*You thought I was only part-time? Me too, but we were critically understaffed for my entire ER career and worked things like 96 hours in a pay period for a number of months.

Now my professional life is a buffet of mental health services, constructed at the whim of a kid. Imagine one of those magicians who whips up a giant castle out of cards in 3 seconds flat, then stands aside and flashes a smile. Pling! (that was the sparkle in the smile).  That’s me. With mental health cards. Most afternoons.

Indiana (and 10 other states) have this strange little grant designed to keep kids out of psych facilities. The grant allows a team of providers to be selected at random from a pick-list, and then interviewed by the family and chosen based on professional qualifications like “Is she younger than 30?” or “Does she like Selena Gomez?” or “How many pets does she have?”.  The real confusing part cherry on top is, the kid who’s picking you is, like, bipolar. So it sort of depends on how everyone is feeling that day.

On some of these teams, I’m interviewing to provide Emotional Habilitation, like coping skills, or Rec Therapy. On other teams I’m interviewing to provide Clinical Consultative therapy to the family and team members, like behavior plans. I look good on paper for the adults, and I wear glitter nail polish for the kids. That’s my strategy.

My first interview last April was in the bag. I put on my sparkly-est silver nail polish and graphic T, and knocked on the door with a smile. 15-year-olds generally love me. Interviews are sometimes a formality anyway- many times a family will pick only you off the list, interview you, and then select you. Other times, they interview multiple providers, and the case manager calls you later with the yay or nay. I knew I was interviewing against 2 other providers for the Hab role, I just didn’t know I’d be interviewing with them at the same time. A panel interview scripted and moderated by a 15 year old:

Kid: What kinds of things do you like to do?

Me: Eat candy and ice cream. Buy gifts for kids.  Have pizza parties. Just kidding. Take walks, be outside, photography, play basketball…

Client: you play basketball?

Me: Yes! Do you like basketball? I can teach you to play.  I also like to swim… (score!)

Client: Swimming?! I love swimming! Do you go to that one park?

Me: Yes, I love going to that one park. (score!)

Client, to second panelist: do you play sports?

Second panelist drops her head: No, I mean, not officially. I was kind of one of those people who played, like every sport, but wasn’t good at one specific sport (defeated!)

Client, to second panelist: do you have any pets? I love animals. I want to be a vet.

Second panelist: Yes! I love animals too! I have a service learning and therapy dog. You could go with us to volunteer at different places.

Pause.

Client turns to me: Do you have a therapy dog?

Me: stupid. stupid. stupid. Why didn’t why buy a dog? Should I say we have one? We almost have a Yorkie. Is that the same as actually having one?  “No, we really want to buy a little Yorkie. But I just love therapy dogs.”

Client, to second panelist (as they walk off in the sunset holding hands): So what all can we do with your service learning dog?

Like I can compete with a service learning dog?!

Lucky for me, Radio Disney is pre-set in my car and saved me during the next interview, in which I was asked to perform Selena Gomez “Who says?” on command. It happens that I know the words. She gave her mom the thumbs up, interview over. I’m in.

But that’s just the preliminary process, because unlike sales, once a client selects me as a provider (or, for DCS contracts and outpatient clients, once they’re assigned to me: cold calls)- they have to actually spend time with me. Learning mental health skills. Like, for 1-2 hours at a time, multiple times per week. This means every week, I have to re-pitch the idea that mental health is important, that positive coping and anger management, or appropriate parenting and healthy relationships, or completion of ADLs and positive self-talk, or not biting your autistic sister, or becoming sober, are all worthwhile things to invest time in. And I have to make it fun! Here comes the tap dancing, because if they don’t meet with me, I don’t get paid.

So, you might see me traipsing around town with a gallon bag of 85 mini play-dos. I may have pixie sticks hanging out of my pocket. Essentially, I’ll be traveling across several counties, knocking on people’s doors saying: You need this. And in my brief case (messenger bag) will be emotions identification and social coping activities between harmless coloring pages and little packets of goldfish grahms. I’ll sit down and spend a good chunk of the hour building a relationship. And then I’ll move in for the ask: So, it seems like you could sort of feel your anger signs coming yesterday. Should we write them down, so you know what your triggers are for next time? Yeah! Let’s write them down. With markers. And stickers. Score.

