toby's from san francisco: The truck! The truck!

Just when we were sure our furniture would get trapped in a snowdrift in Calgary, there was the giant truck, taking up 8 metered parking spaces along the side of St. Laurent, our little blue car smiling at us from the back. Our new apartment is, as toby will be the first to tell you, on top of a yogurt shop. He tells this to anyone who appears to be listening, especially people that we meet on the bus. “where do you live? I live on top of the yogurt shop”. By on top of a yogurt shop, I mean that you ascend one steep, narrow flight of stairs to put you directly above said frozen treat purveyor, then up another two flights into our apartment. If you desired, you could then go up another flight and be in our bedroom or on our deck with a view of downtown. It is a lovely view and you might consider doing this unless you are one of the men carrying our furniture and boxes up from the truck, for example, the man who at the end of the day explained that he had the steel plates holding his recently broken spine together, in which case, I suspect that you might pass on the view because your legs have already turned into jello. And in fact, just so that they don’t have to contend with that last flight of stairs, we tell them to just stack all the boxes in the vast empty area that we don’t have enough furniture to fill right now anyway. As a side note, we bought a new dining table and sofa like a week before we moved. In our San Francisco apartment, they looked enormous and so we have had weeks of fitful sleep when we imagined all the money we wasted on furniture that would be too large to even fit up the stairs, let alone fit into our new place. Of course, the new place is large enough to have swallowed our previous apartment in one gulp, and thus the sofa and table appear tiny by comparison, so in the end, I feel that was not the most productive worrying that we’ve ever done. In any event, somehow, the movers managed to get everything up the stairs unscathed and so our apartment went from empty to full of boxes to full of empty boxes and piles of paper to full of stuff that we shouldn’t have moved all the way over here but we were too frantic before the move to properly clean out our closets so now we have a huge pile of junk for goodwill to almost presentable, just requiring a few more coat hooks. and with that, we’re finally home. And ready for some yogurt.

toby's from san francisco: blandest vacation ever

The grande biblioteque is both grand and bookfilled as its name would suggest. But I am mostly just sitting sleepily watching the glass elevators shuttle up and down. Toby and jon are in the kids section reading, I assume, books about or involving or with at least one picture of lions. As with most aspects of our new life in Canada, this is actually just a form of waiting. In this particular instance, we are waiting for lunchtime. But much of the past week has been spent waiting in lines, waiting and filling out forms, trying to distract toby while waiting, waiting on wait lists, or just generally waiting. It’s a strange limbo. We went to a party last night and everyone asked how we like living here so far, and mostly we smile and respond positively that we like it very much. Because we do, or at least, we think we do, and we certainly expect to. But of course, we don’t really know, because living in a hotel and working by standing in lines isn’t really what our life will be here, in fact with any luck it isn’t what our life will be next week, when we hope that the slow moving truck with its amiable but somewhat tooth-free driver and all of our belongings pulls up at our new apartment. But until then, we live in what may b the blandest vacation ever, swimming every evening in the hotel pool (for which we purchased heavily discounted bathing suits because ours are on that slow truck) and cooking some pasta on our single functioning burner, and waiting waiting for furniture and cell phones and credit cards and bank accounts and medicare and snow. But at least right now we can stop waiting for lunch time as it has finally arrived. cheers!

toby's from san francisco: 4093 km is a lot of miles

Just a few notes for those of you who might be considering a transcontinental move to a different country, for example, from san francisco to montreal.

1) carrying cats through the metal detector is not as terrible as you might expect if perchance you are lucky enough to be holding a surprisingly limp lulington. If, on the other hand, you are holding wendy, it is full of all the clawing, scratching, and bleeding that you had previously imagined. And maybe more.

2) speaking of cats, while soft carriers are lighter, easier to fit under the seat in front of you, and keep the people at customs from asking to see your paperwork because they don’t realize those bags are full of cats, they do little to protect the cats from rambunctious 3 year olds who are also quick to forget that they are not just luggage.

3) the flight from san francisco to toronto is REALLY long if no one takes a nap.

4) 1 hour and 15 minutes may or may not be long enough to get from one airplane, through customs, to a second airplane. We don’t know the answer to this because what we did learn is that 75 minutes isn’t anywhere near to enough time to get through immigration when you are actually moving to that country, especially when the immigration computer system is mysteriously down.

4a) when the immigration computer does go down and they have to fill out your work permit form by hand, be prepared for every office that you walk in to subsequent to that to eye you suspiciously because of your strange non-standard green work permit that has been haphazardly stapled into your passport.

5) while Jon disapproves of “found” toys for hygiene regions, I feel that once you wash off that plastic dinosaur that’s been sitting in the immigration waiting room for hours or perhaps even days, it becomes your best option for occupying an antsy 3-year old while the immigration official tries to fill out your work permit paperwork by hand.

