Joe Shlabotnik Is My Hero
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Below are the 50 most recent journal entries recorded in the "Peter, Not Joe" journal:[<< Previous 50 entries]
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06:25 pm
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St. Gertrude
There is no patron saint to call upon to help you avoid traffic jams.
There are many patron saints of travellers, but somehow I doubt that they would be too sympathetic to my heartfelt pleas that I make it through the Lincoln Tunnel in less than half an hour. When the old saints had to go to State College, Pennsylvania, they had to walk. Still, before I left, I sent out a Facebook shout-out to St. Gertrude of Nivelles to do what she could.
I had plenty of time to wonder if I had made the right choice as I was crawling through the random streets of Hoboken and Weehauken after it turned out that the expressway leading out of the tunnel was mysteriously closed. Traffic didn't ease up much through New Jersey, but we did eventually make it to State College that evening (directions: drive to the middle of nowhere and hang a left), only to find that our room at the Ramada lacked the crib that we had been assured they had for us when I called eight hours earlier.
Fortunately, we had a AAA guide and a laptop, and soon we were calling every other hotel in town, all of which were at least $50 a night more expensive than our room. $100 is more than one wants to spend to make an angry point. But then the last hotel we called (and the last we were going to call) was Penn Stater, run by the Penn State School of Hospitality Management. They had a room - and a crib - for the same price! Sold. It turned out that the lack of the crib at the Ramada was totally a blessing in disguise, as the room at the Penn Stater was just so much bigger and cleaner and newer and nicer. We settled in (at 12:30 in the morning - I left Queens at 3:30), much happier than we were just an hour or so ago.
It seems that St. Gertrude was also the right saint to appeal to earlier that day; among her many duties is helping to obtain lodging while travelling. So hooray for St. Gertrude!
(Why were we in State College? For a wedding of course (photos here). It was fun, as most weddings tend to be. Unlike most weddings, there's a second party to look forward to - a Chinese banquet a few weeks from now here in the city. I should not eat until then so that I have enough room in my stomach...)
Tags: violet, wedding
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06:02 pm
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More About Violet, For Lack Of Anything Else To Write About
Violet and her neighbor Lily are six-and-a-half months old already. They're almost at the age (seven months) where they're still babies, while no longer being "new babies". It's a great age. Violet can almost sit up, but she still doesn't move around much. She grabs for things, but can't really destroy anything yet. She makes cute noises and is usually quite happy, maybe because she's still not teething. And her diapers are big enough to hold her once-every-other-day poop without leaking. She's good at going out, she smiles at strangers, she loves her stroller, she falls asleep easily in her car seat. She's never been sick. She's getting better at eating from a spoon. And she always sleeps nine to eleven hours a night. Plus, she's still adorable.
Perhaps we were blessed with an unusually good baby, but so far this parenting thing has been way easier than I had been led to believe it would be. Am I the only one who thinks this? I kind of feel like I am...
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09:30 pm
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No Dumping Milk
Does anyone have any idea why one wouldn't be allowed to dump milk down the bathroom drains?
(This was taken in the cow building at the New York State Fair. I know nothing about the ins and outs of cow husbandry...)
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06:06 pm
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Labor Day Weekend
I think we had a better Labor Day weekend than you did.
Why? Because we saw monkeys riding dogs, and you didn't.
(PS - More photos from the New York State fair are here.)
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12:47 pm
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Food!
We've fed Violet some rice cereal a few times now, but last night was the first time she ate some "real" food: eggplant!
Why eggplant? Because Sue and I don't much like eggplant. Yet we keep getting eggplant in our CSA share every week. We've tried to work with it, and we've discovered some eggplant recipes that aren't so bad, but now we're just finished. We've had our fill of eggplant this year already. So I decided to steam and puree one of them to see if Violet liked it.
She didn't hate it. She made a weird face at the first spoonful, but swallowed it all. And swallowed most of the next six or seven spoonfuls (making much less of a mess than she did with the rice cereal). But then I could tell she had her fill of eggplant, too. I can't really blame her. Poor girl...
Tags: violet
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05:15 pm
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August Is Almost Over?
I don't have much to say, so I'm just going to post another photo of Violet.
Tags: violet
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07:10 pm
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I've Wasted Half My Life!
August 6, 2008, seven in the evening, work's done, I'm feeding the baby and relaxing at home with "The Wizard Of Evergreen Terrace", a rare episode of the Simpsons I don't remember much about....
Homer is driving, listening to the inane DJs on KBBL:
DJ: Okay, here's another News Flush! [toilet flush sound] Doctors say the life expectancy of the average man is now seventy-six point two years!
Homer: [gasps and spins his car out across the highway ] Seventy-six point two? But I'm already thirty-eight point one! I've wasted half my life!
This sends Homer into a deep depression that provides the impetus for the episode's plot. And it kind of depressed me, too, for I calculated that on that day I was 38 years and 43 days old. Which rounds to... thirty-eight point one.
I did not need to know that I am as old as Homer Simpson.
(Later in the episode, Marge reminds Homer that he's actually 39. Which sent him moaning into a fetal position, yet cheered me slightly. Only slightly. I can't shake the feeling that I've wasted half my life watching Simpsons reruns.)
Tags: random
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10:14 am
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Awards
I've never entered a photo contest, but if I were to enter one, this wouldn't be it...
(PS - More photos from our walk through Flushing Meadows that day are here.)
Tags: random
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05:23 pm
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8/8/8
Violet is 5 months old today! We don't have anything special planned for the occasion. We'll just be home watching the Olympic opening ceremony with friends. I imagine that being on the Olympic Opening Ceremony Planning Committee has to be great fun; judging from previous opening (and closing) ceremonies, I'm thinking that they drink good liquor until they're nice and tipsy, take suggestions for a few hours, and then use *every single drunken idea* that was suggested. A million balloons? Of course. Giant puppets representing Olympic values? You betcha. How about Ferraris doing donuts on a sheet of ice while lasers and fireworks blaze? Why the heck not? (Yep, that Ferrari thing happened. Torino Winter Olympics. Let's see the Chinese top that!)
(Okay, I'm pretty darn sure that the Chinese can top that.)
Tags: olympics, violet
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03:22 pm
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My First Car
My first car was a hand-me-down from my parents: their giant 1979 Chrysler New Yorker. It got 12 mpg and started falling apart pretty much the day my parents bought it, but it had power windows and locks and seats, which were still novelties in the late 70s. Back before kids needed to be strapped in like Hannibal Lechter, it fit half a soccer team, and the ride to Wyoming or Florida was super comfortable.
