Saturday Bullet Points

• Lydie and Phoebe went cruising the town. Don't write us about the missing car-seats... Noah was driving, that should worry you more.
  
• We had a great evening with Britt and Chris here. The married grown up kid thing still seems slightly surreal to me ... Our visit went way too quickly of course and now they're gone to the north side of this island. I gave my son-in-law a haircut, which was totally odd for me but it looked pretty good when it was all said and done. I am Troy's stylist but have never tried my mad-skillz on anyone else. We will see them again next Saturday when we get them from the little airport back over to the big airport.
• They brought in lots of cereal, crackers and cheese. (Yes the 20lbs from February was gone already. A bunch of lards live here.) Tonight we had offered a variety --- cereal and popcorn for dinner - a hit with everyone.
  
• I ran 12 miles with Beth Friday morning and it might have been my favorite Haiti run ever. We talked and laughed and cried and enjoyed a perfectly cool and breezy morning. I have been having trouble squeezing running in this last week so I had no faith I could do 12 but we did it! I am not even sore today. I am pretty pumped about that. Basically, I am trying to tell you that I am a finely tuned machine.
  
• Paige went to the Orthodontist today.There is an Orthodontist from Colorado that comes in every six weeks. He has been coming here for 26 years. Crazy! But Man - that is some seriously expensive metal. She gets her braces in April. We're asking Isaac and Noah to get off their butts and get jobs and pitch in. Ike is applying with the UN - maybe pushing papers or something safe. Noah is going to try the U.S. Embassy. If he finds out he is not disinterested or apathetic enough to work for the Government - then he is going to see if DeliMart might hire him as a cashier. As a last resort they may just go together and sell fruit from the trees in our yard. I'll keep you posted. Paige's crooked teeth depend on them.
  
• There is this man on our favorite running route that is mentally ill. He always tries to stop us and points at the corrugated tin wall and tells us to read it. We usually just say hi but don't stop. Last week he said, in English, "You need to read this about your President". We stopped and let him point at the cement wall where there was a bunch of chicken scratch but no words. On Friday he said again, "You have to read this!" The poor guy needs help that cannot be found here. It makes me sad.
  
• The estimate to fix the truck was $1800 usd - Troy likes repeatedly slamming his head into walls, therefore he is going to turn it into "insurance" and see what they give him. In a few months when he still has zero of the dollars he will ask Tipap to figure out a way to fix the truck with some duct tape and baling wire. Until then the truck looks bad enough that people seem to steer clear of us. The day of the accident I took entertaining video and photos of Troy and the chaos on one of the busiest streets in PAP but I cannot figure out how to get them off my phone now that Lydia has dipped the phone in the toilet. Sigh. You would have loved them.
  
• Lots of people at my house are fighting some fever & cough thing ... the snot is flowing freely from many noses and the crabby babies seem to multiply at certain times of the day. Even Britt found the 6pm dinner-time noise levels to be a bit off-putting. If we could take the hours 4 to 7 pm and remove them from our lives ... things would seem much less insane and overwhelming.
• Jeronne and Tipap are off tomorrow. Troy is playing guitar at church. There is a going away party for C.K. after church. Everyone is supposed to bring a dish to share. Cereal anyone? My plan is to attend the church of "keep them alive and survive" here at home.

~I just realized this post is unusually sarcastic. If you don't do sarcasm - I am sorry, you're missing out!