6) it’s much easier to estimate the cost of all of your belongings on the spot when the customs agent asks if you have just gone against the all the rules of importing furniture to Canada and bought a bunch of furniture immediately prior to your departure.

7) it turns out that montreal is pretty far away. And after today, it feels even farther. Fortunately, beer is here to help.

toby lives in san francisco

ok, so I have plans to describe to you in glorious detail, our new life in Montreal. but a quick digression before we start. when we last left off, apparently way back in february, we were inches away from moving to iowa. well, it turned out that iowa could kinda tell that we were not exhuberant about the prospect of being cornhuskers or hawkshuckers or cornhawkers or whatever they are there and so days before the visit that we had planned for the middle of february, they cancelled. the trip, the job offer, the whole shebang. I can't really say that we were upset exactly, it mostly just meant that they had taken away a really good bargaining chip that we had. an offer from iowa is, at minimum, better than no offer at all. in any case, shortly thereafter, although at the time it seemed like an eternity, somehow through the magic of canada, we got jobs at mcgill in montreal instead. both of us got jobs. that's one, two jobs. 100% more jobs than we have gotten anywhere else. 2 times more jobs than we've been offered before, and this time it was in a city where we would not just be willing to sit for a year or so while trying to get other, different, better jobs, but somewhere we would like to live. needless to say, we took them. fast forward 7 months, and here we are, living in montreal. anyhoo, I had planned to just pick up this blog from where we are now, and not dwell on the dark days of iowa, because I am old and lazy and can barely remember what we did yesterday let alone last july, and if I had to recall last july, well, I think we'd still be stuck with the most recent post being from last february, except that as I was working on the first post, there was a bit of a ruckus upstairs. toby had been complaining about his stomach after dinner. this happens not infrequently, but it's hard to tell if he's just eaten way to much or had too much juice or if the strange sassafrass candy from the local natural foods store is disagreeing with him or if maybe beef tartare isn't so great for three year olds. in any event, we suggested that maybe if he just went to bed, he would feel better. I then came downstairs and was clacking away on the laptop while jon offered him a nibble of an antacid. I'm sure you can see where this is leading. so moments later came the ruckus and the lovely dinner from our new neighborhood bistro was all over the blankets and floor and behold, toby felt immeasurably better. I bring all this up because after we stripped the bed and wiped down the floor, we did not hand wash those items while planning tomorrow's trip to the laundrymat, oh no, we placed them in our energy and water efficient washing machine, pushed a button and set it to work. to which I say, take that IOWA.

and just fyi, that picture is from a little trip we made to san mateo in august to escape the fog and eat some ramen. so now you're almost filled in on what we've been up to.

toby of the day: a picket fence is a secondary luxury

A week or two ago, I may have come up with a brighter side to that whole iowa thing. You see, it was a Sunday night, and toby’s stomach revolted against a) something that he ate or b) some sort of microbial invader. Whichever it was, it meant that, like a little alarm clock, every hour or so there would be some sort of explosion to let us know that time had passed. Sometimes, it wouldn’t fall on the hour, and we would naively hope that it had subsided only to find ourselves, moments later, changing clothes and mopping the floor. Toby wasn’t particularly helpful in this regard, as instead of saying “quick, get me a bucket” he would say things like “I want to lay down” or “I want some water” and so there we would be, maneuvering him through the house only to discover that his request was actually a euphemism for “I am going to puke on you again” or “stand back, I believe my diaper is about to explode.” Needless to say, over the course of a couple days, we generated an astonishing quantity of laundry. We have one washing machine in our building which, when it is not already in use and is functioning, is large enough to fit one pillow case or two pairs of toddler footie pajamas. Consequently, Jon spent the better part of Monday lugging sheet sets to and from the laundromat down the street. And that right there is the silver lining. You see, in iowa, we could afford to live in what’s known as a house. and not just any house, but the kind of house that would have it’s own washing machine. I have only once lived in such a house during my adult life, but I dream of someday living in such a magical place again. Iowa, here we come? Eh, I’m still not convinced either.

