But I don't know how to play chess!

"Ah, so you enjoy travel planning and the ultimate in time management challenges?" it seems the universe is saying.

Point of fact, I do.
I like that we've been able to grow our little business to six times it's birth weight in just over a year - all while living in the third world, managing the United States visa application process for my Iranian husband and enjoying regular holidays to exotic places.

"Ha, ha!" the universe replies, "Try this on for size..."

We've just received word that we are wanted in Ankara, Turkey on June 7 for yet another round of truth or dare with the American Consul. I'm hoping this go-round is less um, mean and more...shall we say, on the positive side of the possibilities coin. This is great news, we're excited, we're ready...but we're also leaving tomorrow for a holiday/house-hunting and fact-finding trip to Kathmandu, Nepal only to return to Bangalore on the 9th for just under two weeks of crazy office hours, managing the donation and distribution of our household goods, booking flights, posting three massive packages to the States for storage (ironically full of darling traditional Indian clothes not for ME but for our children who as yet, do not exist) closing our lease and fighting for the deposit with a landlord who leans more toward 'thief' than property owner, and securing Mooshy's required travel documents. All of this absolutely must be accomplished by the 22nd-ish when we will then leave India altogether to move into a hopefully-already-found house in one of Kathmandu's better neighborhoods. That leaves us approximately ten days to get the new house in order, find a didi (Nepali for 'maid') and a driver, find a five-star doggy hotel, set up what I'm told is fabulously reliable wi-fi, catch up on a bit of work, book our tickets to Ankara, get packed, and go.

Phew.

I do firmly believe in the notion that the universe isn't going to dish out something I just can't handle - so even the most impossible of tasks really isn't all that complicated however frantic it might make me feel. And I've been looking forward to seeing Istanbul and the island of Antalia, not to mention the fact that Turkey is at the top of the shopping destinations list for the Middle East, running a close second to Dubai.

First things first: we sojourn to Nepal for a holiday. We breathe, we rest, we toodle around, we drink the bottle of Bailey's Miss Jess has told me Pujan hid behind the hotel bar just for moi, and we find a house.
As to the rest of it, I'm thinking we'll just amp up that good old fashioned multi-tasking talent to full speed ahead and hopefully land on our feet.