600 Kenyan Shillings

....which is just over $7 most of the time, will get you:

• 6 liters of milk (~1.6 gallons)
• A pound of lean ground beef
• Half a wheelbarrow full of compost manure
• 1/4 cup dried blueberries 
• Less than a pint of grocery store ice cream
• An imperfect but pretty 16-inch flower pot
• A mediocre sandwich on decent bread
• A pair of beaded flip flops
• Half, yes HALF, of a 99-cent made-in-China bouncy ball (I paid for a whole one...)
• 5 Roma tomatoes, 10 carrots, one red onion, a pound of fresh snap peas, 2 heads of garlic, a bunch of basil, 5 apples, 2 yellow bell peppers and a pineapple

Dairy

We struggle a bit with dairy products here. The quality just isn't fantastic. In most cases, it's better than nothing (in some cases, nothing is better).

But yesterday I went to the store to buy milk (which we are now recommended not to buy... another story), and not only is the sell-by date in just 3 days, but the the refrigeration in the dairy section has not been functioning for an indeterminate number of hours.

Cheers!

Footprints on the wall

What a delightfully slow Easter weekend we celebrated. The wee one was gratifyingly excited for Easter and celebrating Jesus' love for us. We died eggs (brown, though they are, we tried) and hung kindergartner-made decorations.

We also had some bug issues. A swarm of dull witted winged things seemed to have congregated on one wall in our house.

Warty, being our Easter egg tree.

It was a bit deflating to have no one to celebrate Easter with (the bugs were summarily squashed and evicted). We've been swamped with figuring out house help and vacation and me temporarily switching jobs and cast-related medical visits, we did not get around to inviting anyone, and nobody invited us. Not to be daunted, however, we had a lovely day, and celebrated the wee-one's first complete week without casts on Easter Monday with a quick safari. (Hubby wanted to get the car muddy. Check.)

When we arrived home in the afternoon, the kiddo seemed a bit warm, but she was acting fine and I didn't take her temperature (the next day was my 5th day on the new job....She'll be fine in the morning! Totally!).

Ahem. Morning temp: 102.7, with a headache.

Afternoon temp: uuuh, that can't be right...? Her temp was so high that I think my digital thermometer wasn't correctly calibrated. Off to the doc we went. Despite the embassy clinic saying it is closed, we got in. No wait!

We came home with a diagnosis of strep throat, two bottles of penicillin, one bottle of "motrin" to alternate with Tylenol and one bottle of generic Benadryl (in case she's allergic to penicillin.... you should just have it around anyway, you bad parent).

The kiddo crashed for the afternoon, and roused asking for dinner. Good sign?

An hour later, the husband was cleaning toast vomit off the kid and I was cleaning toast vomit off the chair, the carpet, the stool, the wood floor, and the bookshelf. Oh, and my jeans. As I'm walking between the vomitorium and the laundry sink for the third time, I notice the shoe print on the wall.

No bugs though. Just keep slapping them down, one at a time!

Things I don't miss

• Home Despot Depot
• Election year campaign ads
• Forecasts of "wintry mix"
• Cleaning toilets
• Hiring contractors
• Stink bugs and mosquito swarms
• DC-area customer service charm
• Utility bills
• Seeing zebras, rhinos, and giraffes at the zoo instead of in the wild

Things I miss

• Safety seals that both seal and are safe
• Shopping, pick a store (except Home Depot) 
• Actual television programming
• Snow
• Driving around without dealing with the panic first
• Pre-packaged food options (our fave salsa, canned soup)
• Trolling the garden center for annuals and herbs 
• The relative ease of seeing family