Last week, I went out and bought a bunch of supplies to build Rhythm a little crate, or cage if you prefer, because she’s getting big and able enough to wreak quite a bit of havoc if left to her own devices. So I bought a bunch of tools - a drill, hammer, saw, a bunch of nails, tape measure, metal caging material, screws, bolts, and all kinds of other stuff with which to build something like a dog crate. Everything except the wood for the frame - the store I went to didn’t sell wood (I’m thinking 2×2 inch dimensions), and the place that did apparently was trying to toubab me with an unusually high price. I’ll probably go this week sometime with Mustafa, the Peace Corps guy who repairs PCV houses, to see where he buys his materials.
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Dear Susan (and all the students of your eighth-grade homeroom!) -

I’m sorry it’s taken so long to write back, but things have been kind of crazy here. Lots of volunteers were recently in town over Thanksgiving, and as a result the limited computer facilities at the PC office were inundated by my upcountry counterparts who, unlike the technologically privileged few of us in Kombo, normally have no internet access.

In any case, I’m replying now, and I hope this correspondence finds you all in good health.

So, without further ado, let’s get to your questions, shall we?
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There are some things that have recently been sources of frustration in my new life out here in The Gambia. For the first few months at site, things were going well - but in retrospect, I think the causes of stress were there, but they just hadn’t built up to the point where things snapped. Well, things didn’t so much snap, but rather that things that at one point were left to simmer below the surface have now come above the surface so that I’m really very aware of the problems, and it’s driving me a little bit nuts.
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So, I went up to Janjangbureh for Thanksgiving this last week. Fun place, Janjangbureh is. Formerly named Georgetown, it sits on McCarthy Island in the middle of The Gambia River in the Central River Division of the country. Quiet streets with a funky mix of West Africa meets Colonial England. The air is fresh with an interesting smell I couldn’t place - but decidedly sweet - and there were more stars than you could ever imagine (thanks, in part, to the electricity being out on the island the whole time I was up there, removing any source of possible light pollution). Oh yeah, and I ate so much on Turkey Day that I nearly got sick.

Nearly.
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Yeah, that’s right baby! I’ve got a box at my home now. Built it from old broken computers at GTTI and convinced the administration there to let me bring it home to do work. They were thrilled with that idea, as several weeks ago I had submitted a request for a computer, which would have meant they’d have to spend money they don’t really have. This way, I’ve taken broken computers and made one working system from them that I can now use. Something from nothing - not too bad, eh?
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This goes out to any vets (in particular my PC recruiter, Carmen) who might be able to tell me what’s going on with Rhythm’s skin and fur in these pictures.
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More cute pics and vids of Rhythm. Poor girl, she’s lost a bunch of fur along the sides of her body and along her rear legs, and in back of her ears from those awful fleas. She’s got to have a pretty serious allergy to flea saliva or something… anyway, her morale is high now even if she’s not as cute to look at. Hopefully, her fur will begin to grow back soon (and hopefully she’ll stop scratching so much). On the plus side, her skin is clearing up - no more scaling, and all the little flea bites appear to be healing and (slowly) going away.
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I’ve been spending too much time focusing on plans for two years in the future. Thoughts about grad school, where I’ll live, what I’ll do, so on and so forth has pulled my attention away from where it ought to be focused. Granted, I haven’t had more than my classes at GTTI to think about work-wise, but in an interest to prepare for the eventuality of starting this Statehouse gig (which supposedly should start soon!), I started some initial design for the app, and spent some time deciding on the system’s likely technological structure.
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I got a response from the School of Business Administration at the University of Vermont yesterday, to my inquiry about my “advanced standing” in their MBA program. It turns out that what this means, is that I could skip all of the core requirements and jump straight into the advanced coursework. Here are the details.
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Yes, I’m setting myself (and you, gentle reader) to experience random posts. These posts will cover something, or nothing, or anything in between. Generally, they’ll contain blurbs of stuffs-going-on that are interesting but don’t really necessitate an entire post of their own. That said, shall we begin?
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