Fresh Air, Exercise and No Boars

So we finally broke down and went walking on one of the trails near our house. It made us realize that #1. We are out of shape (I'm mean we knew this but the walk really drove the point home) and #2. Our kids are big lazy asses. I say "our kids" so as not to point fingers, but it really is Katie.

VJ does OK for a 3 year old. He started to lose steam at the end as we were walking back home (up hill I might add).

2 minutes into the walk Katie starts in
Katie: "When are we going back?"
Me: "Kate, we just started."
Katie: "I don't want to go down there." (pointing downhill because she knows that she will have to walk back up it)
Me: "Noted." They hate when I say "Noted" because they know it really means "Tough Shit."
Katie: "How much farther are were going to go?"
Me: "Far. And the more you complain, the farther we'll go." Papa Smurf, I am not.

Once she gets going she is much better. The kids like to pick wild flowers and look at the dogs in the neighborhood (pets aren't allowed in our fenced in complex, but everyone else in Hungary has at least one -usually large- dog). At the end of the walk, she and Anna were way far ahead of me and Pokey Pokerson.

Here's some pictures:

Katie insisted on wearing a dress, despite it not being the best outfit for a walk in the woods. Just a note: the sweatshirt makes me look fatter than I really am. I'm just saying.

Two of the smallest (and ugliest) dogs in the neighborhood.

The view of Budapest from the top of the hill we climbed.

Driving Miss Anna (& Miss Katie & Mr. VJ)

We went this weekend to buy our 2nd car. And again, by "buy" I mean order and hopefully pick up this Friday. The whole process was less painful this time since we were much more familiar with the process. We also totally lucked out as the (one & only) salesman who speaks English at the Toyota dealership is leaving for a new job after this week.

I can not tell you how much I look forward to not having to chauffeur everyone around all day. Driving Katie to school is not so bad as we found a mostly back way to get there and driving to and from Anna's work has gotten easier as we found a shortcut to get there as well. However, driving Anna to work and THEN driving Katie to school SUCKS. The only realistic way to go takes you through the worst rush hour traffic part of town. To put it in Houston terms, it's like having to drive the 610 West Loop during rush hour, EVERY DAY.

The 2nd car will cut my driving time by at least 2/3 plus give Anna much more flexibility about when to get in/leave work. The down side is that since I won't have to pick her up at night, I'll be expected to make dinner more often. The worse-worse part is that I will then have to eat said dinner.

Just to review: our first car is a Toyota Corolla hatchback (my primary car) and the second is a Toyota Yaris hatchback (Anna's car).

Ballerina Katie

Speaking of Vienna, originally we were going to go for 3-4 days as Thursday, 3/15 was Hungarian Revolution Day (1848)...not to be confused with Hungarian Revolution Day (1956) which is in October of course.

In Hungary, when a holiday falls on a Tuesday or Thursday everyone gets the corresponding Monday or Friday off as well. I know what you're thinking, that's even better than working for New York State (hi Dad)...but there's a catch. In order to get Friday off, you have to work the previous Saturday!

The point is that Anna had Thursday 3/15 & Friday 3/16 off so why not go to Vienna earlier and get in a few extra days? Well, for whatever reason, Katie only had Thursday off and had school on Friday. Now, it's only Kindergarten and we were tempted to just pull her out for the day (like 2/3 of the rest of her class) but there was one problem:

Katie has started taking Ballet lessons on Friday afternoons after school. She's had 4 lessons so far and she LOVES them and has a great time. There was no way we could ask her to miss ballet.



Obviously she's half a year behind the other girls, but is doing really well so far and who cares anyway as long as she is loving it. There's a big show in May that they are just starting to practice for so they all should be on the same page-ish.

Vienna - Part 1

Last weekend (3/17 - 3/18) we made an overnight trip to Vienna, Austria. Our goal was not to see everything in Vienna but to #1. Get out of town for the weekend & #2. Basically scout out the city for future visits. Mission Accomplished.

We left Saturday morning. It took us about 3 hours to get to Vienna, including the ridiculous amount of time spent getting gas (5 min to pump gas, 15 min to wait in line to pay). Lesson we learned: Saturday morning is not the time to get gas.

