It's been so long since I've blogged. You can't even imagine how much time it takes to take care of someone else's dog (she has to be walked 3-4 times a day, plus she wants you to take the time to actually play with her). Our dog, of course, is a cutie and very lovable and pettable and zooms around the apartment so much we don't need to walk her much. But she sure holds her own with Coco! They will both be very sad tomorrow afternoon when Coco goes home. And we will both be very sad tomorrow morning when we have to leave for ulpan a full half hour early because we'll be walking again.

Oh, great. For the first time in over 2 weeks we just heard a huge clap of thunder, and now Coco is going absolutely nuts. Our last night is going to be so much fun...

Last week, actually for about a full week, I was having horrible headaches and backaches. I have no idea what caused them, but I was using lots of drugs, went to the doctor who was nice but didn't tell me anything I didn't already know, had a GREAT massage, and started physical therapy. I think it was the physical therapy that did the trick finally. We went this afternoon for my second session, and the therapist could already see a big difference. I have to do all these lower stomach muscle exercises. The therapist thinks that my surgery last year and my enlarged liver are contributing to the problem. Now that we'll be walking again, maybe I'll start toning up a little. Of course, now that I have to get to PT every other day, and we have to get to Talpiot on Wednesday to do the next step in getting our Israeli drivers' licenses, it will be waiting and riding buses again. Everything will take that much longer to get accomplished.

There's a great shiur tonight with both Rebbetzin Tziporah Heller and Rebbetzin Tehila Jaeger at one of the larger shuls. I just wish it wasn't raining, and that I didn't have so much homework.

Ulpan is starting to be more than challenging; it's downright frustrating. The only good thing is that I know everyone else is in the same boat. For a long time we were concentrating on present tense verbs and infinitives. Now she's throwing past tense (male, female, them, her, his, he, she, yada yada yada) as well as future tense (so far just male and first person) at us. Sarah (our morah) spends the first half of class reviewing and throwing out questions that we have to answer, or answers we have to come up with questions for, or giving us a word that we have to conjugate or give the plural of, and then asking us to repeat what someone else answered, i.e., "Vickie omerit s'he..." After the hefseka (break) she's been giving us about 30 questions. We have to first translate them into English (or Dutch or Spanish or French, whatever works for us), and then without looking at the Hebrew, we have to re-write it from our translations for homework. I have to look up so many words! But, Baruch Hashem, my husband had enough navua (prophecy/forethought) to buy about 7 or 8 different Hebrew/English dictionaries (that I know of - who knows how many more are lurking about...).

So we're well-equipped for learnng Hebrew; the only thing we're short on is time. Hopefully when Coco goes home (she is now drooling all over me and the floor and trying to jump up in my lap even though I closed all the doors and windows and turned music on in all the rooms so she can't hear the thunder {even though there was actually only one clap of thunder about 45 minutes ago}), we'll buckle down more than we have. By the time we get home from ulpan at 1 or 1:15 PM and have lunch and check our email (and one of us does the laundry or dishes or cleaning), it's already dark and time just slips away... Now that I read that over, it sure sounds like a lot of excuses, doesn't it? I guess if you read between the lines, you can tell the real culprit is the computers. They are evil, evil things that eat up precious time that could be better spent on more important things - like learning Ivrit or Torah. Notice how I've passed the blame onto the computers and away from our own addictions to them. We're not actually on them ALL the time, just way too much time.

Right now I have to read my portion of Tehillim I say in the merit of Tehilla and Rafael Dovid Grunberger. It's been 4 1/2 weeks since the accident. They're still in the hospital. I haven't heard any updates in a few days, but I know they have a long way to go. I pray Elazar and Brocha are holding up, and that Hashem gives them strength to deal with all their childrens' needs as well as their own.

40 minutes until the shiur. What shall I do?