i washed all of the floors today, and that's a lot when there isn't any carpeting and you do it on hands and knees without a mop.

Long post title, but besides cooking up a storm for dinner, that's all that I got done today.

So I haven't blogged much. Here's what's been going on...

Once upon a time there was a little girl from the hood who got eaten by a wolf, married a woodcutter and had a dwarf, who rescued a girl from a witch who married a prince and had a son who was cursed by the same wish into becoming a frog, who was friends with a talking fish, who was caught by a fishergirl who became a different witch who got killed trying to eat two little children, one of whom grew up to marry a prince, who had a daughter who made a series of unfortunate deals with a trio of supernatural beings who had another daughter Rapunzel, who was taken by an enchantress and locked in a tower until she was rescued by another prince. And there were no crab people.

Yah, so we saw "The Brothers Grimm Spectaculathon" this weekend that the high school put on. It was great. The kids did a great job! (By the way, above is the story in a nutshell.)

Kevin was somehow elected to be the one to pick up all of the desserts for the play. (It was a dessert theater, so hence why there were desserts.) So we ventured out in our borrowed car to Érd to buy them. Why the people who have lived here the shortest and who obviously know the least Hungarian were chosen, we'll never know. Somehow when you tell someone that you don't speak their language, they think that repeating things and saying them louder will make it so much better. Newsflash...IT DOESN'T! Although I didn't hear "amerikai" in any sentence, I'm sure they were saying something along the lines of "stupid Americans." After waiting almost 40 minutes, we finally left with a couple hundred wrapped desserts.

And along the lines of not speaking much Hungarian, one of the neighbors has come to our house several times to talk to us. We have lived here since August, and since August, the gate that leads to the little driveway behind both our building and the next one has been open. Suddenly last week they have decided that it must be closed. Let me tell you what a pain this is. And pointless. It doesn't lock, so it isn't keeping anyone out. I have no idea why they decided to suddenly start closing this big dumb lockless gate. Anyway, the neighbor came over and said to me, "Gate (pointing towards the gate)... close (making a closing motion)." I said, "Igen," and then he patted me on the arm. We have been closing the gate. Don't know why he came to tell me that.

We went out for a super late dinner Saturday night to Campona with the Jackson kids and Whittington. Nothing like a "csirke gyros pitaban" late at night. (I can't remember which markings go on which letter...UGH!)

Yesterday the neighbor man is back and does the same thing but this time doesn't stay to say anything but walks over to show that he is closing it. We get it. Close the gate. I wish I could have told him that we have been and that it's not us leaving it open. I just don't get it.

Zsolt and Gabi came over for dinner tonight. We had a nice time. We got to know them better, and we had a nice conversation. They brought their magyar/angol dictionary, and we looked up words here and there when things weren't translating. I wish I had one of those. It was awesome. But all in all, we didn't have much difficulty talking. They invited us out for ice cream Friday night. Looking forward to hanging out with them again!

And, today, I saw the neighbor man who was concerned about us closing the gate leave without closing it himself. HA! I checked just a bit ago, and it's still open. Maybe he realized it was pointless. Maybe that little gate closing trend of the week has passed. I can only hope.