A few short days

I had a very nice post planned with pictures of our trip to Stavropol, but Blogger is not cooperating this morning. I may not get to it again until after we return from our third trip. While the internet connection in Stavropol is fairly fast, there is some sort of proxy server they have set up in the hotel that counts your throughput, so uploading photos from Stavropol reaches our limit quickly.

We arrived home late Monday night. Kevin had an important meeting Tuesday morning at work, so we parted ways at the airport. He rode home in a fancy towncar and I drove up to his parents to rejoin the kids. We only have a few short days with C and K, and while my internal time-clock is totally tweaked right now, I am enjoying every mundane second of it.

We left Stavropol Sunday morning and arrived in Moscow around 11am. We had the whole afternoon to kick around so we checked into our hotel near the airport, had lunch, and then took their free shuttle to the Metro station with a line that headed downtown. This time we wanted to see the Armory Museum inside the Kremlin. Kevin waited in line - a miserable affair for him with crowding and line-cutting, not to mention the cramped hot quarters of the ticket office for the Kremlin. They didn't start selling tickets for the 4:30pm tour until 3:45pm, but he had to wait 20-30 minutes because they only sell a fixed number of tickets for each session (which translated to "seance" by the way. It was nothing like a seance, although I've never been to a seance... but of course now I guess I have!) While Kevin was suffering in line, and getting some brief satisfaction as he watched a young German woman chew out a Russian fellow for line-cutting (he pretended not to understand and never moved), I sauntered off in the hot sun and did some relaxing, albeit sweaty, souvenir shopping. When I returned, the ticket office was open and Kevin was next in line. He bought our tickets and after leaving the office (and nearly having a heart attack) we were off to see the Armory. If you have a hot afternoon in Moscow and have never been, I recommend it. It's fully air-conditioned. It's also full of the treasures of old Russia. Gemstones the size of which I would never have imagined, ornate crowns, carriages, thrones. After the Armory, we headed up to Tverskoy Street and had dinner at Pushkin Cafe. What a very aristocratic, fine dining experience.

Now we are home, but leaving again early Saturday morning. Kevin's parents are coming to our house to stay with the kids for the week while we are away, since they are starting school next week. It's a good thing I got the house ready before this past trip, because there's no time to do any of that now. Just errands, laundry and bills to pay. And best of all, kids to love!