I learned to drive on it (somehow I was even able to parallel park it), and got to use it sometimes the summer after high school (on Long Island you couldn't get a full license until 17 and I graduated from high school three days before my 17th birthday). My parents then let me use it for the summers I was home from college, then finally let me just bring it to college with me junior and senior years. Not that I had much need for a car on campus, but it came in handy on occasion.
Princeton has a unique class schedule - the fall semester started in mid-September, with a week off at the end of October, a short break for Thanksgiving, and a week-and-a-half off for Christmas after classes ended. Then January was a week-and-a-half of '"reading period" and a week-and-a-half of finals. So your final exam could be over a month after your last class. I kind of liked it that way; it gave you lots of time to prepare and do final papers and projects and such.
Anyway, at the end of January, we had a week off (called "intersession") before the spring semester started. It was easy enough for me to get home, just a two-to-three-hour drive. Princeton organized a ski trip to Killington that week, but at the time I didn't ski and had no interest in doing so then (I kick myself now, considering how cheap it was, and thinking back on how much fun it would have been to ski with a couple hundred schoolmates). Sue wasn't skiing then, either, but she also wasn't planning on going home (too far without a car). So I got the brilliant idea to offer to drive her home myself.
I had wanted to date her for months, but she had a boyfriend from home. Very frustrating, especially since she kept wanting to hang out with me. Driving her home meant I was doing her a huge favor, plus I'd get to spend nearly a week alone with her. And I had never been to Maine before. It was the perfect plan.
And it worked, though I wasn't at all sure that it had when the trip was over and I was dropping her off at the train station (we had stopped at my house on the way to and from Maine, and she was heading back to Princeton while I stayed home the last weekend of break). I had a very very nervous weekend...
In conclusion, that's why it's handy to have a car at college. The end.
(PS - Photos from that month - January 1991 - are here.)
Tags: college
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12:11 am
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Home Stretch
Well, this is it - my last week as a free man. I pick up my linux machine from the office on Monday and then I have a whole week to curse at it and try to add it to my wireless network before I'm officially starting work again. It's going to be great to work from home, though I'll have to fight the urge to constantly go upstairs and check on Violet - not that I'd think the nanny will be doing a bad job, I'll just want to spend time with the baby like I've been doing.
No, I'll have to do my job and the nanny will have to do hers. It's weird to be picking some stranger to come and be a huge part of Violet's life for a few years; I feel like I'm relinquishing my #1 spot. Reluctantly.
One nanny we interviewed told us that the family she worked for forbade her from telling the kids she loved them, and vice versa. We thought that was thoroughly ridiculous, but now I kind of understand. I can feel the pangs of jealousy already. Of course, that's still ridiculous. We'll try not to be those parents.
We finally got Violet baptized a week ago (photos here); I think both my brother and I were baptized within a week or two of being born, but these days the Church doesn't seem to have the same sense of urgency. Anyway, hottest day of the year and there I was walking eight blocks to the church in a new suit. I thanked God for air conditioning when I got there. Our parents were there, as was my brother and his wife (the godparents) and their kids, and two other families having their babies baptized at the same time. What sounded like a hundred bored whiny toddlers (including my niece and nephew) were running around as well, which kind of robbed the ceremony of some dignity, but then again, theirs is the kingdom of Heaven and such (Matthew 19:13-14)
Sue's parents could only stay the weekend; my parents stayed all week. It was nice to have them around, now that Violet can keep them entertained simply by breathing. And they're only too happy to take care of her. My mom even seem thrilled to change her poopy diaper; too bad I can't hire her to be our nanny. One can let one's kid love her grandmother all she wants without being jealous.
Tags: violet
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05:36 pm
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Wall-E
Looking to go out to the movies and can't find a babysitter? Our solution: drive to Maine and go to a drive-in. There might be drive-ins closer than Maine, but there are none left on Long Island. We used to go all the time as kids, and then as teenagers, and then less often as twentysomethings, as all the drive-in theaters in the area kept closing. I don't think we'd been to one in about ten years. But with a baby, it's the only way to go without spending $50 on a sitter. Violet was a bit fussy at first, but after being fed, she fell right asleep as all kids should at the drive-in.
We saw a double feature of Wall-E and Get Smart. And only $14 for the two of us! Get Smart was unobjectionably mediocre - nothing to avoid, but nothing to write about, either. Therefore, nothing else shall be written. Wall-E, however, is further proof in my mind that the only people who should be allowed to make movies are the geniuses at Pixar. Much has been written about the lack of dialog in huge sections of the movie, and that that it's no impediment to enjoying it, but what also struck me is that there were no evil robots. Evil robots would have been the obvious choice. But all the robots in the movie worked to serve humankind well. Too well, as the problem turned out to be. Even the antagonist robot of the major conflict of the film (which the film delightfully takes its sweet time in setting up) wasn't bad - after all, all he (and the giant corporation who set him up) wanted was to keep the humans happy, if not exactly fulfilled.
To say more would reveal too much. Okay, that's sort of an excuse not to write any more. But really, this is definitely one of those movies where the less you know going in, the better. So go see it, even at a non-drive-in theater.
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01:26 am
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July!
I feel I haven't used my time off to its fullest potential. Oh, it's not that I've done nothing, but I feel like I've done nothing much since getting back from our vacation in May. I take care of Violet, cook, sleep, upload some photos, and repeat. I would have liked to do more, and I actually do have enough time to, say, clean my bedroom, but when I do have non-Violet time, I simply veg.
Doing nothing doesn't bother me; it's just that I'm going back to work by the end of this month. And if I can't get anything done now, what hope do I have once I'm working?
Fortunately, I'll be working from home now! The short story is that I demanded it and they said no. But when they saw I was ready to find another job, they changed their minds. Only they'll be treating me as a contract worker. I don't know why, that's just the way they want to do it. So I get a 25% raise, but I get absolutely zero benefits, since I'll technically be self-employed, and that's another thing I'm not getting to on my to-do list: figure out how (legally and for tax purposes) to be self-employed.
While I'm home, I can still go to the local new parents' meetup group. We meet every Wednesday at 12:30 in the basement of the Gymboree (see accompanying photo), and then often go out to lunch afterwards. The group is a good way to meet people (obviously - that's the intent), so after 12 years in this neighborhood, I now run into people I know on the street! As expected, I'm the only father there, but unexpectedly, I'm just about the only male there, period. The baby sex ratio is way skewed - each week there tends to be about 10-15 girls and 1-3 boys. I'm beginning to forget that little boys exist.
