We're almost home

After a hectic and stressful week (mainly for Sameer) we are ready to leave for California. Almost. Sameer is going to stay up all night again and work on his applications. He has only slept a couple nights this week. He had a huge paper due earlier this week and unfortunately there is no end in sight. On December 26th he'll get back to those applications and then get to work on a paper that is due when we get back. I'm afraid he will spend most of our time at home in the library. Poor Sameer. On a fun note, I just got to go to New York to see the Nutcracker with some friends from church. It was a very festive place to be. We did all the typical "NY at Christmas time" touristy activities - Rockefeller Center, Trump Tower, window shopping, Central Park, Little Italy (canoli is now my new favorite food...) and of course, we went to a sketchy restaurant in China Town and ordered fried frog. It wasn't bad.

Eli Whitney

New Haven is really proud of Eli Whitney. His name is everywhere. I work for Kaiser Whitney Staffing, I work on Whitney Avenue, we go to church on Whitney Avenue. There's the Yale Payne-Whitney Gymnasium, the Whitney Humanities Center, Whitney Lake, Whitney Terrace, Whitney Tower apartments, Eli's on Whitney Restaurant, Whitney Medical Library, Whitney Grove, Whitney Manor....do you get the idea? SO, it's a little embarrassing to be named Whitney in this town. There is one benefit however - for the first time in my life, I am more likely to hear a joke about the cotton gin than a poorly sung excerpt from a bad Whitney Houston song when I meet new people. I always hoped people would get sick of the Whitney Houston comments, but it took moving to a quaint New England town for that to finally happen. Everyone here knows how to spell my name too. It's great.