Beet . . . Beet . . . Beet

I don't have anything monumental to write about, especially when compared to yesterday's Fun With Fertility. Just some updates and little odds and ends.

Other than confirming that I am not 48 years old and expecting, yesterday I was extremely productive and took down the Christmas tree. I loathe that project, and The Spouse even waxed contrite later as he realized that in the 20+ years we have been married, I usually opt for tooth drilling or cat box cleaning or drain snaking . . . anything to avoid taking down the tree and putting the ornaments away.

But the advantage to having offspring (aside from their original purpose: picking up dog poops from the backyard), is that I can assign them tasks, and they do them with relative alacrity. I made them take the ornaments off the tree on Monday, so all I really had to do was take the tree apart and replace it in its box.

But oh, how I procrastinated. I kept trying to psyche myself up:

"It will take less than an hour."

"Oh, you will feel so good when this is done."

"Let me put on a movie for you." (I did actually start to watch Momma Mia, in Sing-Along Mode, but a power surge turned it off, and I viewed this as a sign from the Universe that we have, all of us, had about as much Momma Mia as any one generation needs.)

"C'mon . . . here . . . we . . . go!"

Eventually I did do it, and now the living room has completely returned to normal.

New Topic: Vodka Revisited
At the suggestion of another expatresse, I tried a Russian vodka called Green Mark (Зеленая марка). Waitrose (a UK grocery chain) calls it "a premium quality vodka at an every day price." I think I paid about 150 rubles ($5) for a half liter, this price putting it squarely in the Bargain Bin. It's okay. Certainly much better than the dreaded Smirnoff. But no competition for the Beluga (our preference) or Imperia.

In related vodka news, I noticed this discussion of a Slovak vodka. Seems a bit pricey, but might be fun to try when I'm in the US this summer.

New Topic: Dee Dum, Dee Dum, Delightful
It's a skating rink outside. The temperatures have been warm-ish, so the slush has melted. A nice sunny day yesterday, combined with lots of other pedestrians, has rendered the sidewalks, and even the walkways in the parks, as smooth as mirrors. It is impossible to get any momentum going, so add an additional five to ten minutes to your journey. Not only do you not want to slip and fall, neither does anyone else: so they will inevitably end up in front of you, inching forward at an even slower pace.

New Topic: Valenki
I saw this article in the New York Times about valenki (валенки), which are traditional Russian felt boots. Here is a link to some photos of valenki.

I sent an email to the designer and received a reply! I have the address and want to go next week and see what I can see. It doesn't seem that valenki are really designed for wear on city streets, although I have seen them combined with a rubber sole. What I don't get is the supposed health benefits. But I shall venture over there and report back. Maybe valenki are the answer to Moscow's icy streets.

I Bought a Home Pregnancy Test

I'll warn you now: I have altered the subtitle of this blog. I am bellying up to The Change, my friends, and I'm feeling talkative. If you are faint of heart, go check out I Can Has Cheezburger.

All my life I have been highly predictable. Give me a holiday or a honeymoon: I get my period. Once, on a two-week beach vacation in Spain, I arrived in the midst of a period, it ended, and before we left for home, I got it again.

But most of the time I just had normal cycles. Not even 28 days. In fact, the two times I went longer than 28 days resulted in Baboo and Skittles.

About 7 years ago, I had my tubes tied. I'm north of 40, I have two lovely children: it was time to shut down the factory.

Fast forward to last year. While at the office of the doctor who performed the surgery, I mentioned that it was now Day 37.

"What method of birth control are you using?" he asked.

"Um . . . you tied my tubes." Doesn't he have notes?

He got a funny look on his face, handed me a test kit, and sent me down the hall while remarking, "It's probably nothing, but anything can happen."

Not reassuring, his words. And they've stuck with me.

When the Christmas holidays neared this year, I prepared myself for another vacation marred by menses. Oddly, I got this lingering, annoying cold instead. So the poor Spouse not only didn't get any, I couldn't even . . . Well, let me just say it's such a small thing, isn't it? It doesn't take very long if your heart is in it. And it makes them so happy.

But you have to be able to breathe.

My mother-in-law is probably reading this, so enuff said. You get the picture.

I have no symptoms of pregnancy nor PMS. Zip. Zilch. Nada. But I don't recall how I felt the first few weeks of pregnancy. Pretty normal, I think (until morning sickness set in). I think I had Giant Boobs, however. And PMS usually = Giant Boobs. Moodiness. A marked lack of patience with stupidity. The overwhelming urge to kill someone.

So while standing in line at the grocery store yesterday, I saw, next to the condoms and the breath mints, packages of home pregnancy tests. It was Day 37. The test was only 85 rubles (under $3US these days).

So I bought one. Call it an impulse purchase.

But I couldn't read the instructions. I even looked on the Internet, and while I found, in English, how to interpret the results, I couldn't see if there was anything special I needed to know about the test.

I showed it to The Spouse. Once his eyes returned to normal size, he dutifully set about reading the instructions to me. Turns out they were, in alternating lines, in Russian (which he could read) and Kazakh (which he could not . . . welcome to my world, dude).

Good thing, too, because I thought this was a quick and tidy process. Nyet. This test involves a stick that has to be dipped to a certain depth.

Dipped.

That necessitates collection.

Yeah, yeah, I know. The stuff is sterile. But still. What on earth was I going to use to hold the appropriate amount?

Before you get too worried, you should know that I found some disposable plastic cups in a cupboard. Whew. That problem solved. But my toilet is in a separate room from my bathroom. I don't have what the military would call the ability to make a surgical strike. This just isn't the best format for this type of test, okay? Get the other kind. Even if it costs more than 85 rubles.

In the end, I was able to have a shower, disinfect any contaminated surfaces, and read the results.

You guessed it: not pregnant.

I suppose if I had paid more attention to the clues, I would have known before even taking the test. Yesterday afternoon was a perfect storm of annoyances, and I found my blood pressure rising with each additional vexation.

