Perfect Pensacola Evening
After weeks of early and sultry heat, Pensacola has had a spell of cooler weather, nights down into the 50’s and even high 40’s, and days in the mid 70’s – and not humid. Great weather for working in the garden or going to a park, weather that just makes you want to be outside.
Last night we went to a meeting of the Gulf Coast Diplomatic Council at a beautiful home out in Gulf Breeze, with a view of the water that goes forever. As you walk in, you can smell wood – or at least I can. I grew up with houses that used a lot of wood, and I love the smell. The heart of the house was a kitchen – dining room – sitting area with that forever view.
It was a lively group. The group only gets together a couple times a year, but what a fun group – all people who are willing to host foreign visitors when they come to Pensacola. I am guessing one of the reasons that Pensacola gets so many groups (besides those glorious sugar-white sand beaches, and the multicolors of the Gulf, and all the seafood and palms and balmy weather) is that the GCDC has developed a sterling reputation with visitors, and the Department of State is happy to send them to a place where they will get such a warm reception.
Attending also were some delegates from other countries. We spent some time with a Namibian farmer, who wants to find market outlets for poor rural women in Namibia. We spent two weeks in Namibia – it seems a lifetime ago – and loved our time there. We made a circuit of the country, from the farms in the east to the great Etosha game park, to the Demaraland, and down the Skeleton coast to Sossossvlei, where we climbed the mountainous sand dunes. It was a great adventure for us, and we have such happy memories of Namibia, and our delegate was so happy to meet people who had spent time in her country, We had a great visit with her and a great time altogether.
There were mountains of food available, but you know how awkward it is to be talking with people and they ask you a question just as you have taken a bite of something that needs to be chewed and swallowed before you can answer? We passed on the food so we could focus on the conversations. In the back of our minds, too, we knew we were close to one of our favorite places, Flounders, so we popped over there for a bowl of chowder, grilled grouper po’ boy (AdventureMan) and grilled shrimp Ceasar (me). The evening was perfect – no humidity, temperature perfect, slight breeze but not too hot or too cold – perfect.
This weekend we are taking care of Happy Baby while our son and his wife head off to a family wedding. Happy Baby is fifteen months old, and a live wire. So much energy and no inhibitions! You have to watch him every minute. He loves climbing, but he has no sense of danger. It takes both of us to keep up with him! He is so much fun to be around, that although it will be exhausting, it will also be a lot of fun.
For Me, Two Special Offers, Money Money Money
To me, it’s just amazing; they don’t know me and yet I am a winner. They want to give me lots of money. Big Whoop.
Attention Winner
Greetings of the day, Hoping that this mail meets you in a perfect condition.
(UN Information Service) — The United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC) has made available today a total of $595,044,579.38 to six governments for distribution to 8,303 successful claimants.
Payment is being made in respect of 2,946 claims in category (A-(claims of individuals for damages up to $100,000).
Claims in category (B-(claims of corporations, other private legal entities and public sector enterprises), that were approved for payment by the Governing Council at its fifty-fifth session, held from 8 to 10 March 2005.
Today’s payment are being made in accordance with the Governing Council’s decision 227, which extended the temporary payment mechanism set out by the Governing Council in its decision 197, under which up to $200 million from the Compensation Fund will be made available for the payment of claims every quarter. In the present round of payment, all newly approved claims, i.e. claims approved for payment at the fifty-fifth session, will receive $500,000 or the principal amount of the award, if less, and some claims will receive up to $300,000.
The present payment brings the overall amount of compensation made available to date by the United Nations Compensation Commission to $500,000.00.
Participants for the online version were selected randomly from World Wide Web sites through computer draw system and extracted from over 100,000 unions, associations, and corporate bodies that are listed online. We are using this opportunity to thank you for using the internet daily.
We do hereby Congratulates you, as your e-mail appears among one of the list extracted from this websites.