This past weekend we did make it to the beach with ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) anemone and her husband and their baby (a girl, natch, who turned 1 the day after my birthday), along with some other childless friends. (Photos here.) Hot beautiful day for it, yet surprisingly uncrowded, with fun large rolling waves to play and cool off in. (Note to those from Seattle or San Francisco: yes, it is possible to swim in the ocean and thus one should bring a bathing suit next time.) I do hope there will be a next time - sure, I have all summer, but don't be surprised if October rolls around and you read a post from me complaining that I somehow never made it back to the beach.
(Well, this coming weekend we're going to Sue's family's beach house in Maine, but the beach isn't quite the same. Still, it gets me out of the house...)
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09:34 pm
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Happy My Birthday To You
Seven years ago on my birthday, I was water-skiing on Lake Como and staying at the beautiful Villa D'Este. This year, my birthday is no Italian luxury resort, but it was very nice for my neighbor to take me out to lunch and extremely nice of her to offer to take care of Violet while Sue and I go out to dinner tonight, and it was nice of my brother to stop by, and I'm appreciating all the nice phone calls and emails and Facebook messages - thank you each and every one of you.
Recently, I've been noticing that people who I think are older than me are actually my age. I hate that - it means that I probably look older than I think I do. That'll probably be true for the rest of my life.
So I was wondering, who *is* my age? Here's what I discovered on imdb:
- Born in 1970, older than me - Zack de la Rocha (1/12), Skeet Ulrich (1/20), Heather Graham (1/29), Simon Pegg (2/14), John Frusciante (3/5), Jordan Knight (3/17), Queen Latifah (3/18), Lara Flynn Boyle (3/24), Vince Vaughn (3/28), Jennifer Weiner (3/28), Jason Lee (4/25), Melania Trump (4/26), Andre Agassi (4/29), Uma Thurman (4/29), Will Arnett (5/4), Ghostface Killah (5/9), Tina Fey (5/18), Naomi Campbell (5/22), Rivers Cuomo (6/13), Phil Mickelson (6/16), Will Forte (6/17)
- Born in 1970, same day as me - Glenn Medeiros (6/24)
- Born in 1970, younger than me - Beck (7/8), Kevin Smith (8/2), Wendy Whoppers (8/13), Malcolm-Jamal Warner (8/18), Fat Joe (8/19), Jay Mohr (8/23), Claudia Schiffer (8/25), Debbie Gibson (8/31), Mystikal (9/22), Ani DiFranco (9/23), Tony Hale (9/30), Kelly Ripa (10/2), Matt Damon (10/8), Michelle Malkin (10/20), Jasmin St. Claire (10/23), Ethan Hawke (11/6), Morgan Spurlock (11/7), Sarah Silverman (12/1), Jennifer Connelly (12/12), The Naked Cowboy (12/23)
- Born in 1970, dead - River Phoenix (8/23), Savannah (10/9)
You might have noticed that I also discovered that imdb has listings for porn stars. I really couldn't resist adding "Wendy Whoppers" to the list, whoever she is. Feel free to google her.
Sigh. Tomorrow is just another day...
Tags: birthday
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01:54 pm
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Stupid Lousy Perfect Weather
I need to kick some meteorologists in the butt.
I had planned to have a birthday get-together at the beach yesterday, but yesterday morning, the weather reports all said thunderstorms, possibly severe ones, all afternoon. So I called all the people who were planning on coming (unlike in years past, this year I actually convinced more than one person to come with us - why is it so hard to get people to the beach?) and cancelled. It seemed like the prudent thing to do.
And then I sat at home all day and moped, angry at the beautiful warm sunny day it turned out to be.
Fortunately, I did manage to check one project off of my (long) list: photographing Reunions cups. You see, currently taking up space in our attic are hundreds of cups I've collected over the past twenty years of going to Reunions. For years, I've been meaning to organize and take pictures of them, so I can get rid of them less reluctantly. And so that became my day's project - sitting outside on my roof deck, taking picture after picture (sitting under the deck umbrella because it was TOO SUNNY - stupid meteorologists), then sitting inside at night uploading them all. (Here they are, if you're interested.) And now I'm talking to the Princetoniana committee to see if they'll take them off my hands and give them a good home.
So at least it was a productive day. Now I probably should search through other piles of junk to see what I can photograph and chuck. I could probably clean out my entire house that way...
Oh yeah, and we've rescheduled the beach trip for Saturday. Unless it rains.
Tags: beach, birthday, reunions
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03:41 pm
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Eleven
You think your air conditioner is powerful? Ours goes to eleven...
Tags: random
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05:10 pm
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Paternity Leave
When I tell people that I'm taking 12 weeks off to stay home with the kid, the most common reaction by far is along the lines of "that's so great that your company lets you do that!" Which is kind of an odd reaction, considering that it's the law; my company (and probably your company, too) has to let me take leave. If it were truly up to them, they wouldn't.
It's unpaid leave, but I wanted the time off more than I wanted the money. Because being home with Violet is great. It's much better than working. Sure, she can be demanding on occasion, but so can my job. And my job isn't as rewarding.
Oddly enough, I think I'm getting less done around the house than I did when I was working. Violet's "down time" (when I'm not actively feeding, bathing, changing, walking, or playing with her) is maddeningly unpredictable. I can't say there's not enough of it; it's just that when she goes to sleep and/or plays happily alone, I never know if it's going to be for ten minutes or three hours. So I never know if I can finish what I want to start. And yet I feel like I have an infinite amount of time. So nothing feels urgent.
And now all of a sudden it's 5pm. And it's Friday. I should start dinner.
(The lovely father-daughter moment captured at right is of Violet's first dip in the ocean. We went to Jones Beach on her third-month birthday and it was a smashing success. We must do it again. And indeed we are, a week from Sunday, just before my birthday. Are you joining us?)
(Yesterday, I took her to her first mall - plus it was the first time I've driven her anywhere by myself. We survived. And now that she's been to the beach and the mall, she's a true Long Island girl.)
Tags: violet
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11:06 pm
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Reunions 2008
I am perpetually surprised. Every darn month it's "I can't believe it's [name of month] already!" It's never "Well, I'm certainly ready for [name of month], it definitely feels like [name of month] should be here right now." No, I apparently still haven't gotten the hang of this "time" concept.
And in May, I always think "I can't believe Reunions is coming up!". And right now it's "I can't believe Reunions is over!" You'd think after 20 Reunions in a row, I'd start believing it.
I don't know what Violet believes yet, but she handled her first Reunions like a star. And we did, too. Reunions is a bit different with a baby, as you can imagine. We've now noticed that here are lots of stairs on campus. Pushing through a crowded eating club for meals is tricky. And while Violet is good at staying up until midnight (or later), or sleeping in her stroller whenever she feels like it, we forgot that most courtyards get REALLY LOUD once the bands start playing. That's probably not good for baby ears. So Sue and I took turns finding quiet places for her while the other hung out with friends and partied. Or we found quiet places with friends together. We managed to stay out past 2 a.m., which is more than I can say for some of our childless friends.
