The Brasil Trip Continues

sorry for leaving the z out, I prefer Brasil with s the way we write in Portuguese :-)

I'm visiting my brother's house for the first time in 10 years! He lived 8 years abroad and I haven't been to Brazil for the past 2.5 years.

A quick summary of the past two weeks: after we arrived back from the trip to the state of Paraná and the Falls, my sons spent a week hanging out with their cousins who are closest in age (sons of "K2" who lives in Egypt). They rode bikes, played tons of WiiU and some Minecraft and we all spent an afternoon making tie-dye t-shirts for ALL the kids in the family -- the 8 grandkids of my in-laws + K's aunt's 2 grandkids and 2 shirts for my twin friends' kids (the two that were there with us), plus two t-shirts for my mom and one for me). And I still dyed a giant towel with the leftover dye.

My sister-in-law was at her mom's house all week with my niece (who is 3 and the cutest, sweetest little girl ever) and nephew (4.5), so I spent as much time with them as I could.

In the middle of the week I went clothes shopping with my mom at a nearby town that has lots of textile factories and stores and we also got hundreds of liters of spring water from a local spring (my parents do that every few months so they don't have to buy good drinking water).

Then my husband arrived on Friday (7/14) and his family members started to arrive, one brother on Saturday and the other o Sunday for the BIG reason for this trip: his grandmother's 90th birthday party and family reunion. My mother-in-law's two sisters and two brothers and their children were there on Saturday already and we had a lovely lunch celebration at her cousin's house. The birthday celebration on Sunday night was awesome and the next day nearly the whole family went to a hot water springs resort a few hours away where we stayed until yesterday (Friday).

It was great, but a lot of the kids got sick with the stomach flu. :-(

I hate to end on this negative note, but this will be a BIG week -- we're going to Rio for a whirlwind pre-Olympics tour!!

Safe, and Frantically Traveling, in Brazil

We arrived safely here on Friday, but the delay made the trip into a 24+ event from leaving our house to arriving at my parents'. The bus we could have taken at noon to go to the town closer to them was full and we could only take the 2pm bus. Thankfully, a dear friend who had come to pick up a suitcase from her mom that we brought, had prepared a big bag of food for us! Such a great gift!

Saturday was a great day spent with family and friends (including the same friend who had gone to the airport), but in the evening when we saw what the forecast was for the week and that a cold front was coming to Iguazu Falls (Foz do Iguaçu -- foz doesn't mean falls, BTW, it means the meeting of several rivers), we decided to leave on Sunday & started packing.

We couldn't leave as early as we wanted, but the trip went well and we reached our friends' house before 7:30 pm. This morning we left earlier and arrived at the Falls before sundown (5:30). Tomorrow we see the falls (five minutes away from where we are!), both the Brazilian and the Argentinian sides. I will share photos in the evening if possible. I need to empty a bunch of photos from my iPhone's memory so I can photograph and blog from the phone.

The best of the trip so far is having Wi-Fi in so many places -- people's houses, restaurants, lodging. That way I can be in touch with my husband and friends & family. Hope to be back tomorrow with more!

Flight delayed

Our flight was delayed for a technical problem, but hopefully now we'll depart uneventfully! 

Leaving for Brazil

Everything went pretty smoothly & the only thing I didn't do was to plant these perennial plants I'd bought one or two months ago. :-( Maybe K can plant them, poor guy! At least last night I put the flowers in pots. 

I had a bunch of last minute shopping to do, but we didn't leave for town until I was 100% packed! (Minus the items I bought and some last minute items of clothing plus the computer external hard drive). 

We came home, finished packing, the kids ate (pizzas I bought them at Target) & K tried to get me to eat some yummy mushroom & truffle ravioli style triangles from Tradwr Joe's I had prepared last night, but I was looking for old photo negatives and trying  not to forget anything. So now I'm starving (and craving the pasta) and I guess I'll have to eat at the airport because the flight doesn't leave until 10:05.

I'm excited about this trip! We all love traveling, the boys are well trained from babyhood & are seasoned travelers. Kelvin has checked the aircraft & he is upset that United downgraded the planes that fly to Brasil from 777 to 767 (well, from Chicago it was 77, probably from here it may always been 767).

Ok, let me talk to my poor husband in the half hour until we get to the airport!

20 Years Ago

20 years ago last Monday (June 20th) K & I arrived in the U.S. with 7 pieces of luggage. 1996! it feels like a lifetime ago, and I guess it is, considering that I was nearly 25 at the time. In a few years I will have lived longer in this country than in Brazil.

Interestingly enough, the past almost 11 years are chronicled here in this blog, it's a pity that most the friends who were reading back then are not anymore. 

Happy 20th anniversary of emigration for us! ;-)

List of Updates

- We drove my parents to the JFK airport in New York on Monday. LOOOONG day driving for over 12 hours. Sigh... They arrived safely in Brazil.

- Car situation still not resolved (and my poor dad super stressed about it). Tank was flushed, but car won't start. Of course it's NOT in the Toyota dealership & I guess the mechanics don't have any experience with hybrids. We're trying to figure out a solution.

- I'm packing to fly to Brazil tomorrow night. I hate packing and the days before trips. So much stress! Thankfully if I forget anything my husband follows in two weeks.

- Boys will miss the last three weeks of swim team, but they have been swimming SUPER well, it's awesome to see. I even want them to swim/have some swim lessons maybe in Brazil (except that we'll be traveling most of the time).

- I STILL HAVE NOT planted flowers that I bought into the vases that I always have by the front steps in the summer. HORRIBLE, no? I should stop blogging and go do it. Sigh...

more later.

On (Almost) Being Ripped Off & Resolution In Sight!

Well, I don't have a lot of time because our friends (who had ADORABLE twins 10 months ago) came up for the wedding (I PROMISE more on the wedding soon) and are coming for dinner.

So... we almost were COMPLETELY ripped off by the Toyota place in Maryland.

SERIOUSLY! And, besides, their estimate caused a lot of sadness and needless worry and despair. So, unfortunately we've already lost 400+ because of this car situation, but, apparently the people in the Toyota dealership where our car was taken to are specialists in ripping off customers.

They wanted to replace everything and would charge us 2,400 when our own Toyota dealership, whom my husband called this morning, said that this accident of putting diesel in a gasoline car is common and NOT serious and that they charge...

... wait for it.

TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY dollars to fix it. (which just involves flushing the system completely)

Isn't that unbelievable?? The other Toyota's place wants to charge 10 times more for unnecessary repairs.

Anyway. Problem is that our car is in Maryland, so a friend of ours who owns a tow truck and a dealership/garage has put us in this list in which tow trucks from all over the country transport cars to other locations for a much cheaper price. We don't know when our car will be transported to our local Toyota, but hopefully it will be done within the next month (my husband travels to Brazil on July 14, we go on June 30).

OK, have to go continue preparing for my guests!

A Sad Post with an Undecided Ending -- What would YOU do?

I need to write his as a sad "coda" to today's earlier update post.

Something very unfortunate happened on Thursday. Our car, my blue Prius (which my husband jokingly calls "Blue Cloud," nuvem azul in Portuguese), broke down with my parents in it, in Maryland.

The whole thing was crazy because I was in town with the kids driving a shift gear car around while on the phone, and having to go to Costco to buy pizza for the guests and my mom & her friend were face-timing us and then calling every few minutes while I was with Geico on the phone trying to sort out the situation. Good thing Kelvin has a phone and could talk to my mom & their friend while I talked to Geico.

My parents wouldn't leave the car and stayed in it for FIVE HOURS until the tow truck arrived. People stopped to try to help them, it was an adventure... (I haven't even heard all the many stories they have). They were stuck on top of an overpass. I deeply regret having allowed them to sit there (while their friends went home -- they could have just gone there) uselessly, but I had guests to cook for and entertain and didn't insist they leave the car behind while the tow truck was on its way. The only good thing was that my mom walked to the Toyota Dealership (VERY CLOSE to where the car broke, just down the street) & checked the car in, giving all the necessary info. (In retrospect I should have told them to have their friends pick them up after that).

And yesterday (after Toyota worked on the car all day -- diagnostic alone is $500) we found out what the problem was/IS. My dad accidentally put diesel in the car. :-(

Fixing it costs more than half of what the car is worth. 2,400 (worth -- in perfect condition, 4K).

Please tell me, what would you do?? Ditch the car? Fix it? Would it even work OK and pass inspection afterwards? -- K read that the catalytic converter can get damaged. We TOTALLY can do without it for now and for a while because we bought a mini-van to drive around with my parents & have a Hyundai Accent. We could also fix it and try to sell it. Or fix it & keep it 'till it dies. What should we do?

My parents are understandably devastated and want to pay for everything. But, what is the best course of action?

I'm just very sad, especially because I didn't want this to have happened to my parents, they've been having such a GREAT visit with us (apart from the one day my mom felt sick). We'll get over it, but right now it's hard. Any thoughts are appreciated.

:-(

I'm Officially Old! 8-(

I need reading glasses!  :-(

/       /
O - O

(I made that up, couldn't find instructions online, though I'm sure they exist!)

However, I don't really need them because it's only in ONE eye!!! (my right eye, +1.50)

I've noticed this lately when using my phone and I'm sure that all the reading on my phone PLUS crazy texting and messaging is the culprit for this.

The eye doctor told me, however, that they may have done this on purpose when I had LASIK: made one eye's correction better so the other eye had a chance to still be slightly near-sighted and not need reading glasses. THAT or my brain being incredibly smart and managing to do that on its own.

In any case, I hope this situation will hold. And, if the right eye is bothering me too much, I can buy a cheap pair and knock out the left eye lens. :-P

I suppose I should be happy I had four great-eye years after getting LASIK in 2012. I'm almost 45, so it's not a surprise I finally have this problem. Do you need reading glasses?

--> So, I created a label for this post. If I really do continue blogging as I intend to, I'll be using it in the years to come.

Crazy Changing (& Traveling & Hosting) Times (and I hate Facebook)

Sigh...

Sorry, but I have to begin with a sigh.

Can't believe it's been 20 days since I last blogged. Unbelievable.

Such few people from my old circle blog today (or read this blog), though, and I don't think I'm picking up any new readers or making any new bloggy friends, that I end up spending a lot of time on stupid facebook. I know I should simply unfollow (-->word not recognized by spell check!) most of the 600+ people in my friend list and stick to old-blogger-friends-who-now-facebook-instead and just not be there, but, yeah... blogging is so... I don't know 2004, 5, 6, 7?

And then there are other apps that allow us to talk to friends and family and too much time on my phone.

OK, quick update because I need to write two or three or more blog posts if I truly want to catch up.

My (next to) last post outlined "the crazy" from the second week of May. Well... it turns out the crazy from June would be CRAZIER than I'd anticipated, with a tragic note (next post).

The whirlwind trip to Massachusetts (for a wedding on May 29, one of those (big, huge) weddings you go to where you only know the bride and two other people, then New York City and a brief stop in Philly/PA was great. We left for New Jersey on Saturday (stayed at a hotel) -- my in-laws were here and went there too since they flew out of NYC on Sunday -- then drove to the wedding and drove back to spend the night in Connecticut. Spent the day in NYC on Monday (visited the MoMA and went up on Top of the Rock) -- that wasn't my youngest son's favorite way of spending his 12th birthday, but it was not like he had any choice. We indulged his wish to not dine in the city (OH, SO SAD! So many delicious ethnic eateries) & ate at Panera close to our friends' house in Long Island.

On Tuesday we drove back to Manhattan to park and visited the Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island (GORGEOUS DAY!!) before walking back to see the 9/11 memorial and driving to Philly to sleep at our other friends' house (yes, we have countless friends at whose houses we stay, that's why we also host countless friends here). And on Wednesday, we went to see Samson at Sight and Sound and visited (our favorite!!) Longwood Gardens in the afternoon before saying good-bye to my parents (who stayed in Philly at our friends' house) & heading back home -- stopping at IKEA for furniture shopping (more on that later) & dinner (with bonus sunset!).

Sigh... wasn't that intense? But it was fun and we had lovely weather.

When we got home, I had to work on my friends' wedding shower of and that was also intense and a big success (with a small group of attendants) & I didn't take enough photos, which makes me sad.

The shower was barely over when my parents came back with our friend and her two kids (7 & 9) -- she had decided to bring my parents back and spend a few days here sightseeing and enjoying her kids second week of vacation in the countryside (they live in North Philly right now). That meant we went to the park, went to the farmer's market and shopping (mostly my mom & my friend, to thrift stores), went sightseeing at other local attractions and to the water park all day on Friday.