Or, for my adult clients: So, it seems like a budget would be helpful.  Do you want to complete a budget? And they look at me like, yeah! Yeah, let’s do a budget. And I’m like, Oh look, I just happen to have one right here in my folder. Score.

The real hard ones go like this: I know you’re going to hate this, but you signed this goal sheet that says we’ll talk about such-and-such trauma. They (the state) will not let you out of your contract (give you back your kids) until we somehow work through this…

Or: I know this is the worst, but remember when you signed that sheet of paper saying you understood the limits of confidentiality, and how one of the exceptions to confidentiality is if you told me someone was hurting you, or that you felt like hurting yourself? (Each, weekly occurrences). I have to tell someone. But you can sit right here next to me while I do it, and you can hear everything I disclose to: (CPS) (The Stress Center) (Custodial Parent)…

There are moments and entire days when I feel like an asshole- not like that one time I played hangman with a suicidal 7th grader on the first day of my internship in NOLA. No, not like that. But close.

My saving grace: there hasn’t been one person- not even the chick who was terminated for discontinued use of heroin, or the chick whose kid was removed because her partner fractured the kid’s skull, or the kid who got checked into the stress center against her will, or the dad who got arrested due to neglect of the kid who got checked into the stress center- every single person contacted me later: “You were the only one who treated me like a real person, Brooke. I mean, I know I got problems, but you were always cool. Thanks.”  You can’t fake caring about a person. You either care, or you don’t. Rule 1 in helping profession grad school.

So, I might pull out of the driveway in the morning and yell to Jeff- I have a big account to nail today! (Translation- I’m interviewing with a client who has 18 hours per month! or I’m seeing this chick who no-showed me twice last week!) And when I get home, I sit in the car and evaluate my day like: well, I closed that one. That one needs a follow-up. Or usually: What’s my competition here? After-school activities? Heroin. Daggers.

But in the end, it matters, I think. And I’m selling a valuable commodity, mental health.

Dear B,

You have to stop with the sugar. Berry Flavored Mike n Ike’s from “Jeff’s” snack jar does not provide the right kind of fuel. Also, lemon-lime is not an actual fruit. Incorporate an actual fruit and a vegetable into every meal. Stop eating when you’re full. You are not entitled to a dessert after every meal. Your thighs are tired of this dialogue: excuse me, pardon me, excuse me, pardon me… you could be in control if you really wanted to.

Along those lines, when your body figures out how to adequately fuel itself, exercise more than once per month. Walk daily, at least. Participate in a cardio activity and lift 3 times per week. Your heart rate monitor and pandora station are depressed and lonely. You’re  in the season of life when people glance at your midsection and say, sooooooo? You’re running out of jokes for that one. You like exercise. You have a good bike. Running makes you proud. None of your clothes fit. Get to steppin.

Per the first two, speak kindly to yourself. J is always telling you this, especially when you flip out after running into someone you once knew and feel inferior to. To quote your own self circa 2009: Be yourself and trust that who you are is good enough, cool enough, nice enough, honest enough, funny enough, pretty enough, smart enough and competent enough.

Maintain a schedule. Wake up and carry out your appointments and/or write your reports no matter who is on Ellen. It does not help when the end of the month rolls around and you’ve only seen so-and-so twice instead of 6 times because their time slot is at 2. Same as Ellen. Ellen does not pay your bills. Progress notes pay your bills.

Along those lines, do not wait until the very. last. minute. to finish your paperwork, which, by the way, is not life or death. I think you gave yourself mono and shingles over July’s monthly reports. Practice the calming and stress-reduction skills you teach others and manage your time responsibly!

Stretch daily. You’ll feel better overall. End of story.

Clean your blasted car, girlfran.  It is your office space, and no one likes goldfish crumbs or frosty drops all over their desk. Although, if you follow #1, you shouldn’t have a problem with the frosty drips anymore. It’s annoying for all of us when you have to spend 10 minutes collecting then thousand games and art supplies off the backseat and into the trunk before anyone can sit down. Don’t even get me started on the melted crayons. Respect your space.  Once a week, clean it.

Water the plants! You are inattentive, and they will die. Do it. Every Sunday or something. Don’t even think about a dog or kids until you can manage this.

Develop a plan and do something with the front flower bed. Rip out that one last shrub, and create something spectacular there!

Become organized. Label your files. File your receipts. Archive old files. Maintain the system. It will facilitate the stress-reduction goal mentioned above. Oh, and maintain a home office. The ottoman doesn’t count.

