Just in time for Halloween Alesia dropped a small hand weight on the side of her head (don't ask). Chris was out playing indoor hockey, so I accessed my first aid memory bank to test for head injury (you should have seen the size of the lump that came up!). She ended up with a great shiner that gave us about two weeks of good colour. During this time her school had its Halloween activities (lots of Americans at the school). The teachers were impressed with my skills at face paint, until we pointed out that it was real bruising....
When I see a picture like this I can understand why our girl's get called "mini-Barbie" - especially with those big blue eyes.
I have been down with the flu for two weeks. The first four days I was in bed. Then I crawled out of bed and started coughing. I go to bed at the same time as the girl's do, have turned my insides brown with lemon juice and fresh ginger in hot water, and am scoffing down vitamin pills like a junkie. H1N1 has hit Mongolia and we are in the usual authoritarian response. Alesia's school has been closed for a week (it refused to close when all the Mongolian schools did, but eventually the president's office called the school admin in, fined them heavily and made the school comply) and it looks like it will be closed for another two weeks. This means Alesia has work to do at home. This tends to happen in the evenings or on the weekend when I am around, as Nyama is happy just to let the girl's play and not push Alesia to do her handwriting practice!
Last weekend we decided my cough was not too bad so we headed out to do some sledding in the snow on the hills outside the city. The girl's lasted about 30 minutes before getting cold and sitting in the car. Chris wandered around and took some photographs. It was about -12. We have had a sudden cold snap, with nights jumping to -25 or lower....and it is still only mid November....sigh...
In three weeks we will be leaving on a jet plane.....can't wait...
Why hasn't this crazy bird flown south yet?
With me recovering from the flu, Alesia doing school work at home and nothing that interesting happening I expect that the next update for the blog will be Keira's birthday party. It is planned for 3pm, Sunday 29 November. This morning Alesia and I made the invitations. I will take a photograph of one and post it later. Until then, I am off to cough up a lung...