toby of the day: so long and thanks for all the fish

The simple fact is that toby likes animals. Of course, like all simple facts, this one is complicated by the particulars. Toby likes animals from a distance, a very specific distance that seems to change depending on a nonlinear combination of factors, including but not limited to the type, size, energy-level, texture and general pokiness. To determine the appropriate distance, one must see the animal from afar, then move in closer, until you get too close, then back up again, then move forward, then back up, and so on, slowly titrating until either you reach the perfect spot or the animal, usually a dog or the occasional police horse, wanders away. Every once in a while, toby will pet an animal, again usually a dog. This is best with large, old dogs because toby’s prefers to pet animals on their back about 2/3 of their length away from the head. This way, he avoids the poky and slobbery mouth area while also steering clear of the wagging tail region. Small dogs pose a problem because they tend to be too short and fast for him to manage to maneuver into this region. Similarly, puppies are troublesome because they mostly just want to lick him on the face, so as he circles around, covering his face, trying to get to their back, they circle behind him, trying to lick in between his chubby little arms. Anyway, over thanksgiving, we went to Hawaii for jon’s dad’s birthday. While there, we spent a day ‘swimming’ with dolphins. Knowing toby’s difficulty with approaching and petting animals, we tried to prepare him ahead of time, talking about how fantastic dolphins are and so on. And during the dolphin show that we watched before our swim, I think we had him convinced. They jumped in the air, let people stand on them as they swam around in circles. Toby thought they were pretty fantastic. Naturally, this was less true once we were in the water. To be fair, he managed quite valiantly. The only trouble was, he really wanted to pet the dolphin on that one spot, 2/3 of the way down it’s back. But each time the dolphin would come by, the toothy area or the tail would be too close and the magic spot would pass him by. These days, when we talk about the dolphins, there’s no mention of the dolphins he almost touched. At the same time, his strongest memory is about a statue we saw while I was changing his diaper before the dolphin show started. Apparently, the statue was terrifying. So in some respects, I guess we should be happy he doesn’t remember the swimming part, at least it means that the whole experience wasn’t all that bad, or at least is wasn’t as scary as some tacky Polynesian décor. It’s a start.

toby of the day: I spy something that begins with the letter 'C'

So for the past month or two, I’ve been thinking about making an end of the year post, the sort of post that could make up for all the spotty posting of the last few months, the sort of post that could fill you in on some of the year's highlights --toby’s first camping trip in Yosemite with 30 of our closest friends; proudest moments --toby has memorized much of the soundtrack to Dr. horrible’s sing-a-long blog and belts it from the highest point he can find, usually the cat scratching post while wearing oversized gloves and doing lots of elaborate arm movements; greatest betrayals --in conjunction with the previous section, toby spurned the hand stitched alligator costume that I made him for Halloween and instead dressed as captain hammer. Although, in truth, this really also belongs in the proudest moments section; and general craziness --our new motto is ‘Sunday is the new Friday’ because, in our pre-toby days we could drink many drinks on Friday and use Saturday to recover. We can no longer do this because toby begins screaming “mama. . .maMA!” at 7am sharp every day, even, much to our chagrin, on Saturdays when we are responsible for watching him the rest of the day which he seems to believe involves more than laying in bed watching movies on the laptop in between naps. However, if you treat Sunday as Friday, you can hand him off to the daycare Monday morning, assuming you can manage to dress him and endure the train ride, and then you have the rest of the day to treat as a Saturday, wallowing in bed and watching the likes of Point Break. I should point out that, as you might imagine, jon was a wee bit intoxicated on the Sunday afternoon when he came up with our new motto. Consequently, we haven’t yet decided whether it is the best idea we’ve ever had, or the one that will ultimately lead to our destruction, or at the least a stern reprimand from the people who sign our paychecks. So far though, I’d say it’s been a rousing success.

However, in the midst of all this, we’ve also been applying for jobs. This has been problematic for me in two respects. First, is the fact that after 45 applications, I have not gotten any jobs. While this supports my contention that I would be better off as a baker, it does not do much to boost my own morale. Second, and perhaps more troubling is that jon has gotten some jobs, well, one so far. Which is great, or would be great except that it is in a place so strange, so frightening, so unbelievable that I almost can’t bring myself to mention it. That place, of course, is iowa. It presents me with a similar dilemma as one I confronted the other day when a friend of Toby’s came down with scabies. Because scabies is such a perfectly silly yet creepy name for a disease and at the same time, at least I had thought, such a sufficiently obscure disease that you can use it whenever you need to make light of some other sickness e.g. “if you go to fred’s house, watch out for scabies! Ha ha!” Now, I have to rethink my go-to joke disease, to something like, oh I don’t know, botulism or myxomatosis. See, it’s hard to find a good replacement for scabies. Iowa had been my scabies, as in “you live in Rwanda? Wow, well, at least you’re not living in iowa, am I right?!? Ha ha!” and yet now our living there is no longer impossible. In fact, it is quickly gaining traction in the realm of things that are possible. Faster than I can say scabies. And that is very scary. Very scary indeed. You see, after half a dozen moves over my lifetime, I have finally found a home here in San Francisco which, sadly, is the one place that I cannot continue to live without jon and I both making a drastic career change. And since we’ve never really had the chance to try out the career that we’ve been practicing towards for the past 14 years, I feel like we should give that one a try. Only thing is, we very well might have to give it a try in iowa. Anyway, as you can imagine, all this thinking about my future in some cornfield has left me without much energy for writing quick witticisms. In fact, I bet that you’re feeling like this is the point in the post where I would usually change the tone, start pointing out all the bright sides to the current predicament, how living in iowa will be a great opportunity to join an older ladies bowling league or learn about the intricacies of thunder-snow or watch more television, but I’m just not there yet. Someday I might be. But not today. So until then, here are some pictures of toby, may he never come down with a case of scabies, or iowa.

