Amazed at Amazon

Serving in FS can be rough and a lot of times, access isn’t easy. Many countries just don’t have stuff Americans want. And when you’re living out of your element, it’s nice to have access to your own brands, sizes, etc. And sometimes it’s just easier if it comes to you instead of you having to find it in a city you’ve barely explored.

I’m sure in smaller or more remote posts, there isn’t the plethora of stuff that I have available to me. I have it made here, and I know that. Still, though, it’s nice to be able to know that, if I really wanted something, I could get it, and get it in my size.

And really, I can. I am still subscribing to Netflix, even though the turnaround time is around a month. I can stream, too, but my internet is touch-and-go, plus the new releases aren’t available on steaming. (I’m still impatiently waiting for the latest season Mad Men to be available for streaming; it’s been out of DVD for a month now.)

I even have a Slingbox that allows me to watch American TV on my computer. Granted, I am again at the mercy of my internet connection, but it’s something that wasn’t available to FS members long ago.

It’s similar to PC, I think. For me, communication in PC wasn’t much different than it had been prior to serving. I could call my parents on Skype and email every day. That’s pretty much what I’d done from Detroit, so doing it from Morocco wasn’t anything odd, at least once I got past the time change.

Leading up to moving here, I did all my pre-packing of consumables that I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to find here. Honestly, I probably could have found a reasonable facsimile, but it was a good use of a new paycheck so I’m OK with that.

Right now, my grocery bill is hovering around $20 a week. It’s pretty much the only stuff I pay cash for in-country, since I’ve yet to take the metro or train anywhere.

Really, food and travel will be my bills here. I don’t have a personal cell phone, so I’ve even kissed Sprint goodbye.

It’s not likely that I’ll buy clothes here (I’m too tall), so other than the assorted knick-knacks I might eventually pick up, I really don’t think I’ll be throwing quai back into the Chinese economy, at least directly.

Instead, it looks like I’ll be stepping up the use of Amazon, which seems to be one of the few shippers I’ve seen that is willing to deliver to DPO addresses.

That’s the mailing system we have for overseas. It allows people to mail or ship to us to a local address. This is a big step up over PC, for sure. I mean, people on the receiving end won’t get any cool stamps, but the odds are good that they will get what I mail them.

Anyway, since I’ve been here I’ve realized I needed a few things and hadn’t been able to find them locally, although I know they’re here. For example, to use the pool at my hotel, I needed a swim cap. I know there has got to be a place that sells them, but I have absolutely no idea where that might be. Nor, honestly, do I have the wherewithal to mindlessly wander around the many markets, malls and shops until I happen onto one.

You know where has them, though? Amazon. A bunch of them. They have everything.

So far, I haven’t caved and paid the $80 or whatever it is for the free shipping, but most of my colleagues swear by it. I got an earful about how I should get the credit card, but I won’t be doing that. So far, and this dates back to when I moved here, I’ve spent enough to qualify for free shipping. (I'm not necessarily proud of that.)

It seems a good portion of FS folks swear by Amazon. It’s been fantastic to have access to it.

I splurged yesterday and bought myself a light therapy kit, which I’d seen in the Skymall magazine. I tried to buy it from Target, but they wouldn’t ship it to a DPO number. Well, bummer. (I was really irritated because I’d bought something else as an add-on from Target, too, and then they canceled the light, leaving me with an add-on I hadn’t really needed. More workout pants. Grr.)

But Amazon would ship it to me. Yes, it will take about a month or so (I’m still waiting on the swim cap order) but it’ll come right to me.

The cool thing, I’ve discovered, is that Amazon really does have everything. Including grits; I checked. Even though I placed the order yesterday for the light therapy kit, I’ve already made a list of stuff I could use in the next order.

Hopefully, my first order from here will be in soon. In addition to the swim cap, I have a small frying pan coming. Seriously, I could scramble two dozen eggs in the one that came with the apartment, only it’s not nonstick, so it’d be a holy mess.

And, in order to boost myself to the free shipping level, I added on a case of Junior Mints. How’s that for awesomeness?

At the office, I think we get package mail twice a week or so. It’s a lot like mail call at M*A*S*H, only we await our names at our computers.

The women who run the post office have a group email that says something like “Congratulations! You have a PACKAGE!” that they send just after 3 p.m., when our little mailroom opens.

So, on those afternoons, all of a sudden, you see people jump up and rush up the stairs to get their goodies.

It’s been fun to watch people claim all their Christmas stuff, especially those who are parents of small children.

I don’t really have all the timing down yet, but I am so ready to get that little email. I want my frying pan!

About those TPS reports …

Every new job is an adjustment. The job I’m in will be new every two years or so, so I need to get used this whole “deer in the headlights” look that I’m bound to have, like clockwork, as I try to get the feel for a new post.

Even though, bottom line, the job description is the same, the description as mentioned in the job add is so all-encompassing I don’t know that everybody does everything in a given two-year post.

A colleague of mine here, for example, just went to a three-day training seminar. It was for some software program I’ve never even heard of. Another college in the same position but a different office was messaging me the other day during some training that she had. Again, I’d never heard of the program. And I’m probably doing stuff neither of them has any clue about, but in two years, I might be in a position that requires the knowledge they are gaining now and they might have to learn about the stuff I’m doing.

My job right now is looking like it’s going to be very HR-heavy. That’s fine by me, and it seems fairly straightforward. One of the things I’m going to be doing a lot of – will be what we call “pushing through” annual reports each person has to do. For simplicity’s sake, I’ll call them ABCs.

Each person’s ABC is due in April and they’re dreaded about as much as taxes. There is a loophole to that in that if the person is new, they are due on the person’s anniversary. In my office, almost everyone is new.

For me, that’s fortunate, because a lot of people in my position have horrid springs, I’d guess, because they are frantically trying to help people push these things through. They’re something like 10-step processes that involve, at a minimum, three people – at least on paper.

The good news to quicken the pushing process is that you can gain “proxy” for someone to help push it, like if the person is out of the office but has already approved what’s to be reported.

It sounds simple, but it’s a PITA. I need to figure a way to help track where we are (I have about 50 people I’m helping) but the thing is, except for the very beginning and the very end, there are no incremental “due dates.” The whole ABC report is supposed to encompass a year and in theory you’re supposed to be working on it through that time period. In reality, it’s possible to do the actual computer part in a day.

This is assuming all the reporting part is done, and that part is not my job (at least for now.) Now, what I am trying to do is get people who supposed to have been doing this all year through in a day, using proxies for at least two people. The people need to get done because the stuff is either due, past due or coming due in a week or so.

This one person asked me to help, and gave me her proxy plus I had the proxies for the two others. So we’re on our way, right? Well. Not so much.

