Friday night Milca and I had dinner with Nikki at our local Thai restaurant. Sure, there are tons of local Thai places, but this is the one that we like the most, and it’s close. She then gave me late Christmas presents (ours are still in the works, but won’t be finished until after the wedding, so be patient). She gave me a Harry Potter Rubik’s puzzle, which is one of those weird flat plastic things that folds on to itself where you have to arrange the picture on either side. It was fairly challenging, but I got hte hang of it. She also gave me a Rubik’s cube unlike anything I’d seen before. It’s not even a cube, really. Normal Rubik’s cubes are 3x3x3. I’ve even seen 4x4x4 and 5x5x5, both of which are tools of the devil. This is 3x3x4. When she gave it to me, she had already mixed it up, so it looked kind of odd. There were little pieces that were sticking out, where the normal cube maintains it shape, if not it’s pattern. It was killing me until I conceptualized how it worked. Now it’s like the back of my hand. 🙂
Milca’s Nonas (that’s Grandmothers, a la Argentina) and her dad came in Saturday morning. We woke up at the ass crack (that’s 6am), picked them up, and visited for most of the day. They were pretty tired, so they took a nap midafternoon. I had met Milca’s dad and one of her grandmothers, but her other Nona I had yet to meet. This Nona is the fmaily member that Milca loves beyond most others, so I was fairly nervous about meeting her. I can now see why they connect so much, and I have to say it makes me all warm and fuzzy seeing them together.
That night the cooking went on and on. Pasta with shrimp and scallops, potatoes, sweet potatoes, salad, chicken… we had tons of food. Milca’s mom’s brother and sister came along, so we had a good old meal and some good times. I am sure to beef up on my spanish, but it’s been pretty challenging. The Argentine accent is very different from most other countries, so my progress has been slow.
Yesterday the lot of them went to the garment distrcit to get cloth and other decoration materials. They are now done, apparently, which is nice. Meanwhile I was waiting for my cousin to return a call that never came, so I grabbed a bite to eat, came back home, and found that they had already returned. Milca, her parents and I went to the Nature Friends lodge and scoped everything out, going over basic plans, set up, etc. It’s really frustrating, as we all have slightly different ideas as to what needs to be done, and we don’t always agree. Luckily nobody has yelled yet.
When we got home we found that the satellite wasn’t working, which meant of course that I had to fix it. It’s funny, I could set up the whole system, and I am fairly computer literate, if not savvy, but when thingsg break or don’t work I call tech support like everyone else does. Of course, I understand the technician’s instructions better than others. Anyhow, They had me check that everything was plugged in, something I did before I called, then they had me run some diagnostics, still nothing, and then I went out to check the dish itself. I had never been on the roof, and I have to say it’s kinda nice up there. I may go there to hide if I need to escape for whatever reason. I set up an appointment for a technician to come out Wednesday, which means no TV until then. I guess it’s a good thing that I have so many DVD’s.
So, I’m getting married next week. It’s very frightening that this sentence can be said now. I remember saying I’m getting married next year, then it was next month, then it was this month, now it’s next week, then it will be this week, then it will be tomorrow, then it will have been yesterday, and I’ll be able to breathe again. I need a beer. Scratch that, I need some scotch.
FYI – If someone, or some group of people, were to buy some kinds of booze and wanted to know what kind I were partial to, that would have to be scotch whisky. Preferably Chivas Regal. Mmmmmmm… Chivas…