Home Sweet Home

Last week was a very short work week followed by a very long flight.

I'm not positive if this product is available outside of SA, but we celebrated the launch of Doritos crusted Pizza Hut.

Not a huge fan of Doritos on pizza, but I did like flavors.

I took the red eye on Tuesday night, stopping in Amsterdam.   The flights were not too bad... I really enjoyed my Owl Eye mask.

Upon arriving back in Chitown,I had some priorities which included Bloody Mary's ( I have yet to find a decent Bloody in SA),  getting my hair chopped off, the German Christmas Market, bonding with my cat, and Star Wars.  Well, StarWars was totally not MY priority at 9am on Saturday, but at least I got to see Kelly and Mark.

Having a great week back in Chi-town despite the cold and rain.  Almost over jet-lag and almost done with Christmas shopping and present wrapping.

Happy Holidays to everyone!   And I hope to see as many of you as possible in the next week.  :

Week 6- UK and BBQ and other stuff

Somewhat less sick and very much less crabby.   This week I went from feeling like I'm getting a cold, to a stomach thing, to, currently, a perma-headache.

I feel like Monday was months ago and not just a few days ago.   Monday 

and Tuesday, I was at a meeting in Reading, UK  working on a special project for the nutrition sciences part of my job- not really related to the global rotation part.   It was nice to see my NS peeps and catch up and to finally wrap up this project.   It was a lot to accomplish in a short period of time but potentially it will have a big impact.  Hopefully.  It was hard work.

Nutrition Sciences represent

My head hurt so bad at this point, I couldn't see straight...not sure why I'm smiling

My head was in migraine mode and I almost passed out at that dinner.  I'm not sure how I am smiling... it must have been delirium.   It was nothing 2 Aleves, 3 Ibuprofen and a small cider couldn't handle though.  Well, that cocktail handled the headache... it didn't do much for the stomach ache... all I could force down was a little soup and a hand full of chips (ie "fat" fries).

The flight back wasn't too bad.  I didn't spill red sauce all over my favorite white running jacket, like I did on the flight there.  I changed my seat to the isle so I couldn't be skipped for breakfast.

My magic flight remedy did allow for a few hours of sleep.  And I watched 2 movies... Rikki and the Flash and Trainwreck.  Both Okay.

sleeping aid

The 11+ hr red eye flight left Tuesday night, and arrived at 7 am on Wednesday.    It was straight to work- it was gift exchange and cake day.  I had bought a specialty rum chocolate sauce for my gift and was totally teased and made fun of with my coworkers claiming I bought body paint.   Normally, I probably would have though it was funny, but I was sick, had not slept and I genuinely had  put thought into the gift.  Honestly, my feelings were a little hurt.   I received a couple of cacti, which I am psyched about.  My apartment needs a little life.  Hopefully, they don't die.  I'm pretty positive all my cacti and basil are dead at home.  Phil sucks.

The rest of the week was pretty tame.  I took a sick day Thursday to get some reading done and to not have to worry about  not making it to the bathroom in time at work.   Friday, my stomach was on the mend and I spent the day at the Isando/factory office in packaging training.   I learned a lot about bags and made my first bag. 

My little bag baby.

Friday night we finally made it out to see Hunger Games.   Eh, it was okay.  Hard to enjoy due the couple on our right talking loudly the ENTIRE movie and the guy on my left shaking his cool drink like a maraca.

Yesterday, we had high hopes for this Christmas craft market at the casino that people at work were raving about.  It turned out to be pretty lame, so we did some retail therapy at the mall instead.

Say hello to my new amazing sleep mask/sleeping headphones fleecy owl thing.   Yes, I'm totally rocking this on the plane, quite possibly in my Qatar Airline PJs, even though I'll be on KLM.

Today we were invited out to lunch with Doe and Jay at a BBQ restaurant their friends just opened.  It was a lot of fun, despite the anti-feminist chatter.  Another lesson in keeping my mouth shut.  Yo. I'm getting good at this.   Or I'm just saving it all up and will be extra extra asshole-ish when I'm home in a few days.

Jozie Blonde-  a new fav.

Yum. Meat.

Me and Doe and Tracy in the background

I finally bought some random crap off the guy outside the grocery store.  Every time I walk by he tells me to take a look and every time I tell him that one day I will.  Today was that day.   Random guy on the side of the road souvenirs for everyone!  

