Mijn liefde

It was just after Valentine's day 3 years ago that I first had the pleasure of "chatting" (read stalking) my better half. Sarah and I both had profiles on that essential "social" website for any young lesbot - gaydargirls. If I was bored and on my computer, I'd often find myself trawling through people's profiles, just for a laugh, to see what ridiculous things they're written about themselves.

Normally I'd just look at the main cities, but this fateful evening I decided to look under the towns in the countryside. These ones normally provide even more entertainment but certainly never any potentials for dating...or so I thought.

I began to scroll down the list of profiles from the back of beyond when this very unique looking picture of someone's eyes caught my attention. Viewing the profile I saw that she lived in Belgium and not in the back of beyond in the UK. At that time I visited Belgium 3-4 times a year with my old job so in my head the location was a small detail that could be conveniently worked out.

I remember reading her profile and thinking, wow, this girl sounds AMAZING! Her personality came across in her profile and I very much liked what I read. I had to send a message to her. I did doubt if she would reply though. My first text was some incomprehensible rambling in a rather poor attempt at Dutch. It was enough to hook Sarah in just a wee bit.

The texts progressed into long chats over msn and then on skype over the following weeks. Unfortunately for Sarah, I'm very impulsive and can be a bit pushy when I set my eyes on a goal (read target). I wanted to go over to Belgium to see first hand if all of these feelings were real. And I wanted to do this asap. Sarah on the other hand was a wee bit cooler. Looking at her schedule for March 2007 she replied, "Well, I'm starting my new job in the first week so I can't have any visitors then, and my best friend is coming over in the 3rd week so I'm not free then...How does April or May sound?

GUTTED! That was not the answer I was looking for. Needless to say, I was rather persistent and Sarah was persuaded. I did visit in March, in fact I visited at the end of her first week at her new job. That was a momentous week in her life LOL and as it turned out also in mine :)

Today

Sarah and I took care of something today that I can blog more about later. We were almost very late thanks to the weather. We don't like being late, particularly not for this. The rain absolutely drenched us to the core. But that doesn't matter because we made it. We are making this, together.

Today is a day that I'll recount for the rest of my life *smile and wink*

Is the appartment still free?

Sarah helps me practise excercises for Dutch class. She puts her heart and soul into it, really. Tonight on the way home we were pretending I was looking for a place to live and Sarah was someone renting out an appartment.

Below are 2 perfect examples of the support I receive from my loving girrelfriend...

Jo: *ring, ring* *ring, ring*
Sarah: "Hello, with Sarah"
Jo: "Goodevening. I have seen your advertisment in the paper. Is your appartment still free?"
Sarah: "No, I don't rent to foreigners!" *hangs up phone*

Session 2

Jo: *ring, ring* *ring, ring*
Sarah: "Hello, with Sarah"
Jo: "Goodevening. I have seen your advertisment in the paper. Is your appartment still free?"
Sarah: "No. I've just rented it out."
Jo: *hangs up phone*

One thing at a time

My g/f can't multi task. I have to repeat myself constantly when she's on her laptop, watching tv, reading...you get the picture.

Tonight I was asking her to help me with my Flemish home work. I had to repeat every sentence that I wasn't sure on because she didn't "hear me."

Sarah's response - "Hon, you know I can't multi task! You need to draw me in visually."

I'm off to look for the flip charts and power point! *grumble*

p.s. I only got her attention because I published this blog! ;)

Schatje, if only you were here...;)

Next stop for SVS and JM, floor number 2 ;)

Desperate times call for desperate measures

You know that times are hard when your last resort for satiating the sweetie fix involves chocolate with fruit and nut. It's just not the same. Sarah did buy me emergency chocolate but I've eaten it already :(

I'm also down to my last 4 frozen meals that Sarah 'prepared earlier.' I'm wondering who I can visit to pad out the last few dinners before she arrives on Sunday.

Oh how I look forward to Sunday!

AWOL

I've just eaten a partially cooked meal. My body knows that Sarah isn't here lol.

Of course she's taken good care of me by preparing meals, recording TED seminars on cds, ordering me books, and leaving me lots of little notes scattered around the apartment.

But that doesn't take away from the fact that when Sarah's travelling, so too does our razor and my tweezers!

