Today was the Virginia Primary where people vote to help determine who will represent each party in the Presidential election. I had voted two other times since I moved to Virginia on both local and federal candidates. Both times there weren’t very many people there with me. Today, I waited in line. It was great to see people actually voting. In Australia, everyone has to vote or they will be fined. In America, when 3o percent of eligible voters participate in a primary, they call it a great turnout. In Virginia, you can choose on the day whether you want to vote Democrat or Republican. There was no one standing in the Republican voting line. Everyone in line was waiting to vote in the Democratic Primary. When I moved here, I was thrilled to find out that Virginia had computerized voting with a paper ballot optional. However, I seemed to be the only one fond of pressing buttons to select a candidate. People trust computers to access their bank account and pay their taxes, but not to vote. They were all taking their paper ballots and their pencils to the voting booth. So, Dale, even though I still pay the bills by writing a check ( I gave up that whole EFTPOS thing when I left Australia, and went back to the dark ages), I did vote using a computer. One woman who was working at the polling place gave Zeke and I stickers of an American flag with the words, “I Voted” on it. I looked at it and laughed trying to think of any Aussie I knew who would wear an Aussie flag “I Voted” sticker. I, of course, wore my sticker proudly.
In celebration of Dale being halfway done with his tour in Iraq, we attended another Skate Night at the roller rink. The night ended with the song YMCA and Zeke sang it all the way home and has not stopped yet. While Josiah was skating around, I tried to get him to do the motions for YMCA but he wouldn’t. If Dale had been there, he would have performed YMCA enthusiastically to greatly embarrass his children. Only six months left until he can once again undertake his much loved role of “I’m just pickin!”
The children’s piano teacher, Mr Matthews, is a survivor of the Battle of Iwo Jima. When he was recovering on Maui after the battle, he wrote a piece of music that we heard played today. Another student of Mr Matthews played the piece, accompanied by an orchestral cd that Mr Matthews had created on the computer. The student was 15 years old. He played the entire piece which was quite complicated and lengthy from memory. The student had only practiced on a digital piano and prior to that day had never played on a grand piano. The orchestral cd started and the student began to play and the grief and sorrow and loss of war contained in that music filled that room. It was a moment that left me in awe. Music not only written with great emotion, but a musician who captured it. Both talents rare and unique, separated by generations, but working together to create something stunning.
I headed out about 0700 this morning with Mike and Glenn to visit one of our projects in the Aski Mosul region. This area is northwest of the city of Mosul, south of the reservoir formed by the Mosul Dam. The drive was uneventful, just like I prefer. After about 1.5 hours on the road (and off the road at times), our 4-vehicle convoy arrived at the Aski Mosul Drinking Water Treatment Plant (DWTP). The contractor had been awaiting the delivery of some new pumps so that he can complete this project over the next few weeks. I was pleasantly surprised to see the 4 new pumps on site with 1 of the 4 already installed. Here’s a view from the project site looking north.
There’s not much scenery in this area. Gee, from the office in Dahuk, sent me a few pictures from a recent site visit he conducted. The project site is only about 30 miles north of the Aski Mosul project, in the mountains north of Dahuk.
As a classic Far Side cartoon once said, “Same planet, different worlds”. Oh well, I don’t really like the snow anyway!
I was thinking today that I was tired of having a virtual husband. I know some wives might think that a virtual husband would be a good idea. He makes money that he can’t spend, so I get to spend all the money in the bank. He calls and talks to me twice a week. I get consistent email and occasional gifts. He operates a blog for me. This for some would be the perfect husband, because it avoids the difficult bit of actually getting along with each other in the same house. But, as I mailed his Valentine today, I thought about how nice it would be to actually hold his hand, to arrive home and find him there, to live life together not life apart. I do appreciate my virtual husband, but I’ll happily trade him in for the real one in just over 6 months. I like the real one much better.
