IrishOboe

One must always keep a sense of humor about when dealing with foreign languages.  Some offenses are more egregious than others, and this one was harmless, but I got a good chuckle out of it.  After submiting a question with an online form to my Swiss insurance company that specializes in health insurance for foreigners the next screen pleasantly informed me:

As proof that I'm busy doing all sorts of things and therefore cannot post, I'll take a moment to announce that today the fruit of some of my labor has been plucked.  I am now the proud owner of a Swiss driver's license!  It will be valid as soon as I pay the modest fee of 140 Francs . . .

As expected, my US license was returned to me undamanged but for the sticker "Not Valid in CH."  Basel, have great fear, Janet is now free on the roads.

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I am now fully functional and feeling wonderful.  There’s nothing like being sick to encourage the appreciation of health.  The first few car trips out of the house were a bit tough, but Sunday was fine and I enjoyed the pool party the church hosted - food and all.

Happily I was better just in time for us to loose water again.  Due to iron bacteria they had to shock the well again, so it was back to camping inside.  Plus we lost internet just as I was about to Skype Stephan.  Man, life is tough.  I’m discovering I’m much more demanding than I thought . . .

Mostly we have had all the amenities and I have had many good conversations with Stephan and I’ve managed to squeeze in some work here and there between playing with the Nephews. 

No baby yet, we’re still waiting and praying.

I’m at my sister’s new house for the purpose of helping with before and after baby needs and one of the first things I did was get sick.  The one claim to helpfulness I have is that I haven’t gotten anyone else sick yet.  Other than that I’ve been lying in bed with just enough energy to move about now and then before collapsing back in bed.  Today I have enough energy to sit up for longer than a meager meal and thought I’d use the time to catch up a bit with blogging.  Up until this sickness I’ve been living this glorious live God has given me rather than blogging, so apologies to those who miss hearing from me, but my web-life has nearly disappeared as I’ve lived real-life.

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Just a quick post to say that I am alive and well and enjoying my vacation.  Obviously I've taken a vacation from just about everything, and it's been so long I almost forgot how to create a post.  Unfortunately, I am not sure when I will sit down to catch up, but for now I'll leave you with food for thought.  This Christianity Today article on Living Leviticus is worth a read.  I happen to be in Leviticus now so it was a timely reminder that Leviticus holds important revelations of God's character.  I'll tease you with two quotes from the article.

"[Often w]e take God's grace for granted. Because holiness can be difficult, we default to simply admitting we're miserable sinners, get our grace, and then get on with living our lives the way we were going to live them anyway."

"The Law's purpose was never to save anybody. Rather, its purpose was to show saved people how to live a saved life."

May 1^st is a holiday and it was also Ascension Day, which is a holiday, but since they fell on the same day, we only got one day.  It was a pleasant day, so I’m not complaining.  Stephan organized a hike to the castle Dorneck where we met up with a few more folks from church and enjoyed a barbeque before the rain hit.  It was lovely to go hiking again and we caught a glimpse of Swiss culture to boot.  Traditionally, the men of the town march around the local borders and fire guns to symbolize their readiness to defend their land.  Hopefully the video is small enough to upload so you can enjoy it.

2008-05-01_DorneckHike_firing.mpg

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Puzzle #1: What event does this picture reveal?

Puzzle #2: When did this happen?

[Stephan's pictures added later] 

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Obviously I haven’t had a class canceled in a while as it’s been super long since I’ve gotten a chance to write.  Life has been by no means any less exciting, despite a drop in frequency of performances.  Still, I’ll make you wait for it as I try to catch up chronologically.  [Haha, I didn't wait] The good or bad thing about writing about events much later is that I tend to write much less because all the details aren’t as fresh in my mind.  Here goes . . .

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I won't have time for an update for a while, but to keep yourself entertained you can check out the five star hotel I'll be staying in.  Don't ask me why there's never enough money for poor musicians and then they put us up in a five star hotel, but I bet you're not refusing your refund check either.  Interesting things of note lately have beeing watching elephans fight (or play?) at the zoo.  There's a place where you can peek in from the outside and the Stephetc. club and I caught the action on the way home from Bible study.  I also got to see a helecopter lift cargo to a nearby roof.  It was quite a shock to be sitting in class and then see a construction cone drop from the sky.  Hat's off to the teacher and the students: we all stopped to watch.

I had some classes canceled again today, so I figured I should continue the trend of catching up with updates since soon I’ll be having more adventures (likes a trip to Italy) that will prevent me from writing and provide lots of material for future posts.

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I woke up this morning to find that my morning classes had been canceled.  I decided to celebrate by writing an update before prepping piano lessons and getting some practice in – which otherwise wouldn’t have happened today!

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I am behind on my book reviews as well as updates, but I’ve started a book that I can’t keep quiet about.  Thanks to Stephan’s IVCF friend for the recommendation and to Stephan for ordering it.  I was immediately drawn in because Chan asks good questions.  The second sentence of the book is “Is the church to be seen as an instrument to accomplish God’s purpose in creation, or is the church the expression of God’s ultimate purpose itself? (p.21)”

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. . . the dog was oddly suspended in the air, in the arms of Sarah S.  In fact, the room was full of people and I suddenly saw stars.  Okay, so it was just camera flashes, but I certainly was struck dumb.  This was to be no intimate dinner affair, but a surprised birthday party!  I was completely taken by surprise and I think was in shock for a good deal of the party.  I just sat on the couch while everyone scurried around making preparations.  The meal of grilled meat and salad was one of the best ones I’ve had in a while (church folks make some mean salads) and there was plenty of tasty dessert to go around.

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Yeeps.  It’s been a month since a real update.  And what a month it has been!  Full of concerts.  Full of fun.

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I'm behind with the blog and have lots of interesting adventures to write about, but I was encouraged not to let that get in the way of announcing that yesterday I ate at McDonald's for the first time in Switzerland.  2.50 for a cheeseburger with pickles and ketchup.  If I'd gotten a menu meal it would have been 11.30.  That with the falling dollar, and you have quite an expensive meal!