First, I received, as a gift, the Mother of All Food Processors. Long story, but it is fantastic. The Gift Giver, in her efforts to be thorough, and assure Recipient Satisfaction, had made the shop clerks check, twice, that all the parts were in the box. A key part . . . no, the key part is missing. She'll track it down for me, but I was so excited about my treat which I had known was coming since before Christmas. So now I have to wait a little longer. Harrumph.

The same Gift Giver had included a really nice bouquet of flowers. All of this was part of an elaborate thank you for some volunteer work I do. Flowers are expensive in Moscow, and I was delighted to have some in the house for once.

So was the cat.

Like a man possessed, he was after that bouquet. I put it on the piano. He climbed up. I put it on a bookcase (that is, more or less, blocked by the drying laundry . . . yeah, my living room is very Russian-y). He leapt over to get at it. I even set the container on the floor so he could smell and rub to his heart's content, but all he really wanted to do was chew on the leaves. No amount of yelling or startling noises could dissuade him. Finally, as I was leaving to go get the children from school, I shut the vase of flowers in the dining room. The door doesn't have any sort of latch, but I wedged it closed with a doorstop.

When I returned home, I found the door had been forced open, and the vase was lying on its side on the dining room table. Nothing was broken, but the water was soaked into the place mats and lying in puddles on the wooden tabletop.

Then, poor Baboo inadvertently brushed up against a car while walking home. Her winter coat was covered in слякоть (say SLY-ah-kot. Great word, eh? Exactly the sound of your boot as you pull it from muck). Okay. It's washable. I had just washed her coat, but no matter.

As my blood pressure began to spike, I thought I detected, ever so slightly, a hint of a back ache, the very sensation that usually heralds my period.

All the signs are there.

I can just wait, I guess.

Splish! Splash! SLOP!

Moscow is at its most hideous today. The temperature hovers right at freezing. The sidewalks are a sea of slippery, brown slush not deep enough to even cover my boots, but wet enough to cling to them and be tracked in the house, be splashed up the backs of my calves as I walk, and to give cover to legitimate patches of ice, lurking below the unattractive glaze . . . waiting for the unsuspecting pedestrian to become lulled into a false sense of security ("It's too cold for ice today!") and wipe out with a landing in the wet, shit-colored sludge.

Yes, temperature-wise the world is right pleasant. Last night I even went out without my hat. But the temp comes at a price. It isn't just the unattractive state of affairs. The temperature rose yesterday from -12C to 0C during the course of the day, twisting the sinus cavities on the left side of my face into a torture device straight out of the Spanish Inquisition.

Yeah, I know: nothing is more fun to talk about than one's medical problems and nothing, with the exception of another person's dreams, is less interesting to hear about (while certainly the most over-heard conversation in restaurants).

So I'll spare you the details other than to say that I have always believed that the most intense pain is said to come from kidney stones. I don't know how this could have been much worse. I seriously wished I could have driven a spike into my head because that would have felt better. I was so restless and fidgety with the pain, that I finally ended up in the kitchen, sitting on one of those big plastic storage boxes, with a hot water bottle sandwiched between my hands and my face, while rocking like a mental patient. The drugs finally kicked in, and I was left with a buzzy after-glow.

Which was just the right state of mind to soak up a little Russian culture!

It's called Судебные Страсти or Judicial Passions. Think People's Court in Russian. If you can read Russian, here is the link to the episode we watched last night. If you can't, I'll give you some highlights.

The shows lasts an hour, and each episode features four cases. I cannot say for certain that the show is completely scripted, but I had reason to suspect it is not a reality show. Instead of the avuncular Judge Wopner (showing my age here . . . just googled the show and found the comely Judge Marilyn Milian now presiding), Russian viewers get the devil-may-care Judge Nikolai Pavlovich Burdelov. (See for yourself here). Judge Burdelov doesn't suffer fools and dishes out justice every 15 minutes with a BAM! from his gavel.

Two of the four cases yesterday were especially Russian-y. In the first, the plaintiff complained that the Ded Moroz (Father Frost) she hired for her Christmas festivities ruined the affair by arriving drunk. She even supplied video evidence (much to the horror of defendant) of a very impaired Ded Moroz staggering off a bus and proceeding to urinate against the side of the vehicle (the cheesy quality of the video is what convinced me this was all pure entertainment).

The defendant claimed that the bus suffered various delays, stranding him, his lovely assistant (Ded Moroz is always accompanied by Snegurochka, the Snow Maiden), and the bus driver for more than three hours in the cold. The bus, said the defendant, was in such condition that he could tell it had been "written off as scrap immediately after the victory over Nazi Germany." He claimed the driver provided the vodka in spite of his repeated requests for tea (after all, he and his partner can live six months off of the money they earn over the holidays; they would not jeopardise this income by behaving unprofessionally).

The plaintiff even produced the bus driver to help her cause. Long story short, the driver confirms that the bus was in a sorry state (he had asked the plaintiff to finance repairs to no avail), and that the cold conditions on the bus while he tinkered under the hood certainly necessitated a few "drops to lift the tone." In fact, he has the liquor in question with him in the court room, and offers the Judge a taste of his mother-in-law's special recipe. It is 78 proof.

Judge Burdelov wisely finds in favor of the plaintiff.

But what I found so funny was the Jeraboam of bootleg hooch on the bus does not merit even the bat of an eyelash. Neither does the offer to sample to brew in court.

Second case. Manager of a theme restaurant wants an employee to pay for damages done to a costume worn for work. There is much discussion of the size of the changing facilities, the train schedule, and whether or not the defendant merely liked the costume and wanted to wear it home that night. The defendant claims that the costume provoked a sexual attack by strangers on the street. The damage indeed occurred, but it was not her fault.

Judge Burdelov finds in favor of the plaintiff, but, as I predicted, awards her only 10 percent of what she had been seeking as the defendant earns so little.

