The Utrecht Trip. Exposition.

Wow, that was a really full four days. Um. Ack.

I need to back up a bit, to talk about schools. Specifically, back when DrBob was working in London, we did consider moving there. London is chaotic, dirty (well, compared to West Germany) and expensive, but we figured all of that could be gotten past. Then we found out that the public schools pretty much suck, that there are some good ones but no way to assure that our kids’d get into those, so our only option would be private school, and even some of those suck. Ack. DrBob and I are big believers in public education – I think private schools breed snobbishness, and I really dislike snobs. And to pay tens of thousands of um, local-currency-units and end up with some elitist twerp for a kid… bleck.

So for the England move, the school situation was the deal-breaker.

ciao for now

Sorry for not keeping up with the posting, my internet’s been really slow lately. Maybe it’s tired.

Leaving tomorrow for Utrecht, armed with a list of schools and a list of questions to ask them. I don’t know if I’ll be blogging from there, depends on my access to DrBob’s computer.

It seems like our situation and our options keep changing, faster than my pokey internet connection can keep up, faster than I can get my head around the details. I hope this trip will clear some things up and I can offload some of this anxiety about the future.

Song du jour of the day: Sitting in Limbo, by Jimmy Cliff.

human again

So remember I mentioned that my long-term memory is kind of weak, and if something happened more than ten days ago, then it might as well have happened to someone else? So now it’s been more than ten days since I got sick, and this evening I’m feeling very, very strange. Like, I can climb a whole flight of stairs (split level: 1 flight = 7 steps) without having to sit down and rest at the top, what is up with that? And I haven’t had to lie down for six whole hours! Weird. I feel sort of abnormally alert, but I can’t tell if I’m delirious and overcaffeinated, or if this is what not-sick feels like. It’s been so long, ooo ten whole days, that I’ve forgotten.

Song du jour of the day: Human Again, from Beauty and the Beast.

chop wood, carry water

Um, I’m coughing a bit less today. And… I did some housework, and… talked to my kids some. And the cats are still here, being cats, and we all keep on keeping on, and every day is like the one before, pretty much. I’ll let you know if anything happens here, or if I come up with an opinion about something that happened elsewhere. Or something.

Song du jour of the day: It’s Only a Paper Moon. Couldn’t find Ella Fitzgerald singing it on YouTube, so here’s the Natalie Cole version.

bleah

Good Lord, is everybody sick? I’m clicking around the blogosphere and everywhere it’s notes-from-the-couch, too-sick-to-knit, haven’t-been-to-work-for-a-week. Egad, people.

As for me? Guess what? I’m sick!

why whine

Oh wah wah wah, my husband got this fabulous job and we’re moving to one of the best cities in one of the nicest countries in the world! And we have months to figure out how to get all our stuff up there! Poor me! Every time I catch myself playing this riff, I think to myself, self, I think. There are refugees. Shaddup.

blinders on

Ignatz has therapy until mid-March, but today was the last time we the parents went to see her. The session consisted of DrBob and FrTherapist congratulating themselves on how Ignatz seems a little bit less unhappy than he did four years ago. His grades still suck, he’s still chaotic, disorganized, forgetful, and about to throw his future down a rathole, but he seems comfortable with that now, so, you know, yay!

remind me…

…Why did I think it was a good idea to deal with Ignatz’s ADHD by sending him to the ONLY kid-therapist in town? How is “well I wouldn’t have to drive him there” a criterion for a therapist? Tomorrow is our last parent-session (thank God), and Ignatz will run out of sessions in April.

Song du jour of the day: Things that Make You Go Hmm by C + C Music Factory.

3-way meatballs

I don’t enjoy making meatballs all that much, but we sure like eating them – it’s one of those meals that gets tested into oblivion, so that by the time 6:00 rolls around, there’s almost none left for dinner, which is okay because nobody’s very hungry for some reason. Anyway, since making them isn’t all that fun, I occasionally set aside a couple hours and make a LOT. When I do this, I usually consult five or six different cookbooks and my own memory, so I’m putting it here so that I can find it when I need it. But you’re welcome to use it too.

New Year’s meme

2009 New Years Questions
Ganked from Sandy at Momisodes, and updated (this has actually been in my Drafts folder for a little over a year).

Here’s the rule: Remove 1 question from below, and add in your personal question, make it a total of 20 questions, then tag 8-10 people in your list, list them out at the end of this post. Notify him/her in his/her chat box that he/she has been tagged.