Skip to main content

Disappeared

Reasons why I went AWOL for the last few days (in no particular order):

1. Got gobsmacked by a vicious intestinal illness that left me incapacitated, on the couch, watching Mame, and downing gallons of Gatorade.
2. Had to find chemical cleaner that would remove ink from the toilet after a failed attempt by The Rabbit to clean a balloon she'd written on with washable marker. (Yeah, right.)
3. Finished back to back deadlines on stories that I think are pretty d--m good must say.
4. Planted paper white bulbs in any container I could find turning our apartment into a mud zone.
5. Had to venture into Times Square on a weekend and turned (briefly) into one of those tourist-hating Gothamites.
6. Taught a newspaper writing class to The Rabbit's class. (Which meant teaching the difference between facts and stories about fairies!)
7. Cooked a complete Indian feast for some friends that taught me Indian food is best left to Indian restaurants.
8. Made the BEST apple pie ever made in the history of the world. (Try me.)
9. Tried out a new babysitter who cost more than the BILL FOR DINNER for The Prince and me. (But she rocks. Sigh.)
10. Tried to find something that would clean the washable marker from The Rabbit's actual skin. (not happening. She looks mottled.)
11. Spent 20 minutes looking for hair clips at Rite Aid, and finding them in 30 seconds at CVS.
12. Broke The Rabbit's piggy bank stealing coins while she slept to finish a roll of quarters.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Apologies for being incommunicado this week and hope none of you out there are too distraught not to be receiving the usual almost-daily MotV missives. The reason for the silence is that I'm up to my neck, metaphorically-speaking, in research papers for my first grad course assessment. This experience has made me realise how rigorously un-academic I am in my thinking. It has also illuminated how reliant I am on red wine in order to get through endless evenings typing furiously on my laptop, not to mention the fueling of increasingly colorful curses that I feel obliged to aim at the University's online library system which consistently refuses to spit out any of the journals I'm desperate for (I refuse to believe this is 100% due to my technical incompetence...) Oh well, if this is the price one has to pay in order to realize a long-cherished dream then it's not all that bad... No one ever said a mid-life career change would be easy. Wish me luck!

Environment

Being an expat, a favorite topic of conversation is 'where I/you want to go next?' or 'When do you plan to go home?' It's a good question. I'm not sure I want to stay in Dubai for ever, but I'm also not sure about how long I want to be here for or where else I would like to live. For almost the first time ever, I have no fixed plans apart from keeping my eyes and mind open to interesting opportunities. And as to going 'home', I have no idea where that is. Constantly moving around as a child left me with the feeling that 'home' is wherever I am right now, so in effect 'home' could be anywhere. The longest I've ever lived in one fixed place was 18 years in London, on and off, but that doesn't feel like 'home' either - I love going back to see family and friends, and it's a great place to shop, but that's about it. I have a great love for California, which is where my extended family is from (and where most of the