have kids older than the Joo, having brunch and cake and champagne in the back yard while the bunch of kids run around.  It wasn't bad, it was nice, but damn, I found myself sitting there thinking:  "holy shit.  This is it.  This is what *parents* do now.  This is what *I* do now..."    WOW.  Talk about a freak out.  Up until now we would've skipped these kind of things whenever we're invited.  But now this it.  This is the thing you do.  Kiddie parties.   Luckily all the adults were scandinavian types who were very cool, friendly, and very funny and totally sociable and had somehow managed amongst the lot of them, to raise extremely well-behaved kids.  The whole time that we were there, none of the younglings pissed me off or spilled anything on me and to be honest even in the small space that was the townhouse, I didnt even really notice them at all - they were all out in the communal playground area doing their kiddie thing & not bothering me at all.  The Joo sat nicely in her Bumbo next to the birthday girl (the youngest 2 there) until it was time for her nap, at which time she promptly went to sleep whereever I could find a soft place for her to lay down upstairs, and that was that. After it was time for her to wake up, she sat some more and flirted with everyone there until the cake was eaten and it was time to go. 

Oh yes, there was a treasure hunt.  An adult + kid treasure hunt.  I was skeptical at first, but I put on my game face and we plowed our way through it.  Swedes & Danes are funny that way.  It was all very american in the way that it was a party and there were "organized happenings".  Like there was also a sing-a-long there at one point too.  Very interesting.   I still question the relevance for a 1-year-old though.  I mean H. (the birthday girl) is only 6 months older than the Joo.  I can catagorically state that she didn't have a clue what the hell was going on, so it was obviously a THING for the adults, not her.  Which I am not a fan of.  But on the other hand, I'm remaining positive about this stuff - all in all I really like the crowd that was there, so I just take it for what it is: a party for the parents, celebrating the successful survival of 1 year with a kid.  Hell, what am I talking about.... if they're serving champagne, you could invite me to a 3-hour college calculus exam and I'll be happy as Larry!

But dang, I think 4 different cakes is a little excessive for a birthday party.

We got home yesterday at like 4pm and were just so flat out wrecked from the weekend (and of course I didnt get any work or studying done) that we took a nap, and then it was like - bang - dinner, shower, read a little, bed.  The end.  Where the hell did the weekend go??

Tomorrow the Mr. is leaving me for Zambia for 3 days & 2 nights, for this next big project we stumbled into.  Again I curse!  what is it with this year?! We go years without having to be apart overnight, and then all of a sudden in one swift 3-month period, it happens twice.   I curse my job!  And I have to be in Maun for work all day Wednesday, so the Joo is going to have to stay with the maid, and then Thursday I have my new mindfulness course, and he doesn't get back til late at night, so she'll go to uncle Leto's house for a few hours.  Luckily tomorrow night Soo has invited me over for dinner (sympathy work-widow dinner.... she has to go through it all the time) so me & the kid will go over after work and play & eat over there.  That will be nice.  The Joo loves going over to Soo & Mx's place because they've got the whole joint kitted out for this kid that they're about to drop.... TO THE NINES, MAN.... it's like a bleedin' FAO Schwartz over there... and has been for oh 7 months now or thereabouts.... makes our place look like a corporate waiting room.  But that's good.  I want The Joo to believe that she grew up in the ghetto so that she can appreciate the finer things in life as she grows to accummulate them on her own nickel.  HA!

Labels: animal peeps, mis amigos, The Mr., work

I have a few photos of the new house PRE-furniture, as just a big old empty canvas. But of course I forgot the camera today. Oops. The past weekend has been nothing but an absolute blur of unpacking, organizing, hole-drilling, cramming, up the stairs, down the stairs, up the stairs, down the stairs, lifting, shifting, and not a lot of relaxing.

My feet have never EVER hurt so much in my life. Never. Not even after my first weekend on the job as a waitress. NEVER. And I only peed once yesterday because I haven't been hydrating - let alone eating - but yet I still manage to be 1kg heavier than I was BEFORE the move!??! WTF?!?!

Friday was semi-pleasant, crashing in our neighbour's little guest cottage by the river (just opposite our old house) with Al and the Mr. and the puppies. We had a braai and listened to all my cool new music on the ol' laptop, and tried to get the puppies to go on a canoe ride, but they were having none of it. Up with the birds before 7am (ON A SATURDAY), fetched Mary, drove through the bush (the back way) to G-village and met the movers and the chaos ensued.

