Indoor/outdoor

Train stations are such a weird mix of indoor and outdoor. 

My kids had no idea that we drive by train stations every day. 

Tristan is coming back from youth group on the train to save me the hour round trip. Another first in their growing up! 

The Aravaca station is built into a hillside and the architecture beautifully reflects the location.  That is Wyatt little bitty on the escalator.

The train company logo.  I saw a Center for Advanced Magnetism, which did not make a lot of sense until I saw the railway logo.

Thursday Best and Worst

Here are three links to interesting or funny things posted by others on the web:

1.  Jason Kottke posts interesting tidbits.  Famous naturalist David Attenborough does a mock-umentary of curling:
http://kottke.org/14/02/david-attenborough-narrates-curling


2.  Tyler Cohen writes an economics blog, but don't let the scary, boring word 'economics' turn you off.  Here is a big surprise: religious values empower women!!!  Even Islamic religious values.  And he has numbers of high school graduates to back it up.
http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2014/02/is-islamic-political-control-bad-for-womens-empowerment

Photo credit: Muscat Daily

3. Profanity alert!  I guess when you write a popular blog you can analyze what search terms lead  to your blog.  Jenny Lawson is famous for her scatological humor and making the most of blundering through life.

http://thebloggess.com/2014/02/i-suspect-youre-all-just-messing-with-me-now/

Anger management: assuming the worst

Imagine that you are the woman in red, minding your own business, getting your recycle-able grocery bags out of the back seat.  The woman in blue is saying something in Spanish, but all you catch is "license plate" and "twisted."  You just parked, legally and properly, in a nearly empty lot.  The only thing that might appear odd to the woman is that you have diplomatic red plates instead of white, which means that you don't have to pay for parking.


(photo credit, actually a celebrity fender bender)

I looked at her, but I didn't smile or acknowledge her at all, because if a Spanish stranger stops to say something, there can be only one reason:  she is complaining and criticizing something you have just done.  I didn't even bother to look at the plate.

Later I saw it.  It was indeed bent as if one side had been pulled forward.  I don't know what happened or why she thought she should point it out to me, but I was struck by my reaction to her.  Later that day, Gary Thomas had this to say about couples stuck in a cycle of anger: "They look at every situation as more of the same, they always assume the worst and never give the benefit of the doubt."  God help me, I have an angry, disfunctional relationship with a whole country.

Awareness is the first step to recovery, they say.  I have in mind a second step.  The husband of my Spanish friend from school loaned me 800 pages of Spanish history in fine print and assured me that it was written in a very readable manner.  His favorite king was ____(? I already forgot), who was king during Spain's greatest period of empire.  So that was where I started reading.  If Spain is anything like the US in lack of historical knowledge, I need a fallback question.  For example, "Who is your favorite and least favorite soccer player?"  The goal of that project would be to find videos of good and bad sportsmanship to show to Wyatt.  He needs help giving the benefit of the doubt without assuming the worst. German soccer, I hear, lacks the prima dona's and theatrics.  That is probably why we never hear anything about it.

The wind at my back

I found this picture while doing Spanish memory work and it summarizes how I felt this week. (The link is just for a photo credit.)


All the boys are opening up about their time at school. Wow!  Homework (their homework) still takes hours, but it is hours of actually work instead of hours of squawking and procrastinating.

   Tristan has a plan to bring his last class up to passing.  His teacher said about his Treasure Island test, "Did someone help you?  Are you sure no one helped you?  This is very good work."  Of course it helps that he already knew the story.  He also has to practice dictation, where I read the sentences and he copies them out.  He doesn't mind doing it once, but hates having to repeat it.

   Wyatt noticed his nemesis doing something nice for him.  His teacher has said twice that Wyatt thinks everyone is against him.  He focuses on just a couple of kids.  Since the episode of repeated very bad tummy aches, we have been hitting him with every trick in the book.  The goal is to assure him that we are on his side and to help him see past the annoying kids who take up all his attention.  About the girl  who lied and got him in trouble, "Do you want Daddy to beat up her Daddy?"  About the kid who cuts in line in gym, "Do you want him to be taken out of your class?  No, we better not wish for that because if he gets hit by a car we will feel bad."  And also big doses of "who is one person you can love?"  His friend Joaquín.  "Who is hard to be nice to?  Which soccer player COULD you play soccer with?  Spanish kids push and hit and cut and tattle.  You can't just look at all the rules you follow, and then be mad that the other kids break them.  You also have to have GRACE and forgiveness."  Wyatt is very law-abiding and way too quick to judge, so hopefully he is learning life-long lessons.  It is working, because he did notice Ramon picking up his pencil that fell, and he was excited to tell us about it.