Since my older son's dear friend is moving to TN, we invited him to the waterpark with us and on Friday morning had a Wii & WiiU playdate with four loud boys (while my mother was sick in bed with something (some kind of digestive discomfort with nausea and dizziness) -- right next door to the family/TV room). Sigh...

Mom recovered quickly and then... and then we started the crazy process of moving our office from upstairs to downstairs so the boys can have separate rooms!! Yeah, it took me this long to get to the "changing"/moving part of the post that comes first in the title.

IDEALLY, we would have first painted the family room downstairs, then moved everything, then painted Kelvin's new bedroom, then assembled the IKEA furniture we bought, but, we didn't have all that time AND... were going to have guests again this past Thursday, so we wanted to get the bed together ASAP for the guests (twin that turns to king bed -- LOVE IKEA and foam mattresses).

We didn't do the painting, BUT we did ALL the filming. Yeah, this is the house of a YouTuber and, having enjoyed immensely our previous furniture moving time-lapse, we filmed everything again, except that this took a lot of time (WAY less than it would have taken to paint, ha ha ;-) because we couldn't find the tripod (probably lost it), then the memory cards wouldn't work, or the camera's battery would end and need to be recharged. But we finally moved most everything in time for the guests who arrived mid-day on Thursday.

This was my husband's cousin and (newly pregnant!) wife plus three friends & a baby. They all live in Michigan and came for a speaking engagement in D.C. The friend who came by himself is actually practically family to me -- he was the baby of my next-door neighbors when I was growing up in Brazil and his family remained really close to mine, so I've known him from the time he was born (the Seventh-day Adventist church community is really a huge world-wide family, you always know someone who knows someone, all over the world, especially if you're Brazilian!!) :-D

They stayed only 24h and my parents actually left for Maryland not long after they arrived. Their visit included an unexpected rain shower while on a hiking trail (which let to iPhones on rice and rice getting into charging ports and whatnot), but I didn't go on the visit to the park because I had to take the boys to have their vision checked and mine was too (another quick post for that). And yesterday I did stuff for my friends' wedding, picking up mason jars, getting nails done, YAY! loved that part!, shopping for fruit and cakes (YUMMY, can't wait to eat them!!), picking up photo booth, practicing music briefly.

YEAH... CRAZY busy. So, yeah, I'm tired and slept only about six hours, but I'm wired and can't sleep from the moment I open my eyes (generally between 6 something -7 something).

Last, but not least! I worked out three times this week with friends. They do Pop Physique & Barre. I'm lovin' it!! (but I do want to try to go back to doing Yoga every week in addition to that fun ladies' group work out).

So there you go, mostly updated about my (crazy) life!!

Manhattan, I've missed you!

Photo taken from the George Washington Bridge

I used to come visit nearly every year during our 8 years in MA. And for the six years we lived in Philly our Brazilian consulate was here, so we came for passports for the boys and for dropping and picking up up family at the airport. I took the boys to various playgrounds at the Central Park several times & felt like a local even though I lived a couple of hours away.

In 2008, on the way back after my dissertation defense, we stopped here on a whim on Memorial Day and took the kids to this awesome playground with a natural stone slide. I'm thrilled that we're going back on Memorial Day tomorrow, after we attend a wedding in MA today. 

I can't wait! 

Quick update of my "indiscriminate and reckless" helping ;-)

I began to write this last night, but then felt bad that my husband was driving and I wasn't talking to him, so I stopped. And then this morning I wrote the other quick post about NYC.

My life has been crazy & intense three past few weeks. I hadn't even finished turning my last grades in when I began to work on some crafts projects of decorations for my friend's wedding. Since we're traveling this week, I needed to have most everything done before the trip, so I threw myself feverishly and hyper-focused-ly into work after I decided which colors to use (when I talked to the bride) and what to make. After she sees them at the shower next weekend, I want to post photos and share more details!

--> The post's title comes from my an email I sent to my friend when I was feeling guilty for making too much stuff that she might not even like or use (you'll understand when you see the photos). She thought it was hilarious that I talked about my helping that way! ;-)

My parents helped me a lot with those projects and more, but things got crazier when I threw myself head-first (again) into helping with my son's eighth grade graduation. I went completely overboard as usual. I took photos of the 8th graders in class on Friday 5/20 (and spent most of the day at the school as the kids received and signed their yearbook). Photographed them in their concerts at church the next day, went to soccer games on Sunday, and last, but most importantly, took formal portraits in black & white of each 8th grader on Monday.

Then I began to edit the photos, ordered prints at Costco, and continued collecting photos and croping them to create collages for each of the 14 kids while my parents painted wooden photo frames. In the meantime, my friend, whose son is the class president (my son is treasurer) was crocheting a blanket on her spare time as a class gift to the teacher (she works full time, BTW).

Sigh... I had 4-5 hours of sleep every night on these weeks. 

Oh, and did I mention that my in-laws arrived for the graduation on Wednesday,  I helped decorate all day on Thursday (the graduation was that evening), and on Friday, after all of it, I had to take ice cream cake to celebrate younger son's birthday with his class since it was the last day of school & his birthday is May 30.

Are you exhausted yet reading this? But it was all awesome! The graduation reception was very lovely and the children loved it. I even wrote a letter/card for each of them during the ceremony.

Ok. I'll have a photo post now with the few pics on my phone!

Almost over... and, Broken (by the grading)

This year the grading broke me.

I mean, it wasn't the grading, it was the online homework that many students didn't complete that broke me. I didn't check it until the very end, as I usually do (because it's time consuming), but this year, I decided I was going to be more strict and really take points off for late submission. After all, they were aware of the deadline. Until... I realized that several students had NOT done the work.

And some of those were really good students who were doing well. Some of them contacted me after the final yesterday, when they saw the damage their lack of homework had inflicted on their grade. Some of them actually had a good reason -- that made me think that I could maybe bend the rules, but I can't do that for the past, only for the future -- they said that they left the online homework to do before the final so they could use it to study. Fair enough, but still, I had already taken points from everyone for lateness and it would take A LOT of time to go change everyone's grades at this point (8 lessons and several hundred online activities to scroll through in the report).

