Thursday, July 28, 2016

Shoot the Moon

I woke up a few hours early today. Hoping to pound out another section of work on my certification, I tried to slip off to the dining room in the dark. My stealth abilities need work. I only woke up two of the other three people in the house. Oops! A couple days ago, I found out that I do need to complete the TESOL certification before getting my visa. It's about teaching English as a Second Language, but I have no idea what the "O" stands for. Technically, it takes 120 hours, but of course I'm hoping to speed that along. It has eight phases. In between each phase, the assigned tutor must check the test before giving access to the next phase. So I woke up ready to work, but my tutor hasn't approved the next phase yet. This new coursework and its necessary certificate may cause me to leave to China later. Another waiting item for my visa approval is authenticating my college diploma. The USF registrar notarized that it's real last Monday. Tuesday the SD Secretary of State added her paper validating its authenticity. It's been sitting in our nation's capitol since last Thursday, waiting for their approval. Then I add some more money and mail it to a courier to the Chinese consulate. Just another odd detail that's been added. We've been doing paperwork since March, so it's not a procrastination issue. The standards change and everything feels like swimming through mud. On the upside, I finished the summer class. Organizational Behavior was my favorite so far! If you only take one class on being a better manager, this would be the one to take! Today we travel to Birmingham, AL, to catch up with some lovelies there! However, as soon as I receive an email from the TESOL tutor, I stop whatever I'm doing and study for a few more hours. WAIT! I FORGOT TO TELL YOU SOME INCREDIBLE NEWS!!! Last night when playing Rook, we were losing oh-so-very badly. Maybe the score was negative something versus their 490. The game ends at 500. So my brave partner and I called, "Shoot the moon!" blindly. Then we did it! We took every trick and every point - an automatic win for calling it ahead of time! Sweet hubby was the scorekeeper and usually writes down the bids beside the score tally. He scratched down StM and romantically pointed out that with a heart around it; it looks like S+M carved on a tree for us! AWHHH!