Highlights from the inaugural concert

We all headed down to the mall today for the concert in honor of Obama's inauguration. Overall, we've been a bit torn about how much we want to participate in the inaugural festivities. There are certain factions of our family that are quite pleased with the electoral outcome and want to celebrate. Others are more concerned about the possible crowds and inconvenience, such as people from random places parking in our driveway. But we haven't had any driveway problems (no thanks to the DC government despite the impressive armada of tow trucks that they deployed to remove cars from M Street), we haven't noticed any other inconveniences due to the inauguration despite warnings to the contrary, and we only live a 20 minute walk away from the mall, so we figured that we'd head down to the concert. We bundled up the kids, walked down to the mall, dropped the stroller at work on Constitution Ave. (because strollers were reportedly verboten), and carried the kids to see what we could see.

Which, at the end of the day, wasn't much. We ended up in the "overflow" area near the Washington Monument, where strollers would've been allowed. There were a few jumbotrons, but we couldn't make out many of the people on the screens. And we couldn't hear much at all. I found the lack of effective audio to be particularly annoying. After all, there are outdoor concerts every day - why can't I hear the deep thoughts expressed by Denzel Washington? Or Jamie Foxx? Or any of the other similarly august speakers at the event? When you combined the lack of a stroller, which necessitated chasing the boy all over the place, with the lack of effective audio and video, I eventually decided that it was best to concentrate on the crowd rather than any of the deep statements being expressed by speakers at the Lincoln Memorial.

And, I have to say, the crowd was pretty cool. An extraordinarily diverse crowd - black and white, young and old, all of whom seemed to be in a good mood. Teddy would trundle into someone leading that person to apologize profusely for getting in his way. "Not your fault," I would say, and we would get a grin or a nod of the head in response. Just a cool vibe with everyone enjoying the scene in their own way.

In the end, as I told Abby, the concert epitomized the Democratic party (and, more broadly, the left wing in the United States). An amazingly diverse group with (more or less) good intentions if you can get past the lack of organization (i.e. the poor crowd control and the bad audio and video) and the insufferable self-righteousness (i.e. the people waving political placards about torture, capitalism, poverty, etc.). As the crowd control and technological snafus suggested, it's never clear who's really in charge in the Democratic party. In the end, the diverse groups usually lead to an ideological implosion. But not this time, it would appear, as they managed to elect Obama.

And perhaps Obama will solve all of these problems in the Democratic party. Perhaps he'll managed to capitalize on the strengths of the left (e.g. diversity, tolerance, careful thought) without succumbing to its weaknesses (e.g. excessive thought and overemphasis on unrealistic or even counterproductive goals, all in the name of self-righteous "good intentions"). Currently, I'm not too optimistic. After all, he's inheriting a major pile of sh*t which, for better or worse, will likely overwhelm any other deep thoughts and good intentions that he might have. And he's got a Congress that epitomizes the worst of the Democratic party.

But I'm willing to cut the guy some slack - perhaps he can capitalize on the cool vibe that we experienced at the concert to actually accomplish something. Like I said, I'm not optimistic. But I guess that I am hopeful, which was, I suppose, the core of Obama's entire campaign.

The blowout boy

Every day, the folks at daycare send home a report with the kids. The first part of this report is a broad discussion of what the kids in a particular classroom have done up until around naptime, at which point the teachers have time to sit down at the computer to write up the report. The second part involves the minutiae of, for example, Teddy's day noting how long he napped, how much he ate, and how many and what kind of diapers he had. Most of the time, neither report is terribly interesting, although we occasionally get notices about the first time one of our kids sat up in the infant room, said a certain word, or got bloodied by a classmate. (Incidentally, I can't actually remember the dates of many of these milestones, but rest assured, we've saved the report sheets.)

Yesterday, when reading through Teddy's personal report, we noted the following details: Snack - 2 servings! Lunch - 2 servings! We've noticed that he also likes to eat at home, although he often complains at first, putting up symbolic resistance when he's given his dinner. The boy's stellar appetite has a couple of implications.

First, he's becoming a serious bruiser. While he's nowhere near as big as his cousin for a kid his age (15 months), he's clearly out of 12 month clothes and is solidly in the 18 month, and often the 2 year, clothes size (the sizing of clothes being a real random card in the infant clothing industry.) Given his Buddha belly, which is a really amusing sight when he gets ready for a bath, he'll probably pass Margaret soon in girth and possibly in weight, despite the fact that she currently towers over him.

