Ellen In Amerika!"MY EMIGRATION TO AMERICA AND MY ADJUSTMENT TO LIFE IN CALIFORNIA SINCE SEPTEMBER 2008"

Friday and Saturday, I had to work the late shifts. It was busy, and the time passed by quickly. Saturday morning, I watched the Holland-Japan soccer game while wearing my orange shirt!

Despite what I heard from others,  I thought it was a very exciting game. At some point, it annoyed me that the Dutch players were now and then playing pretty rough.  It was more than appropriate, the Dutch team won the game. It is the first team that is sure of going to the next round. Again, I wished we were in Holland with my family.

Dan is not a real soccer fan, so I watched it alone. That has some advantage also, because I can yell and give my, so called Dutch “comment” on the game, uncensored :-) If you did not watch it, I really recommend it to you. This Thursday, Holland has to play the last round in this series against Cameroon. I do not need to work, so I will watch it for sure!

Dan and I went to Green Thumb and bought some nice plants for the planter in the frontyard and for some pots in the backyard. I still had a lot of money from my in-laws for my birthday, so finally we went for the plants. It is always difficult to pick plants you like but also plants that are okay with the Californian dry weather.We  picked out 2 big bougainvillea’s, 4 small ones, 3 Star Jasmins, a plant with blue flowers, (you see these all over Southern California), and a plant, (the big one on the left) I do not know the name of, but Dan and I loved it so much.  Monday, I will have the day off, so I will plant them. Ryan will be here too, so maybe he can give me a hand We had an early dinner and at 5.00 PM, Dan dropped me off at the hospital.

Because I had to work the whole day, we celebrated Father’s day after our all American dinner: Grilled Hamburgers, baked potatoes and Bush beans ! I like all kind of stuff on my burger bun!

My little gift was not there yet, but Ryan had done a great job, by wrapping his present in a pink bag with Father’s day on it and a girlie card. It was very funny!

The present was  a battery recharger for the Xbox controller and  a hiking backpack for around the waist, with water-bottles. Dan was very pleased with the gifts. Later, we called Dan’s dad and we had a very nice conversation with him. The phone was on speaker, so all 3 of us could talk with him.

Father’s day for me is also very emotional. The same with Mother’s Day. I like it, but they are still sad days for me. I always think of my own mom and dad, and wishing they were here. Wanting to hug them and tell them what great parents they were. I am sure they know their children think of them often.  http://www.elleninamerika.com/category/in-memory-of-my-parents/

It is late here, so this post will be a bit short, sorry. I worked hard tonight to get my recipes back, and it worked. I updated WordPress, and I got right away a message how I can move the menu items to the side bar. If you scroll down a bit, you see the recipes itemized. Also the Topic “The Netherlands”  in the top menu bar is now in the sidebar itemized.  Facts in the menubar have all the items back.  I still have to work on the pictures. Not sure how to do that.

Tonight was the big finals between LA Lakers and Celtics. Shame on us, but we did not watch it, I think LA Lakers won, because we heard tonight a lot of horns going on in the street.

I have had a wonderful day off again. Tomorrow and Saturday, I have the evening shift in our hospital here.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Truus, dear sister in law, happy birthday! I hope, you’ve had a wonderful day with Jos and the kids.

Today I decided to call my sister Lotty. Actually, it just came into my head yesterday to call her, but I was at work.  We do have contact on a regular basis through email or Instant Messages on the Internet, so I am fairly updated with her life. I still do not know why I wanted to call her, but when I did, and asked her how she is doing, she asked me why? I was a bit startled at first, but answered, just because I care and wanted to know how she is doing. The reason she asked me was that she has been thinking of calling me today and also because she fell yesterday 9 steps down the stairs. She has bruised ribs, bruises and a scraping wound on the legs, and all her muscles are aching. I felt so sorry for her. But she is a trooper, much more than I am. I hope she will heal quickly. It must have been some kind of telepathy that I felt I had to call her…….strange…..

