Yesterday I was on a quest for car seats and while in the shopping center I saw a H&M store. It looked exactly like a GAP store. I’m not sure about it being a less expensive version (at least in CH). THe prices didn’t seem very low, but I only looked at a few items. I could see our family spending lots of francs there.
Sorry, I know all my posts are under the Rants category – I’m a whiner, but you all know that!
1. Temperamental furnace: every so often, it will start to work and then just begin blowing cold air – the next day, it will be back to normal. Melissa, you picked a good time to go to Auburn!
2. Water heaters, esp. when they need to be replaced. I mean really, 10 years is all you can give me?
3. Windows that let in the cold and noise (or maybe some of that has to do with the street I live on…)
4. Low ceilings that make the whole house feel that much smaller (and that husbands can make finger marks on when proving they can stand on the ground and reach the ceiling).
5. It’s tough to choose just one more… the great water pressure? the roof that needs to be replaced in the next couple years? the ugly bathroom that really should be remodeled – carpet in a bathroom is a pretty gross thing…
Me and my chilly self are going to the gym to try and warm up now! Dumb heater…
Aren’t you up for a vacation yet? Why don’t you just come by this weekend? Doesn’t that sound like a great idea?
our air freight shipment just arrived about an our ago. it’s mostly unpacked (only 500 lbs of stuff) and the kids have been happily playing ever since!!! wheee!!! the only toys i put in there were the legos, rowan’s big wooden car carrier (with the three cars), the fish bowl eve got ro for his first birthday, baby, the play silks, the fridge abc thing, and the cart. and they are thrilled.
….eeek. spoke too soon. a fight just erupted over the ABC thing. rowan is in time out in his room.
anyway. this is making me seriously reevaluate all the STUFF we had. so much stuff. we cleared out a ton, as you all know, but it’s starting to feel like we still have too much.
i looked at all the clothes that came today, and wondered whether we really need them after living without for the past two weeks. with no problems. granted, some of it is summer stuff. but still.
and the toys! they were mostly doing fine with what we brought with us on the plane. hmmmm.
obviously we NEED very little, but all this stuff i thought was nice to have anyway, maybe just clutter? anyway. random thoughts. and when we leave switzerland we will probably have the same problem we had when we left seattle. *sigh*
it’s so nice to see some of this stuff though. books, pictures, dvds, misc. other items. yay!
on a separate, but related note, rowan was terrified of the delivery man. howled for the longest time. poor guy was so nice and felt very bad. the crying stopped as soon as the man opened up the legos for him. the delivery man also brought with him (by coincidence) a handyman of some sort who did some random painting in the the apt. i’m not sure why? hope he was legit. have seen him around the building working, so i assume so. he did not speak any english. i had to sign some paperwork too, which makes me a little nervous. WHAT was i signing? hope it was okay! eeek! the handyman at one point tried to make niamh laugh…but instead she howled…do you think my kids take after me???
Sara and Don had their baby!
Their adventures can be found here:
http://schmidtson.blogspot.com
But it should be all better now. Sorry about that, folks! For future reference: don’t just cut and paste articles that have ads in them. You need to paste them into notepad or word first and cut out the ad picture and any text before putting it on the blog because the language that publishes your entry will go all wonky if you don’t.
Most of this article is only mildly entertaining due to the absolute ridiculousness of the way bureaucracy muddles things but I will highlight the portion that I found simply delightful.
Friday, March 23, 2007 · Last updated 12:11 p.m. PT
Tacoma Narrows bridge component stuck on I-90, ruled too heavy
SPOKANE, Wash. — An oversized expansion joint for a Tacoma bridge project made it more than 1,300 miles before being stopped at a weigh station on the Washington border because the Washington State Patrol said it’s too heavy for its trailer.
State Department of Transportation officials looked for ways Friday to send the 73-foot expansion joint the final 300 miles to its destination to help complete the second span across the Tacoma Narrows. It has been sidelined on its custom-built trailer since Saturday at the Spokane Port of Entry on Interstate 90 just west of the Idaho border after tipping the scales at 330,000 pounds.