Get more than 6 hours of sleep per night. At one time this meant limiting midnight back-to-back episodes of Chelsea Lately and Sex and the City. Now it means putting your kindle down and stepping away from books like The Hunger Games. What is WRONG with you? Sleep is better!

Stop buying Kindle books willy-nilly. You cannot be trusted to a) buy in moderation b) stop reading before 3am.

Make some friends. Yikes. Don’t know how to help you with this one. Two words: act normal.

Pass your LCSW exam in April. (That means start studying for this, like, yesterday)

Become certified in CISM and follow-up with the opportunities and resources that have been offered to you. It will open doors.

Go to France. Jeff needs to meet Mr. Gay, and Mr. Gay needs a hug, presumably. You need to hear these things again at least once in your life: Bwooookie? Happy. Bwookie resemble Karen. Thank you, Bwookie. Happy. Happy. Happy.

Stick to the budget. No exceptions.

Write daily. No matter what, about anything. Okay, maybe daily isn’t realistic. 5 times per week? Three? Done. Three times per week, you will write.

That said, it’s been two years since I did a year in review, two years since I wrote some resolutions, and consequently, two years since I resolved some resolutions. In the two year gap, I got engaged, got married, moved to a new city, bought a house, started 3 new jobs, graduated, became licensed, acquired a couple more nieces- you know: Almost all of the most important things that can happen to a person besides being born. Now that I sit down to review last year, it seems like nothing happened.  But alas. It did.

January  Co-piloted a tiny plane from Belize City to PG. Swam in a blue creek. Climbed into a cave. Met some fun UWisc Physical Therapy peeps. Watched the Rose Bowl on a rigged up TV, under a thatch roof outside, sitting on benches removed from a mini-van. Spent nights in tiny cabins above water. Ate seafood caught on a kayak with a spear. Took a 6 hour bus to Cayo. Shed tears over this discussion with my former supervisor: “Your work is being used here, Brooke. Every day.” Discovered God doesn’t need a person to use a person. Understood that sometimes we don’t even know we’ve been used. Said goodbye to the BZ. Again.

         More pics: here

February  Worked a 16-hour shift during Snowpocolypse 2011 and felt like a Lamb in a Bow Tie. Discovered, via Jeff, that cross-country skiing on the Monon during an ice storm is possible, and acceptable. Went to New Orleans and spent time with my good ole friends and co-workers. Got my Haydels King Cake. Got my Abita. Got my Steins, my Surreys, my house party with a nice brownie spread, my 2 days of 65/sunny, got my washboard band, got my Kim, got my Mandy. Could not have been happier until Tator Tachos appeared. Realized (besides the availability of junk food & supportive social worker friends) why the NOLA feels like home: it’s where I fell in love! J and my’s entire do-I-like-you-do-I-love-you-I-totally-love-you-let’s-get-a-daiquiri-let’s-get-married happened here. Sigh

March Went to Cuba Belize Mexico Belize Cuba Belize. Cuba with some good friends. (If you’re an immigration officer, I would like to state for the record I oppose the embargo.)  Had many rooftop mojitos. I neither confirm nor deny the Cuban cigar or the night dancing in Old Havana. Listened to old men argue about baseball in the center of the park. Watched a Cuban baseball game. Became entranced by and forever drawn to Cuba and its music. Thanks friends!

         More pics: here

April  Unveiled Brooke 3.0 to the public. Not so bad, 30. Received breakfast in bed from a dude I thank God for by the minute, and a tent. Promptly camped in the backyard. Celebrated Lil’s 3rd birthday (where does time go?) Took down the Christmas tree… and put it in the Monon. Can you find it? Spent Easter with the Hartmans in WI, and got the Easter flu, which everyone mistook for morning sickness. If that had been the case, I’d be 9 months pregnant today. Told you guys.

May Started a new job! Waved goodbye to the hospital (although I still pick up ER shifts here and there when they need help) and joined a private practice in Carmel. Before you call me a yuppie, I still do home visits and school visits and drive 8-year-olds to the park to work on anger management and/or 14-year-olds to Steak n Shake to work on coping skills via therapeutic games & rec therapy. We call this Consultative Clinical Therapy through a grant being piloted in 11 states, provides state-wide mental health services for emotionally impaired kids. When I’m not hanging with kids modeling appropriate skills, I’m consulting with the team and writing behavior plans from home. Not a bad change from the 3-11 shift in the ER!  Hosted the Kaminski Fam for Memorial Day and ran around Lucas Oil. Celebrated J’s birthday. He continues to be in his 30s. That’s all he would want you to know, I think.

