Trick or Treat

Someone had their first Halloween tonight (last year doesn't count since Halloween hasn't caught on yet in Switzerland)...




Plus, a bonus trick-or-treat action shot!

"Well, that was...sort of fun."

Those were my last words as we pulled away from our condo after spending last week in Perdido Key, Florida.

I should start by saying we've been lucky to have some pretty fantastic vacation experiences, especially while living overseas...Christmas in Venice, long ski weekends in the Alps, a "babymoon" on the beach in Thailand, side trips to Malaysia (on the way home from working in Vanuatu) and Bangkok (on the way home from working in Australia), a few extra days in Japan, lots of short trips within Europe...the bottom line is, we were extremely spoiled the last few years and we know it.

So now that we're on a much humbler income and I'm not traveling for work, our vacation options are much more limited. When we were trying to decide what to do this fall, we realized we could spend a ton of money we don't really have to fly someplace like the Caribbean or Mexico, or we could get a cheap domestic flight to Florida and go to the family condo (which Gretchen and her sister did such a good job putting in order this spring).

I've never been there, but Gretchen has always enjoyed it and we were excited to see the weather forecast for the week called for sunny days with highs in the 70s/80s. If nothing else, we could look forward to a week of relaxing in the sun. Well, as they say, be careful what you wish for. These ended up being the high points of our week in "sunny" Florida:

• It was gorgeous when we arrived, but when we went out to the beach all three of us couldn't stop coughing, and there were dead fish along the water line. As it turns out, there was a "red tide" along the coast that kills marine life and causes respiratory problems.



• The beautiful weather when we arrived gave way within 24 hours to two days of heavy rain, followed by three days of cold and cloudy weather...most of the time we were there, it was actually warmer in Washington than in Florida.




• Given the lousy weather, we spent much more of the week at the local library (which was actually a very pleasant surprise) 15 minutes away in neighboring Alabama than we did at the beach outside our back door.



• In the midst of this, I came down with a cold. By the time the sun came out, I didn't really care because I just wanted to lay on the couch, feel sorry for myself, and blow my nose all day.



• Did I happen to mention the neighborhood I grew up in was devastated by one of the big fires in San Diego? (By the way, if you're interested in this sort of thing, go to this map and click on the link for "92127"...I grew up right at the edge of the big cluster of burned homes just west of Interstate 15, basically right where the perimeter of the fire crosses West Bernardo Drive.) Needless to say, for a couple of days I couldn't pull myself away from the TV because I wanted what little news I could get from home on CNN and my BlackBerry didn't work in our condo. A couple of times Gretchen had to make me turn off the TV, in part because she didn't want Baby to grow up with some weird subconscious paranoia about brush fires.



• Baby seemed to have begun her terrible twos about eight months early.



• What little free time Gretchen had was spent shopping for things for the condo rather than actually relaxing.

Having said all that, we hate to complain about a vacation. In fairness, it wasn't all bad (even if it seemed that way when it was raining and 52 degrees). Among the highlights:

• We ate lots of good seafood...grilled, pan-fried, deep-fried, you name it.



• We went to a little nearby zoo one chilly day and happened to arrive just as they were bringing out their four unbelievably cute 11-week old baby tigers for play and exercise. Gretchen even got to pet a few of them:




• No one else got sick. Just poor ol' me. Wah.



• There were moments of comic relief. Like the time we were in a five-and-dime store to pick up some beach towels. Gretchen grabbed one that looked perfectly fine but fortunately decided she should check to see if it had a design on it. Good thing she checked, because I can just imagine the reactions if we were hanging out with Baby on this towel:
  
  
  It was also pretty funny when I hoisted Baby way up in the air while getting her out of the bath...and rammed her head into the shower curtain rod in the process. No, really, it was funny--the rod was flimsy so she didn't even cry--OK, so maybe you had to be there...



• The sun did finally appear the day before we had to leave, so we were at least able to soak in a few rays and take a walk on the beach:





• And perhaps most importantly, regardless of the circumstances, a week with my family was better than a week at work, hands down...