It's technically their fault, not mine, that they didn't do the work, but I feel horribly guilty and broken nevertheless. I contacted a student (who was not doing that well and who had done next to nothing of the homework, at the time I hadn't yet checked the other students), but I must have written the wrong words, because this student responded back with a negative tone and... worst of all, even after I wrote that the work could be accepted late (but for less credit) this student didn't get the work done. (and didn't do well in the final). It's hard not to feel it's partly my fault, because I contacted the student trying to help and it had the opposite result. :-(

I keep telling myself that even though the assignments are in the syllabus, I should have emphasized in class that they NEED to be done. And I do think I said it a few times. I am quire sure that the students knew that they were 20% of the grade.

I still feel broken. And I feel responsible -- because I was the one teaching more classes than I should and not putting in more time into working with my students.

I'm sad and upset about all this. There is no way to really fix it. I have allowed some students to do the rest of the work for partial credit even though I didn't want to. Students with As on the final exam and Cs on their homework. :-(

This will be bitter a lesson, for them and for me. I wish the end of this semester didn't have to be bitter like this. I hope next school year will be better. I feel this semester was the worst one ever. :-(

Edited to add: I'm feeling a little better and more hopeful after grading some compositions and getting ready to leave everything ready to submit once the "late work" I'm allowing is submitted. Sigh... I hate grading. It's like passing judgment one someone, I just don't like to do it.

My parents are here! After 5 years not visiting.

In the meantime, we visited Brazil twice and met them in other parts of the world (South Africa into 2012 and  in the Middle east and Europe in 2015), but it is so good to have them back at our house for an extended visit!

I am driving home and hoping that they will already be there. We will pick up the boys from school and later on go to their piano recital. That's why my parents came for one evening visit. They return to my uncle's house tomorrow morning, and then come back on Saturday to stay!

I'm very happy!

Edited to add, at 4 pm: they were not here when I arrived, but I'm hoping they will soon be... Sigh... I don't like it that they don't have their cell phone working. I'll let you know when they're here!

5 pm: They arrived!

Should we be freaking out?? :-(

Independents WON'T vote for Hillary, is it possible that a crazed outspoken, racist, bigot, anti-women, billionaire celebrity with no substance and questionable morals could really become president to this nation? :-(

I wish Bernie had a real chance. Independents WILL vote for him. 

What is going to happen? I can't believe it has come to this. But we obviously have had it coming for years.

:-( 

Late!

I can't believe I'm late for my first final exam. :-( 

Class is at 2, exam was at 1 and I was on "automatic pilot" and forgot. 

Sigh... Hope it all goes well.

The Third "Last Day"

This semester I have five "last days" -- last Thursday was the first, the last day of classes at U#1. Yesterday, was the second one, last day of classes at U#2.

Today is the (first and) last day of exams for me at U#1 and I have two days of exams at U#2, this Thursday and next week on Thursday.

Yeah, this CRAZY semester of teaching is drawing to an end, as well as the insane four years of teaching at two universities. I am not at all sad about it all ending, except maybe for earning a bit less (2-3K), but I'll be doing LESS WORK and being paid nearly the same.

I am cautiously optimistic about trying to slowly go back to my main research project (from my crazy 500 page dissertation). I already have a conference presentation in October and I want MORE!! Sigh... the plan is to integrate the research to my teaching and even apply for an internal grant for it. We'll see how it goes. Sigh...

I can't wait to have some free days, but before I have to face all these last days, all the grading and, next week, an intense conference in which I'll be helping out. Probably in exchange for a few free meals and perhaps good interactions and networking, but maybe there will be some payment (if funding comes through for my friend the organizer).

I'm mentally spent, exhausted really. I think this was the worst semester yet, not in craziness of hours of teaching (that was the Fall of 2013 -- utter insanity), but teaching with a brand new book and, "tele-teaching" FIVE days a week (that hadn't happened before, it was always only Tu/Th). This takes a lot of energy, not to mention the stress and claustrophobic feeling of teaching in a room without windows, in the basement of a building (for 4-5 hours straight on Tu/Th -- teaching and then preparing materials, printing, etc).

Today is my last day in the teleconference room. YAY!! I'm moving on and I won't look back (remember I was counting the days?). Phew!!

Pop!

"These are great pants! I love them!" Said the lady crossing paths with me at the university and smiling. 

"Thanks!" I reply, also smiling now. And I didn't even have time to say, "Yeah, I got them in the girl clothes' section at Target!" ;-)

I'm not afraid to wear bright colors, that's for sure! And while hot pink is not one of my favorite colors, I'll gladly wear it:

Written on Wednesday 4/27.

My "Baby" is Back Home & My Parents Arrived Safely in the U.S.

On Sunday night, my 14 year-old son returned from a six-day trip to Florida with his school's bell choir. We all missed him so much! (especially mama here, sigh...) He's a joy to be around and I'm thrilled that he's back, ready to experience his last month of Elementary school. His 8th grade graduation is precisely a month from today. I am so proud of the young man he is becoming, so responsible, so poised, so intelligent and determined. When they get their yearbooks I'll share here what I wrote to him there. It was hard to write only 150 words.

This morning my parents arrived safely in the U.S., flying into NY and then taking a connecting flight into D.C. I'm sad that they won't arrive at our house until next week because they will be helping my aunt with my uncle Oseas, my dad's younger brother. He was left permanently disabled by the removal of a benign brain tumor back in 2009 and needs around-the-clock care. My aunt is taking this opportunity of my parents coming to take a break for a week traveling with her sister.

It feels very strange to have them in the country and not to have even talked to them yet. My mom thinks it's unnecessary for me to go see them now, especially because we're horribly busy with the last week of our semester. I wanted to go see them on Saturday, but we have an event with our church, so maybe we'll go Saturday afternoon. Sigh...

I can't believe the semester is almost over!

I forgot to blog about Brasil...

Last Sunday, after a weekend of upheaval in the Brazilian Congress -- speeches ALL NIGHT from Friday to Saturday and all day Saturday, arguing pro and against impeaching the current president Dilma Rousseff -- they voted to begin impeachment proceedings.

I watched/listened to the voting live while I pulled weeds from my backyard for hours! It was very entertaining and very depressing, all at the same time. 

