september to remember

Here we are, closing out the first month of my life as a New Yorker with another relatively great week. Everyone is adjusting to their new roles and circumstances fairly well, I think. All the wonderful goodness of working for a benefits consulting firm kicks in tomorrow (that is, excellent medical and dental and all that other stuff) for employee + family, so we can start getting out teeth cleaned, fillings and prescriptions filled, Felix can get his 15 month checkup during his 15th month (assuming we can pick out a pediatrician in that short amount of time), and life can resume without that "without a net" feeling we've been having ever since I quit my last job, the prescriptions ran out, and Felix developed a runny nose.

Felix is walking, if you hadn't heard or seen the video. Actually, he's running now too. He still prefers to knee-walk or crawl depending on the terrain, but he is quickly shifting from crawling to knee walking to walk walking quite easily. Now it appears that he chooses his ambulatory style based on the intended altitude of his hands and face. If he's in the sand or grass, he stays on his knees to move fast and quickly goes ot crawling so he can see whatever is on the ground up close. If he's coving lots of territory he will stick to his knees, drop to all fours for sudden bursts of cheetah-like speed, or rise to his feet if he wants to get or grab on to something that is above his shoulder-level or above his head. I think he still finds walking completely upright to be something of a trick or a hobby; not something that you do all the time and not when you mean business. But that is slowly changing, too. He's also become a much more avid climber, if you can imagine that. His major development today was that he rose from kneeling to standing without pushing up with his hands at all. It was all leg. Kneeling to one-leg up to crouching to standing in a relatively (I expect unconscious) fluid motion. He wobbled a little at the top but then ran off in zig-zag fashion. When this kid learns how to lean into his turns we'll need to install speed bumps and edge-guards.

I had a good work week, accomplishing a relatively major task in the time allotted and also laying the groundwork for some pretty major future changes. I still really like my job and I like the people there a lot too. I'm quickly learning the pros and cons of working in a smaller company, but luckily not a tiny company. As far as size goes, we've got a pretty sophisticated operation going, IT wise.

Andrea comes home most nights glowing with what I can only describe as job satisfaction. It is something of an alien experience for her to really like, no, love her job. She often speaks of her job as a double-whammy, "Like getting paid to get a masters, that's how much I'm learning. I get master-level critiques almost every day!!!" And this whole weekend, a gorgeous indian-summer weekend in Brooklyn, Andrea keeps falling into a mystified mantra of, "Oh my god I love our neighborhood, I don't ever want to leave here." And I agree, it is very nice. One of my little refreshers after a day of work is to take Felix for a walk up and down 7th Avenue and just window shop ro pick up some odds and ends, and just be in the neighborhood. This area absolutely teems with life, with activity, but, I don't know how to describe it so much as just "the good kind." We are all very happy to be here. I know we've made some tremendous leaps and landed on some pretty amazing (and incredibly stable) ledges on the far side, so I don't expect that our story is anything but the exception to the rule. But you know, I really doubt there's a real rule. For our set of circumstances, we probably did exactly what should have been done and had exactly what should have happened happen. Life is good.

My 32nd birthday was a non-event, and as such was probably one of my most enjoyable birthdays of late. In a way, it's nice to not have a bunch of people get together or go through so much effort because then I don't feel like anyone was put out by it and also that no one felt pressure to attend, etc. It is just another way in which the distance between here and Minnesota is more than a little freeing. I don't have to worry about organizing any events and I don't have to even consider motives for people not being able to attend. Its win-win all around.

One of these days Andrea will be emailing or posting or maybe just describing, pictures of our apartment post-unpacking.

And the odd ting is, it feels like we just got here and as if we've been here forever, all at the same time, all after 30 days.

We're all liking, if not loving, our new jobs, we're collecting paychecks, we're paying bills, and Felix finally made it through a whole night in his own bed. Here's hoping for two in a row.

And now something from home:

Brooklyn's in the house!

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

Do you want to know what's the worst thing about semi-stupid help-desk people? They do not believe that there is anything beyond the script. Well, if i can ping your cable modem, there's NO REASON you can't get on the internet. All the right lights are blinking and all of the tests that I can run come back "normal" therefore nothing is wrong. Your inability to connect to the internet must have something to do with you not being bounced around between the local and national helpdesks enough times, or not turning the damn modem and computer off and back on in just the right sequence...or something.

Grrr. I WORK with these things, been using them for a long time, and when i tell you that the modem is not working correctly, odds are, I'M RIGHT. So tomorrow I am going to bring my supposedly perfectly working cable modem into a TimeWarner location and trading it for another perfectly working cable modem, because its impossible to get these jerkoffs to come to your house.

