International Shop Til Ya Drop

Elizabeth and I were excited to do something today that we used to love to do every Sunday when we lived in the northeast before...go shopping at the asian grocery store and go dollar store shopping. So today we decided we would locate where to go to start this time honored Sunday tradition.  This was also our first trip into Hartford (the big city! giggle) for shopping. So here we go..... (click on pictures to enlarge them fullscreen)

A Dong Market!!!  This is the area's largest asian grocery store.  If you have never been to an asian grocery store it is an adventure in all the senses....the sights, sounds, smells and tastes are all thrilling (except near the fish dept - ewww).  They have everything from home interiors to food to stuff you have no idea what it is. This store is located in West Hartford in a shopping center that is all asian shops.  When we pulled up I knew it was the spot because there was not a western face to be seen.  As we walked into the grocery store all eyes were on us.  It is not impolite to stare in eastern culture, so as we walked up and down the aisles people stopped and just stared at us.  Children smiled and followed us about.  We had so much fun looking at all the interesting gifts and kitchen supply items and of course the food. We were on a mission for vegetable dumplings and asian candy (which is the best!!!). Of course there were also rows and rows of HELLO KITTY stuff! I was in heaven.  We also got a little propaganda with our shopping as we heard the Chinese National Anthem played over the intercom (which oddly sounds like Auld Lang Syne!).  Here are some of the items we purchased.
Kristi holding two of her favorite snack foods....strawberry soda which comes in a glass bottle which has a glass marble in the lid.  You use a tool provided with the soda to dislodge the glass marble  into the neck of the glass bottle....this is thought to help keep the soda's fizz from escaping...I don't know if that works but it's cool! and my favorite....EVERY BURGER!!
Here is the outside of the box. Yum Yum trust me they are to die for!!!
Here is what the actual cookie looks like....they are little cookies that have milk chocolate (the burger) and white chocolate (the cheese) in the middle and they look like little burgers. I mean come on how cute is that.  
And we scored the vegetable dumplings!!!  I'll be making those for dinner  : )
Then it was off to the dollar store....I know that isn't international but Elizabeth says "well everything in here is made in China!" giggle
Then on to the Jamaican Bakery for some patties and cocoa bread and Kool Kat soda!
No international shopping trip is complete until you finish off the day with sushi.  Here we are at Oyama Sushi restaurant in our little town of Enfield.
And let me just tell you... sushi with FRIED SWEET POTATO in the middle is REALLY YUMMY!!! or as they say in Japan.... Oishi des!! (delicious).  Well that was our international shopping spree. Hope you enjoyed seeing how we will be spending our sundays.

We made it!!

I can't believe it but we did it!!!! with four animals and a car loaded down with supplies.  It was not without it's challenges though....like forgetting Elizabeth's crucial work clothes for the first week of her new job and having to turn around and get them adding about an hour and 45 minutes to the opening of our drive. Oh well! We were just ahead of all the bad weather. We were glad to hear from the real estate company in Omaha that things are doing okay at the property there, just some yard waste needed removing and the driveway had to be trenched for water drainage due to all the rapid amounts of rain. 

On to some of the highlights of the move process....the movers broke PLENTY of our stuff!  Oh lawd! These were by far the least professional movers we have ever had. It's a luck of the draw with these things but from inappropriate actions by the driver like...screaming on the phone in an argument with the management handling the union packer workers to wanting to sleep in his semi ideling outside our quite residential home in Omaha...lawd the list just goes on and on.  But the important thing is we did get our stuff...even if some of it was broken or had water damage????


Elizabeth and Mokie just before we loaded the truck in Omaha.
When we got to the new house we realized there were no window treatments...You know how violated you feel when the whole world can look into your house....so that had to be the first thing to go up.  This is a job for Elizabeth.  This is where she shows she really is a Heelan.  She has good measuring and engineering skills.  
Here is E brushing here teeth and getting ready to head off for her first day of work at the new job.  E is REALLY loving her new job!!  The people are really nice and she has a s-w-e-e-t office with a terrace!
Okay, I thought I would do a little intro to our awesome new town. We both love it sooooooo much. It has so much charm.  The picture above is of the town hall. On the green here they hold craft shows and things in the summer.

The picture directly below is a very typical looking residential street scene in my town. The pictures following that are of shade tobacco. We live in what is called the Tobacco Valley and this VERY expensive form of tobacco called Shade Tobacco is grown in the region...as you drive you see fields like the pictures below hanging with this gauzy cloth blowing in the wind...very neat.  The tobacco can not take heat or wind so the shadey gauze is moved around by workers as needed to protect it...all that babying makes for a sweet cigar we hear.

Our town has a very old world feel with places like Russo's Italian Pastry Shop where John the owner wouldn't let me take my cannoli's I had purchased with me into the record 100 degree heat we had the other day because I had another errand to run and was not going straight home and he did not want them to melt....so I had to run my other errand and come back by to pick up the cannolis!  To a younger more vibrant feel of young working class people with busy lives (and lots of kids) who take advantage of the great starter homes in the community and close proximity to all greater New England has to offer. We have heard the town is basically made up of these two types of people: the young people and the older people who originally built these 1950's gems. (You know I am partial to the great and long forgotten craftsmanship of the 1950's house!) with a few professionals enjoying the convenience of it all thrown in for good measure. All I know is we love it!!! I love the new house, it's got a fierce cottage vibe going on. I will post more pictures of the house on the next blog entry.  I should have things out of boxes by then....maybe.

I need some Advil now

Well....no move is complete without some drama.  We had issues with our pack and load day...the packer guys (who get paid by the driver) were not happy that they did not receive double time pay for their work on sunday and did not show up on Monday to load the truck.  Well they were loosers because we had planned to tip them both $50 dollars when they returned on load day. The driver started loading the truck himself and then after some unprofessional yelling on the phone on the part of the driver the dispatch service sent over another guy and the truck got loaded.  What should have been done in 4 hours took 9 hours!  This put us behind for everything else so we are this morning at the last minute finishing up the cleaning.  I so just want to get the hell out of this house now.  Both Elizabeth and I have worked to total physical failure of our bodies.  To say the least we are both on a 4 hour schedule for the Advil.  So this is it people...after I hit send on this blog we are packing up the car with all our stuff and animals and gettin' out of here.  So the next entry will be from the other side.  Wish us luck in our journey and we will talk soon.  : )

P.S. - A lovely parting gift from the house...one of the large pines off our drive way died. (yea the one we planted St. Joe under - not sure what that means!!!!) and we had to spend 1,000 bucks to have it removed.  Nice! 

P.S.S. - Please forgive any grammar and spelling mistakes...at this point it's scrambled eggs for brains.