Deep Breaths

Spring is in the Air

My, how time flies. It seems like only yesterday that we updated you all on our lives, and it's been like five weeks. When last we spoke, the bitter chill of winter was in the air, and now it's looking a lot like spring (in Cyprus, at least). Sorry about the lengthy delay. So let me get you caught up...

As it turns out, thanks to a very gracious friend with a satellite dish, we actually DID manage to see the Super Bowl - albeit two days later on tape delay, and with most of the second quarter edited out for the sake of time. I stayed away from the phones and internet for two days, so I had no idea what the outcome had been when we sat down to watch it. Very cool. Glad the Colts pulled it out, although it was a pretty sloppy game, and because the second quarter was chopped I missed most of the Colts' scoring. Oh well.. it was still nice to finally catch some American sports footage. Now if only I could get some baseball..

Leia and I went out to a very cool sushi place to celebrate our first Valentine's Day together. We had a lovely sushi/sashimi sampler, green tea, the works. I went out that morning and got her some lovely purple flowers (her favorite color) and had them arranged on the coffee table along with a balloon, a card, some dark chocolates, and a little bear, so she would see everything when she walked in from work. It was fun. I love plotting surprises.

I have been clawing and fighting to finish the book I've been writing since July. I have about 3 and a half chapters left to go, and just over three weeks until my deadline. Should be a photo finish. I'm dying to be done with it, but I'm also pretty proud of what I've accomplished when I look back at it. It will just be nice to have it sitting on my shelf instead of having to load up an increasingly-huge computer file every morning.

Next week is going to be pretty eventful. Wednesday night is the talent show at Leia's school. She helped a group of kids put together a little drama production, which apparently has been drawing rave reviews in all the rehearsals. So I'm going to go check that out with her. Then on Friday and Saturday we're helping out with the pan-island youth event that Leia's been helping to plan virtually since I arrived in Cyprus. Two days of music, sports, games, food on the grill... I guess some things appeal to kids in every culture (not to mention those of us who can't claim to be kids anymore... at least not very convincingly). Supposedly around 230 kids are coming, which, if you know anything about the number and size of the evangelical churches on this island, is absolutely phenomenal. So we're looking forward to that, both because it will be a lot of fun and because after it's over we won't have to go to any more meetings about it.

Hmm.. so yeah. That's pretty much what's been going on. My birthday is coming up in about two weeks (hint hint... get those presents in the mail now), and then Leia's two-week Easter break, and then a trip to England in May for her cousin's wedding... so we have some nice things to look forward to in our immediate future... and hopefully you'll have some fresh blog posts to tell you all about it. In the meantime though, comment away on this one. We'd love to hear how you're doing.

- John

posted by John and Leia @ 7:29 AM