Fire in the Sky

This has been a pretty crazy week at work. First was the auction, it's great because old items that we can't use get reused rather than thrown away, plus we get some money - which is that much less than we need from the taxpayers. We also spent a good chunk of the week getting ready for a visit from Washington that didn't even happen in the end due to plane trouble. The other ongoing excitement had to do with a shipment of Turkeys that was ordered by the Employees Association for Thanksgiving. Everything was fine until we learned that arrangements had only been made to get the turkeys as far as Tashkent in Uzbekistan (a 10 hour drive) and we had to figure out how to get them the rest of the way to Dushanbe. Let's just say, it's taken 4 days, a Toyota 4-Runner, and a lot of dry ice.

In another interesting note, I learned a new folk remedy for the flu. One of my staff said that he was coming down with the flu (the 'grip' in Russian). When I expressed concern, he told me not to worry, that he would 'kill it' with vodka and lemon. Something to keep in mind should the shortage of swine flu continue...

Outside of work has also been busy, but more enjoyable. In the wee hours of Wednesday morning, Stephanie and I ventured out to watch the Leonid meteor shower, which was supposed to be particularly good. We found a relatively dark spot and were able to see a few good ones during the half-hour we were out. I saw one in particular as I was getting out of the car that blazed bright turquoise and left a bright green streak across the sky for several seconds.

Tonight (still Wednesday) there were also bright streaks in the sky, but not due to meteors. For some reason, the night time is the right time for cutting down trees on our street. We were sitting in the living room when apparently the chainsaw hit the power lines. Electrical mayhem ensued in our living room with the lights flashing on and off, all of the voltage regulators were clicking madly and there were showers of sparks flying outside the house. It was so sudden it took us awhile to realize what was happening. Fortunately our generator kicked in and everything is steady now. It will remain to be seen how long we need to be on generator.

I think that's enough excitement for this week. Time to go catch up on some sleep.