At 12 weeks, Violet wasn't the youngest baby there (I met babies of 8 and 6 weeks), but she was adorable enough to get lots of attention regardless. And I didn't mind the attention, either, especially when it was from a gaggle of gals from the Class of 2006. But it was fun to have a bunch of wives of the Class of 1962 moon over her, too. They were so sweet and grandmotherly - I probably could have convinced some of them to babysit while we went out. Maybe next year.
So as always, it was a fantastic weekend. And of course I took hundreds of pictures. Then Sue had to start work again on Monday. Poor Sue. I can't believe she's back at work. Me, I'm home with the baby for about two more months, and then... well, we haven't really figured that out yet. Stay tuned.
Tags: princeton, reunions, violet
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12:28 am
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3241.4 Miles
Our 3241.4-mile road trip is over! In 18 days, we covered 14 states (plus D.C.), saw friends we hadn't seen in years, and made our parents very happy. We took Violet to National Parks and bourbon distilleries and Disney World and highway rest stops galore. She saw Gettysburg, the Washington Monument, Lincoln's birthplace, the Grand Ole Opry, roller coasters, caves, a 62-foot Jesus, fine barbecue joints, okapis, peach groves, Amish people, swimming pools...
Yes, she's seen all that before she was ten weeks old, yet she's never been out to Long Island (8 miles down the highway).
She'll remember none of it, of course, but I have hundreds of photos to prove we were there. (And I'm still adding more.)
I'm happy to be home, but part of me wanted to keep on driving while we had the chance. There's still so much to see...
Tags: vacation
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12:09 pm
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Universal Stroller
It turns out that taking a two-month-old to a theme park isn't such a bad idea!
This past Thursday was Violet's two-month birthday, and so we (Sue, her dad, and I - her mom was at work) celebrated by going to Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure. (Well, the timing was really a coincidence, but we're telling her it was to celebrate her birthday, and that's the story we're sticking to.) We were a bit wary, unsure of how she'd handle the day, but she behaved like a perfect little angel (not like the Old Testament angels wrestling and carrying flaming swords.) Or maybe the heat just conked her out. Regardless, she was remarkably easy to have around.
As a bonus, she worked as our own personal Express Pass. All the rides at both resorts have a "baby swap" at the end of the line, where one or more people can wait with the baby while the others in the group go on the ride. When they're done, they swap places with the people waiting with the baby so they can go on the ride. Or some can go again; they don't check too closely. Pretty nifty, no? And the bonus part is that the baby swap room is almost always set up at the end of the express line. So essentially, if you show up with a baby, you get to cut the line. Sweet.
Not that there were many lines to cut that day. Being a Thursday in early May, the longest line we saw was a mere 30 minutes, and even that was rare. Zero to five minutes were more the order of the day. Even the brand-spanking-new Simpsons ride (which officially opened the day after we were there - it was still in "previews" on Thursday) had an easy ten-minute wait on the regular line. With clips from Simpsons TV shows running, it was probably the most fun line I've been on. And the ride was great, too.
The question now is whether we hit another theme park on Sunday, or just stay in and not push our luck with Violet, in case Thursday was an aberration...
(If you're interested, click here for all my Universal Orlando photos...)
Tags: florida, violet
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12:11 am
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Welcome To Florida!
Some people had warned us against taking Violet on this long road trip, but so far, so good. We left NYC at 12:30 in the afternoon (later than we had expected) on Wednesday, did some brief sightseeing in DC and had dinner there with friends, and stayed our first night in a hotel south of Richmond. Then it was a relatively short drive to Raleigh, where we stayed Thursday night with more friends. Violet was a bit crankier on the long haul from Raleigh to Jacksonville on Friday, but it wasn't anything that stopping to feed her couldn't cure. So that leg took 11 hours - longer than it would usually take, but we could afford to be leisurely. Now we're at my parents for a few days before heading down to Sue's parents for a few more days. Sadly, I don't think I'm going to be able to get a job driving around the country visiting people, so we're eventually going to have to come back home. Drat.
Tags: florida, vacation
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04:10 pm
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Squill!
In my previous post, I had a photograph of Violet lying down in a bed of pretty little blue flowers that covered her great-uncle's lawn. Which, by the way, was the first time we had ever put her down on the dirty ground outside. Before doing so, we had a moment akin to psyching oneself up to jump into a cold swimming pool (okay, okay, on the count of three put the baby down, okay, one, two... okay, let me catch my breath first...)
Anyway, neither I nor Sue nor any of her relatives knew what the flowers were. "Bluebells" was the best guess, but it didn't sound right, considering that the flowers weren't bell-shaped. Well, some knowledgeable people at the FLOWERS Flickr group identified them as "squill". Probably "Siberian squill" (Scilla siberica), to be exact.
I had never even heard the word "squill" before (have you?) but apparently, it's real. Not that I'm surprised that there are flowers I've never heard of; identifying nature-type things such as flowers, trees, and birds is not at all my strong suit. But even though I can't identify a marigold or a zinnia, at least I've heard of them. This "squill" concept is entirely new to me, and yet there it is all over the darn place. Shows how much I know.
In other news, today is my last day at work before I go on twelve glorious weeks of paternity leave. It's unpaid leave, aside from my vacation time, which I have to use all of, so I'll have no vacation time when I come back at the end of July through the end of the year. But I still think it'll totally be worth it. After over twelve years here, I sorely need a break. A longer one than twelve weeks, really. Who knows, maybe that can be arranged...
Also, "squill" is a fun word to say. Squill squill squill...
Current Mood: squilly
Tags: violet
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05:26 pm
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Violet's First Vacation!
I'm happy to report we successfully brought Violet to Boston and back this past weekend. It was her first time out of New York City!
We were there for Sue's cousin's wedding - actually, her second cousin. Me, I wouldn't know if my second cousin was working in the same building as me, but that side of Sue's family tends to stay close. Much of the weekend involved introducing Violet to lots of relatives, including her third cousin, Helen. Who in the world has (knowingly) ever met any of their third cousins? Given that Violet is only six weeks old and Helen is only six months old, I doubt they'll remember meeting (though I do have photographic evidence). But given that there are three guys in Sue's generation who are still years away from getting married, I have no doubt that the two will be playing happily at some future family wedding.
