Here’s to the Cylinder in the Middle of the Washing Machine!!

My laundry always comes out looking like this:

There is no cylinder in the middle of our washing machine to keep ‘THE BIG TANGLE’ at bay.

This year is allowing Mark and I to renew our appreciation for many, many things that we took for granted in the US.

Here’s a few:

• Coffee shops that open earlier than 9am (they don’t do early coffee around here … we haven’t a CLUE why.)
• An enclosed shower
• A dryer
• Being able to communicate
• The GREAT NORTHWEST wine selection (no decent wine is under $30 a bottle here).  Translation: we’ve had wine once since we’ve been here
• Dark chocolate (we are in the land of milk chocolate)
• Peanut Butter & Grape Nuts (thanks Sandy and Rob for the care package!)
• Walls that you can hang something on (cement walls don’t really allow for hammers and nails)
• Netflix and Pandora
• Traffic that moves logically and crosswalks that are safe to walk across
• Hamburgers
• Hot water heaters (our hot-water-on-demand takes it’s sweet time)
• Shoes larger than size 8 ladies and size 10 mens
• Buses that come to a complete stop when you board and exit
• Blending into the general populace (As fun as it is being a super-star, sometimes you just feel like a freak)

But, at the end of the day we can always remind ourselves that we are making millions.