December showed up anyway

Not a whole lot to report on. I've been here over 6 weeks now-- isn't that crazy? Things are starting to become routine, but unfortunately I haven't been able to do a lot of sightseeing yet. I imagine I will do more of that once Ian comes to visit (in only 2 weeks, hurrah!).

Last weekend was kind of crazy. I spent a lot of time with my friends, including all Friday night when we were dancing at a club until the metro opened again in the morning (it's closed from 1am to 6 am)!! I figure if I'm not doing the tourist thing, at least I am getting the authentic Moscow experience. The club we usually go to has decent music (mostly British post-punk and pop from the last couple decades, but there is some variety, and there's usually a couple hours where the music's live) and has a large amount of expats there. We almost always run into other teachers that we know that we didn't show up with!

This weekend I'm looking forward to having things be much more low-key. Saturday we're having our late Thanksgiving here. I am really excited to be able to show everyone a real American Thanksgiving. We're going to have quite a mix: three Americans, two Brits, a South African, a Russian, and we're seeing about a partridge in a pear tree. I hope there are not any huge culinary disasters. We are rather limited on cooking utensils and pans, and there is no thermometer on our gas stove. We're doing a shopping run to the big grocery store (Ashan) for some last minute ingredients, as well as to IKEA for meat thermometers, pie plates, etc.

The weather here is not that cold, but it's pretty miserable. The sun is setting at 4 about now. But that isn't even the main thing-- the most depressing thing is that even when it's light out, you don't see the sun. The sky is just white. No blue, no discernible clouds, just white. One of my students said that living in Moscow is like living in a glass of milk, and I am inclined to agree. I'm hoping to maybe get a plant light while I'm at IKEA, because my cilantro plant is not doing so well, and it could perhaps double as a happy-people-light.

Tomorrow is my formal observation for my adult class-- wish me luck!!