We did not over-prepare for this trip. Again, we were just looking to have a relaxing weekend away and therefore did not have a map of the city or a list of sites to see. What we did have was door-to-door internet driving directions from our house to the Marriott-Vienna. The directions were PERFECT and the hotel was easy to find. The only problem we had was that we did not see it until we were right on top of it and passed it. No problem, just turn around, right? Except it was a one way street (of course). OK, we'll just turn down this street and double back, right? 45 minutes later we stumbled across one of the three streets named in our internet directions and we were back on track. This is where a map of the city would have been helpful, laid back weekend or not.

After checking in, parking the car, etc. it was about 1:00pm and the kids wanted a happy meal. We were able to walk around and window shop on our way to McDonalds. We started to walk around some more after lunch but the weather was colder than we had expected and it started to rain so we headed back to the hotel. VJ (& I) had a quick nap while Anna & Katie scoped out the hotel. Then it was off to the kids favorite part of the trip: The hotel pool.

It somewhat annoys me that the kids' favorite part of visiting a new European city was the hotel pool. However, I've just resigned myself that this is how it will be. I have visions of Katie, in 3rd (or 4th) grade back in Houston and the teacher asking her what she liked best about living in Europe and her answer being "Well, the hotel pool in Vienna was nice and the one in Rome had a slide, but I have to say that the Paris hotel pool really was the best."

Sunday we had a great breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Anna summed it up best: "VJ had scrambled eggs, Katie had waffles, you had French toast and I had Eggs over easy and I got to eat with everyone."

Not to waste a lot of time on Breakfast, but I do have to mention one thing. Breakfast was set up buffet style with an egg-to-order station. There were three options for breakfast:
1. I can't remember the exact name but it boiled down to: Cereal & Fruit
2. "Continental" - this included the above with the addition of Waffles, French Toast, pastries, cheese and the Egg station.
3. "American Style" - all of the above plus bacon, sausage and a bunch more stuff that Americans would never eat, especially not for breakfast. It was like prosciutto and fish-something and just nasty non-breakfasty food. It was like whoever named it had never met an American before.

The weather on Sunday was MUCH improved...one might even say that it was GORGEOUS. We spent the morning just walking around, taking pictures and enjoying the sites. We went through several beautiful parks and past many old, beautiful buildings including the Vienna Opera House and just had an enjoyable day together.

The drive back was non-eventful and we look forward to going back.

Here are the pictures from the trip:

On Friday night we put the digital camera in it's docking station to make sure that it was fully charged and I can confirm that yes, when we returned on Sunday, it was fully charged. Success!

So we bought this disposable camera for 15 Euros. That's equivalent to about $20 USD. I don't really know how much things cost in the US (everything costs one swipe of the credit card) but I'm thinking I got robbed. I do know that I wanted to puke when the nice camera store lady told me the price.

As soon as we get them developed, I will post some pictures from this trip. If too much time passes, I'll just Google up some pictures of Vienna and photoshop the kids in.

Happy 3rd Birthday VJ!

My little guy turned 3 this weekend. Although if you asked him, he'll tell you that he's 5. Because we went to Vienna this weekend, we had his cake on Friday. It was a very Superman Birthday what with receiving Seasons 2 & 3 of Superman: The Animated Series from grandparents and a Flying Superman from Mom & Dad & Katie (it glides actually).

I know you are all laughing at my parents for actually believing that it was VJ that wanted Superman: TAS and not really me (a friend of ours once made the mistake of asking me what Katie wanted for her birthday and I convinced her that she wanted the Thundercats, Season 2...luckily Anna intervened...Hi Renee!). Actually VJ LOVES Superman and is watching it right now, which makes my day easier, you betcha.

A Tale of Two Vito's

So VJ has finally wrapped his head around the concept that both he and I are named Vito.

He has known for some time that his name is Vito and that Mommy has a "real" name but he had trouble recognizing that he and Daddy shared a name.

This is a conversation we had back in Texas:

Me: "VJ, who's this?" (I point to Katie)
VJ: "Katie."
Me: "And who's this?" (pointing to Anna)
VJ: "Mommy."
Me: "And what's Mommy's real name?"
VJ: "Anna."
Me: "And who am I?"
VJ: "Daddy."
Me: "And what's my real name?"
VJ: "Daddy."
Me: "Yes, I'm Daddy, but what's my real name? What does Mommy call me?"
VJ: "Com'ere Daddy."

OK, so you have to give the kid points for being perceptive.

Me: "No, my name is Vito, too. Just like you."
VJ: "No, I'm Vito. You Daddy."

Some time in the past month the light went on and he grasped that we had the same name. Now he likes to say to me "We're Vito's" which just makes me feel so terrific.