Back to packing my ass off.   I'll be back home on Wednesday!   I expect lots of Festive cocktails.  

Week 5- still sick and crabby

So this is more of a 5.5 week update, since I've been still sick, still crabby and I've been traveling for work.

Due to the sick and crabby state, I don't have much to report for last week.  I was feeling shitty, I made a miraculous recovery midweek and crashed hard on Friday- which Tracy has termed "friday-itis, since this is 2 weeks in a row I was sick on Friday.

I've been doing a lot of work stuff.  I helped on a plant trial on last week Monday.  It was long.  Very long. And hot. Very hot.  I was sick and probably had a fever which didn't help, but I'm in awe of the people who are in the plant for 8 plus hours everyday.  I couldn't do it. I'm weak.

I also got in the lab this week- first time since grad school.  We were doing a moisture test and it all came flooding back to me.   "I know how to do this!   This is EXACTLY how I got dry weight data on my mouse shit!!", I proclaimed triumphantly.   Needless to say, I didn't make many lab friends.   I'm totally that weird American chick who bakes mouse shit now. Sigh.

I also learned how to season and how to collect stuff from the plant. 

I bought A LOT chips from our Tuck Shop or company store.  If you are nice, my American friends and family, I may be bringing some home to share.

Friday- I learned or really more of observed a type of Jewish chanting ceremony that occurred at sun down and sun up on Friday while I was trying to sleep.   I lived in an Orthodox community in Atlanta but never saw anything like  it.

Saturday- I took a really long flight while feeling half dead.  I made myself get up for breakfast but they skipped me and wouldn't even bring me coffee. :(    I was really sad, but was able to find the arrivals lounge for a  proper English breakfast after spending over a hour in immigration lines because I was told the wrong line twice.  I did get to watch Vacation and Pitch Perfect II. No Drew Barrymore unfortunately.

Yum.  Beans.

After the really long flight and breakfast, I got to wait in front of the Harry Potter store for 45 minutes waiting for it to open.  There's a reason I'm my mother's favorite child.

Then I hopped a train to Farnham to see Karen and David.  Twice in one year!    For those who don't know, I met Karen in 2003, while back packing in Thailand.

Thailand, 2003-  Holy F we are tiny.  

Mel, Karen, David:  Dec. 2015

Here's one from July 2015-  because we are much cuter here.

It was a short, but fun visit.  She fed me a lot, like usual.  I got to see their oddly shaped tree, which they assured me was normal and I got to see downtown Farnham, which was adorable and very British looking.  I also made a Poundland purchase.

Farnham-  cold and rainy per always

Oh Christmas Tree, why do you look so weird?

Poundland Score

You'll have to wait on this week's adventures until Sunday-  spoiler alert- still sick and crabby.

Week 4- Crabby Pants.

I'm crabby. Leave me alone.

I'm apologizing in advance for this update being short or not funny or just whinny and bitchy. The awful cold I always get when I'm in a place more than a week has arrived. Actually, I usually get a cold in the fall too.  I hope this the same cold.  Unless it's two colds in one... Which is rapidly beginning to feel like that is the case.

This is our month anniversary! I can't believe time is moving so fast!   It feels like we just got here... I'm a little sad that we only have 5 months left. 

Ok.  So this week:

I drove a little. It's getting better.   I just need to remember I go in the middle of the road.  And that I drive from the right side of the car.  Friday, I got in on the left side and sat there for 30 seconds before I could figure out why it felt wrong.

Hi!  My name is Abigail and I'm super slow, I esp. have issues with hills.

It was Thanksgiving.  No, they don't celebrate the discovery of America here, although randomly,  they do "celebrate"  Black Friday here.  T and I had our own make shift Thanksgiving dinner.  We couldn't find turkey, tofurkey or pumpkin, but we made it work.  Of course, we did find pumpkin today, a little too late.  We made some pretty decent mashed potatoes and stuffing though and an interesting sweet potato pie.  And I had my Thanksgiving sausage with peach chutney.  

T cooking.

selfie with our feast

my thanksgiving "soysage"

Not too shabby.  I ate ALOT.

The aftermath.