Second, Teddy is prone to blowouts at school. Each kid has a bin in his or her cubby that holds spare clothes for use in the event of an accident. In Margaret's case, these accidents typically involve potty-training snafus, potty-training being something that we're working on, but she doesn't have quite down (particularly at home where she objects to the potty by plaintively saying, "I'm a baby girl".) Occasionally, she also has episodes of over-energetic art that necessitate a wardrobe change.

Teddy, on the other hand, is a blowout boy. We have to keep his back-up cubby well-stocked given his propensity for working through his clothes inventory. Whenever I show up after work and he trundles towards me in a one-piece bodysuit, something that we rarely use when dressing him in the morning, I always know that he's had a diaper event, and I mumble apologies to the teachers. (To be fair, he sometimes has a food event that requires a change of clothes. Such as when he dumped his tomato soup on his head a few weeks back and Ms. Dana actually had to give him a bath, which is a rare event in the Toddler I room. I was so proud.)

The teachers typically smile and brush off any concerns. Except for yesterday. In light of his yeoman's work at snack and lunch, Teddy apparently had the blowout to end all blowouts. Both of his teachers, Ms. Mary and Mr. Ty, marveled at the diaper that caused the problem. And, as noted above, they clearly recorded how much food he'd eaten beforehand. Ms. Mary was quite philosophical about the cause-and-effect associated with eating so much food. And as I told her today after school, what can I say except for "That's my boy!"

In other developments, Teddy is starting to develop his verbal skills. Which is a good thing, because he's also becoming pretty vocal in his various objections about his life. Doesn't like his food (at least initially)? Wail. Doesn't like when his sister takes his toy (and often pushes him in the process of taking it)? Wail. Doesn't like his hat or coat? Wail. Doesn't like ______ (fill in the blank)? Wail. Abby thinks that he's frustrated that he isn't effectively able to communicate what he wants. I suspect that he's just being difficult, but there's probably something to Abby's theory given that, unlike a newborn who wails at just about anything, Teddy's complaints are becoming quite focused.

So it's a good thing that he's starting to "talk." He can say "Mama" in a clearly correct context. Such as when I'm rocking him before bed and Abby walks by the bedroom door, leading him to pull out his nuk-nuk to declare "Mama." (His ability to say "Papa" or "Dada" is much less developed, although I do have to say that he fancies me at this point given how he wails when I desert him by leaving the room.) He can also mumble "nuk," something that he's becoming as attached to as his sister (although pretty soon, we'll have a cold-turkey day regarding those little devices, notwithstanding the blessed succor that they provide on car trips.) One of his first words was "spider" in the context of his favorite song "The Itsy Bitsy Spider." A couple weeks ago, we went to Safeway early on Saturday morning, and Teddy kept shouting "spider!" as we walked through the aisles. I thought it was pretty funny, but no one else could understand him. He also says "Thank you," although it sounds more like "Da doo." But he does appropriately use that phrase, such as when he's given more food, which is nice if he's to grow up to be something other than a bruiser hooligan. Another phrase in Teddy's vocabulary is "Uh oh," which is particularly important given how often he gets in trouble. Finally, he's working on "No," which is important for reasons analogous to those for "Uh oh." The nice thing about a simple word like "No" is that he can really work on the subtleties. He can sharply say "NO!" or he can drag it out: "Noooooo." At this point, one of the real joys in my life is listening to him work on verbal nuances related to the word "No" when he's been brought into bed with us at 5:00 in the morning (after having been up at 11:30, 2:00 and 4:00 as he was last night.) Yep, a pleasant, smart little guy.

Under the Table and Dreaming (or navel-gazing on New Year's Eve 2008)

Should I or shouldn't I publish this post? That's something that I've been struggling with since I wrote it back on New Year's Eve. On the one hand, no one could possibly be interested in this type of navel-gazing (to cite the title of this post). On the other hand, my dedicated readers like full access to all of my ruminations. Nay, they demand access to those ruminations. And someday I'll look back on this post and think about how young I was at 36.

