Twisted sister

April 7,2010

I received a call from my sister, who lives in Atlanta, on Easter.  It is a shame that she had to call me as I am the one with one child who is 13, while she has 3 children under the age of 7.  In addition, she has a military husband who was deployed on March 27 to Qatar.  Therefore, she was alone at home with 3 young children who had been hopped up on chocolate bunnies most of the day. 

I assume Qatar to be a rather rebellious country as they have already decided to spell their name without the "u".  I mean, how many words are there with a "q", but no "u", like 8?  Okay, I just googled it and there are more like 50, but who knew?  Still, that is a rather small percentage.  It also explains why I am not good at Scrabble.

So CJ's Uncle Edward is over there in rebellios Qatar for 6 months.  When you deploy for 6 months, you get no leave, so my sister is on her own until September.  She already complains about not having time to read my blog, so I guess now she thinks she has a better excuse.  I would think my blog would rank ahead of laundry and feeding the kids, but we all have differing priorities.

So Qatar.  Don't you love how when you google one of these countries, they pop up with ads for hotels and such?  Are there a lot of people traveling to Qatar for leisure these days?  Maybe there are, again, I only thought there were 8 q no u words, so there could be lots of folks flying Qantas airlines to Qatar.  (Don't try that, I think Qantas flies to Australia).  Anyway, Qatar is in the Persian Gulf attached to Saudia Arabia and across the gulf from Iran and Iraq.  (So Iraq has no "u" either, maybe they can't afford it.)  When you look on a map, it makes it look like Edward and his unit will be huddled very close together in this tiny country as it is dwarfed by the surrounding countries.  Perhaps that is why the "u" is missing, there wasn't enough room.

Okay, enough about Qatar.  Our prayers go out to Edward to return home safely and for him to find his family safe and sound when he returns.  Beth and I have decided to travel to Atlanta for vacation this year to help check up on the sanity of my sister.  We are telling my sister that, but really we are coming to see our nieces and nephew.  I don't know how they managed it, but Ed and my sister spawned some really cute kids.

I know, that sounded rude, but someone actually said that to Beth and myself when we had CJ.  We tried not to be offended, because, we are pretty cute, right?  DNA is rather random I guess.

So we are the godparents to the youngest child, and she seemes to like Beth a whole bunch.  My nephew still likes the Cars movie, and the oldest niece is a movie star in the making, so it is best to visit them before they grow out of being cute and catch on that I am the weird uncle.  Every family has one, and I think I would qualify in mine.

So sister, if you are reading this before we travel there, most likely in June, there are some things we need you to prepare.  No, don't worry about cleaning, we aren't that picky.  It is more about the menu.  As Beth and I took a walk last evening, we discussed how Edward gushes about your cooking.  I remember you making a couple creamy cherry jelloish type dishes when we were younger for the holidays, but other than that I don't remember a lot of cooking.  You were always more partial to going out to eat and ordering prime rib.  We had hoped you would hook up with a husband who could afford to take you out for prime rib.  I think I also joked about him being blind, but that is what older brothers do, keep the younger sister down.  However, I guess you married for love, 'cause now you are cooking.  Therefore, Beth and I will do the shopping, but you need to do the cooking.  I know you planed on pulling out the family photos to show us when we arrive, but this will need to happen after the breakfast casserole thing has been consumed.  I can't remember what all specialties Edward has mentioned, so just dazzle us.  Perhaps you could email the link to this blog to Edward, and he could help us out.  Just a thought.  Do they have room for computers in Qatar?  I guess if they can fit a landing strip there, perhaps there is a least one computer and the whole unit can get involved in this blog.  Guest posts and all about being a perfect dad.  Then their families could link up here for info...

I was getting very excited about this, then I remembered my limited computer skills.  Still, stranger things have happened.  I have a kid with good looks and musical talent.  Perhaps God works in strange enough ways that He could help me with this blog thing.  Hmmm.

So we will chat later, and plan this trip.  We will plan the trip, you plan the menu, just don't forget to add the extra chuckle.  Chuckle???  See my blog from October, 2009.