toby of the day: wherein we learn about some lesser known federal statutes

Ahhh, winter, time for egg nog, sparkly lights, and evening trains full of crazy people escaping the cold. The latter is not necessarily problematic, so long as you sit quietly, minding your own business, not drawing attention to yourself. Pretty much exhibiting a range of behaviors that are almost impossible for a 2 1/2 year old. Case in point. toby has recently become a bit overenthusiastic about gloves. He likes to point at people wearing gloves and then, in a rather loud voice, discuss those gloves, what color they are, whether they look soft, whether the wearer of the gloves is male or female, how he would like to have those gloves, etc. This is not normally a problem since most people find it endearing that he is complimenting their gloves. But sometimes, well, sometimes it is a problem. For example, if you happen to get on the train and sit behind a crazy man carrying a bag full of meat who you didn't fully realize was crazy until after you sat down and that man is wearing gloves and toby happens to point a few too many times at those gloves causing the crazy man to swivel around and yell at you that pointing is a state, no, a federal offense and that you had better stop pointing or so help you and then he continues yelling at you as he and his meat move to another part of the train, only to be stared at by other passengers at which point he focuses his crazy on them and threatens to beat them up if they don't stop staring at him. Meanwhile, after being briefly stunned into silence by the yelling crazy man toby recovers and begins asking, in a voice so loud it seems like it could be heard outside the train, why is that man so angry? And of course, to be sure you know which man he’s referring to, he points at the crazy man, which causes you to whisk him up and off the train a stop early. Well, that is a time when you realize that maybe it’s time to buy a car, at least until the weather warms up again.

toby of the day: what else are you hiding in there?

When we were in Kyoto last year, toby was quite taken by a picture of a daruma on map of local sights in the lobby. So taken, in fact, that we attempted to visit the daruma shrine, only to discover that the map was apparently not created by people from earth, so not only was it considerably farther than anticipated, but even though the picture of the daruma had been one of the largest on the map, none of the people we stopped on the street had any idea that it existed. Eventually, we gave up and headed to the golden temple instead. In any case, because toby was so smitten by them, when I returned to Kyoto a month and a half later, I decided to forgo buying him his perennial favorite, a stuffed owl toy, and instead picked up a little plush daruma. I’m not sure if it’s the beady eyes or thick scowling eyebrows, but from the first moment he saw it, toby has hated that daruma. Recently, he started to play a game with it wherein he insists that it is his “friend” then proceeds to throw it down the stairs. My part in the game, from what I can tell anyway, is to insist that daruma is my friend and try to steal it back before toby hurls it over the banister. The other day, after rescuing the daruma from yet another flight down to our foyer, I hid him under my shirt. In retrospect, this was not my best idea, but at the time it was pretty amusing since Toby was completely flummoxed by this move. He searched and searched for the daruma, always returning to just stare up at me, his brow furrowed, his eyes blank and confused, while I pointed frantically at my suddenly larger belly. Eventually, I let the daruma peek out from beneath my shirt hem and something clicked in toby’s head. What I mean is that now, whenever toby comes into contact with one of my softer parts, and these days I have lots more softer parts than I used to, he will poke me in said softer part and ask “daruma’s in there?” then try to peek under my shirt. I have to say that some of these softer parts are parts that you don’t necessarily like to have a two-year old poking you in or digging through in search of his most hated stuffed toy, especially while you are, say, riding a crowded bus. But I guess so long as he doesn’t try it on anyone else (friends, strangers on the bus, first girlfriends) I can probably manage, and at least it means that the daruma, and my various softer parts, have gained a more favorable status. And perhaps best of all it has provided us with a new euphemism so that we can say things like “check out the darumas on her” and, really, who wouldn’t want to work that into their lexicon.

