gone

We have eaten all the cookies in the house. At least, all the ones I like. THANK GOODNESS. Now I just have to avoid the little pushers, so we don't get any more.

House Finches

The photo is a little blurred cos I have to stand on our rocking chair and lean left to get past the screen on the window. But aren't they adorable!

Bus musings

I rode the bus a LOT yesterday, had to take three buses to get to my interview and the reverse to get home. SO I had plenty of time to make comparisons to my previously adored bus route straight down Connecticut ave in DC. Firstly, buses here are practically empty and therefore a lot less frequent. I never minded waiting for buses in DC cos the next one would always be along presently. Not so here. If you miss one, you could wait 45 minutes for the next! One of yesterday's observations was that there is a coffee shop near every bus stop I waited at. Smart of the owners. Total niche market.

The biggest difference I found though is the social interaction on the buses. In DC people were mostly quiet, or at most talking gently to the person they were riding with. Of course there was always the occasional boffoon on the phone letting us all know about how much beer he and Brad drank last night. On the buses yesterday, everyone was chatting to everyone. As far as I could tell they were all complete strangers. One particularly long, tedious and loud conversation was between five guys sitting at the front with asides from the driver. It was all about how to get money from your workplace by falling down. Additionally, there was a segway about how one guy was arrested for harrassing his girldfirend and was looking at 6 to 15... also, a segway about how one guy beat up the chef of one of the downtown restaurants where he was a waiter. Charmers the lot of them. Quite the incentive to get my license.

cookies and calories

The squash courts at the gym are longer and narrower. Which puts the T far back on the court. You'd be surprised at how this affects your game. Taking control of the T means you can't reach the drop shots anymore. It took us a good half hour to work out the problem with our game. (and it wasn't that we hadn't played in months!)

Girl Scouts are EVERYWHERE! This is dangerous because it is cookie time. They are ruthless in their little uniforms with their little puppy-dog faces. And if that doesn't get you, their Mothers loom in the background promising flat tires and lipsticked windscrrens if you don't buy some cookies. IF you manage to get into the grocery store through the exit, thereby avoiding scouts and mothers at the entrance then there is always someone you know whose daughter is selling the things. An entire hour of squash down the tubes alongside a handful of Samoas. Let me explain why I can't just say no. Donut shaped goodness, shortbread biscuit topped with toasted coconut, toffee and drizzled with chocolate. erg.

Mostly quiet

Aside from getting an interview, life has been mostly quiet. I do have a few interesting things to note though. Or at least they are interesting to me.

We went and sat in a coffee shop on Sat evening, just to get out of the house. While we were sitting there the girl at the next counter got up and went to the loo. She left, on the counter, her books, papers, laptop, cell phone, blueberry and wallet, amongst her work. Keir and I stared at each other in amazement and fascination. After spending a year in WHK we couldn't believe that she expected it all to be there when she came back from the loo, and more amazing, it WAS still there when she came back. Huh, I guess we really don't have to worry so much about whether the back door is locked.

K wrote a test on Sunday. There is this Honour system at Uni's here. You collect your test paper from your lecturer, due a week from when you collect it. Then you study. At some point you write the test, and it is just trusted that you won't cheat, or take longer than you are supposed to. Wow.

In the grocery store there were 27 different kinds of milk to choose from. Including vitamen A and D added kind. I made K decide as my brain was boggling.

The bird bath was frozen over this morning

It made me glad I was snuggled up in bed all night.

even more ooh, aah than the moon!

JUST saw a HUGE sharp-shinned Hawk sitting at my back door. Literally! I opened the back door and there he was, we gave each other such a fright. It looks amazingly like southern Africa's Rock Kestrel. The book says they like to sit near bird feeders and nab little birds. Shame! Now the birds will never come to my feeder. You should have seen Henry and Oleo scurry inside after he flew off. Don't think he is big enough to actually catch them though, especially with Oleo's retrieved beer belly.

Eclipse last night

Last night was a full eclipse of the moon. We didn't stand outside in the freezing the entire three hours but instead dashed out, oohed, aahed and then dashed back inside. It was really something to watch, very eerie and ghoulish. These are some of K's photos over the eve.

Today at the bird feeder

Two Carolina chickadees, a female red finch and a tufted titmouse. Also something small and adorable and too fast to identify.

The weather

It's so cold outside today that when I opened the back door for the cats this morning, Henry decided to pee in the litter box and Oleo went back to bed. They didn't even stick their noses out and sniff. They both sat about a foot from the open door and gave me the classic "is she crazy?" cat look. Hence I have decided to do the same. I peed in the loo and went back to bed. I am sad to say that after some time under the covers, the weather is still freezing and now the reports are offering rain and possibly snow. erk. What an excellent day to write dozens of cover letters. double erk.

