95% Diagnosed?!

Wow... it was a really drawn out process, this "getting labeled" thing!

Sigh...

And kind of frustrating, to be frank. After my first visit back in June I was given one diagnostic questionnaire for me and three to give to friends and family to take. I really didn't have many options as to who could take it, so I had my husband take one, my 12 year old son another and my one local Brazilian friend answer the third.

It turns out that the three of them thought that most of questions were quite irrelevant (they thought it was mostly about a school child -- if I fidgeted in my seat at school or something) and while my husband saw some mild distractability in me (about 65% in the evaluating scale), my friend and my kid basically flunked me.

My responses, on the hand, passed with flying colors, A+! Ha! Now the doctor had a quandary -- I see myself 100% ADD, but other people don't necessarily agree -- based on those questions, obviously! Talking to them, especially to my husband, indicates that they are aware of certain things I do and ways I behave that certainly point to ADD. I also took the other computer-based test, which I did in less than an hour (it's supposed to take up to two hours) and that one is supposed to rule out other conditions such as depression and bipolar disorder. The doctor didn't spend a lot of time going over that one, but I suppose I don't have the other two conditions. I asked him to take two more questionnaires home to have other people respond and see if it would help with the diagnosis and he agreed.

In between my second and third visit I was reading one of my journals and I found this piece of paper in it that I had written when I was 18 years old. I was trying to "define myself" and describe what I was like, so and I typed it up and printed it for the doctor. It was a list of about 50 or more characteristics, many of which are classic ADD symptoms such as:
- talkative
- clumsy/  all-thumbs (I let things fall all the time)
- undisciplined (not in school, in life – I’m impulsive)
- disorganized
- I think too much
- impulsive (I do whatever pops up in my head, whatever I wish, at whatever time)
- unquiet, restless (that kind that “doesn't stay in one place” “doesn't stop moving”)
- I leave everything for the last minute (work, assignments), PROCRASTINATOR
- impatient (I cannot wait for things)
- explosive (I explode, but in a minute it’s always well) “Never take me seriously when I’m nervous or explode because in five minutes I wouldn’t be able to repeat half of what I said”
- I speak everything I think (even too much, even what I shouldn’t)
- Impatient to an extreme
- I’m always in a hurry (I’m always running and I climb stairs jumping 2 or 3 steps at a time)
- Clumsy
- Forgetful (of details, but I generally remember on time to fix things)
- Absent minded (for my stuff)
- Irritable
- Ultra-impatient
(Note that I wrote impulsive twice and impatient three times throughout the list -- as I wrote this list over weeks and months and kept going back to add things as I thought them out)

Other characteristics (I'm not going to bore you with the whole list):
- dreamy
- exaggerated
- anxious
- nervous
- screamer
- loud
- transparent
- Enthusiastic
- Extremely vivacious
- Rebellious
- bossy
- annoying (a hard to translate term in Portuguese "chata")
(screamer & nervous also showed up twice each)

The doctor thought it was good that I had all this "proof" of me having had these characteristics for a long time. I also went over my challenges and and even read this blog post from 2011 to him, which he thought it was also "classic" of ADD people.

Prior to that visit I also had my husband fill the questionnaire with my mom over the phone (she dismissed a lot of questions, she believes that I "want" to be ADD rather than actually being it, sigh...). And I photographed it and had my good friend J (who reads my blog and knows me relatively well [except for the things she can't see because my husband cleans the house and my messes!]) email me her responses so I could fill it out.

I should have had the doctor go over those questionnaires during that third appointment, but thought that he would do it in between that one and my latest appointment (yesterday), but he had NOT tallied the results, which he did during the appointment. That was BAD, but he had to do it because I needed to see those results and see if they would finally help with a diagnosis -- and they did!

My mom did score me about 65% for distractability, but for the rest it was fairly low, around or below the 50% mark. My friend J did score me high (85%) for that too, and fairly low for the other characteristics (hyperactivity and low self-esteem -- a bit higher for her than for my mom).

