10/06/04-Some random thoughts...

Tonight, we have some random comments and updates. First, my adventure to exchange Grace’s shoes was successful. Two of the same girls were working and they laughed when I walked in. They had a smaller shoe in the same size, but they only had brown. I liked the red, but the brown are cute, too. They fit perfect. She kept them on all day.

Gma and I are still experimenting with different foods. At the last trip to the grocery, I had Lena help me find some meats. We got some meat that looked to be packaged in some seasoning. (She assured me it was not horse.) She also got me some sausage to cook.) When we got it back, we went on to WorldLingo, which is a great online translator, to see what we had purchased. The first item was beef and the second was labeled Salami. In the end of the day, we figured out we got corned beef and bologna. The beef was very good as a sandwich, especially with the Gouda cheese I previously bought. Gma fried the bologna tonight with some BBQ sauce. Yes, Pittsburghers, I came all the way to Kazakhstan to have some fried jumbo.

On my walk today, I think I found the answer to one of the questions I’ve had that some you may also be wondering – What do they do about the snow on the roads? Apparently, nothing at all. The snow is not too heavy, but they just drive on it until it melts. I noticed the side streets are very icy. I didn’t see a lot of cars (or people) slipping too much, so I guess they know what they are doing. I’ve told you a little about the drivers here, but one thing I noticed is that they really don’t go that fast. They are aggressive, but they are not moving very quickly.

We’ve realized what the first complex concept Jack is going to learn – the concept of the time-out. The kid is into everything. We’ve been working on “No”, which we think he understands. He just looks at you and smiles and then goes right back to what he was doing. Today, when Gma told him “No,” he just looked back and waved her off. Again, he always does it with his wonderful smile, but he still just says, “Forget you.” Just think – “Little Jack Horner sat in his corner…”

Before Mary Jo left, she had Jack waving bye-bye. One of her last orders to us was that she wanted Grace waving before she came home. Well, Mom, task accomplished. She was definitely waving today. In fact, I captured one picture that looked liked the kids were waving at each other. OK, they were waving and happened to be facing each other, but it was a great effect. Jack has taken it a step further and actually says “Bye-Bye” sometimes.

Well, those are my random thoughts for today. As of today, we are two weeks from going home. Check out some pictures.