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I started feeling old around 1:00 yesterday afternoon. The Philly relatives are planning to come down to D.C. for the Georgetown-UConn basketball game, but because they want to attend the womens game, which led to some initial confusion on our end, we need to pick up the tickets at the box office on campus. While the Hoya men play at the Verizon Center with tickets sold online, the women continue to play at McDonough Arena on the campus with tickets only sold on site. Incidentally, it's going to be a slaughter - UConn playing G'town in womens basketball is like the best team in the country playing a high school team. Oh well, at least we spanked them this past week in mens b-ball.

In any case, Maddie and I headed over to buy tickets yesterday after lunch. It was a stunningly sunny day as we trudged down O Street towards campus. In general, we don't spend much time west of Wisconsin Avenue in Georgetown. For one thing, it's dirtier, more crowded, and louder over there than on our side of the neighborhood with lots of students and their messy trash cans crowding the sidewalks. More importantly, I tend to get a little weirded out when walking through my old college haunts, constantly seeing carbon copies of my twenty-year-old self. Luckily, the school is on break, so Maddie and I had a peaceful, student-free walk through the campus to the box office. On that walk, we passed through the main quad, by the library, and down the road past my old dorm where I looked up and unsuccessfully tried to figure out which window was my freshman room. After finding the box office closed, we wandered back through old paths that I took numerous times during my college years, marveling at the new construction. It was simultaneously striking how much things had changed, but how much was just as I remembered it from back in the day. Maddie and I walked back home, sans tickets, with thoughts of how, at the end of college, the world is spread out before you like a blank slate just waiting for you to make your mark. Not that one has regrets, but one naturally wonders what could have happened differently with different decisions. Hell, rather than working for the Board, I could've made a mint at Lehmans and helped bring down the world. That's probably not better, but it would've been different.

Last night, a colleague of mine from work posted a playlist on his Facebook page comprised of songs that his research assistants suggested. The list included a bunch of old bands, like the Clash, but what really caught my eye was the inclusion of Joy Division. They were a late '70s punk/new wave band whose career was cut short by the suicide of their lead singer back in 1980. "Geez," I posted on John's page, "Were any of your RA's even alive when Joy Division was?" "Nope," he replied, "But you have to admire their knowledge of and enthusiasm for that era." A historical study for them, but I remember listening to Joy Division and the Clash in middle school. And listening to the old, but cool, bands like the Doors. R.E.M. was an underground, college band, while U2 had just started to break through.

Today, Abby and I took the kids to daycare where we offered Margaret the opportunity to stay home with Papa, which she declined in favor of Power Tots (her toddler gymnastics class) and Show-and-Share (her show-and-tell event at school.) I dropped Abby at work and headed out shopping to see if the stories of outrageous sales in our recession-bound economy were true. While waiting to pick Abby up afterwards, I flipped between radio stations. Q101, the "alternative rock" station from my earlier years in D.C., and 107.3, a "mix" station that plays "hits from today and yesterday." In both cases, I was struck by how many songs they played from the early '90s. Q101, which ostensibly is still a "hip" radio station, was particularly dominated by grunge and descendants of grunge. I sat there and listened to Pearl Jam ("Betterman") and Blind Melon ("No Rain"). About halfway through the latter song, I started thinking about how old the songs really are. At least 15, and perhaps almost 20, years each. In some part of my mind, I still think of these as "new" songs, but they're really no newer than the Monkees song ("Pleasant Valley Sunday") that I heard on the official "classic rock" station.

Music is an interesting thing. In some ways, it can take you back to the time when you heard the songs. Makes you feel young again, as if things haven't really changed all that much. At the same time, however, it can make you realize how far back that time actually was. So, I sat there in the car, thinking about how the "Big Chill" and "thirtysomething" were attempts to tie the Baby Boomers back to their past through music, although the Boomers are now collecting social security, and wondering about what would be the equivalent retrospective for Generation X. Perhaps it's Q101.

To celebrate New Year's Eve, we headed to First Night in Alexandria with some friends and their daughter. Although there were tons of venues with all sorts of interesting acts, we were confined to the kid-friendly shows at the Jefferson-Houston School for Arts and Academics on Cameron Street. There, Margaret got an excellent balloon ladybug from a clown and danced to Mister Don, while Teddy lumbered all over the place. The kids had a great time while we had fun hanging out with our friends and marveling at the chaos associated with kids.

