Cheat

I completed the crossword in today's newspaper. I totally cheated. Google is awesome - so is the Thesaurus on Word. All I really needed was some names...who really knows who "Actor Claude" is?? :-)

Getting up early has never been my thing but I've been beating almost everyone up these days. Jake was watching TV when I arrived downstairs this morning. Everyone else was snoozing. He normally sleeps in too so maybe the sunny weather is "getting" to us.

Our bedrooms have been getting messier and messier so I tried another tactic today. I gave everyone 5 minutes to start in their room. After that, I gathered all the kids in Nicole's room and we got to work. Somehow the camaraderie and the idea of organizing somebody else's room helped. In less than an hour, all of the kids' bedrooms and bathrooms were spotless. There is no way they would have done that on their own. I'm putting that idea in the good pile for future reference!

Tonight I went out and did some grocery shopping. It's the South America's group's turn to bring snacks to school for the week. I bought a lot of stuff. We'll see how long it lasts!

I'm feeling homesick for my friends. The ladies in the attache class are lovely but they aren't my buds. I went so far as to job search today. Although I am not required to attend the attache classes, there's a feeling of obligation - mostly because I've been planning to go. I miss being around people that don't have anything to do with my husband's job. There's also the fact that pretty much everyone I meet over the next few years will be directly because of John's job. Hmmmm. Not much I can do about it. Time to suck it up! Such a good wifey I am! Bleah!

Learning to be a Diplomat

I'm back! Hope you missed me! :-)

So here we are, John and I at school, learning to be diplomatic. Hopefully they don't actually pass or fail you. We aren't star pupils!

Yesterday we learned how to deal with customs/immigration if they really aren't interested in honouring your diplomatic status. When it was my turn to play the tired mom, with my kids, no husband (he was to join us on this "trip" later - typical!) and the "health monitor" for the foreign nation wanted to give us Yellow Fever shots or at least wanted a $50 waiver "fee" (cash, thank you very much) - I politely refused both and offered to wait for a supervisor... right answer!! Yeah me!

Another couple playing the part of a couple re-entering an Asian country where the customs agents were looking for a donation as well (the guys playing the agents were hysterical!) seemed at an impasse. John and I urged them to "buy" the agent's hat (it was cool!), thereby paying money and getting the heck out of there. They followed our advice but it was the wrong advice! Oops! I'm sticking to this one though, I really liked the hat! :-)

So it's been very interesting and lots of good info so far. We haven't been doing our homework - let me tell you, between the drive and school its a ten plus hour day. Then home to make dinner, kids and housework. Momma ain't used to such hours! And yes, I have been cooking and yes, I'm doing housework though with an empty house it isn't much! So bedtime is much, much earlier than normal for me. Thankfully school isn't M-F for me.

We're sleeping on air mattresses still. Our stuff won't arrive from Argentina for another month or so. Our car is...somewhere between here and there, hopefully! Our Express shipment arrived - and was delivered exactly on it's deadline day. :-( We haven't been reimbursed for any of our expenses. Just another international move. Ugh.

But I'm back! Glad to be here.