The custom-made costume is by the plaintiff's side during the proceedings. She holds it up from time to time to point out where it was stained. But never does she, the defendant, nor the judge ever comment of the fact that the costume is a sleazy dress featuring fake bare boobs.

BAM! Next case.

The Spouse and I must be the only people in Russia who found those details remarkable.

Judicial Passions airs daily at 1:00 p.m. and 5:00 p.m. on DTV.

Domestic . . . Bliss?

The cat has no idea how good he has it.

I passed a lovely street cat yesterday. Out in the cold, on the snowy Moscow streets. A nice fluffy cat with a poofy tail.

Our cat has started being really naughty. First, he got into the closet where we keep the fur hats. I usually am very careful to keep this closed, as I am afraid he will eat the fur.

Here he is: busted.


Then, yesterday, there was this nonsense:

His hat trick was pulling an entire roll of toilet paper off the cardboard center in the night. I didn't have a chance to take a picture as The Spouse already neatly folded it.

This is on top of his usual antics involving the bathtub. He loves the bathtub. He doesn't even run away when you turn on the tap, although the shower does drive him out. For now.

I have never known a cat to play Tag the way he does either. He will lurk somewhere and then leap out and gently tag you before running away. Clearly he wants to be chased. It is very funny.

On another domestic topic, yesterday The Spouse and I celebrated our 21st wedding anniversary. Can you believe that? I think he was traveling for business last year, so somehow this year, although it is not such a milestone number (other than the fact that our marriage is now legally old enough to buy a beer), it seems somehow . . . sweeter?

We didn't really do much. The plan, initially, had been to get a sitter and have a really nice meal out. But The Dreaded Cold made the idea of paying Economic-Crisis-Notwithstanding-Inflated-Moscow-Restaurant-Prices seem like an even bigger waste of money.

In the end, we sent the children to school and went to the Starlite Diner where we had Cobb salads. I had really been craving a Cobb salad and Starlite does them well. With 1000 Island dressing even. There is one down the street from us, so we soldiered out in the -12C weather and had a nice lunch. It was just what I wanted.

We've also had sort of a Film Festival since Christmas, as I got several movies. Last night we saw Aldomovar's Bad Education (which, although I knew something about it, was not at all what I expected). Over the past week we have also watched Pan's Labyrinth (grim, and I did not like it as much as director Guillermo del Toro's earlier The Devil's Backbone), The Motorcycle Diaries (another opportunity to look at the very lovely and talented Gael Garcia Bernal), and The Darjeeling Limited (probably my favorite and the most typical of my kind of movie). However, all are worth watching.

Finally, I have received much good advice about vodka after my last post. I think I might have to write about bacon in Moscow next. Got lots to say about bacon. Really.

A Lesson and Lecture on Vodka

I am cautiously optimistic that I may have turned the corner on this cold. But I've been living with it so long now (two weeks) that not only am I scared to make any sweeping statements like "Today, I'm actually feeling better!" but if I never smell eucalyptus again, it will be too soon.

One of my virtual friends whispered in my ear that vodka might be the answer. I have been drinking vodka medicinally since Cornwall. Which is how we came to conduct this little experiment yesterday.

When I arrived in Moscow, we were fans of vodka, but not what I would call serious vodka drinkers nor vodkaphiles.

That quickly changed.

There is something about Moscow--maybe the short, dark days, maybe the effort required just to slog through one's daily routine--that lends itself, nay begs for vodka.

I let my wine club membership expire and began stocking the freezer.

At first I went high-end: Russki Standart Platinum. In the US, even premium vodkas top out, pricewise, around $35. But a quick check on the Sedmoi Continent website puts a liter of this vodka at 1019 rubles . . . well, I stand corrected. At 29 rubles to the dollar, XE.com tells me my liter of Russki Standart Platinum now costs $34.95. Perhaps the thesis of this entire blog entry is now flawed. And that's a good thing.

Let me explain.

There is, after all, an economic crisis. And we have been putting away shameless amounts of vodka. So I decided to economize. I started buying another, cheaper, Russian brand called РУССКИЙ ЛЁД or "Russian Ice" (which, up until I asked The Spouse to help me type it, I had been reading as РУССКИЙ МЁД or "Russian Honey." Hey, it would be a good name for a vodka!). Nothing wrong with this vodka: it tasted nice and was cheaper.

But for weeks I was haunted by the Smirnoff display.

There it was: right by the meat counter. A half liter for 127 rubles. Smirnoff is decent vodka, right? I mean, if a bartender mixed me a vodka and tonic with Smirnoff, I wouldn't object. It's not top shelf, but it's drinkable, right? Vodka, by definition, is a neutral spirit. Without a distinctive taste. Right?

Wrong.

Oh, how wrong.

Yeah, it's probably fine in a mixed drink. But Russian style (chilled in the freezer and drunk neat), it's about as pleasant as drinking antifreeze.

Our Russki Standart and Russian Ice experiences taught us that Russian vodka was smooth and velvety. A happy, mellow buzz. And, if drunk in relative moderation, it brings few, if any, negative side effects the following morning.

I had just half a shot of the Smirnoff. With ice. And I could not choke it down.

I'm spoiled.

Good thing the ruble is dropping like lead: I can go back to the Russki Standart Platinum with little (or less) guilty pleasure.

Now, those of you reading this on the North American continent may lament, "But I cannot find Russki Standart!"

Oh, but you can.

I found it last summer in my ancestral village. If a dicey liquor store on the edges of the scariest inner city neighborhood of Columbus, Ohio carries Russky Standart, surely it can be readily found.

But maybe dicey liquor stores on the edges of the scariest inner city neighborhood of Columbus, Ohio are just the place to buy good Russian vodka. I went there because my younger brother suggested it.

"Where can I buy vodka?" I asked, dropping my suitcases in the living room. Although I had arrived at the Moscow airport three hours before my flight, I spent so long standing around in lines to check-in that I hadn't had time to stop in duty-free.

