I do not!!!

Had a funny moment yesterday: Spoke to my dear friend, Carol, in Adelaide, who told me that I've picked up a bit of an American twang.

I do not sound American!! (add petulant stomp of the foot!)

(-:

A brush with nature

I've always wondered if Africans drive home from work, see an elephant on the side of the road, and think, "oh, how boring". As Australians, we tend to take our amazing and unique animals for granted. Seeing kangaroos while driving on the highway, most people just think, "that bugger better not jump out onto the road!".

Being here in the U.S., though, I'm still discovering their natural wonders. It doesn't last long, so I guess it's something I should enjoy while it lasts. When I first arrived here, I remember sitting on my back porch and watching the squirrels for hours. I hate seeing them now, because I know I'm going to be dragged behind Bonnie as she tries in vain to catch them!

Walking an hour with Bonnie (usually) every day allows me lots of time to enjoy our area. We're very lucky, in that the land opposite our house is vacant, about the size of 3 city blocks, I guess? The richest family in Augusta currently own the land and they've done nothing with it, so it's turned into a sort of local park area. There are huge magnolia trees everywhere, and the grass gets cut regularly, so it's a wonderful place for Bonnie to meet up with all her friends.

Last Thursday evening, as we were walking through the park on our way home, Bonnie decided she was hot and wanted to just sit quietly for a moment. As we sat there, a raccoon came out of the trees, sniffed around for a little bit, then trotted off into another grove of trees. Raccoons are very shy creatures, and Dustin tells me that if you actually see one, it's probably rabid. But this one seemed like it just didn't realise we were there. It was so cute: little bandit mask, beautiful striped tail ... that was a cool moment. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccoon: the one we saw was actually much heavier than this one pictured.)

Another very cool moment happened on Sunday. Dustin and I bought some Adirondack chairs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adirondack_chair), so we were sitting in our backyard, enjoying the serenity (I can't use that word without thinking of Seinfeld!!). He was looking over at the plant bed, I happened to look up, and out of nowhere, a hummingbird appeared and hovered right above Dustin. I quickly tried to tell him to look up, but by the time the words came out, it was gone. That was very cool, because I've never seen hummingbirds at our house before. The moment actually seemed very Harry Potter-like: this tiny thing, appearing out of nowhere, then taking off before you realise it's there... sounds like the golden snitch!

Speaking of our backyard (that's a whole other story), here is a photo that I took about a month ago. 'Til next time...

Final round of chemo- update

As usual, the week after chemo was yuk. Each round of that horrible stuff seems to hit me differently. This round gave me the wonderful experience of terrible reflux, ulcers coating my throat and gut, a completely numb tongue and mouth, and the usual fatigue and bone aches. My boss is currently in Athens, Greece, so it was great to be able to just sleep 16 hours a day and groan pitifully the rest of the time.

Friday morning, though, I woke up feeling much happier and was even able to work the whole day. Today has also been a good day, so from here, I should start feeling better and better.

My princess

Here she is, my little princess.

Living in the South

We went to a wedding today. The bride and groom are classmates of Dustin's, and I'll call them "Jack" and "Jill". While we at the reception, we were told the very sad story of Jack's family.

Apparently, they are very faithful Southern Baptists. The mum had a revelation from God when Jack was 10 years old, that Jack should marry the child of one of their family friends. So, when Jack started dating Jill a few years ago, the family refused to acknowledge her. Apparently, they still hold the belief that Jack should marry the girl that God chose, and since he chose to marry Jill, he is defying God's will. So, the wedding was held today without a single member of Jack's family in attendance.

I can't imagine how sad he must feel. I can't imagine how his family felt when they looked at their clocks today at 11:30am, and realised that their son was now married.

Earlier in the week, I spoke to a business colleague about his experience of being black, and being married (for the last 40 years) to a white woman. I was astounded when he told me that even today, there are still parts of Augusta that they cannot go to together.

I just can't imagine holding a conviction so strongly, that it would cause me to hate like that. I just don't understand it...

Let's try this... see how long it lasts...

So, having become addicted to the blogs of my friends, I thought I would try it out for myself. Y'all know how I've struggled to keep up with the emails, so I'm not sure how successful this experiment will be, but here goes!