On Thursday, Adam and I were en route to the Algiers airport, all set to take the delightfully quick flight to Valencia to join our friends for Fallas festival, when the U.S. Embassy Algiers (aka our employer) called and said if we went to Spain – a country with a growing number of Coronavirus cases […]
First, some news: I am no longer Algiers’ foremost lady of leisure. (As much as this city lends itself to leisure, anyway). I have traded my well-worn pajama pants for pants with a zipper and a button as I have again found myself having a real pants-wearing job. This job is both a real, as […]
Adam and I recently hosted our 4th Annual Holiday Spirit Party and it was our most successful yet. It’s a holiday soiree with a cocktail making competition mixed in. We started this annual tradition back in Jerusalem after being inspired by another Foreign Service couple who have hosted a holiday dessert competition for well over […]
Have I mentioned how much I love French? I have never before had this much fun learning a language. Not in high school when I was the most consistently tardy, unmotivated, yet energetic student in Mrs. Belanger’s Spanish class; not when I did a seven-week Spanish immersion course at the Foreign Service Institute, or when […]
The three of us – Adam, our friend Sarah, and I – recently shuffled across the epic mosaic floors at the Bardo National Museum in Tunis, Tunisia and gazed at the intricate tile walls depicting ghoulish sea creatures or fertile signs of the Zodiac. “Can you imagine how long this must have taken?” Adam said, […]
My husband, inspired by Benjamin Franklin, tracks metrics about his life performance. Everyday, he records whether or not he accomplished certain goals, like drinking fewer than x number of alcoholic drinks, exercising, meditating, and much, much more. He’s been tracking all this DAILY for more than a decade. I’m much less of a tracker. Mostly […]
When we moved into our Algiers home, I did what we always do and set to rid the place of the clunky and fancy government-provided furniture. I did, however, decide to keep a wood desk that was in the house. It wasn’t bad, especially after I switched out its shiny chrome knobs for matte black […]
It’s officially the holiday season here in Algiers. Our Christmas tree is up, our house is aglow in twinkle lights, we are going to lots of parties and eating our weights in decadent foods. We are preparing to host our Fourth Annual Holiday Spirit Cocktail Contest Party in just a few short days and I’m […]
It was near the end of our time in Rabat when I decided I’d make pillows out of the cool African mud cloth I’d bought in Marrakesh. I had a new sewing machine and I had the fabric. I just needed zippers and so I went in searching in the Rabat medina, a place that […]
You might be aware of my ongoing love affair with Paris. From the first time I stared down the endlessly beautiful streets in 2015 to my right-in-this-moment Paris visit (my ninth trip here), she just never disappoints. I’m currently in Gray Paree where, for the second time in 30 days, I’m enrolled at a language […]