The weekend:

We saw lots of lions at the Lion Park  The same place an American tourist got eaten in June. The tourist had the window open and the lioness had cubs around.  The lioness is still there.  The park's opinion was that the tourist was in the lionesses house and didn't follow the rules.  She was just protecting her family.  We  didn't get out of the car or have any windows open. I follow the rules around in situations where I'm considered lunch.  And we didn't drive this time, so we actually enjoyed it more and were able to learn tons of stuff about lions.   Too bad I have the memory capacity of an ant or I'd totally rock African animal pub trivia night.

We were on the fence about the "cub experience " add-on because cheesy and exploitation, but in the end we're glad we did it. I mean when is the next time I will hold hands with something that could easily eat me.  When in Ro...Africa.

Today we were supposed to go hiking, but I feel like shit,so alternately the plan was brunch and Hunger Games, but I barely made it through brunch. I almost need to take a break pushing my basket around the grocery store after buying soup.  So it was brunch and a long afternoon of crappy movies on the romance channel and naps.  :( 

This is so not a bloody mary.  F sickness. #givemevodka

I leave you with a meerkat. Because meerkats. 

Week 3

The Week in review....

I drove.  A little.  Decided I dislike it as much as driving in Chitown.  My car is still at work.  Tracy has graciously been chauffeuring me around.  Also the hijack training instructor told me that someone might bite my finger off to get my ring.  Engagement ring now lives in the safe. I like my fingers.

The summer storms started this week, which is good... There's a pretty serious drought here.   They seem to happen at night and are pretty bad ass.

I did my first plant trial.   I "tested" too much product.  I'm going to gain a million pounds.  Related to work and unrelated to the trial, I also "tested" a bunch of our current products.   This is my new favorite:

Offsite at the Johannesburg Zoo-team building scavenger hunt type game. Our team name was Versatole  cameleons.  Yes, we spelled it wrong.  As much as I liked to say we did it on purpose to be some kind of clever, we didn't.  I think that set the tone...  we didn't win.  I didn't know many of the SA questions, but I did get to see a lot of friendly animals... They come right up to the fence.  And a couple of birds took a walk with us (but the video is too big to upload.  sniff sniff).

The Versatole Cameleons

Cheetah!

Meerkat!

Hello! Hello!

There was also ALOT of peacocks:

Bryanston Organic Market-  Saturday craft and food market about 30m away.  Plenty of good excuses to spend my money and food and music.  At least I got a lot of Christmas shopping done (and bought a pretty bad ass bracelet for myself). Woot!  And market Dosas from Meera's.  Not quite the same as New Deli, but still yum.

Market view.

Delicious Dosas

Retail Therapy

Cradle of Humankind- where the whole evolution thing went down and our monkey ancestors lived.

The home of my great great great great great great... great  monkey grandparents.

Hangin' out in the homeland.

Sterkfontein Caves -still active excavation sites, where two of the oldest fossils were found, Little Foot ( he had really little feet, for realz) and Mrs. Pleas, which was most likely really a Mr. Pleas.

Decked out in our mining gear, ready to go.

Cave entrance... yes those are a lot of steep stairs.

Inside the caves.

Active Excavation Site run by students at Wits University...where either Mrs. Pleas or Little Foot was unearthed.

 We also paid a visit to the Tumulus Building,  the underground visitor center to learn more about Darwin, evolution and our ancestors.  It was pretty awesome to see evolution in action.  Go science and paleoanthropology (which I didn't know was an actual thing until today)!

Maropeng Visitor's Center

 The Lion and Rhino Nature Reserve-  kind of a shit show, because it was not well run and we had to drive ourselves around the reserve which we didn't realize until after we had paid and the gate was swinging down behind our car.   Despite there being almost no signage and us off-roading in the lowest end VW ever made.. we only *almost* broke the car a handful of times, scuffed the hubcap only once, did not run over a wart hog and did not get eaten by a lion... although we did witness an Asian tourist jump OUT of his car.   Oh and I met my giraffe.  Yay.  It only took 3 weeks.

So Giraffes!!

And other stuff...

And just because some Black Coffee and dudes in a truck:

I hope all my Midwest peeps are  enjoying your snow.   I'm feeling your pain.  I really am.

Dreamin' of a white Christmas... not.