Home Away From Home

Blogging or not here I come you can't hide... Not really sure what this means but that was the reason that pulled me into my newest ipad app to blog so ai thought it should start like that. Blogging less again means I am working more. But this time not even for a little gesture - I am working more at work. Despite the longer hours and weekend stretches I must admit it is one of the best times since I started this role. And don't get me wrong, I am now coming from low expectations or low satisfaction. I was already pretty delighted with the work I was doing and felt I had come along way from putting my advisory skills to work for real. But now I am putting those together with a lot of excel, models, analysis and today I even took a shot at a 3 variable optimization equation which I don't think I have done in many years. It's being a lot of fun and highly challenging - the only question may be after this how do you go back to any less? But I need not worry about it right ...

I struggle I struggle and I struggle. It seems to be a never-ending story. I have been depressed for the last 2 weeks for the lack of an apartment to live in very shortly. It was as shortly as next Friday but I think we managed to extend it to the 2nd of April. It is still not that much time, but better than in 4 days time. Life has been complicated trying to juggle work and flat hunting and the NGO has been left behind. I desperately need to review 2011 accounts and status of donations for 2012 but I seem to go in circles and always get trapped on something else. And then I keep going back to flat hunting anf offers that do not get accepted or flats that get rent out to someone else. Last night, we decided to have 2 hours for ourselves and a piece of it we went to Mass. Trying to put it back on my routine, it helps making you spend an hour thinking and reflecting about life and what really matters. And it brings me and B together. As I was leaving (late of course) I got a portuguese-m...

Sometimes I just feel out of place. And it is not that people put me there - it is just me. Here I am weekend away with friends and kids everywhere. I love kids. You can't even say it is my biological clock because I always did. I changed nappies before I was old enough to do so and I was never scared by screaming or putting kids to bed. It was all very natural. So what I feel is not that it is un-natural what is around me - I just feel the un-natural one. All seem to be living their lives and I seem stopped in some different dimension. I seem to have moved away and everyone continued life as usual, seems like I missed reality train. I am typically happy in my life - challenging job, so much charity, so much happening. But in a moment like this, I can't help but wondering - why am I the odd one in the group? - Sara @ iPad Location: Algarve

There are weeks that could just be erased from the map. And it all started so well with me and nephew #3 spending hours doing leggos and him surprising us with full sentences in English (English is his third "native" language so he is not keen to speak it). And that was it, the last remaining pieces of good stuff in the week.. Back on last Sunday! They always say bad things come in sets of three but I must have lost count by now. It all goes from being delighted with the new flat we made the deposit on to the landlady deciding to go back on the agreement and taking someone else's offer. I had already done my IKEA shopping list, the new table, the new closet, new stuff for the kitchen. I am not a compulsive shopper but I do love buying things for the house, or should I say home. But we have options, so no panic, despite being upset, we have options. So I cross town in the middle of the day to go confirm option number 2 and find out the landlady does not want me to put a sh...