Tanya Grows Up

These are a selection of pictures from Tanya's childhood to the time she first came to Canada in 2000 with the other top students from the 1999 CUBFD program.

Tanya at 1 Year.  Soooo cute!!

Tanya at 4 years, in Kindergarten which is what they call daycare/playschool.

Tanya at 11 years, 1969

Tanya at 12 years with her three room-mates and two friends.  She boarded at school from Grade four on.

Tanya at 14 (back row, left), camping in the Taiga at a hunter's cabin, summer holidays after Grade 8.

Tanya at 17 (2nd row, 4th from R), graduating from Grade 10, the end of highschool in Soviet times.

Tanya 1984 married, two children.

Tanya in Canada at a Chinese Restaurant 2000.

DYI or Home Groan Computer Skills

My computer started acting up three of four days ago.  S.L.O.W.  Scrolling is  painful to say the least as the screen ripples through one click at a time rather than a nice even movement.  Drag a dialogue box across the screen and it leaves a ghostly trail.  Of course if I had a brain I would have immediately gone to system restore and solved the problem.  Instead I tried to fix it myself over the past three days which created more problems.

Our local IT tech told Tanya that she should not be afraid of her computer, it should be afraid of her.  Mine is afraid of me...VERY afraid.

I am seeking professional help. For both of us.

Masha in the Box

Masha and Tanya came for the afternoon.  So my Tanya dug out all the Christmas stuff in preparation for decorating next week.  Masha duly admired all the decorations. She decided the storage plastic tub was a good hiding place.  So she climbed in and I put the lid on it and carried her to another room.  She would hop out, bring the tub back and we'd do it over again.  Apparently putting her out on the balcony was a no-no.

In other news, Tanya went on a cooking spree yesterday and today. Ground liver and onions meat balls (I love them, sorry), Bliny with mushrroms and onions, smothered in butter, Roast pork and Plove.  She kept calling me downstairs every couple of hours to eat something new she had cooked.  Finally I begged off and kept the Plov for supper at 6:00 instead of 3:00 pm snack.

She also made some delicious soup from the juice of a very cheap beef roast.  She is my dollar bouillon baby!

Christmas is a'comin'

Last Sunday we went to the market and bought lovely large fat goose which we will roast for our holiday feast, likely New Years. 

That is THE big festive date in Ukraine with many families.  Instead of decorating for "Christmas|", people decorate for New Years.  Father Frost and Snow Princess are the Santa equivalents, parties are held, visits made and gifts are exchanged.  Orthodox Christmas Day tends to be a solemn religious occasion.  In a way that makes some sense.

Tanya is itching to get at decorating the house.  A couple of years ago you couldn't find much for decorations and now the stores are well stocked with items.  Tanya brought home a couple of small things a few days ago.  Yesterday we were in Dnipropetrovsk in the Dafi (the Dolphin) Mall at the Big Spoon supermarket, they had two aisles filled with Christmas/New Years decorations and she bought a few more, which she set out when we got home.  Next week will be full decoration mode, I expect.

Found a few more things in the Supermarket - winter windshield washer fluid.  No more vodka and water in the washer tank.  And Teriyaki Sauce, $8 for a 250 ml bottle.  We are going to make Teriyaki chicken kebabs.  May-B made them for us when we were there so Tanya wants to try it herself.  Tabasco sauce, 350 ml bottle for about $35.  And real Heinz ketchup and salsa which I didn't price out.

We'll be back to the big city next week again and more Christmas stuff.  I love how Tanya decorates the house.

Happy Thanksgiving, America

Happy Thanksgiving to my American friends, relatives and readers.

Transmission Troubles on my Keyboard?

Bought a new wireless keyboard and mouse today for about $40.  Considering my old one cost $200 a few years ago, I like this one better. It is a full size keyboard with number pad.  The reason I bought it is that it has the Cyrillic alphabet built right into the keys. I used stick on ones on the other keyboard and the lettering wears off in no time.  Of course, like any new keyboard and mouse it will take a while to get used to it.  The left SHIFT key is half the size of one on the other keyboard so I keep getting \i or \d or whatever letter \i am  trying to capitalize.  I am having trouble shifting, so to speak.

The set up instructions came in 27 different languages.  Which tells you something about Europe.  No wonder Europeans speak 6 or 7 different languages.  Every 25 km you change countries. And languages.  Ukraine is the biggest country in Europe not counting Russia of course and it is the size of Saskatchewan.  Europeans have no concept of distance, like Russians and Canadians do.  "How far do you live from Moscow?" "Not far, only 10 hours by train".  Only a Russian could say that and only a Canadian understand it.

This one is for Demeur

This one is for Demeur who would rather be correct than right.

A man a hot air balloon realized he was lost. He lowered his altitude and spotted a woman in a boat on a lake below him.


"Excuse me, can you help me?” he shouted down to the woman. "I promised a friend I would meet her an hour ago, but I don’t know where I am.”

The woman consulted her portable GPS and replied: "You are at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100 degrees, 49.09 minutes west longitude at an elevation of 2,346 feet above sea level."

The man rolled his eyes and said, “You must be an Obama Democrat.”

"I am," the woman replied. "How did you know?"

"Well," answered the balloonist, "ask a simple question and you give me this left wing liberal gobbledy gook to show off your college education. I have no idea what to do with your information, and I'm still lost. Frankly, you've not been much help to me."

The woman smiled. "You must be a Republican," she said.

"I am," the man replied. "How did you know?"

"Well, you don't know where you are or where you are going,” the woman said. “You obviously have no qualifications for what you are doing and have risen to your current position because of a large quantity of hot air. You have made a promise you have no idea how to keep. You're in exactly the same position you were in before, but somehow it’s now my fault and you expect me to solve your problem and save your a$$.”