June Celebrated our first anniversary with a romantic evening alone the Hartmans, Kaminiskis, Sellers, Sharon, Pat and 2500 others for the 18th annual Indy Nite Ride. Jeff and I enjoyed a burger at Bub’s after everyone left. The event has facilitated use of the following statement all year to justify anything we’ve wanted ever since: Well, this can be our anniversary meal/gift/trip since we didn’t really have one? Celebrated Maycie’s 2nd Birthday. Love her.

July Breckenridge! This was our anniversary trip, since we didn’t really have one. Also, it was truly the anniversary and location of our honeymoon! Hiked some hikes. Snapped some pics. Ate some good food. Drank with friends. Hot-tubbed with family. Surfed on snowfields. Biked down Vail pass. Garden of the Gods. Pike’s Peak. Celebrated a Hartman (the original Hartman- well, not the original original, but the Ron & Kathy Hartman ) Anniversary. This one gets 2 rows of pics, because I’m the boss of this space, and it’s what I want to do.

  More pics: here

August Hosted the Sellers/Wilsons for Labor Day. Shucked some corn. Grilled some food. Played with some noopy nieces. Dad’s family reunion in Brown County. Spent some time in Nashville and a good night at a Brewery. Hosted Elaine & Doug, also Sprinky. Cut into a sex cake. Found out E&D are having a boy! Can’t wait to meet brand new Baby Luke.

    More pics: here

September visited some good (fun!) friends in NYC. This was our anniversary trip, since we didn’t really have one. These friends appreciate my knowledge of pop culture, which is sometimes a foreign language to J (although he is the one who first informed me of the Kim/Chris split and insisted I see Bridesmaids. He heard both on sports radio). Observed 9/11. Held the Statue of Liberty in our palms. Went to the Catskills. Ate some good food. Played with an adorable baby. Participated in the first bonfire of Fall. Played in a kickball tournament, concussed myself on the pavement. Celebrated Callie’s first birthday. Love her. Joined a small group at church. Made some friends. (Right guys? riiiiiiiiiiight?)

   More pics: here

October Destin! I know I’ve said this before, but this was our anniversary trip, since we didn’t really have one. Plus it was the location of our other honeymoon, between the ceremony and actual honeymoon in Breck. Spent some time with the Grampies. Spent some time at the Blossfolly (ceremony beachouse) beach, for nostalgia’s sake. Ate dinner at Henderson Park Inn, where God gave us the most amazing anniversary sunset ever imagined.

More pics: here and here

November Hosted the fam(s) for Thanksgiving: Hartmans, Sellers, the Grampies, Wilsons, Kaminskis, Sharon, & Grams. Got rear ended. Saw THREE rainbows in one day. Spent a noopy weekend with Callie.

December Watched the Badgers win the Big Ten Championships. For reasons unexplained, my nieces started calling me Uncle Brooklyn. Dressed up in snowflake placemats & battery operated lights for a party. Celebrated our engageaversary in Chicago on the 96th floor. Celebrated Christmas in Iowa, Wisconsin, Indy, and Sprinky (not a place, but a BFF). Celebrated the last moments of 2011 with good old friends and good new friends.

          More pics: here

The End! Cheers to all for such a great year, and thanks for the friends who hosted us.

Some things end, but then other things begin. My little NOLA church wrote this a couple years ago, and it stuck with me: We will remember the storm (or the aunt, or the friend, or the city, or the experience) and give sacred honor, but in worship we inherit all things anew for this day.

So thankful for all new and beautiful things inherited today.