Surreal

Where I grew up, pretty much nothing ever happened. Sure, things got a little exciting at the beginning of each month when social security checks were issued and the roads were clogged with retirees driving 15mph below the speed limit to flock to the shopping centers, but that was basically it. Except for one thing: brush fires. Although we lived in the northern-most part of the city of San Diego, we were surrounded on all sides by open canyons and hills filled with brush. Every summer we would have a few fires and all the kids would hop on their bikes and race to watch the firefighters in action. Still, I can only think of one time where the fires got close enough to truly endanger homes, and even then they were somehow all saved; I don't recall a single home ever being lost when I lived there.

So imagine how strange it was to be sitting on the other side of the country and watching reporters identifying your sleepy little town by name as one of the epicenters of damage in the big Witch Creek fire. As far as I know they still haven't done any final tallies, but I heard something this morning indicating that approximately 300 homes may have been lost in my community alone--from a fire that started 20 miles away. Even stranger, based on what I've been able to read online, there has been particularly heavy damage within a couple of blocks of the house I grew up in. As mentioned yesterday, I'm not really in touch with people back home any more (although my Mom may very well know folks who have been affected, and I suspect the former homes of several friends are likely gone), and indeed I haven't been back in at least 5 years, so I can't say it hits quite as close to home as it could, but it's still incredibly strange and surreal and heartbreaking to imagine so much loss in such a familiar and generally quiet place...

Rainy day at the beach

So we're spending a week of vacation down in Florida, and it's POURING rain so we're hanging out in the local public library instead of on the beach. But all I really care about at this point is the huge fire that is burning back in San Diego, where the local paper is reporting that both the town I grew up in and the town where my high school was located have been evacuated. I don't think I really even know anyone who lives there anymore, but it's still freaky when something like that happens in your hometown...

Oh, by the way...

Yesterday was our 9th anniversary! We really didn't do anything to celebrate, in fact we decided (for the first time) to not even buy cards for each other. I know, we're kind of lame, but I try to tell Kirk how much I love him every day (and he does the same), so really, what else can I say in a card? And who has time to go shopping for a card? We spent our evening with our very dear friend Jeff, who was in town on business visiting from Basel, and we had a great carryout meal from our new favorite neighborhood Thai restaurant.

We're keeping our fingers crossed that next year we can do something baby-free to celebrate our 10th anniversary. That would indeed be VERY special, considering Kirk and I haven't gone out of a date in over 15 months, unless you count shopping at Kohl's while Baby stayed with Grandma Caril during our recent visit to Asheville.

You can read some nice things I wrote about Kirk and our wedding memories in last year's anniversary post. Or in Kirk's anniversary post from last year.

Happy Anniversary, my prince charming!

Gross

After reading in the paper about a hotel in a sketchy part of DC that had to be shut down after complaints from customers who contracted scabies, I knew I had to see if there were reviews posted on TripAdvisor...bingo! (There is a stretch of hotels/motels in the vicinity of this particular hotel, and we've often commented that we feel sorry for the people who probably read that they were only a mile or two from the Capitol and so figured it was a good location.) Having skimmed some of the reviews--and they're well worth a read--I feel especially sorry for the folks from other countries who have ended up staying there and getting a GREAT view of life in the U.S. of A. Perhaps the most frightening thing is that four hotels on TripAdvisor are rated even lower...

(And on the subject of gross things in the paper, there was also a story today about these strange brown mutant crickets that infest basements here...the article makes it sound like they're more prevalent this year because of drought, but we've had them in our basement as long as we've lived here.)

One year later

One year ago, Baby was a very chubby baby who could hardly roll over and barely ever smiled. Now she's a tall and lean toddler who is (finally) learning to walk and loves to give us a toothy grin. One thing hasn't changed: she's still a Badger fan!

October 2006


October 2007



Seriously, this girl loves football. We're happy about that because after living overseas for 3 years we're really enjoying spending our fall weekends watching some good games. She claps anytime she sees a football game on TV (even when the wrong team scores). She even claps if she sees a picture of football on the front page of the sports section of the Washington Post!

Evolving style

When we first moved back to the States, Baby had a rocking faux-hawk hairdo (which a sweet old lady at a cafe in Basel described as "ganz modern!"). Like most other kids, though, her style continues to evolve and now we're proud to say she's got her own little mini-mullet in effect:



(As a side note, I was browsing and laughing about Global Librarian's recent post about Swiss mullets--frighteningly common among middle-aged women and teenaged boys there--when Gretchen had to explain the "business in the front, party in the back" reference to me...mullets, also known as "hockey hair", were evidently much more common in the Midwest than in Southern California when we were growing up...)