Prior to the visit I had also read more portions of a book the doctor had me buy: Sari Solden's Women with Attention Deficit Disorder. And I had written the doctor an email with my impressions and the parts I fully identified with -- that was helpful to him (I wish I had reminded him of tallying up the results of the questionnaires in that email, but that's part of his job, he should have been on top of it!). So during the visit the doctor copied this "Self-Screening" questionnaire from Solden's book and had me highlight my answers as well.

At the end of the visit he said that I was "95% diagnosed" and that since I don't want to go the medication route (for now at least), he would work on coaching and other treatment approaches for next time. In order to prepare them he asked me what are some of my challenges and goals (being better organized with paperwork for my teaching and at home, organize office, books, etc, be better at planning in the home front, menu planning, that kind of thing). Let's see what he will come up with to help me!

(written by my 12 year old son who was reading and finding typing errors in my post, I had started with "I'm kind of dis..."):
I'm kind of disappointed that I didn't get 100%. ;-)

hahaha! we're having fun over here, and I think I'm going to hire Kelvin as my editor! ;-)

Anyway, what I meant to say is that I'm kind of disappointed at how long it took and these inconsistencies in how I view myself and how people view me -- again, based on those questions!! which can be faulty, especially for women with ADD -- make me feel doubtful of a diagnosis that for me is/was very clear. :-(

OK, that's where my "labeling quest" took me so far. I'll keep you posted. Any comments/ thoughts would be appreciated, especially from Spanish Prof who was diagnosed years back along with her husband. Oh, and thanks to my sister-in-law who encouraged me to go ahead and seek help. We'll see how helpful it'll be!

Kennedy Space Center Visit - Photo post!

Because I really love to have photo posts, but hardly ever get around to it!

When we were in Florida, instead of going to a theme or a water park we decided to go to Kennedy Space Center - KSC, and it was awesome! I don't know if you're into space exploration & NASA or not, but I've always enjoyed it.

It was the third visit to KSC for K & I (1993, 1997 were the previous ones) and it's changed considerably every time! The relatively new Atlantis exhibit is really awesome.

We also visited the Houston NASA back in 1999 with K's younger brothers and LOVED seeing them build the International Space Station -- back then Brazil was involved too! Now it's no longer one of the countries... :-( -- and train for assembling it in that HUGE pool. Apparently visitors no longer get to see the pool, good thing we saw it back then!!

OK, without further ado, the photos:

 I was not supposed to take this next photo!

 One of the launching stations they lease to SpaceX & others:

 Did you know that this building is so huge (the largest one floor structure in the world!) that if they don't control the humidity and temperature in there, clouds can form and it can RAIN inside!!!!

My boys, Kel's profile:

 The boy that likes to make faces!

 The control room for the first Apollo mission (if I'm not mistaken):

 The Saturn rocket (can't remember the number)

We had lunch and then went outside for some hot air! ;-)

At the back of the building, these weird ugly looking birds (vultures?) love to gather:

 On the way back we see the Atlantis exhibit building:

Before you get to "meet" Atlantis, you see lots of great photos such as this:

 Here it is!

 A scale model:

 Actual size of the rockets & fuel!

 We spent the rest of the time watching the IMAX movies and some of the other exhibits (some of which are pretty weak). Good thing it only rained while we were seeing the movies! I spite of the rain I wanted a photo of this depiction of the Space Station:

 We all enjoyed the visit!

Our Blue Prius!

Here's our new car, isn't it cute? I love it and I never want to drive another car ever, I want a Prius forever now! And hopefully the next one can be green, not blue!

Translating is Mind-Numblingly Boring... ;-)

warning: word repetition for emphasis below. Is that better or worse than ALL CAPS? I hate caps, I suppose it's because I can't stand anyone screaming with me. Not that I don't ever scream with my kids... Sigh...