     We went to the home of my Spanish friend that I thought was gone for good for a birthday party. What a relief to start fresh with all the bad feelings gone and nothing but gratitude left.

The bidet is not for storage

We went to IKEA for some odds and ends. Tistan surprised me by asking for a week's worth of pillowcases. Apparently they were changed every day on the ski trip and his pimples got better. Yes!!! I will get those right away!

Winston assembles the bathroom cart. Now all the junk can go in the cart instead of the bidet. I heard Troy in there giving Winston a much-needed lesson on how  and why to use the bidet. He seemed very bright-eyed and excited about it. 

In other life skills...We were supposed to go out for Valentine's Day, but the anesthesia and whatnot caught up to Troy. So the boys had a fun evening planned for themselves. 

Ramen, soda, ipad on the table, movies ... We'll try again tomorrow. I hope you all have your loved ones beside you. 

Don't look too closely

Here we are in the waiting room for laser vision correction surgery. That screen on the wall REALLY IS what you think it is. 

It is real-time closed-circuit TV from the operating room. Troy said, "Oh cool, look at that!" Silly me, I looked. 

Hockey was on in the other waiting room, and since that's all the Olympics I'm going to get, I watched. 

Surprisingly, this is the first time in six months that someone parked one inch from my bumper. I should get out more. 

Random architectural detail. 

Curling is a sport performed in slow motion, but it builds to a good climax.  I'm telling you I'm desperate for Olympics. But even so, we only watched curling because one team was Swiss, like my friend Fabia. We really were on the edges of our seats. (Canada won.)

Wyatt  takes his first antacid. It was like sucking toothpaste out of a packet. 

How is his tummy ach? Fine. The disgustingness of the medicine made him forget all about it. He seems much better. 

They are having a special week at school put on by the English Department called "a Trip to London."  There are puppets, magic tricks and a theater group. They came home quoting Hamlet and Macbeth and summarizing Oliver twist.  Tristan's favorite part of the day was when everyone in Hamlet got killed one by one. Hooray for the classics!  Tomorrow is a book fair, but alas, all the books are in English. 

Worker Safety

As I said, it has been raining for six weeks. Here's a drizzly picture of our little church. 

The workmen came to repair the skylight at the same time I was hosting Bible study.  When I first met Jorge, the Romanian repair guy, he asked twice if I lived here in the house. I think his confusion came from the fact that I was mopping and doing housework. He thought I must be the maid. I teased him about being Romanian and a gypsy. That was a mistake I won't make again, though all he said was that they have nothing to do with each other. 

Here Jorge and partner tie a strap around the new skylight to hoist it out the window. I asked the ladies downstairs to please pray, because they were on the roof in the rain with no harness. I thought my roof was really steep but it's actually flat on top. 

Here we are at the embassy to see the doctor about Wyatt's lack of appetite.  It's gone on about two weeks and a couple of times he was writhing on the floor.  He ate three quarters of that hamburger, so hopefully he's feeling better.

Flown away

I am preoccupied with manners. So when someone comments about how bare my house is compared to other embassy families, what's the tactful answer? My answer was what I really think.  I don't know where they get the money.  I think the manners book says not to talk about money. But if your friend invites you for coffee at a shopping mall, it seems better to be clear up front that coffee is all I'm going to spend money on.

     What do you think? Polite evasion, as in, "They do have beautiful houses," or direct explanation, as in, "My house is bare because I am a tightwad." I guess it depends on whether I want to be invited back.  Leave a comment :-)

     I was stuck in the mall, wishing I had parked on the street and not in the garage so I could take pictures. What is there to take pictures of in the mall? Nothing. Or so I thought it first. Then, I wanted to take pictures of all the cute retirees, but it's not really acceptable here to take pictures of random people. 