I’m still bad with names and I went to the proxy person’s queue where the report should have been. In it, there were two ABCs, one for J and one for A. J was a guy, and I knew him because we’d been putting out the same fire for a day. So, under the watch of the person, I “sent back” A’s report to the beginning because the first step had to be altered.

And then I realized the person standing in front of me wasn’t A. Holy crap. I’d sent the wrong person’s report back. Plus, we had no idea where K’s report was.

So upon realizing this little snafu, I immediately contacted A, the management person and the HR person, telling them what I had done, apologizing profusely and trying to figure out how to get A’s report back to the point where it had been.

And then it’s demonstrated that I work with the government.

I got an email from the HR person, who is new, who told me “never” to send the ABC thing back to step 1. She then attached the standard operating procedures of the ABC report.

Sigh. That wasn’t the problem. I KNOW what the procedure is. The whole point of what I was doing in the first place split from “standard” procedure, because procedure normally goes from 1 to 10 or however many steps there are in the darn ABC report.

I replied, saying I had done what I intended to do, but for the wrong person. Sending the thing back to No. 1 wasn’t the error. My bad was that I did it to the wrong report.

She then called me to tell me the same thing – don’t send back to Step 1. I’m like, look, I understand what you’re staying but that’s not the point. K *wanted* me to do this. It wasn’t that I did it, it’s that I did it to A instead!

And she went on and on about the SOP. It was totally the TPS reports from “Office Space.” I wanted to jab a letter opener through my ears.

Anyway, in the end, I think it sunk in to the HR person what had happened and she was able to find where A’s ABC report was and put it back.

We never found where K’s original one went. HR tried to blame that on me, but I never saw it, which was the problem in the first place. And apparently this had happened to another guy earlier in the week, too. He somehow got DC involved, but since we’re 13 hours ahead of DC time K couldn’t wait and we just re-created it from scratch. She had everything saved on a backup, so it was fairly easy even though I had to keep going in as one person, coming out and then going in as another.

This is what my life’s going to be like for the next two years. I’m not entirely sure whether that’s good or bad, but here’s what I do know: Payday is Thursday.

Call a Marine. No, really. That’s what you do.

For anyone who owns the “Drinks After Work,” you know this song. Well, if you have the deluxe edition, anyway. In keeping with the wrapped-around-the-flag image he’s cultivated so well, Toby Keith sings this cutesy song about how, if you’re in trouble, it’s handy to have a Marine nearby who can bail you out. In the lyric (and I think this was co-authored by Scotty Emerick, but it doesn’t say in the liner notes), they’re built to “improvise, adapt and overcome.”

I have Marines. Most posts do, although mine didn’t until they moved into a new building. I haven’t met them all yet, but I did figure out which one is from Florida.

They live in a compound at the office. From what I can tell, it’s one building and an outside area with a basketball hoop, although I’m not entirely sure. I knew they lived in the city, but I had no idea they were on the premises. From what I understand, they rotate out after a year.

On Friday, I went to my first Marine promotion. Normally these are big, impressive events, with everyone in the battalion (and I hope that’s the right term) in attendance. In this case, there aren't all that many, so some of the people from the office came and watched it. It’s a big deal to the person being promoted, and it really was a formal ceremony. Small and impressive as opposed to big and impressive. The head guy has everyone in line, and the “officer to be promoted!” stands in back. After the head guy informed us of the protocol and importance, he called up the corporal, who then stood at attention as the higher up read the declaration (I’m sure there’s a technical term) of his promotion to sergeant.

It didn’t take all that long, and after it’s over everyone in the room congratulated him. I hadn’t met him before, at least that I know of. They guard the doors, but sit behind this glass that has a horrible glare and I can’t tell who’s in there. Not that I have the names down or anything. I think I know two of the names. They have their individual pictures posted on the door to their main office and I tried to memorize that.

The names are going to kill me. I have about 120 people in my department and I’ve probably gotten down 10 percent of the names. I am just so bad with names. I have one of the sub-department’s bio sheets bookmarked and when someone comes by I try to match up the name and face. It doesn’t work all that often, and the photos don’t show size. One guy came in and said he was Eddy and I thought he was Ben. Ben is about six inches shorter, but they look similar in the photo.

There’s a lot of local staff, too, and man, it’s rough. I went with a group of three to do a daily paperwork exchange with S, Ben (a different Ben) and Ken. Then I switched and joined another group and promptly forgot all those names. I think the one woman went by initials. I’m really not good for more than two new names a day. I had already figured out S, so Ben and Ken were the new ones. And Jack is in the office supply room. Or maybe that was Jerry. Then there are three Cherrys. It’s very confusing.

On my errands with S, Ben and Ken, they were showing me how to do this hand-off. We went downstairs and through some kind of garage thing with two doors. I had no idea if I was supposed to shut the one door or not so I was kind of standing there and S couldn’t get out. I thought we were locked in, but she’d had that issue before and got it straight, so we made it out. (You manage to figure out quickly who runs the place, and S is one of those. Good person to know.)

Anyway, since that little errand is a daily thing, and I can see myself botching it, I asked if they ever did get stuck in that room. She said yes, it’s happened before. I asked what happened if you did get stuck in there and she said, “Oh, you call a Marine.”

I swear, I am halfway around the world from Nashville and my life is a country song.

See you later, America!

After a long travel day, I’ve reached my first post and am settling in.

My camera is in a shipment that’s coming later, so sorry no photos for now. But it’s really nice. Go with me on that.

It’s sort of weird that less than a week ago I was still in the US, doing all things normal. I left on Tuesday, and spent Monday doing a few catch up and check out things but mostly just tried to chill out.

I opted to go see “Catching Fire” at the Courthouse Theater and was appalled that the 1:45 p.m. showing was $10.25. That’s highway robbery, but I really enjoyed the books and wasn’t sure of my future movie options, so I bit the bullet.

Wow, movies have changed. This theater was AWESOME. It was one of the new pick-your-seat spots, and each chair was a comfy pleather recliner. The arm rest thingie also popped up to turn the chairs into little loveseats. I pretty much curled up into a ball to watch the movie.

I’d tried to go on Sunday, but it was sold out. Monday, however, was pretty sparse. I had an entire row to myself.

After that, I decided on Chick-Fil-A for my last meal in America for two years. I suppose some would find that kind of silly, but I really like Chick and plus, the peppermint shakes are back and I hadn’t had one yet.

My flights went just fine. I had some issues with my checked bag, which was overweight. That took awhile to settle, but once I got to Beijing it got complicated again. Eventually it got settled – I think there was some kind of error in DCA but whatever, it was fine.

I had another small issue in Beijing. I’m ticklish! I had to go back through security because once you clear customs you have to, and they did a pat down. I couldn’t stop laughing. It was a very un-diplomatic first impression, but I couldn’t help it.