Well, translating is very time consuming and very very hard and when the text is really really long and dry and technical, it's just boring! :-(

And I still have hundreds of pages to go and only one more full week of vacation without travel (two more with travel -- don't know how I'll translate then, since I much prefer to use the desktop).

I absolutely dread the thought of having to drag this project throughout the semester, but I think it's the only way I will finish and get paid!

I need to admit that this is still WAY better work than the online teaching for University of Phoenix associate Axia College (and it pays way better).

I just need to persevere (because the project is simply way too long) and try not to fall asleep at my chair as I try to consistently translate words such as "intended," "required," "rules, regulations, guidelines," "maintenance, repair," etc. and hundreds of technical terms!

P.S. I feel like eating a very decadent and unhealthy treat. Preferably something with lots of condensed milk and chocolate and maybe berries? Even if I had the ingredients to make such a concoction I just don't have the time!! AAAARGH! (I'm OK with using caps for interjections! Like BLAH! or WOW! ;-) )

Edited to add that my brain isn't working right! ;-) I originally titled this Mind-Mindbogglingly Boring (see the URL) by accident, changed it to Mind-Bogglingly later and now, 8:13 pm I realized that I actually meant to write/say "mind-numblingly" boring!! Sigh...

Going the Second Mile (even while being exploited)

I need to confess that, because I feel exploited in my situation as a lecturer (now "part-time") and an adjunct,  for the most part, I do the bare minimum. I don't spend a lot of time preparing classes and I don't spend a lot of time on campus apart from teaching, only my office hours (none for U#1 because I really don't have time, with the mega-commute and all). (the worst part, perhaps, is that I cannot bring/let myself to feel bad about that, what can I do after all?)

However, I'm going the second mile in dealing with enrollment at U#2 because it's done in a permission basis and we really really need freshmen-junior students (and not seniors) to take the intro language classes so we can build the program.

This year I'm recording every single permission request (a tedious process of copying and pasting the info from various boxes in the university registration system website) and also emailing every single student I grant permission to with a letter that explains that there's a long permission/waiting list and that they were lucky to be selected and also practically "beg" them to continue into the upper level classes.

And I'm doing this all mostly for the benefit of my colleague (and "boss") that will get to teach the upper level classes.

Sigh... It's tough.

Thankfully through all this week I basically forgot completely about the upsetting offer letter I received a week ago. I only thought of it on the morning we were driving to pick up the car and K & I had a conversation in which we were both very very bitter about this whole situation. What I really wish I could do (and K thought would be the right thing to do in these horrible circumstances) would be to wait until the day before classes to tell them that I am not accepting the job and that they can find someone else to teach those classes.

But I need the money. I need to help support my family. I don't have other options, it's the only "job" I've got!! Sigh...

And, of course, I love the students!! (wholeheartedly at U#1 and up to a certain point at U#2, there's a certain "situation" with them that I cannot really discuss for fear of revealing too much about the school and thus blowing my precarious cover -- if you're curious, you can always email me and I can "reveal all!") ;-)

So, yeah. I had to come blog this as therapy as I was working on the registration some because it's helpful.

P.S. I'm very busy translating, trying to catch up after all the time spent with car-shopping. I'm super excited about the car, BTW and hope to blog about it soon!

We're Going Green(er)!!! After All, we're not very Fit anyway! ;-)

I'm so excited! 

We're buying a Prius -- which we thought we couldn't afford -- and we're going to save so much on gas! And be a bit greener too!  

We saw a shiny, fairly new Fit (2010) with only 21,000 miles, but it was more than we wanted to pay (13K). The 2008 Prius has 75,000 miles, but it's only 11K, precisely what we'd planned to spend! YAY!!! 

I'll post a photo tomorrow -- it's blue, not my favorite color (green, rare on cars), at least it's colorful!! I hope the boys will like it! I'm sooooo excited! It's so fancy, all computerized. 

