:: Tuesday, July 04, 2006 ::

Ob-la-di ob-la-da

Life does indeed go on, and I, in fact, am not dead, though apparently reports of my demise have been circulating throughout the blogosphere like vultures over a roadkill elephant that's been lying in the middle of the road for way too long.

But as time passes, more things keep happening that I want to blog about, so that by now it would take me like 8.375 hours to write about them. Not having 8.375 hours free, I have postponed posting until I had the time to post everything, which leads us to the predicament we're now in. But since I still don't have 8.375 hours, you still won't get everything I want to talk about. Maybe I can bullet point through them in my next post, which I assure you will happen before 2008.

So why am I posting then? Finally?

Because it's Independence Day, baby! The good ol' Fourth of July! Fireworks, flags, BBQs, and a little scrap of paper I like to call the Declaration of Independence.

Of course, here in the Czech Republic, we don't celebrate Independence Day, and fireworks are for New Year's Eve, man. But much though I hate to admit it sometimes, I am an American (my passport says so, for all that I was born in Japan), so here we are. Fortunately, here in the ČR we do have the 5th and the 6th off as holidays (something about Sts. Cyril & Methodius and the death of Jan Hus as a heretic), so it's not all bad. I only had one class this week, that I just got back from, and I made it into a nice little Independence Day lesson. A little bit of history, a little bit of "Star-Spangled Banner," a dash of patriotic music, and a lot of pictures of the US of A, Virginia, and DC, too. Didn't have time to get to the "Create Your Own Country" part of the lesson, but there's always next week, right? Anyhoo, it seemed to be a successful lesson, even without the fireworks.

So what are we doing on our nice little holiday this week, my Polka dot and I? Well, the original plan had been to take a trip for the five days Wednesday thru Sunday. Maybe hit the Šumava mountains, maybe a little Česky Krumlov...but other winds prevailed. Because the Polka dot is going to America! No, not now. But she does work for an American company, and they do want her to come to the U.S. for some training, and they're even taking care of the whole visa process for the most part. Which bodes well for our planned Xmas trip back to the homeland. So what does this have to do with the price of beer in Bohemia?

Because the American embassy, in all their wisdom, scheduled her visa interview for Friday. Yep, Friday. Right smack-dab between two holidays and the weekend. Which means no long vacation for the two of us. And because we're both such decisive individuals, we have been unable to plan anything else for one of our double free day periods, other than agreeing that "we should do something." Still, I can't really complain, because it will certainly help us with having the whole visa thing for Christmas. So I guess it's a case of lemonade from the lemons. As long as you remember that lemonade is still sour.

That's it for me, for now. So Happy 230th, America! Go buy yourself something special. And happy Independence day to all of you Americans, too, wherever you may be. Light up a couple of sparklers for me.

And last, but not least, if any of you pay attention to a little thing called the World Cup, which is about a sport called football (no, not that football), which also happens to be the most popular sport in the whole wide world (except, of course, America):

Forza Italia!

(For those of you not paying attention, Italy plays Germany tonight in the semifinals, hence the above.)

(P.S. And keep your fingers crossed on Friday for my Polka dot and her interview. Ain't nothin' wrong with greasin' the wheels with a wee bit o' luck.)

:: posted by Rob 4:59 PM [+] :: 4 comments
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