Violet slept through almost all of the car trip, and was very good while various relatives manhandled her. She only melted down when we got to the church and - of course - right in the middle of the wedding ceremony. (What can I say - gals always cry at weddings.) But a quick feeding made her happy and she was content to sleep through the entire reception. We stayed awake and had a fun time. All in all, the weekend worked out great. Sure, it helped to have lots of relatives eager to take turns holding the baby, but we're still confident in our ability to pull off a road trip to Florida next month.
(More photos from the wedding are here - as of today, I've only uploaded a quarter of the photos I have, so check back over the next few weeks if you're interested...)
Tags: violet
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03:11 pm
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New Experiences
I knew that once we had a baby, I was going to do lots of things I had never done before. I was not expecting that one of those things would be to buy a humidifier. You see, having grown up just over a mile from the ocean, I had always viewed humidity as something to be conquered, not encouraged. Our evil foe humidity caused mold and warping and out-of-tune pianos. So our dehumidifier ran nearly nonstop from spring through fall. In the winter we could enjoy dry, spark-filled air naturally.
But when Violet came down with a little congestion a couple of weeks ago, the pediatrician recommended that we get an un-dehumidifier. That is, a humidifier. We were told it'd help clear her up a bit, though I'm not clear on why. Still, "anything for our girl", so I bit the bullet and bought this adorable penguin humidifier . And I'm happy to say Violet is breathing much better now. Whether the penguin had anything to do with that is unclear, but at least it's really cute.
In other news, we took Violet to church for the first time this weekend, and she behaved admirably. Somehow the organ and the singing put her right to sleep, and when she woke up later in the Mass, it seemed to keep her calm. So another thing I might do that I've never done before is install a pipe organ in our house. Hey, you go with that works.
Also, here's a short video showing how much Violet loves her swing:
( Baby video behind this link... )
Tags: violet
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04:22 pm
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Violet On Video!
Flickr now allows users to upload short videos! Given that my point-and-shoot camera has video capability (a capability I have never once used in the nearly two years I've owned the camera), and that I have a one-month-old baby hanging around the house (you may have heard the news), I found Flickr's offer irresistible. So behold: my first two masterworks!
( Warning: baby videos behind this link... )
Tags: video, violet
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04:55 pm
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One Month!
Well, we've successfully parented for one month! So far, so good. Aside from a bit of congestion, Violet's been doing adorably well. These days, she's often alert without crying, she played with a toy for the first time this past weekend, and she's even gotten used to the idea of being changed (initially, she hated it), though she still hasn't gotten the hang of when to pee (hint to Violet: either before we take the diaper off or after we put the diaper on, not in between.)
Also this past weekend, to celebrate Sue's birthday, we took Violet out to her first restaurant (thankfully, she slept), and the next day we even ventured into Manhattan to visit friends - our first road trip with her that didn't involve a pediatrician or a Babies-R-Us.
Our next planned trip is a big one - we're driving to Boston to go to Sue's (second) cousin's wedding next weekend. And that's just a dress rehearsal (baby steps, if you will) for our potential two- or three-week road trip extravaganza in May to visit the grandparents in Florida, as well as friends down the East Coast. We've been told that we're crazy for even considering such a trip, but then again, we've been told that we're crazy for having a baby in the first place (oh wait, that was us saying that).
So right now, unless there's a massive meltdown on the way to or from Boston, Violet's looking forward to spending her second-month birthday in sunny Orlando (okay, I'm projecting - I'm looking forward to it. Violet is just along for the ride. And if all goes well, she'll be sleeping for most of it.)
Tags: violet
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06:25 pm
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September 1990
Happy Birthday to susanofacadia!
Coincidentally, I'm up to Fall 1990 in my photo-uploading project, which is when I met Sue, so here is the first photo I ever took of her (and of greenexecutive, for that matter). We didn't start dating until five months later, though it would have been much sooner if it were up to me.
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03:09 pm
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In The Pink
Forest Hills, March 30, 2008 - This past weekend we took Violet for her first walk around the neighborhood. Well, I should say it was her first successful walk around the neighborhood: she didn't seem to much like the bumpy sidewalks the first time we tried a couple of weeks ago, so we abandoned that attempt after a block of crying.
(As an aside, I should mention that the sidewalks in our neighborhood are bumpy on purpose. They're paved with a pebbly finish, which looks pretty and presumably discourages rollerbladers and other wheeled hooligans.)
(Our back courtyard, however, is bumpy because it's probably not been redone in 80 years.)
This time, no such problems. Our neighbors and their new baby joined us (or rather, we joined them, as it was their idea), and we had a perfectly pleasant jaunt on a beautiful lamb-like end-of-March day (photos here). Not that either of the babies saw much of anything, Violet being asleep in her stroller and Lily being asleep in her baby carrier. But it got us out of the house.
And into other houses. I like going to open houses; in fact, we bought our current house that way - we were just randomly strolling around the neighborhood seven years ago and went into the open house on a whim. It was most likely the most expensive impulse buy we will ever make.
Anyway, even when I'm not in the market for a new house (and I'm not), I still like peeking around. This weekend, the four of us saw this lovely six-bedroom, six-bath mansion in move-in condition. Move-in condition is rare in our neighborhood, where many of the houses for sale have been lived in by their elderly owners for decades and haven't been renovated inside since they moved in. Way out of our price range, of course. Then again, our own house is evidently out of our price range at the moment, too: we also saw a townhouse slightly smaller than ours - four bedrooms set up very much like ours (one a bright pink, shown here), but narrower, with a tiny kitchenette, no garage, no attic, and a much farther walk from downtown and the subway - and they were asking more than twice what we paid for ours six-and-a-half years ago. I suddenly felt rich. We can sell our house now and use the huge profit to pay for Violet to go to Princeton. Yay!
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04:57 pm
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A Bit Of Doggerel
Penelope the Pup
Would eat Violet all up
But she's eaten enough
So thank goodness she's stuffed!
(A coworker of Sue got Violet this massive stuffed dog. Now where are we going to put it?)
Tags: violet
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11:06 pm
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Violet Go Bragh
Today (St. Patrick's Day) is Violet's due date, but instead she's nine days old. So far we've done well, but that's because right now it's not too difficult - all she does is sleep, eat, cry, and poop (sometimes all at the same time) and we have those four events covered. But somehow it takes all day to cover it all. We can probably stand to get a bit more efficient.
Anyway, I promised details: There we were, a week ago Friday, about twenty minutes into Bender's Big Score, when Sue felt a sharp, painful kick. Which was odd, because up until then, none of the baby's kicks had hurt. A few minutes later, having gone up to the bathroom, she shouts down to me: "How can I tell if my water broke?" Darned if I knew, but she soon decides that that's what happened and calls the obstetrician, who tells her to get to the hospital as soon as she could.