Welcome to the future, right!!? If only we could afford a Tesla! ;-) we spent a fun time looking at them at the super fancy mall when we were in "Mickey Mouth" in Florida on my birthday -- that wast husband's smart silly joke, can you guess the town's name?  

;-)

The Car Saga Continues... Better Fit or Prius?

We missed buying the two cars we saw on Thursday (only K) and Friday, both of us -- we were waiting to hear from the Friday car guy (we offered but he had already gotten another offer) before we made an offer to the Thursday one and, of course!!, both cars sold to other people. :-(

They were Fits, 2009 & 2010 and with 36K and 39K miles respectively and now the standards are SO high that I'm afraid we'll never find the right car in the next two weeks -- which is the window of time we have in order not to have to rent a car to travel to Montreal in early August!!

That's why we're also looking at the Prius. One with good mileage is more expensive than the Fit, but if we can't get the exact Fit (pun intended) we might as well go with the Prius which is also a car we want.

I hope we'll succeed, we were pretty bummed last night when we got the messages about the other two cars being sold! Wish us luck! I'll keep you posted.

46 Years Ago...

warning: this is the "exclamation mark" post, OK? I will try to use less of them as I finish writing, but you have been forewarned! ;-)

...my parents got married in Curitiba, Parana (Brasil)! (one photo here)

My uncle Hugo married them on his birthday, he was turning 35 and today was his 81st birthday!

I was talking to my mom on the phone about their wedding earlier this evening and she said that my aunt Ofélia (the oldest of my dad's four sisters) congratulated mom on facebook and wrote "I never met someone again  that lost their shoes on their wedding day!" And my mom said that she didn't even remember that -- but it was a big (super stressful) part of her day!

The last time I heard the full story was years ago, but we should have her tell it to all of us sometime soon again. And we also need to have the 16 mm movie of that day turned into a DVD!!

In today's phone call I was asking if the lost shoe had made her late, but no, it wasn't that, something else delayed her wedding for an hour! I'll get to that in a minute, but first, a few anecdotes about that day.

My mom had purchased the shoe and left it inside her wardrobe, but one day her older sister decided to organize the clothes and she had the "bright" idea of hanging the shoe (which was in a stringed bag) from one of the hangers. Unfortunately when the wedding day came my mom just couldn't find the shoe and to her chagrin and stress she had to go buy another one!

Another funny story is that my paternal grandmother wanted to make her son, the groom, look beautiful, so she got this bottle of perfume and reportedly poured the whole thing on my dad! He then went and took another shower to try to get rid of some of the strong scent.

I'm sure there were many other things, but the real "scandal" according to my mom was that she was really late for the wedding ceremony (about an hour) -- something unheard of and very rude at that time, she told me. The problem is that they needed to be married by a justice of the peace first and my dad's uncle was going to be the notary public in the civil ceremony. It turns out that the notary uncle was told to go to my mom's brother Paulo's house for the civil marriage, but he didn't know that Paulo had moved so he went to Paulo's old house, waited for an hour and then went back home. It took everyone a long time to figure out where the notary had gone and by then the justice of peace had left! They signed all the papers anyway after the notary uncle showed up because there couldn't have been a religious ceremony without the civil one having taken place. My mom said that they could have annulled their marriage afterwards because no justice of peace had been present!

Needless to say they never did that and 46 years they are still very happy together. Happy Anniversary, mom and dad! I'm sorry there was so much stress on your wedding day!

Better Fit than Not, right? Car shopping adventures begin!

I briefly mentioned earlier this month that we're having trouble with our old minivan, so I wanted to do an update and let you know that we're actually car shopping right now, sigh...