During an intermission in Mister Don's kids act, we headed next door to watch a young band in the school auditorium. They had a saxophone and a violin in addition to the standard bass, guitar and drums. My initial thought was, "These guys have some sort of Dave Matthews thing going on." In fact, the second song they played was "Dancing Nancies" from the Dave Matthews cd "Under the Table and Dreaming" (hence, the title of this post.) I sang along to show Abby that it was actually a song. Looking around, I saw a middle aged woman also singing while all the teenage kids stood with blank expressions. Later, they played "Runaround" by Blues Traveler, which Margaret and I again danced around to, along with the other older folks in the room.

Upon getting home, I busted out my old Dave Matthews cd's, having been put in the mood to listen to them by the band. I was struck by two things. First, in the cd cover, the Dave Matthews Band listed a P.O. Box to join their fan club. Think about that. Although the cd was put out in 1994, that was so long ago that the internet didn't exist enough for a band to have a website. They were still using P.O. Boxes. Second, as I told Abby, I was once able to play a bitchin' version of "Satellite" on the guitar. No more, however, as my guitar skills, bitchin' or otherwise, have long since departed.

As befits an exciting New Year's Eve with kids, the night culminated with me putting in a set of early '90s cds - Live, Toad the Wet Sprocket, and the Spin Doctors in addition to Blues Traveler and the Dave Matthews Band - to revel in that music while writing this post.

On the one hand, all of this makes me feel old. I'm convinced, based on listening to Q101, that music hasn't really progressed since the mid-90s, but I suspect that's because I'm just fundamentally out of touch. And a New Year's Eve at home eating a frozen pizza, as we ended up doing, just doesn't seem that fun. While at CVS, I spotted some couples dressed to the nines, obviously heading out for exciting times. In contrast, I was paying for our frozen pizza and trying to keep Margaret from disassembling the candy rack.

At the same time, Margaret had this enormous grin on her face while prancing around to Mister Don. Unlike the other kids who tend to walk around with blank expressions, Margaret has this big grin that she puts on during such events, like she did at her Xmas pageant at school. We see it and, despite our natural parental bias, I'm sure that everyone else picks up on it as well. She just looks like she's having a blast. And everyone smiled at Teddy as he cavorted around, shaking the various musical instruments that he managed to pick up or trying to grab (and likely pop) other kids' balloons. So what if we were listening to Mister Don sing a bad version of She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain? I sang a better version on the way home in the car, and I think that Margaret appreciates my singing much more than she does that of Mister Don or anyone like him. And Margaret loved the frozen pizza. Which really is all that's important.

Another Christmas in Connecticut

We just returned from our trip to Connecticut for Christmas. The important stuff (i.e., the pictures) are included below. But the brief summary is as follows.

It snowed a lot the days before and after our arrival. Margaret and Teddy had fun in the snow, although we spent almost as much time getting them prepped and out the door as we did actually playing in the snow. Which is pretty consistent with my recollection of snow days as a kid.

Abby and I then deserted the kids for few days to head into New York City where we hung out with Eleanor. A lot of fun (esp. being sans kids), but I don't think that I could live in NYC at this point in my life. Too dirty, too crowded and too expensive. But it's a nice place to visit. Although it was cold. Damn cold.

Margaret enjoyed all of the hoopla associated with Christmas including making cookies and opening presents. In fact, she really seemed to grasp the gestalt of the whole event as it's defined on her mother's side of the family. She did get worn out by the excitement of opening presents on Christmas day with the initial excitement about opening each present eventually replaced by a desire to immediately play with each one.

Compared to last year when he was just a blob, Teddy was naturally more involved in the whole scene, but he was primarily interested in playing with the wrapping paper and, more generally, creating havoc. He's a walking disaster at this point, and I would just complement him with a "Good job, boy!" as he found something new to pound on.

Our drive back was fraught with delays as we ran into bad traffic throughout New Jersey and Maryland. But we sang Beatles songs and showtunes for the kids which kept them happy, for the most part, until they eventually fell asleep.

Merry Christmas!

Margaret took part in her first Christmas pageant today at daycare. For the past few weeks, she's blasted out tortured versions of "Jingle Bells" and "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer." Often, she has sung them while we're walking home. She has especially liked to yell "Hah, hah, hah" after the line "Used to laugh and call him names" in the Rudolph song. And she has enthusiastically yelped "Hey!" at the end of the line "One horse open sleigh" in "Jingle Bells."