toby of the day: a somebody named toby

While jon and I were eating dinner the other night, toby wandered in holding what looked like chunks of colored cardboard. “Look, somebody broke this box.” Since it was a box that had been held together by duck tape, we were not particularly fazed by this news. “uh huh”. He struggled to try to fit the extra piece back onto the other two unbroken parts. “But look, this box is broken. Somebody broke it”. I replied, “Yes, I suppose so, but, you know, that’s okay”. We returned to our wine. “Mommy, look, somebody broke it. can you fix it?” I considered this for a second, whether it was even worth hunting down more duck tape to fix that old box. "You know toby, that box sure is broken, I don't think I can fix it. but, again, that's okay, it was an old box." he looked concerned. "somebody sure did break it." I waited for him to accuse someone, Jon or I or maybe the cats, when he chimed in “maybe somebody sat on it.” hmmm, maybe. “Um, Toby, did you sit on the box?” his head was down, he was still fiddling with the pieces, and his voice was distracted, innocent and perhaps even a wee bit patronizing. “yeah”. Well, I guess we solved that mystery. Up next, somebody got paint all over the floor, and it’s not who you think. Or is it?

toby of the day: I said good day!

The other night when I was putting him to sleep, toby had mostly dozed off when he suddenly bolted upright and asked “Mr. Wonka pee in the toilet?” then just as suddenly he laid back down and was snoring again. I imagine his dreaming little head to be like some crazy editing room where all sorts of gibberish gets spliced together in a manner a thousand times more nonsensical than what I wake up remembering these days. Which I have to say makes me a little jealous. For example, I recently dreamt that I was hanging out with Ewan McGregor talking about how my hand felt like it was asleep at which point I awoke to find that my hand was, in fact, asleep and then I lay awake for a while, feeling vaguely disappointed since dreaming about my hand being asleep because it was actually asleep was sort of a waste of a dream involving Ewan McGregor, you know what I mean? In any case, with regard to toby’s dreaming, the answer to your first question is that toby is obsessed with the classic willy wonka and the chocolate factory movie not the more recent, although also enjoyable, tim burton remake. It started with an interest in the oompa loompa songs, but has spiraled into an addiction to much of the film and often results in him singing various songs and reciting bits and pieces of it, especially this scene. I have to say it’s a bit unnerving when your two year old is constantly walking around shouting “good day, sir!” or “it’s all there, black and white, clear as crystal!” in his grumpiest, most Gene Wilderesque voice. The answer to your second question is that toby does sometimes pee in the toilet himself, although not frequently enough that we can imagine a diaper free lifestyle anytime in the near future. And as far as toby’s question, well, if you have any insight just let us know.

toby of the day: our summer vacation

Toby has not flown on an airplane since we came back from japan last October. That flight, described in detail here, was sufficiently awful to swear us off of flying with Toby forever. And by forever I of course mean 10 months. Historically, Jon and I have tended to take elaborate trips, and like a couple of heroin addicts we usually rationalize those trips by telling ourselves that this will be it, after this we’re staying home, only to get antsy after a month or two and suddenly we’re on the interweb buying tickets to Thailand. So for us, 10 months is kind of like forever. Sure, during those 10 months, Jon and I traveled a bit for work, I went back to Japan, and jon and I both went to bochum germany, which jon described as the scranton of germany, mostly because to call it the detroit of germany would make it seem too cosmopolitan. But those were definitely trips for work, and so by june, we were crawling out of our skin at having remained so sedentary. Because, really, while Germany in January might be many things, it is not Thailand. I realize of course that Seattle is also not Thailand, but I would point out that it is also not scranton. And it’s only 2 hours away. And has some really nice hotels. So recently, we braved the skies again with toby in tow, as well as our friends ed and michelle and their 5 month old son milo. Here’s a little summary of our trip.

Thursday: car to airplane to car to hotel. Toby liked the airplane, if only because we spent most of the 90 minutes stuffing him full of dried fruits to keep his ears clear. We ate lunch, and toasted the start of our vacation with some tasty beer. Then toby and I made some vague attempts at napping while jon slept like a hibernating bear. Then dinner at a brewpub down the street where our waitress managed to create toby a fruit bowl filled with fruits she snuck out of the bar and off the dessert plates. Those seattle folk sure are friendly.

Friday we spent the morning gawking at other gawkers at the fish market. Toby found the market to be somewhat uninteresting until we discovered the construction they were doing behind the fish market involving a number of digging trucks and a crane. I believe if we had offered to just leave him there with a sleeping bag and a handful of dried cherries, he would have been set for the rest of the trip. But we didn’t and instead we packed him up and headed to the space needle. At the bottom of the needle is a little amusement park, full of cleaner than average carnies and even what toby called a “big train” otherwise known as a roller coaster. In truth, it was one of the smaller roller coasters I’ve seen, but you wouldn’t have guessed that based on the squeals of the preteen boys riding in the front car. Toby was too short to ride, so we headed over to the carousel which toby called the “scary horse”. Given such a name, as you might imagine, we didn’t make it onto the carousel. But, we did which make it onto a flying elephant and dragon ride, called dumbo and puff, I guess to avoid copyright issues associated with rides that only include flying elephant. It was a successful ride in that I did not get dizzy, and toby thought it was the greatest thing since tiny rocks. Then we went up the space needle. Then we came down. Then lunch. Then toby surreptitiously vomited lunch all over his pants, so he and I caught a bus back to the hotel. The bus was full of physicists wearing fezzes. Toby was blissfully sleeping in my lap or I would have followed them. Then we did some other stuff which I can’t remember because it was not yesterday, but it can’t be as interesting as the physicists in fezzes, right, so really, what does it matter?