We actually had a house full of stuff by lunch time, which I was amazed at - I really thought it would take longer. But even the big things like the fridge and sofas etc pretty much just flew themselves in there and set themselves up like lightning. BUT!

Of course carpet guy let me down. Alas there was some issue with his truck being stuck at the border, etc etc, blah blah, and carpet never showed. Carpet was supposed to show this morning, monday morning, 1st thing in the morning. Never showed. 10 phone calls and some rather unruly language later I find out his truck was in a wreck last night and was impounded at the cop shop so he couldn't deliver. Ugh. So now he's going to deliver the material (today) but not install it til tomorrow. first thing. supposedly. we're runnin out of time here, people! jeeeez. SheofDC is arriving in a wee few days and I need carpet! And linoleum! Which I managed to find today. Shortly after realizing these carpet fools weren't coming, I went into town (after hanging at the house WAITING til 11am) and found the lino. It ain't pretty. But at least it's dark blue & light blue. Much more bathroomy than pink & maroon-red. blech! We'll lay that tonight (on our anniversary ~sniff~) and have that out of the way.

I AM SO FRICKIN SORE! My dogs are barkin! My dogs are barkin! I can hardly stand up straight. My legs hurt because apparently they don't remember what it's like to live in a 2-story house anymore and I must've made at least 100 trips up and down over 24 hours.

ANYWAY, today is the day of my 7 year anniversary. And I couldn't be happier. As 2009 is the year of love (and good luck) I think our 7th year is going to be the best. This whole 7-year-itch thing is way ridiculous. When you're married to a guy like the Mr., how can you NOT just keep falling more and more in love with him every year? As far as I'm concerned, I got love in logarithmic style... each year it grows exponentially and I say bring on the 7s. Then again I know I'm lucky and I got lucky and not everyone gets lucky, so I'll just keep counting my blessings and remind myself to stop complaining about the little stuff. My life could have been very, very different and I would be less of a person if it wasn't for meeting the Mr. 9 years ago and marrying him nearly 2 years later.

Unfortunately there's still too much work to be done in the house, to really go out and celebrate love and romance tonight (but we knew that, which is why we pulled out all the stops on valentine's day) but I'm not sweating it, because I see the light at the end of the tunnel. Saturday night we all went to bed with not even an open square inch of floor space in the whole house, due to boxes of junk and random bits and pieces everywhere. Sunday night we went to bed and you could see that people did indeed live in the house, and that it wasn't just a Federal Emergency/Disaster Zone. Hell, there were even pictures hanging up on the walls. Just shy of "presentable". Tonight, things like clocks and decorations and books will make their debut out in the open, after 2 weeks in a box, and then tomorrow there will be carpet and lino upstairs in the master loft. Just in time for SheofDC on thursday.

Along that line is Emelda, my new maid. She was helping the previous tenants move out and was cleaning the place up for them on the day we moved in. She's lovely and from Zim, like Mary, and she and Mary had a nice chat and liked each other, and I kind of felt like it was Mary "handing me off" to someone else, that day.... it was just a vibe, I can't really say what, so after watching her work that day I thought she would be great and asked her if she wanted to work for us and she said yes. woo hoo! She's lovely and today I showed her all the ins and outs of working for the wayward family and their hounds, and I think she'll be just fine. She was a little scared of our laundry machine and her mop water looked pretty rank after cleaning the tiles but nothing traumatic. And she likes dogs and is quite busy talking to them while she works, so I'm chuffed. Whew. That was one thing still left weighing on my mind = sorted.

Mary gave me a chicken to say good bye on saturday and gave me a huge cuddle and picked me up and swung me around a little bit. The Mr. dropped her home that night and apparently there was an emotional moment there too. :( But she's still intending to clean our office for us once a week so at least we'll still see her a bit. I would miss her sooooooooo much otherwise, and would have to make some excuse up like going out to buy more chickens off of her every week or something (she'd run out within a couple months I think), if she wouldn't. What with my aims of trying to eat more local and free range these days, that wouldn't actually be such a bad deal. Just not on the way to anywhere...

I will wait til all of the above house-things have been accomplished before taking "after-" photos, but hopefully tomorrow I will have a chance to at least post "before".

Labels: house, mary, The Mr.

