It's been a quiet May so far and poised to get even quieter. After getting back from our trip, we've been making a few quick visits to see friends and family because of a small procedure (this thing again) in a few days.... hello internet-browsing bed rest ; ) Last weekend we caught the bus up to Everett, Washington for a Mother's Day / birthday picnic at the beach with D's relatives.
A Ukrainian church group set up their own picnic about 20 feet away. D's brother-in-law was busy both making our shashlik for our group and watching the church group prepare theirs. "Какой позор", he said, shaking his head, What a shame. I looked... and saw nothing out of the ordinary. He pointed at the woman standing near the shish-kebab grill. "Don't you see that? A woman! Shashlik is a man's job!" ; ) To be fair, his shashlik was quite good.
D came down with the flu recently and spent lots of time napping, so Кит and I had to keep ourselves amused somehow. Although perhaps the amusement was one-sided...
A card arrived from Kharkiv!
This morning I skyped with some of D's relatives in Crimea. It had been several years since we were in touch and in that time they've been taking in stray animals- their brood is up to 6 dogs and 3 cats now, most of whom made a brief cameo on the web cam. His relatives are really worried over all the human refugees and abandoned pets in the Donbas. This video from last month, called Volunteers Save Animals in the Donbas, shows what it's like for those still there, man or beast.
We skyped in English. My Russian feels so unused that it's about ready to go extinct. (Anyone else in the same boat?) To remedy this, I've dusted off my other site- the blog about learning Russian- and have so far written 10 posts over there, hooray. They say the key to learning is consistency and if there's anything I can be consistent about, it's blogging. I love blogging!
So that's it for now: we scheduled everything for the beginning of May and left the rest of the month open. I've never had surgery so it's a bit nerve-wracking, but the doctor seems like a very calm and methodical woman. Hopefully I'll be back in a week or two because there's some good news I'm excited to share with you : )
In the meantime, have a great May!!!
D came down with the flu recently and spent lots of time napping, so Кит and I had to keep ourselves amused somehow. Although perhaps the amusement was one-sided...
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| D has since recovered and is back to protect Кит from nonsensical photo shoots. |
A card arrived from Kharkiv!
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| Дякую! |
This morning I skyped with some of D's relatives in Crimea. It had been several years since we were in touch and in that time they've been taking in stray animals- their brood is up to 6 dogs and 3 cats now, most of whom made a brief cameo on the web cam. His relatives are really worried over all the human refugees and abandoned pets in the Donbas. This video from last month, called Volunteers Save Animals in the Donbas, shows what it's like for those still there, man or beast.
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| Geese "daycare" in downtown Portland. |
We skyped in English. My Russian feels so unused that it's about ready to go extinct. (Anyone else in the same boat?) To remedy this, I've dusted off my other site- the blog about learning Russian- and have so far written 10 posts over there, hooray. They say the key to learning is consistency and if there's anything I can be consistent about, it's blogging. I love blogging!
So that's it for now: we scheduled everything for the beginning of May and left the rest of the month open. I've never had surgery so it's a bit nerve-wracking, but the doctor seems like a very calm and methodical woman. Hopefully I'll be back in a week or two because there's some good news I'm excited to share with you : )
In the meantime, have a great May!!!
It's hard keeping a language up from a distance. You have to make opportunities to practice instead of just being presented with them. If you discover any tips for making this happen (besides 'read more' *shudder*), let me know!
ReplyDeleteHope the surgery goes well. :)
Thanks, Ruth Elisabeth : )
DeleteSo far the best (but non-specific) tip I've heard is "You don't learn a language, you get used to it"... believe it came from All Japanese All The Time- have you ever checked out any of his ideas? http://www.alljapaneseallthetime.com/blog/ He's got a lot of interesting posts that cover all aspects of language learning.