On my departure day, I went biking early in the morning, and first time dared to venture from the bike path into the Loop (there is very little traffic thee Saturday morning, and I decided I needed to start from something!)
Saturday Morning
Category: everyday life
Passports Disaster
I am on my way to Helsinki, but not the way it was planned – I am flying on my own. As I mentioned, the last two weeks were one emotional roller coaster. Here is a complete story of our passport disaster.
John’s and Nadia’s passports were good to travel in June, but Anna’s passport had expired, and Kira didn’t have one yet. Anna applied for both passports in February, not even thinking that she might need expedited processing, starting the whole thing sixteen weeks before the trip.
However, that was when everybody started to apply for passports and the current backlog had started. When the passports didn’t return in May, Anna started jokingly saying that she and Kira might need to travel to Chicago for an emergency appointment. When the passports were still not there two weeks before the departure date, she tried to apply for an emergency appointment only to realize that no appointments were available before the departure day!
That’s when we all started panicking. Anna called her Congresswoman, and her office promised help. Meanwhile, Anna called every day to see whether there would be any cancellations, but even when she would catch one, while she was on hold for another representative.
On Wednesday, she came to Chicago to try to get in without an appointment, but they won’t let her in. Her Congresswoman’s office told her that they were supposed to get a callback on Monday, but they didn’t, and they don’t know why. Anna decided to try to get an appointment for a later date (she found another time during summer when everybody could go), and was able to get one for the two-week later date.
We decided it was better to go later in summer than not at all, and Anna spent another two hours on the phone exchanging the tickets. I decided to still go now (I just made the trip shorter) and booked another ticket for later. Just after we were done with all of these exchanges, Anna’s Congresswoman’s office called to inform her that they got an appointment for her on Friday!
We had yet another several very emptional hours. It turned out that while I could easily restore my original trip, Anna’s original tickets doubled in price. Even though I suggested a crazy idea of making this wish come true, there was a risk – what if the passports would still be delayed? What if something went wrong?
Anna and John decided to keep the new dates but still used this Friday’s appointment. Then, Anna had a last-minute realization that Nadia’s passport won’t be good for travel in August, so she needed to make the new one for her as well.
I am on my way to Helsinki, but not the way it was planned – I am flying on my own. As I mentioned, the last two weeks were one emotional roller coaster. Here is a complete story of our passport disaster.
John’s and Nadia’s passports were good to travel in June, but Anna’s passport had expired, and Kira didn’t have one yet. Anna applied for both passports in February, not even thinking that she might need expedited processing, starting the whole thing sixteen weeks before the trip.
However, that was when everybody started to apply for passports and the current backlog had started. When the passports didn’t return in May, Anna started jokingly saying that she and Kira might need to travel to Chicago for an emergency appointment. When the passports were still not there two weeks before the departure date, she tried to apply for an emergency appointment only to realize that no appointments were available before the departure day!
That’s when we all started panicking. Anna called her Congresswoman, and her office promised help. Meanwhile, Anna called every day to see whether there would be any cancellations, but even when she would catch one, while she was on hold for another representative.
On Wednesday, she came to Chicago to try to get in without an appointment, but they won’t let her in. Her Congresswoman’s office told her that they were supposed to get a callback on Monday, but they didn’t, and they don’t know why. Anna decided to try to get an appointment for a later date (she found another time during summer when everybody could go), and was able to get one for the two-week later date.
We decided it was better to go later in summer than not at all, and Anna spent another two hours on the phone exchanging the tickets. I decided to still go now (I just made the trip shorter) and booked another ticket for later. Just after we were done with all of these exchanges, Anna’s Congresswoman’s office called to inform her that they got an appointment for her on Friday!
We had yet another several very emptional hours. It turned out that while I could easily restore my original trip, Anna’s original tickets doubled in price. Even though I suggested a crazy idea of making this wish come true, there was a risk – what if the passports would still be delayed? What if something went wrong?
Anna and John decided to keep the new dates but still used this Friday’s appointment. Then, Anna had a last-minute realization that Nadia’s passport won’t be good for travel in August, so she needed to make the new one for her as well.