People that we've passed on the street have seemed to think it's funny, especially since Margaret has been sitting in the bottom seat of the stroller lately so they haven't been able to see the source of the little voice spouting these songs until they've passed us. But it's been like a broken record for me, although it does keep her from moaning, another favorite pastime during the walk home.

In any case, Margaret was very excited about the show. Once they came out to perform and she spotted us, however, she collapsed into tears. One of those "I'm a baby girl" episodes that she's exhibited lately. It took a while to get her back with the group, but we eventually managed to do so, and she was happy enough once we did. Funny thing but, after all of the practice in the stroller and at home, Margaret appeared to forget the words when the time came to perform. She couldn't even really manage a "Hah, hah, hah" or a "Hey!" at the appropriate points. But we couldn't really fault her as all of the other kids seemed to suffer from similar stage fright.

Early Xmas photos

We got our Christmas tree over the weekend. Margaret and I decorated it while Teddy tried to pull down the ornaments until he was banished to his bed. We also tried to take some photos for our Christmas cards, but we weren't very successful, as you'll see in the photos below.

"It's just very frustrating..."

During our recent trip to Cleveland for Thanksgiving, a number of my dedicated readers admonished me for playing favorites. "He's a good boy," they said about Teddy. "Just look at him go! Even if he's getting in trouble, it's nothing personal."

Before getting into the important substance of this post, a few of notes about our trip to Cleveland. First, Abby, Teddy and I visited the "Christmas Story House" where we were photographed in front of "a major award." Frankly, the visit wasn't worth the $7.50 we each paid for admission, but I suppose that, as Abby said, we can at least say we've done it. Second, I got a number of comments, and read numerous angry columns in the Cleveland newspaper, about how the Feds refused to bail out some Cleveland bank and instead gave money to some Pittsburgh bank that was used to buy that Cleveland bank. What's funny (sic) is that a colleague of mine who spent the holiday near Youngstown got reprimanded in a similar way by his relatives. Upon returning to DC, his impression was that Ohio is a really depressed (and depressing) place. I'm not sure if I'd go that far, but some people there certainly are bitter.

In any case, back to the subject of this post. Despite the fact that I praised Margaret and slandered the boy in my last post, since our return, Margaret has repeatedly done her best to tick us off. She has become, almost overnight, incredibly petulant, often about completely trivial issues.

An example. One of her recurrent complaints involves getting an insufficient number of some food item. Margaret wants a certain number of fig newtons or olives or croutons, and so on. Specifically, she wants FIVE of whatever she's been given, and she holds up her hand, with fingers spread, to indicate how many she wants. (What's really ironic is that she often doesn't bother to check whether or not she actually has five of the relevant item.) These foods tend to appear either before dinner or as a post-dinner treat. In the former case, we'd like her to hold out for more stuff until dinner. In the latter case, how can she complain about how much dessert she's getting? But she's very adamant about needing five! So she starts to wail at which point we try to explain, in vain, how she can't have more. Perhaps we're being too stubborn, but it inevitably deteriorates to the point where we're threatening either to take away the food that she has (which elicits more howls) or to give her a time out in a chair or her bed (which gets a similar response.)

This type of stubbornness, often accompanied by wailing, has occurred in lots of situations since we've gotten back from Cleveland (e.g. her clothes, who dresses her, what shoes she wears and so on.) I start by trying to reason with her, often by pointing out the unimportance of the relevant issue. No luck. Then I try to ignore her or move on to something else. This occasionally works, but often doesn't (and it can be hard to ignore her as she dials up her crying.) Next, I move on to arguments about how things could be worse, noting how unpleasant she's being. Again, no luck. We eventually escalate to the point where I start making threats (e.g. time out in bed, food taken away.) At that point, we're done. She's howling, I'm completely pissed off, and no one is being very rational anymore.