We started Saturday with a leisurely brunch. Afterwards, hopped up on pancakes, toby tried to break into the museum of mysterious things because he desperately wanted to hug the stuffed yeti sitting in the stairwell. Unfortunately, the
most mysterious part of the museum was the fact that it was not open even though according to the hours it should have been. After that we worked our way over to the sculpture garden. There, jon overheated and insisted that we find a cool spot with beer before he passed out because it was easily 85 degrees out. So we were working our way back toward our hotel, searching for beer on the way, when we ran across some very helpful people holding what might be described as an outdoor informational seminar. Their gathering might also be called an anti-gay protest held by religious wackos. but that difference is mostly semantic. in any case, one woman in particular wanted very much to let milo and toby know about appropriate versus inappropriate places to put an erection. While her list was a little sparse, she was surprisingly detailed about the few places that she did include, and quite loud. Whereas I, with my prudish nature and all, would be a little embarrassed to be standing on a street corner yelling at passing children and families waiting to cross the street about erections and rectums, she seemed to find it completely natural. Unfortunately, both milo and toby were asleep at the time, so they missed out on her wealth of information. And while someday I may remember to counsel toby on things I might avoid were I to have an erection (sharp objects, paris hilton), I worry that now he may never know this woman’s useful tips. At least I can only hope. After our run in with the zealots, we finally found some beer and toby and milo awoke and ate snacks. Then Jon and I went to dinner by ourselves where we tried to come up with something to talk about other than toby while toby hung out with ed, michelle and milo and introduced them to a range of youtube videos that I can only assume they never imagined existed. Like this one. And maybe this one. Then we came home, and we all went to sleep.

On Sunday I picked everyone up in our zipcar minivan and we headed onto a ferry over to Bainbridge island. Toby enjoyed the ferry and jon and I only briefly discussed a rescue plan for what we would do if he jumped from my arms and fell in. We spent a few minutes trying to reach the front of the boat where the wind was very strong. At this particular moment, I have difficulty envisioning a time when we will ever encounter wind again and toby will not say ‘remember the boat? Windy!’ but I’m sure if you ask me in 6 months, he won’t be saying that and I’ll just stare at you blankly having forgotten about this episode entirely. In any case, the ferry docked and we drove for a couple hours to port townsend where we ate at a brewpub then wandered around the tacky shops. Ed and michelle did not buy a hand carved wooden moose, but clearly wanted to, so if you’re looking for what to buy them for the holidays, now you know. Then we piled back in the car and returned to the ferry. We played a delightful game of “where’s Edward?” which involves asking “where’s Edward?” while lifting your hands, palms up, next to your slightly shrugged shoulders and then looking around. A similar game called “where’s Michelle” was also played. Toby is quite the expert at both games, as well as a third game called “where’s Milo?” In contrast, he is not a big fan of “where’s mama?” or “where’s daddy?”, at least not when he can play the highly superior “where’s Edward?”. We returned, rested and headed out for hip, upscale Vietnamese food suggested by our concierge. Perhaps because it was the first non-brewpub food that he had encountered for a few days, toby seemed particularly enthusiastic about dinner, and even voluntarily ate some carrots. Our waitstaff was not as enthusiastic, and appeared rather perplexed by the presence of two patrons under 2 (and 4 patrons over 30). I think we were not really their demographic. But the food was delicious.

Toby and I spent our last morning touring the library across the street from our hotel. It’s awesome. We spent much of our time at the children’s section, which was bustling with playgroups. While most of them seemed entirely reasonable and cohesive, there was one special one. It was kind of like when you assemble a Swedish desk and are left with a perfectly functional piece of furniture and a whole bunch of screws and strange plastic bits that just don’t fit together at all. These women were those screws. Their leader was patronizing and bossy and did a surprising amount of yelling for someone in a library. Below her was a moneyed grand dame, mostly interested in where they were going to go for tea. and at the bottom was a flustered woman who seemed unable to stand up to her 3 year old, let alone the playgroup leader. I would describe their children, but I can only assume they had snuck out of the library to find themselves good therapist because I never saw them. Toby didn’t either because he was busy reading about dinosaurs. After the library, we took a little stroll, had our last lunch of bar food and beer and headed back to the protective san francisco fog. The flight home was a breeze. Next stop: indonesia.