So instead here's a picture of our loose, banging skylight. The workman came at 10:30 but didn't have a ladder so he left. When he came back well after dark, the skylight had "flown away" in two pieces to the neighbor's yard. That explained why it was freezing cold in the kitchen.  At  Troy's suggestion and with Troy's tools he put up Troy's tarp. At least today we had our first day of sunshine in six weeks, so hopefully it doesn't rain. 

We should wait till business hours

I am very happy to report that we have a small group!  We have our own group on WhatsApp so it is official.  If you have not tried it you should. Spaniards are tickled that they all use an American app but none of their American friends do. Maybe with unlimited SMS you don't need it. We don't have unlimited SMS here, so the free app is better.  I don't think Europeans would have unlimited anything. It's somehow not environmentally correct, even if it is just SMS. 

Wyatt demolishes the gingerbread house in order to eat it. I need not have worried about the cake. I said it was biscocho and that was that. They were much more interested in the homemade ice cream. 

   We have all been praying for a group, so praise God. 

     At least once a week we black out the house. Between the oven, dishwasher, washer and dryer you can only run two out of four at a time. 

Tristan is the expert.  He shows me the shortcut on the circuit box. Afterwards he said he had to put his flashlight back under his pillow. So prepared!

     Troy said we need to use our alarm system or the embassy could lose funding for it. Some houses really do need it more than we do. So tonight I finally found the instructions. As we went to try it at 11:30pm, I said maybe we should wait till business hours. Sure enough, the thing armed and would not disarm. All I can say is, our poor neighbors. I can also say the technicians handled it really well. 

Troy spent the weekend adding a map feature to his surveillance detection app. He is a genius! 

Exploding pound cake

Wyatt made his own paper decorating tubes. There were a couple of false starts on the royal icing, which is egg whites and powdered sugar. 

At first it was really dry. Then he realized he used the egg yolks instead of the whites. So he dumped in the whites. I had an extra box of sugar and plenty of eggs, so no worries. 

The biggest problem was what to do with the three eggs already mixed with the pound of sugar. Poundcake, of course. 

I do not know what happened but it boiled over like a vinegar and baking soda volcano. 

Wyatt scraped up the overflow, which came out somewhere between candy and cookies. 

There was literally only 1 inch of cake left in the pan,

And all of these lovely candy bits. Thanks to Mom and Julia Child I am all set to serve it tomorrow mixed with homemade ice cream.  If anyone asks, it is a traditional family recipe. 

This is the mall where Winston went for bowling. The neighborhood is dilapidated, but the mall was bright and busy inside. 

This is how I imagine him, aloof and not interested. But really he was in the middle of it, speaking Spanish and having a good time. (He is not in the picture below so Mom doesn't need to look for him.)

The bowling alley was packed. The line went out the door. I had several interesting conversations with parents. I prepped Winston for the party by practicing manners. We did role-plays of holding doors and thanking grownups.  I learned a couple of things myself.

13.  The world does not care about what you dislike. Keep negative opinions to yourself. 

22. Ask the other parent what their kid likes. I genuinely wanted to know after buying presents in the blind for kids I knew nothing about. 

   Winston wants to have a party like that, but at home, with just a few friends. So he wants what we always have. Whatever it is, it will be great. 

Not Too Proud: Americans vs Europeans

At my Friday Ladies Bible Study, we are reading a marriage book.  This group is much smaller and more intimate than the Tuesday group.  But the Tuesday group is closer and more accessible to new people.

Today´s homework was to tell our husband specifically something we appreciate about him.  The author even gave us permission to write it in a note.  I kind of missed that part about the notes, but I liked the idea, so I took a napkin and lectured my friends, "Seize the moment!  Don't talk yourself out of it or think it has to be on some perfect card.  Write on here 'Dear Troy' and draw a heart."

One woman absolutely would not draw a heart.  NO WAY.  Only Americans do that.  

A second woman observed that it was pride that kept them (Europeans) from writing notes and drawing hearts.

A third woman said, "Please show me how."  

I thought she wanted me to show her how to draw a heart.  "How to draw a heart?"

"No, how to write a note."  

I was stunned almost to silence.

"OK, so then you open it up and, well, your husband looks like he works out and is fit, so you write,..."

And draw a smiley face."  

She held her hand out for me to give it to her. 

 She took it.  

She looked at it from every angle.  

She KEPT it.  

She tore off the Dear Troy part and tucked the other part in her book.  

