Come on Baby

We are still (not so patiently) waiting for the baby to come.  Our stubborn son is currently 8 days late and making no signs of his arrival.  I'm in my last week of FSI, in a pretty cool class on Islam.  While the class is interesting, I'm ready to meet my son.

misidentified

I've spent the past three weeks at FSI and have regularly run into old colleagues, friends, and A-100 classmates who I haven't seen in 2-5 years.  It's the Foreign Service rite of passage - catching up with old colleagues who you haven't seen.

What's been interesting about this latest go around of catching up is how many people simply don't recognize me.  I know I've lost a ton of weight and added a beard, but it's been a gradual(ish) change over the past three years, so I forget how dramatic the change is for people who haven't seen me since I left Belize.  I was in a class two weeks ago with my boss of two years.  She knew from the class roster that I was in the class, but until I spoke and introduced myself to the class, she didn't recognize me.  Several other colleagues required me to say, "It's Al Caniglia - from Belize" before they made the connection.

#nobabyyet