We decided (last year, in fact) to buy a Fit & later on save to buy a Prius since we need  to cars -- for now we'll keep using the Hyunday Accent that we bought in 2012 & I never blogged about 'cause I needed to take a photo! I suppose we'll be done with the bigger cars for several reasons (mostly cost) and we will all miss our dear old Odyssey like crazy! :-(

K saw a car 1h30 from here last night and we're scheduled to see another one a little closer in about an hour. This guy put this car on Craigslist last night and he has FOUR people to see it today*, so... yeah, I don't know what our chances are. Maybe it's not meant to be! I'll keep you posted!

* It seems like today is not our day, right? We also got this mysterious letter from the IRS indicating something may be wrong (like we didn't pay our taxes -- WHAT?!). I'm freaking out thinking "identity theft." Hopefully it's nothing!

Back to Real Contingency -- Full Time Employment is NO MORE

I received the "offer" letter just now from U#2's HR. I knew it was coming, but still, I shed a few tears and  I'm livid and I'm angry and I'm devastated. Most of all, I'm as angry as can be.

I had put off for as long as possible even contacting the chair of the department, but maybe I should have contacted hir.

It's a one semester contract for half of what they pay a full-time person a year. That means that if they change their minds due to enrollment and decide to "give" me three classes in the Spring (they're probably going to give me only two) I will have effectively have been full time for a year but WITHOUT BENEFITS.

In fact, because I teach two FIVE CLASS-HOUR meetings (4 credit) classes, BEING PAID FOR THREE CREDITS (their flat rate for a class), if I teach two classes in the Spring I WILL HAVE WORKED the equivalent hours of FULL-TIME at this university. (At least this semester I'm not driving 152 miles  every day because I'm not teaching five days a week for 50 minutes each class, I'm teaching 4 days with longer classes on Tuesday/Thursday -- still too many hours teaching for the pay).

Sigh... OK, I'm done, I can write no more without screaming non stop here. I know I will calm down very quickly and that I will write the chair a very calm email, but still... This is unfair and horrible and I knew it was coming, but I was still unprepared.

And the reason why I didn't even contact them was that I was pretty confident it wouldn't help at all.

Thanks for listening. And bear with me next semester as the "Working in the Margins" label gets filled with angst & a hint of despair.

Ha Ha...

I hate academia, why am I still in it?? WHY? (There is a short answer: because I don't want/can't have a 9-5 job and I want to do "kind of" what I prepared for with that useless phd I don't regret).

From Gates to Jobs & back to Gates

Last week we finally broke down and bought a desktop computer -- our second Dell and our third desktop ever, the first one was a Gateway that we bought in 1998 and used for eight years! Our old Dell from 2006 was obsolete and had become useless since it couldn't go online after we moved to this house in 2011 (there's no phone jack in our office!).

After buying my very first Macbook Pro back in 2012 I thought that our new computer would be an iMac, but unfortunately we can't afford that. In addition, after two years as a Mac user, but not a Mac "convert," I was becoming increasingly frustrated with my inability to back up my photos (I still have 25,000+ photos that I have to dig from the dungeon that is iPhoto in my macbook and save into an external hard-drive and to another computer -- ARGH!!).

I enjoy a lot of features of the macs and I'm addicted to my iPhone, but, ultimately, I still prefer to use a desktop over a laptop (much more ergonomic and easier to type, etc) and we desperately needed a new computer in the house now that the boys are into Minecraft (we're very late adopters into most everything! ;-), so... back to PC-land!

I will confess that working on this desk with this old monitor again does bring some unpleasant flashbacks of those crazy dissertating days (hey, YEARS!)  from 2005-6 and 2008! The worst part, I suppose is that I still feel 100% like I would do it all over again!! Sigh...

Because of this latest project I will probably spend lots of time sitting at this desk and typing in this keyboard in the next week or two, so I think I'll have many more feedbacks. The truth is that I really really missed working on a desktop in these past three years! I had an iMac in my office at U#2 and I used it as often as I could, but I was pretty much tethered to the macbook at home.

I still want to own an iMac, but I don't see us being able to afford one any time soon. Sigh...

