Mom’s been visiting me. She got here on the 14th and she goes back soon.  I’m sorry about that; this visit has seemed so short.  But I’ve really enjoyed having her here.

Jeremy and I have taken her around to see various places.  We took her to see several historical sites: a couple of old, traditional Arabic houses where the rooms are built around a central courtyard and to some ruins: notably the oldest mosque in Bahrain and a 4,000 year old village, and an old fort that the Portugese built and also to the Burial Mounds, which just look like mounds of dirt but are actually graves thousands of years old.  We also took her to the zoo where I got attacked by a bird–I’ll try to post pictures later.  We took her to church and she and I also went to base to watch Jeremy play football (American football, not “real” football).  We haven’t gotten to see everything, but we’ve done a lot.  Other sailors are always telling me there’s nothing to do in Bahrain and they wouldn’t bring their families out because there’s nothing to do.  I don’t know what they call “something to do” because I find plenty to do.  We haven’t even taken Mom to see the museum or the other two forts or the Barbar Temple or the Grand Mosque or the Tree of Life yet.  So if anyone wants to come visit us, there’s plenty of stuff to see–unless you don’t like historical things–then maybe not so much.

One way Mom’s been a real blessing here is that she’s been helping me get organized.  I couldn’t get the whole week off, but they did let me work half days, so I would come home at noon and Mom and I would work around the house getting clothes organized and books shelved and boxes unpacked from our move back in the middle of August.  I bought some plastic organizer drawers at the NEX (Navy Exchange), and we used those to organize the clothes.  I have closets and some shelves but very little in the way of drawers, and things like socks go better in drawers, so putting things in the plastic drawers has helped a great deal.  My clothes storage area looks so much neater now.

So I’m glad Mom came.  For those of you in Illinois–thanks for letting her go for a couple of weeks.  I’ve heard that a couple of you (I won’t name names) think she’s been gone an awful long time, but for me it seems that she’s been here just a short time.  I wish she could be here a bit longer.  But I’m glad she could come for the time that she has.  Now if I could just get the rest of my family to come visit me….  (Jeff and Betsy, we should talk about this…)