Thank you, thank you, thank you…

To everyone who sent us warm wishes and words of support. Even if you just thought them but didn’t post anything, we appreciate it. (Yes, I can read your thoughts and you should be ashamed of yourself.)

It has been a comfort to hear other peoples’ stories about their wonderful pets and how they have coped with their loss. I guess there are a bunch of people out there who feel the same way about their animals that we do. It’s nice to know that we’re not alone and that it is OK to grieve. When I heard that my mentor at work hasn’t gotten over the loss of her dog after three years, I feel normal. I was afraid that feeling the pain of the loss of my cat after more than a couple of days would make me some sort of a freak. I respect my mentor a lot and think she is a wonderful, thoughtful and smart woman. I am honored to think that I am somewhat like her.

I still haven’t made it through the day without crying. When I’m sitting on the couch, I look to my right and expect to see my Monster sitting beside me and kneading the afghan. It was a habit to check to make sure he was alright and I keep finding myself looking for him. I’m still shocked that he isn’t sitting beside me. I find myself putting more and more stuff on the couch to fill the empty space.

Thank you again. This has been incredibly hard and I know that Husband and I both get a great deal of comfort reading your words of support.

Crab prison guard

That’s really all I’m useful for on this trip. That and taking photos.

Today we spent out on the reef snorkling. It was so much fun.

We first went to the front reef, which is the part of the reef that faces the ocean. I was all excited to get in the water, but I always let the students go first. They are here for a class; I’m just here to drive the van. I figure they should probably try to see as much as they can!

We jumped in the water (which was pretty warm) and within about 30 seconds of sticking my face in the water, I saw about 4 barracuda.

It really kind of put a damper on the snorkling trip for me.

They aren’t aggressive towards people. I know this because the book told me so. The only time they’ve attacked people is when they were being spearfished. I might get a little titchy too.

I was still not really happy to have a six foot barracuda swimming under me.

(BTW – the underwater photos are not mine. I have a camera, but it is the old fashioned film kind. I got them from some of the students.)

I couldn’t get really comfortable in the water and soon got out and let the boat captains have a go.

After lunch, we headed out to the back reef, which is the backside of the front reef. (Duh.) It is much sandier and has a lot of sea grass. It wasn’t as interesting over all, but I did see a puffer fish, several conchs and a Yellow Sting Ray:

After dinner, the students had to do a lab that involved taking clumps of seaweed and alga and seeing what species hang out there.

It is pretty disgusting. There are shrimp and crabs and sponges and worms. Yucky, icky, red worms.

I am a chemist. I don’t poke things, especially if they move fast or look gooey. So my job was to watch one of the groups and tell them when one of their crabs was about to escape.

Yup. Twenty three years in school and this is what I am reduced to.

But I will admit, I was pretty good at guarding against any escaping crabs. On my watch, none escaped. However, when I went to investigate some screams, he made a break and the girls chastised me.

One of the groups had a really cool urchin on their clump of gooey stuff.

It has these little tentacles that came out and would stick to things that were close. I know this because someone else found it out, not me.

But the really cool thing was the octopus we saw last night:

He was the most brilliant, bluish-green that I have ever seen. He didn’t like the light and kept hiding under the rock. We would walk away for 5 minutes and then run back with the light to catch him out hunting. Pretty soon, he got tired of us and hid away.

Posting is hard when…

There are so many excuses…. er, reasons, that I haven’t posted the Sicily pictures.

1. My lap is full when I sit down. I can’t sit down for longer than 10 seconds without a cat crawlingon me. Not that I’m complaining or anything. But the cats won’t move when I put the computer on them either. It makes it difficult.
2. The weeds are taking over. I look out the window and can’t handle the weeds everywhere. I’ve spent about 3 hours outside this weekend and only got three beds cleaned out. Two of them are small! I have two more to do and they are both ginormous.
3. Hanging out with friends and family has a higher priority right now. Sorry about that! I know that a lot of you are friends and family too and this is a surrogate for hanging out. I promise to post pictures tomorrow. (I have a sunburn from weeding on the fourth and can’t be outside if I want to keep my outer layer of skin.)
4. I have to write a grant!! I’m trying to scare up some funding for my students next year. I need to focus on that and get it done!!

We are settling right in to living in the US though. It was pretty seamless, which is a little scary. I kind of wish that it would have been harder to get used to home life again. But I am enjoying watching TV and going to the movies.

We saw Wall-E tonight with friends. I love Pixar. It was good, but no Monsters, Inc.!

I have a visa… and I’m already over the limit.