OK, last, but not least, I suppose my fondness for desktops can be compared to my preference for books over e-readers (not that I've ever used a Kindle), but I suppose that's a pretty uneven comparison. Gotta go do some more translating now!

P.S. hopefully now I will be able to post more photos. And let's see if I'll miss Apple!!

P.S.2 I had some trouble installing Office, but I must say that Microsoft's customer support is pretty stellar! And I don't think I ever have to pay extra for it, like with Apple Care. Ha! I'm sure I'll come back to this subject again, should I create a label for that?

Freelancing

I had to create a new label for this post -- translating!

I suppose it's because in the past 10 years since I started blogging I didn't do whole a lot of translations whereas in graduate school I translated  and interpreted a lot through a center in my university. I am not a certified translator, but I have lots of experience from those years translating professionally and think I do a pretty good job (sorry about the lack of modesty!).

I needed to share this here because in the next few weeks, possibly even months, I have a HUGE translation job to accomplish. This local company contacted my department at the university many months ago and the chair gave them my email address so we began to talk about this project. We met, I gave them a quote and they decided to give me the job.

So, it turns out that I'll have a "summer job" that I'm hoping won't extend too much into the semester or else I'll go crazy! And I also hope that the IRS doesn't keep too big a chunk of the sum I am going to be paid... yeah, they'll probably keep a few thousand. :-( 

(I totally don't mind paying taxes, but it's way easier when they're taken from your pay check and don't have to be paid by myself as will be the case with this freelance project, sigh...)

I haven't started the project yet, but I will soon. It's hundreds of pages of a very technical user's manual. Wish me luck!

Amateur Blogging is Dead & That's So Sad! (ironic, but sincere, silly rhyme)

My bloggy friend MemeGRL (or O whom I met IRL [in real life] at a "blogger meet up" dinner at Lauren's house before I read her blog, same thing with my friend Anjali) titled her post "Having No Readers is Freeing," but I don't know if I agree, probably not exactly, though I suppose it can be true! I can write anything if I'm "freed" from an audience, right? Nah...

For me, the feeling of having no readers anymore is depressing. I have decided, however, -- together with Jo(e) and then JaneB -- that I'll be one of "The Last (Amateur) Blogger Standing" -- before I even had the word Amateur to add to that sentence -- thanks O, I like to be called "amateur blogger!" ;-)

Here's what O wrote:

Ah, the end of the age of amateur blogs. It was fun to be here while the form morphed and I enjoyed it. I'm not stopping what I'm doing--it absolutely serves the purpose I meant it to serve. But it is strange watching my Feedly depopulate.

I love that first sentence and I borrowed the idea for my post's title. Anyone else wants to join our little band of "last amateur bloggers standing"? 

As for me, I simply feel sad to see the community that I had become part of when I started this blog disappear. It also saddens me to be posting so infrequently now that I don't get the feedback (however little) that I used to get. It's very comforting to think that at least two of my "IRL" friends and one family member read this blog (they are also bloggers -- sorry, too many links already in this post, I don't feel like adding more, just woke up from a nap, still exhausted from yesterday's wedding). It's also cool that once in a while I'll get a commenter that I hadn't seen before (like JaneB).

My need for blogging hasn't really diminished and like O says, it does still serves the purposes I want and need -- in this case, a space to reflect upon my life and to record significant events, a kind of public journaling (duh, pretty obvious, right?).

So I'm not quitting because I love it. And if I can have a small group still around, I suppose I'll be happy. But I will forever be missing those other relationships that were forged via blogs even though I'm in touch with a lot of those people on facebook. I miss you lots and lots everyday, M, Anastasia, Professing Mama, Dawn, Aliki, (and Anjali too), etc. Sigh... I'll stop or I'll get too nostalgic!

And I'm thrilled that those of you appearing weekly on my side-bar feed are still around for the ride!

I Missed the World Cup Final Game Because...

