It's the little things

Updates:
Vivi has learned how to take off her diaper (god help us) and open doors. This means a hightened level of security (possibly orange!) to prevent her from giving herself swirlies in the toilet or inspecting the bathroom trash.

She has decided that she needs to be held for the entire duration of all naps, and possible for all nighttime sleeping as well. I like to cuddle her, but this is where I draw the line. She is cuddled, then put in her crib, where she screams and whines (sometimes for a while) and eventually goes to sleep. If she is really tired, this is not necessary (which is why I make her do laps before bed).

I have become one of those cruel cry-it-out moms, but if she thinks I'm going to hold her all night, she's wrong. Mom needs her sleep. And I know, because I've read 18,000 books about parenting, that this is a result of separation anxiety and it will eventually pass.

Positives:
We figured out how to return recyclable bottles here. There are two different types of bottles you can buy, retornable (I swear that's Spanglish) or non-retornable. If you buy the retornable ones, you take them back to the store, stuff them in a machine, push a button, and it spits out a ticket. You take the ticket to the cashiers when you check out with all your groceries, and you pay less for the new bottles. Ideally, you buy the same number of bottles as you just turned in, but the grocery checkers here are generally assholes, so I think it may be fun to take in 4 but only buy 3 and watch their Chilean hampsters fall off the wheels. But then, it will also result in them saying "blah blah blah blah blah blah el fundo" to me. So maybe it's not worth it. (El fundo means "the end," and it is the answer EVERY SINGLE TIME you ask where something is in a store. We think people may actually be signaling that it's the end of what they're saying. Like when you say, "the end" at the end of a children's story.

Complaints:
We have to add "roast beef" to the list of foods we will have to live without for a while. So even though we can find good bread, and horseradish sauce, a roast beef sandwich is not to be had.

I am really sick of studying for my stupid driving test. There are 280 questions, many of which are just wrong: they say "mark one answer," then have all four options marked as correct, or they don't make sense: "What do you have to do when going in cars row?" or they have nothing to do with driving (for example, number 52 "Which of the following statements is true in relation to the development of a person's morality?" (I want a driver's license, not a degree in psychology!) And, if anyone in this entire country follows the guidelines of this exam, then I am qualified to be a Spanish/English interpreter for the UN.