Big Boat Movers of Zavalla, Texas, the trucking company hired to haul the steel and neoprene component, can resume only after complying with state requirements, possibly by spreading the weight over more axles than the 21 now on the 149-foot trailer, Nicholas Hopper, a spokesman for the patrol’s Commercial Vehicle Division, said Thursday.
“They’re going to have to figure that out,” Hopper said.
Trucking company owner Mike Love said adding more axles might not be practical because more trailer means more weight and because a longer load would present traveling problems, extending the length of the trailer to 200 feet.
The 130,000 pound trailer already has 21 axles and 84 wheels.
“We’re open to suggestions,” Love said. “What I’ve told them is, ‘We’ll do this any way we can. If it’s impossible then it’s real easy; y’all can build the bridge in Idaho.’”State traffic engineer Ted Trepanier said Friday the trucking company could rent equipment locally to properly distribute and transport the load.
The trailer might have passed muster at scales in other states, but Washington also considers weight distribution, Transportation Department spokeswoman Claudia Cornish said. Too many axles in one area can sink into pavement, so regulations aim to make the trailer’s footprint larger to spread the load.
The expansion joint is one of two made in Minnesota that are designed to allow the deck of the 1,500-foot-long suspension bridge to move during an earthquake and expand with temperature. The second joint is still in Minnesota.
The movers made it through five states on fewer axles without being stopped, Love said. Anticipating Washington weight restrictions, the movers stopped in Idaho to add three more axles, he said.
Weigh station employees said it was the heaviest load they could recall, but Jeff Carpenter, chief engineer on the Narrows Bridge project, said heavier loads have entered the state.
the obvious answer to that question is–SUPER BRAVE! so i actually did go to that playgroup today. wonders will never cease. it was here, for anyone who is curious: http://www.edukids.ch/ i am fairly certain that no one who is a “member” of the morges playgroup was there. but there were other expat moms there, so that was nice.
even though i wouldn’t say i made any friends, i think meeting all those people more than fulfilled my one friend a week quota.
no one batted an eye at niamh’s name. i didn’t have to repeat it once, let alone the half a dozen i normally do.
there was one other american, and everyone else i met was from the UK.
people were suprised that i was getting out and doing this after only being here a week and a half. YAY! more points for emily.
so, pat watched niamh and just ro and i went. we rode the bus there, which i was also very nervous about. but it was really easy, and really short (maybe 15 minutes). and rowan adored it. rowan was terrified when we walked in the door of edukids. not sure if he thought i was going to leave him or what. but he screamed and screamed and screamed. finally he calmed down and played with trains and cars…didn’t play so much with the other kids. they were all quite a bit more…outgoing/aggressive than him, though i wouldn’t call any of them terrors.
there’s not really much else to report. it was hard to do too much chatting with any of the other moms because rowan was wanting attention half the time. but we did chat some, and i’d say there were potential friends with an irish born mom (but moved here from london) who has a son niamh’s age and a daughter a bit older than ro. did not catch her name. and also claire, one of the owners of edukids. she is friends with the wife of one of pat’s coworkers. so when i told her pat works for agilent we talked about that…claire has a 2 month old daughter, a 2 year old son, and a…i don’t know…6 or 7 year old daughter.
anyway. i think i have a one on one playdate for next week with a mom i “met” through the swiss expat yahoo group. she lives pretty close, about three exits away in the direction of geneva.
feeling quite proud of myself. i think i would go again. pat also mentioned tonight that a bunch of his coworkers have plans for get togethers with us (including the one who is friends with claire). hooray!
So, did NPR/KUOW decide to follow the new time change and start their pledge drive early? I thought it always happened in April (spring pledge drive that is)! And why did they start it in the middle of the week? It was a cruel joke to start the car this morning and hear that the pledge drive had begun – I feel like I hadn’t even heard it was starting soon and certainly didn’t expect it this week as Monday and Tuesday were regular programming days…. whine, whine. And one more whine, why can’t I go back to listening to regular programming after I’ve made my pledge. If they could some how figure that out, I bet they’d met their goal faster!
bacon crisps. i found them today. they are basically air flavored with bacon with a bit of rice/corn/something for crunch. they even have two little reddish stripes to make them look like bacon. they are so unsubstantial that i could easily eat a full bag and still be hungry.
on a less disgusting note, i also discovered wasabi covered peanuts today, which were pretty good as well.