Visa, visa, visa. What an awful word. If you are planning on staying in Europe for more than 90 days, you’ll need a visa. To get a visa, you need to go to the consulate of choice and bring with you proof of …. everything. Proof of health insurance, proof of lodging, proof you have a way out of the country, proof of means, proof of rabies vaccination, proof of good taste in clothing… It’s amazing. Maybe one day I’ll regale you with the story of proof of health insurance, but not now. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Back in October, I did not know any of this.

Because I have a Fulbright scholarship, I’m supposed to get this letter from the Italian commission that explains some of this info. I think that this letter is magic and is all I need. I contact the Italians back in OCTOBER about this letter. They say “No too early, wait until the end of November!” So I wait. And wait. Finally, on January 3rd, I email again.

Office closed. Back in on the 7th.

January 8th I get a note from the commission saying “Oh yeah! You need that letter. We’ll send it to you today.” It arrives on January 14th. In a FedEx envelope. In Italian. With no instructions. I freak.

I frantically email my contact in Italy and start surfing the web. I find the consulate’s website and realize that this is not simple. And I need one to THREE weeks. I also find on my surfing trip a .pdf file entitled “Predeparture Information for Fulbright Grantees to Italy. Academic Year 2007-2008″. Amazingly, this has a lot of information that I need!!

Just a note here – I never got this pdf file. I was never told it existed. I know, because I went back through EVERY piece of paper that I have gotten in conjunction with this award.

So for a week, I hunt down every scrap of paper that I need. This includes a letter of invitation from our host in Italy. The host won’t respond to my emails, only Jim’s. Sigh.

Three weeks from the day I am supposed to leave, I am about to go to the consulate, but realize that it is Martin Luther King Jr. Day and everything is closed. Small panic attack, but now that I have all of my paperwork, I’m much calmer.

Wednesday, my friend Claire and I head to Detroit. Long story short – 1.5 hours of driving to the consulate, 15 minutes of waiting in lobby, 3 minutes at window waiting, 15 seconds of very nice lady sorting through my paperwork and telling me it is all there, 1.5 hours of driving home. Now the panic begins. When will it all get here!?!

Claire and I take a detour to the new MGM Grand Casino in Detroit on our way home. She won $50 in the first 3 minutes of playing. I lost $5. We leave.

So the visa arrived on that Saturday. JOY!! WOO HOO!! I open up my passport to admire my fancy new visa…. and realize the departure date is wrong. ARGH!!! Because it is Saturday, I have to wait until Monday morning to call the consulate and beg for mercy. (It wasn’t my fault, but groveling is the best bet I’ve found.)

I call this morning, and apparently, they really don’t care when you leave. I was told it would be no problem and don’t worry (crazy american). So, I’ve decided not to worry about it. Maybe they’ll deport me, maybe not. Maybe they won’t even notice.

On a lighter note, I finally learned something useful in my Italian lessons today: “I’d like some wine.”

This is a chickpea.

So in preparation for my trip to Florence, I’ve been cramming trying to learn at least a little bit of Italian. I’m using two different CDs. The first is the Barron’s Foreign Service Institute “Mastering Italian”. The first 10 or so units was all about learning the correct way to pronounce things. Which is good, but from that I learned how to say “Is Amanda around?” Not very useful, unless I end up meeting an Amanda. About unit 13 we started learning vocabulary.

Now remember, this set of CDs has “The same course used by the U.S. Government to train *Diplomatic Personnel*” (The stars are actually on the case!!)

The first phrase that we learn is “What is this?” (Che cos’e questo? in Italian if you care.) The first response that we learn: It’s a chickpea (E un cece). Thank goodness our diplomats know how to identify chickpeas. I also learned “It’s a wolf” and “It’s a wastebasket”. (Lupo and cestino, respectively.) One day this might be helpful but I was more hoping for things like: “Where’s the bathroom?” and “Help me, I’m bleeding.”

The second set I’m using is the Pimsleur language CDs. Very good. Learning some more useful phrases (“I would like to drink something.”) in this set of CDs. It is presented in dialog format. This is good because it forces you to respond. However the dialogues are kind of creepy:

• Man – Signorina!
• Woman – Yes?
• Man – Where is Veneto Street?
• Woman – Over there.
• Man – (Out of the blue) How are you doing?
• Woman – (Spotting friends and running off) Goodbye!

Is it just me or is it teaching men to stalk women? Another dialogue:

• Man – Would you like something to eat?
• Woman – No, I would like something to drink.
• Man – My house?
• Woman – I want to drink now!

Honest to goodness, this was a dialogue on the CD.

It’s been fun. I annoy Jim every night with the phrases that I know. Of course, he responds in Italian which annoys me because he’s not doing any of the CDs with me.

Maybe today I’ll learn “Where is Pepe’s house?”

Italy