"You know over there by the dirty Krogers?" he said. "Next to the check cashing place? Right on Alum Creek? There's a Russian liquor store there."

I knew the place. It was on a frontier of sorts.

"You'll be the only white chick in there!" he shouted after me.

He was right. Just me and the clerk.

The parking lot held vehicles like Oldsmobile Delta 88s and late model Lincoln Continentals. I wasn't exactly blending in here in my dad's Prius.

Inside was Russian-y indeed: products all behind the counter. I looked at the vodka options, but I didn't see Russki Standart. The store clerk was very big, very bald, and sporting a visibly gold tooth. Rather than seeming threatening, he seemed vaguely familiar.

"I'm looking for Russian vodka," I told him. "Do you have Russki Standart?"

His eyes narrowed. He reached under the counter. "I have Russki Standart," he said with a strong accent. And he put two bottles of vodka on the counter in front of me.

Neither bottles resembled what I had seen in Moscow, but the words "Russki Standart" were imprinted in the glass of both. They were the same price, about $30 for a liter.

"I'll take that one," I said, pointing at the bottle labelled "Imperia." (I learned, only today, that Imperia is the high-end Russki Standart product.)

He put it in a brown paper bag for me and took my money.

"Спасибо," I said. He raised a single eyebrow.

I leaned over the counter conspiratorially, and asked, "Are you Russian?"

"I'm American now!" he seemed defensive.

But of course.

"До свидания," I said, putting my brown paper bag under my arm.

"До свидания," he replied.

For an interesting review of 11 vodkas, you can read this article on Slate.

In Which I Examine the Road to Hell

The children returned to school this morning.

In a show of solidarity, I accompanied them and The Spouse on the trek through the dark and snowy streets of Moscow. The plan: drop off the girls, have a nice breakfast with The Spouse, and then take advantage of a Child-Free Day.

So. Are we having sex like crazed weasels in every room in the house? Finally visiting Lenin's Tomb or the Pushkin Museum?

Nyet!

The Spouse is watching Russian soap operas while I continue to blow the part of my brain once responsible for the ability to do long division out through my chapped and raw nostrils.

There is no other way to say this: I have the MOTHER of all colds.

I no longer fear Hell.

"I'm sorry," I snuffled to The Spouse once we returned to our apartment. We did have breakfast out (which I could not taste) and provisioned. "I had every intention of going out and exploring something new in Moscow. But it's just too fucking hard."

I have friends who used to live in Moscow who are rolling their eyes as they read this, I know. But it is difficult enough to weigh yourself down with layers of clothing, penguin-shuffle across the icy sidewalks, and sweat in the Metro. Add to that the fact every cough reminds me that I need to do more Kegel exercises . . . well, I think that already qualifies as "Too Much Information," don't you?

Gack! Snort! Cough!

The Cold From Hell is now solidly in its second week. It started with a sore throat on December 29, 2008. I have spent the days since trying every over-the-counter concoction sold in Boots, as well as what I had in my Drug Arsenal here at home. Yeah, even vodka. I am in Russia, after all.

Thankfully, the children don't go back to school until tomorrow, so there was no reason to go out and about in the -12C weather today. Today I slept until after 2:00 p.m. and let The Spouse and The Offspring fend for themselves.

The whole week is a holiday here in the Russian Federation. Orthodox Christmas is January 7 (today). I get the impression it is celebrated quietly as it is a religious holiday. The devout go to church. New Year's Eve is party time when the Russians exchange gifts and celebrate with friends and family.

As in all countries, the Russian government determines what are official holidays. This New Year's/Christmas holiday extends from Wednesday, December 31, 2008 until Thursday, January 8, 2009. (I don't know why the French school resumes on Thursday . . . I expect there will be a lot of empty seats in school this week.) That makes Friday, January 9 a work day. But no one is going to want to work on Friday, so the Russians have swapped Friday for Sunday, January 11.

That's right.

Sunday, January 11 is officially a work day here in the Russian Federation.

This happens a few times a year. Usually people use the work day as a chance to clean up their desks or other low-key tasks. But it definitely feels strange to us.

The Spouse is using a vacation day for Sunday, so he doesn't have to go back to the office until Monday, January 12.

Odd, isn't it?

Odder still is that on Friday, January 9, The Spouse and I will have been married 21 years. That's longer than just about anyone we know.

BORK

Temperature in Moscow: -12C
Currently Reading: Inkheart. Great fun. I highly recommend it. I finished Twilight this morning, which was also fun (vampires, teenage lust . . . what's not to like?).

I was sitting in the airplane on the way back from England, and the guy in front of me was reading a Russian magazine. The title was ВОЯЖ, which means voyage. Sound it out if you can read Cyrillic. But it looked like BORK to me. If I had known this word when I started this blog, I would have called the blog BORK.

I got the DVD of Mamma Mia for Christmas, but I haven't watched my copy. I doubt I ever will, actually. We didn't have time before we went to England. There, the children watched it and listened to the soundtrack non-stop. It got to be so much a part of the fabric of the week that we began to play a game: What ABBA Song Are You Currently Humming?

It was a riot. We'd be sitting at a meal, and I would ask, "What song are you humming?" We'd go around the table:

"Dancing Queen."

"Money, Money, Money."

"Super Trouper."

Sometimes there was an odd one like "Voulez-Vous."

Often it was "Lay All Your Love On Me."

I recommend it as a game. But now I think I can't watch my movie.

It was one of my Christmas presents. I asked for it. I also asked for a purse-size calendar book. The Spouse, dutifully, tried to buy me one. It's a little big for the purse I'm currently carrying. But worse, it has no dates written in. I mean, you have to write the date at the top of each page. Makes it very difficult to determine if I am free on February 21. He had no idea when he bought it as the little book was shrink wrapped. He was as vexed as I was.