toby of the day: an excuse to use the word dapper

Remember the scene in Cinderella, where the forest animals have spent the day collecting junk around the house to put together a dress. And so Cinderella gets gussied up and wanders downstairs and her ugly stepsisters proceed to tear the dress apart. well, the other day I was trying on my favorite dress in preparation for a wedding we were attending. It’s a royal blue, silk Chinese dress that jon bought for me when we were first dating. I’ve worn it once, to a dinner in boston where I managed to cover the front with wine and duck. Since then jon has refused to let me wear it. Apparently, even though I cannot see the stains (the dress has little tolerance for such grandiose movements as, say, looking at your chest so when I try to look down at them a bunch of snaps bust open on the shoulder) he can see nothing but the stains. But I figured this could be my chance to wear it again, because no one would bat an eyelash at the fact that a woman holding a two year old had stains on her dress. So I was trying on the dress, mostly to see if I would be able to chase that two year old around when I was unable to breathe, bend over, or separate my feet more than 8 inches. But it turned out that the chasing part wasn't much of an issue, because toby immediately turned into one of those wicked stepsisters, screaming “noooooooo! take it off! take it ooooooffffffff” while clutching at the fabric and yanking with all his might. Fortunately, his might is not as strong as Chinese silk, so the dress remained intact. But it did mean that I had to hunt down something else to wear at the last minute, or find myself some forest animals willing to make me one, since having your clothes torn off by a small screaming child is often frowned upon at weddings, even weddings held in Berkeley. And while that would have made for some exciting photos, you’ll have to settle for these of toby looking quite dapper in a sweater vest.

toby of the day, great day for seals

Toby likes the beach. I like the beach. Jon, well, Jon does not like the beach. I think it’s the sand, and how it’s all sandy, and as I’ve written previously, the beaches here are a little chilly, so while at other beaches you can rinse the sand off in the ocean, that’s not really an option that we have. In any case, because toby and I are beach supporters, we continually try to win Jon to our side. So recently we drove to one a little south of pacifica. It was a warm and sunny day. From the parking area, we walked past a field of wildflowers, and jon and I remarked how we should really get ourselves a car so we can do this whole nature thing more often. The sand was warm, the ocean waves big and sonorous. And as we searched for a place to settle down we discovered that the beach was, well, it was full of dead animals. The first spot where we almost tossed our blanket was apparently devoid of people because of a dead seal decaying a few feet away. And the second spot was available because of a dead seagull. But, third time is the charm, and we found ourselves a reasonably safe spot, though we suggested to toby that he might not want to dig too deep. Which turned out not to be a problem as he was far more excited about a little pool of runoff from the nearby hills, so we took turns standing in the frigid water while he splashed around. And for a brief moment, we were a happy beach-going family. But then it came time to head home. The last time toby went in the ocean was the day I forgot to pack him a change of clothes so we ended up dressing him in a sweatshirt and a nursing cover. This time, I packed him a week’s wardrobe, but forgot an extra diaper. So we dried him off, and crossed our fingers. As we quickly made our way back to the car, we peeked back over our shoulders to see the sun glistening off the ocean, a few small children splashing in the stream where toby had been playing, and, just a little ways upstream, prostrate against the bank and dangling it’s foot in the water, a dead bird. A cormorant I think. Regardless, Jon frowned. A lot. While we whisked toby home and into a diaper without incident, I think the entire day was a bit of a setback to our pro-beach propaganda. If only jon was a taxidermist or pinnipedieologist, then he might have thought it was the best day at the beach ever. although, on the other hand, I must say I feel very fortunate that I am not married to someone who gets excited about dead, decaying seals. Sigh. I guess at least he enjoyed the wildflowers.

toby of the day, his tombstone will say 'also ran'

The other day toby came home saying what sounded like “payback nick” over and over again. I can only assume that he must have made some bad bets at the track and is now in over his head. Of course, I warned him about this sort of thing, but he said he had it under control, so what can you do. I guess when they break his kneecaps that’ll teach him a lesson. Sometimes kids just have to learn the hard way.

Update: turns out he was just learning to sing 'nick nack paddywack'. it's amazing really, I had no idea that song was about bookies.

toby of the day, what's so wrong with a little green space?