I think he is also realizing that Vito is the best name ever. I am, however, going to have to teach him not to brag about it too much as other people may get jealous. For example, we were sitting down to dinner the other night and he says:

VJ: "Daddy, we're Vito's. I'm Vito and you're Vito.
He turns to Katie
VJ: "Not you Katie."

Katie just rolls her eyes at him and pretends that she doesn't care. But having lived with the jealousy of others over my name all my life, I can see how she's really feeling.

Here's a picture of young Vito playing with his Hot Wheels racing set. Santa brought it at Christmas but we just opened it this week. Talk about very excited.

Return of EvilCat

So EvilCat, the stray black cat that hangs around our house, returned this morning. On a Sunday no less! That's so Evil.

Anna was in the kitchen cooking breakfast when EvilCat jumped up on the ledge outside the kitchen window, scaring the crap out of her. OK, that's funny...but Evil too. Plus, now she couldn't open up the window so the bacon stunk up the house.

What more proof than this do you need until you realize that cats are evil?

O-H D-A-M-N

Katie's reading has just improved so much since she started at her new school. I don't know if it is something the school is doing differently or just coincidence but Anna and I are very pleased.

There's a downside of course. Like most parents, when we don't want the kids to know what we are talking about, we spell it out. Usually it's to discuss a decision ahead of time so we can present a united front to the kids. You can see where I'm going with this.

Last night at dinner, the question of dessert came up, as it always does.

Katie: "What's for dessert?"

Anna and I look at each other. I should note that I tend to skew more towards junk food dessert -ice cream, pudding, chocolate- while Anna tends more to the healthy (or at least healthier) - apples, pretzels- Hence the need for discussion. (I still don't understand why she is the favorite parent but I digress).

Me (to Anna): "P-U-D-D-I-N-G ?"
Katie: "Did you just spell pudding?"

Damn it. She learned how to spell ice cream ages ago so we usually spell something else like "Breyers" or something to get around it. This leads to two problems: (1) if one of us picks something "weird" as the substitute word so the other doesn't get the code or (2) Anna spells the word too fast and I can't keep up. This leads to her re-spelling it 3 times and then yelling at me.

We also know enough of the alphabet in sign language that we've used that on occasion.

We're either going to have to start discussing these things ahead of time (unlikely) or learn Morse code.

--. --- --- -.. / -... -.-- . / ..-. --- .-. / -. --- .--

Beware Boar Crossing

So, pretty unspectacular Saturday.

Katie was supposed to go to a birthday party for one of her school friends but as we were getting ready I came across the invitation and found out that the party was from 9:00am - 11:00am instead of 11:00am - 1:00pm. As it was 9:30, no one was showered and the party was on the other side of town...Katie was a little disappointed but took it pretty well.

Plan B involved going to the park. Great idea until 10 minutes before we left it started to rain.

Plan C. F*@& it. Let's have lunch and then take a nap. Success!

In the afternoon we went to Culinaris, a specialty food store recommended by another expat and spent way too much to buy some Rice Krispies, Poptarts, Brownie Mix, wine, etc. We forgot the Marshmallow Fluff, so since I have go back I guess I'll get some Oreos as well ($5.00 for a lunch box size package).

On the way home we were able to find a store called Praktiker which is the Hungarian equivalent to Home Depot.

As we were driving home and nearing the turn off to our house I see what I think is a large dog cross the street in front of me. Then I realize it's not a dog.

Anna: "Is that a..?"
Me: "Yep. That's a boar."

A boar crossed the road in front of me. A Boar.

Now, in addition to fresh air and exercise, we have another reason to avoid the nature trails around our house.

A freakin' Boar.

Car Farts

OK, so sometimes the rental car makes a fart smell. It usually happens when I have to, like, rev the engine because I'm stopped on a hill and I want to get going without rolling backwards or stalling the car (I still usually stall out). I don't know if this is a diesel car thing but I'm guessing it is since both of the rental cars we have had did this and they were both diesels.

So this happens last week with just VJ and I in the car and the conversation went like this:
VJ: "Ewww! Stinky!" Covers nose with hands
Me: "Yes, the car is smelly."
VJ: "No Daddy. It's not the car, it's you."
Me: "No VJ. It's the car."
VJ: "No, it's you. It's your heinie."

The kid would not believe that the car had farted and not me. It's happened twice more and he always blames me.