Sue was surprised; after all, she hadn't felt anything other than the kick. No contractions yet. But the doctor, presumably remembering that she had been dilated 4cm all week, insisted. So I started packing last-minute items while she showered (knowing it'd be the last shower she'd get for days), and that's when her contractions started. Three minutes apart, just like that. At exactly 11pm, less than 20 minutes after her water broke, we were pulling out of our driveway and hoping for good traffic into Manhattan.
And traffic was indeed good, thank goodness. 23 minutes later, we're at NYU Medical Center. I drop her off on the 8th floor, and go back down to park the car (the valet isn't there at night) and then to get her properly Admitted. The guy at the Admitting desk wasn't in much of a rush (we were to discover over the next few days that nobody at the hospital ever seemed to be in much of a rush) and I wasn't back to her room until nearly midnight. I see her surrounded by a dozen nurses and interns and med students and doctors and find out that she was 7cm dilated when she was first looked at.
Our obstetrician suggests she just start pushing, as the baby could come pretty soon, but Sue demands the epidural. Which she gets, although not as quickly as she would have liked. By 12:45, the drugs have kicked in, and most everyone leaves. A nurse or intern or someone would occasionally wander in to check in with us and the monitors, but for the next two hours, it's mostly just us doing nothing. Sue tells me that before the epidural the contractions were very similar to a leg cramp - slightly less painful, even - only they keep coming, and there's nothing you can try to stretch to make it go away. But at least there's an epidural.
At quarter to three, the obstetrician seemingly randomly decides it's time to start pushing. He had been in another room delivering another baby, so had that baby come sooner, we suspect she would have started pushing sooner. The nurses holding her legs were very supportive (in both an emotional and physical way), but it took us a while to catch on. When they were both shouting things like "Great job! That's an excellent push! Come on, you're almost there!!", I initially took them at their word. Half an hour later, I began to realize that while they may have meant what they said, it did *not* mean that the baby was about to come out. So I kind of got a bit jaded, and even after the doctor came in, put a sheet over her knees, and got all the instruments out, I figured that it'd still be another hour or two or three of pushing. Yet a minute or two later, after being resigned to the fact that I'm never going to see this baby, boom, there it is. Totally took me by surprise.
In case you didn't keep track, water broke about 10:45pm, contractions start about 10:55pm, we're in the car at 11pm, at the hospital at 11:23pm, epidural is administered at 12:30am, kicks in at 12:45am, Sue is told to start pushing at 2:45am, and the baby is born at 3:50am. Five hours from start to finish. Everyone tells us that Sue's lucky. But it was long enough.
After they poke and prod the baby for what seems like an eternity, we're left mostly alone until about 6am, when she's moved to her room, and I'm told to go home. Fathers can't stay in non-private rooms, and visiting hours don't start until 8:30. The bastards. But I was secretly glad to be able to get home and sleep. Only I didn't sleep much. So I uploaded pictures, and then the rest of my life started...
Tags: violet
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11:38 am
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It's *Our* Girl This Time!
Violet Antonia Dutton
Born 3:50am, March 8, 2008 at NYU Medical Center
7lbs 1.4oz and perfectly healthy!
Everyone's doing well. Tired, but well.
Photos here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/joeshlabotnik/sets/72157604072917161/
Details later....
Tags: violet
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04:23 pm
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It's A Girl!
Manhattan, March 5, 2008 - That's right, Lily Reed Tobey, 4lbs 11oz. Mom and baby are doing well, and... what's that? Oh, thank you, but don't congratulate us - congratulate our neighbors! They had their baby a month early; we think they induced because they really wanted to snag the name "Lily" before we changed our mind. We all thought Sue and I had dibs on a name, since we were due three weeks earlier than they were. And they knew "Lily" was one of our final four, but we ended up choosing another non-Lily name, so we "gave" them Lily with our blessing. Still, we suspect they wanted to be sure.
As for Sue, she's still very much pregnant and is not too pleased that it's very possible that she'll have a baby that's twice as big (that'd be 9lbs 6oz). Apparently, the baby is quite large already, but facing the wrong way, so we're going to just wait and hope she turns around. In the meantime, she'll get bigger. (The baby, that is. Sue's only gained 23 pounds so far - much less than we had originally feared. Friends love telling us how they gained 50, 60, 70 pounds. Yet she's still complaining. I mean, really...)
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05:56 pm
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Important Preparations
One of the most important things I've done to prepare for our baby is to buy a new camera. Oh sure, I still like my old point-and-shoot, and I'll still use it when I want a camera I can slip into my pocket, but Sue decided I needed a better camera so I could take better baby pictures. Who was I to argue?
I've taken tens of thousands of pictures in my lifetime (and I plan to upload them all to my Flickr page eventually), but this is the first SLR camera I've ever owned, and there's a big learning curve ahead of me. And it's going to be very easy to disappear down the rabbit hole of new lenses and filters and tripods and all sorts of expensive accessories. So far I've resisted, but then again, since I didn't get to go skiing at all this winter, this could be my substitute expensive hobby...
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05:35 pm
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A Whole Weekend Shot
Manhattan, February 9-10, 2008 - As I suspected from the beginning, as all my friends who went through them told me, I now know through direct experience that childbirth classes are a waste of time and money. An entire weekend was lost listening to a cheery nurse go on and on about stuff every single couple in the room had most likely already read in What To Expect When You're Expecting. The nurse was nice enough - a sweet middle-aged woman - but she taught the class as if we were first-graders. We knew we were in trouble when she earnestly asked us early in the class "does anyone know why labor hurts?" I wanted to answer "It's God's punishment for Eve's sins" (Genesis 3:16), but I couldn't really read the room well enough to know how that'd go over. So I kept my mouth shut and glared at Sue.
It was Sue's idea to go, despite my protests. She thought they'd impart some secret knowledge that you couldn't get from the books. They didn't. She was looking forward to the hospital tour, but even that was useless. And hot. We saw a bunch of hospital rooms. We've all seen hospital rooms before. Hearing our nurse gush about how that this is one of the rooms Sue might be put in before giving birth and this is one of the rooms Sue might be put in after giving birth was hardly edifying.
And as many a friend told us, anything we might have learned (breathing, relaxation techniques, when to call the doctor) just goes right out the window when you're in the thick of things. Either the situation on the ground changes, or you're going to second-guess yourself and go to the books anyway.
My perspective is that I'm going to be there, but I'll trust the experts to do their jobs, and I'll do my best to stay out of their way. All I really need to know is how to get to the hospital. And I know that. I'm hoping it's not March 17 (the actual due date) because driving into Manhattan on St. Patrick's Day sounds less than fun. (Sue's already told me that the subway is straight out...)
