Just a taste - or several

Back in Switzerland and behind on my blogging - as usual. We've recently returned from two weeks in the US, most of which we spent showing Dani and Steph as much of the "real" America as we could without either scarring them for life or convincing them to move... We did, saw, ate, and bought so much that, honestly, I'm just not sure where to start.

Which means - food. When all else fails, we start with food.

I'm just going to run through this in list format and will be back later to expand on the more memorable meals and activities - think of it as a "to-do-been-done" list. Or ignore this post and come back later for the meatier versions.

• Thursday Mr K and I arrive. Pick up rental car. Hit Chipotle. After Chipotle, Mr K goes back to hotel to pass out. I head to Falls Church to meet up with the amazing Asharah and see Amanda Palmer in concert. Go to bed at 2 AM after having been awake 30+ hours.
  

• Friday Dani and Steph arrive at Dulles from New Orleans. We pick them up, get them checked in and head to Uncle Julio's Rio Grande Cafe for margaritas and actual fajitas so they understand why we found the ones here so funny.

• Saturday we all head to the Mall to see some museums and monuments. We watched Dinosaurs 3-D IMAX. That night, we went to Texas de Brazil for a really spectacular dinner.

• Sunday Dani tries to recover from the spectacular meal. Steph helps. Mr K and I head to IHOP to brunch with our old gaming buddies. Dinnertime comes and Dani is still recovering. Steph joins us and some other friends for yummy dinner at an Irish Pub. Everyone else goes back to hotel while I head to IHOP for the second time that day to catch a late night (11-1 AM) dinner with my old boss.

• Monday everyone is recovered and it's time for some shopping - Leesburg Outlets. Pre-shopping sustenance provided by Panera Bread. Post-shopping recovery dinner care of Red Robin.

• Tuesday Dani and Steph sleep in while Mr K and I meet up with his coworkers for lunch. After lunch we return for Dani and Steph and head to air and space museum (Dulles version). Dinner Tuesday night is at a Japanese hibachi restaurant. Dani scores a 66% at aerial-shrimp-catching.

• Wednesday we breakfast at hotel and pile into the car to drive to York. Our luggage and the four of us just barely fit in our rented SUV. We arrive to hot pepperoni pizza, which we promptly destroy. We rest a short while and then pile back into cars to head to Reading for more fajitas and the Brian Setzer Holiday Extravaganza of Festive Ear Destruction (hee hee) courtesy of my dad - thanks dad! Great show but way louder than I expected. A holly jolly time was had by all.

• Thursday we woke up and skipped breakfast in preparation for the approaching Turduckengeddon. If you haven't tried one, do so - greatest turkey ever!

• Friday is spent in recovery. Leftovers for lunch and soup and salad for dinner.

• Saturday we polish off last of leftovers. dad shows us his fire trucks and ambulances (yay Super Truck!) Dani drives the Mustang and Steph drives the lawn tractor. Saturday night = Medieval Times - the most fun activity ever in the history of jousting-related mealtimes.

• Sunday Mr K and I head back to VA. We meet up with friends for "New Food Sunday" and I eat a tasty but complex sandwich involving a corn hoagie roll, smoked pork, lime crema, roasted peppers, jalapenos and cheese.

• Monday Dani and Steph head to New York. Mr K and I head to the dentist. Mr K retires to a bar for a short Happy Hour while I meet a friend for a super tasty Italian dinner. After dinner, I meet up with Mr K, who is continuing the short Happy Hour... for a couple more hours.

• Tuesday Mr K consumes some Gatorade, some Tylenol and a cheeseburger and is pronounced fit for duty, so we go shopping some more. We eat kebab at the Mall and we love it. Tuesday night we and another friend meet up with Papa C at the Cheesecake Factory for dinner. we all wish Mama C could have been along. I eat a tasty pasta dish involving breaded chicken, pesto cream, prosciutto, and lemon-dressed arugula.

• Wednesday we wake up and pack, while continuing to eat my pasta dish from the night before. We pick up last minute items, mail packages, head to airport. Return rental car, check in, go through security. Drink. Buffalo chicken salad. Flight. Bulkhead seats - the galley light is bright.

• Thursday we land in Zurich. Eat Egg McMuffins. Grab groceries, catch train. Come home, snuggle cats, eat lunch. I pass out while Mr K unpacks.