The card center will send you an ATM DEBIT CARD, which you will use to withdraw your money in any ATM machine, Banks and Union Pay Credit outlets in the world; you are hereby selected as an honour for this payment approval, which you are to acknowledge the receipt of this mail to the Logistic Department by email listed below.
Contact Mr. Peter Nick with below e-mail;
Mr. Peter Nick
Manager Foreign Operation
E-mail: mrpeternick@yahoo.co.jp
Good luck and kind regards,
Making the world a better place
Adam Shamir
Personal Assistant To
Dr. Ban Ki-Moon
{Send copy of email to: mrpeternick@yahoo.co.jp}
In respect to the delivery of this ATM Debit card, you are to bear the cost
And on the same day, this one in from Ouagadougou – don’t you just love that name? People in the state department used that as a threat, like if you aren’t good, you go to Ouagadougou:
From the desk of Mr. Hassan Ahmed.
Auditing and Accounting section of
Bank of Africa (B.O.A)
Ouagadougou, Burkina-Faso
West Africa
Good day,
I wish to know if we can work together because i would like you to stand as the
beneficiary to a deceased client Mr. Emmanuel Etukudo who made some deposit sum
of_ ($15.5million) fifteen million five hundred thousand united states dollars
in my department in the Bank of Africa Burkina-Faso, West Africa before his
death.
He died on the 2nd may 2007 without any registered next of kin and as such the
funds now have an open beneficiary mandate. Upon your reply i will give you
details on how the transaction will be executed, and I’ am assuring you that it
is 100% risk free hence you co-operate with me.
Best regards and expecting your response.
Mr. Hassan Ahmed.
Start of Ramadan 2011
The calendars are proclaiming that the first day of Ramadan will be August 1st this year, and the Eid al Fitr will be August 30th.
I cannot imagine Ramadan in August, especially in Kuwait and Qatar. It will be a brutal test of self-denial.
Did you Tell Him We’re Going Dancing?
I was laughing as I heard AdventureMan talking with his Saudi friend, making a time when they could get together. I knew he had called about tonight.
“Did you tell him we were going dancing?” I laughed as I asked him.
“Uhhh . . . no,” he said.
This is new to us. We are taking dancing lessons, ballroom dancing, at the YMCA. We both had those lessons you take in eighth grade, but we’ve forgotten most of what we learned. I don’t care about going dancing, or fancy dresses, or competitions. I don’t even watch dance stuff on TV; I just don’t care that much. These classes are something we’ve wanted to do for a long time, and it really takes us out of our comfort zones.
We really are having fun. The first lesson – not so much. It is hard work! It doesn’t come naturally, it comes with PRACTICE! Lots of PRACTICE! It’s like fencing lessons, or horseback riding, or karate, or gymnastics – After a while, your body knows what to do, but at the beginning, it can be a little excruciating. As for AdventureMan and I, we mess up a lot, but we laugh a lot too. We are getting better, but best of all we are having a lot of fun. These kinds of things rewire your brains; it may not be easy, but it is good for us.
And I am still laughing, thinking of AdventureMan not telling his friend that he was going dancing with his wife, LOL!
The Minority Prayer
I listen to National Public Radio in my car and in my project room. I finally figured out how to stream WUWF, my local station. Until today, unless I wanted to use my wind-up radio, I had to stream KUOW in Seattle, or NPR which I like because it has so much BBC.
I am really delighted to figure out how to stream WUWF, because it has a lot of local news and events I might miss streaming one of the other stations, and I also like hearing who the sponsors are, so I can tell them how much I enjoy National Public Radio.
So today I am listening to Talk of the Nations, a segment on Pakistani-Americans, and this particularly articulate young lawyer mentions ‘the Minority Prayer.
Do you know what that is? I didn’t. But I laughed when he explained it, because we have prayed it so often living overseas . . .
