Well, we've started the process, which I'm told starts with a petition to apply for a visa and then the visa comes later. So we've started the petition! Yay! Or rather, my husband has. Mostly I've just brought him tea and handed over documents for him to scan but it's a start! There's really not going to be anything else to add until this bit is decided one way or the other which is likely to be months away. I'm still excited though, it's a big step towards our goal of moving in together in the 'States. Right now, the OH is here with me in good ole Yorkshire, UK and will be until his visa runs out (we're doing everything properly, the last thing we want is to peeve the people at immigration) then he's going back, hopefully with me and mini-me tagging along! If not, well, we'll probably still go for a visit then have to come back here somehow. Probably best not to think about that or I'll panic myself again.

After all the stress and paperwork, all it took to get Obsidian into the country was a rabies shot. Unfortunately, Snowflake "Ozzy" Obsidian is no longer with us. She had a liver condition which came on suddenly and was incurable. My husband rushed her to the vets and held her and stroked her as she was put to sleep, purring loudly in his arms. She was only 4.

It appears that, in order for me and my husband to live together, we must first invent the universe. The long term plan is for myself, the cat and the munchkin to end up in New England, where my husband lives. The shorter term plan is that he is coming to the UK for a year first to study. In order for us to live together HERE, I needed to re-house my cat as she isn't permitted in rented places so the cat has been hurriedly crammed onto mine and munchkin's flight when we visit hubby in June/July so that the mother-in-law can take are of her for the year and a bit til we arrive. Unfortunately, one of the airlines we are using decided to be extremely unhelpful, the other were an absolute delight. After 4 phone calls to one and no less than 30 emails and 4 complaints to the other, the former are perfectly happy to accept the situation and the latter are lucky I was in a good mood last time we spoke or I'd have reduced the "customer care" agent to tears where he stood after the drama that they have caused. I do not have the strength to relay the entire situation bit basically, we played he said, she said and myself and the other airline were right while the argumentative airline were wrong. So the cat is now sorted. On to the housing related issues then... It's a long and complicated one. Basically, if I had decided to not bother with legal issues or regulations from the OH's university housing, we'd be fine. As it happens, I'm not a fan or prison or getting him thrown out of his housing but doing what we like and ignoring the rules would be far, far easier than trying to work around all the various rules we have to abide by to be able to live together and work. It's not even simple, who can work where and when whilst the other is working there and then is just baffling and that's before we even look into the tax credits that would be paying for part of the childcare. If the universe could see fit to just let me win the lottery, we'd have far less trouble. I'll update IF and when I can figure out what exactly it is that we're supposed to be doing or not doing.

How wonderful it is to live in these modern times of unusual families! As you all know from the past few posts, I'm married, have a daughter and a cat and the plan is to get us all from the UK to the US with minimal chance of a nervous breakdown. As it happens, my daughter's birth-father is making our lives difficult. I'm not allowed to go into detail as it's ongoing but basically, he wants sole custody (because he's mad, I think) which he isn't going to get because I'm in a stable home and not an unfit mother and he's...pretty much the opposite of me. *sigh* all hell broke loose because I married my lovely American and changed mine and the little monster's names so that we're now Mr P, Mrs P and Miss P (Fuzzy still has my maiden name on her vet records but when I remember to change it, she'll be Moggy P) and despite Miss P never having her birth father's surname or having his name on her birth certificate, he's throwing a tantrum and trying to stop us going abroad. The judge, thankfully, seems to agree with the rest of the sane world in saying that it's better for Miss P to stay with us but that moving will complicate it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not denying him access, I'm just denying him the possibility to dictate what I do with my life, which he seems to think he has the right to do. If you ask Miss P, she'll say she wants to move to be with Daddy, Grandma and Grandpa and all her aunts, uncles and cousins in America, so it's not like she's against the idea either. We'll know more about what's happening there in a few months time but until then, because of the confidentiality surrounding detail, I'm confined to talking to the cat about it. Like a crazy person.

Yesterday marked one month of being Mrs P. I'm pleased to say we've hardly argued but spending 13 days of that on separate continents may have helped somewhat... We're really starting to get into everything we need to do now and it is COMPLICATED with a capital...well, all of it. So the things we've investigated this time are: getting me a bank account over in the US, getting myself and my daughter to the US, getting our cat to the US. We're going to talk to someone at the bank sometime this week, the same day I get a phone to use over there (well, here since I'm visiting the US right now - this could get confuzzling!) so we can find out IF I can have a bank account (pretty sure I can) and HOW to get one (still drawing a blank on this one). As for getting the moggy over here...as soon as I think I've figured out how to do it, I read something that contradicts everything I'd figured out. Right now, a CAT-apult and a parachute seems to be the easiest, cheapest, least hassle way to do it but we'll see how that turns out later. On the surface, I've planned the act of physically moving myself, my daughter and our relevant belongings over here so that's done. We just need the bit of paper that says we're allowed to move more permanently. I say more permanently because I'm pretty sure we need some more bits of paper once we're in the country but my husband has been dealing with it so I really have no idea other than what he's told me and what I can make of the gibberish...er, I mean government websites. With that, it's lunchtime. Toodle-pip!

Yesterday (Thursday) marks one full week as Mrs P. We're already doing better than most celebrities! Sadly, that means that this morning, I had to tearfully say goodbye to Mr P as his time in the UK was up and he had to head back (sad face) and yes, I cried like a little girl in the airport. Again. Even though I'll be flying out there in 10 sleeps time, it still bothers me to be apart from him. So much so that I've spent most of the afternoon (got home about 2/3ish) tidying up or, more realistically, packing and pretending to tidy whilst drinking tea and looking sad. I've calmed down now so tried again to get my head around US bank accounts - no progress. I think the best thing to do is to let my husband sort it out and just give him any documents he needs. I've been trying to puzzle out how best to move too, even though it won't be happening for quite a while. All the furniture can stay here and be sold off, clothes will go with us at the time apart from what we already have over there from our visits, toiletries and the like, I'll just run down to nothing nearer the time and leave anything that's left for my sister. Small stuff like books and photo frames can go over a few at a time each visit we do since I have storage over there. DVDs I'm probably going to get again over there and just sell all my copies here since there's a difference of regions and Mr P has a lot of the same DVDs anyway. All of this planning is just to distract me from being sad about being apart from Mr P. It isn't really helping though since it's a vague and ambiguous plan and I still miss Mr P. All the tidying did was make more space that he isn't in and turn up some of his stuff in my washing basket. *sigh* I knew I wouldn't cope well with this. My one consolation about long distance relationships is that anything difficult is worth doing. We won't get to say goodnight tonight since his flight gets in so late and we have a huge time difference so I'll probably just go eat a whole tub of icecream and watch awful tell until I fall asleep. Tomorrow should be better since I have all day to tidy up like an obsessive crazy person and hopefully have a morning email from him saying he got home safely. *thinks* ...writing a blog in a lot like talking to yourself. Except strangers know what you're saying and can comment on it. I feel even crazier now.