Even in Huntington Beach

In Nairobi, we were fairly used to having the electricity go out. My goodness, for the first four years of our time out in Tot, in extremely rural Kenya, we didn't even have electricity. But I've lived in the US and Mexico since 1991, and I'm used to lights on, refrigerator humming, fish tank bubbling, fan blowing... At about 4pm yesterday, the transformer controlling our block exploded, and out went the electricity. It was AWOL until 8:15 this morning. That made getting up at 4:25 to take my sister to the airport especially fun. Even after the electricity came on, we could tell that the underlying problem had not yet been solved, because the power company had three large generators set up, feeding power to the houses on the block. Hopefully the problem will soon be solved, but at least we do now have electricity.

One of the activities I worked on last week was making felt and puff-paint animals to go with Jan Brett's story The Umbrella. I've also made some of the animals from Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? by Bill Martin, but there's still several more for me to make before that's done. I'll use the animals with my class. I'll tell the story first, using the felt board, and then the kids can tell it to each other or even take the supplies home with the book and tell it to their families. It'll be interesting to see who my new students are and how many I'll have.

Saturday night my sisters and I went to see Anthony and Cleopatra, courtesy of Shakespeare By the Sea, a company that tours around giving free shows of various Shakespeare plays. They did a really good job, and we enjoyed the performance.


A friend of mine from high school is visiting from Oregon. She and I spent some time together yesterday at Balboa Island, and we'll be getting together this afternoon before she leaves.

Some time today I'll also be going through my teaching trunk - a collection of various teaching supplies, books, puppets, and stuffed animals - to see what I might want to take to Puebla. The new baggage restrictions make planning difficult. I know for certain that at least one of the airlines I'm taking charges for the first piece of baggage. Well, it can't be helped.

This week is my last summer school class. Yippee! I'm done with all but one page of homework. I will not miss driving 49.2 miles each way.

I sent out the Powerpoint presentation cd's about PCS and Dios es Amor last week. If you didn't get one and you want one, please let me know before I leave on the 19th. Thank you so much for your faithful prayers and support!