The Longest Shopping Spree

This week we finally feel that we are beginning to have time to live in our new home rather than just to create it. It is good to remind ourselves that Johannes has only been here three weeks, and I only a couple weeks longer. Having arrived with just the suitcases included in the price of our airline tickets, and meeting six boxes that were shipped from Spain by FedEx, we obviously had a lot of shopping to do. Yes, I have had several boxes stored in the bedroom closet of one of my sisters (who has graciously shepherded them through two moves of her own in the past decade), and a few pieces of furniture have been on loan in her household. I thought we would only have to buy the obvious major pieces of furniture (beds, a sofa, bookcases). I was wrong.

For one thing, you need linens and pillows for the beds. Then you need lamps so you can read in bed, and some bedside tables. You also need towels and soap and soap holders and shower curtains and bathmats for the bathroom, as well as night lights and organizers, and--since who would waste valuable packing space on such things?--a whole new set of toiletries and and personal care products to replace the half-used ones you left behind.

Kitchens come furnished, but stocking the refrigerator and getting a few supplies into the pantry so that there is some choice of what to eat at the end of a long day of running around takes time and money. And then there is the interesting experience of planning a nice dinner based around a simple family favorite that you have made hundreds of times over the years, and suddenly remembering that you don't have a potato peeler to peel the carrots, or a soup ladle to dish it up with, or even an appropriate container in which to store the leftovers.

Then there are the decisions to be made and technical matters to attend to. Living in an apartment community takes much of the choice out of selecting a television and Internet provider; that's a good thing, but you still need to learn--and remember--how to access the new network and get the interfaces to work. New mobile phones were also required, and we each had home offices to set up, with computers and painting supplies, and more furniture and more lamps and more bookcases.

We made four or five--I've lost count--trips to Ikea the first ten days we were here. This week we managed to keep it to one. On the other hand, this week we have been to Verizon, Target, Staples, Sears, PetsMart, Meijer, Kroger, Goodwill, the Dollar Tree, the Apple store, and Aldi, at least, and sometimes not just once. Today, a day that we had planned to "take off" and go to an outdoor art festival in a neighboring community, we were greeted with the forecast of scattered thunderstorms, and by mid-morning, two occurrences of thunderstorms. So we decided not to risk the drive to the art show and instead did what a lot of people do on Sunday in the U.S. We went shopping. We geared up for what we keep saying is the "last big purchase." This time it was a large-screen computer monitor for me, a printer to share, and a vacuum cleaner to deal with normal cleaning and the precious cat hairs of our little Guapita. We were successful at one store--Best Buy--and managed to get all three of the purchases inside the house before the rains came again. Now, a few hours later, two of the three are fully assembled and functional.

Tomorrow afternoon we meet Two Men and a Truck at my sister's house. The two men will load the dining room furniture and an easy chair and ottoman--items that I thought we would have moved long ago--and then they'll drive the truck fifteen minutes up the street to our new home, where they will carry the furniture up three half flights of stairs and immediately take care of any reassembling that is necessary. And then we will declare the move "done." There are, of course, several smaller items we want to purchase--I'm still missing a cooking fork and a butter knife, and we want a different waste and recycling solution than we've been using on a temporary basis--but we really think the big stuff is finished. And good thing. Did I also mention that we made trips to one bank and our investment offices this week, too?

La Guapa

What more can I say? This little cutie has come to live in our new home. We have missed an additional life in the house since we lost Goldie almost a year ago. Guapa means "good-looking" in Spanish. Or "cute." She certainly is. Also energetic and mischievous. La Guapa is already spoiled, and she will keep us busy for a long time to come.

OLLI

OLLI is the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute of the University of Cincinnati, and it is just the type of learning experience that I have missed for the past decade. The "lifelong learning" aspect refers to low-cost courses for "mature learners." You have only to be 50 years or older; and a payment of just $85 per academic year quarter allows you to take as many OLLI courses as you can handle. Of course there are no tests or grades.  Two of my sisters had mentioned OLLI courses to me, and I am very glad that one morning in Spain this spring I woke up early and happened to remember to check out OLLI. I was one of the 250 people who successfully got in to the summer session--they stopped registration at that number for lack of more space.