Sweetheart - is this what you want to come back to?

On my Tod

Sarah left for Boston on Friday. She'll be there for the next 2 weeks to study at MIT. Top blag! To help me to *cope* with her not being here for the next couple of weeks, my girrel very kindly and lovingly prepared no less than 10 home cooked meals, of which 7 are in the freezer. Included with each dish is an ingredient list and full cooking instructions lol. Unlike me, she doesn't appreciate toast as a good meal.

And, I just received 2 books from Amazon that she'd ordered so that my brain didn't dry out whilst she was away. I am vay lucky *big grin*

Talking of drying out though, the *only* thing she's asked me to do it to water the plants. I just hope they're still alive when she returns ;)

To do or not...

I have been on my own this weekend. So I had a long list of things I *wanted* to get done. I managed to get some thing scored off, but they took a lot of energy getting them finished. The main thing that I'd been delaying was house hold chores. Normally we have someone come once a week to clean and iron, unfortunately for me they didn't come last week. It was my turn to step up to the mantle.

I spent 5 hours ironing on Friday night. Not fun. I don't mind ironing, just so long as it doesn't take a large chunk of my life away. Admittedly all of the shirts were mine apart from 2 of Sarah's. The saving grace, and ironically the reason it took me so long was because I found the starch spray. I was obsessed with having clean sharp lines on my sleeves. It's very satisfying seeing them hang in my wardrobe like carboard cut outs (so long as I don't think about the time it took).

I found an unopened box of Kellogs 'Just Right' in the cupboard, so of course that delayed my trip to the supermarket. After 2 days of eating cereal and toast I managed to find the motivation to go to Delhaize. Oh how I miss Tesco's home delivery service!

Sarah will be home in 4-6 hours. I think that should be enough time to put the *finishing* (and the starting) touches on the flat. I don't mean this in a 'oh shit the folks are coming home better get the place sorted.' At the risk of sounding just a wee bit cheesey, it's more her coming home gives me the inspiration that I need to get off my arse and take action. It makes sense to do it for her.

Ok, so now I must ...I think Nike know the pains of procrastinators...that's for another blog...

Today's temperature

Sarah sent me out with a list of meds, on this list was a thermometer. Not just any thermometer, but an electronic thermometer. She's a physicist you know.

Since 2pm this anoon, I've been getting hourly readings since she got her new toy. Luckily she hasn't gone above 37 degrees yet.

She's a wee bit peely-wally

Sarah is sick. :(

It's contagious.

*meep*

Whilst I'm nursing her to the best of my capabilities. I'm really, really praying that I don't get it. I have 2 presentations to do next week in the States so I will be devastated if I catch it.

To avoid contamination, I've separated out the towels, toilet paper, poor Sarah's sleeping on the sofa - her suggestion so that I can sleep btw, and she's trying not to touch communal surfaces lol. Again, the last one was her suggestion just before she muttered something '...leper...'

I feel like I'm on the 'school run' (in a nice way ;))this weekend, taking care of Sarah and the house. It's like she's secretly preparing me for little Sarahs...Normally she does the cooking you see. She's adamant that she enjoys it and it helps her wind down. Even if I'm home first she calls me with the instructions to not even so much as look at a kitchen utensil. I'm happy with that set up because I'm not one to spend time in the kitchen unless it involves toast, chocolate, coffee or beer. So what's on the menu tonight? A taste of Scotland, packed full of iron and vitamins, and a great comfort food for this time of year - porridge.

I just googled porridge and found this excerpt - '...used traditionally in many cultures to nurse the sick back to health.' Guess what Sarah's having for the next 5 days?!

Height of ignorance

I like to think that Sarah knows me better than anyone. She can easily pick up on my moods, or thoughts that perhaps I'd rather keep to myself. She knows when I'm battling not to take that last piece of chocolate or one more slither of Speculoos from the jar. I like to think that my girrel knows me well!

Well, you'd think.

Today we had my health insurance form returned. Why I hear you ask? Because Sarah had put yours truly down with a height of 1 metre! 1 METRE!!! I'm 5 ft 2 and a 1/4 in my socks. I know she has this thing that she's taller than me -only just, by the way- but 1 metre! Really. And to think that she has a Phd that involves taking measurements ;p