He made up for it with a lovely birthday present, however. We were in Cornwall, England. He went into St. Ives (Yeah, that St. Ives. As in "As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives . . .) without me one day. St. Ives is an artists' colony with lots of galleries and shops. He found this necklace, which, after I went to St. Ives and looked in a lot of the shops, seemed to me to be the very item I would have bought for myself. It has Cornish granite (I was always a rock hound) and a freshwater pearl.

I like it.

Rockollection

Oh, when you let French people pick the music, weird things happen. There is no decent French rock you know. Who was I having this discussion with recently?

Anyhow, at our Christmas Eve dinner last night, I was introduced to Laurent Voulzy.

This is what you get:

Apparently this was a huge hit for this guy.

Santa's Coming Tonight, Tonight!

So sings Sponge Bob, and my children. They are locked in the dining room (the warmest room in the house, even WITH a window open), wrapping my Christmas present. I know it is a DVD of Mama Mia! because I asked for that, and The Spouse tried to get me to wrap it earlier this week. Ha! Yeah. Right. You gotta at least wrap what you givin'.

Tonight, we are going to dinner with some French friends. We are the Perfect Storm of dining partners: three families, six kids. Everyone gets on famously, although one husband always takes off his shoes and socks immediately upon entering the host home. Which is sort of weird. But he is funny and charming, so we forgive him. Last time I hosted a dinner, he and the other French husband corrected our (American) pronunciation of such things as "Oasis," "The Beatles," and "Elvis Presley." Seems we are doing it all wrong.

Anyhow, there is going to be foie gras and jumbo shrimp. I am contributing champagne, and a great green salad, and the Nigella caramel croissant bread pudding. Oh, and tons of cookies and the chocolate peanut butter cups the girls made.

The Hostess sent her husband over on his way home from work this afternoon (December 25 is NOT a holiday in Russia) so he could collect the heavier items. I stood outside our building with a carton of champagne and a tray of cookies. I got a lot of looks from people who, I think, think I was selling something. One little old lady came by and stood nose-to-nose with me.

"What is all this?" she asked.

I thrashed about for some Russian vocabulary and finally confessed, "I speak Russian not very well."

"Ah," but she was still curious.

"Party?" I tried. "Fiesta?"

That seemed to work for her, and she ambled on her way.

Then I spotted a very draggy-ass Ded Moroz coming up the street. Some poor young guy, wearing his Russian Father Frost giddy-up and dragging his bag of presents, his heart JUST. NOT. INTO. IT. Why? Why? Why don't I carry a camera with me always?

I relayed these stories over lunch.

"Mama, you are a magnet for the weird," said Baboo.

Yeah. That may be true. But it all makes for good blog material.

Merry Christmas y'all.

Dee Dum, Dee Dum, Delightful

I awoke to the sound of shovels scraping the sidewalks.

Well, that's what The Spouse said it was.

I said it was Cat-O in another of his lame attempts to bury his waste, which usually involves him scratching at the wicker laundry basket that is next to his cat box.

Lo and behold, there actually is some snow on the ground in Ye Olde Moscow Towne. A pathetic, paltry amount of snow. But there you have it.

For the record, I took these photos at about 10:00 a.m. today. I am not sure that the haziness is so much a result of the polluted and/or snowy Moscow atmosphere as, in fact, a result of my dirty windows. Ho! Ho! Ho!

Makin' Memories

When my brothers, who are both younger than I am, were little, they, like most brothers, called each other evil names. My mother, being a good Unitarian, chided them for this. "There is enough hate in the world," she would say. Like Thumper's mother, she urged us, "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

So they modified their techniques. They called each other "Pal."

"Oh, Pal . . . come here so I can give you a wedgie." "I love you, PAL," before ambushing each other in the living room. This sort of thing.

Pretty soon, they were forbidden to call each other "Pal."

So, of course, it stuck. More than 30 years later, they still call each other "Pal" and "Pal-y." But the tone has softened to something almost resembling affection.

They weren't just snarky with each other. They were snarky with me, too. Especially during the holidays they would say things to me like, "Let's make memories, Sissy. Let's make memories to keep us warm in our golden years."

On paper, it sounds affectionate enough, except it was usually said while holding me in a headlock and farting in my face. But it has become one of those family mantras. Even our spouses will sometimes get a little dreamy-eyed during a particularly warm and cozy family moment and murmur, "Makin' memories . . ."

It was in this spirit that I unclenched my normally anal-retentive grip on my kitchen and allowed the girls to wallow in the tastes, sounds, and smells of Christmas. I let them bake today.

They selected some Christmas CDs. First, it was Al Green Christmas. They allowed it to repeat until I think next year will be too soon to play it again. Skittles especially likes Al's version of "What Christmas Means to Me," which, unfortunately, I cannot find on YouTube. I can find his version of "O Holy Night," which gives me goosebumps. Listen:



Then I gave them the Ally McBeal A Very Ally Christmas CD, but they rejected this in favor of Christmas Classics with Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Dean Martin, Nat King Cole, and Louis Armstrong. They especially liked Armstrong's "Cool Yule." Go figure. YouTube says that video is "Not available in my country," so you'll have to look for it yourself.

Anyhow, they made two recipes from Nigella Lawson: a spicy cookie with icing and a sort of peanut butter/chocolate candy. Both are delicious. I gave them some direction, but then I would leave the room and just let them get on with it. They really did all the work. And the washing up.

My kitchen floor is sticky. I will be stepping on candy sprinkles for days. And there is a sort of cement of icing sugar on the counter top. But I think they had a lot of fun together. And, after all, isn't that a big part of Christmas?

Here are the peanut butter sweets:


Here Skittles is icing the cookies.


Notice we are still in pajamas . . . an important part of vacation.

Winter Solstice

Today is the shortest day of the year. Skittles wanted to know how many hours today has, so we had to explain that it still has 24 hours, but the fewest hours of daylight. That made me curious about the actual sunrise/sunset for today, so I looked it up.