A few months ago, a neighbor across the street dropped off a few books about toddler behavior problems. In the past, I haven't been too keen on consulting those types of books. They tend to involve impractical advice that, frankly, doesn't apply to my perfect little daughter. And, in any case, my parenting skills are such that I can deal with any problems that arise. Tonight, however, after Margaret basically missed dinner due to a completely pointless meltdown about how many croutons she had, I told Abby, "You know, we may want to take a look at those books that Donna gave us." It would appear that the terrible twos have made a belated appearance at our house. To illustrate that it's not just me, Abby later commented, after recovering Margaret from a time out in her bed, "It's just very frustrating..."

As for the boy, he's been getting up at 4:30 in the morning lately which isn't ideal, but at least he goes back to sleep once we bring him into bed with us. And he's displaying a good sense of humor and good belly laughs that are much better than the petulant wails of his sister.

Daddy's favorite

Some of my "Facebook friends" have accused me of playing favorites.

Regarding this accusation, a first point is that, yes, I have joined Facebook. Because I bitch and moan about how out of touch I am, I decided to join the preeminent social networking site and, sure enough, I am now in touch with people from high school that I haven't heard from in years. Now, I lived for almost two decades without being in touch with these people, so I'm not sure what I've gained by being a Facebook member. Perhaps I'm still just too old to appreciate the scope of Facebook.

A second point is that the Facebook commentators are probably correct, I do play favorites with Margaret receiving more attention and affection than Teddy. Margaret is simply more interesting than the boy. She can talk. She can (almost) read books. She's just very interesting to be around.

In contrast, as my last post suggests, the boy is a world of trouble. He requires constant attention to keep him from hurting himself. And he gets fussy for inexplicable reasons. Which, I think, sums up Teddy's drawbacks at this point - he simply isn't able to provide rational reasons for his various actions. He does have a charming chuckle - heh, heh, heh. And he has a funny walk, sort of like Redd Foxx from Sanford and Son. But, boy oh boy, is he a lot of work. When we visited Philly this past weekend, someone (usually Abby) had to chase Teddy around to keep him from plunging off the stairs.

In the meantime, Margaret, Andrew and I took the train into the city to see a kids' performance by the Philadelphia symphony. While she was a bit young for the show, Margaret was enthralled by the music. And she loved the train and the pizza that we had for lunch.

So I may be biased at this point, but the girl is just much more fun than the boy. I'm sure he'll come into his own, but it just gets tiresome to follow him around trying to keep him in check.

The Destructo Kid

At the end of every weekend, after spending two full days with the kids, Abby and I both think the same thing: it's good that the kids are heading to daycare tomorrow. I love the kids and all, and they're a lot of fun to have around, but good grief, they're a lot of work. I think that we both end the weekend with a renewed appreciation for the dedication of stay-at-home parents.

Lately, this sentiment has become even more pronouced due to the behavior of the boy. As I've noted before, Teddy has always been a troublemaker (or as Margaret calls him a "troublemarker.") But lately, it's gotten even more extreme. He is constantly, and I mean constantly, getting into trouble.

• Heading up the stairs. Repeatedly. He'll get about three stairs up and will sit down, grinning at us, but apparently oblivious to the predicament into which he's gotten himself.


• Getting into the dog's food container. Repeatedly. If we're not quick, he'll sample some of the dog's food. Even if we get him away from the container, he'll head right back there.


• Standing on the chairs for the kids' table. Repeatedly. He pulls himself up, stands up on the chair, and grins, again oblivous to his precarious position and the fact that it's unclear how he'll get down.

Basically, we spend all of our time chasing him around trying to keep him out of trouble. One the one hand, he does have a charming grin that he flashes at us when he's getting into trouble. But on the other hand, it's a royal pain in the arse. In contrast, when Margaret was the same age, I don't recall needing to secure the stairs by closing the child gates. With the boy, it's absolutely necessary. It's just a matter of time before he takes a header down the stairs when one of us forgets to close a gate. Even then, I'm not sure that he'll learn. Because what's really amazing is his determination. Pull him away from something or get him out of a dangerous position, and he'll head right back to the same thing.

Abby thinks that he knows when he's doing something wrong. Such as getting into the dog's food, because we always yelp at him. I'm not so sure. I think that he's either not too bright or he's a real risk-taker. People that I've discussed this with have either appealed to sexism ("he's just being a boy!") or ageism ("he's only one!"). Both are true and may have some relevance for this behavior, but when I sit there on the couch trying to read the paper, I just have to shake my head as I watch him pull a basket of books down on his head. Once upon a time, not that long ago in fact, I was able to read the Sunday paper in peace...

