Also, new pictures!

WTF!

Either I am slowly going crazy or I am looking at a picture of my husband with Reagan and Putin circa 1985. I knew he was building something strange in that shed out back, but a time machine? This can only end badly…

We hear sirens like crazy in this town. I don’t know if we just have the most diligent police/fire/ambulance services here or if we live in a crime infested land. Seriously, police cars speed through town all the time, sirens blazing. This past Monday, there was a robbery at a drug store about a mile from us. Maybe 30 minutes later, there was a car crash like 500 feet away. We heard or saw 4 police cars, 1 fire truck and 1 ambulance zoom by in a 5 minute span. A couple hours later, we look outside and there are 3 cop cars at the strip club across the street. I don’t know what happened there though.

Um, what else? We saw a dentist’s office today that we’re pretty sure is called Hoosier Dentists, but the ‘H’ in the sign was missing, so we thought it might be a Cockney dentist office. Shortly after, we went to Hobby Lobby, which it turns out is a very Christian business. Anyway, as we were walking to the door, a small child flashed me. I don’t think I’ve ever been flashed before; quite unsettling.

It’s Spring Break for Kate this next week. Woo! Spring Break! We’re trying to decide between Ft. Lauderdale, Cancun or Indianapolis. Hmm. Indianapolis does have the former home of our 23rd president. That’s right, Mr. Benjamin Harrison! I think we have a winner.

Oh yeah, there were a couple of tornadoes about 30 miles south of here last weekend. We didn’t see them, though we did have some light thunderstorms. So we’ve got snow, tornadoes and humidity here. But I do kind of miss earthquakes.

We’ve been taking ice skating lessons at a community rink very near own home. It has been a lot of fun. Through five lessons, neither one of us has fallen. That’s not a surprise for the angelic Kate, but for me it is. Next week is our last lesson. We might take the intermediate class at some point. Kate might even take a figure skating class. Girl can skate.

What else is new: Kate totally rocked a powerpoint presentation in her Children’s Lit class. Speaking of power point, Kate also made 2 60 question movies quizes for me with power point. She’s a super lady!

We just can’t get enough of that great Pittsburgh Pirates blog wewillneverlearn.blogspot.com. Wow! What a site! Great stories! Great ads to click! That site has it all!

We had about a foot of snow come down two Wednesdays ago. It really just started to melt yesterday. It’s been in the 50s the last two days. It feels like California a bit. One of my least favorite expressions of all time is “You don’t like the weather, wait five minutes.” It seems like every state east of California claims that with pride. But anyway, the weather didn’t change quite that quickly here, but Friday morning it was about 10 degrees or so at 8am. By 4 pm it was 56. It hadn’t been above 30 for 5 days, now all of the sudden it’s always 50. Strange.

That’s all for now. We miss you all and think about you often. The first visitor we get from California will receive a very special prize. So special, I can’t even name it.

So we’ve been here in Bloomington a little over a month and we’re still getting used to things. We had always heard that things move slower in the Midwest and that people were friendlier. That might be half true. People do seem to drive slower, but that might be because the speed limit is no more than 30 mph anywhere in town. People also seem to move slowly at the grocery store, but I think that phenomenon is nationwide. The friendly people part: all myth.

We both make a concerted effort to at least make eye contact with people we pass on the street or neighbors we see outside. Generally speaking, they seem to avoid eye contact with us. Sometimes we say hi and they give us a startled, brief ‘what’s up’ in return. A couple of weeks back, I was taking some trash to the dumpster. As I approached the dumpster I passed a guy walking to his car. I looked at him and said, “How’s it going?” He stopped dead in his tracks and stared at me, trying to figure out how he knows me. I smiled at him. I think he then realized that I was just a stranger saying hello. He said, “What’s up?” I said “not much” and then I tossed my trash in the dumpster. He slowly turned back toward his car and continued on his way.

There are a couple of exceptions though. There are two or three guys that always race each other from their car to the door to their apartment. They’re always laughing and having a good time. They smile and say hi to us. They’re our favorites.

Also, our next door neighbor, we’ll call her Connie, has been pleasant and friendly with us. However, she is a bit on the mysterious side. One day, Kate heard an argument from inside her apartment. After that, we didn’t see her for about two weeks. There were no lights on either. Maybe a weeks or two ago, we would sometimes see a cat looking out her front window. There were no lights on at the time. We have not seen the cat for a number of days now. Just the other day, she left her apartment in the morning carrying a baby. We had not seen this baby before or known that it existed. Later that same day, a car pulls up and her boyfriend, who we’ll call Thayne, gets out. Also in his car, another woman and a baby. The same baby? We don’t know. Anyway, Thayne knocks on Connie’s door and she comes out. They both get into Thayne’s car and the four of them drive off.

Our theories: Connie is an animagus. She can turn into a cat when it’s most opportune. And, Connie and her magical group of friends found a baby and they are taking turns caring for it. Is this baby magical? Were its parents slain by an evil wizard? Only time will tell.

So there's a strip club across the street from our apartment, but I can't smoke on campus and we had to produce 4 forms of ID to buy a bottle of wine last night.

In place of the apartment tour video, how about some pictures of our new home? We went on a Christmas walkabout today and managed to take some photos before the sunset. Someday we’re going to leave the house before 4:00.

I didn’t have a map of the IU campus with me, so I have no frame of reference for most of these pictures. We’re planning to get more acquainted with the campus shortly. We did drive past the School of Library Sciences, but it was too dark by then to photograph. I could see books through the windows!

We also took a few more Christmas pictures this morning. In other news, our Christmas chili is cheerfully simmering away, and we rented some movies for tonight.

Happy Holidays to all!

EDIT: Video is too long for YouTube. Will try to figure out how to fix it.