... we had to be at our friends' wedding that started at the same time as the game!! :-(

Well, maybe you wouldn't care, but for me, and for many people around the world who really love and enjoy watching the World Cup this is/was extremely exasperating!

When I found out the date of their wedding (the day after missing the engagement party which my family attended last December) I immediately texted both the bride and groom and told them that they should be aware that they had scheduled it for the day of the final!! How could they do that?

But they didn't care!! :-( And then, they got really, really lucky because Brasil (sorry, I will follow my practice on FB & will use the Portuguese spelling here) was not in the final after that devastating loss.*

We love these friends dearly, though, and because of some complex circumstances (her dad being against their relationship & marriage and not providing any financial support), they needed all of their friends to come together to help them, her mom, and his parents and family so they could have the wedding of their dreams. (she's in her first year of medical school and really wanted/needed to get marry this summer, precisely in the middle of her 4 week break)

So... yeah, not only were we at the wedding, but we and three other families (including my only local Brazilian friend) were "honorary families" and we were actually honored in the ceremony by being escorted by the groom and walking in (and then, immediately going to the cafeteria adjacent to the church to finish preparing the food -- we didn't even get to take photos with the bride & groom! ;-( ).

Sigh... I'm writing all this because I'm really, really exhausted after we edited their reception video until 3 am last night after I'd gone to four stores to buy ingredients to make punch. I was responsible for all the drinks of the reception and I didn't stop spooning sherbet into lemon-lime soda for about 3-4 hours. Sigh...

And I want to sleep, but my husband is watching the game online. An excellent game, a CLASSIC final with Argentina vs. Germany, so of course I'm blogging!

In case you're not aware of it, most if not ALL people in Brasil were rooting for Germany and against Argentina -- isn't that crazy? Brazilians are so "anti-Argentina" that it's almost annoying. The BBC published/posted an article explaining this phenomenon.

OK, I'm all over the place, as always! I want to try to post some photos of the wedding as well as more commentary on the world cup (interesting links), I hope I can do that!

P.S. It was a beautiful wedding and reception (though it was positively exhausting!)...


* I wanted to write more about that, at least share a bunch of links. For now I will just say that during our drive back on Thursday I thought more about the game, felt very very sad and shed a few tears. But my husband told me to stop and said I could only cry SEVEN tears, one for each goal, ha ha ha :-( really dark humor! In any case, I probably did cry only about seven tears, it was a pretty short-lived outpouring of grief!

The Most Shocking Result Ever!

Or "the worst day in the World Cup ever" or something like that. Not my words at all, but those of ESPN's announcers.

Today experienced announcers who have been covering World Cups for years and years lost their voices, had no words, were momentarily speechless. There was no way to explain what happened -- it had never happened before quite like that! It defied World Cup history and peoples expectations, all at the same time!

And what could we say to our boys? Particularly the 10 year old who really likes soccer? "Son, this has never happened before, they've never played so badly!" "Don't be upset, there will be other World Cups, maybe they'll do better in the future!"

I was ten years old as well back in 1982, the first World Cup I remember watching. We cried and felt traumatized when Brasil lost to Italy in the quarterfinals. My little brother was inconsolable, poor thing! But there was a crucial difference! (Many, in fact) That team was absolutely wonderful! They played marvelously, artistically, beautifully and reminded he country of he team from the 70s. Zico, Eder, Sócrates, Falcão, Cerezo, were great!!!

This year we had no team, really. A few good players, but they were not a cohesive unit, with technique as well as talent. Utterly frustrating! Add to that a coach who prized emotion above all and used really bad techniques to try and motivate the team (like playing videos of poor orphaned children and saying that they were going to "save" the country and it's people). The pressure of playing at home was too great and they were ill prepared!

Yeah... They'd barely made it to the semifinals, that's the truth, but that still doesn't explain he humiliating defeat 7 X 1. My personal explanation has to do with lack of training and, particularly, nerves! I kept joking that While the German have nerves made of "titanium" Brasil has nerves of tissue paper! 