My “sponsor” met me immediately and escorted my back to my apartment, which I was pretty happy to see. I arrived to the airport about at 9 p.m. and the apartment is about a 45-minute ride.

The place is nice but really not a whole lot like the website. I’m not sure which floor plan it is; I am on the very end of the building.

It's set up oddly, I think, but I have a fantastic view. However, much of the fantastic view is from the bathroom, which is glassed in. I can, and I'm not kidding, soak in the tub or sit on the toilet and see the city. Who needs reading material?  I can see this thing that was built for some sporting event – it’s a grandstand overlooking what used to be a pool; no clue what it’s used for now. There’s also the giant TV tower that’s in all the travel guides, the opera house, the museum and the river.

It's gorgeous but a little bizarre. I can see my office from the apartment, too. It's across the street from the Starbucks that looks like it's across my street. It’s maybe a five-minute walk.

The kitchen is a tiny closet and I can deal with that but there is no place to put your groceries. Not a single spot. Since I don't drink, I moved the wine service for six (which included a rack that used an entire pull-out drawer) and crammed it under the sink. That space is unusable for anything else because there are pipes and a fire extinguisher under there, but I worked around it to just store the stuff for two years. I got the coffee pot in there, too.

There are two doors because that's what fire regulations call for. Only my second door is about 10 feet away from the first, leading into the same hallway. If there's a fire in the hall, that 10 feet likely won't make a big difference. The second door, is, however, 10 feet closer to the emergency exit. I guess it has that going for me.

I am on the16th floor at the end of the building, which means I have the great view from all sides. I just looked and I can see a bunch of kids playing on the mini-golf course, which is really neat. There's construction out the view of another room.

My walk-in closet, which I've walked into multiple times so far thinking it was the second bathroom, looks nice but it's not too functional. There is a thing of drawers, but when you pull them out they're maybe 4-6 inches deep. The floor has a vacuum, stool, TWO ironing boards (one's new in wrapping - it'll be like that in two years, too), a laundry basket and some other stuff. Hence, no room for shoes.

I’ve problem-solved this by moving most of the stuff from the floor to the shower in the spare bathroom.

There are light switches everywhere. Each room has about three or more switches to various things. I was beat last night but spent time trying to turn out the lights before crashing. I am going to have to make labels. And once the lights were off, it didn't matter much -- since I have floor-to-ceiling windows with a city view, I had neon blue nightlights.

There is a TV in the living room and in each bedroom, so a total of four. However, there’s no consistent English channel that isn’t news. I can watch CNN or the BBC all day, but so far I haven’t seen anything that would be worth just leaving on for background noise.

I did try out my Slingbox this morning in an effort to watch FSU beat Duke. (Yes, morning. I’m 11 hours ahead of the east coast.) My internet is slow, so it was incredibly choppy and painful, but it was awesome to have some kind of access.

I don’t have a little hook on my front door, so I’ve had to hang the FSU flag that Dana gave me in the house. It’s sort of looped over a shelf. My Christmas stocking, which is also FSU, is sort of sitting on the next shelf down. My only other décor right now is a stuffed bald eagle that I got at the State store. I named him Indy.

There’s really no telling when my boat shipment will arrive, but I have a lot more decorative stuff in there. I brought a lot of my fridge magnets, but I had a sudden realization that in the new kitchen’s weirdness (which, BTW, includes having a washer and dryer in there) is that the fridge and freezer are the built-in kind that have faux wood doors that are not really wood (hence the “faux,” duh) but also not metal, either.

Thanks a lot

Happy leftover turkey weekend. The Noles beat the Gators and Alabama lost. We’re No. 1!

Yet another thing to be thankful for … Florida State is back. I have a little garden sign on my door (thanks, Dana!) to show my colors. I’ve gotten compliments on it.

The Gator game started a bit scary but thank God it leveled out and wasn’t much of a contest.

I will be out of the country for the ACC championship, but I’ve utilized my new paycheck and invested/splurged on a Slingbox. This is a device that hooks up to Daddy’s TV and allows me to watch what’s on their satellite.

So far I’ve only tested it in dry runs, because the events I’ve intended it for – FSU games – have been since broadcast on national TV, or at least TV that I get. That ends on Tuesday, so I am hoping this works.

All in all, I think my preparations are somewhat in control. I had a little bump with Sprint, when the in-person associate at the store gave me a “I don’t want to deal with you” vibe by flicking her fake eyelashes at me and telling me to call customer service, but once I did that the guy on the line was really nice and my phone will be canceled with no issues.

The next step is to park my number, so when I return I should be able to get the same number. That’s increasingly important only because I have been giving out my cell number with several of the new accounts I’ve been opening.

As I get ready to close down everything outstanding, I was taking down my phone numbers. I don’t keep that many numbers in my phone, and I got a new address book to safeguard them.

Transferring them, I was a little surprised that for the first eight entries, every area code was different. I guess I know a lot of random people.

Anyway, how was your Thanksgiving? I went with a friend to her aunt’s house and it was really nice. I figure it’s probably my last Thanksgiving in the US for quite a while, so I loaded up on turkey, ham and mashed potatoes, especially.

Although I intended to stay away from Black Friday, I did get drug along at 6 p.m. on Thursday to Best Buy. People, go home. It’s a holiday! There is still football to be had!

Tomorrow is my last day in country and I really hope to wake up and get the necessary stuff done early and then shift into cruise for the rest of the day. I’ve started packing, but at this point it’s just throwing stuff in a bag anyway, so it doesn’t matter much.

I did realize that I shipped my Skype headphones, which stinks. What’s worse is that I am not sure if I shipped them by air or boat, so it could be 3-4 months before I see them again. Don’t expect any phone calls from me.

If I can get done with my stuff early, though, I might wander into town and try to see “Catching Fire.” I aimed for it today after church but the 1:30 show was sold out and I didn’t want to hang around until 2:30.

Mostly, I’m just trying to stay low key. No outgoing drama for me, thank you.

The Breakfast Club remake

Thankfully, as far as I know, there is no planned reboot of one of my favorite 80s movies. But I relived it on Friday, or so it seemed like at the time.

I’m finally done with classes over here, but thing was, we ran out of classes before we ran out of time. We had to fill up the spare days, so I had some random “post research” class show up on my schedule.

Since I’ve already done a ton of research – even doing a presentation on it – it seemed a little weird, so a couple of weeks ago I asked the lady in what’s essentially a research library about it.

The library is really cool and has extensive information on each post. It’s really a great place to go, and I knew that because I’d been there multiple times.

So, when I asked what, exactly, I was supposed to do for this 8-hour day, she offered some suggestions, all of which I’d done.

She then suggested practicing my language, but I didn’t get language classes so there’s no language to review. Another suggestion was to do my distance learning classes, but I did them – and far, far more – on, well, the days we had assigned to do distance learning.