I see now.... if you force yourself to do all the crap on your to-do list on the day you write it down, it gets done. And then you dont have a 10-mile long to-do list. Jeez, you'd think it was rocket science or something. It sounds like that's just an intro sentence or two, but it really did hit me today. AH-HAaaaa! Got it! There IS a method to this madness. I see it on Eric too - he's messing up all the time these days. Mistake after mistake after unnecessary mistake, and I'm sitting there muttering to myself: "for F's sake, dumbass, if you'd just get yourself a damn little notebook..."

Anyway here we go:
yesterday . . .
-TAL - listened (it was quite touching this week - Valentines theme)
-Yoga - yoga'd. But I've got a new strategy since my heart just isn't in it anymore - from now on on mondays the Mr. and I will clime K. Hill instead. I wouldn't let myself quit yoga and just do nothing in place of it, but i needed something i would actually look forward to doing... I think that's the ticket.
-Graphics and adverts - still working
-School forms - filled out
-2nd round of photos - uploaded.
And wait - wait -

BONUS...

like not only did i do all that crap, I ripped about 6 cds that I'd been meaning to do for yonks now. AND I went over to the internet people for a couple hours and started sorting out the Animal Peeps website. AND I called the Mominator to wish her a happy bday. AND I even made dinner last night even though technically it was the Mr'.s turn. But I want to give him as much time as he wants to play his guitar these days. He's learning really fast and I don't want to stop him, since I see how much he enjoys it and how seriously he's taking his 30-45 minutes of "practice time" diligently, every night.

So today, anyway:
I got nearly nothin.
except:
* Calculate the number of pages i have to read in the new courses per day
* Play banjo
* Read at least SOME of the new course stuff
* Go to gym (done already)
* Ask The Mr. to call Frank
* Rough sketch more graphics

And now to end, some romantic images from the tres posh lodge from the weekend - I couldnt believe the spread they layed on for Valentine's day. We came back from stalking wild animals in the bush saturday evening to a room full of rosepetals and candles and sparkling red wine next to the bathtub. And a 5-star dinner by candle light. it was soooooooooo worth the wait.

Labels: photos, the bet, The Mr.

Yesterday:
Groceries - bought. Except there's no FLIPPING limes in this town. How am I supposed to make cold udon noodle salad with no lime?!? (i used lemon)
TLA - downloaded. Eventually. It was definitely the most entertaining one yet. 5 stars.
Campground - contacted, but to no avail. Try again tomorrow.
University course - checked up on and confounded. WTH classes did I sign up for anyway?!?!

Today's list:
* Decide if I like T.I.
* Play squash
* Try camping place again
* AB-N's photos for newsletter
----

This whole Month of Self-Betterment is going quite well.
I'm learning stuff. Useful stuff. Like,

IF YOU WANT TO GET ANY WORK DONE, TURN OF THE DAMN INTER-WEB!!!

(or at least between the hours of 10-4)

In addition to that little gem, can I just say believe it or not, I'm enjoying my job more. OK I still wish I was something interesting, like a psychologist or a horse trainer, or just Professionally Awesome.... but I have to say there's a sweet note of "something-that-is-not-hate" in my working hours over the last week. That is so odd.

I think one reason is that I've learned that I can indeed do some things while listening to iTunes or some of the podcasts that I've decided to start downloading during this little human experiment. (This American Life, All Songs Considered, and the weekly Best of YouTube -nb: that's a video one, so it doesn't get watched til we're off-the-clock)

I always said I was the type of gal who can't listen to something (tv, music, radio) if I'm writing. And given that 80% of my job is writing reports, I've never even bothered to try. But the thing I'm learning is that I can do CERTAIN parts of the report-writing while listening. For example, I can set up the document, I can do some cut & pasteys from other reports, I can format the thing, I can make charts and tables, etc.... all that stuff, I can actually listen to iTunes in the meantime and boy howdy, does that make all the difference in the world.

Man it's like 2009 is going to be the year of epiphany.
Who'da thought?!

I watched the Grammys (24 hours behind, as everything else on tv here) and was soooooooo happy for Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. Raising Sand was my Big Musical Discovery for the whole of 2008, and I love them both as much separately as together. AND they played live during the awards. Awesome.

I went running with the Mr. yesterday instead of going to yoga. I need a break from it or something. I just need to WANT to go again. I'm finding it a little on the yawn-side lately. No reason in particular, I'm just letting the whole "avoiding unpleasant things" thing play itself out and see how it goes. Not that yoga was unpleasant. Oh no, on the contrary I love it. I just need to avoid the burnout.

