mumble mumble

I’m having trouble finding time to blog, is why I’m never here anymore. A real estate agent came over and photographed the house and crunched some numbers for us, we’ll give her the go-ahead to list the house tomorrow, and then we’ll have to keep it clean All The Time (apropos of nothing, can anybody take a couple of blondish kids off my hands until July? I can’t pay much, but on the bright side, they’ll probably behave for you).

I’m taking Dutch lessons on Fridays, over in Eglharting, a 45-minute drive away. My textbook is in German. Ignatz is taking Dutch lessons on Saturdays in Feldkirchen, a train-ride and an s-bahn ride away, and I’m also teaching him Greek from a Dutch textbook, so even our meta-languages aren’t in easily digestible form. The time we put into this is fairly hefty, but what I forgot to consider was the brain-drain aspect – after two hours of Dutch I’m blithering and unfit for anything useful.

There was another bullying incident at school for the Sniglet, but he handled it well and we spoke to the teacher and we hope it will go no further – oh, and all the clinicky stuff, I forgot to mention that. Ig’s therapist gave me a list of recommendations. I called the conflict-resolution group therapy guy: waiting list. I requested an application from the Heckscher Klinik – 2-3 month backlog. I made an appointment at the almost walk-in place across the street – useless. That appointmet was actually right after we talked to the Snig’s teacher about the latest incident, so I may have already been close to my German saturation point, and I may not have understood everything he said, but the parts I did get? Not helpful.

It’s a cultural thing that I am too dang tired to go into right now – remind me later – but Germans don’t seem to do the whole “targeted strategy for a specific or possibly temporary problem” thing, they’re more about the “change your entire life to bring it more into line with how my beard and I think everyone should be. And it doesn’t matter if it takes thirty years.” This was a key component in my frustration with Ignatz’s therapist too – after two years, his grades still suck donkey butt, but now he’s learned to accept that about himself, yay.

No! Not yay. Very not yay!

Anyway.

Song du jour of the day when I haven’t listened to any music in weeks, except the Frank Sinatra CD in the kitchen: The Coffee Song, by Frank Sinatra. Which is tragically not even on that CD.