This is a little gripe of mine. I’m in the extreme minority as far as being one of those people who does the assignments on time and all, and it sometimes gets aggravating that everyone else is given a “catch up” day to do all the stuff we’d had assigned all along. If I were given the day off, that’d be one thing, but essentially, I wound up having eight hours of detention because I did what I was supposed to do when I was supposed to do it.

Seriously, there was very little I could do. Fortunately, the librarians understood my dilemma, since I’d gone in previously and asked. It wasn’t like I had to write “I will not do assignments on time” 500 times or anything like that, but I was completely grasping at straws as far as what I could possibly do to fill the time.

And I had to the drill was, the four of us assigned to this “class” had to sign in at 9 a.m., sign in after lunch and then sign out at 4 p.m. No leaving early, even though it was Friday. It really was like the Breakfast Club, only without Emilio Estevez.

I always get there early, and Friday was no different. In fact, I’d scheduled an Excel test at 8 a.m. and had one errand to do before the class. So, by the time I checked in with the librarian, I had pretty much accomplished far more than anyone else had, at least in that wing of the building.

Two of my other classmates kept busy doing their distance learning, and I mostly checked my email. I also got started early on my “check-out” procedure, which means that I’m going to be struggling to fill up my “consultation” days this week, as that’s what those are for.

But I didn’t care because I was so bored. I mean, I could have re-read the same information again but I just didn’t care to. I am as prepared as I’m going to be, and since I don’t have a car or a pet I’m taking and have no husband and no kids, there just wasn’t a single bit of research left for me to do.

I think I spent a good portion of the afternoon looking at strongboxes and playing Set Game and Sudoku online.

I felt bad for the librarian, who tried to offer suggestions as far as what to do, but I’d done everything. She asked if there was something else they could offer for the “class,” but honestly, I couldn’t think of a thing. It’s not that the library isn’t useful; it’s that I’ve already used it.

Assigning “post research” as a class was just redundant, although I completely understand that there simply was no class offered that I could have taken. God knows I checked.

Now, I am down to the last week before deployment. Packout is tomorrow and boy, I’ll glad when that’s done. I hope it’s in the morning, but the guy didn’t give me a time.

If it is in the morning, I hope to knock out a run to the main building tomorrow afternoon. I’m here through Thanksgiving, but I’m not convinced the people I need to touch base with are.

Packing up and out

Yay, the new swim suit fit! LL Bean is awesome.

Got the old one returned too, I think. I had a rough evening on Wednesday, which is the day I got to Bible study. The church is three metro stops away and right across from a UPS Store.

I had a Netflix coming that day, so when I left the apartment I made a mental note to verify that I had my post office box key in addition to my MP3 player, Bible, phone, wallet and package. Note what I did *not* make a mental note to check.

So once down in the lobby of the building, I realized that without a house key, I was going to either be crashing at a friend’s or a neighbor’s if I didn’t solve the problem before church, because the apartment front desk closes at 8. Since church doesn’t end until then, I went to the apartment's front desk and got the key of shame – this regular key on a big overseas key ring that says “Return after 24 hours or there will be a $25 charge.”

By the time I ran back up to the apartment to get the key, returned the key of shame, took the metro and got off at the church stop, it was 7:09, and the UPS place closed at 7. I carried the package across the street to church and, after Bible study, apologized for being late. Pastor Jim offered to drop off the package the next day, so I’m glad of that.

The whole thing was more annoying than tragic, because I’d had plenty of time to leave and just waited to time it right before realizing I’d forgotten my key. Grr.

“Returning swim suit” was one of the little things remaining on the list, and even though I’ve crossed that one off, it seems the list itself doesn’t get any shorter.

I’m down to two weeks left – I can tell by the packages of waffles in the freezer – and the “I’m going to be out of the country for two years” thing is sinking in again.

I’ve been through this before, of course, for time spans of 27 months, 12 months and 15 months, so it’s almost old hat, but the difference is this time I have some money and unlimited shipping.

This has led to innumerable trips to Target; two of these took place last week. My little Redcard card has now saved me almost $35, making the cost of my soul a little more expensive. As if that’s a consolation.

I’d lost track of what I’d put into the shipping boxes, which go away upon packout on Nov. 26. I really don’t think I need to bring much, as China pretty much has everything.

But will they have grits? Hmm… Jakarta didn’t, so maybe I should throw in some. (This is the prevailing school of thought.I’m now up to four canisters of them.)

I’ve been doing this for various things lately, not as much for the stuff itself but for the brand (even if it’s Target), or the form of the product. (Example: sugar. It’s not always pourable and in a convenient 4-pound package.)

So my box/pile of stuff is a little out of control, and my big spur-of-the-moment project yesterday after church was to get a grasp on what they’ve done.

As a result, I’ve created what no one outside of foreign service should ever attempt: an inventory list, in Excel (I was in classes all week), on everything in my HHV, UAB and CO. (These are the three shipments I get: by boat, by air separate from me, and carried on in the plane.) So far, I’ve only done the HHE and part of the UAB, although I will likely still add to it. (I realized it might be tough to get real milk in China, as Asians in general aren’t as big on it as I am, so I’m going to get some powdered just in case. And maybe some more grits.)

I’ve no idea if it was a practical idea to do this (or even all the shopping, for that matter), but I figure when I get the next post, I will have a start at figuring out how much, say, ibuprofen, I took in two years to gauge if I need more or less the next time around.  And it was a good time-waster on Sunday, which was a good recharge day for me.

The past week was far more social than I am accustomed to, and even though I enjoy the company I am an introvert and needed some down time.

I need that to continue through this week, if only because I have cooked a big, week-long meal and need to eat it. I’ve been out to dinner way too much lately, to the point where my last week-long meal started to MOLD. That was gross.

It’s also time to empty out the refrigerator, and if I don’t eat here, that’s not going to happen.

But some of the dinners have been awesome. In Delaware, we went to a pizza place and got strombolis. Mine was easily stretched to two meals, plus someone else gave me her leftover pizza, so that was another.

My favorite place here has been Fetoosh, which is a Moroccan-Lebanese restaurant somewhere between home and work. It’s on the corner, between a 7-11 and a gas station, in the same building as some other, larger restaurant. Don’t go to that place, go to Fetoosh. It’s fantastic, although the meals last, in general, for three meals.

Elizabeth, a former Morocco PCV who’s from Panama City, took me there first and wl-lah, it’s wonderful. I forced myself to get not couscous on Friday; I’d had that the first two trips and wanted to expand so I had the tagine djej (chicken).

The place is legit. It’s just fantastic and I might have to go again, really. I’m not sure when, though. I have plenty of food in the freezer plus just way too much stuff to go between now and then. It also requires a ride to get there.

But since introducing others to it, it’s been easier to get a ride. Everyone is anxious to go back.