Give or take a few more days for recovery and here we are!

That turned out much longer than I planned - I have a feeling there is much more writing to be done! What am I missing?

The perils of growing up a military brat... or why I can't be bothered to keep in touch (Answer - I'm lazy and ill-trained but trying to do better!)

So, other than football mania, not a whole lot has been going on this week that I would consider blog-worthy. This leaves me with the question of what to blog when a post is "due" but nothing inspires an entry: look for writing prompts! I flipped past six or seven prompts until I got to this one:

“Is there someone important in your life that you have lost touch with? Why do we allow ourselves to get so busy that we place our friendships on the backburner?”

I was preparing to skip that one as well - it's the kind of question that only makes you feel worse the more you think about it - but it stuck with me. This level of self-examination is bound to remind me of the parts of myself I'm not so fond of, but then again I could probably use that sort of reminder every once in a while. The quick answer to the question is yes, I have lost touch with an important person in my life. The longer, and more telling answer is I have lost touch with any number of important persons in my life - in fact, with most. You would think the internet would make it easier to keep in touch with people over any span of time and distance, but I'm starting to think otherwise. Maybe because email is so quick and easy, we find it even easier to neglect. Sending a card, postcard, or letter requires some forethoughts and preparation - it takes work. Email takes a few seconds sitting in front of the computer and, honestly, isn't that where most of us spend a substantial part of our days?

My lack of keep-in-touchness dates all the way back to my childhood. I keep in touch with one childhood friend - intermittently and through Facebook only- and maybe three friends from college - also intermittently and through Facebook. I quit my job just over a year ago this month, and yet in that time I've already lost contact with all my former buddies but five. This is a really sad statement to make in a world where I could easily be communicating with several people effortlessly and on a daily basis.

I trace a little bit of this to growing up in a military family. Now, dad, before you get too up in arms (ha ha get it?!?!? Army! Up in arms!) I think the pros of growing up the way we did far outweigh the cons. In fact, I'm pretty convinced that if I (and Mr K for that matter) had not grown up thinking frequent moves were a normal part of life, I would never have had the courage to move to Switzerland in the first place. Moving every couple years taught me how to adapt and how to find my niche in a new place (though many people would probably argue I've never actually been so good at that part). It made me more reliant on myself because I knew that, every couple years, it would be time to start all over again. I grew up seeing people do work they were dedicated to and believed in and that developed my own work ethic. So, no, given the chance, I would not choose any other kind of childhood. The downside to all that moving was the sense that friends and companions are replaceable and, in fact, have to be replaced every few years. Gah, that sounds terrible even to me reading over it, so lets try and explain this a bit better.

As a child, I knew every couple years I would be leaving all my friends and starting all over again. When we were still in military schools, this was hard but because you knew everyone else was in the same boat, it wasn't the worst thing in the world. You made friends fast and moved along from there. So I would be inseparable from a friends for a few years and then one or the other of us would move. It was sad but, thanks to the typical kid-attention-span, you moved on. As I got older, those friends and I would exchange sloppily written letters and postcards for a few months and then that, too, would fade away - not a big deal, just how life went. When my dad later went into the Reserves, my sister and I found ourselves in a civilian school system and it was a huge change (and probably fodder for a posting of its own, assuming I feel like dredging all that up again). Suffice to say I spent most of high school fairly niche-free since everyone already had their friends by the time I came onto the scene. No matter - in a couple years I knew I would move again - to college - and start from scratch with everyone else. Then when college started, I already knew in four years we would all be moving on yet again. See the cycle?

So, here I am, doing my best to better keep in touch with the people I have left (in both senses of the word). The good news is this: of the people I've managed to keep in touch with, it has been well worth the effort. I've gotten to know so much more about some of these friends through email and phone calls than I ever did when we lived in the same town. I love it that many of my friends blog - it makes me feel much more in-the-loop on their lives and also provides a kind of insight into their minds I would never get otherwise. I've discovered among my friends painfully talented musicians, brilliant writers, an incredible dancer, and just plain good people. I've been honored to know these people and feel continually enriched and encouraged by my interactions with them.

This is the kind of thing I try to remind myself of when I'm feeling just too busy to answer an email. Back burners are for the ignorable and the replaceable, and I've finally figured out that friends are really neither.