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05:20 pm
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Super Bowl Baby Shower
Forest Hills, February 3, 2008 - We're not really shower-type people; the idea of having a party devoted to our getting stuff seems a bit unseemly. But when our neighbor offered to throw us one, we figured sure, why not. It was very nice of her to offer, and everyone would expect us to have one anyway. So we registered (something else that seems a bit unseemly to me, but if it doesn't seem unseemly to you, we're registered at Buy Buy Baby and Pottery Barn Kids :-) and got to planning.
Sue's and my goal was to make it a real party, not have it be some girly event that would exclude me and bore Sue. So we decided early on to make it a "Jack-and-Jill" shower. (Men at a baby shower? Yes, it's not the 1950s anymore.) And then we decided to hold it at our house on Super Bowl Sunday, to give people a reason to stay. Bold decisions, you might think, but it worked out spectacularly. The shower started at 3:17 (Why? Because.), which gave us plenty of time to do showery things like decorate onesies (I'm quite impressed with our friends' artistic abilities) and open presents before the game started. And then what a game! Best. Super Bowl. Ever. Genuinely exciting game, genuinely perfect result.
Thanks go out to our neighbor for suggesting and planning it, to her husband and our other neighbors who all got roped into helping out, to everyone who came, and of course to the New York Giants! Thanks much to everyone for all the gifts that have made a new mess out of our nursery-to-be. And thanks, of course, to susanofacadia for putting up with being pregnant. (You're welcome to stay pregnant as long as you want, because it's much easier than actually taking care of a baby. Even for you. You'll see...)
Sue was one of three pregnant ladies there that day. Our friend sbtorpey has finally told everyone that she's due in June, so even though we've known for a while, I can mention it openly now. And our neighbor is due three weeks after Sue. When she first suggested the shower, we thought it would be nice of us to reciprocate, so we offered... and she politely but firmly turned us down. She apparently has other friends who'll throw her a proper girly shower. I'm not invited. At least that'll give me more time to clean out the nursery, a process that is even more slow-going than writing thank-you notes...
(By the way, click here for photos of the shower. I don't have all the photos uploaded as of yet, because there are a huge number that need me to do some red-eye reduction first, which is yet another slow process...)
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05:51 pm
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Six Things Meme
I don't normally do memes, but this is a simple one and Clara asked nicely, so here goes:
1) Link to the person that tagged you.
2) Post the rules on your blog.
3) Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself.
4) Tag at least three people at the end of your post and link to their blogs.
5) Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.
6) Let the fun begin!
Okay, six things:
1) I ran the Nude Olympics completely sober after being unintentionally shamed into it by my drunk friends (shown here).
2) I have saved every single letter, note, and card given to me by anyone ever, since high school. The last time I systematically looked through the collection was when I was living in Florida back in 1995. I'm afraid to read them all now. I'm more afraid to throw them all away.
3) Bananas are perhaps the only "mainstream" food that I can't abide. The smell nauseates me.
4) The first LP I ever owned was Culture Club's "Colour By Numbers". The first cassette I ever owned was Prince's "Purple Rain". The first CD I ever owned was A-Ha's "Hunting High And Low". I can't recall the first mp3 I ever had.
5) I miss Snapple Moon. That flavor was awesome.
6) I taught myself to play the accordion for a band I was in back in 1990. I'm having less success teaching myself to play the ukulele now.
It was harder to come up with six things than I thought. Let's see if Maya, Carolyn, and Kristine have an easier time. You too, Doug, although you need to answer in haiku form.
(And of course, all you LJ friends can give it a shot if you'd like. I just wanted to shout out to some non-LJ folks...)
Tags: meme
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02:04 pm
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ScanCafe
When I build my time machine, I am going to travel back to meet my teenage self and, after presenting him with a 1985-2005 Sports Almanac, I will order him to take more photographs. He might think I'm a bit loony; after all, he thinks he takes plenty of pictures as it is, and film and developing ain't cheap.
(Objectively, I can't say I've been a photography slacker: between getting my first 35mm camera for Christmas 1987 and getting my first digital camera for Christmas 2004, I had built up quite a considerable photo collection; I've estimated it to be about 8,000 pictures in those 17 years. But considering that I've taken about 8,000 digital photographs in the subsequent 3 years, I'm fine with subjectively calling my younger self a slacker.)
So I'll insist: four photos at my friend's prom just isn't enough, not twenty years later. What of the after-party? Nothing. Breakfast on the beach? Zip. Friends' graduation parties? Nada. And that's just one week of one year back in 1988. The photo opportunities I've missed overall can fill many bookshelves' worth of albums.
Back to the present.... Ever since joining (and being completely sucked into) Flickr, I had been wishing for a way to easily digitize those thousands of photos hidden away in my house, thus having my entire collection sorted and organized and backed up in one safe place. I thought about scanning all my photos one-by-one, but that would have been time-consuming. I thought about buying a negative scanner - scans from negatives give much better quality than scans from prints - but that would have been even more time-consuming. I thought about finding a service online that would do the work for me, but everywhere I looked was charging about $1.50 to $2.00 a picture - fine for a few important shots, not so fine for archiving a couple thousand.
So I was stuck - until a friend of mine told me about ScanCafe. Send them your negatives or color slides, wait about 8 to 10 weeks, and they'll send you back a disk full of high-resolution digital scans (along with your original negatives and slides). Opening the box was like Christmas all over again. And the best part is that they charge only 19 cents a scan. It's ten shades of awesome. Anyone with old photos moldering away in boxes and albums owes it to themselves to give ScanCafe a try. (I probably sound like a commercial, but really, I'm not a paid actor.)
Thanks to them, I now have all my photos (well, all the ones I could find the negatives to) from 1988 through 1991 digitized: 1,521 photos, which I hope to have uploaded to Flickr soon enough (check this link often to see my progress). And of course I'll soon be sending away a few more years' worth of negatives...
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05:40 pm
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The Home Stretch
After nearly two months of guests - Sue's cousin had been living with us since early November, and then we had about two weeks of hosting relatives over Christmas, then a surprise visit from greenexecutive - everyone's gone and we finally have our house to ourselves! And it'll stay that way for about ten weeks now. I'd like to relax and enjoy our last bit of time alone, but there's so much to do. As I suspected, not much baby-related got done in November or December, so it's finally time to knuckle down, rearrange furniture in at least four rooms on three floors, paint and clean and shop and make room and be as social as possible before March. I think I need to take my 12 weeks off starting now.
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02:45 pm
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The Seventh Day Of Christmas
Happy New Year, everyone!
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05:17 pm
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December
December 2007 - Sorry, not very inspired recently. Plus Facebooking and Flickring take up time that could be spent LiveJournaling.