A belated post

I suppose that I have to start this post by explaining the lack of recent activity on the blog. Not that this post is that late, but given the political theme of my earlier posts, I suppose that my dedicated (sic) readers have been waiting for my insightful (sic) comments about the election.

Alas, illness prevented me from being more active in my recent blogging. It started with Margaret on the weekend before Halloween, then moved to Abby, and then passed to me. Margaret was knocked out for a couple of days, while Abby seemed to be ok as it wasn't clear that she was really sick until she noted that her sore throat was accompanied by a 102 degree fever. Once it hit Papa, however, around Wednesday before Halloween or so, he was in bed for 3 days straight with a sore throat, body aches, head ache, and high fever. So I suppose that we know who the tough people are in this family.

As for Halloween, Margaret was a dinosaur, while Teddy wore Margaret's pumpkin costume from the year before. We had some conflict as Margaret initially wanted to be a pumpkin again, but she ended up being happy with her dinosaur costume. I was pleased with that outcome as I'm shooting for gender neutral costumes for as long as I can so that Teddy can wear them in the future (next year: Teddy the dinosaur). Some people noted that Margaret looked more like a dragon than a dinosaur, but that didn't seem to throw her off. Instead, she collected lots of candy as part of the mayhem that occurs in our neighborhood during Halloween. Notably, she didn't appear to understand what she got from her trick-or-treating. When she got home, she spent most of her time sorting her treats by size, shape and color without actually eating any of it. By the next day, her treats were hidden away and, beyond an occasional request for her "trick or treat pumpkin," she didn't seem to miss anything. And I'm fine with that.

Here are some pics from the time around Halloween.



As for the election, we spent the evening watching the news with a bottle of wine. Early on, I texted some friends in Chicago to see if they were heading to Grant Park for the celebration. None of them were devoted enough to brave the crowd, although it turns out that my brother from Minneapolis was in Chicago and was young, idealistic and energetic enough to head down to Grant Park.



Around the time that they called Pennsylvania for Obama, I started sending texts saying "I think it's over." "Not so fast," my cautious friends replied. Then they called Ohio for Obama. "IT'S OVAH," I sent. Some agreed with me. Other's, perhaps remembering 2000, were more hesitant. Then 11:00 PM rolled around, at which point California and Washington closed, and BOOM, there it was. Done. Over. Nothing left to discuss. President Barack Obama.

And my initial reaction was subdued. Apparently, people were dancing around all over DC at that point. As a colleague who lives in DC Chinatown said, "I can't recall people being this excited about the outcome of an election." To which I responded, "Yeah, but what recent outcome would've excited people in DC? Or any other city? But think about those people in Alabama or Oklahoma. For better or worse, they're probably not dancing on cars." I thought about taking Maddie out to find some of those people dancing on cars, but decided that it was too late to do so.

My second reaction was one of panic. "Oh my god," I thought, "What have we done? We've put an incredibly inexperienced person in the most important position in the world at the worst possible time. Based on what? Hope? Change? What the hell?" My attempts to communicate this sentiment to Abby received little sympathy. After taking a few deep breaths, I realized that the next president was facing a world of sh*t no matter who he or she was, and Obama was preferable, from my point of view, to anyone else who could face that world of sh*t.

So, at the end of the day, where does that leave us? I dunno, but we did wander down to the "Obama Wall" at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial. A pretty cool scene, although I was still disturbed by the somewhat naive idealism reflected in many of the posts. At the end of the day, I signed the wall, as you can see in the following pics.



As for the big picture, Margaret sums it up better than I ever could in the following video:

Almost done

I have a colleague who lives in NoVa, part of the battleground state Virginia, whose two-year-old walks around saying "I Barack Obama and I approve this message." My colleague is a McCain supporter, but regardless, what are we doing to our kids? I suppose, when I vote with Maggie and get the "I voted" sticker that I put on her (hopefully, we'll get a few because those stickers are the key from her point of view), we're introducing them to their "civic duty."



Margaret had earlier looked through the rouges gallery of commentators in the Washington Post that gave predictions on the election. Her prescient observation: Lots of guys! Sure enough, out of 14 commentators, there were two women. Those women? Adrianna Huffington and Eleanor Clift. Double groan.