I arrived. The trip was long but fairly easy. I made my connection in London, but my luggage didn't--hopefully it will be on the British Airways flight this evening. Amazingly, someone spilled something with me on every leg of the trip. Water, coffee, tea, red wine, in that order.

Muscat, what I've seen of it, is spread out--it actually reminds me of southern California to a certain extent. The new housing developments are basically suburbs, a golf course is planed, etc. The coast line is lovely and goes on for miles. Starfish. Colored rocks. Boys playing soccer. It's greener than I expected--they must be doing some serious irrigation and landscaping. Dry craggy mountains just beyond the city.

The hot water heater exploded shortly before I arrived, and Mary has a concussion from slipping and falling to get away from the falling heater and the exploding, scalding hot water. I was sorry to not be able to shower, but also kind of nostalgic--I've lived in many places overseas with exploding hot water heaters, no water, or both.

I also have hives all over my face! Hives aren't unusual for me, but I haven't had them in ages, and I haven't had them on my face in ages. I met the neighbours with a layer of white anti-itch cream smeared all over my face to help prevent me from tearing off several layers of skin. It sounds even better than it feels.

There are other, more interesting things to say. But I've really only been awake for 10 hours since I arrived. Taking notes. There's a coffee shop behind the house, between the gas station and the highway. I can't really go, but I can watch the patrons sit outside from one of the windows in the house. They drink coffee and watch either soccer or bellydancing projected onto an outside wall. Tomorrow I'm headed down the coast for the day. I have not spell checked this.