Third Culture Kid(s)

We’re in the middle of our visit from K., which is going well enough considering she’s 16 years old. She’s a sweet kid and demonstrates nothing short of infinite patience with MM, who’s adopted her as her New Very Best Friend. The first couple of days after she leaves could be a little dicey…

But, since she’s on a “diet,” she’s not eating much and mostly seems to want rice, miso soup, and - tonight - instant ramen. Which is fine in the general sense, but I feel a little like I’m falling down on the job here.

She’s also inadvertently come during the single hottest week of the entire freaking summer - and this after a relatively cool, temperate summer to date. Now we’re in the 90s, heat index in the 100s, and it all comes with a bazillion% humidity. So showing her around has been a little tricky, especially since I’m not really supposed to be overtaxing myself here. Again - feel like I’m just falling down on the job.

And MM has decided that she’s just too, too interested in K.’s comings and goings to sleep, so she’s been doing this 4:30 am thing that’s kicking my butt. And since I’m busy showing K. around, MM hasn’t been getting many of her usual naps, which screws everyone and everything up.

We had our ultrasound the other day - it went okay, but the placenta is a little too close to the cervix to completely let down our guard there (although I’m not too worried about that), and 2.0 was too small (although measuring to date) to get a good look at the heart, so I’m a little fretful about that.  I’ll probably wind up going back in in a week or so, depending on what they decide at my doctor’s appointment this week.  I would have preferred a more definitive ultrasound, but, then, with kids it’s never very cut-and-dried, is it??

And I got some feedback from a big ol’ piece of crap writing that I sent to my old dissertation support group back at my university that was - well, it was honest. The piece of writing I sent was pretty much cobbled together from stuff I’ve been playing with for awhile - I didn’t really make any effort to piece the stuff together in any coherent form, and the comments pretty much reflect that. I’ve been wanting to retire from the group for awhile now, since I’m neither participating like I should nor can I keep up with the writing demand like I should. I’ve broached the idea of withdrawing with the professor who runs the group…I’m really hoping that offense will not result. I tried to be as diplomatic as possible…

Other than that, well, we did have good news on the scooter fund front and we’re back in business there, and the work situation is still in flux. It did get interesting - in that Chinese proverb sense - there for awhile, but the pieces have yet to fall where they will so we don’t quite know what’s up yet.

I think it’s mostly sleep deprivation, but I’m feeling a little down this evening. I hope everyone else is doing better.