Anxious. That’s the word for the week, although it might be more appropriate for next week. I’m just tired of class and getting too comfortable in my little college-like life. I might not be ready to get to my new job, but at this point, I really do want to just bring it on.

Checklists and countdowns

The to-do list is getting things crossed off of it, but somehow, it’s still not shrinking. With about three weeks to go before departure, this might not be a good thing.

It’s not that I can’t do stuff once I depart, but the ease of picking up the phone or whatever gets a lot more complicated with a double-digit time change. (It was 12 hours; now I’m not sure if it’s 11 or 13 … the international date line confuses me.)

Most of the money stuff is figured out and now I’m working on the medical stuff. I’ve been warned to get all the medical and dental out of the way before I hit China, so on Saturday I completed about $2600 worth of improvements to the pearly tea-stained whites.

This week, I also went to a doctor’s office to renew my prescription for a year. Getting the piece of paper wasn’t difficult, but now begins the hunt to get it filled. I need a mail order pharmacy, but after doing a bunch of research and deciding on one, I learned my particular brand of insurance doesn’t utilize mail-order pharmacies.

Great. Now it looks like I am going to have to switch medical insurance. Not what I wanted to do, but I don’t think it’s a big deal. I signed up for “basic” with the one place and should just have to upgrade to “standard,” although I am not entirely positive what that entails.

Really, every time I think I’ve gotten caught up, something else falls in the way.

But I do get things knocked off occasionally. When I got off work on Friday, I called the doctor in Minot to verify the fact that the knee bill was paid off. Two weeks ago, I’d called and the lady said yes but I was a bit skeptical because she was describing a different bill than the one I was asking about.

But praise God, both bills – topping $600 – have been paid. Oh, that was such a relief.

Tomorrow is a holiday, so I’m heading with some friends to an outlet mall, where I hope to cross off “get tennis shoes” and maybe some other assorted stuff.

My new apartment, of which I have photos, has an indoor pool, so I figured I’d get a swim suit. (In Jakarta, I wore a sports bra and shorts – that would likely not be appropriate this time around.) I took a chance, ordering one off Amazon.

It was the last available and I waffled on it, wondering if the size was right. I figured the bottoms would fit, but I have a lot of trouble sticking my shoulders in shirts so I wasn’t sure if the top would. I took a chance.

When it arrived, the bottoms fit fine. The top had to have been worse than any corset ever created. I couldn’t breathe.

Once I peeled it off – and boy, that was a feat – I caught a glimpse of the size tag. It was a smaller size than the bottoms!

So it’s going back. I was extremely disappointed because it really was awesome, but that was the only one they had.

If I don’t see one at this outlet mall in Delaware, I’m going to just cut my losses and take a chance on one from LL Bean. They have 10 percent off through tomorrow, so I’ll have time to order if I come home empty-handed.

Really, I’ve curbed the shopping. I just don’t know what else I could possibly bring with me. I wish I had some books, but I’m not going to lug stuff over there. I have access to a lot of periodicals through the department library and I guess I’ll just go with that.

The computer situation is what’s tricky. The laptop isn’t going to be coming back, and I am trying to make sure everything is backed up in case stuff gets weird. But my external, which I’ve hardly used, is crashing – or something – as I’m trying to make copies of stuff to put on thumb drives. I wanted to just leave the external and take off the music and the Thru the Bible series and leave everything else, but I started getting all these “failed to write” errors. And during the copying of U2, too. Bummer.

So in tomorrow’s trip to Delaware, we’re also stopping at Best Buy. The advantage of Delaware is it’s a no sales tax state, so I plan on picking up something else to back up, although I am not sure what. It’s just weird. It’s like the external is failing or something.

And it’s not a good sign when your backup is failing.

At least I’ve had all my shots

As of Sunday, I’ll be down to T-minus 30 days before my estimated departure date. I have a reservation for 12/3 to Guangzhou, although it can be changed if necessary.

So long as my visa comes in, I’ll be leaving as scheduled, but there still is a lot I’d like to accomplish.

Really, about the only thing I’ve completed in full is to get all my vaccinations. Even though I had a ton of them in PC, I didn’t have a record of some and it was just easier to get them re-done than dig up the paperwork.

At the beginning of October, I had something like seven – plus a flu shot – and on Halloween, appropriately, I finished off the last three. I’m not really sure what Japanese encephalitis is, but I’m fairly confident I won’t be getting it. The trade off is I couldn’t lift my left arm on Friday, but whatever.

I should be immune (ha) from any more vaccinations for a good long while, especially since they went ahead and gave me the yellow fever one. I’m not up on all my infectious diseases, but at this point I can’t imagine there being much left that I might need.

So that’s one item on the list that’s been checked off, but I just have so much to do in a month that it’s a little daunting.

I’ve fought some of the financial fires I previously mentioned, but there are still little flare-ups from the ashes. One of the retirement places, in particular, is putting up a fight in me consolidating some accounts elsewhere. I’ve had to make three calls on that one.

On the plus side, I think the AmeriCorps insurance came through on the knee bill, but despite that, I got a “we’re turning over your bill to creditors” letter from the hospital. I called them to try to straighten it out, and the lady assured me they did get the check and she would straighten it out.

I don’t believe her and will call back.

It’s also confusing because there are multiple bills and right now I’m not clear on which one was completely paid. What the lady said and what I had in my hand didn’t really mesh.

So Monday I’ll be doing more calls, but I think I got the third fire – the one where I had given the wrong account number – taken care of. The problem repeated itself, but I think I just didn’t catch it in time. I do know the first $193 credit did finally find its way to me. That was the most important thing.

Our training right now is all over the map. Really, we have no way to know what type of work we’ll be doing in our jobs, so they’ve assigned random stuff to fill our schedules until it’s time to depart.

Next week we have two days of “coaching.” We’re supposed to bring in a list of personal and career goals. Uh…

Last week, we worked on PowerPoint. Previously I’d made a sum total of two presentations from scratch. One of those had about 60 slides but the other had maybe eight.

The classes weren’t overly helpful, but I did get to make two short presentations, which were fun to do.

The directive on the first was “something you really like,” so I did Florida State football. I had a little “Running Wild and Free” slide and used all kinds of clip art and screen grabs. (That was a GREAT trick to learn.)

The second class was a bit more advanced, and we were told to do something not work-related. It had to include a video clip.

Well, for some reason, Scotty Emerick popped into my brain and I did a little thing on his songwriting. All kinds of screen grabs and animation, which can drive you nuts. I had one where I had the name and photo of the different co-writers enter the screen at the same time as the photo. Each had a different animation and the timing required a lot of work.

I knew I was onto something when, when I asked Lisa to help me imbed the video, she took a look at my screen and burst into laughter.

