Frogs and Catapults

Since Ron had to work when Janet and I went to the museum, I thought it only right to bring him back a souvenir. We picked out a pencil sharpener. He does like to draw after all...ok, so it happens to also be a working catapult! Wee! Ron clearly appreciated his gift and set about launching all sorts of things across our tiny flat: cats (plastic), frogs (rubber) dice (ok, those would have hurt). The frog took ages to find again so that put a stop to it for now.

Speaking of frogs, did you hear they (the mysterious "they") have named this the year of the frog? Apparently some sort of fungus (I think) is killing all sorts of frogs; it goes right across the lines of different species. So they're trying to draw attention to the problem to get funding both to research a cure/fix and also to make isolated habitats for as many kinds as possible so they can be released again once it's safe. Poor frogs. We have so many species endangered due to human activity; they've got a raw deal to have yet another source of threat bearing down on them. Ron's very fond of colorful poisonous tree frogs (luckily not in the keep-as-pets sense), so hence the availability of a bright blue rubber frog to be catapult fodder.

Life plans update: I have extended my stay in the UK to 26 February. This is still a couple weeks shy of my 6 month limit, but I thought it best to have a cushion in case of emergency. My choir here is performing the day before my visa runs out, so it was very tempting to push it to the very last day, but for once prudence has won out. I'm not doing anything to endanger my ability to come and go. Hopefully by then we'll at least have heard back on a date for Ron's immigration interview. Ron says he's hoping it might happen by the end of February, but I've got my bets on a March/April date. Whenever the interview happens, it sounds like there's not more than a couple weeks between that and a visa being granted (assuming it's approved, but I don't see why they wouldn't. It's a relatively straightforward if very time consuming process. He is my husband after all).