Learning to share.

YUM!

We made a fantastic discovery last night, an excellent combination...

Bird feeder

Nothing new at the bird feeder today. Am beginning to wonder if our wind chimes are keeping them away?

The best spot in the house

And he kicked his sister off to get it!

Outside

The weather is absolutely stunning right now, (as in, this half hour) so Oleo and I sat outside on the side steps for a little, while Henry gallivants. While I was sitting there I had to rush back inside for the bird book and binocs. A pair, male and female, of House Finches came along. Not exciting for anyone else as they are apparently quite common, but exciting for me, sweet little re-headed chap and his stripey lady. Speaking of red-heads, the woodpecker was back too, and he was in a fould mood. Dashing around the trees in the back garden making his angry little Chchch noises. He sounded like a squirrel so I ignored him for ages till I caught sight of his bright red streak.

Back to birding

Yesterday as we were about to leave the house, a bluebird just casually sat down on the fence in front of us. We were in raptures. We have only ever seen a bluebird once before and it was exciting then too. It was a female and it wasn't long before a male joined us. We then noticed all kinds of little birds hanging about. Including a few chicadees, a junco and a red-bellied woodpecker! We were so excited that we went out and got a very nifty bird feeder for the front garden. More on that later. Meanwhile, here is a pic of the female bluebird and also the woodpecker.

More on the Teapot

It is wonderful and fabulous. It is the teapot that keeps on giving. I believe the search has ended. Of course there are two new problems, we don't have anyone to share the tea with yet and the kettle in which we boil water is half the volume of the teapot. SIGH.

P.P.S

Also found Mrs Balls. Halleluja for no more dry sandwiches. AND found rusks, both K's and my favourite flavours! Both these items at VERY reasonable prices and affordable as daily consumables. On the other hand, we also found five roses tea at an extortionate price. Seriously, anyone wanting to import the stuff el cheapo could make a killing underselling the current distributor.

PS

The marmite bottle is to give an impression of size. Also - YAY - I found marmite for my breakfast toast!

In search of the biggest teapot

Some of you will know that I have long been searching for a teapot that can serve 6 mugs of tea, and then give everyone a second cuppa, whithout being refilled. We found this one today. It did not have a volume marked on it, so I can't be sure if it is THE ONE but we bought it in an optimistic fashion. Purchase based mostly on the fact that it has been provided with a second handle, at the spout. Which says to me: this pot has so much tea, you need two handles to pour it. Of course there are no longer six people in our house, or even in our neighbourhood who need a cup, but K and I will try it out, and see if we can a) have three cups of tea each, and then b) another three and c) does the pot need refilling. Think kindly of our bladders this evening.

Freezing Rain

It's disgusting when you are outside in it, but quite pretty when you can stay in your pj's indoors!

Overheard while walking down the road

Gent A: I had me a 'Gator once
Gent B: ya don't say?
Gent A: Yeah, Sowth American Red
Gent B: them big suckers?
Gent A: 4, maybe 5 feet
Gent B: Ya get it down in Florida?
Gent A: Yeah...

I wish I could have found some way to hang around and hear the rest of it!

To make up for power outages

Excellent things about Cville, VA.

Clumping cat litter actually clumps and truly nuetralises odors.
62 (we counted) different flavours of mustard in one grocery shop.
Really good microbreweries which make excellent beer and so many to choose from.
Hank would be considered a small car. (can't decide if that is good or bad)
Holly trees everywhere.

from Carter Mountain and bending pines

The wind in the pines and not the first world

We such a full day yesterday, woke up late and had scones for breakfast and then dressed up woolly and warm and headed out towards the mountains for a walk. It was just a short walk as the weather was brisk. We walked up to Carter Mountain lookout which looks towards Cville. The amazing thing about the walk was the wind. There was a weather advisory out for extreme windiness so of course we decide to go walk in the woods. At one point we both had to resist running back to the car because the pines which line the pathway are a few stories tall and were bending over under the wind. The rushing sound in the tops of the trees must be like what a flash flood sounds like, loud, elemental and feeding directly to your reptilian brain. When the pines bent over too far you could hear cracking and creaking low down in their trunks and sometimes they bent far over the pathway shedding needles and cones down in front of us. The experience was so heady and intense that we went grocery shopping after to calm down.