My final slide, which came after a “Bus Songs” tribute, had a page that, after sitting on a photo of Emerick, Willie Nelson and Toby Keith for a minute, had “I’ll Never Smoke Weed” float up and then “With Willie Again” follow it, forming a circle. A couple seconds later, a pot leaf clip art bounced into view and twirled around a couple of times.

Then, it went into the last few lines from a video taken from YouTube: “In the fetal position, with drool on our chins, we broke down and smoked weed with Willie again.”

I recognize I’m a bit partial, but I really did like my presentation best. Certainly more than the person who did “planning a destination wedding.” Blah.

I must admit, though, that in light of all the security warnings we are given about cyber security and all that, I was kind of concerned people were going to bust in and drill me on why I was doing internet searches for things like “whiskey image” and “marijuana leaf clip art.”

Finding Famous Jameis

I miss Gene Deckerhoff. In Morocco, I used to be able to find the FSU games streamed online somewhere. Ditto for Indonesia, but now the Almighty Dollar has blocked me out. Games are no longer streamed and you have to subscribe to something.

My issue is I can’t find out what to subscribe to in order to get Gene. The ESPN online is hard enough, as my ESPN provider is not a cable network.

So sometimes FSU can be hard to come by – even harder than when I was half a world away. And now that the Noles are getting to be back on top (knocking on wood here), I don’t want to miss them.

Om DC, every college has some sort of a booster club gathering to watch games, so I decided to go down to the local bar and watch the NC State game with them. Since it was an afternoon game I figured what the heck.

When I learned that there was an FSU bar in town, I didn’t realize the enormity of it. I figured it be like the SEMINoles (that’s be the Southeastern Michigan Noles), who, on game days, met at a local bar and commandeered a room.

This was on a much grander scale.

The bar, Union Pub in this case, was absolutely, completely overrun by Seminoles. Every single TV had the game on. After TDs, they played the fight song in the bar. The waitstaff wore Union Pub FSU shirts with the 2013 schedule printed on the back. There was even a booster club raffle. (The prizes were mostly booze, so I didn’t buy one.)

With the exception of a lone NE State fan and a table full of drunk, misplaced Cornhuskers, it was all Seminole.

So, it was kind of cool that the atmosphere was there, but I just didn’t enjoy it so much. I’m not a bar person and going at it alone in a packed house was just too intimidating for this introvert. I hung out and watched the first half in the bar (I was late due to the metro hating me), where they wasn’t even a speck of a table to sidle up to.

During the third, the eating places cleared out a bit and I grabbed a seat on the patio and got dinner. I was pretty much famished and wolfed it down. By the end of the third, though, the drunken Huskers combined with the chilly and windy weather chased me out and I headed back.

I won’t be doing it again for the Miami game, but would consider it for other afternoon games, I guess. I’m not sure. During football games, I don’t really want to socialize. I just want to watch football.

But it was a decent weekend, and had it not been chilly I would have been content to sit by my lonesome on the patio and watched the game. I was just so chilled – hard to believe I was in North Dakota just a few months ago.

Like the tail end of my ND tour, I am trying to explore the area a bit. Saturday I wandered into the city, if just for a bit. I’ve putzed around the district a tiny bit, catching a glimpse of this memorial or that White House mostly in passing.

I visited Chincoteague, too, and on Sunday I got out and about a place nearby that felt like it was a world away.

Just down the street (or the metro, anyway) from the district is Alexandria, Virginia, which is just a wonderful and peaceful place to hang out on a Sunday. The weather was a lot better than Saturday and it was just gorgeous to wander around.

One of my classmates had recommended it, so I just headed out after church. Had a great time just walking and seeing the remnants of what must have been Dog-o-ween: lots of pups in costume. Ate a catfish po’ boy and sat and watched the water, which is always peaceful.

I’d totally go back for another Sunday afternoon. There were some awesome-looking restaurants and it was kind of tough to decide on one. I was fairly happy with the po’ boy, though, and the cupcakes on which I splurged later.

I have got to cut myself off, though. Now that I am getting a paycheck, I am also spending said paycheck. Saturday, long before the Noles game, I sunk $1210 into my teeth in the first of two dental visits, then I hit Target for my first $100 trip of the week.

Although China pretty much has everything, I’m going ahead and stocking up on what I can. I’m not sure of the availability of certain brands. Since I am allowed to take 7,200 pounds of stuff (and I only own 2,300 pounds of it – I checked), I figure why not? It’s something to aim for before I leave.

I’m also trying to schedule doctor’s appointments, too. My wrinkle with that is the fact my insurance card isn’t in. I got one but my name was spelled wrong and the corrected one hasn’t come in.

I have this standing list of “to do before I leave” that just keeps growing. It feels like I might never leave, but I’m still trying to be OK with taking it day by day. It’s not like I have an option.

Moving on

I’ve got six weeks of federal employment down. The first three were orientation and the second were billed as “specialist training.”

This is vague. I’ve no idea what I am getting into. I’ve communicated with my predecessor in Guangzhou (she’s out of the office now; three weeks’ vacation at Everest Base Camp) and she keeps dropping names of software and systems things that I’ve never heard of.

I thought these things would be taught in class, but nope.

Don’t get me wrong, we did stuff. Not as much as I was thinking we’d do, but we did stuff.

Some came via guest speakers, most of whom were entertaining.

On Friday, we heard from someone who “works the line.” No, this is not a knockoff of Johnny Cash. It is Statespeak for someone who works in the office of the Secretary, a/k/a Kerry.

This speaker was highly entertaining and very likeable. She’d been in training four years before and had just gotten her position “on the line.”

To catch people up, the tours are mostly two-year tours and the first two are “directed,” meaning ultimately you go where you’re told. After that you essentially apply to positions (“bid” in Statespeak), just like anyone who’s looking for a job.

On paper, it seems like it kind of stinks, so we’ll see how it plays out for me in four years.

But anyway, this woman being in her four year means “the line” was her first job on which she “bid.” It’s a high-prestige position, too, so that’s really cool for her.

Her description of the position actually made me think I’d like to do it, and I’d really never thought about working in DC. For this, though, wow.

She’d taken the job in July and since then had been to training in London, then to an event in Bogota, then an event in London, and then to another event in the Philippines. And in there somewhere, she was in New York working when the UN General Assembly was there. Sign me up.

At this point, I’ve forgotten why I brought this up … Oh, yeah. Four years. She’d said she had been in training four years ago – the very same room and indeed, right there, she said, pointing to a seat in the back – and commented that in training, “you learn everything about the State Department but nothing about your job.”

And wow, that might have been the most honest, accurate and insightful thing said during specialist training.

Yes, we briefly learned how to write cables and the style for correspondence. But other things have been just so darn vague and abstract that I’ve wondered what is going on here.

