Moving fast

Sometimes things just move fast.


And sometimes, like this week, there is a fast move.

We moved to a different apartment this week. At the end of this week we were notified of a possibility, which I declined because it didn't seem like it was putting us in a better situation. Then we agreed to a move the next day after being told that the place was bigger than we thought. And then we were offered a bigger place on Friday if we could move in on Monday! Since we don't have any of our furniture to move and felt we could do it, we took the offer. My wife spent Friday night and some of Saturday gathering our things and packing them in a dozen medium boxes. Some of our neighbors helped us move on Monday after work. The place was even better than we expected. We have more space and our children especially have more space and privacy and actual beds! Thanks to those who helped us! We're grateful to be able to be here even though we're sad we're not closer to friends we made at our other place. The good part about that is that we are less than two miles away from our other place, still in the same ward and the same school district, and close to some other friends of our children. Since my wife is so organized and doesn't wait to get things done, the move went very fast. Everything was unboxed and put away very soon after we moved, too. Fast.

I can't believe it's been less than a week since we moved in. The weeks just seem to fly by, but also it seems like we've been here longer. Also, we are almost exactly at the halfway point of our time here in the Washington DC area. It has moved fast but also seems like it's been a long time.

My language training is going pretty fast, too. I am close to the halfway point for that training and I have a "progress test" this Tuesday. It goes for a couple of hours and they assess my current abilities in speaking, listening and reading in Indonesian. I have a long way to go, but am amazed when I look back that I can understand things when a few months ago I couldn't understand anything. I had a 45-minute one-on-one with a new teacher that was pretty exhausting, but possible.

The winter weather, thankfully, seems to be moving on fast, too. This week has been a lot warmer than the last couple of months. It was even sunny during most of the week, even though it is rainy this weekend, but the sun and warmer weather is really encouraging.

So many things this week really do seem to have moved fast. I even had one of the supervisors at my next post ask me about my training schedule since they want me to get there as soon as possible so the person I'm replacing can move to his next post sooner. A number of people in Indonesian right now are leaving very soon or have already left. Just a reminder that it is coming up fast.

And last, but not least, happy pi day! That's a picture of the chocolate pie I made to celebrate pi day today (3.14).