     Now I'm intrigued.  What is she thinking?  What is she going to do with it?  What if her husband finds the Dear Troy part?  

     If you have to be American to write a note on a napkin that your husband is a hunk, then I'm glad to be an American.  I was actually planning to give it to Troy.  So the one in the pictures is one I made when I got home.

Three of Winston's classmates have a joint bowling party tomorrow.  What a great idea!  Here's the three presents.

My friend who kept my note said that her family used to have "Wild Night," when they could lick their plates and play music and dance and slurp their spaghetti. They choose the menu and cook it. 

We tried it tonight.  Wyatt made gingerbread.  Winston made chicken nuggets.  Tristan made pasta.  Except for all the snacking and spoon-licking before dinner, it was really not that wild.  I did have to draw the line that still there are no guns at the table.

Fraud alert

Fraud alert: Troy got an email calling itself a fraud alert from our bank. Pop quiz: see if you can spot his mistake. He called the number and the Indian lady asked for his credit card number.  He told her to look it up by his name. She wanted his address and Social Security number. He said he would call back later and hung up. 

     Answer: call the customer service number on the credit card, not the number on the email. The same goes for email links: instead of clicking on a link in an email, go to your browser and look up the web page of the bank.  The email was legit, by the way. 

It's a little late but here's my Christmas present from Troy. 

It's a gingerbread mold made of cast iron. Winston asked why it was nailed down, but it's just really heavy. 

Tristan is powering through treasure Island in Spanish.  He has a test tomorrow. He gives us an hourly update. "They hired the crew for the ship! They set sail! They got to the island! They had the first battle! They found Ben Gunn!"

But some of it is not completely clear.  Did Squire Trelawney get killed? How about Dr. Livesy? Tristan did not believe me that it was written in 1886 and people still read it. 

Stick-up

Winston wore a hat with his hood pulled up over it.  

He looks like this robot rabbit creature from a book the boys like called Amulet. 

The storm trooper is telling Wyatt that he is under arrest. He ran over Winston's foot with the chair. There was a lot of squawking and complaining about homework and chores, so a little laughter was very welcome. 

Drama

I have just as much drama in my life as always, but suddenly it doesn´t seem as interesting.  I hosted the ladies bible study, with 18 women and 8 kids under 2. (and a babysitter)

I really like hosting so that was good.  Everyone has some kid or family drama every week! I shouldn't be surprised by that, but in my old Bible study we never really had time to talk about those things.  I can't go into detail, of course, because of confidentiality.  I also recommitted to studying Spanish, so that is taking a lot of time.  We have had some families over from church, so hopefully that will turn into a small group.

Wyatt got bored at recess and jumped the fence to the forest.  There were four other kids with him (including Tristan), but he was the only one who got a note sent home.  His teacher wants him to play soccer and get along with the other kids. My kids hate soccer and team sports in general, because of all the cheating.  The other mom in my Spanish class said that her kid says the same thing.  

 Winston had a friend over this weekend, and I heard him speaking Spanish for the first time.  We were puzzled about the child's name.  I wrote a note to 'the mother of Fechal,' and she wrote back, 'I'm the mother of César.'  I tried to tell Winston "It's César," but he insisted it was Fechal, until the kid was sitting right there.  They had a great time.

I feel bad about complaining so much about school.  Now Troy wants to move them to the American School.  I think I have a quota of ill-will and it all gets focused somewhere, usually at teachers and authority figures.  This time it was the school.  It is hard but it is worthwhile!  We decided not to because he doesn't feel that strongly about moving them and I feel pretty strongly about not moving them.

I hope everyone gets this with the new email group.

Manzanares Castle

I needed a break from blogging after all those long blogs. This castle pretty well speaks for itself. 

It seemed to me to be more of a summer palace, built around this courtyard. 

The stormy sky was a nice touch behind the battlements. Those cannonball things seem to be there for decoration. 

The tour was pretty strict, but we did get to go up and down some tiny staircases. Winston wants me to add that this one went from the very top battlement all the way down. 

This drawing was on all the doors. I noticed that in government offices also they have drawings of local landmarks. It's a very nice touch. 

It was a stork convention. There were storks flying in formation. There were flocks of storks in the fields. There were pairs in nests. There were colonies on top of every bell tower.