She's Back

i know that it's been awhile since i last blogged. honestly, i've been in a blurr lately. like the "days of wine and roses", i went into a sugar induced binge and was out of commission for a few days. i've also been babysitting full time for sahar and as hard as it is to admit, it harder than i thought it would be.

he's still very much controllable, but i find the lifting (he's 18 1/2 pounds) and the sheer amount of hours, very tiring. gal's sister has been home from high school and has taken care of him so i got to go to yoga twice this week. she's off next week so i'll be able to do my volunteer work and go to yoga.

after shavuot, i went into a sugar frenzy. i gained over 5 pounds and have been unsuccessfully, able to knock them off. we have had a bit of strange weather lately, which i'm sure is due to the volcanic ash from iceland. yesterday, it was unbearably, hot and the sky was dark and grey. it rained in the early morning, which is very unusual for israel. there was a dryness in the air and the sky was smokey. my eyes were burning and my nose started running. it looked and felt like the end of days.

i went to netanya yesterday for a friend's son's wedding. we had a mini bus pick us up so the travelling was quite comfortable. on the way there, we witnessed the most unusual sunset, ever. the sky was grey, the color of ash, and the sun was white. when it set there was no color in the sky. there was no bright orange or red, as the norm. it was the creepiest sight that i have ever seen!

the wedding was in an old and slightly delapidated hall but the simcha was inmeasurable. it was a 'sanzer' chassidic wedding and there were hundreds of people in attendance. i tried on all of my stretchy, synthethic, black clothing, but nothing seemed to fit because my stomach was a bit 'poofy'. i knew what the costumery at the event would look like, but in the end, i opted for comfort and chose a full length, colored, paisley print, cotton dress. i wore my short wig and was able to comb it to suit my liking. i wore a set of natural pinkish, purpleish pearls, with matching hanging earrings. the set was a gift from my niece, who hand picked each pearl, and designed the jewelry when she was in india.

my niece returned from new dehli this week, and i visited with them all evening long. mendush, who is 13 months old didn't quite remember me. i bought him this rolling ball toy, that makes a lot of noise and music. sahar loves this. but poor, mendush was afraid of his. he kept on crawling over to touch it and would then crawl away from it ,as fast as he could. they are planning on returning to india for good. it's very hard to think about this.

i finally made it over to the city tax office to pay my bills. in the end, they gave me an 80% discount on my real estate tax bill. they never came to investigate and i never received a letter or any type of notice. i just received an updated reduced bill. i waited for a couple of weeks because of my babysitting schedule, and they fined me over 3o$ and put a stop order on my bank account. my trying to talk with the new manager proved useless as always. i simply, paid the fine and after a two hour wait, got out of the office.

i then walked over to the new water office and paid those bills. it was very cave like and i started to feel claustraphobic. i had to leave and get a coffee. i tried very hard not to freak out and leave for good. i do not do well with dome shaped ceilings. interestingly, it's not the size of the room that gets me feeling closed in. i was afraid to list my son and his wife as co-residents because i feared that i might lose my discount. so i'm paying a ransom in water beacuse i'm using more than the state's alotment. you simply, cannot win here.

i tried my darndest, yesterday, to spruce up my appearance. i put on two shades of eyeshadow and a real lipstick. i even, smeared a bit of rouge on my cheeks. it was not easy to do because of the loss of peripheral vision in my right eye. i was afraid that i might have overdone it. i haven't worn makeup in over a year. i do have to admit, that i felt like a mentch and i received many compliments. it's been a long time coming! i sat with a group of women, all american, and all from the past. it was really good to get out again. i even got up and danced a bit. zelda was back again!

it's 3:00 p.m. on a friday afternoon in the holy city of zefat and i've been having a real lazy morning. i watched sahar for a couple of hours outside and he got really 'schmutzy' so i raced him upstairs to gove him a bath. i left him alone for a moment and i heard the crash of breaking glass. i raced over to him and picked him off the floor. he had reached up for a candle in a small glass dish and knocked it over. thank the Lord up above that he wasn't hurt. he definately, needs to be confined to a playpen now.

i still need to do some laundry and wash the floors. my apartment is slightly trashed. i think that i might just stay home by myself tonight and have a quiet shabbat. tomorrow, i'll visit my family in the afternoon and go see the 'clan' afterwards. i wish everyone a great shabbat!