This is the month when the Class of 2014 is scrambling to buy last minute pieces of furniture, check every last thing off their bucket lists, and schedule movers, hotel stays and plane tickets. Meanwhile the incoming Class of 2016 is trying to figure out whether to bring their bookshelves and patio furniture, how to get their pets on an airplane in spite of a heat embargo and animal importation restrictions, and freaking out about living in The Middle East. I’m sitting calmly in the middle with nowhere to go and nowhere to be and it’s looking pretty fine.
The driving mostly doesn’t bother me anymore. In fact, I’ve developed a few bad habits in the last two years. Two days ago I had to get to a meeting and no one was moving. I veered around a few cars, took a short trip the wrong way up a wrong way street and dropped out right in front of the light, bypassing about 25 cars. I was ready to resort to driving on the sidewalk, but thankfully cars started moving and it didn’t have to come to that. Now I’m more annoyed when people aren’t driving aggressively than when they are. Like the guy who wouldn’t pull into traffic today even when he had 5 second long gaps. I gave up and drove in the oncoming lane to go around him and merge into a space that he considered too small. Blame it on the Saudi influence.
To drive here without losing your mind you have to be willing to swerve like you’re driving through an obstacle course: (around random pedestrians, bicyclists, and cars that don’t stay on their side of the road). The key is look at every other thing on the road whether it’s a car, animal, or human and think to yourself, “What is the stupidest move they could make right now?” and assume they will do it since it’s about a 50/50 chance that they will. 8 point turn on a major street? Check. Driving in reverse because they missed their turn by 1/2 a block? Check. Creating a third lane on the sidewalk? Check. Driving through the red lights en masse because they don’t want to wait for the next green? Check. Parking on a major thoroughfare, in the lane just because . . . Check. (Those are all examples from this week.)
In the spirit of “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em,” I’ve figured out some tricks to keep me sane on the roads whether it’s shortcuts that bypass the worst of the intersections, audiobooks, or doing a bit of curb hopping myself. We just picked up a second car, another island beater, so Josh can do some of the shuttling of the boys home after their after school activities instead of me having to drive to base to pick them up. It’s a gift to ourselves for the next 2 years. We’ve done a good job of sharing one car, but the older the kids get, the more they are doing and the more driving it requires — often in different directions.
We were at the mall this past weekend buying some pants for Calvin’s trip to Germany. He’s grown so much over the past few months that all of his pants are floods. He’s going to freeze his butt off in Germany compared to the temperatures here, so I was a nice mom and bought him some new ones that he’s sure to outgrow in about 3 months.
I was excited to see this bit of Engrish on the wall at H&M until I realized it was only vandalism — it’s supposed to say “wear it” not “near it,” but someone picked off part of the W. Boo for proper English.
I loved seeing these Bahraini men shopping with their bags from Bath and BodyWorks. I wonder if they are buying freesia shower gel and cherry blossom lotion?
We have an Entertainer coupon book that has buy one, get one free coupons for food places all over the mall. We stopped at ColdStone so we could say we saved money somewhere after spending almost $150 on three pairs of pants. They were advertised at 50% off, but since something that retails for $50 in the US costs twice as much here, we basically paid full price after all the “discounts.”
Cotton candy ice cream with marshmallows. I can recommend the mud pie — coffee ice cream with oreos, fudge, peanut butter and almonds. The peanut butter sounds like overkill, but it’s perfect.
The other thing we shop for at the mall is our coffee. My best purchase of the year is my Nespresso machine. I know people buy gadgets and then they sit on the counter and never use them, but this machine is genius. I generally use it twice a day and can make a cappuccino for myself in about 30 seconds. A capsule goes in the machine, push a button, pour milk in the foamer (the container with the red light) and when the light turns off, pour the foamed milk into my cup. Each one I drink is 1/6 the cost of getting one at Costa or Starbucks. I won’t brew a pot of coffee because I only ever want one cup and it’s quick enough that I can make one as I’m rushing out the door. It costs more up front, but I’m close to breaking even. Maybe. I don’t really care since I can have a cappuccino without guilt every day now.
Totally unrelated — just a photo of my girlie playing at the park.
