I heart Prague

So it's about one in the afternoon here, which means it's about four AM in Portland. Jake, my traveling companion, is hanging at his school today, so I'm cruising solo around the city snapping photos and hitting up some old haunts of ours. I'm currently at Bohemia Bagel (love it), but paying by the minute, so I'll have to make it short. Thankfully, I'm not jet-lagging near as much as I thought I might. I slept about two hours during the combined fifteen or so hours of plane time and arrived at nine AM yesterday. I managed to stay awake on good espresso until eleven last night and crashed hard. Woke up this morning at about nine and I'm suddenly on the Euro-clock. Easy enough. Don't know if I'll be able to maintain the energy-level though...we're going to a Ples tonight until about three or four AM and then up at six to catch a bus to Western Bohemia.

If you're reading this and are in the area, we bought a Czech SIM card yesterday for my phone so you can ring or text us at +420 736 271 189. My cell will be at that number rather than my usual number until we head back home next Thursday, so if you're in Portland and trying to reach us, you'll either have to eat the bill on an international call or wait 'til next week. I know we'll be seeing quite a few folks in Sokolov this weekend and a few more in Prague next week, so feel free to give us a call if we need to set up a place and time.

Love you all,

M

According to the blood test, my negatively-allergic to turkey but only slightly allergic to chicken husband left for Prague this morning. He will arrive in Praha at 7am Czech time on Thursday, which is 10pm tonight Pacific time, and 12am tonight Central time.

And yes, he is bringing back beer, chocolates, and chapstick. :) I miss him already, but am a 'really excited to eat Milka chocolates' wife.

kate

...cause for excitement...

Anyone who knows me very well knows that I am deathly, and I mean fatally, allergic to poultry. I haven't tasted the forbidden flesh of dead birds for over six years (at least not intentionally...thanks Jeff). Although it sounds like a ridiculous and almost comical allergy, I can honestly say it's something that crosses my mind quite literally at least a dozen times a day. Everytime I buy a new food at the store, everytime I walk into a restaurant, everytime I'm invited over to someone's house for dinner...I'm terrified that the food I'm given was cooked in chicken broth, accidentally touched a turkey burger on the grill or is some new-fangled half-beef, half-goose mystery meat. Well, those days may be over soon.

I figured it was time to find an allergist in Oregon and I needed a refill on some preventative medication, so I made an appointment. Since I'm seeing a new doctor in a new state, they wanted to do another skin test on me before prescribing me some more auto-injecting adrenaline shots. Four years ago I had a similar test and it had to be scrapped after a mere six minutes because I was SO allergic. Today, I sat in the office for thirty minutes with no reaction. While this in no way means that I'm no longer allergic, it made the doctor curious enough to run more tests to see if it could possibly be true. I had some blood work done and I'll hear back in about a week. If it comes back negative, I'll actually sit in the doctor's office near the hospital and take my first intentional bite of chicken in years. I've still got a few more hurdles to hop over, but there's reason to be optimistic.

In other news, I'm leaving in less than a week for Prague. Much to look forward to in the near future.

Our housemates have a baby arriving in about 3 weeks!!!! Seriously, baby Ania (Anyuh) is entering the world soon. I am so excited!!!

Michael is headed to Prague in about 1.5 weeks. He will have a great time buying things to bring back to his anxious wife...chocolate, beer, czech chapstick, etc. He and his friend Jake, who also taught in the CZ, are going for 10 or so days to bum around. Fun stuff. Yes, i am a little jealous, but he's been working for months without a vacation and really deserves it.

My sister Liz is busy with wedding stuff. Her and Matt get married on June 10.

My parents are celebrating their anniversary next week!!!

So much life happening right now...

Katie

It's been a while...

The sole purpose of this post is to draw attention to the simple fact that it's been over two and a half months since either Jeff or Jay have blogged...and that's a cryin' shame.

I like my husband very much and haven't had much time to see him lately. Tonight. Oh, and it's raining again. But it's nice.

We are having homegroup tonight. Our homegroup, after a year, is slowly morphing into something else. We shall see what the morph brings.

Katie