Today, December 21, the sun rose at 8:58 a.m. and will set at 3:58 p.m. That is short, but today is actually sunny, so it won't feel as short as some of the overcast days last week.

Yesterday, we went to The Spouse's office party for the children. I put a lot of photos on Facebook, but I know not all Beet Fans use that. So I repeated a few here that were relevant to previous posts or comments.

There was a puppet show. The puppeteers made the set and the puppets. I didn't understand the story at all, but it was wonderful anyhow. They punctuated the tale with folk singing (very Russian-y). The set was quite complex and involved lots of moving parts that enabled them to change where the action took place (inside, outside, in a troika). We saw something similar last year, where the storyteller set up about ten pieces of cardboard on chairs and flipped parts down and open to illustrate the story. There, too, he was the artist as well, and the affect was impressive.


Below, you see me and the children participating in parlor games with Ded Moroz (Father Frost). I'm wearing the Ugly Purse.


Here is a really cool mask Baboo got.


And here are some hats we saw in a market near Red Square. A fellow expat commented that his Russian wife has a fur hat that looks like it has roses on it. I was wondering if it was similar to these?


Everyone has been on their very best behavior in anticipation of Santa. We have been Bad Parents, teasing them that they will receive gifts from head to toe (i.e. books and socks). They remain hopeful, if cynical ("Maybe at least I'll get fuzzy socks.")

Heh! Heh! Heh!

Lucky Number Seven

Lugging my purchases (liter of milk, liter of vodka, laundry soap, chicken breasts, beef, paper towels, carton of eggs, cream cheese, salami, pickles, yogurt drinks, red and orange peppers, broccoli, Diet Coke, tonic water, chicken stock cubes, and five red and green Christmas garlands), I just arrived back home from the grocery store to discover the elevator, which was functioning when I left the building, is not working now that I have returned to the building.

I had to carry my bags up seven, SEVEN! flights of stairs. In the interest of journalistic accuracy, I weighed the heavier bag. It weighed seven kilos.

Oh, and did I mention the cat puked just inside the door while I was gone. So that when I pushed open the door, it dragged over the cat yack. Good thing I just bought more paper towels.

I've been in a bit of a state lately, what with this economic crisis and all. Although, and I say this for the record, I have not personally experienced any inconvenience or change in lifestyle because of it, I have heard about expats and Russians losing their jobs here. The rate of exchange is drifting, slowly toward favorable because the only thing worse than the state of the U.S. dollar right now is confidence in the Russian ruble. But nothing has changed enough to make us rich, and if the ruble crashes it will only make just about everything I buy more expensive because just about everything I buy is imported. Not because I am some sort of snob, either. It's just that Russia produces petroleum and not much else. Okay, vodka.

What's got me worked up are the rumblings I have been hearing about increased crime in Moscow. Again, let me speak clearly into the microphone for the transcript: I have not been a victim of crime in any way here (aside from The Spouse's wallet . . . but he got it back intact), nor have I ever even felt uncomfortable. But I have heard, via the expat forums, stories of apartments being robbed. The occasional mugging. Breaches of security in apartment building lobbies. There was the suggestion that carrying a second, worthless, and basically empty wallet is advised so that should one be mugged, you can hand off the bogus wallet (complete with some business cards of people you don't care for or don't remember meeting and some old loyalty cards from local businesses) while your real wallet remains safely nestled in another pocket.

All well and good if you are a man with a lot of pockets.

But what if you are a woman and feel compelled to carry around a cell phone, metro map and pass, emergency woman supplies, artificial sweetener, lipstick, Advil, a pocket calendar and pen, and a passport with an oversize Russian visa that is neither attached to the passport nor fits in the passport, in addition to the standard wallet contents of bank card, paper money, and coins? I travel light, actually. And I have given up carrying around my pocket Russian-English phrasebook/dictionary.

Oh, and my keys . . . I've explained about the giant set of jailer's keys I am required to carry around, right? I have friends who have a tiny device to open the front door to their building . . . something small and discreet and the size of, oh, a cotton swab tip. . . and one door key. I have seven keys (lucky number seven, again). You can't leave them lose in many coat pockets because they will rip the pocket lining. And make your coat hang askew on your body.

I had been leaving my passport at home, even though we are required to carry them. I figured it was easier to pay a fine than to replace a lost or stolen passport. But now I am also hearing it is more likely that the police, who normally ignore foreigners, could, feeling the economic pinch themselves, be more inclined to ask for papers.

My compromise is to carry mine, but not the children's.

But the purse thing. Oh, the purse thing. I have been wrestling with it. I had a tiny purse on a long strap that I tucked my money and bank card into one day, while carrying everything else (and a big, older wallet) in an old Coach purse. Unwieldy. Especially when I have to dig out the little purse in order to pay for something.

So I ditched the little purse and put everything in the Coach purse. It, too, has a long strap so I can wear it across my body.

But it has been really cold here, and I want to wear my fur coat. A purse across the body and outside the coat will rub off the fur. So I have to wear it under my coat, which pushes the already too-big coat that much farther away from my body, allowing the frigid Moscow wind to blow right up the front of me.

I tried a "purse on a belt" option, but the purse was just big enough that it made me look like I was packing heat under my coat.

So now I am back to a really ugly Nine West purse I bought a few years ago. It is, by design, an across-the-body purse. Black. About as pretty and feminine as bandolier. I look like Pancho Villa. But it has a separate pocket for my phone. And the main pocket is large enough for my wallet, my passport, my pocket calendar, and my keys.

I'm just gonna play fast and loose with the other items.

Taking my chances.

Better not mess with me.

Darkness on the Edge of Town

I've sort of given up on notifying Beet Fans every time I post something because it takes longer to assemble the email than it does to write the blog entry. Not conducive to quick and dirty blogging. You'll have to just check in regularly, I guess. I'll notify when I think of it. Or when guilt wracks me.

It's been dark when the girls leave for school in the morning. But today was the first day it was dark before we got home. Skittles announced, "It's 3:59!" And it was pretty dark. In the next few minutes the street lights came on.