The summer program is an even better bargain than the regular academic year program. I registered online and paid my fee--a paltry $10--which entitles me to attend any one or all of seven weekly lectures on various topics. Last Wednesday morning was a talk by a representative of the Cincinnati FBI Field Office. I learned more about the history of the FBI, founded in 1908, than I had ever thought about, and developed an appreciation of its missions and ethics.  The room was packed so tightly that they had to refuse admission to some late-comers, to comply with fire regulations.

The week before--my very first OLLI event ever--the speaker was the executive director of the incipient Museum of the Voice of America radio broadcasting service. Voice of America--not to be confused with Radio Free Europe--is an independent broadcast service founded in 1944 to provide unbiased news and entertainment programming to countries around the world. Although there were transmission sites on the east and west coasts of the U.S., the third site, northwest of Cincinnati, was felt to be the most secure during its wartime beginnings. In addition to learning something about the Voice of America, which is still broadcasting today, though not from the Cincinnati Tylersville Road site. I learned a lot about Cincinnati's illustrious broadcasting history, starting with Powel Crosley, the Crosley Broadcasting Company, and the WLW group.

This coming week I look forward to an executive producer of 20 full-length documentary videos, who will speak about his love affair with history. I suspect I will learn something about the profession of history as he has practiced it, and a great deal about the history of Cincinnati, for he has also written several books about the city. The following week features a vice president and editor of the Cincinnati Enquirer, on "Your Newspaper's Future," a topic I have followed since I first started writing about newspapers in the early 1970s.

In addition to enjoying the lectures, I have enjoyed informal face-to-face conversations with several people prior to each lecture. Everyone is very forthcoming and welcoming. One even called me last week after the session, because she hadn't seen me in the crowded room during the FBI talk. I had looked for her, too, and missed her. And remembering that some people were shut out of the room last week, I will make sure I arrive early for the session this week.

A New Chapter

This is a successor blog to Sundays in Spain, a blog I have maintained for five years and more than 300 posts, during the time that I have been living on Spain's Costa Blanca. Now I have moved my main residence back to Ohio, USA, the country and state in which I was born and grew up.  Not the city--I grew up in a small town 100 miles north of Cincinnati.  My parents moved from Sidney to Cincinnati the summer I graduated from high school, and my acquaintance with the city is limited to two summers I spent working here between college years in Boston, and visiting family, some of whom remained here and others of whom have returned, during the intervening years.  The most significant event that happened to me during the short time I was in Cincinnati was to meet my future husband; we met while I was on spring break during my sophomore year; I returned the following summer to get married; and then we both moved back to New England, where we spent most of our adult lives before "retiring" to Spain in the early years of this century.  So it is fitting now that we both return to this city, where a long-term marriage was initiated.

Except for the differences caused by its location, this blog will be much like its predecessor, Sundays in Spain.  I will generally write once a week, on Sunday or about a Sunday event.  I write for the discipline of writing, to concentrate on something positive and/or thoughtful, and to keep friends and family up to date with what is happening in my outer and inner lives.

I expect that there will be posts about an expat's relocation, notes on US cultural changes during the decade I have been living away, reports on explorations in a new city and different, but home, country, and observations and musings about the experience of growing older.

Today I can note that after two whirlwind weeks that involved four trips to Ikea (blessedly only a fifteen-minute drive from our apartment), seemingly endless trips transporting things between car and apartment (and we are only carrying the light, miscellaneous items ourselves), and lots of orders and negotiations with service providers, I woke up this morning for the first time in our new bed, fully assembled, and am posting now with our super high-speed Internet, and will soon watch one of my all-time favorite TV programs live, Sunday Morning on CBS with Charles Osgood.

Welcome to Sundays in Cincinnati!