kofola

i'm having my first kofola today, a gift from a student.  he's not from the czech republic, but he said he had said to himself that if he can learn to like kofola then he can lived here, so he forced himself to acquire the taste.  the taste is vaguely medicine-y.

kofola is a cola sold here during the communist era. but even though coca cola and pepsi are now available, people still drink kofola happily.

traveling

tonight we leave for finland!  kimmo and i are both excited and i think even lumi gets that something is happening.  we looked at our family photos again last night to review.

a clash of kings

A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

i had lots of other stuff to do this week (work is quite busy, plus i need to pack for a trip) but every spare moment i got was instead spent with my nose in this book. it's great!

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2 more days

2 more days of work, then a 2 week vacation in finland.  everything seems to be coming together packing-wise, and we hired an adorable young woman to watch the cats.

melon

the hotel where i'm teaching has a wonderful selection of fruit with the morning and afternoon coffee breaks.  consequently, i have eaten a tremendous amount of watermelon lately.  delicious!

amazon transactions

a few weeks ago i ordered a dr. seuss 'lift the flap book' for lumi from a seller on amazon.co.uk.  i received a book from the seller, but it wasn't the right one.  i sent this email to the seller:

I ordered a Dr. Seuss book for a young child, and instead received 'Nine Proposals for the Reform of the Law on Unfair Dismissal' by Hugh Collins. The baby is not very interested in Employment Law, as you can imagine.
Please send me my proper book!
Thank you,
Angela Carpenter

fortunately, they are offering to try sending the correct book.  and i can keep the 'nine proposals' book free of charge!

sunday activities

we went to the zoo today, which means we have been twice on our yearly pass.  we still haven't broken even.

that said, the prague zoo is very cool!  they make it easy to see lots of animals.  the only sad part about the visit today is that the orangutans weren't out playing.

beroun

today we went with some ladies from IWAP and their families to a little nearby town called beroun.  it was neat to see their bears, a set of brown bear triplets that live in a park there.  also the company was great.  there was one family from the UK with two girls, and the girls took care of lumi all day.

fast week

i'm teaching again this week, and it has seemed to go quite quickly.  hopefully the weekend will slow down.

the lumster was in high spirits yesterday (probably because it was a sunny day) and she was wonderful to be around.  

family

i love this photo.

rss readers

i'm exploring alternatives to google reader.  i tried to use netvibes, but the refresh was quite slow.  a given item wouldn't show up until at least 4 hours after it had showed up on google reader!  now i'm trying feedly (which is still syncing with google reader, but a different interface) to see how it goes.

beers in class!

a student bought beers for everyone in class today (her phone rang, and that's the rules) and it's making the afternoon fun.

i spoke too soon

the shower was cold again this morning.

Jane Eyre

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

i quite enjoyed this book!

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modern civilization

the whole building has had no hot water since monday, but it's back today.  it's luxurious.

finished a book

A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

i read this for the exact same reason as sarah wheatley. but also because my husband recommended the book, and i'm always shoving book recommendations in his face (not that he reads my recommendations, but what is marriage for if not to stake out and defend moral high ground?). anyway, i couldn't put it down and i wish i had read it earlier.

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Tourism

Today we went to the astronomical clock and the old Jewish cemetery. Lumi is having a lot of fun with her grandparents.

touring

another quite nice day: a couple of hours of work in the morning, then lunch at Grosseto, then afternoon cruise on the Vltava with Tom Kolisch!

visitors

a couple of calm days here -- grandpa and mama dollie are visiting and lumi is having a wonderful time.

Sunset from the balcony

gassy skins

the salad bar at the hotel where we are holding class has a beautiful selection of raw peppers.  i carefully avoided the green today but i'm still a little gassy.  i just read that removing the skin will avoid that, but maybe peeling bell peppers is too weird to do at lunch with coworkers.

new teeth

the lumster had 2 new teeth showing sunday morning.  she has 2 molars, we think!  one on each side on the bottom.

small victories

lumi doing a poo in the toilet makes it feel like the day is going to be AWESOME.