How's my December been? Same as lots of people's: presents, cards, decorating, preparing for an onslaught of family. Weather's getting colder, Sue's getting pregnanter. Only thirty or so years until I can retire. I'd love to retire now, only we have to start saving for college...
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04:44 pm
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Babymoon
Peter Island, British Virgin Islands, November 18, 2007 - Peter Island totally lived up to its name. It was incredible. Obviously, one expects awesomeness from a luxury Caribbean resort, but what makes Peter Island truly special is that its a private island. There are about 50 rooms spread out over one corner of the island, and that's it. So there's no fighting crowds; you practically have the beautiful beach or pool or spa or sunset or windsurfing equipment to yourself. We were a bit apprehensive before going, thinking that we'd be bored before the four days was up, but after four days, we were wishing we had four more weeks.
We had never heard the term "babymoon" before, but apparently, that's what we were doing - one last big vacation before the baby comes and makes it harder to go on vacations like this. Not impossible, just harder. No matter how much people say they love their babies, nobody ever says they make life easier. Then again, everyone told us to expect Sue to get tired and moody and sick, and she's been none of that. So what does everyone know, right?
(PS - See the photos!)
Tags: peter island, vacation, virgin islands
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05:26 pm
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Big Ass Fan
British Virgin Islands, November 21, 2007 - While the service at the Beef Island airport leaves a LOT to be desired (seriously, did they search the entire West Indies to find the slowest and least friendly people they could find to work there?) you gotta hand it to the person in charge of buying the huge and cool-looking ceiling fans, which do a good job of cooling you down as you're waiting and waiting (and waiting) on line. Then looking up and seeing that the big-ass fans were actually made by a company called Big Ass Fans, well that can't help put a smile on your face!
Tags: vacation, virgin islands
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08:47 am
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My Island!
Peter Island, BVI, November 18, 2007 - Is it really so odd to be online while on a beautiful tropical vacation at an awesome private-island resort? The computer room is in a beautiful glass-walled hut overlooking the pool, so it's really no different than sitting by the pool reading...
Yesterday morning was my first time ever windsurfing. The guy at the watersports hut gave me a couple minutes of pointers on the beach, then a couple more minutes of shouting instructions from the shore while I floundered around (it was harder on the legs than I expected), but I did eventually get some sort of idea of what to do. After a few hours, I was good enough at getting up, going around, turning around (not very gracefully), and going back, although not really ever to a place where I intended to go. But at least I didn't end up flying out-of-control across the channel to Virgin Gorda or Venezuela...
(Today I'm not even that sore, which might be due to my first-ever massage yesterday afternoon!)
Tags: peter island, vacation, virgin islands
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10:14 am
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Shredding
Home, November 7, 2007 - So we have until March to make as much room as possible for a new baby. You'd think that, living as we do in a four-bedroom townhouse with a finished basement and finished attic, plus garage, we'd have plenty of room already, but anyone who lives anywhere knows that it's easy for the amount of stuff one has to expand to fill the amount of space one has. Combine that propensity of stuff to act like a gas with our house's 1920s-style tiny closets and my pack-rat tendencies, and we have a huge job on our hands.
We started off well, giving away loads of stuff by sticking it all out on the sidewalk with labels reading "free". I suspected that much of what we put out there would eventually be taken, but I was wrong: it turns out that everything we put out was quickly taken. Often within minutes. I started by leaving out an old printer, an old rusty hoe, an old three-way lamp that only worked one way, and an old snow shovel that didn't work well. Before I brought anything else out, they were all gone. I'd like to think that they were all taken by one lucky guy who happened to need a printer, lamp, hoe, and snow shovel that very day and just happened to walk by at exactly the right time, but I'll never know for sure.
We also came across old tax forms (from as early as 1993!) and receipts and other stuff that couldn't really be given away, so off to the shredder it all went, along with a bunch of other stuff that didn't exactly need shredding, but hey, I was on a roll, and shredding is kind of fun. Five 33-gallon bags of shredded paper later (plus two bags of magazines and brochures that wouldn't fit in the shredder) (all to be put out with the recycling, of course), I still have crates of papers to go through. With three free days between now and Christmas (how is it Thanksgiving next week already?) I suspect that's just not getting done anytime soon.
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05:38 pm
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Halloween In The Hamptons
Sag Harbor, New York, October 28, 2007 - In both 2005 and 2006 I had classes at NYU on Halloween night, which made for the perfect excuse to go see the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade. (It's too crowded to actually see the parade, but the crowds of costumed spectators are a parade enough.) This year I stayed home and therefore, sadly, got no pictures.
However, I did take photos at a Halloween Parade that we accidentally encountered while driving around the Hamptons the day after my high school reunion. When we pulled into Sag Harbor, the town was full of kids (and some parents) dressed up in much better costumes than we remember when we were young. Turns out they were getting ready for a parade down Main Street, which ended up blocking our car in and making escape impossible. Not that we needed to escape: the weather was great, and the parade was one of those cheery small-town affairs that made us want to find the nearest real estate office and move in immediately to the very first house they showed us.
But the commute would have been crazy, so instead we simply drove home that night. Sigh, maybe some day...
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02:57 pm
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Westhampton Beach High School 20th Reunion
Westhampton Beach, New York, October 27, 2007 - When we were planning our 20th high school reunion this past spring, someone objected to the idea of using Evite instead of good old fashioned paper invitations. Most people our age aren't tech-savvy enough to deal with that, he said. Nonsense, I responded, and I did my best to promote the reunion via Evite, Facebook, Classmates, website, and multiple emails via email-list and directly.
Only about 25 of our 230 classmates showed up to the reunion this past weekend.
Turns out he was right; I had lots of people tell me that they never received an invitation (meaning a paper invitation) even after I know they read the evite, and I have a feeling that some people just ignore emails altogether. And forget trying to explain Facebook to most people over the age of 35. I'd bet that the class of 1997 doesn't have such problems.
Still, it was great fun. 25 seemed to be a good number, actually. As it was, I feel like I didn't have enough time to talk to as many people as I wanted to. It would have been even harder if there were 100 of us. Someone asked me if many of my friends came back; yes, some did, but it didn't seem to matter. Everyone there felt like good old friends.
Sue and I were part of the distinct minority who didn't have kids yet. And how: not only did some of my classmates have kids who've graduated from high school already, but at least two are grandmothers! Yikes. I might not even be a grandparent at my 50th.
(Photos of the reunion can be found here. Of course, if you didn't go to high school with me, you probably won't find the photos very interesting at all. But you're welcome to look at them anyway...)
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03:37 pm
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Taco Tour
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