After I talked with her, I spoke with my good friend Sonja through Skype for more than an hour. It was wonderful to see her again. Her kids and husband came into view of the camera, that was really nice. I heard from her that the streets in the Holland are all orange now because of the Soccer World games. I asked her about her brother, if he was in South Africa, but he wans’t. So it wasn’t him that I saw the other day on the TV

Today I cleaned the downstairs area and washed a big pile of laundry. Because of the nice warm weather, I had my lunch outside while reading my book. It almost felt like a vacation Around 3.00 PM Annet came by, we had a nice talk while drinking a cup of tea with a cookie (how more Dutch can we behave, lol)

For dinner, I made a huge pan with macaroni! I made so much that I have enough for 2 days.

Oh, yesterday at work went very well. I am getting more and more familiar with the other hospital and the people that work there. In my breaks, I sit in the Healing garden of the hospital. It is such a calm and serene place.  I was extremely tired after dinner last night, but we went to the gym anyway, and that was actually very nice. It was pretty funny though, I watched the soccer game Brazil against South Korea on the little TV screen on my crosstrainer, and all other members watched the Lakers-Celtic game! So many soccer fans here in California

At home, we watched a new series, Unknown People. Not sure I really like it, but it has some suspense in it. Tonight I saw a bit of America’s Got Talent. The performer I saw is a mother of the actress who played Precious, and she wanted to become a professional singer. I first thought, this is kind of embarrasing, but then, she started to sing. An utterly beautiful voice. Despite her, to my opinion, poor choice of clothes, she walked and behaved so ladylike, it was a joy to watch her. She had 3 yes’s, so is is through the first round.

Tomorrow will be a day off again. I really enjoyed today’s day off. The school district did call me  twice today. There must be a lot of sick instructional assistants.

I hope you all have a nice day!

Sorry for the title of this post, but I just watched the game between Holland and Denmark, and I really enjoyed it! 2-0 for the Dutchmen!! The sound of the supporters, the very nice reporters of ESPN, the soccer players who did a great job and the big surprise that Ruud Gullit, one of Dutch best soccer player ever,  is contracted by ESPN to do the talk over before and after the game. It was fun to hear his so strong Dutch/Amsterdam accent The goal that Denmark made for us, was in a way pretty funny. The Danish player later corrected this mistake by  kicking the ball backwards out of the goal area. That was an amazing maneuver. Before the game started, they interviewed some Dutch Fans who had dressed and painted themselves in orange. I could swear that one of the men was my Dutch friend Sonja’s brother. I have to verify this with her The stadium was packed with so many Dutch fans. It was again all orange everywhere. I am surprised that so many Dutch people were able to travel to South Africa.

Today was a another working day. It went very well at our sister hospital, and it was pretty busy, which I liked a lot. At one point, a lady called and she wanted me to page a doctor for her. I told her that that wasn’t hospital policy. She became very upset, and I explained to her that I can page a doctor only in an emergency. She was very stubborn, but I told her again, only when it is an emergency. She hung up, but less than a minute later she called again, and said she had an emergency and wanted me to page that doctor. I explained again the rules of the hospital and gave her the doctor’s office phone number, and that she could leave her phone number at his answering machine.. Finally she gave up. Further things went okay and at 3.30 PM I could go home and watch my soccer game! I really would have loved to be in Holland now, with my family and friends to watch this game. That must have been a blast! Although….I remember about 36 years ago, Holland had to play the finals of the World Championship Soccer. (The 1974 FIFA World Cup Soccer, the tenth staging of the World Cup, was held in West-Germany from 13 June to 7 July.The host nation won the title beating the Netherlands in the final, 2–1).  It was so exciting and my whole family (9 persons), was gathered around the TV, the young kids on the floor. Among them was me. The sound of the TV was not loud enough, so someone asked to turn the volume up a bit. Instead of doing that, by accident, I turned the TV off! The whole family was yelling at me, and I only wanted to shrink down and crawl away. We had to wait a minute after turning on the TV again, because those old TVs took forever to warm up, so we missed the start. That was not the best game I watched! We did loose the finals that year Wikipedia has a great page about the history of the Dutch Soccer team. Here is the link to that page.

Now it is almost 9.00 PM. One more day to go, and then I am off for 2 days. 8 days working in a row is absolutely doable, but it is not preferable.