Tonight I logged on to see which health issues I might be inadvertently talking people through this year. Parasites? MRSA? It turns out, I have become quite influential in the field of… raccoons. Over 200 searches with 3-5 hits each, on the following (actual) searched topics:

Sleepy raccoon
Happy Thanksgiving raccoon
Raccoon driving a car
Smiling raccoon photos
Grilled raccoon
Raccoon climbing wall
Raccoon in red truck
A raccoon having sex
Raccoon crap
Raccoon homes
Raccoon wine
Raccoon fighting
Raccoon diet
Funny raccoon
Broke raccoon
Raccoon dancing
Mean raccoon pictures
Raccoon phone
World record raccoon
Raccoon ninja
Raccoon stare
Raccoon in school
Violent raccoon
Hilarious raccoon
Running raccoon
Raccoon thief
Caribbean raccoon
Funny raccoons driving
Birthday raccoon
Strange raccoon behavior
Raccoon house
Cute outfits for raccoon
Raccoon man
Raccoon jokes
Raccoon street in Belize City
Raccoon at bus stop
Raccoon in car
Wet raccoon
Raccoon toast

What?! I would deny any association to this crazy raccoon business, except for that one time when I actually did post a picture of a raccoon chained up in the back of a truck in Belize linked with the following sentence: The minute I caught that first campfire and coconut smell and saw my first raccoon on a chain in the back of a truck, I knew I was home in BZ.

Just like that, my blog-fluence was hijacked by this asshole raccoon (although, honestly, he’s kind of sad looking, and totally limited in mobility. Maybe it’s not his fault? Just his other dancing, mean, sleepy, smiling, grilled, funny, broke, fighting, world record breaking ninja ones in school, and driving cars, and on the phone in cute outfits, or else the wet and thieving ones in the Caribbean. It was probably those guys.)

Raccoon searchers, I wish you the best. Thanks for keeping this space active.

Honorable Mention Searches

lipglosses that are exotic colors
(Guilty as charged)

denise sex fort wayne video
What kind of space do you think this is? And Denise who?

ninja shoes
Of course

“peed her pants”  
Yep. Google knows me.

hallmark card “thinks I’m funny” 
Punchline: they didn’t

sweatpants bulge?
(Seriously, Google? I’m working on it)

friends are just parasites
Aren’t they?

sprinky lobster
I’m sorry. Did you say Sprinky Lobster?

kickball angry pirates
Yeah I got all those things

Mr. Gay wrote this on a little piece of paper at her funeral: Bonne nuit joli petit oiseau – Goodnight pretty little bird.

We’ll see you on the other side.

Want to go to the lake?
But we don’t have a boat.
Oh.

We could call our friends- maybe they have a boat?
But we don’t have any friends.
Yeah we do. We have those one friends.
They’re in Ohio.
Oh.

Let’s go to Taste of Madison!
We don’t live in Wisconsin.
Daggers.

How about a hike.
Where? It’s 96 degrees.
Ugh.

Let’s take the kids to the pool.
We don’t have any kids.
Crap.

We could ride our bikes to B. Ripp for lunch and–?
Nope.
Fine.

Having already covered this in other cities, I immediately knew what we had to do:

Get iced coffees and sneak into the Sheraton Rooftop Pool downtown, duh.

In which we pretend to be staying here: Are you going back to the room, babe?

2. Sometimes you can learn adaptive habits from each other, like making the bed every day. There! Now, doesn’t your day feel more organized? Yes!

3. Per the prior, the last one out of bed makes it. Except for today.

4. Sometimes you need to go to the bathroom for 45 minutes. What you do in there (examine your pores, pluck your eyebrows, steam clean your face over the sink on one leg with John Legend on your ipod- whatever) is your own business. It used to be your SSB: Secret Single Behavior. Now it’s your Secret Married Behavior. It’s okay to keep it secret.

5. Separate bathrooms are icing on the cake.

6. Engage in hobbies together. People might laugh when you turn your living room into photo studio, but it’s y’alls own thing.

7. A programmable thermostat can help facilitate this discussion: The heat was on all day?

8. One of you may be the type to save the good champagne and Swiss fondue for a special occasion; the other may want to pop the cork at 8pm on a Tuesday. Find a way to make 8pm on Tuesday a special occasion. S’mores fondue night by the river? Yesssss.

9. Re-evaluate goals when things like thousand-dollar car repairs come up. You’re probably working toward something. Continuously reset the course together.

10. Keep a bottle of Fat Bastard in the house to uncork after your first fight. The presence of the wine itself may keep you from having a worst-ever first fight.  For all who wondered, we have not yet opened the Fat Bastard…

11. You might accidentally buy a house. When you do, agree in advance how many towel bars and curtain rods you will ask him to help hang. There is a threshold.

