freedom?

Tomorrow I have the day off from my data-entry job! So that I can go work at my Munich job. This doesn’t seem like much of a victory. But after work I get to go knit at lanaiolo! And I would post a link to the site but it isn’t up yet, and frankly, this is a bit less than okay. She’s been in business since November, and the web design agency she hired still hasn’t put her site up. When we talked about it a few weeks ago, she said “you’d be surprised how complicated getting a website is,” and I said “no, I am a web designer, and it’s not complicated.” You can get something up in a weekend – your location and open hours and upcoming events at the very least – and add the fancy stuff later. There’s no reason for it to take this long, and I bet the agency’s getting a lot of money from her too. Grrr. You know, there are so many crap websites in Germany, and so many businesses that need them and don’t have them, and honestly, if agencies like this are the norm, I begin to see why.

But anyway. Tomorrow I get to knit. That’s a reason to be happy. I also get to sit at a computer and type, which… is… what I did all day, and what I’m doing right now. Hm. Maybe I should re-think how I spend my non-wage-earning time.

Song du jour of the day: Mean Woman Blues, by Roy Orbison.

like blood in water

The scandal is spreading, and praise be. Even the United States of If You’re Poor It’s Because God Hates You is getting in on the action, though any penalties the IRS imposes will probably be laughable. I do like Nick Cohen’s take on the story, if you have time to read it.

new niece!

I have another niece! Yay! Her name is Daphne Claire and I can’t wait to meet her (but I’ll have to wait because she’s eight time zones west of me, and I have no idea when we’ll be getting to Denver – the plan was to think about it this year, but Things keep Coming Up, as they tend to do). I wonder who she’ll look like? She was born yesterday, so right now she probably looks like Alien Frog Baby, but bits of the family keep showing up in the next generation, and I find this really, really cool. First Niece looks so much like my mom, and Second Niece looks so much like Ignatz. First Nephew looked a lot like his dad when he was a baby, but not so much now. The Sniglet looked so much like First Nephew when they were babies, but now he doesn’t at all. Or maybe he does, we haven’t seen them together since the Sniglet was a baby. Anyway. An adorable family is now one unit more adorable and I am so pleased.

Song du jour of the day: Isn’t She Lovely, by Stevie Wonder.

sigh

Tomorrow is San José Day, the (hang on, counting on my fingers…) 14th (gah!) anniversary of the day DrBob and I met… in Quito International Airport. Um. We were on the same flight from San José, Costa Rica, and actually it was in San José that I first saw him, though I don’t know if he saw me there – goodness, what a thing not to know about your spouse after 14 years, eh? Anyway. We first spoke in Quito. First kissed in Cuenca. First… um, wait. Do my nieces still read this blog? Okay, nevermind.

The point I was planning to make is: he’s not here. He also won’t be here on his birthday, in about three weeks. This distance thing is losing its shine.

Song du jour of the day: Summer Kisses, Winter Tears by The King.

recharge

Well, I put Ignatz on the bus at 8 a.m., and the Sniglet didn’t get home from his soccer game until 9 p.m., so I had the whole day to do Whatever. Whatever turned out to be knitting on the couch and watching an entire series of Blackadder (the second one, which was my mom’s favorite), as it turns out. I got a few serious things done, but mostly I just, um. What do the whippersnappers call it? “Chilled”? Yeah. I probably did that. It was probably the best thing I could have done with a whole empty day.

Song du jour of the day: Viens, by Noyau Dur. Because ce soir tout est permis, but it’s 10:46 and I’m going to bed. God, I’m middle-aged.

weekend!

Ignatz had another Tae Kwon Do test and now has a yellow-green belt – DrBob calls it the “Brazil belt.” It’s hard to believe he just started in September. The Sniglet had a soccer tournament and his team came in second place, out of five! Last time it was fifth-of-six, so this is a definite improvement. I am very proud of both of them.

a conversation at breakfast

I opened a new jar of honey today, and noticed that it said “Bienen-Honig” – “Bee Honey.” I mused aloud as to what other kind of honey there could be. Is there perhaps cat-honey, or bird honey?

The Sniglet said: “There’s cat-honey, but you can only get it in another country.”

Work makes me boring

I entried some data for one skillion hours and then trudged home and rebooted laundry (so now that makes four loads waiting to be folded). I made Boring Soup (carrots. potatoes. meat. water.)

a nation is born

Okay, granted, this happens about every ten minutes here in Europe, but it’s still news: Kosovo, people! Germany and the U.S. say yay! Russia and Serbia say hell-to-the-no (Serbia’s recalled its ambassador from Germany! Oh no!). I’m not sure what I think,

Dear Liechtenstein: shut the hell up

You helped hundreds of Germans commit a crime. Don’t you bleeping dare try to come across as the injured party here, you toffee-nosed, scum-sucking sacks of greed. Every other damn week Munich is full of cops blocking traffic and fondling their guns to protect some fatcat corporate freebooter or his politician toadies, and those cops’ salaries come from taxes paid by the middle class, because the freebooters don’t pay taxes because they hid their money in Liechtenstein.

And tell your pencil-necked prince to get a real job.

Song du jour of the day: Eat the Rich, the Aerosmith version.