| Archive for langcafe2.myfreeforum.org Come in and have your daily cup of languages! |
| Joanne |
HolidazeFor the Americans, it's Memorial Day weekend, the unofficial start of summer. People will be clogging the shore, especially on this gorgeous day (84F/ 29C), and driving like Tasmanian devils on crack...I hope you enjoy your extended weekend... remember to buckle up, and drive carefully. The po-pos are out en force. Last night, two cars cut me off (@#$%ing New Yorkers passing on the right...ugh! Figures!  ), and I saw five cars get chased down and ticketed for speeding.
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| André in Zuid-Afrika |
Re: Holidaze
You have a holiday again? And I suppose the Americans on this forum will use that as an excuse not to post here again. 
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| Deborah |
Re: Holidaze
I have no special plans -- I'll be here. I'd invite you over, but... |
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| André in Zuid-Afrika |
Re: Holidaze
But....?? 
What's Memorial Day about, anyway? |
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| Deborah |
Re: Holidaze
But you have a new job, you've just moved to a new city, and I was sure you wouldn't be able to make it over here. 
It's a day when everyone works on improving their memory.
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| André in Zuid-Afrika |
Re: Holidaze
Ah OK! Yep, moving this coming week. On Monday my things will be packed (I don't have to do it myself, it's done for me, the newspaper's paying!! Whoopeee!!!!) Will drive to my new home town on Tuesday, probably(or not, I'm still fighting over the car I'm getting there, I'm not happy about it, so I won't go until they give me another car. )
 OK, that makes sense!!
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| Joanne |
Re: Holidaze
Oops.  I should have included that info in the original post:
Clicky for the history.
(I'm so behind on all the posts!  I have a lot to read...)
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| André in Zuid-Afrika |
Re: Holidaze
Yes, I'm moving to a town called Kuruman, where I'm going to open a new office for the newspaper. |
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| Uriel |
Memorial Day -- when you remember all the people who fought and died in our country's wars and raise a barbecue tong to them!
I have no plans for it, myself -- I'm even going to work. I think it was optional for me, but I figure my office will be a mess from all the pillaging if I don't, so I'm going in self-defense. |
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| Joanne |
...which is also an American holiday tradition!
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| bruce |
Memorial Day weekend is just an excuse for us Americans to host all-day barbecues and get drunk off cheap beer.
I wish more people would attend the parades and ceremonies dedicated to all the soldiers who fought/are fighting for the US. |
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| Deborah |
One Memorial Day I attended a church service (yes, I really did!) with the guy I was going out with at the time. It was at Glide Memorial Church in San Francisco, and Rev. Cecil Williams gave the sermon. In a nutshell, he said the he wished Memorial Day would not be so much about glorifying those who died in battle, as about remembering how horrible war is, and using that feeling as incentive to do everything we can to elect leaders who are committed to trying to work problems out peacefully. I heartily agree. | ||||||||
| bruce |
Not to taint the forum with a cloud of cynicism and disillusionment with human nature but...
I think that no matter how many holidays we put aside to think about how horrible war is, we can never truly attain world peace. I go to church every weekend too (Roman Catholic), and I pray whole-heartedly for an end to war, an end to starvation, an end to poverty, and all that good stuff...but who am I kidding? People who are in the position to make war will make war. And that's just sad. |
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| Elaine |
Today is Rosh Hashanah and apparently everybody here at work but me (and a few others) has suddenly turned Jewish! Everybody's gone! Well, the schools are closed today so perhaps the goyim took time off to be with their kids.
Anyway, in honor of my Jewish brothers and sisters... 
L'Shanah Tovah Tikatevu! Yom Tov! |
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| Elaine |
It's beginning to look a lot like....
...Chrismakwanzakah! Anybody got any exciting plans for the holidays? Me, I was planning on taking a road trip with my bf to Tucson to visit his parents, but my dad, who apparently still thinks he runs my life demanded that I be with la familia for the holidays. Oh, well, I guess if we were married he'd think differently. |
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| Uriel |
On Wednesday I will be braving airport security/long lines/interminable boredom/heinous layovers to visit my mother in Georgia, a la our long-standing family tradition (it's the only time I see her all year, since we live a couple thousand miles apart). I'm going for 10 days, which really, given that travel eats up an entire day, means I will be seeing her for 8. Which may indeed be as long as we can comfortably stand each other -- just kidding!
For a couple of years running, we were getting together with the grandparents and the aunts and uncles and cousins, and both my mother and I decided that that was all we could handle -- neither of us wanted to face that bedlam again! She's torn between the fact that her parents are getting very old and don't have that many years left, the fact that she doesn't have anything more than a superficial relationship with her parents and her siblings, and a real yearning for family ties -- and the fact that if these weren't her blood relatives, she wouldn't give them the time of day or even have lunch with them. And I heartily concur with that last bit, and am not wracked at all by any of the guilt she feels. I've never been close with any of my extended family in part because as an army brat, I was always moving around and living far, far away from any of them, but also because I just don't have anything in common with these people on a personal, social, or any other level. I have a couple cousins whose company and personalities I enjoy, but the rest of them might as well be strangers. And I'm okay with that, deep down. My poor mom isn't, but she acknowledges that her sadness at how unconnected she is with her parents is why she tries so hard with my half-sister and me. Personally, I would rather spend quality time with a few people I really like than face time with a bunch of people, politely smiling all the time. That said, it's odd for me to go to say, my ex's family shindigs and see the whole huge clan get together, and realize that these people have all known eachother since they were in diapers (and until they're in diapers again) -- it's not that fake smiling politeness that we have in my family reunions, where we all have to be literally introduced by name and relationship. What those big Mexican families have looks like fun -- but I'll never know what it's like, I guess.
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| greg in noord-frankrijk |
Re: Holidaze
Bien vu !
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| André in Zuid-Afrika |
My holiday is over. I was at Jeffreys Bay until today, tomorrow I have to work again...
But Jeffreys was marvellous!! 
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| Elaine |
Une question: How many of you fellow American here have the day off this coming Monday (César Chávez Day)? I guess I'm just curious how big a deal he is over in your state/region.
And on a related note, I recently saw the most puzzling and humorous thing on the news. The segment was about the St. Paddy's Day Parade in downtown Los Angeles, and most of the participants and spectators were Latino, some waving the Mexican flag. But one guy said "On Saint Patrick's Day, everyone's Irish... it gives us a good excuse to drink!" and I thought to myself, "Since when do Mexicans need an excuse to drink??" 
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| fab |
Elaine, In what does consist Cesar Chavez day? | ||||||||
| Uriel |
Apparently the rights of farm workers don't rate me a day off..... which is odd, because this is an agricultural region, with plenty of cebolleros....
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