Our Lady of the Lawn dressed up for Mardi Gras, although it’s a bit of a non-starter here in Mexico – they do King Cake in January, so we didn’t have any Mardi Gras celebrations. John and I did celebrate our 13th wedding anniversary on Tuesday! We stayed in and grilled steaks and opened a bottle of wine. My mom asked me if I had had any regrets about marrying John – no! We’ve been so happy, and I can’t imagine my life without him.
This was another good, busy week. Last Sunday, we had our neighbors Mike and Teresa down for smoked shrimp – yum! John is doing excellent smoking! It was a bit hit.
I spent a lot of time getting ready for Friday’s Consular Leadership Day – it’s an annual event at embassies and consulates around the world, and I was part of a great committee that took on the planning and execution of it. We had a fun day of teambuilding classes and exercises, topped off by an excellent happy hour in the employee garden at the Consulate. The weather has been fantastic – hitting 80 pretty much every day.
Friday night, our friend Neal put together another fun wine tasting at Pomodoro’s. We had a Spanish-speaking Frenchman as the sommelier, plus a good dinner and good company.
Saturday I made an early run to El Paso, then went to work for a while. We stay so busy during the week interviewing, that it’s pretty impossible to get extra stuff done – like working on my first employee evaluation. I worked until 1PM or so, then had a pedicure. We had a wonderful dinner at my manager’s house. He’s Haitian and his wife is Turkish – he cooked a typical Haitian dish of rice and red beans with a beef stew – delish – they are excellent hosts, in addition to being wonderful cooks.
Today we did our weekly shopping in El Paso, then picked up two State Department retirees from the El Paso airport at noon and got them settled in their hotel here in Juarez. I went back this afternoon to take them grocery shopping.
All in all, it was a good week – busy as usual. Mom had a scare with her heart this week – rapid heartbeat – but her friends in the emergency room got it under control quickly. I talked to her again tonight, and she was feeling fine, thank goodness.
John and I continue to obsess over the bid list – the list of places where we could be posted in 2010. So far, nothing is really jumping out at us, but we continue to plug away at it…