I've had some Fun With Cyrillic moments this week. Also known as Honey, What Did I Buy? Seems the face wash gel I bought is for oily skin, something I no longer have. (I have that charming peri-menopausal wrinkles-with-zits and where-did-that-whisker-come-from? melange). Okay. It can be backup face wash gel.

Then I could not identify what, if any, package held the plastic wrap at the grocery store. I identified the imported $12 attach-it-below-your-cabinets plastic wrap and dispenser combo. But I didn't want a $12 attach-it-below-your-cabinets plastic wrap and dispenser combo. I've been looking all week, but no additional stock. I finally found what I was looking for (plastic wrap on a cardboard tube, no box) at the bigger Sedmoy Continent over by the kids' school. I also found a package of decent toilet paper there. Even The Spouse has commented that some days we are stocked with what looks like paper I must have stolen from a gas station washroom.

The third thing (these events always come in threes) was the fruit dumplings.

Russian cuisine is full of items in dough that are boiled. The fillings range from sweet to savory. The dough comes in myriad shapes. The resulting combinations, and there are many, all have different names. Pelmini. Variniki. Piroshki. Think ravioli, Russian style, garnished with sour cream. The freezer cases of every grocery store are filled with bags and boxes of the things.

I'm up to speed on the savory ones. The girls eat the meat-filled pelmini at least once a week. I can even read what type of meat is inside or if they are "home-style" or "traditional," although I cannot say what those distinctions bring to the product.

A year ago I bought a box of the dessert dumplings. But I never got around to cooking them and eventually, perhaps it was June, I threw them out. Today I bought a replacement. I promised the girls they could have some for dessert.

The box the dumplings came in shows raspberries and blueberries along with the pelmini. So I assumed I had purchased fruit-filled dumplings. After all, the Slovaks have fruit-filled dough balls that are boiled (they can be lumps of lead or sublimely light). Surely there was a Russian equivalent of this Eastern European delicacy.

I cooked them. They were strangely . . . white. I served them. I took a bite.

They were filled with tvarog, which is a cottage cheese type dairy product. It is used in all sorts of dishes (I make a savory spread with it). This was lightly sweetened, and very nice. Just . . . void of fruit.

Ever observant, Skittles says, "Well, it did say 'tvarog' on the box."

The 8 year-old reads better in Russian than I, the Provisionista, do. Sigh.

Wordle Up! The Internet Brings Me Yet Another Way to Waste Time.

One of my fellow bloggers turned me on to Wordle. So I Wordled my blog. Click on the image above, and it will take you to a larger and more legible version. And you can Wordle, too.

Ewww

Another vigilant expat drew my attention to this article in the Moscow Times.

We woke to a dusting of snow on the ground this morning, but, according to the article, it may not be real snow in that it is a result of factory emissions and not precipitation.

Ewww.

Things Can Get Dirty

I don't generally make political comments about Russia, but this story appeared in my hometown paper.

I saw OMOH heavies (the Russian SWAT equivalents) hanging out in a square on Saturday when I walked Skittles to her cooking class. They were mostly smoking cigarettes and taking pictures of each other. They make me smile, ever so slightly, because I am told that the Spanish gays, among others, covet their uniforms and regalia because it is all emblazoned with the acronym OMOH, which looks like HOMO backwards. The H is really an N, but never mind. Anyhow, they arrested 90 on Sunday.

The gay pride people routinely can't get a permit from the mayor's office to have a parade because they are dangerous, but the Movement Against Illegal Immigration was allowed to hold a demonstration on Friday. Then there are stories like this.

Yeah, I know. New York isn't a great place to be Ecuadorean either.

Walking into the Metro yesterday, the rush of air in the doorway blew my hat (not my fur hat) off my head and out the two sets of doors where it was stopped by a kind passerby. It wasn't until I was on the train and had traveled several stops that I looked at my hat and saw how dirty it was. I was cold the rest of the day because I just could not put it back on my head without washing it. Teach me to leave my big fur hat at home on a cold day.

In Which a Chicken Is Not a Bird, and a Woman Is Not a Person

Well, we have been in Moscow now for a year. According to the children, yesterday was our anniversary. That sure went fast. We celebrated by going to Gorky Park, but you'll have to see the photos on my Facebook page. Uploading photos on this site is too frustrating.

The days now are short, dark, and overcast, making them even shorter and darker. The temperature has been below 0C the past few days, which is a blessing only in that it guarantees no rain. No snow either, but time enough for that. Maybe. I'm starting to wonder if the whole global warming thing is going to screw with my time in Moscow. I can imagine looking back on our time here on day and saying, "Oddly, we never had much snow in Moscow."

I got a piece of mail the other day addressed to Expatresse Nopatr. My full name was in Cyrillic, last name first, then my first name, then "Nopatr."

That cracked us up. I have no patronymic. Well, only because I never gave anyone one. But I could have one.

You may or may not know how this patronymic name thing works, but the Russians use the patronymic, based on the name of their father, as their middle name. It is an official name and is used on official documents. There is a feminine version and a masculine version. For example, if the father is Ivan, the son's patronymic name would be Ivanovich and the daughter's would be Ivanovna. Since my father's name is Larry, my patronymic or middle name would be Lariovna.

To be really polite and respectful, you use a Russian's first name and their patronymic. We shouldn't call Vladimir Putin "Mr. Putin," for example, but, if we want to be polite and correct, should say Vladimir Vladimirovich (his father was also Vladimir).

Russian doesn't have the titles "Mr." or "Mrs." which I find very disturbing as there is no polite way to address a stranger. Nobody says "comrade" anymore, but they haven't come up with an alternative. There is no "sir" or "ma'am" or "miss." Apparently you can say "girl" to women of any age. It's odd, I know.

