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Camino minus 15 – To Be? Nope. Not To Be.

Posted on by Kathleen Foote

I had decided to get a new smartphone for my Camino. I had hoped to post a photo from my new phone today.

The folks at the store had promised that it would be in last week. Therefore, today would be the day.

Sadly, I am still phoneless.

I went to buy the phone this afternoon. I had gotten all the bank information I would need in order to sign away two years of my life into technological servitude as a serf in the phone company’s fiefdom.

As I prepared to face the music and walk up to the salespeople, I had a bad feeling. There were three of them, matching nametags, and they were standing in the little kiosk, chatting away. I recognized one of them – she had helped me last week when I was trying to make my decision as to which phone to get. She had been very friendly, just not particularly helpful.

She had not helped her case when she didn’t know how much it costs to make out of country calls.

Everyone here travels out of the country. Often.

I already had a pretty good idea of how much out of country calls would cost since I knew from the phone I already had. Plus, I had just asked at another phone kiosk. But I wanted to see how accessible information would be if. . . no . . .  when I had a problem. Especially if I was out of the country.

“I’ll just look it up,” she had said, cheerfully, and began searching on the company’s dedicated program.

More than 10 minutes later, she was still trying to get the information.

Hmmmm.

So, here I was again, facing the same helpful salesperson. She remembered me and gave me a cheery “Hi!”

I smiled a friendly hello and asked, “Is the phone in?”

Crestfallen, then a quick, cheerful recovery. “Nope. But it’ll be in tomorrow!”

“OK. Thanks. Bye!” I gave a smile and a wave, turned, and walked away, even though it looked like she wanted the conversation to continue.

I, on the other hand, was hungry and tired. I had been prepared to begin the long, tedious process, chock full of surprises, that buying a new phone has become. But I wasn’t ready to engage in small talk.

Maybe tomorrow.

But I have a feeling the phone won’t be in tomorrow, either. And I’m sure I really won’t be in the mood for small talk tomorrow. I have to be psyched to sign a two-year contracts, and the air had just gone out of that balloon.

 

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Posted on by Kathleen Foote

  I’ve been in Germany for about 4 months now. I’ve unpacked every single box, save for one. I hope all the items that are still missing will be in that one box, but I am not hopeful.

  Germany, and Stuttgart, is still taking some getting used to. Our apartment does not have air conditioning, and they issue a severe weather alert when the temperature threatens to be in the mid-80’s, so that takes some getting used to,  both the high temperature without an AC, and the severe weather alert for it hitting only 85.

  DH has the video working. Unfortunately, not cable, just the TV, so we watch DVD’s. I quickly got over them and just listen to music over the set now. Since my wonderful CD player bit the dust about two weeks ago, I can only listen to CD’s one at a time. However, the van has a six CD changer and I can listen ad infinitem when I drive.

  Tonight is the opening day for the London Olympics – wish I could watch. Oh, well. I plan to find one of the famous mineral spas in Stuttgart today, instead. Hope I don’t embarrass myself too badly with my non-existent German.

  Tomorrow is the local Volksmarch group’s annual event. After a week of sweltering, sunny days, the weather man predicts thunderstorms all weekend long. Just my luck.

 

Today is the first day of the rest of your life

Posted on by Kathleen Foote

Welcome, dear reader. I hope this blog is not too mundane for your taste, I’ll try not to make it too dull and boring for you. Nothing worse, for example, than skimming through dull, dull dull Facebook postings. What is significant to one person can be so insignificant to another. so I hope this will be interesting to at least one more person.

Let me try to catch you up on what this all about. I’m an Army wife, have been for the past 35+ years. The Army lifestyle is great, but definitely keeps you going. As do family and friends. My DH (Dear Husband) left two days ago to return to Germany for a new job with the military  and I plan to join him soon, probably after Easter. I have mixed feeling about this move.

We moved here from our last duty station, Japan, about 2 years ago, because of  DH’s new job. We (at least, I) figured that this would probably be our last move and I was happy with it. We’re in Virginia, about 3 hours from DC, a city I enjoy visiting.  We were 5 hours from DS#2 (Dear  Son #2), who had been in “the sandbox” with the Army for several tours, got out, and was earning his college degree. DS#1 was in California, struggling but getting by,  DS#3 was in Hawaii, DD (Dear Daughter) was in Philadelphia going to school. Except for DS#3, we were closer to family than we had been for a long while (the rest of our families are in New York/Connecticut). Since we had been closest to DS#3 when we were stationed in Japan and he was in Hawaii, it all seemed to work out.

We bought a house in Virginia and settled in, finally getting household goods which had been in storage in three different locations and some of which we hadn’t seen in 5 years. Unpacking took (honestly, is still taking) a long time, lots of decisions to make about just about every single item.

About 3 months after our household goods arrived, the Army announced that it was closing the department where DH worked. Not just his department, but the entire building. Surprise!

DH is an incredible hustler and quickly found several new opportunities. We decided that, since things were still in turmoil here job-wise, he would take up an offer for a one year TDY (that is, temporary) assignment overseas in Germany with the military.  The odd thing about it was that it was a one-year TDY, which I had never heard of before.

So, off he went to Germany for a year. We had never been stationed in Europe and actually, with nothing connecting me here since I was new, I looked forward to visiting him there once he got settled, probably visiting for an extended length of time. I love travel and, well, it was Europe.

Once he got over there, things started to change.

 

Hello world!

Posted on by Kathleen Foote

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