Avoiding situations of potential aggro and stress at all costs is a good strategy. It's been working wonders for the Mr., who has made so many changes to his behaviour in an attempt to bypass all the aggro he managed to find himself in last year. For example: trying to find an auto trader to trade in old car and dealing with the messers = difficult. Money to be made = high potential, but Dickheads to be encountered and messiness to be had = high potential. Whereas: Putting old car in newspaper and missing out on a few bucks but having people come to you = easy. His new strategy is to make life more pleasant by making life easier. Hence, drop the Treasurer gig with the Animal Peeps, and put the car in the newspaper. Move into house in G-village that isn't a total dump in need of major fixing, instead of saving a few bucks moving into a dive (with more slacker overseas landlords) in our Priority 1 neighbourhood. OK I know I'm going back a month now, but it's proving a good strategy. I recommend it. And the new Mudcrutch album. And the Hold Steady album. And Raising Sand.

That is all.

Labels: the bet, The Mr., work

Annnnnnd we have won!

It seems we've beaten the epidemic of Cranky Husband Syndrome at the home for wayward children. Ever since the business has somewhat exploded and my dear sweet workaholic baby has become consumed by stress due to his unavoidable Dutch breeding, it's been complicated and a truly bouncy ride when it comes to just getting along.

Well, the workload hasn't changed, and none of MY proposed 12-step strategies have worked, so who would've thought that making one slight change to one's lifestyle would be the saving grace that would bring us back down to loveland and solve all our problems?? Honestly, I'm having a hard time believing it too. but we're going on the 2nd week of success here, so I don't feel like I'm jumping the gun by saying "it's all good, at last", I feel like this could be the ticket!

The secret has actually been him getting up a little earlier every morning. Just that extra hour with the birds and the not-sweltering-hot death sun is making all the difference in the world. He can bang around the swimming pool pump/chemistry maintenance, read through his course material over his peaceful cup of coffee, organize some accounts for the Animal People, make an early phone call or two, and just come to life at his own pace. I'm amazed. I'm seriously, unbelievably amazed. Then he comes in and wakes me up NICELY and it's like he's a different person. There's no tension and stress explosions and "I won't be eating lunch today as I have to do A, B, C, D... so just GO BY YOURSELF!", none of this "No I refuse to get my eyes tested, I'm TOO BUSY!", no more "we should never have started that %$#*ing Setswana class! I can't handle it!"... basically no more "I'm TOO BUSY to be nice!!" mentality that I've been having to troubleshoot for like, weeks now. And all because he gets a little "me time" first thing in the morning and can clear his mind. I'm just shocked it was that easy and doesn't involve me having to work *my* ass off to achieve the ultimate goal, here. All I can say is Hallelujah!!

There's been one or two backslides along the way, such as a little "I refuse to go to the gym with you during lunch because I have A,B,C, and D as TOP PRIORITY" explosions (particularly when I can categorically prove that A,B,C, and D are in fact NOT matters of life and death - it's just that when you're Dutch anything on your T0-Do List is TOP PRIORITY MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH. But interestingly enough, those came on days when his early-morning hour of solace were used to do WORK STUFF, instead of Me-Stuff. Interesting indeed!

Anyway, I'm a happy girl and he appears to be becoming more of a happy boy. Now if we could both just reach the ends of our respective courses (my semester ends in early Dec., his whole diploma is finishing in Nov... WOO HOO!) then hopefully that will also alleviate some of the pressure pushing down on me, pushing down on you... da da da da. And then there will be holidays... ahhhhhhhhhhh

In the meantime, we had a weekend full of studying and working and Animal Peopleing as well as a visit from a ginormous Nile Monitor lizard in our backyard. Now THAT was surreal. I'm still kind of in mourning that he didn't make it. :'(

Labels: BW-general, stress management, The Mr.

what is WITH this particular moment (or, rather, "chunk of time") in the space-time continuum where so much aggro is trying it's darnedest to suck the life out of the Family W.???

All I know is that for like the last, I dunno, 5 or 6 years I/we haven't had to deal with awkwardness and weirdness and confrontation and... all that. (with the odd mother/daughter BS excepted) It was like 5 or 6 years of simple coasting along with no rocking of the boat. OK with one exception: when I quit my job at JKA and the "J" himself got all psycho and yelly and screamy and viciousy and personal-attacky at me because I was leaving. I remember not sleeping well and obsessing over it and feeling horrible for the weeks surrounding that. When was that? OK that must've been 2004. Right, so the last aggro in my life was in 2004. 4 years of smooth sailing.