(Since I'm writing this on my phone, I was going to insert various sadness and frustration emoticons here, and then thought that those aren't really part of blog writing... Sigh! Texting and social media commenting are ruining our writing, no?) :-( 

It was depressing, almost alarming to watch the vote, because it was a true snapshot of the population of the country. Many uneducated folks, making errors while speaking, invoking the most disparate reasons for voting "Yes" and "dedicating" their votes to every member or their family in shameless family and self promotion (a very Brazilian thing BTW).  An analysis of their "speeches" would enable a researcher to find out the most popular baby names in the country for the past 10-20 years (Sophia is wildly popular).

The representatives against the impeachment, many from the president's party (the Worker's Party), and every single member of the Communist Party, were in the minority's and were, for the most part, very articulate, unlike the riotous majority. Oh, and it was a circus, the voting was!! Booing, screaming, crowding around the microphone, insulting the president of the Congress/Speaker of the House (also being indicted for corruption), not to mention the crazy "celebrity" representatives-- this guy who won the Big Brother Brazil competition who spat (yes, spat!!) on another guy who dared praise a horrid torturer from the military dictatorship years (the man who tortured Dilma Rousseff). 

Sigh... It was interesting to see the reaction of all my friends on Facebook, ashamed of the spectacle, of our country. I had friends who were very happy with the results (367 in favor of the impeachment, 137 against) and had actually gone to watch with the crowds in the center of the city of São Paulo. 

Now the Senate will decide whether to impeach her or not, but it's pretty much a fait accompli, it's a given that she'll be impeached. And nobody knows what is going to happen because the vice-president is also implicated in the corruption scandal as well as the "speaker of the house," Eduardo Cunha who was insulted countless times on Sunday, but still maintained a "Cheshire Cat-like" grin most of the time. 

Sigh... What will happen to our country? :-(

Your own kind of beautiful

I couldn't resist and bought this for me a couple of months ago. It hangs right next to my closet!

Oh, and somedays, one's hair is just cuter than on other days! 

On being "cute"

I don't know what got into me, but I felt like writing this post.
 
I am kind of cute. You can tell me that I'm "beautiful" all you want, and I respect your opinion, but I know the truth.

There are "drop-dead-gorgeous" people (extremely rare), there are not-very-good-looking people and then there are millions of us in the middle, kind of cute, almost pretty, pleasant looking, but not really beautiful. 

I had a keen awareness of this from a very young age for two reasons (and I am being as vague as possible on purpose). My younger brother is one of those truly good looking people and everyone told me that I looked like someone and my honest assessment was that that person wasn't beautiful.

Sigh... this is not a big deal and I am very self-confident, I love my body (for the most part), my curls, my cute derrière and I know that, all things considered, I look pretty good. In addition being small and relatively skinny (and fitting into clothes sold to teenage girls) makes lots of people jealous (some of whom don't hesitate to tell me so to my face).

Oh, and there's this small detail, I'm EXTREMELY photogenic -- I am one of those lucky folks that looks really good in photos, always. But looking good in photographs (which is where some of you may gather your idea that I'm beautiful) does not mean that a person is indeed beautiful.

I don't know where I am going with this, so I know I shouldn't even be writing it (whatever!), but I've been thinking about this often lately. When I see people with gorgeous long hair, which I know I can't ever have or when I catch a glimpse of one of those rare gorgeous folks. Or when I wake up and look in the mirror and think I look "ugly" that day (I know, NOT true! But some days are harder than others).

I have also had these funny conversations with my husband, who is definitely also cute. When he praises my beauty I tease him a little and say that I'm merely "cute" and that I'm special to him for other reasons, not just my physical "beauty." And I joke with him that none of us could have married a truly "beautiful" person, that we're the perfect fit in terms our appearance.

Last, but not least, I love cute clothes and outfits, so I often look "cute" because of what I wear. I've wanted to blog about clothes and fashion forever and maybe someday I will. I'll let you know if I do!

He skipped two whole sizes! ;-)

Two years ago, when my eldest son had turned 12, the pediatrician warned me: "Buy him only one pair of pants and one pair of shoes because he's going to be growing like crazy in the coming year!"

I laughed to myself because I have always bought my boys multiple pairs of pants, shorts, polo shirts (their school wear), but thankfully they generally have only one pair of sneakers and one pair of dress shoes (ok, until size 4 youth they also had another pair of brown or khaki color dressy shoes, I like them to look sharp in church every week!).

The pediatrician wasn't kidding. Once Kelvin started growing, he grew like ...whoa! Last year in the Spring he went through 3 pairs/sizes of dress shoes in five months, and because he was performing with his bell choir and school band & choir I had to get him new ones every time – good thing his younger brother gets to wear every single one!

This year it was pants that he outgrew at an outstanding pace. I bought and had to return several pairs, to Kelvin's great triumph and delight! He would try a brand new pair of pants and it would be tight! 

He went from size 12-14 khakis (which he mostly wears to perform with the bell choir) straight to 18 -- 16 wouldn't fit him! At least size 16 jeans are ok (for now). Well, I better check his black pants before he leaves on his Florida tour with the bell choir next week!!

This was written 2 days ago, & didn't publish for some reason.

Letting Go...

just a quick update to say I decided not to go to Ohio. (a few people asked me off blog about that)

:-(

It's hard to let go, but in this case I just had to. It would be too great an expense without funding from the university. Sigh...

Someday I'll go to Columbus and meet Dawn, Jenna, maybe even Amber! AND -- I really need to visit two other places in the same trip: Pittsburgh and Cedar Point!! I've always dreamed of going to Cedar Point.

Let's dream on.

New Book! Catastrophic Happiness

[photo to be added tomorrow]
Gone are the "good old days" when I'd get books before their release date to review on my blog.

Sigh...

I was thrilled to find out that Catherine Newman (of Ben & Birdy fame) was going to publish a new book! I was a faithful reader of the Raising Ben (Then Ben & Birdy) Baby Center column and I loved her first book, Waiting for Birdy.

Catastrophic Happiness: Finding Joy in Childhood's Messy Years, arrived today and although I have only read for about an hour, I really love it.


I will write a proper review after I've finished reading it, but for now, I just wanted to register my happiness in getting a book on the day of its publication!

Watching Figure Skating! --> Silver!!

I don't know if the Americans will earn a medal and make "history" tonight, but I'm enjoying watching figure skating! 

 10:56 pm--> Ashley Wagner won silver! 

Oh no! Gracie fell, that's sad.

I don't think they can win because one of the Russians scored the highest free skate performance ever. 

