April Fool's day

It's 14C and windy today, positively muggy, have to find my spring coat.

M and I submitted our passports for renewal this morning, it only took about half an hour. We used the simplified adult forms and the regular child forms. Technically, either parent could have been the children's guarantors if the other parent were the applicant, but we asked a friend to do it anyway, just to be sure. We paid for 5 hours parking just in case (that's me), so we gave our ticket to someone else as we were leaving and he asked if it was an April Fool's joke!

L and 3 classmates went on a field trip of sorts to a women's shelter on Monday. She actually chose that shelter and made all the arrangements, and one of the parents drove them to the place for a few hours of interviews. They are submitting a report into a contest sponsored by the founder of MACs cosmetics. The winner will have $5,000 donated to their charity. From what she tells me, it seems like most of these worthy charities could use a lot more money. They told her that a lot of women show up at the temporary shelter (referred by the police stations) with broken legs and bloody-faced children in tow. They try to make the place as homey as possible, relying on food bank donations. The women get to cook their own meals and do their own laundry, to feel as 'at home' as possible. This particular shelter was named after a woman that was murdered by her husband after he tracked her down. This is a major reason why the shelters remain as anonymous as possible.

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