They all came to Chicago on Friday a half-hour before their appointment time (which was 10 AM), and it turned out that the time didn’t matter at all, and they had to wait in line. They got in at about 12:30, and Anna was sent to retake her photo, but the person was at lunch, so they waited more. All our plans for the birthday lunch for the girls were not going to happen, and I decided to walk in their direction at least to see them and hand out my mom’s birthday cards for the girls and Vanille cookies and macaroons, which I ordered a day before. Fifteen minutes into our conversation, Anna received a call that the girls’ pictures had to be retaken as well.
After that, John drove home with the girls, and Anna waited for the passports, which were ready closer to 6 PM instead of 3-15 PM.
The good part is that now everyone has a passport so that we can plan our early August trip, but the horrible part is that… well, that is was a mission impossible!
What Defines Me
I was lucky since the Red Line train approached the station just as I walked down the stairs. I hopped into the nearest door and looked around to find a place to sit. The open spot seemed to be almost too narrow for me to fit, but in the car full of Cubs fans, I was not going to miss this opportunity.
I apologetically squeezed myself in, and an older gentleman on my left assured me that he was not that big and that I was fine.
In a couple of minutes, looking at me browsing my phone screen, he asked me what I was doing for a job. I replied, and since he looked puzzled, I explained to him, alluding to the search for products on Amazon. He said it was cool, and he was “just a retired forklift driver.” And then he told me that he wanted to start driving a semi because it’s a better pay, and we talked about that, and he mentioned that he worked for Pepsi, and I told him that I worked for Pepsi in the past and that I did this warehouse automation. I still remembered all technology, and he nodded approvingly: I see that you know what you are talking about! Then he said that he was originally from Michigan, and I said I have a friend there whom I visit, and we talked about what we like in Michigan.
We talked all the way to Wilson, discussing Cubs and Sox fans and the Red Line reconstruction and children and grandchildren, and then we shook hands, and he disembarked, waving me goodbye.
Thank you so much, Mister Retied Forklift Driver, for not asking where my accent was from!
***
The last several days (actually, more than a week) were a complete rollercoaster, and I can’t and do not want to talk about them now.
I know that the problems we were solving and the worries we had were so minor in comparison with what other people experienced. There are no life-threatening events, everybody is healthy, and I am almost ashamed to talk about our situation.
The good part is that we have plans for this summer, and although they’ve changed drastically from what they were a week ago, they should work :).
Since over the weekend, I was still unsure whether I would be traveling or not, I didn’t start packing, and then I was too nervous to pack because of all uncertainties. Tonight I skipped the concert I wanted to attend so that I could finally pack because I am leaving on Saturday, but I got caught up in reading about the current situation at the front, and… well, I still have about 40 hours 🙂
Kitchen Update
I won’t call it remodeling, but two things out of the three I wanted to do are completed.
The kitchen was the last space that needed painting, and I held off last summer because I didn’t decide on the color. This spring, I was ready, and I love the way the kitchen looks now!
It also worked perfectly that now I work in the office where they feed me:), so I had no problem with not having a kitchen for two days. It was for the third time that these painters did some job in my house and each time I admire the quality of their work. The trimming, and all these small details – everything is perfect. Also, they clean up the area after the job is done. They even take down the pictures and put them back!
Blueberry biscuits
Baked them last Friday, and they ended up being so delicious!
Original recipe here. Tried it and loved t, will do it again
Ingredients
BISCUITS1 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted, plus 10
tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1⁄2-inch
pieces and chilled
3 cups (15 ounces) all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (31⁄2 ounces) sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1¼ teaspoons table salt
7 1/2 ounces (11⁄2 cups) blueberries
12/3 cups buttermilk, chilled
HONEY BUTTER2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon honey
Pinch table salt
Directions
FOR THE BISCUITS:
Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 425 degrees. Brush bottom and sides of 8-inch square baking pan with melted butter.
Whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in large bowl. Add chilled butter to flour mixture and smash butter between your fingertips into flat, irregular pieces. Add blueberries and toss with flour mixture. Gently stir in buttermilk until no dry pockets of flour…
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Ukrainian Rally June 10
It is difficult to write just about anything related to the war these days when all you think about is, “Please, let it be a success; let it be victory.” The news comes and goes, the situation is changing, and just three days ago, things were different.