With what started as the Great Ma P. Debacle in July (June?) and ended up with me wincing my way through the months that followed with that, as well as the DIFFICULT PERSONALITY (x 2) (we'll call them DPs since I don't want to propagate more evilness by going into what I would REALLY have normally wrote) that we have to deal with on the Animal People committee (it's a volunteer organization here people, come ON!) and other assorted related confrontations, it just makes me wonder: HUH?!
WTF!? What is WITH this year??? Is it ME??? Do I attract this stuff??? (But I went for the last 4 years with no aggro??) OK, well then if it's not me, then WTF!??!

Especially when The Mr. gets it, too. I mean HOW can ANYONE get a case of the aggros with The Mr.? Now this is really making me seethe. Could you not get a more agreeable, more sweet, more non-aggro type of guy than the Mr??? He's so "Winky from 'Best in Show' "!!

Ugh, this Animal People DP really bothers me. On the board, The Mr. is the Treasurer, he is devoting his time, his *very rare free time* to doing all their financials, balancing books, paying salaries, organizing monies, paying bills, depositing checks, counting spare change (by the ton), etc etc etc, and this DP is criticizing the way he does it (this person used to do it all, so obviously has control issues), harping on him, demanding financial breakdowns from him on a moment's notice... and then at the same time This Person is plaguing his work email address with more harping and banging on and demands and what-what-what... it's insane. The worst part is that it makes him so angry that he fires rebuttal emails back to This Person in anger and then the whole thing just snowballs into a big load of aggro that keeps him wound up and uncomfortable.

I had to stop him today from sending This Person a snarky email telling This Person that They are welcome to take over his job if they think they could do so much better. Yikes. So he toned it down and sent it without that line but This Person still sent back a snarky email anyway very much loaded with "How dare yous" and "I'm right and you're wrongs!" AGH! Aggro!!

Not a good spin to put on a cause (the animal peeps) that is close to your heart and that you're doing voluntarily because you believe in it. It's this kind of crap that makes people act stand-offish and reluctant to do anything worthwhile for nothing. I know, because I'm getting it too, from the other DP on the committee who's a control freak and won't let me do my job! The other night at the meeting I even said something I regretted (and I'm paying attention these days before I open my mouth) which may not be a big deal in the pit of aggro circumstances that it happened in, but for me and my new goals of being a better person, it was just a big backslide that I totally didn't need on my conscience. Uggggghh. If the universe is really out to get me, what I said (and regretted) will spread like wildfire through the flames of local gossip and then *I'll* look like an a-hole, rather than the real cluprits. We'll just have to wait and see on that one.

Being a non-confrontational personality (OK not in this blog, per se, but in real life), I'm just desperate to scream out "CAN'T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG??!?!?!"

Heck I'm even working on it in this blog - now THAT'S progress. I notice my own cuss rate is down at least a few percent. And as for my new positive vs. negative ratio, I think I'm way up. Which makes me happy. What does NOT make me happy is AGGRO!!!! ESPECIALLY when it drags the Mr. into it's nasty clutches. grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr........

We are both trying SO HARD these days for self-improvement. Which is why I don't understand the timing of all these confrontational difficulties. Perhaps it's all just a great big test, giving us practice for out in the great big real world, for when we achieve our self improvement goals? I do notice a wee difference in my behaviour, however. That means progress. Where I would've in the past recommended him to "give That Person a verbal ass kicking!! Go on, baby, rip That Person a new ass hole!! That Person deserves no tolerance!!! Here, write what you just screamed out & I'll even proofread it for you when you're done!!" now I'm telling him "Hmmmmm... this might start something worse. Maybe you should just take that last part out?" You know, big picture stuff. -sigh- it's hard. But I'm going to pinch SK's latest quote from her blog which has always been a favourite of mine, but I'm only really grasping it in my personal life over the last couple months, which unfortunately speaks volumes about the "old me" (oops!)

"Keep your thoughts positive because your thoughts become your words. Keep your words positive because your words become your behaviors. Keep your behaviors positive because your behaviors become your habits. Keep your habits positive because your habits become your values. Keep your values positive because your values become your destiny."
–Mahatma Mohandas Gandhi

Labels: aggro, animal peeps, QSI, The Mr.

