a paring knife in my butt pocket

I posted this, then received a Skype call from one particularly concerned reader (my mom), then took the post off, then woke before 6 a.m. to another phone call from the U.S. regarding Jubilee's impending medicinal treatment, then figured I may as well get up and make myself this over-easy egg on homemade bread, and republish this post - because after all, the one person who really should have been kept in the dark about this already knows.  I love you, Mom, and I did stop crying and fall asleep so no worries. xoxoxo

Two things inevitably happen when Mr. Rupp is not around.  1.) We all get sick.  2.)  We find ourselves in a major, MAJOR pickle.

We are over our diarrhea (hip hip hooray) so now the real fun begins.  Yesterday morning, a cop showed up at our door.  Let me remind you that we live in an Asian country where a cop showing up at your door does not bring warm fuzzies.  The cop proceeded to communicate with my house helper/beloved friend, who then relayed to me, that there was a passport issue that required our appearance at the police station immediately.  I couldn't help but notice that this cop was wearing a pair of worn blue sneakers, as opposed to the stiff black boots that his cronies usually wore.  Hmmmm...

Jump ahead a few hours and a dozen or so phone calls and you will arrive with me at this conclusion:  the police have no record of there being a problem with our passports and they did not send someone to my door yesterday morning.

So who in the WORLD was the guy with the worn blue sneakers?  What were his intentions?  To make matters worse, I heard my house helper tell the man that we would have to handle matters when my husband got back into town.

Yeah.  I know.

Needless to say, it was well past 2 a.m. before I fell asleep last night.  Every light in the house was on.  I was wielding my sharpest paring knife in my butt pocket, and I could even have been seen thrusting it forward and upward in front of the mirror to practice my form.  I am not kidding.  On top of that, I washed my face with a rag and rubbing alcohol so that I wouldn't have to turn on the faucet and potentially drown out the sound of an intruder.

Granted, I live on the 12th floor and the door is steel and double-dead-bolted, and the guy was probably just after our passports, which are worth a lot of dough on the black market, but when your husband is out of town and you are in a foreign country with your kids, you will certainly not get a good night sleep after a faux-cop knocks on your door.

And now the good news.  As the picture of my dad, husband, and brothers (below) was loading, I got an email from my treasured friend, Allison Hilliard in Van Buren, AR, and she wrote (completely unaware of the kind of day I'd had), "The Rupp family is safe in G0D’s pocket." 

Wow.

So there you have it.  We will be fine.  We are in G0D's pocket, and a very sharp knife is in mine.  

And here are the guys who would protect me if they could.  Makes me feel safe just looking at them.