My brother thinks it was a sinister fluke that led them to suffer 4 goals in literally SIX minutes!! Fluke or no fluke, it was pretty embarrassing!!

And I hope that it never happens again!

South American, European or Mixed World Cup Final?

I love the World Cup, but some negative interactions I had on the Facebook chat (messenger) on the eve of my birthday left a bitter taste in my mouth (it was this childish 60 year old guy from Church married to a Colombian lady who knows nothing about soccer and yet took upon himself to harass & annoy me insisting that Brazil had "robbed" Colombia... Sigh... I should just block this guy!).

Brazil, Germany, Argentina & the Netherlands are the four teams left in the World Cup, so there are three options for a final: all-European: Germany vs. Netherlands; all-South American: Brazil vs. Argentina or a mixed final with either of them. 

We'll see how Brasil (that's the Portuguese spelling) will do today! I'm pretty nervous! And I'm also leery of watching games on a hotel room! Back in 2010 we were in a hotel in Atlanta & Brasil lost to the Netherlands! :-( I hope it won't happen again today! It's not the same hotel chain, let's see if that helps!!

I don't know if I can enjoy posting on Facebook during this game if I don't block that guy... Sigh...

Wish us luck! ;-)

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I had a lovely birthday! We drove 1,000 miles so I could be with one my my oldest and dearest friends and it was so worth it! 

We went out, spent time together, ate and our kids played together as well, it was great!! More later!

Oh, and my birthday is always on a pretty date which was prettier this year 'cause 7+7=14!

Beach Blogging!

It's a canal beach (safer for our friends' little kids), but still a beach! 

And we're thrilled to be here!! Photos to follow later when I'm using wifi!

Driving South towards... A hurricane? (edited!)

We have dear friends in Florida and every couple of years we like to visit them. I was already blogging when we started this "tradition," so I can actually add links for personal reference!

1) The first trip was in August 2006 (here's the announcement and some photos of the boy, the sea and the sunset -- we did lots, went to a water park and to Sea world and to the beach a lot!);
2) in December 2008 we had a nice winter trip, but I was overwhelmed by my University of Phoenix gig and didn't post any more.
3) In November 2010 we spent "Thanksgiving at the Beach" after a Star Wars marathon watching and a visit to Sea World!
4) The fourth, and last, was K's family "reunion" holidays in Orlando in 2011-2, we went to the beach, to Disney (1 park, 1 day) and enjoyed time with family in a house with a pool!

 

The best trips are when we go come in the Winter and get to enjoy lovely warm weather, but we don't mind going coming in the summer, especially because our friends live near very nice beaches (photos here - I'll add later).

When we planned this trip we never imagined that maybe we won't get to enjoy the beach because there's a storm headed to FL! :-(
edited to add: it seems like hurricane Arthur is going up the coast headed North, YAY!

It will still be lovely to see our friends, though! After all we're traveling to see them and so I can spend my birthday with one of my best friends and her family!

I'm hoping we can still get to use all those beach clothes we packed, though! Let's see what happens!

P.S. after editing the post and adding links I'm convinced that we'll "have" to go to Sea World once more. Both boys can ride the roller coasters now, I think!

The World Cup, NPR & Facebook

I was thrilled to see that the U.S.'s World Cup game yesterday was all over NPR this morning!

I haven't been blogging much, but I've been extremely active on Facebook (which I otherwise don't like) during World Cup games & I'm having a blast!!! 

There's nothing like real-time interactions with far away friends to help me not to be so nervous during Brazil's games and to have fun during the other ones!

And because I truly enjoy soccer, it's a delight to be interacting with friends who are also fans! Every four years I fully enjoy  a month of soccer frenzy and this year it's better because the TV shows beautiful images of my country, a win-win situation!! 

OK, let's hope Brazil doesn't get eliminated (like the US) on Friday!