Actually I never went away. I've just been too tired, distracted, without the time and just not in a blogging mood.

So what's been happening? (If I just said "a lot", then someone out there in Blog-reading land would probably put out a contract on me.)

So instead I'll break it up.

The Home

We've been living here for over a year. It's really nice being here, definitely larger than the apartment, but inadequate storage. I bought a shed, but it's already full.

S loves the place, she says she's never slept better.

The kitchen we finally settled on (we took a private carpenter rather than a kitchen place), has lived up to our best expectations. Not that it's perfect, but we can live with all the problems.

We left the Entertainment center at our old apartment (it was later stolen by our renters). Read "The Apartment" section below.

The television is on the sideboard, and that arrangement works fine. The display cases we had build, are nice, but don't really fulfill their expected role.

I installed shelves above the computer desk. Although the bookshelf we bought for the computer room is taller than the large one we had in the apartment, it's already full.

We got new furniture for the kids' room.

We didn't have to rewire, but the electrician "ballsed" up the job of putting in the Shabbat clocks and that was only fixed by the air-conditioner technician.

The grass is dying in the back yard, so we can't use walk there for a while, especially  we are not to let L run around in it. (See "L" the dog below.) The "birds of paradise" didn't flower this year.

"L" our dog

We went soon after Pesach 2005 to the dog shelter. We saw one month-old black puppy, who wouldn't look at us. Just keep on hiding. The books warn against taking such a dog, but who reads the books and we wanted him anyway.

Just before Shavuot, we picked him up. And he's great. The kids love him. He sleeps in a corner at night and on the front patio during the day. He loves basking in the sun.

People describe him as a big dog, but he's really only large medium.

He's only partially trained, doesn't bite, but leads with an open mouth and sharp teeth. He doesn't foul inside the house, but he does throw up every so often.

Since this year was our first Pesach with him, we had the interesting experience of having to buy Kosher-lePesach dog food.

Work

I was retrenched from my long-term employment at the end of 2004. Worked almost a year at another company in the same industry. It wasn't a good move in some ways. In 2005, I started with another company.

S started work in  kindergarten as a kindergarten teacher. Her feelings about the  place are mixed, but she enjoys the work in general.

Health

I had another bout of vertigo last year. Went for tests that told me that it's just in my ears. (That is, it wasn't worse than that.)

Family tree

My main obsession.

I have details of over a thousand people in the database. The descendent tree (showing the descendants of my earliest ancestor) is about 15 pages long.

I've found people that were just forgotten. It's really an issue of using the dead to find the living and the living to find the dead. It's sad just how many died in the Holocaust. There's enough work in it to keep me happy for years.

The Apartment

The first family we rented to, were thieves. Apart from stopping to pay us rent after a couple of months, when we finally got them out (after 6 months and going to court) they stole every piece of furniture that wasn't tied down (and some that were). Apparently they owed money "from Metulla to Eilat" and the husband of the family would rip off cars from people while pretending that he would sell it for them. Despite his long criminal history, he still hadn't served any time. A TV show that deals with people being ripped off, did a segment on him and gave us some (un)welcome publicity. According to what I've heard he's now in jail. Of course, we'll never see any of the money.

The current people are nice and honest, but apparently having their own problems with their own renters.

E's batmitzvah

This was probably the biggest event in the last 12 months. E was great. And there were no major disasters, except for the sewerage entering the house and for the presence of my in-laws.

Well the sewerage wasn't my fault, but some of the bad interaction with the in-laws was.