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If you want to go straight to Vol 5, you may do so now!
...
October was a busy month. The social scene seemed to pick up
and was, at times, a bit overwhelming. Kalle and Taltarni luckily
love being babysat so we didn't have to worry that they were
being looked after about twice a week!
The first thing to occupy us was the US Navy and Marine Corps Ball on the 3rd. It was a good night but we're not sure that we fulfilled our role as representatives of Australia well enough. We had two full tables tucked away in the corner so we weren't able to offend nearly enough people! There was a minor problem from the American perspective which was a huge problem to the Australians, there were only two bottles of wine per table and the waiters took ages to get us resupplied.
We had wanted to be seated next to the Mormon tables so that we could take their wine! As it happened, the wine problem was easily fixed, whenever the waiters took too long to reprovision the table, we sent out someone to "borrow" wine from the slow drinking tables. We were also lucky enough to win the aluminum (aluminium to us) flower arrangement that was on our table. Judy Lawler (from the other Australian table) managed to swipe an additional arrangement to the one she won. Pick the Aussies!
That weekend was also special for Kalle as he was the Star of the Week in his class which meant that Boris the Bear came home with him for the weekend. Boris got to be babysat as well, although there was no additional charge.
After Tim went to Swedish School the next day (another in a number of occasions when he turned up to school with a hangover) we went to ScanFest, a celebration of the Scandinavian influence on America. It was a lovely day and the number of people there was amazing, many more than the organisers expected. Kalle and Tim had fun standing in line for food while Kajsa and Taltarni browsed the stalls.
(There are a large number of visiting and ex-patriate Swedes in the Washington Area and, for that reason, there is a Swedish School just down Route 7 from us. The School is really for children but there is also Svenska Skolan for Vuxna which Tim attends. He is in Level 2 and is not finding it too much of a strain.)
Later that weekend, we had our first experience at carving pumpkins for Halloween, even though it was almost a full month away from the celebration. The pumpkin that Tim bought was huge, so huge in fact that we were able to make two huge pots of pumpkin soup and a pumpkin pie from all the stuff we scooped out. Kalle was very keen to have some pumpkin pie until he tasted it, after which his enthusiasm diminshed somewhat. Afterwards we discovered that most Americans don't actually anything with the pumpkin other than carve it and throw the guts away. This is a pity really because the soup is quite tasty.
Tim carved a face in the pumpkin and put a whole bunch of candles inside. The "Jack lantern" had pride of place in Kalle's room for about a week after which it had to be thrown away because it rotted so quickly. We guessed that it should be kept outside in the cold to help them last longer.
On the 6th there was the Naval Attaché's reception at which Kajsa had a great time - from what she recalls of it. There is an American Commander, and a Captain, who will remember her well. The Commander was chatting to Kajsa and remarking that he had Swedish ancestry. He was taking down Kajsa's phone number when Tim and a wild American woman (Anne Potter) wandered over to check out what they were doing. The Commander looked up from his writing to see Tim and Anne peering very intently at him. It seems as though he thought that he had just crossed a very jealous husband because he quickly took leave of Kajsa, not even saying goodbye to her - and never rang her. Obviously he took us far too seriously! Kajsa didn't seem to mind, she just went off to find someone else to flirt with. Thus she found the Captain. Kajsa was waving her hands in the air wildly as she was talking to the Captain's wife and managed to spill her wine all over him. Then she just ignored the poor bloke as he was crawling around on his hands and knees trying to clear the mess. Red wine does show up so well on the white summer uniform, don't you think.
The next night was the Harvest Festival night at Kalle's school. It was pot-luck so everyone brought a plate of something. As it is a very international school there was lots of really nice food. We brought some of Tim's Adequate Cheesecake. Unfortunately some of the important ingredients are not available over here so it didn't quite make it to the adequate level. Perhaps he should call it "Tim's Adequate Cheesecake II - the Mediocre Version". Anyway we got to talk to some of the other parents and see the kids run riot.
Kajsa continued on with the ladies' set with a farewell luncheon on the 8th. What they got up to is a mystery to the author!
The 10th was prayers followed by dinner at a Thai restaurant. Don't believe people when they say that you can't find good restaurants in America. You can find some hopeless ones for sure (International House of Pancakes is one) but there are also some very nice ones. The Thai restaurant around the corner from the Embassy is among the latter.
That weekend we took Tasha for a long walk in a local forest. It was beautiful with the trees changing colour. Even Tim and Kalle enjoyed the walk!