When we arrived home the power was out. Which is apparently common in high winds as all the electric cables are above ground. We fluffed around the house all afternoon feeling bereft of our computors and radio. As it started to get dark and the power was still off we assessed how far reaching the lights were out in the neighbourhood (far as the eye could see) and located our headlamps, gas stove and LED wind up lamp. At this point I would like to take a moment to thank C and P for that thoughtful and perhaps prescient gift. They live not far from us, and I begin to wonder if this isn't a common pattern in VA, the loss of electricty due to weather.

K poured us each a beer and we played a close and comptetive game of scrabble by headlamplight. Of course our scrabble dictionary is currently somewhere over the Atlantic ocean so we had to make frequent calls to the ever patient S to settle our challenges. As the scrabble scores mounted we became horribly and terrifyingly (for me anyway) aware that we hadn't heard the furnace come on for some time and that the temperature in the rest of the house had dropped considerably. K had started a roaring fire early in the day so the lounge was still toasty, but the cool from the kitchen was seeping it's way across the wooden floor towards the dining table. I valiantly fetched my gown from the bedroom and pretended it was ok if we froze in our beds. I couldn't contain myself for long though and started pacing the house, assessing the situation from the windows as the lights coming on in the neighbourhood crept closer and closer to Broad Ave, our current place of residence.

Imagine my horror and also indignance when the lights came on all along Cherry rd, our closest neighbour and yet nothing for Broad Ave. K eventually convinced me to desist my pacing by serving me hot pea soup. Thank goodness for our camping gear! We used the last of his laptop energy in watching three-quarters of a CSI and then went to bed.

The night was a true test of the quality of our duvet (very good) as when we awoke this morning, the rest of the house had a layer of frost on every surface. OK OK. not EVERY surface. OK. Not any surface. But it was VERY cold and neither the heat nor anything else was on yet. K kept the bed warm while I popped out and fed the cats. The loo seat was not for the faint of heart, and I was not faint of heart, but in fact full of bladder. Not an experience I wish to repeat. K got up to go to lectures and I poked one hand out of the blankets to call the electric company with a quavering voice. The lovely lady on the other end promised they hadn't forgotten us. I think they did, cos 15 minutes after my call the miraculous music to my ears of the furnace kicking in was heard. Hallelujah I cried and sprung from my bedcovers.

And they call this the first world. Where is eskom when you need them!

The new House

This is the house from the front, also a photo of the lounge, except of course I have changed it already. Will try and post a more up to date photo. Things I love about the house are the shower is intense and hot, the wooden floors are warm and easy to clean, the fireplace is cosy and the afternoon sun streams into most rooms and lights them up.

First Impressions, again.

I feel almost as though I have not lived here before. I am having to relearn everything. It will be some time before I walk around to the correct side for the passenger seat of the car and I hope I relearn the direction to look before I get hit by something. I think the worst was doing grocery shopping. I cannot seem to recall any of the products and brands that I used to buy. I spent about an hour and a half for a few bags of shopping because I was pricing, checking ingredients and mostly just feeling overwhelmed. I did spend the first few days just feeling overwhelmed, like I knew nothing and was completely out of place. Now though, my feeling of adventure is returning. I am looking forward to figuring out which bus to take, and am quite excited about finding the Library downtown, of course, Libraries have always been happy places for me. Things that are strange once again include how big everything is. The highways are huge, they go on forever and they fit so many cars at a time. The cars themselves are generally twice the size of cars in Namibia. It is so strange, I feel a little like Alice in Wonderland and I drank a small-making potion. The trees are huge too. Which is something that I love about this part of the world and I love that we have so many huge trees in our garden. The weather adjustment has actually been quite easy, probably because I have been able to just stay indoors on nasty days. What is strange though is the constant cloud cover. My eyes feel like it is just before sunset all the time. More later when I have explored Cville more.

The best thing about the US of A

Tissues with lotion and ... wait for it... vicks! Oh yeah... it's soooo good. you breathe in, it clears you up, you blow out and it clears you up and no sore, red and chapped nostrils. What a wonderful thing.

crazy for crockpot!

There is so much to say about being back in the states, and I will get there. But for now let me talk about the simple wonder in a crockpot. S gave me one that she wasn't using and I am inordinately excited about trying it out. I have gathered together the ingredients for Chilli, vegetarian of course. The beans are soaking overnight and they look gorgeous with their deep and fresh colours in my bright green bowl. tomorrow early I will set everything cooking and hopefully by sometime in the afternoon the whole house will smell edible like when Mom made various deliscious things for meat eaters in her slow cooker. Next I will try three potato soup and maybe even eggplant parmigiana! Will let you know how the chilli works out.