Uzbek Campsite Reconnaissance, or My, How Close Kazakhstan Is!

Katheen's contribution:

This past Monday was Labor Day, and Mom decided to take us all into the mountains for campsite reconnaissance and a picnic. The Uzbek mountains are not as close as the Tajik ones were, so it’s a bit of a drive to go hiking. Mom had seen this nice lake (actually a reservoir), and wanted to check it out. Once we got close to the lake, we saw the dam. It was huge, and we thought we were pretty close to some awesome campsites. We found this winding road, and we went up and down, hoping to get close to the lake.            

But any side road was either part of some local’s dacha complex or led to a lakeside village. Turns out, Uzbeks are a lot like Tajiks. Wherever there’s a nice lakeside spot, there is bound to be a house. Now, we found plenty of not lakeside campsites, but Sophia had been hoping for a lakeside campsite, and apparently, Joseph agreed. When we drove out of the last village, Joseph was almost in tears. “Stupid Uzbeks!” he fumed. “We wanted to go camping!”

I was about done, but Dad wanted to go a bit farther. We drove until we got to this gated place with lots of semi-trucks. Dad got out and spoke to a guy in uniform. Turns out, it was the Kazakhstan-Uzbekistan border! None of us had our passports, so we drove back home. Now, we can say we have driven to Kazakhstan. We hope you also have an interesting Labor Day!

Operation Steal Kay Kay’s Heart

Kathleen has asked to contribute to the blog.  I warned her that she wasn't going to earn fame and glory because this blog will never go viral, but she still wanted to write for the blog.  She'll be periodically contributing, which is whenever she feels like it.  Blogging is not a required activity in our house.

Edwin is a very secretive person. He mostly keeps to himself, but has some interesting schemes. One of these is to get William into Kay Kay’s heart. To make William appear to the best advantage, Edwin dressed him in a velvet jacket with a tie and loafers. At first, the scheme didn’t appear to be making any progress. But this week, Kay Kay started to notice William.

And why did Edwin want William in Kay Kay’s heart? Edwin adores William, and likes the attention that William gets around the world. But Kay Kay seemed more interested in 4-month-old Timothy, so Edwin devised this scheme to get William in the limelight of Kay Kay’s heart. We hope your brothers’ schemes are successful.