This is, however, the only time that State can tell us things as a group while we’re in the States. That’s helpful, but the thing is, a lot of the stuff deals with things we won’t encounter for three, four and more years down the road. It’s tough to know where to file that in your brain so you will recall it when it’s needed.

But now that training is over and I can just hope and pray that I recall the knowledge at the right time, whether it’s the stuff I need to do before departing or the stuff I need to do after tenure for promotion.

Next, we have random training. I think this is to kill time before our visas arrive, but it’s not like it’s wasted. The stuff was scheduled with eye down the road: some are the things required for promotion (which won’t come until after tenure, takes 2-5 years).

We’ve also got “distance learning” days scheduled in. These are days when we’re supposed to do online classes. My problem with that is I’ve already taken all the suggested ones and more. I’m kind of running out of related classes to do.

I have one in the hopper if it’s cleared by my “Career Development Officer” so maybe that will come through. In the meantime, I’m having to clean up a lot of little messes.

Last week was brutal for finances. Not spending money – though I did that, too – but tracking it down.

First, I had a fright when I realized a $1250 deposit I’d mailed from DC to Florida on 9/30 hadn’t been deposited into my account. After several phone calls and emails to various people we were able to determine that the right bank had received the money but put it into someone else’s account. That got resolved.

Now, I’m waiting on a $100 check to arrive to me in DC so that I can mail it back to Florida. It was said to be mailed over a week ago. I am not sure where the carrier pigeon got shot down, but I sure don’t have it yet.

My new credit union account, with one here in DC, mailed my credit card to Florida, which I specifically told them at least twice not to do. I had planned on picking that up tomorrow. Nope.

Then, I’m trying to transfer two IRAs into my new federal retirement account. I sent them both the federal paperwork.

One transferred the money no problem. Only my account doesn’t show it yet. The other refused to transfer it. Seriously, folks?

And lastly, I am putting $193 from each check into two separate accounts for savings. I got paid on Thursday and checked tonight if it went into my new credit union.

I can’t tell because I can’t create an online account. I’m told I have a login, which I never set up but there’s no way to. I keep doing the automated “send me my login” thing, it hasn’t done so. It looks like I’ll be in that credit union’s office tomorrow even though I don’t have to pick up the credit card.

The other bank that is supposed to receive the $193 doesn’t have it in my account. I went back and checked – and this is my bad – and I gave them my MEMBER number, which, for this place, is different than the account number.

So tomorrow, my plan is to knock out that one class and then call all those financial institutions and try to get my financial world straightened out.

Oh, and give blood. The Red Cross is coming and I figured I’d try. I usually am on the bubble, but I had salmon on Saturday and a Fuddrucker’s burger today in preparation.

Misty in Chincoteague

For my first federal holiday, I decided to take a holiday.

So far during the shutdown, I have been one of the lucky ones and haven’t been furloughed. It seems we’ll have at least next week, and that’s pay week. My financial confidence is growing slowly and I wanted to take advantage of the holiday.

The idea of a holiday, especially a little-celebrated federal holiday like Columbus Day, is really entertaining. With the exception of this last Fourth of July, Thanksgiving and Christmas I haven’t taken holidays off lately, which means dating back to 2007. And I can’t think of a time when I was off on Columbus Day. I mean, who celebrates that?

Anyway, with the thought of another paycheck next week I’m moving ahead with being a regular American, which means spending money.

My first foray was to go to the dentist in the US for the first time since 2007. Not surprisingly, I got a list of $1900 worth of stuff that needs to be done. Sigh. But I knew this was coming.

But that’s not a highlight for a three-day weekend. I pulled out the map and tried to find a place to go to for a little bit. I mean, it’s likely the last vacation I’ll have in the States until my first home leave, so I wanted to do something. Even if it wasn’t far away.

So I Hotwired a rental car and chose Chincoteague Island, which is only about three hours away. This is assuming you don’t get lost. “Lost” is a really vague term while on vacation with no set itinerary. Fortunately, since I didn’t bring my GPS.

Chincoteague Island is in Virginia (I had to reiterate this to the rental car people for some reason. I started to think the car might lock up when I crossed the state line or something, but nothing nefarious happened.) on the Eastern Seaboard.

The ride here is probably really gorgeous, but it has been a soggy, soggy time in the DC area. There’s been at least a steady misting from the get-go.

And "misty" is appropriate, I guess, because the reason I wanted to go to Chincoteague is because it’s the setting of “Misty of Chincoteague,” one of my favorite books from my youth. Marguerite Henry wrote it in 1947 and several related books followed. (As it turns out, there’s at least one I never read, “Misty Twilight” or something like that.)

For those who don’t have a clue what I’m talking about, the story centers around an annual event on the island called Pony Penning Day. In the book, a brother and sister save money and buy the filly of a wild pony than no one was able to bring in called Phantom.

The ponies originate on Assateague Island, across the channel. They’ve been there for 200 years. No one can really say for sure how they got there, but the legend in the book is the one about a shipwrecked Spanish ship that was loaded with horses. Some of the horses escaped, and the ones that roam the island today are descendants of those.

On Pony Penning Day, which is held at the end of July, “saltwater cowboys” round up the 150 or so horses on the 37-mile island (the island stretches into Maryland, but I think the boat tour guy said the horses were only in the Virginia part, but I’m not sure) and herd them across the channel to Chincoteague Island.

There, the colts and fillies are separated from their parents and sold at auction, although some people “buy back” some of the foals. That, I learned today, is when a benefactor basically makes a donation to the fire department and sends the pony back to the island to replenish the herd. (The fire department acts as the caretakers for the horses and runs the roundup and the auction, plus a carnival that goes along with it.)

In the book, Paul goes on the roundup and gets the Phantom, who has a filly by her side. She’s a flash in the wind, so he calls her Misty. Paul and his sister Maureen buy both the Phantom and Misty, but Paul winds up turning Phantom loose again because she’s a free spirit. Misty, OTOH, is “Misty of Chincoteague” and wants to stay with Paul and Maureen.

Misty is still a big part of the community. There’s even a statue downtown, modeled after one of the illustrations in the book. An artist named Wesley Dennis did all the illustrations for all Henry’s books, and they are just phenomenal.

The book was made into a movie, which I’ve never seen, and that’s blasted all over town, too.

But it’s not a hugely commercial place. It’s a beach town. Oysters and crabs are as big as the ponies. Well, in popularity, anyway.

I did a boat tour so that I could head over to Assateague to see the ponies (it’s a federal park/refuge so it’s closed due to the shutdown) and got the rundown on the seafood side of it.

I don’t think I realized how much I miss beach. I loved the boat. I miss salt water, salty air and all that. I could definitely retire to an island.

Photos to come. I have to unearth my connector cord thing first, but even before that I am going to splurge (in more ways than one) at one of the many ice cream shops I’ve seen.

