It’s been a helluva month. When August ended, we literally had no idea what was coming next. Seriously. Waking up on the morning of August 31, we really didn’t know what the future was going to hold for us. All we knew for sure was that Rasa had her PhD defense coming up on the 21st of September, and that was causing enough stress on its own.
Continue reading “September”
A couple of years back, we got a car. It was a much needed balm at the time and over the past few years, it has been a real life saver. Our little “Silver Car,” as Monki dubbed it, allowed us a freedom of movement which was vitally important.
Sure, Kaunas has public transportation, but the car let us go and explore places public transportation made extremely difficult to reach, if they went there at all. This was how we were able to visit the beaches and hiking sites in nature and even make day trips to the zoos and dino parks which aren’t in our backyard.
Had an interesting moment today. Monki and I had a fight. Not a big one mind you, but an important one. See, every day, we change the calendars. Over here in Lithuania (and maybe the rest of Europe, I can’t really say), calendars come with a piece of elastic with a little red square for putting over the date. Handy, right?
Anyway, this is just something we do on a daily basis. There’s three calendars in the house at the moment, one in the living room and one in her room, on which she likes to “X” off the days as they happen, and there’s a page-a-day Marvel calendar in the office. And this last one is where the problem occurred.
Continue reading “Family”
School starts next week. For me. For Monki, it starts the week after. Yup! She’s not only enrolled in kindergarten/preschool, but she also starts ballet classes on Monday the second of September. Now, those events will probably warrant a post of their own, but in the meantime, this is my last weekend before the semester starts and I have to knuckle down and get stuff done.
Therefore, we decided to take a little break and have some fun family time. This decision was aided by the fact that one of Rasa’s good friends was getting married and we wanted to go and congratulate the happy couple. Continue reading “Adventure Weekend”
Rasa’s mom’s birthday is August 4th. We decided that going up to Mažeikiai would be a nice weekend trip. Of course, since we were already going to be heading that way, we may as well go a little early and take Monki out for something fun. The beach was again considered, but the weather was being a bit prickly so instead, we opted for the Dinosaur Park, the signs for which we pass every time we head towards Klaipėda. Continue reading “Dino Park”
It’s been a busy few months here at the new house. First, the folks came to visit, then we had to finish the semester and whatnot and then, just a few days ago, my sister, along with my nieces and nephew, came to visit!
Like my folks, the Fulton Clan was coming from Asia (visiting their friends Johnny and Simone in Hong Kong and our cousins Mitch and Wassana in Thailand) and they were arriving very late on Thursday night. So, in order to make things easier, I rented a larger car (four adult size people and their luggage were not going to fit into our little Toyota) with the license plate of JOB418, which became our title for the entire trip. Continue reading “Job 418”
So, for the last few weeks, starting on Rasa and my anniversary (April 23) through to the morning of May 14th, my folks have been visiting us. I previously wrote a bit about the first few days but I wanted to catch up and speak a bit about the whole trip.
Unfortunately, when people are visiting, it throws your whole schedule out of whack and I wasn’t able to get as much writing done as I would have liked. Thankfully, though, mom did. So I’m going to do something I’ve never done before on here – co-author a piece. Using mom’s facebook posts as a starting point (you’ll see her notes in red), I will comment, add, reflect, and ponder my own thoughts and feelings on the three weeks.
Enjoy! Continue reading “Bubby and Pa Come to Visit 4/23-5/14, 2019”
Monki is now 23 months old. Leave aside the standard “oh my god look how quickly time goes by” stuff and there’s some really interesting things going on. As you know, we’re a divided family. I’ve talked about this before when it came to naming the wee one.
Continue reading “On Language Acquisition”
Wednesday-Friday July 5-7
The next three days were a blur of seeing friends and doing things around the house with the parents.
Wednesday, I got up early to go shopping with dad. We hit several different stores, including Walmart. I ended up getting a few more things than I originally intended to and got gently ribbed for it. I can’t help it! Continue reading “Visiting Friends – 2017 Summer Holiday”
Monday/Tuesday July 3 & 4
Monday morning and we had been “in country” for nearly a week. We woke up early (no jet lag excuse, just normally get up early) and got everything packed and ready to go. We had to “check out” of our Air B&B by 11am so the house was a flurry of activity as everyone grabbed all the stuff which had migrated everywhere and corralled it back into suitcases and backpacks. Continue reading “Baked and Stuffed Bears – 2017 Summer Holiday”
Saturday/Sunday July 1 & 2
Saturday was reserved for Sea World. Like the Zoo, we were again in a situation of several groups looking at different things. And since we were on baby schedule, no one wanted to stay with us for long (mom and dad stuck it out for a bit, but then they wanted to go see other things, too). Continue reading “Like a Fish Needs a Race Car – 2017 Summer Holiday”
Friday June 30
Friday morning was destined to be a travel day. First up was having breakfast in nearby Oceanside with an old friend, Mike Wallis. I first Mike some 25 years ago when he was my instructor at a comedy traffic school and we ended up having a discussion about Satanism…as you do. Back when I lived in LA, we were pretty tight but, as happens, we drifted away into our own things. We’d chatted a few times over the years, and even gotten together for a coffee or two when I was in town, but even then it had been several years since we’d seen each other. So he came down and we went up and we met for a nice breakfast at a place called Don’s Country Kitchen. Continue reading “Old Friends and Disneyland – 2017 Summer Holiday”
Thursday June 29
Thursday was again planned to be a family day. And again, due to jet lag, we were up early. Fortunately, mom and dad also got up early so we could spend some time with them. Faye, her boyfriend Matt and the three kids were all still sleeping, having stayed up late the night before so just the five of us headed out to grab a bite. Continue reading “Family: Food and Fun – 2017 Summer Holiday”
Well, it happened.
After all the trouble we went through to get all the proper paperwork and everything, on Saturday the 23rd of April, we pulled it off and we are now, officially, hitched. Continue reading “Wedding”
(this is the third of three parts and very long – just giving you fair warning)July 2, 2015
We’d been in the country for two weeks and were just now making it to the ancestral homeland. This week was going to be different than the two previous weeks as now there was going to be a bit more visiting people rather than places. And we got a good start to this on Thursday morning. Continue reading “Las Vegas, Baby – USA summer 2015 – Week 3”
Getting the Hang of Thursdays 