Home (not so) Alone

So this week has been pretty boring. On Monday Ariella and I had a mind-numblingly boring day at home so she was more than ready to go to gan on Tuesday. Monday night we met the Balsams at Burger King for dinner, for one last Chanukah hurrah. Technically, it wasn't Chanukah anymore by the time we ate, but you get the picture. Of course, Tuesday morning there were the usual fights about not wanting to go to gan, despite the mind-numbing boringness of the day before, but I had a surprise weapon in my Bribery Arsenal - I promised Ariella we'd go for ice cream after gan. That, plus wearing her new sweatpants did the trick and we all tramped out the door. On my way to ulpan, I decided to check the mail. Our mailbox is not near the main entrance of the building, so I often forget to check it. Also, in New York there was more motivation to check the mail because there could be treats, in the form of magazines, especially my beloved People. Here, there are only bills, takeout menus, and lots and lots of ads for cleaners, babysitters, texis (that's Hebrew for taxi). So I'm not terribly motivated to check the mail every day. But I figured it had been long enough. And lo! A surprise awaited me. This Tuesday was "ki tov, ki tov" indeed because in the mail was.........MY LICENSE!!!!!!!!!!! It's official, folks, I will never have to take another driving lesson/test again! My favorite part of the license is the picture, because I'm wearing my favorite purple scarf. In America, they give you trouble if you show up in a hat or scarf, so I always made sure to wear my sheitl for my license picture. Granted, it was a little strange showing up at the DMV in my sheitl when I was sixteen, but what can you do. Ha! Just kidding! Let me clarify - I've always worn my sheitl for license pictures since I got married.

In ulpan, we are continuing to prepare for our test, part of which is next week. There is an oral test, next Wednesday, and a written test, which is the last Thursday in January. It's a three-hour test! The best part is how they scheduled it - right smack in the middle of the day, from 1:00 - 4:00. Of course, this messes everyone up, because almost all of us have kids in gan/school that need some sort of pick up/transportation/food during that time period. The reason for the timing, from what I heard, is that there are two ulpans - the regular morning one, and an evening one that meets twice a week. So they decided to make the test right in the middle of both of them, so that everyone is screwed! God forbid they do something crazy like, I don't know, administer it twice? Anyway, I've already told Donny he needs to work from home that day so I can take the test and officially be considered "fluent." (Shalom! Ma Nishma! Hakol b'seder?) I'm sure Donny has forgotten, so Donny, consider this your reminder. January 29th. You, Ariella, Yaakov. Be there. It's a little crazy that ulpan will be over in a month (February 5th is the last day, for those keeping track.) Because I still can't put together a coherent sentence. I know lots and lots of words now, but conjugating them so the sentence makes sense is a totally different story. (For example, "I am bored" is VERY different than "I am boring" but in Hebrew, the difference is one tiny, little "vuv." Darn you, hufal.) Actually, "hufal" is preferable to my nemesis "nifal," which, as Donny reassured me, is just a kal gone bad. Not so reassuring. And forget the future tense. I am TERRIBLE at atid. From now on, I live my life solely in the past and present. I did learn one great trick, though - if I can put the word "tzricha (need)" or "yecholah (able)" before the verb, then I can get away with using the infinitive, and thereby bypass the need to conjugate. For those of you who are still paying attention to this lengthy digression into dikduk- and the only people who are are Shoshana, who will do anything not to write her anecdotals, Donny, Nafi, though he doesn't even read the blog but Lisa does, and Dadz, who will read it in a month from now and call to tell me he's all caught up - I thank you for your patience. To everyone else, I'm done now! You can wipe the drool off the side of your face and refocus your eyes!

So the reason for this long and rambling post is that I am home today with the kiddies and not really doing much. Yaakov woke up with a bad cough, and in the past I would have marched him off to school, but I figured I should be a good mother and let him stay home and hack all over me, instead of the other kids at gan. Ariella, sensing that Yaakov was about to have a day off, suddenly had a very bad headache. But the truth is she has been coughing a lot, as have I, so I figured might as well have a day at home. Also, keeping her home has the added advantage that there's someone to entertain Yaakov. We're off to the doctor later (not until the evening, because that's when the English-speaking doctor is there.) and until then we'll have a day of making huge messes in the living room and, of course, food shopping.