I am glad that this rally attracted more people, I am glad it was visible, and I am thankful to everybody who participated. And I am sorry I am not doing enough.
Books
I have time to listen to audiobooks, and sometimes, I even have time to read books on Kindle, but I have no time to write reviews or at least to rate the books I read on Goodreads. Today (because I am extremely nervous for more than one reason), I finally recorded my last two-and-a-half months’ reading list.
Aquarium by Victor Suvorov – the only book I read in Russian for a long while. It was one on this “how could you possibly not have read it,” so I did, and it left me with a sort of “what was the point of this?” reaction. To be fair, recently, at least half of the books I read prompted this reaction. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.
Attention Span: a very different book, but I had a similar reaction. I was listening to it and nodding: OK, OK, I get it, now what?… and then no conclusion, no new ideas…
I‘m Glad My Mom Died: I liked this book; it is very sincere and talks about situations and feelings which are not talked about that often. A couple of months ago, I listened to the last minutes of David Sedaris’s interview. Answering the question about his father and his relationships with him, Sedaris said: why can’t we say bad things about those who passed away? If he was a bad person, why I can’t say this? Well, maybe I will follow his lead sometime.
The next three books came from the Chicago Public Library list for Women’s Month.
Daughters of Victory: just a very bad book. I don’t know what else to say about it. I am surprised by how the author collected so much information about that period of Russian history and still did it all wrong! Like people didn’t talk this way, didn’t behave this way, didn’t think this way! The picture does not come together.
The Book Woman’s Daughter: not super-exciting, but good reading (and when I started reading, I thought that “blue people” are imaginary and just presented racial discrimination).
The Exceptions: Nancy Hopkins, MIT, and the Fight for Women in Science: I really liked that one! I didn’t know about the women mentioned in the book. I didn’t know about the magnitude of gender discrimination in academia (and so recently!). A true eye-opener.
Clean Code: in case you saw this book in my Goodreads feed and wondered that in the world was that, it was given to the whole IT team with the intention of initiating discussion about the code quality. I am planning to review it in my professional blog.
A Beautiful Day In a Beautiful City
Weather-wise, the day was perfect, and the whole city was outside again! There were at least ten events I wanted to attend, but It has been a month since the last time I was escorting, so making a shift before another long period of absence was a must.
Just to give an idea of how bad was the situation at the clinic:
Somehow, they always get police protecting them, not the other way around!
I had some time between escorting and the next thing on my list, so I decided to take the Riverwalk, to get at least a glimpse of this amazing day!
Updates And How Is Life
By the end of the week, I went into another spiral of “everything goes wrong, and I am behind on everything!”
On Thursday, I decided to call my doctor and ask whether I should see her for my broken nail situation It turned out she just went on a long vacation, but her medical assistant suggested I see another doctor, just to make sure. I made an appointment for Friday afternoon since I was going to work from home because of another appointment.
Then the day went not as planned (and I already had a backlog of things, as it always happens by Friday.) My other appointment got canceled last minute, and when I went to the doctor, my appointment was delayed, and when the doctor finally came, she said she wanted to make sure there was no fracture (I still can’t bend the thumb). So she sent me for the x-rays, and it took me a long time to find where I needed to check in and where to get the xrays (people were sending me back and forth multiple times). Not worth going into the details, but I got increasingly frustrated that it took so long, and even though I took Uber both ways, I was at home only at 4-35, three hours after I left!
There is a high chance that I indeed have a fracture. In the beginning, I was focused on the nail and the pain around it and attributed all the discomfort to that problem. But now, when the wound is stabilized, I understand that the pain comes from the thumb itself and my attempt to use it.
Since the x-rays were taken at the very end of the day, I do not expect the result until the end of the day on Monday. I know that regardless, there is no specific treatment for the broken thumb if it’s indeed the case I am just extremely annoyed that everything takes twice longer than it should take.
No excuse for not finishing the next Red Gate article and not replying to a couple of emails asking for my professional advice.
The day is gorgeous; it should be a day at the beach, especially because Sunday will be cold and rainy. Oh, well…. Back to the tasks of the day!
Hettie's Reflections 