Last Saturday night was the big Spring Party at the Yacht Club. It was fun. We went, we ate, we drank, we boogied, and watched the veld fires spread across the night sky over the dam.


Wednesday The Mr.'s birthday was a great success. I leaked his presents to him at decent intervals throughout the day, and he was happy with them all. Especially the new gee-tar that he's been promised since xmas 2 years ago!


Dinner was fun. But I hate rectangular tables. So hard to converse, it's like if you sit next to peeps A, B, and C, you can forget about ever hearing anything from X, Y, and Z throughout the night unless you come with a bull horn. Here's a bad photo of the A,B,C end of the table:


Anyway, that sneaky girl of mine, Ubs, got the waiters out to sing for him after dinner. The funny part was that they came out clapping and chanting and saying "AHNYO CHEH! AHNYO CHEH!" and we had no idea what it was that they were saying because of the acoustics (and the variety of different waiter accents) so the Mr. just sat there clueless and they had to keep chanting it for like 50 times straight - finally P, or whoever it was goes "OH they're telling you to stand on your chair!!" So finally he gets up on his chair and THEN they proceeded to sing happy birthday. It was funny. And they gave him tiramisu:

AHNYO CHEH!!:

This week has been full of going out and not so full of studying. My next semester for my course started on the 1st of september and so far i've only managed to read 68 pages. blehhhh. I have learned one thing, though: Toxicology bores the bejeezus out of me.

So yeah, Monday was yoga as usual, Tuesday gym, Wednesday the birthday dinner, then last night a big "thank you" drinks & braai for the Animal People volunteers that helped out at our big open day a couple weeks ago. I took some photos of the shelter between drinks and nibbles.


Troublemaker Billy:



This guy always jumps up on cars and then stands on their roofs and proceeds to jump up on top of the carport. However, the cars then eventually drive away and he's left stranded. Us committee members have no sympathy, and let him stay there. Actually about 8:30pm last night in the dark, Jenny finally gave in and moved her own car underneath him so he could get down.


Bunny & Guinea-Pig Land:

Eric showing off my favourite little guy: "The One Who Got His Ears Munched":

And finally, it is indeed bushfire/veld fire season. Since last weekend every night there's a massive orange glow on the horizon which stretches as far as the eye can see. Very upsetting. Especially last night when it was so close to my neighbourhood that I could see individual smoke plumes and flames from my kitchen window....

Labels: animal peeps, goin out, photos, school, The Mr.

The Mr.'s birthday!!

I am so happy that it's his birthday because I know he'll get lots of attention and happy messages and what-what-what, which he needs desperately because he has been in BAD FORM lately. Walking ball of stress and anger, overworked and under appreciated. The same old story. But I'm going to try my best to turn that around today. Already I woke up early and fed the puppies (normally his job) and made him eggs benedict and coffee and brought it to him in bed. And he got the first present of the day (new wallet) and a card, but the cloud still hangs there... :-(

But we're going out to everyone's favorite hip hep happnin' restaurant with 8 of our friends tonight, so I'll just ensure that I get him drunk and he lets all his cares just drift away, at least just for one night. (That means i'm on sober duty... poo) And all our buddies will fawn over him and make him all better. And laughs will be had by all!

If we hadn't gone off on holiday already a couple months ago, I'd say that's what he needs. But unfortunately I think we'll just have to keep our heads down and plow ahead til December 9th. Which is not that far away!! Yay!! AND on that positive note, I just now found out that my best friend HG is actually NOT going to be in Vietnam for the whole time I'm in the USA, but will rather be in DC and JC and DC again with me so WOOOOO HOOOOO for me!!! (my heart mourns for you though! ;-) really, I swear)

Things between me and Ma P. pretty much melted down to hell this week, but at least it's over. I said what I wanted to say, what's been building up for months now, and she pretty much got shitty and defensive and belligerent refused to even give an inch. Whatever. Like I said, it's over. And there was some selling off down the river involved, but I have to bear the repercussions of that (should there be any) and I'm prepared for it and will accept it as my lot in life. As Brandon said, it's just some deep shit that I'm going to have to wade through, but I'll get out of it on the other side somehow.

In the meantime my "aggro management plan" is to focus on the Mr. and let the bad things drift away as best I can.

Labels: aggro, stress management, The Mr., The Ps