Well, let's see! 

I'm glad that the 9 year "drought" of world championship medals is over for American women skaters! 

Really Hard Decision: Conference & Blogger Meet-Ups

One of the unintended consequences of leaving U#1 is losing my academic conference funding. It was one of the "perks" that I really enjoyed and didn't even take enough advantage of in the past few years when I was working at both universities (given my difficulty with not being able to find substitutes during the regular school year at U#2 & its lack of support).

I don't know what I was thinking when I submitted a paper proposal to one of my favorite conferences (the Kid lit one) without realizing that I wouldn't have funding to go. The deadline to register for the conference is tomorrow, so I have to decide whether I am going or not.

The saddest part is that I had decided to go to this conference no matter what because going there would enable me to meet up two bloggers/former bloggers that I really love (Dawn & Jenna), I was really looking forward to that! :-(

It's a hard decision to make because this trip will mean expenses that I probably shouldn't have. I also wish I could take my parents with me (that was part of the original plan) because they love getting to know new places... or, go with the family to Cedar Point and also visit Pittsburgh (which is on the way), since I've never been there.

Yeah, a hard decision and almost no time to make it. I kept putting it off too... :-(

(I truly hate money, I wish money wasn't such a "problem")

My car hit a bird! :-(

And I'm so, so sad! :-(

I could see its wings flailing desperately in the middle of the road through therearview mirror. I don't know if it died or not, but it probably did... :-(

First thing in the morning too...

I'm upset. May the rest of the day be better. For me, you, and everyone we love. 

The Busiest Craziest Semester

We are horribly busy this semester. It's all kinds of overwhelming! Sigh...

And soccer season just started (practices, games in a week), I don't know how we'll survive the next six weeks! My dear parents will arrive precisely when classes end for me and K and the craziness subsides -- good for them!!

K is teaching three classes instead of his regular class, so he has extra preps, an extra night class and no free time of any kind. He just had two back to back conferences and we're still recovering. So, what's the best way for recovering than to have ten people come visit for the weekend?

We had 8 come in 2014 and it was a record, but this will blow the previous record. BIL's family is coming from Montreal (can't wait to see my "baby" nephew!) and a childhood friend of mine is coming along, with her husband and three children. To top it off, my BIL who live in Egypt is defending his doctoral thesis today (YAY! Good for him!) in Michigan and will come tomorrow. I know it will be great, but it's not easy to juggle this with having to teach today and tomorrow.

Oh yeah, and our boys have their Spring break next week! :-( I suspect they will spend a lot of time playing Minecraft and -- good thing for my poor teen who has slept SO little in the past month --
hopefully getting lots of sleep. (He wasn't here last weekend -- he went to a robotics competition in TN and before that he spent a lot of time preparing for it with his team).

Well, Spring is here and I should rejoice that it's only six more crazy weeks!! (technically 5+ finals)

And now he hates the collages ;-P

So, remember the graduation photos? I spent a lot of time, stayed up really late and finally I have 10 photos now, but 4 of them are collages (I got PicMonkey to work on another browser and it's awesome!). But back to the collages... One has FOUR photos, another one three, and two have only two.

However, Kelvin says that he hates collages...

Sigh...

I'm inaugurating a new label right now: Teen Years.

Oh man, I have eight long years ahead!

I'm sure we'll find a compromise, but I'll have at least one of the collages, the patriotic one, with him wearing the same shirt, at three months and three years old:

And here are some of my favorite smiley photos from 7-8 years old. Oh, how I love this boy of mine! The top two were taken in Massachusetts in April 2009, bottom ones: left, Philadelphia Zoo, Nov. 2009; right, Longwood Gardens April 2010.

It's because of photos such as these that I never really cared for having professional photos taken...

Chaos in Brasil! :-(

"What's gone wrong?" is the link bait in the BBC's website for today's article "Brazil corruption: Is the government in crisis?"* Lots has been going wrong in my country, for several years now. :-(

Sunday night I opened my facebook account and was inundated, overwhelmed by photos and video of friends and family, including my brother, his wife and two young children, all dressed in green and yellow, on the streets, protesting. Millions of people took to the streets. They want the president (Dilma Rousseff) to be impeached and tried for huge corruption scandals and last Friday, former president Lula (José Inácio Lula da Silva) was questioned by the police about this involvement with the same corruption scandal.

Well, today, Lula was nominated as Dilma's chief of staff, ostensibly so he can get away from the indictment that a judge in my home state of Paraná is trying to bring against him. People are disgusted and upset and are taking to social media again to voice their discontent. Again my FB feed is inundated with tearful eyes with the country's colors, and other signs of outrage.

Sigh...

I hope that justice will be done, I hope corruption will be curtailed, but it's very hard because Brazilians (in general) are used to "easy" and not always legal and legitimate ways of getting what they want. It's hard to have hope. We'll see what will happen.

* nerdy comment: didn't know capitalization in British English was like in Brazilian Portuguese materials.

14 years in 10 photos - Hardest Task EVER!

For 8h grade graduation I have been charged to choose ONLY TEN, out of thousands upon thousands of photos of my first born son.

How is that possible? I take way too many photos of my gorgeous kid! (I know, modesty is NOT my forte, sorry! And note that I didn't say "gorgeous photos," which only very very few are).

I am already trying to "cheat" by creating at least three collages to add a few more photos, and that's how I found out the really nice online photo editor fotor. I am also trying to use PicMonkey and it seems amazing (and oh, so helpful in answering my questions about pixels and print sizes, thank you!), but so far I have been unable to save the only collage I made, all I see is a monkey blinking at me in the center of the screen! :-P

Here's one of the cute collages I made with fotor.com, I am titled it "curly angel boy":

These photos were taken in 2003 & 2004, the one year old (nearly 1 and a half) looks baby-ish and the two year old is much more grown-up looking.

I'm spending way too much time selecting photos! Sigh...

March Torture (Revisited)

Every March, for almost as long as he's been in graduate school, with the exception of a few years, K goes to his national conference and when he goes, it's a hard week of single-parenting for me. He's been to so many places! Seattle, LA, Madison WI, Baltimore (several times, including this year), Portland OR (where he got me my favorite mug!), the list goes on & on...

I'm whiny tonight, upset that my husband will be gone from tomorrow to Friday, so I decided to look back to past months of March in the blog.