It was quiet for a while then, until Thursday when Tim played golf after which we went to Anne Potter and Doug Greenlaw's house for dinner. The golf was ... well, the course was very nice ... scenic, anyway. There was water everywhere, and bunkers (the bunkers!), and huge tracts of virgin forest. We must have lost a brace of balls (and a brace must be a very large number). John Jacobi lost his 7 iron and lots of balls and we all lost our tempers. Yet again Tim couldn't freely swear in Swedish on the course, this time because Doug Greenlaw had brought a Swedish friend. Kaj was more than happy to translate for everyone. To make things worse, Kaj has a handicap of 12, so although he didn't have a good game himself he still thrashed us. As I mentioned, it was scenic and we saw hundreds of squirrels, flocks (actually two flocks) of Canadian geese and a half dozen groundhogs. (Haven't I hit this ball before?)
Dinner was excellent and Doug and Anne's house is amazing. They live in Great Falls too but when we see their house and all the houses around theirs, we realise we live in the scummy end of the area!
On Sunday 19th we did some more pumpkin carving, although this time a little more socially. A whole bunch of Australians gathered a the Lawler's residence and we hacked and slashed in the bitter cold. This time the pumpkins were somewhat smaller, a not so small one for Kalle and one so small that Tim could barely fit his hand in it for Taltarni. Kalle's ended up with a scary face but Taltarni's was friendly with a big smile. Sometime around here Kalle got himself a very scary bat and a very badly deformed bat (well a black stocking and a coat hanger). Kajsa also made some very scary ghosts to hang in the tree out the front. One was a Taltarni ghost (with a tennis ball for a head) and the other was a Kalle ghost with a big fat head (using a soft ball). Cloth nappies made up the sheet.
During the following week, people started to be ill. Kalle went down first for about 24 hours. Then Taltarni was very ill. She had a tight stomach and was so pale and listless that the doctor was very worried about her. They sent off some emergency blood samples but nothing showed up. She also had a very high temperature but that went after she got some antibiotics and baby Panadol. Then Kajsa got ill. Tim didn't get ill but was instead very busy trying to stay awake at a symposium on Commercial Off The Shelf issues for two days.
Of course, all that illness didn't stop us going out (although it stopped us staying out too late). On Friday we went to the Canadian Embassy for a wine and cheese night for a couple of hours. It was a good demonstration of how well Australian wines compare to those of the rest of the world (despite Tom Clancy's comments in one of his books).
The next day was another farewell. Although Kajsa was too sick to attend, she did make some pancakes (it was a champagne breakfast) which were a huge hit. Tim rushed home early to be by her side (via Radio Shack of course because we needed an antenna to get good reception of the X-Files channel before the new season commenced).
Then the month was drawing to a close and time was running out for Tim to get himself organised before travelling in early November. To crank up the stress he had to attend a meeting on Interoperability, supposedly for the whole week (after being informed that it was happening just before heading off for the COTS Symposium). That was laughable. There was no way that he could attend the whole week so he spent two days listening and trying to look like he had a vague idea of what they were talking about before begging off and rushing back to the Embassy to get his life into order.
Then he was told that he had to have the Naval Attaché's Webpage up and ready by the 7th of November. Excuse me, that gives me exactly one working day, given my other commitments. (Quick, bring another stress-meter, this one's off the scale!) He doesn't even want to think about the in-tray (oops, he just did).
On Wednesday evening we went to watch the Vienna Halloween Parade. It was a bit cold but Kalle quite enjoyed seeing all the kids dressed up and watching the school bands and cheerleaders. We took Tasha so we quite often had the parade coming to us - "Oh look at the Husky!"
On Thursday 30th there was a lot of rushing about. Kajsa drove into the Embassy about 10, then Tim dropped Kajsa off at Chris Ray's house for lunch and went back to work. As Chris' kids were ill, she spent a lot of the time at the doctors while Kajsa and the other guests entertained themselves. Tim was back at work for about an hour and then rushed to Kalle's school to pick him up and then drive back to DC to drop him off to be with Kajsa.
Tim then went back to work for an hour and a half, during which the computer crashed about four times. Then he rushed off to the eye doctor. (He has lost his reading glasses and now looks at the computer with a strange angle to his head while wearing his bifocals - very bad on the neck!) After the doctor's appointment he rushed back to the Embassy, swore as the computer crashed once more, tidied up his office and went to pick up Kajsa and the kids.
Then we all drove back home where Kajsa quickly made some Thai cold beef salad and also some pasta for Kalle and Taltarni while Tim tried to keep the very tired children out of her way. Then, after the babysitter arrived, we grabbed the Thai salad and rushed back to the Embassy where the Chief of Navy (Vice Admiral Chalmers) was being hosted at a function. We arrived a little too early because just as we got there the speeches started (if we had been about fifteen minutes later we would have missed the speeches altogether. After about an hour and a half we were able to unwind a bit and enjoy the evening.
