Well, that didn't take long. 
Charles's car is at a body shop.
He was in a minor freeway accident earlier today, and thank God no one
was hurt. His Buick Skylark tangled with a Suburban.
I would say the Suburban "won" but that doesn't seem an appropriate
term, since it's our insurance company that will pay for its scars.
Raise the driving age to 27, that's what I say. 
Okay, that was a bit embarrassing. One would think I'd know where my own child spent his early years, wouldn't you?
Dmitry's feathers were a bit ruffled when it came to light that I
thought he'd lived in Alatyr until going to the children's home in
Shumerly.
Nope. Yes, he was born in Alatyr, but that's because that's where the hospital was....his mother actually lived in a small town (16,000 people, according to a source on the net) called Pervomaysk:
"I told you that!" Dmitry said severely.
Oops. My mistake (hey, all those Russian words sound alike,
y'know?). Let the record show that Dmitry grew up - until shortly
before his 8th birthday - in Pervomaysk, not Alatyr. 
Unless a potential adoptive family is located within the next few
weeks, we'll be hosting a pair of brothers from Russia at the end of
July. 
The upside, of course, is Dmitry having - for ten days - a couple of
live-in video game players, and maybe even checker opponents. He
wheedles me into the latter game occasionally, which I simply
loathe....checkers is one step above tic-tac-toe on the boredom scale.
I've been assured checkers is very popular in Russia, and these boys are
Russian, so with any luck whatsoever he can get his fill for a
bit. Of course, watch them not like checkers, either.
The downside are the obligatory meetings for the host families.
The only thing worse than meetings would be meetings where checkers are
played.
Ah, for those halcyon days when I thought meetings were nifty. Go to enough of 'em and one gets disabused of that
foolish notion, lemme tell you. Oh well! It's not forever,
and I evaded them when adopting Dmitry so I suppose it sort of balances
things out for me to be stuck attending them now. Talk about
locking the barn door after the horse has escaped, though.
Here's a photo of them:
The eldest is, I believe, 13 (or 14 - I've heard both), and the younger
is 9. Is it my imagination or does he look a little like a young
Jimmy Cagney?
Amazing. Utterly.
We live one block from the Dairy Queen where Charles works. ONE
BLOCK. When grandchildren are over we often amble down to get
some ice cream.
Charles just called out to me that he's "running down to Dairy Queen for a minute."
Coming out into the front rooms I see his car is gone. He drove? A block? Who on earth drives a block on a lovely summer morning? 
A boy with a new driver's license and car, that's who. 
Dmitry has fallen head-over-heels into the world of MMORPGs (Massive
Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games, for the uninitiated), starting
AdventureQuest yesterday. He had to select his character's name,
so told me "Lawton." (My father's name.)
I paused and looked at him. "Lawton?"
He became slightly defensive. "What? It's a cool name. I like it."
Okay. "'Lawton' it is," I agreed, and obediently typed it in.
It's not that it's not a "cool" name, but it is a bit unusual for a fantasy-world setting. 
Every now and then there's a news headline that tickles me, such as this one at CNN:
And, by jingo, he oughta know. 
Sometimes the mail brings delightful surprises, and it did so for
Dmitry.....a letter from his best friend in Alatyr, BION! The
last time Sveta was in Chuvashia she went to Alatyr and located him,
giving him Dmitry's new address, and he (another Dmitry) wrote him and
included a photograph, to boot.
Dmitry's in seventh heaven, as one may imagine! 
The reality of driving has apparently hit Charles right in the checking account.
Yesterday he filled his tank, and drove to and from the Dairy Queen in
Azle (he and some others from the Montgomery St. store are helping
train the Azle employees).
Today he's back at the Azle store, but this time he caught a ride with someone else.
Thanks to Tulip Girl's blog for alerting me to this bit of useful information:
Get a couple of mist sprayers, put vinegar in one, hydrogen peroxide in
the other, and you're on your way to a Really Clean Kitchen.
Stuff even disinfects wood cutting boards.
Recent Comments