DC life, part 2

There's a lot to gripe about living here (the latest: 90-degree weather in early October, when we should instead be getting out our sweaters and watching the leaves change), but I was reminded recently that there are worse things in the world than deciding you need to stretch your legs and get some fresh air at lunch, and being able to see the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the view across the length of The Mall to the Washington Monument and U.S. Capitol, the Lincoln Memorial, and the oft-ignored but very cool sculpture of Albert Einstein, and still be back at my desk within a half-hour...

DC life, part 1

There are plenty of things in DC that are no different than any other big city, but it also has its unique elements as well. One such element is that sometimes it seems like you can't walk a block without seeing reminders that it's still, for better or worse, the Capital of the Free World (or something like that). If someone wants to make a political point, Washington is pretty much the place to be. I've been reminded of this recently when a couple of protest groups passed right outside my window. The first, I think, was the Code Pink womens' anti-war organization, and the second was an unfortunately small group protesting what has been happening in Myanmar/Burma.

Here comes trouble

One of the best parts about visiting her Grandma Caril's place? Finding new cupboards and drawers to pillage, of course!

Caught in the act:


Making her getaway:


Scene of the crime:

Southern efficiency

Having lived in North Carolina for a couple of years, I know things move at a slower pace in the South. (If you want to get particular about it, we actually live in the South now, but as anyone in the rest of Virginia will tell you, the DC suburbs are not culturally in the South.) We got a reminder when we tried to get a taxi to the Asheville Airport.

We called the night before and arranged for a 9:00am taxi, which couldn't have been easier. So when it got to be 9:10am and the taxi wasn't there, we got nervous and called to find out when the driver would get there...only to be told he had just left and was at least 10-15 minutes away. Sure enough, when 9:30am came and he still wasn't there, we called again. Now it turned out he was driving somewhere in the vicinity but, since he didn't have a cellphone, couldn't call us to get more info. I tried to give directions to the dispatcher, who passed them to the driver on the radio, but since it was our first time visiting my Mom's place I didn't know the names of the streets and had to go onto MapQuest to dictate directions. Luckily we had built a cushion into our pickup time just in case something like that happened, but even with that I thought Gretchen was going to disembowel him when he finally pulled up. It didn't help when she asked if he had a map of the area and he said "no, but I been thinkin' about gettin' one o' them GPS things." (I mean, why on earth would a taxi driver need a map? Silly Gretchen.)

After promising to get us to airport quickly and, he assured us, without getting us killed along the way, he proceeded to irritate Gretchen even more by driving with his seat back the whole way so that she had to ride with her knees up around her chin, then really compounded it by talking. And talking. And talking. And talking. Things might have gotten ugly if--much to her amusement--he hadn't all of a sudden turned his attention to me.

We were talking about buying produce at local farmers' markets (or, as they call them there, tailgate markets), when he mentioned that his sister made really good sauerkraut with jalapeños. Now, I truly can't imagine many dishes that would be more disgusting--I may have grown to like many German specialties while in Switzerland, but sauerkraut was definitely not one of them--especially when combined with jalapeños. This was evidently one of the funniest things he had heard all day, because he looked at me, laughed, and said "why, you must be a city slicker if you don't like jalapeños!" He then laughed some more and said "I sure hope you got an education to go with that city slicker!" (By the way, I still don't know what that means...besides, what do jalapeños have to do with being a city slicker, especially since North Carolina is nowhere near Mexico, unlike my hometown?)

So now when Gretchen needs to put me in my place, she can just remind me that I'm a city slicker...

What, now?

(It's only taken two weeks since visiting my Mom in Asheville, NC--a very cool little city, by the way--to finally get back on the blog again. Our computer is getting more temperamental by the day and I just don't have the patience to constantly shut down Internet Explorer. But I digress.)

My hearing is pretty lousy, which is almost as frustrating to Gretchen as our computer...if we had a dollar for every time I replied to her with "what, now?" or "were you saying something?", we'd be rich (or we'd at least have enough money to buy a new computer). Anyway, after this exchange I may now understand where I get my bad ears:

GRETCHEN: Do you have any chip clips?

MOM (looking puzzled): Chick flicks?

Strong girl

Yes, that's a cheesehead. At 15 months, she's already a Packer fan like her Mom.