My First week – week commencing May 3rd 2009

Well Spent Sunday with Jarlath buying all my electrical items to replace those that I could not bring over from the UK. I bought the boring things like Hairdryer, hair straighteners, clock radio and electric toothbrush in Target - a shop similar to Big W in that it stocks almost anything you could need for house and family and is quite cheap. More exciting though, I bought a new laptop. This will replace my PC from the UK and with wireless in the house means that I can come online in the garden as well. I bought a HP notebook which had a built in webcam for Skyping friends and family at home and a good size widescreen for watching dvds as well, if I choose. I am happy with it so far as everything seems to have loaded fairly easily. It is a nice looking silvery/bronze colour.
On Monday Jarlath took the day off and we all loaded into the car to drive up to Gettysburg. It was pouring with rain the whole day so not the best day to do this trip. The Visitor centre was $7.50 to enter and this included a movie, the cyclorama and the museum and was well worth the money. We then did the Auto tour of the battle sites (I,.e. drove around following the signs). It was all very interesting and educational – my American History is very poor so I learned lots from this day. When I get my social security number and join a library I plan to educate myself a bit on some American History.
Tuesday was chores day for me. I had to get up at 6.30 a.m. to run Jar to work (we only have one car now) so I could have the car for the day. I then went to the Social Security office and waited until it opened its doors at 8.30 and started dealing with us at 9.00 a.m. You, basically, don’t exist in this country until you get your social security number. I was taken very quickly and was done in about fifteen minutes. Now just have to wait 4 to 6 weeks for them to send my number through to me. Some of the sights you see in that office are heartbreaking or frightening, depending on what mood you are in. Out of the people waiting to be seen I would say only 10% actually spoke English as a first language and 10% had obvious mental health issues. The people working there were very different as well. There was one lady (who Jar remembered getting) who was very unhelpful to everyone she was supposed to be helping. She seemed to work in slow motion and lacked urgency or interest in her job. One of the girls, who I dealt with before was very efficient, helpful and knew what she was doing. The girl I got this time was young and while she was trying to be helpful, she just didn’t seem to have the knowledge of what she was trying to do – but at least she went to ask her supervisor when she was stuck.
Wednesday decided to start tackling the housework. The house hasn’t been properly cleaned for some time obviously. Got up at 6.30 to make Jar his breakfast and send him off to work with a packed lunch – not sure how long the perfect housewife act will last. Went back to bed to try and shake my cold but didn’t really work. Spent the day cleaning, coming online and reading so nice and relaxing. It is the last night of my BIL and friends holidays so we went out to Bethesda for dinner and drinks to say farewell. Had a Chinese for dinner but ordered way too much food so I have four boxes in the fridge of leftovers for lunch – but I don’t like going back to leftovers from Chinese so will probably end up throwing it out. The weather had been nice all day but about 5.00p.m. a storm came in. The rain was torrential and there was lightning and everything. This meant that Jar and I just stayed out for one drink and then got a cab home and left the boys to their night out. I am still slightly jetlagged so off to bed at 10.30 again.
Not sure I am liking the weather at the moment, it is very similar to home with sun one minute and rain the next. The only difference is that it is a slightly higher temperature during the day. I bought myself a lot of sundresses looking out for lovely weather, well I guess I will give it another couple of weeks to see\ if summer kicks in.
Thursday another early start to run Jar to work for 8.00a.m.. Got back about 8.30 and spent a lovely couple of hours just reading. Then starting to tackle some paperwork like contents insurance, finding a doctor etc. It is nice to be able to spend some time reading all the documents and making informed decisions as if I was at work unlike when I was actually working and all personal documents/decisions were made in a rush. Other than that I was just hanging about as our house guests went home and I had to run them to the airport. The highlight of today was the two gifts of live field mice as produced by Bobby, at least he is comfortable in his new home. They were both brought to me alive and completely intact, in fact the 2nd one was really funny ‘cause Bobby came running in and I could hear an indignant squeaking coming from him, only to see the back legs of something hanging out his mouth and struggling to free themselves. Luckily he dropped it into Jars hand and we let the mouse live another day.
Friday and the sun is splitting the sky. Went out on a bike ride along the canal up to Great Falls. The Great Canal runs just near our house and it is about 5 miles on the towpath up to the waterfalls at Great Falls. The water was wild today as there has been a lot of rain and storms this week, it was very cool to see and a lot of people say it is even better than Niagara falls! My bike ride was a positive nature trail - I saw turtles in the water, squirrels, huge dragon fly type thingies, some beautiful bright red birds that were like mini phoenixs a la Harry Potter and lots more. It was so peaceful just riding along in the sunshine. I had planned to take my book to stay and read in the sun for a while but forgot to pack it – do’h. The evening we cancelled plans to meet friends in downtown DC and just walked the couple of miles to the local Irish inn for dinner and rinks as we were both tired.
Saturday dawns and brings with it the glorious sunshine – it is in the mid eighties already. I am trying to avoid putting on the air conditioning to save on the utility bills but it is damn hot. Just pottered about today and no heading to the airport to deliver hubby as he is flying off to India for a week for work. It sucks a little as we have only had one day together on our own so far, what with house guests, so it is not ideal. On the plus side being on my own for a week in my new location will make me go out and explore more as I will have the car all week and don’t have any meetings or schedules to meet.
Well hope you have all had a good week as well. Will update you next week on my first week on my own in my new home. Take Care H Xx