Then there was the biggest day of the month. Halloween. After Kajsa made some meatballs, we went to Kalle's school to help set up for and watch the school's Halloween Parade. They walked around the administration building and then formed up to sing songs and read little poems and stuff. Afterwards Kalle's class retired to eat meatballs.
In the afternoon we got Kalle to sleep for a while (amazingly enough) so he was not too tired to go trick and treating in the evening, which we did as soon as he got home from gymnastics. Kalle was dressed up as - you guessed it - Batman. Taltarni was a pumpkin witch. Kajsa was a black witch (including black makeup) and Tim was pirate. Although there was some discussion that perhaps he didn't actually need to dress up for that role - just being in the RAN might be enough - he finally put on one of Kajsa's more dangly earrings, an overcoat, a pirate hat (which looked like a big sock to most people) and a belt with a dagger. Then we headed out. Kalle carried a pumpkin basket which ended up about half full after only six or so houses.
Then we came home and drove over to the Lawler's (they have young kids so they are into these sort of things). From there we drove to one of the best Halloween houses in Vienna. It had a soundtrack playing with spooky sounds and screams and evil laughter. When you walked up to the porch there was a man sitting outside on a rocking chair dressed up as a demon. He wasn't a scary monster, he just handed out candy - (he was a nice Halloween creature according to Kalle).
After getting our goodies, we started to walk out of the property, through the trees. We had stopped near a bench where a scarecrow had been set up, while Judy Lawler explained that last year there had been someone up near the porch who leapt out and scared the heck out of her but there was nothing like that this year. Just then, the scarecrow jumped up and yelled at us. Judy screamed. Kalle didn't scream but he was being carried by Tim and certainly didn't want to stick around.
After that we went back and ate pizza and drank champagne. A very civilised way to celebrate Halloween. We headed back late and hoped fervently that Kalle and Taltarni would sleep late on the first day of the November!
Quite a while ago Tim was driving along and pointed out some squirrels to Kalle. One of the squirrels was chasing another and Kalle asked what they are doing. Tim responded with "Oh they're just playing silly buggers." One day more recently Tim came home after Tasha had chewed the cable TV cable. Normally he plays with Tasha when he gets back and Kalle comes out too. This day as a punishment he didn't play with Tasha but Kalle still want to go out and play so they went out the front. Tim asked Kalle what he wanted to do. "I want to play silly buggers," he said. So they spent half an hour running around after each other.
When driving Kalle into DC, Tim and Kalle were listening to a Tears for Fears CD. Kalle asked the name of a song and Tim told him that it was called "Power". Then Kalle asked "What does power look like?" Tough question. Tim answered that power doesn't really look like anything. There are two types of power. The power that you need to make the TV work and the power that gives you the ability to do something but it doesn't look like anything, as it is really a concept. He went on to explain that a concept is like happiness, sadness, or friendship. Then Kalle asked "What does friendship look like?" Another tough question. "Well, friendship isn't something that you can see. You share friendship with people. If you are nice to each other and share things then you share friendship. You and Lachlan share friendship when you play together." A pause for thought. "Pappa, how do you play with friendship?" Hm. In the background now, as this is being written, Kalle is explaining to Kajsa that friendship is something in the water.
Taltarni has begun to really walk strongly. She continues to crawl most of the time but she does choose to walk more and more often. She is getting better and more dangerous at her climbing. She can now open the "child-proof" locks on the cleaning cupboard, which means all the other cupboards are very boring. She can say pappa, mamma, vovve, Tasha and, of course, titta. She did say pappa first and don't let Kajsa say any different. She understands lots of what we say to her (when she wants to) and she is very, very stubborn.
Kalle is not developing an American accent as quickly as we feared. Perhaps that is a function of being in an international school. He is intensely curious and is learning very quickly. It is likely that he'll be beginning to read soon but we will try not to push him.
Tasha has been getting ticks which is a worry. Hopefully she won't get any evil diseases from them. It's a bit of a worry when we try to take them off her. We worry a bit about either leaving bits of them in her or getting them on us.
The autumn leaves are just wonderful. There are some glorious liquid ambers around on the route in and out from DC. Some of the oaks are also gorgeous. As this is written, most of the trees have changed colour but most still have most of their leaves so it is beautiful to be here. The locals are very used to it so are not as amazed as us. It is definitely a good time of the year to be in Washington area! The weather is beginning to turn cold but Halloween evening was extremely mild so that was good. It should start to get very cold in November and we are still hoping for snow!
This is enough for now, the author's back aches and there is no more to tell.