The good and the bad

Let's start with the good, shall we? After all, it is over the hump day which means there's only 2 more days of this looonnnggg week left!

A big THANKS to those of you that ordered a magazine from Alex. He has met his goal, thanks to all of you!

Congrats to Laura and Andres! They received their referral from Colombia this week.

Congrats to Brandy and Cody! The also received their referral and their travel dates for their first trip to Kemerovo.

Good luck and safe travels to Carey and Norman who are on their way to Vladivostok to meet their little girl!

And a special "thanks" (insert sarcasm here) to President Putin for dissolving the Russian government. Ohhh... wait. That's not part of the good. Enter the bad.

Virginia tells it best on her blog, but the jist of it is this. (Disclaimer: This is summarized in "Becky-speak". If you're not familiar with "Becky-speak" it's a bunch of jumble with lots of opinion thrown in) The entire Russian government resigned. Everyone apparently woke up on the wrong side of the bed and said "ya know what?!? I've had it with this place. I'm gonna quit and talk everyone into quitting with me." Yeah, right. The prime minister stepped down as did the minister of education. Stepped down with a little bit of nudging, I'm sure. For those of you not married to the Russian adoption process, the Ministry of Education (MOE) is key. They are the governing body that has the ability to grant accreditation to the remaining agencies. They issue referrals, process our paperwork, etc...

Putin has announced his new choice for prime minister, Viktor Zubkov, and he'll most likely be Putin's successor in the 2008 Presidential elections. Keith told me that this same thing happened back when Boris Yeltsin was on his way out of office. Who did he choose as the new prime minister? Why, Putin of course! The real important question is who will head up the MOE and what will that person do going forward.

I'm really getting a crash course in geography, history and politics with this adoption. Those that know me, know how much I hated those subjects in high school. As I'm getting older, I find I like to learn these things. Don't ever tell my high school history teacher if you run into him. I can't ruin my image.

On Friday night, Keith and I are taking a little road trip to the great state of Alabama! We have our International Adoption Clinic on Saturday from 9 - 3. I'm very excited about it. Knowing what I know now about wait times for referrals I kind of wish we were going later in the year, but the good thing is that we can go back again for a refresher. We're going to spend the night in Birmingham on Friday and we're playing Saturday night by ear. Part of me wants to spend another night just so we can go to sleep at 7pm without dogs or having to nag a teenager to write his language arts paper and oh yeah - QUIT TEXT MESSAGING! :-) And to spend a weekend with my husband, of course. :-)

Say a prayer, wish on a star, hop up and down on one foot - we need this situation in Russia to work itself out for the best. Good luck to everyone waiting for referrals, court dates and the like! I know there's definitely been a pick-up in activity lately which is a GOOD thing!

I'll be back Sunday to post about my IAD appt. I'll take copious notes and be sure to entertain you with everything I've learned about assessing a referral. I know you can't wait!!

Hugs!
Becky