This blog title comes hand-in-hand with other Russian remarks such as "I thought I saw two people on the road, but it was just a man and his wife." There's a weird mix of sexism and chivalry here. Men will hold doors and offer seats on the metro (sometimes). I have also seen men carrying the purse of their female companion. That looks a little strange to me, and I have seen it quite often, actually. I cannot imagine The Spouse ever carrying my purse for me. I mean, he always offers to carry things if I want, but he would never think to offer to carry my purse, and I would never hand it to him on my own. He can hold it while I go on the roller coaster. But that's it.

I also hear expats relaying stories of Russian women deferring to male colleagues because "He is the man, so he is smarter." I have not experienced anything like that, and, frankly, suspect that in most Russian households the woman runs the show. It is another one of those cultures where the sexes are defined: men are masculine and women are feminine. Why would you want to be otherwise? Given how we Americans sometimes neuter ourselves, especially at work, I don't mind being allowed to be female. It hasn't gotten in my way anyhow. But I'm also not trying to run a board meeting here either. Ask me again after I try that.

As an aside, Miss Russia won the Miss World 2008 competition this weekend. Here is the winning interview. She is adorable.



There was also the Miss Constitution pageant last week, commemorating the 15th anniversary of the post-Soviet constitution. Read all about it here.

In other news, I am on the hunt for a new winter coat. Every coat I have seems to have a problem. The lining is shredding on my favorite coat. It is becoming embarrassing. I have another jacket-type coat I bought from JJill before Youngest Daughter was born. I mean, I have photos of a pregnant me wearing this coat. There was more of me then, and now this coat is too big. The wind blows up it. The good news is I can wear layers with it (always useful) and even wear my purse under my coat. But the shoulder seams hit the middle of my biceps: it really doesn't fit nicely. I have a similar problem with my lovely mink coat: it is too big for me. And sometimes it just isn't appropriate.

I looked at coats in a shop in town the other day, but what I wanted cost between 25,000 rubles to as much as 36,000 rubles (these days, 2,700 rubles = $100 US). I don't want to spend $1,000 for a down-filled winter coat.

That's what I want: something knee-length, water-resistant, down-filled. With a hood. Some fur trim would be nice, but isn't vital.

I got a tip from a woman on the expat forum about a market ("rynok" in Russian) called Konkovo (conveniently at Metro Konkovo, for those of you following along on your Moscow Metro Map). This morning I went to check it out.

All I can say is "Wow."

It goes on and on. All indoors. Shop stall after shop stall of coats, jackets, furs, men's suits, shoes and boots, bras, evening gowns, and those over-the-top Russian women's outfits complete with too much lace, glitter, and bows.

I was too intimidated to venture into any of the shops. While some items I saw did have price tags, many things did not. Clearly, this is a place to bargain, and I am convinced that, without a Russian speaker, I will be lunch meat. Even with The Spouse, we are likely to pay the Foreigner Prices. But I'm sure I will do better with his help.

So we will go back together another time. There are, uncharacteristically, some sales in Moscow already. But Sale Season is traditionally after the New Year. It might pay to hold off until January.

Ho! Ho! Ho! A Study in Contrasts

I received a call last night from Trusted Girlfriend. Her husband had my Christmas tree; was it okay if he dropped it off at 7:45 this morning?

Okay?! That's terrific!

The girls, especially Skittles, have really been into the whole idea of Christmas. Last year was such a wash, what with the move and all happening, and our shipment being delayed. We spent what felt like an eternity in this empty apartment with only an air mattress (that leaked) and a few dishes for us (not even a coffee pot) and bunk beds for the girls and pieces of cardboard to play with. December 25 came. The girls opened a few gifts, and then the Spouse went to work (it isn't a holiday in Russia). By the time Russian Christmas/New Year's came, we had furniture, but it seemed too late and not the right time to be putting up decorations.

I stored the box on the stairs to the building attic. It's locked. The neighbors and we have keys, although technically we aren't supposed to. A few weeks ago, the woman who manages the people who maintain the building came along and, without accusing us of having keys we shouldn't, very nicely but firmly said we had to remove anything we wanted to keep from the stairs as they had to paint.

So the box moved into our bedroom. The cat likes to sleep on top of it, and slash at us with his claws when we walk by. Looks like we'll actually get to open it. Too bad for Cat-O.

I let the tree sit in its box for a while this morning as I harbored some sort of illusion that if I waited a bit, it would be light enough to see what I was doing. Around 10:00 I realized that this was about as light as things were going to get. I was sitting in the dark at the computer, and the rain outside was not about to suddenly stop, heralding blue skies and sunshine.

So I assembled the tree. It was harder than I expected. Here's how it looks right now.


If you follow the Lolcats link on the right of my page, you may be familiar with the "Basement Cat" concept. Here's one. Above you can see that I have my own. He is fascinated by the tree.

Buoyed by my productivity, I even got dressed and went to the grocery store. I filled my cart with eggplant, Parmesan (a real luxury here), avocados, cleaning supplies, milk, granola, grapefruit, wine. All in all, it was about a $100 trip. The clerk didn't put my change in my hand, but set it, coins and bills, on the counter. People often leave the small coins behind as they aren't worth much, and there is sort of a "Got a Penny? Leave a Penny/Need a Penny? Take a Penny" view on the kopecs. I collected my bills, but ignored the coins.

While I was bagging my purchases (the only store here that bags for you is the Why Pay Less? store), I noticed the fellow behind me.

He was grizzled and carried a cane. He didn't exactly look homeless, but he had that worn out look of the street drunks we so often see. He was buying a bottle of vodka, and I realized he was unsure if he had enough money.

I wish I knew more Russian because I would have just leaned over to the clerk and said, "This one's on me." But I couldn't. By the time I even cobbled together a few words in my head, he had pulled out the appropriate bills (all small) and was waiting for his change.

I probably would have only embarassed him.

But I felt awkward and self-conscious carrying my Trader Joe's and Mono Prix reusable bags full of groceries back to my apartment with my Christmas tree waiting.