Another remarkably beautiful day in sunny Moscow and I’m loving it. Crystal clear skies but the temperature doesn’t seem willing to go above 8°F, which means that as lovely as it looks out my window, it is still much too cold to really take any long walks. I did manage a half hour outing before heading to the grocery store to warm up and gather some food for tonight’s dinner party. We have invited the principal of the high school, a single woman who doesn’t cook and is departing for a principal position in China in July. She is a lovely lady and we look forward to having some private time with her tonight.
Last night I made a nice little pasta with peas, bacon, onion, garlic and cheese, tossed with a mixture of regular and spinach pasta. This is the kind of soul satisfying meal that makes you tingle while eating. The frozen peas really were delicious and tasted like they had must been shucked. You can take a look here. Cindy, in an effort to sleep through the night, decided to just have a glass (and a half) of wine with dinner and nothing before or after. Needless to say, cleaning up was really easy with only two wine glasses and two water glasses. It worked to a certain extent, but she was still wide-awake early and decided once again to take the early bus. I think she has only taken the late bus once in two weeks.
When we first moved here we were amazed at the number of ATM machines that seemed to be everywhere, from the corner store to the Metro passages to restaurants and cafes. It wasn’t until we tried to use one that we found out that they are really payment terminals where folks without bank cards can actually pay for their utilities, cell phone bills, bank loans, etc. Well now it appears they are going to try to enter the US market so keep your eyes open and remember, you heard it here first.
Remember poor Yuri Luzhkov, the 17-year mayor of Moscow who was thrown out of office last year? Well he has been shopping around for a European country in which he could establish residency so that he would be free to roam Europe without the hassle of visas, something Russians must have for each country they visit. Well, he was declared a persona non grata in Latvia yesterday, dashing his wanderlust hopes. Don’t count him out just yet. With all the money he funneled to his wife, they have untold millions of Euros that they’ll be able to spread around as they continue to shop for a permanent residency.
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| Entangling Alliences |
We have had so much sunshine in the past four days that my plants are starting to do that old heliotropic thing. As I began to turn them so they wouldn’t get too bent in one direction, I noticed that one of my plants has decided to embrace another. It is really cool and I hope the attached picture doesn’t make you blush as it did me.
And finally this, which will make me stop complaining about walking in cold temperatures. I guess you just gotta believe!
Best to all, Cindy and Wm
PS from CC: I had my usual weekly meeting with my tech team today (5 young Russian guys). These meetings typically go very well and today was no exception; I have an agenda of things we need to discuss and then I say we’re done - and then they keeping talking and talking. It’s rather cute – they wouldn’t admit this in a million years, but they like sharing things with me, and I suppose they appreciate the fact that I really listen. Today one topic was about occasional work for them on Saturdays, such as videotaping a special event. Here’s the quotation of the year from one of them: “You can never control how your Friday night is going to end.” I’m still laughing – notice he didn’t say predict or know, he said control. Hmmm, I’ve had some interesting Friday nights in my life but I don’t ever recall not being able to control the ending!
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