Friday

I meant to mention this Tuesday: my medical assessment is finally complete. I got the official "class one" clearance in a voice mail first thing after waking. That's a relief. All shots and prodding finished for another two years. We've scheduled our official pack-out for October ninth to use the Columbus Day vacation for sorting everything three ways: an air shipment with weight restrictions, conventional freight which might arrive months after we've moved, and what we'll carry with us onto the plane. We think we'll fly Wednesday, October seventeenth, but I'll update that once we actually have tickets. Sunshine's mom left town today after two museum afternoons and three area cuisine evenings. The restaurant highlight, for me, was Zaytinya,¹ if for no other reason than the highly dramatic second floor view of a sunset-lit one-block G Street spur between the MLK Library and some industrial stone building. Other meals were rife with all sorts of emotional last-minute feelings since we're flying away so soon. Today, Sunshine and I met in Silver Spring to eat a rapid dinner before seeing American Visa (Juan Carlos Valdivia, 2005),² a movie Sunshine felt trepidation about screening when we had the opportunity while still living in México (and part of the Latin American film festival³ happening now). The first three-fourths of the movie are fantastic, with real human concern for a man trying to abuse the US legal system by immigrating on a tourist visa. He wishes to be reunited with his son by fleeing from a corrupt Bolivian society. "People just do whatever they want here," he says at one point. But the film eventually degrades into a silly crime plot before finally providing a "daring" revelation that serves to reveal it's no better than any disgruntled political cartoon. What a waste.[Cavin]