Shooting up with “Breaking Bad”

For years, people have been telling me that I’d enjoy “Breaking Bad.” I’m not into TV all that much, at least as it airs. I don’t have the commitment in me to watch it on whatever channel it comes on, but once they get to Netflix, I don’t mind trying out new shows.

On that, I recommend “House of Cards.”

Anyway, last weekend or so – right before the overall season finale on real TV – I finally decided to start on “Breaking Bad.” As the first season was only eight episodes or so, I watched them in a few days but then got waylaid with my DVD Netflix order.

As an aside, I am not sure why I continue to put movies in my queue that the rest of the word says are bad. I don’t always have the same views as the rest of the world – in fact, I usually don’t – but on movies, the general public has a good grasp on movies.

So I should have known better than to put “The Great Gatsby” into my to-view list. It took me three days to make it past the first 30 minutes. Yeah, big red flag there. It was pretty horrible.

After that diversion, I got back to “BB” and am currently in the third season. Gotta say, it’s everything people said. Very addicting.

Really, I don’t understand why people watch TV as it airs. It’s much better, in my mind, to watch three at a time or whatever at your own convenience.

For some reason, I thought my whole training period would be foot-to-the-floor busy, but I haven’t been. I’ve had periods of dead time that I just hadn’t anticipated.

Our training schedule – there are 10 of us – is basically 9-4 with an hour lunch and 1-2 breaks in the morning and afternoon. It’s not bad.

So far, my end of it has not been directly affected by the shutdown, although that could change. I recognize that I am lucky and blessed to have received a paycheck and, so far as I know, still be on track for the next one.

But the slowness is welcome; I’ve been doing a few of the additional classes online and in general, trying to get ready for deployment.

One of the pre-departure errands is vaccinations. For those who haven’t heard, I’ll be heading to SE Asia (email me for more detail) and there is a slew of shots I need.

I’ve had many, thanks to my PC service, but things like typhoid expire. (Fortunately, I don’t think the rabies series does.) And PC didn’t record some of the ones I know that I’ve had.

But I lack a spate, and last week I got started on them. Holy smokes. I did the flu shot on Thursday and made the appointment for the rest on Friday.  

Well, Thursday came and I went at lunch to get, I think it was, seven shots. However, since I have to go back in for the second of one of those series a bit later, we broke it up, plus on one, I am going for the oral instead of the shot. It lasts five years vs. two, and it's one less hole in my arm.

The oral thing turned out to be way, way worse than the shots. It’s one of those you take on an empty stomach, so I did it right before I got to bed. The normal side effects include diarrhea, 100+ temperature, abdominal pains and the like, but I slept just fine I and figured I was OK.

Wrong. Friday I was just blah. I didn’t have any of the listed effects to the extreme or anything, but it wasn’t a good day. Plus, I’d gotten three shots in one arm and two in the other, so I couldn’t even lift my arms.

Totally listless, I muddled through class and then just came and crashed on the sofa, with “Breaking Bad” on Netflix.

Since the oral thing is a series of four pills, one a day over a span of six days, I hoped to God that my Friday reaction was from the whole HepA-B-Japenceph-flu-yellowfever combo and not just the oral thing.

Apparently not. I took the second of the four last night and this morning, same thing. I’d had delusional plans of playing tourist in an abandoned District of Columbia, but that just didn’t happen. I drug myself to church and was so out of it I don’t even know what the pastor talked about. I was sweating up a storm and had shortness of breath – the whole nine yards.

So I came back home, turned on “BB” again and just did nothing. Sheesh, I don’t even think I drooled.

Tomorrow I am due to take another, and I’m going to change the tactic to take it in the morning. Since it seems to take awhile to kick in, I will try to state off the nasty/listless feeling until I get out of class.

Fortunately, I should be well over this vaccine long before the second round of shots, which is scheduled to be on Halloween. I thought that was appropriate.

It’s more than just a fantasy

Zippy and Daddy’s 50^th anniversary is next year, and since I won’t be around, I tried to line up a gift in advance. (It always comes to me.)

Of course, Zippy is of no help when it comes to big gifts. Daddy doesn’t care, either.

When I suggested a cruise, Zippy’s only response was, “But who would go with me?” So that was out.

When I posed the question to Mary Lynn, she suggested Yankee Fantasy Camp. After all, Zippy loved it when Charles went a couple of years ago. She crashed the final day’s events and even got to see Richard Gere.

But when I asked Z about it, she kind of made it sound like she wasn’t interested. Between that and it being a really hard sell to Barry, I kind of left it. At least until I went to Charlotte and Charles showed Z his custom Yankee uniform and she looked pretty envious.

I decided to do it, but being an AC volunteer at $200 a week doesn’t really make that a smart purchase, so I pursued the siblings. Laurie was an easier sell. Wendy was pretty easy, but since she never has any money she couldn’t go even.

Barry thought it was a stupid idea, but he finally gave us the go-ahead. Of course, I had already decided to do it so that worked out well.

Even though it was supposed to be an anniversary present, since that falls in June we decided to give it to her on her birthday.

Well, that was fine except she was born about a month too late. All the medical paperwork is due on Nov. 1, which, last I checked, falls before Nov. 9.

So Laurie and I decided to give it to her when I came down for Mackenzie’s birthday.

Originally, I’d figured on being in North Dakota and had made plans to come down on Thursday, but after taking the new job that went out the window with the “no leave during training” rule.

So instead I did a quick up and down over the weekend. Mackenzie and Cracker Barrel. That was it. No friends, no malls. There was no time.

But it was fantastic. Mackenzie didn't have a family birthday party (Barry didn’t have her that weekend) but she invited me to the Japanese steakhouse with her friends. She'd invited four and her mom took them to dinner.

I'd cleared it in advance that Nic and Zac could come (this was my last chance to see her before I leave for post) and Laurie came along, too. It worked out well because we sat at one side of the table and they sat at the other -- no boy cousins embarrassing her or anything.

I gave her a little silver jewelry box with a silver cross necklace. She squealed when she opened it and so did her friends. Score! I really had agonized over the purchase so it worked out well.

Sunday morning we met Barry at Cracker Barrel. Zippy, true to form, didn’t want to get up and go in the morning. I wound up sending Daddy, Laurie and the boys in one car to force her to go with me in another. It would have NOT been cool had she not attended!

Laurie had wrapped the folder with the Yankee camp information in anniversary wrapping and put it in a box with Christmas gift wrap. That was in a box with birthday gift wrap.

Zippy was totally confused but I just said I wasn't going to be there for those holidays and that was why.

She got to the inside and of course had the wrong side of the folder facing her but when she opened it her jaw totally dropped. She just kept saying “I can’t believe I’m going to Yankee Fantasy Camp.”

So that gift was a definite home run.