3 years from now you might see this…only bigger...

Our path room got plumped

For the longest time we’ve only had one functioning bathroom. Technically our apartment has two and so technically they both should work since technically rent is higher for apartments with two bathrooms rather than just one.

When we first moved in we naively made a list of everything “wrong” with the apartment so that our landlord could either fix it or at least not charge us for it when we move out.

We told him about the leaky toilet and sink in the spare bathroom—and not leaky in the annoying, but common, drip-drip-drip way. No, our toilet and sink leaked onto the floor and when you flushed the toilet water literally sprayed across the room. So we turned off the water to the toilet because we were tired of having our floors be wet all the time…and we asked our landlord to fix it.

His solution: You are only two people. You don’t need two bathrooms; one will do.

One week

I think I’m officially the most pregnant lady I know of now. Everyone else has gone off and had their babies leaving me pregnant and wishing. I’m trying not to be too impatient, honest! After all there is still a week left until my estimated due date, which is a rather poorly defined date to be counting down to since the baby isn’t tied to a schedule at all. Still, I can’t help but think of how nice it would be to have Miriam on the outside.

She doesn’t seem to understand that as her quarters get cramped she’s supposed to move less. Instead she decided to kick it up a notch, quite literally. But at least I don’t have to worry about my cervix getting jabbed anymore since her head has effectively plugged off all access to that area; her flailing limbs can’t reach there anymore. That doesn’t mean I’m comfortable.

Anxiously Engaged

Yesterday marked the first day that Miriam could come without causing too much extra and undue stress.

For starters, Andrew got our passports back from AUC who had to expedite them from the mugama with our new visas. We turned in our passports quite a while ago—before the swine flu closure and before eid and before our visas expired. They expired the last day in September and we haven’t heard a peep from the visa office at AUC so Andrew went to nag them.

Guest Post

Today I'm being featured as a guest writer on my friend and (step-)cousin-in-law's blog, The Grass is Greener, while she's off gallivanting the European continent. And she just got back from Hawaii, too. I tell you this girl never sits still! She's awesome and I was so excited to be able to write a little something for her.

And a high of 102°F

Rachel has been so excited about the coming winter. She’s been pulling out sweaters and hats for weeks and trying them on—getting ready for winter. Ever since we hit our “cold spell” earlier this month she’s been waiting for “our winter.”

It was still 80 to 90 degrees by day and 70 to 80 degrees by night and she insisted that it was cold enough to wear pants, long sleeves, socks and shoes. And frankly, it did feel good. We took the fan out of her room because she was getting too cold at night. We started sleeping under the top sheet. It certainly did look like winter was upon us.

But this past week we’ve been back up in the high 90s and low 100s. Today’s high is 102°F (39°C)! Need I mention it’s the middle of October?

Flashback Friday: Once I skinned a badger

I’ve always been a bit of a conservationist at heart. My friend Emily and I started an “Earth Club” when we were little and would do clean-up projects in our neighbourhoods. Just little things, like picking up all the discarded flyers around the mailboxes.

I collected bugs, both live and dead. My mom’s cousin Don had an extensive bug collection and would invite me over sometimes to look at it. He taught me a lot about collecting bugs. My collection disappeared when we moved to Utah. Weird how those things happen.

Like a hamster wheel…only for ants…

Rachel and I were colouring this afternoon amid the left-over ants from lunch. The fact that we’ve been invaded with ants again is entirely my fault.
I thought the ants had gone away for the “winter” so I put the honey container back in the cupboard—it had been quarantined on our counter all summer long because for some reason the ants can’t find their way onto this one particular counter we have—and the ants found their way to it. So when I got it out for lunch it was swarming with ants and I didn’t even notice until I had set it on the table and they scattered everywhere.

Communication Black Hole

Andrew’s cell phone sat on top of my dresser all day today; he forgot to grab it when he left for school this morning. That’s not a tragedy, really, except that my uterus is a ticking time bomb.

I didn’t even notice he had forgotten his cell phone, but he did. It serves as his clock on campus where they are apparently morally opposed to clocks—Andrew says there are no clocks in any classrooms and no clocks in the library—and more recently he feels it is important to have it on hand in case he should get “the call” from me.

Hospital Test Run

I woke up yesterday morning to the sound of screeching tires skidding on sand and a loud *THUNK!* It always surprises me how dense the sound of metal crashing into metal is: thick, heavy, final. For some reason I always expect it to sound more tinny.

The short silence of the aftermath was followed by an eruption of angry Arabic. I didn’t understand much of it except for “!عامل ايه؟” which in this situation can be roughly translated as “What do you think you’re doing!?” (pronounced ‘aamil ay).

Voices and shuffling footsteps gathered around taking sides and making sure the verbal fight didn’t escalate into a physical one while the two drivers involved in the accident continued yelling at each other. Human curiosity got the better of me, too,