He was talking about when attending a Muslim-American Lawyers National meeting, and how the buzz spread that Osama Bin Laden had been killed, and how they all sent up a quick minority prayer – “Please, Lord, don’t let it be Pakistan where he was found” – and of course, it was Pakistan. He was very wry, and I enjoyed listening to what he had to say. At the same time, I was grinning. I cannot count the number of times we have heard rumors – in Germany, in Kuwait, in Qatar, in Tunisia, in Jordan – and prayed . . . “Please Lord, don’t let it be the USA who did this . . . ”
It’s very much an expat’s prayer.
If you want to listen to the interview yourself, you can find it here.
Yelling For Help
I don’t often have bad dreams, and this one was a doozy. I was in my house – or office – and it was a large, clear white space. I noticed a lot of fine black dust in places on the white carpet, like toner from copy machines, and then it gathered and swirled, but sometimes it was white. Then I saw a man – or something with a skull – sitting on a white slab couch like my Mom used to have in turquoise back a long time ago.
I kept looking – sort of like a cat does when he sees something he is not sure of, looking for motion or some sign of threat, very alert. When the skull creature started to move, I started to yell.
(Lithograph by Munch)
It’s hard to yell when you are scared, but I kept at it. “Help!” It sounded weak and tentative. “HELP!” “HELP!”
AdventureMan was there to help, calling my name, asking if I was OK. “I thought it was the Qatteri Cat,” he told me, “It sounded kind of strangled and yowly.”
I just laughed. I felt good. The skull man didn’t get me, AdventureMan was right here, my trusted knight, and I had broken through my fear – or the sleep barrier – and yelled really loud. I don’t know why, but it made me feel powerful and like I had survived something and that made me feel good. 🙂
(It could also be related to the series I am reading, on which the current HBO series Game of Thrones is based, and maybe it disturbs me on some deep level.)
Happy Mother’s Day
There is this thing on FaceBook where for Mother’s Day you put a photo of your own mother as your profile photo. I don’t do a lot on FaceBook, but I did this one, and I thought I would share an early photo of my mother with you:
I just love that mischievous little smile that says “Don’t you want to come play with me?”
Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.
Dear DADDY Intlxpatr
I get the feeling he doesn’t really read my blog . . .
Dear DADDY,
I am Johnson Koroma, from the Ivory Coast (D.R.C) in Africa. I am the first son and the eldest child of my late father, Late Capt. Suleiman Koroma.
My late father was killed by the rebels in my country as he died in the hospital, two days after he was shot on his chest.
I am in Jakarta-Indonesia now; I was smuggled in here with the help of the United Nations (U.N.).
The U.N assisted me to convey my inherited fund($15,500,000.00) to Jakarta-Indonesia, as I told them that, the fund was supposed to be delivered to my late father foreign partner here in Jakarta-Indonesia according to my late father’s instruction before he died.
I did this arrangement, as my late father told me before he died in my country Ivory Coast; to make sure I convey this fund to his foreign partner here in Jakarta-Indonesia for investment purposes since there is instability of power in Africa.
But on my arriving here in Jakarta-Indonesia, I could not find my late father foreign partner as I was told he died in a bomb blast that occurred in J.W Marot hotel here in Jakarta-Indonesia two year ago.
In this regards, I seek your urgent assistance, for you to come down here in Jakarta-Indonesia, so that I will introduce you to the U.N as my late father’s foreign partner for them to release my fund to you. This is because, the U.N said they will not release my fund to me, until they see my late father foreign partner as I told them earlier, as the said fund is too big for only me to handle as the U.N. officials said, since I am just 24 years of age.
Note: You are not expected to make any upfront payment before you make this claim, all you are required to do is just to come down here in Jakarta-Indonesia, and I introduce you to the U.N as my late father’s foreign partner, who will make the claim of my inherited fund and invest it into any lucrative investment according to your directives… Also, 15% of this total sum shall be giving to you for your kind assistant.
The U.N will deduct 10% of the total sum, for their service charges etc after they hand over my inherited fund to you, hence you will not be expected to make any payment for this claim.
Thanks and remain blessed, as I await your urgent response and arrival schedule here in Jakarta-Indonesia.
Yours son,
Johnson Koroma.
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