Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Busy, busy, impending departures and arrivals

Just a quick note to say things have been kind of crazy over here. Hubby's travelling next Monday, my parents arrive from Brazil next Tuesday.

Last Friday my husband finally found out he was going to Brazil to give a talk at the university he's interested in applying to. We were waiting to hear back from the consulate, because he didn't want to buy a ticket without a date for his Visa interview. It's impossible to schedule an interview at the American consulate in Brazil without 2 months' notice, and he had to do it through their emergency service.

We were driving to Maryland/Virginia for the weekend when we found out the consulate had given the go ahead to schedule the interview. When we stopped for a few hours at my brother-in-law's house before continuing to Richmond, VA, he bought his plane ticket, and some other stuff he has to take along with him. In VA we had a good time with friends we hadn't seen for quite a while. It was good to have some "academic" conversations, since we stayed at the house of a doctoral student friend, and visited a post-doc friend and his family (all of them Brazilians). Kelvin had a great time playing with our friends' 6 year-old daughter and 10 y.o. son. Too bad our car battery died and had to be replaced, but at least we were not on the road, but enjoying the beautiful pool at our friends' apartment complex. Back home from the weekend, we're very busy with packing, hubby's even busier trying to prepare his talk, and, maybe, just maybe, the application for the Florida university. He may not have time to work on that, which is sad. Why is it that everything has to happen always at once?

My parents are coming. That means I have to make up my mind to let go of the kids for a while and work, work, work. Major problem -- I have nowhere to go. I'll try to work at the house, but if that doesn't work out, I'll have to find a good library to drive to. Our town library is only two blocks away and open most afternoons, but it's really really small. What should I do? It would be great if I could go to UPenn, but the price for commuting would be just too high.

Well, we'll see what'll happen. The good thing is that I won't be alone while hubby's in Brazil!

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