In the outer sunset, it seems that the most popular landscaping style, aside from painting the concrete in front of the house green, is to surround indigenous shrubs and small plants with rocks. While I applaud this approach for its simplicity and water saving potential, it means that the 2 block walk from the train to the new daycare is like a trek through a minefield, except that instead of trying to avoid the mines, toby is collecting as many of them as he can press against his little chest and still walk. My newest strategy is to throw a rock ahead of us and convince him to race me to it. This usually works for at least a block or so to keep him on the sidewalk, and holding only a minimal quantity of rocks that he will add to our own growing rock garden at the entrance to our apartment. Then I can just carry him, albeit kicking and screaming, that last block. I guess this is why people use strollers, if nothing else it means you can transport larger rocks.

toby of the day, boys: don't cry, like trucks

The next day we continued to avoid contaminating people we know with hoof and horn disease and instead went to the beach. Ahh, what a lovely way to spend a spring afternoon you might say, probably as you imagine people in swimming trunks, warming themselves under the sun and romping in the surf. But that is not our beach. I would like to suggest that our beach is more like how you might imagine a beach in, say, Denmark. Except that I have been to a beach in Denmark, and it was hot and full of very athletic and scantily clad beach volleyball players. And again, that is not our beach. Our beach is one where I didn’t want to take off my shoes because my feet were already cold. Our beach is one where I was pretty sure the wind was going to blow off my wool hat. Sure sometimes it can be warm enough for the wearing of, say, a light sweater, when you make it there in the few hours after the sun has heated up the sand but before the fog arrives. But this was most certainly not one of those days. Consequently, Toby seemed somewhat nonplussed by our beachcombing, and was even becoming a little irritable about the wind burn on his face. That is, until we rounded a bend and snuck up on a digging truck. It turns out that Toby is boy and therefore in love with a wide range of construction vehicles, most of which he refers to as digging trucks. In this case it was a bulldozer and it was parked on one of the paths through the dunes leading off the beach. Toby tried to convince us to drive away in it, but we thought better of that suggestion, mostly because we figured it would not maneuver well in a high-speed chase. That, and we needed to get to the park chalet for a beer, and there isn’t much parking over there, especially not for a stolen bulldozer.

toby of the day, a cow says

A couple months ago we transitioned toby into his new daycare. As a special welcome, one of the children contracted hand, foot, and mouth disease which the interweb was quick to point out is in no way related to hoof and mouth disease, although we’ve had a difficult time not referring to it as that. In any case, hand foot and mouth is a pretty contagious virus similar to the chicken pox that results in small blisters on, yes you guessed it, the hands and feet, and inside the mouth of the kids that get it. The first case at the daycare was discovered on a Saturday and by midweek the following week kids were dropping like flies. Little blistered, feverish flies. Toby lasted most of the week, but by Friday, he too had a couple of blisters. Fortunately, his version never really amounted to much. Still, we tried to least avoid contaminating people that we know, so we spent Saturday morning busily infecting strangers at the farmers market. We had a close call when we ran into toby’s friend jonah and his family and I imagined having to explain myself as I slapped away jonah’s hand as he went to give toby a high five or something. But luckily toby decided to act shy, preferring to nuzzle his face into my chest, rather than run over and hug, drool on, or otherwise shower jonah with infection. Which meant we managed to escape after some brief chit-chat and quickly wandered away to wipe our hands on some heirloom lettuce.

toby of the day, that's not a lion

toby likes fruits. sure, he likes other foods too, he eats a reasonably balanced diet, full of meat, starch, tofu and the occasional vegetable. but he really likes fruits. really likes them. here we tried to capture what we mean by that. of course, as demonstration of the heisenberg uncertainty principle*, as soon as we pull out the camera, we destroy his momentum, turning him into a tame and principled fruit eater. However, by the second video, he's back on track, managing to stuff almost and entire mango into his little mouth. and just so we're clear, the place mat that he's naming animals on has been washed so many times it resembles the walls of a romanesque church in some unheard of spanish town, the kind where the murals on the wall could be paintings of saint christopher, or they could be paintings of a kangaroo wearing a tutu and a man about town hat, which admittedly has always been my preferred interpretation of those murals. in any case, it makes it all the more fun to watch toby try to decipher what's in the picture. Enjoy!

*I will point out that wikipedia tells me I should really call it the "observer effect", but that sounds lame and lacks the ironic grandiosity which I'm trying to convey, so I'm sticking with heisenberg, wikipedia be damned.

toby of the day, let's pretz!

Apparently it is traditional in japan to celebrate hanami or the arrival of spring, and the associated blooming of cherry trees, by drinking sake under those flowering trees until your necktie ends up around your head. This year we had our own hanami celebration, replete with blooming trees, sake, revelers, and even a necktie. The tie belonged to Jon and while it did not end up around his head, I believe that is only because at the end of the day he wasn’t really in any shape to figure out how to tie a tie around his head. So basically our hanami was a success. And as you can see by the video, toby also enjoyed the welcoming of spring, in particular the part where you can just stand around dancing while eating japanese snacks.