On my first year as a mother of two (2005) I was in Brazil when he went to his meeting and the following two years my parents were with us, so I didn't have any trouble. In 2008 he didn't go (it was the fateful year of the big-pharma job) and I was dissertating, with my parents living with us again for a few months until my defense & commencement. He had to skip 2009, with nothing to present, having gone back to academia & being a post-doc only six months earlier.

I wrote a quick blog post in 2010 about single parenting for a week & a humorous one about my son not missing daddy (I was cyber-schooling the boys back then, so I'm sure it was intense, but OK), I was glad when he returned & thankfully we had a house-guest, so I didn't have to wake-up the boys to take them to the airport in the middle of the night.

I think K didn't go in 2011 & 2012 (not having enough results to present, being fairly new in his tenure track job). In 2013 the kids had Spring break so they stayed for part of the week at my brother & sister-in-law's while K was at the conference in Baltimore (he may have stayed at his brother's house, I think) & I stayed home alone & went to work. That worked out great!

I don't know about 2014 -- I didn't mention anything about him going to a conference in the blog, but I did last year I mentioned him going to the conference (in San Antonio, TX -- literally a week after his uncle had moved away from that city to Tunisia!) in a post titled "Academic Single Parenting" & I rejoiced when he came back in a snowy night.

Well, I can't wait for Friday night!

14!!

My son turns fourteen today and I'm happy that he's growing and maturing by leaps and bounds! He is such a joy to be around, whip-smart, funny, easy-going, even-tempered (for the most part, particularly compared to his younger brother), and now -- new and improved edition! -- very responsible* and excelling in school. He is friendly, but quiet, and enjoys working in the background (e.g. this week his class is doing skits in school and he volunteered to take care of the sound system). He is also so hard-working! He is involved with multiple after-school activities: bell-choir, robotics team, and soccer, in addition to having piano lessons, and he has been handling all very well.

Last night I wrote some of these things for his online high-school application and I felt happy that he is so prepared for this milestone in his life and he's looking forward to it so much. I think that one of the things that helped him is that we are supporting his hobbies, particularly his YouTube channel (if you click you can see a time-lapse video of Kelvin and I moving a bookcase from one room to the other). We bought another monitor, a graphics card for the computer (as he explains in much detail at the end of that video), editing software, etc. and we allow him to use his free time to record and edit videos. Some mornings he gets up at 6:30 to spend sometime working on his channel before school. I am a firm believer in supporting their interests, especially for a child like him, who needs to be interested in something and motivated in order to thrive and to focus.

This year he didn't get an actual gift like last year -- I didn't get to blog about it, but we ended up completely surprising him with a WiiU on the very day, using some Best Buy gift cards we had, plus some old birthday money Kelvin had with us (he agreed after the fact). However, a few weeks ago he bought a new phone (a Samsung Galaxy S6 Active -- it's waterproof!! The phone itself is a case!! Battery lasts A LOT!!) and that was partly a birthday gift. And yesterday we bought him these fun slippers:

We started a tradition a few years ago, I make an Oreo vanilla ice-cream cake and bring it to his class in school and they LOVE it! So I did that for the last time (sniff, sniff) today, since I know I won't do that stuff when he's in high-school, right? :( And... we're going to have dinner at Olive Garden! I think it will be a nice birthday!

* He has always been very intelligent, but 7th grade was challenging because his attention issues (no official diagnosis, but my therapist and I are pretty sure that he has ADD like me, sigh...) :-( and his inflexible teacher (who did NOT accept any work late, no exceptions, no excuses) caused some lower grades. The teacher hasn't changed, but Kelvin has learned to deal with it without complaining or much prompting from us. It's incredible. Even my therapist cannot believe his turnaround, given that I spent a whole year stressing out about my son and jointly diagnosing him. ;-)

Bad Girl!

I've been a very bad girl, not flossing my teeth as I should, so, last week at my cleaning & check-up dentist's appointment, I was told I have four cavities and that they need to be filled.

:-(

All my fault, of course!

So today I went in to have the first two cavities filled. Not fun at all, and there are two more to go. Sigh...

Needless to say I have a new resolution and I hope I can take better care of my teeth in the future!

Pay Day*

Yesterday I finally received the check with my payment from the "never-ending translation project" that took me a year and a half to finish. And, coincidentally, last week we had finished paying off the very last credit card debt we had from getting money to buy our Prius back in 2014. That means that this 8.5K is ours to do whatever we want and we are debating what to do.

One thing we decided (unrelated to this payment) is that we are buying a cheap/in good condition mini-van and selling it again after we use it with my parents this summer. I hope we'll be good with getting rid of it, but I have a feeling that maybe K's parents and brother may want to help us out and have us keep it so it will be a car that they can use when they visit. If it were an 8 seater it would be amazing because we could actually travel with brother-in-law's family! But I have a feeling it will be hard to find one of those, they are hard to come by. We'll see!

K's dad can't believe that we have two small old(er) cars and won't invest in a larger, more comfortable vehicle, but we don't mind his criticism -- it's what makes sense financially for us! (We have a Prius that I use for my mega-commute and last year we had a friend returning to Italy after 8 years in the U.S. and we bought her Hyundai Elantra that had very low mileage, less than 60K! And we sold our little uncomfortable Hyunday Accent that had NO air conditioning [Canadian car] and only two doors!).

This payment took so long (I sent the invoice in December and emailed them a few times after that, never hearing back) that it's almost anti-climatic, but it does feel good to be helping my family even more! I'll let you know more about the car purchase when we decide what to do!

* I MUST disclose that saying this would send Brazilian kids into fits of laughter, because it sounds just like the verb conjugation for "I farted" :-P

A Tale of Two Universities or... Why the Mixed Feelings

I need to write at least one more lengthy post about this before I can put it behind me and (try to) move on, so please indulge me (if there's anyone still out there reading, that is!). :-)

I am attempting not to give too many details and to discuss general issues pertaining to my work at both places. (if you're curious to know more, just email me and I won't mind sharing more details). I have already written lots in the past four to six years, so for old time readers, not much will be new. I also want to write this to help sort through my mixed feelings in this moment of transition from "bad" to "less bad!" ;-P

U#1 has its advantages, even though they are pretty "minimal." The department gives us contracts every semester, but the renewal is indefinite into the future (why would they want to change that? Cheap labor, abundant!). As you may know, I had a yearly full-time contract at U#2 for the past four years, but renewal was not a given and it was a veritable nightmare in 2014. No benefits on the first and benefits on the second.