12. Per the prior, don’t flood the house.

13. Per the prior, know where the water shut-off is if you begin to flood the house.

14. Per the prior, when your spouse floods the house, take the opposite temperament, call the insurance company, set up a fan, and get away for the weekend. It will fix everything.

15. Discretionary spending accounts: one of you may be at a constant balance of $5 as you happily line up shoes and play with new hair accessories (Jeff?); The other could fly to Hawaii with his. Mutual goals achieved otherwise.

16. The Ron Hartman rule: don’t take the last slice of pizza.

17. Post-it notes, breakfast in bed, and knee squeezes- excellent forms of nonverbal communication.

18. If you can make each other laugh, you’re already through it.

Any tips for year two?

Turns out, nobody cares. They flipped through our passport and stamped without incident. On the other side of customs, J was wired and elated. All I could think about was how much Cuban Rum we could have brought back. And to think we were worried about the rolled up stuffed-in-a-corner purple “Industriales” t-shirt we bought from some guy’s plastic bag at the 1pm baseball game. It’s Havana’s team, and current champs- equivalent to the NY Yankees, says J. He knows these things.

But what a rich country! Well, not literally rich. But socially. Sort of. And healthy! Infant mortality is lower than US, and HIV rate is less than .1%.  Architecturally rich. Beautiful. Colorful. Friendly. Inviting. Warm. Historically rich and totally preserved. Also pork-fat rich, which resulted in a day by the pool (read: bathrooms), and special “injections” by some lady named Julia. I think Jeff and Ricardo pretended to be sick the next day just to get a special injection from this Julia. No matter. Rachel and I made several trips to the crepe line, as the crepe maker was, how you say, crepetastic!

Catching a taxi feels like you’re at an antique car auction. Night club dancing with the locals feels like you’re in a black-lit, salsa-and-marengue-with-the-stars episode, where you can make up your own version as long as it involves some hips and twirls and drama. That experience was a fave.

And the mojitos. Don’t even get me started.

There is also a group of men in the square who sit and stand all day and argue about baseball. J heard about this group, and loving baseball and old Cuban men, went to find it. It exists! He listened, talked to a couple people and stood-bye as we witnessed a few near-fights. While we were there, we made a friend who explained that 2 or 3 years ago, nobody could talk to tourists. Now they are able to apply for a private license to be an unofficial tour guide in exchange for, like, a mojito. However, there is an officer every 10 feet, and if you say no, and the friend follows you, the officer blows his whistle and shakes his finger. Then the friend has to walk away. Poor friend. Our friend told us how to get out of the city and to the baseball game. He also offered us his aunt’s house for dinner.

The hotel we stayed at was a National Monument, with bullet holes in the front from mob shootouts, and our room faced the Hotel Libre, where Fidel ruled the country from the top floor during such-and-such time frame. Now it’s a disco.

Architecture is a colorful and stoic mix of Eastern Europe, the Caribbean and Latin America. The culture is the same. I kept saying as we walked around Habana Viejo: this looks like the French Quarter! And Prague! And as we walked around Habana Central, with colorful laundry hanging and bright vibrant paint: now this is the Caribbean. And then with the all Spanish and dancing, Latin America. We visited Cuban China-town, took the cigar tour (I neither confirm nor deny that we purchased or smoked a Cuban cigar), went to a Cuban baseball game, ate lunch and dinners on several rooftop bars and in Cuban homes. We discovered this interesting new allowance the government is giving to individuals who apply for private licenses. People who apply can gut the inside of their home, fix it up, and serve meals- but limited to 6 or 12 people only.  Here is a lunch place we stumbled on, plus the house on either side showing the disparity in opportunity:

Within a week of being home, we had purchased and watched Motorcycle Diaries, both Che documentaries, and a 3 hour music documentary on the creation of the Buena Vista Social Club. Also, we also almost got bitch-slapped by my grandma who assumed our enthusiasm toward Cuba (and our realization that many revolutionaries were idealists gone bad, that any government in its ideal state has strengths, and that the homeless dude living under I-10 might be okay with a socialist arrangement) was a plug for communism (what?). How she tied Obama into the conversation, I’m not really sure…

We are not socialists. But the trip was fascinating, and we are already planning a return- thanks to good friends who coordinated and visa’d us to be there, and who also had birthdays to celebrate!  (No thanks to Julia for the injections.)

My pics are here.  Jeff’s pics are here.  Here are a couple of tider-overs: