dear lufthansa:

I'm all for labor unions. I can even support a well-coordinated strike when necessary. But you listen up when I say that if you do not get my husband back to me on August the Fourth, as originally planned, I will probably cry. And you will probably lose your standing as my very favorite airline.

That's all.
Lex

blogkeeping

There are a few housekeeping-type items that have come to mind lately. Allow me to bore you with them.

(1) I love that so many friends and friends-of-friends are blogging these days; however, I can't quite keep up with you. Don't feel slighted if I don't add your link to to my sidebar. If I know you and I like reading your blog, I keep track of you by adding you to my google reader account. (If you read blogs but you don't use google reader, you will thank yourself later if you just go there now and set up an account.) If you want me to link to your blog, I would be happy to. E-mail me at inthewoodland [at] gmail (dot) com.

(2) If we know each other, then I most likely will have no problemo with you linking to my blog from yours. Please don't link to us using our first and last names. Sorry if that cramps your sidebar style.

(3) Lastly, who are you, anyway? Yeah, you, lurking over there. Months ago I added a sitemeter to this blog out of curiosity, and I noted with some surprise that people besides my mom are reading this blog regularly. Many people will read a post in a day and only a few of them will comment. Also hits are coming regularly from places where I am pretty confident that I do not know a single living soul. Or a non-living soul, come to think of it. Which is fine, assuming you unknown people in the unknown places are not crazy stalkers of the concealed-weapon-toting variety. New readers are always welcome, but feel free to introduce yourselves. If you don't want to leave a comment, you can always e-mail me at the above-mentioned inthewoodland [at] gmail (dot) com.

Thanks and happy blogging!
The Management

summer entertainment

Stop everything. Have you seen North & South? If you haven't, you should. Tonight. Or maybe right this very minute. This BBC mini-series-turned-DVD has long been on my list of things to maybe, possibly watch sometime, when I ran out of other options. Once last year I even brought it home from the library with the best of intentions. Unfortunately every time I picked it up and saw the label Two Disc Set!, I balked at the thought of spending four solid hours watching it (and no, I have never been able to get through the thirty-hour-long Pride and Prejudice from 1995; please don't shun me, period drama fanatics.) Thus, North & South ultimately went back to the library, unwatched and unappreciated.

This week when I picked up the same North & South at the same library, my thought process went more like this - four hours of corsets and cravats? How lovely! Because time is exactly what I have these days. And corsets and cravats and Victorian romance could be exactly what I am lacking.

I watched. I enjoyed. I savored. And you might like it too, especially that last scene at the train station, which is basically perfect.

Other mass media that may possibly keep me from losing my mind:
-podcasts of This American Life; All Songs Considered; and Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me
-So You Think You Can Dance, my current guilty pleasure
-sampling new CDs, for instance Amos Lee's latest
-the book She Got Up Off the Couch, because it just makes me laugh

What is keeping you entertained this summer? What are you watching/listening to/reading and loving?

a sunday sermon on divine intervention

I'll let you in on a bit of my (somewhat pathetic) pleading earlier this week. The wording has, of course, been paraphrased.

"...and thanks for this, and that, and gosh I'm so blessed and blah blah blah. Okay, so it's true. But really. Let's be honest with each other here. I feel stuck in a big fat rut today. This whole business of living on a different continent than my husband is wearing on me already. I KNOW! ALREADY! I feel silly complaining, when this situation is clearly something Shay and I, after careful deliberation, chose to bring upon ourselves. But I'll still admit that it stinks. I miss having my closest friend around all the time. There is so much empty space in this house. It's too quiet at night. I've had some great times this week, but there are these little moments of loneliness that just - ugh - they could drive me crazy. I don't want to go crazy. I bet you don't want me to go crazy. So I'm doing everything I can to handle this well. Any help you could offer me in climbing out of this rut would be greatly appreciated."

And this was my favorite voicemail of the week, which came that afternoon, from Jen (my friend of, oh, 15 years) and her husband Li. Again, I can only paraphrase:

"Hi! We're not living in Florida any more. Kind of unexpected. Long story. But we're driving to Philadelphia today and then heading to Utah for the rest of the the summer. Can we come stay with you on the way? I want to come see you."


Now, folks. I won't say that I summoned a miracle. And I won't say that having Jen close by for a little while made me any less bothered by the fact that Shay is far away and will still be far away for three more weeks. I'm just saying that I asked for some help mixing my life up a bit, lest I start to descend into a pit of despair, and I ended up getting an impromptu visit from one of my closest friends. It was just what I needed, and someone knew it. Those are just the facts. And I'm sticking to them.

oh, you shouldn't have

It sounds like there are going to be festivities and fireworks displays all over the U.S. today. To be honest, it's a little more fanfare than I expected to meet on my return to my home country, but uh... okay. I'll take it.

I am home from Slovenia and am mostly unpacked. What a great trip it was. A few things I am missing already:

*waking up in this lovely pastel-colored city:


*eating sour yogurt + crunchy muesli for breakfast - trust me, it's heavenly

*admiring the Alps

*seeing flower boxes in almost every window *counting the number of ice cream stands I pass on a given route (once I counted 13 on a ten-minute walk)

*eating dinner along the river, while people-watching and soaking up the cafe culture

*being able to walk nearly everywhere I need to go, and having easy public transportation for everything else

*spending most of the day, every day, with Shay

A few things I am especially appreciating today:

*my comfy bed

*friends close by and family more easily contacted

*not having smoke blown in my face everywhere I go

*not being barked at by ornery grocery store clerks, postal workers, restaurant employees, etc.

*frequently seeing random people smile, hold the door for each other, say thank you, and show other evidences of warmth and humanity

*having a shower curtain, and a shower head that attaches to the wall - poor Europe, have you still not gotten the memo about some of these advances?

*the flexibity that comes with having a car

*air conditioning as a given

*the quiet beauty of my own little neighborhood

*a happy, healthy, full life in a prosperous country that, despite its problems, is still my favorite place to be