At U#1 part-time faculty members (a really really messed up definition, since some "part-timers" in this dept. taught 6-8 language classes -- maybe not anymore, I know some recently turned "full timers" are teaching 6/6) are eligible for all kinds of professional development opportunities, many of which are compensated and provide amazing opportunities to network and grow professionally. I took advantages of many of those and did very well.

However... all this "development" just led me nowhere, really. I often was the only person, or one of a few, who was non-tenure track faculty at these things and that was hard to bear. Some of these felt like a waste (maybe of time, more a waste of my talent & a lack of recognition from THEM or waste of their money too...). 

U#1 also funded me 100% to go to one conference a year. A perk that I suspected existed because they saved so much $ on teaching, that the budget allowed for it, or maybe not enough people did go to conferences (?!)... I don't know. I never asked, I just gladly took the money and went! (Obviously first went, then got the refund).

So at U#1 I mostly pretended I had a real job and was allowed to act like a real academic (including going to "departmental meetings," designing & implementing new classes, organizing student panels in the annual conference, etc.), but it was all very not real when looking at the pay and ridiculous semester by semester contract.

At the other place, for one year I was "in charge" as the only person in my area, then they hired a young(er) person (I had applied too, but, nah...), and for a year I still felt mostly ok. Except that the other full time adjunct faculty and I were clearly not considered equals as compared to faculty. Of course it's because of the type of institution, but this week I understood better what the problem is. It's what I explained in my first disgruntled post this week, we are supposed to "know our place" and stay there. And now it's official.

In all fairness, the dept. is actually trying to provide us all with FUTURE funding to go to conferences, but we don't have any now. I could say more, but maybe I'd reveal too much. As for What Now?'s question, yes, I have friends who support me, all of us are in the same boat. All we can do is to commiserate together. 

But there is no hope, really. One my office mates was denied tenure at an Ivy League school years ago, and the dept. chair has no clue of that and keeps reminding office mate of the "advantages" of not being tenure track (sigh...). The system is what it is and what I described earlier this week. It's pretty much take it or leave it. Change is NOT forthcoming, the New Faculty Majority multiple initiatives notwithstanding. In certain situations, there is NOT "strength in numbers."

Let's hope I'm wrong! And do you see now why I've been responding very unenthusiastically to any congratulations I've received on my long-time in coming three-year contract?

Sigh... (and I still need to share some other things that upset me regarding these issues a few weeks ago, I don't know if I'll get to blog those)

I really don't see how the situation is ever going to get better. The worst part is that I have a feeling that once one gets a TT job, one moves to the "dark side" and can't help but defend one's own position. I often have a hard time talking to my husband about my situation. He understands, but he is still part of the system/ "dark side." And once more I end a post without finishing it properly, but it's just because there is no "end in sight" for this situation...

Salt in the Wound, Poison in the Veins/ Academia: Sciences vs. Humanities (Literature, Languages, Cultural Studies)

They've been building up momentum for over a month, my bitterness and discontent, informed by years and years of resentment (well documented here in this blog over the years), but after yesterday it all exploded in my head.

Conversations with colleagues that left me with a heavy weight of nervousness in the pit of my stomach. Official communications from the department, surreal conversation with colleague. All boiling up in my head like a cauldron with a bitter potion.

I know my system will slowly clear, but right now, it hurts, because too much salt was rubbed on the wound; there is poison cursing (pun intended) through my veins.

I think I'm most stunned by the (very late) full realization that in fact, in the humanities, academia is a war, unfair, brutal and soul-sucking.

In the sciences, collaboration is crucial -- most important for experimentalists, but even for theorists, who need the experiments to validate their theories. I have been closely following my husband's career for almost 20 years. You begin by working at someone's lab (sometimes as an undergrad, but more often as a grad student) and when you finish the degree, you also work as a Post-Doc in charge of projects at someone else's lab again. Until after getting a job, you can run your own lab. And even then you still collaborate with former colleagues, current and former students. It's a web of collaboration, a machine with many parts that moves slowly, but surely forward. And these relationships can actually be quantified and visualized in number of citations, who cites who, etc.

In the humanities, however (particularly in languages, literatures, cultural studies, and related fields). Each of us works ALONE. Of course it's not in complete isolation because we still need to read the works of others and "interact" with them, but the greatest likelihood is that the "big names" we cite won't ever read us or ever even hear of our work.

There are too many areas, it's impossible to really be visible (take the MLA for example, it's a jungle, it's ridiculous), so we "speak" to nobody really, and try to make our mark uselessly.

It's a field heavily populated by white males and even though they need to hire the "token women" or "token minorities," I believe that white males still call the shots. This may change, but I don't know how, really.

And yesterday I realized one more layer in the conflict and the bloody war -- people in the humanities are even MORE isolated because they are afraid of each other, they are threatened by each other.

Sigh...

and fortunately, I ran out of steam and will publish this half-finished. Maybe it's good that my motivation to write about this is waning. I guess the poison is getting diluted, the salt is slowly washing away. I'm sure I will have more to say soon.

New (Brazilian!) Colleague

Last year, my husband was very upset when his closest colleague and collaborator at the university decided to leave for another university where his wife was also offered a tenure track job (he was already tenured, but left anyway). 

One of the reasons that upset K the most was that he felt that maybe he/we may need to do that someday in order for me to have a job I'm happy with. That problem is still up in the air, but apart from ther, he sorely missed his colleague and hoped they'd find a good replacement.

From the moment the dept. decided to open the position, K contacted M, a Brazilian scholar who works in a related field, to let him know that the position would be open. M interviewed, and was unanimously (a first on this department!!!) chosen to be offered the job. 

K was delighted, but worried that M might not want to come here (his wife was unable to visit the area and we wondered if she's want to live here). Today K was told that his friend M has accepted the job and he is thrilled!! I hope M and his (American) wife will like the university and the area!

Kind of relieved

I can't vote yet. On the one hand, I really would love to support whichever Democratic candidate ends up being nominated, but, on the other hand, politics has become so crazy that it is scary!

I also think that we wouldn't have become citizens in time to vote this year, so I am not beating myself up for not having done it. We really couldn't afford it right now. 

Sigh... 

So I will just watch from the sidelines once more!