Luckily the phantom wireless network that was in place when we moved in is still there, still unlocked, so I can connect to TimeWarner's website to find thew phone number to call up these helpless people. And of cours,e an hour later, I can post this pissed off blog.

bday

Tomorrow is #32. I am firmly established in adulthood now, it seems.

Bloggersphere

I got to introduce myself to the rest of the IT at today's staff meeting. Other points of note, we're looking at starting our own company "blog" and just "three years behind everyone else." (not my words) Heh, its a fun place. I like it.

Got email from our agent and the house situation is starting to sound a little better, just not better enough. Not yet, anyway.

Also got email from Mom, a internet junk mail about a little kid's school essay about why he believes in God. I responded back...twice. Hope it doesn't come off too snidely...I'm just a little worn out with it. Richard Dawkins may be an asshole when it comes to his rabid attacks on religion, but he makes a very good point. Why should people's religions be held in greater esteem than other aspects of their personal lives? You can joke around about all sorts of things, but don't mess with a person's religious beliefs, their convictions. Oh no, not that! Even if they believe a DIFFERENT religion, you should still respect that. Yeah? Then why not respect a woman's right to have an abortion? I don't mean her legal right, I mean her belief in it. That's just like religion. It's something she believes without any real factual basis, just something she knows because maybe someone told her and it seemed right to her. Or how about respecting a religion where the women are mutilated so as not to experience pleasure from the acts of sex? It's just as valid a religion as the rest of them, but somehow the fact that some part of it is so distasteful that it overrules the sacred protection that religion gets as part of the social contract. And don't get me started on the gays. You can honestly say, with a straight face, that you can respect Mohammed Jihadmiester's personal belief in Islam but somehow Adam and Steve are an abomination because they want to live together for the rest of their lives and keep each other company and happy, just like Merle and Edie have been doing for thousands of years? Gimme a break. Hate-crime laws and legalized gay marriage, that's the real war on terror.

I appreciate the crazy street preachers and the mad dog fundamentalists because at least with them you are allowed to view religion in the proper context.

Rock

Well, another good day at work. For both Andrea and I. As we all knew and expected, Andrea really likes her new job, her new employers, and her new home. I feel the same way. I imagine that given the opportunity, we'd both stay at our respective jobs much longer than we're expected to stay. But Felix gives us both reason to return home. I know what you're all thinking, "Don't you want to see each other?" But we don't need to go home for that. During lunch I hopped on the six and met Andrea at her new studio. We walked a few blocks away and sat on a bench and ate our sandwiches together. When she works during the day, Andrea learns something that I've known all along; you really come to look forward to and enjoy your time with your kids when you spend most of their waking hours at work. Tonight Andrea gave Felix his bath because she wanted to get more quality time with him. I usually give him his baths (not always, but more often than not) but I know what she's talking about. We've been giving him baths almost every night since his new favorite thing to do is rub his dinner into his eyes and hair. You just can't clean that up with a paper towel or a wash cloth. Doing that only cleans the surface and makes his hair start to smell like sour milk the next day.

All in all, life is good.

Mondays

Heh, not the "I hate Mondays" type of post that usually bears this type of title. In fact, I am looking forward to Monday. My first Monday at my new job. Not that Mondays are any different from any other day at the office, but for me, it is the signifier of my first complete week at work. And I hope to make some real traction on my new work load. I have ideas and I'm going to be able to work on them, for real! I asked my boss last week about current processes, etc, and he said, "My only requirement is that it works, doesn't break anything, and doesn't make it more difficult for anyone else. Otherwise, go for it...but run it by me first." Of course. But, yee-haw!

Ok ok ok. But yes, it is nice to be looking forward to going to work in the morning.

day too

So here we are on our 2nd full day of NYCitizenship. Something I have noticed is that a LOT of the people who go walking or walk their dogs in the morning wear shirts that have NYC bradning or logos of some sort or another. Makes me wonder if they are tourists who converted to residents and just never gave up their souvenir shop wardrobes or maybe these shirts are their grubby-grungy-don't-care-about-it clothes. I don't know. I just always find it strange when you are at a place and you see people wearing shirts that reference that place (unless it's supposed to be ironic). Like, there's a shop just down the street that sells nothing but Brooklyn apparel. I get it, but I imagined it is for people to gear up before going abroad, not to wear Brooklyn across their chests while actually being IN Brooklyn. You know, like the line from PCU: "You're wearing the shirt of the band to the show? Don't be that guy."

Anyway, again, the morning ritual has played itself out: Felix gets up early, gets Andrea and I up, I get dressed, pack him in the stroller, go get coffee, and off we go for our walk. I decided to not go the same way I went yesterday and explore the park more. That is on damn big park. We walked along the path the went south, then cut over to the walking path on the side of the parkway. The road slopes down and to the east, eventually bottoming out at the lake at the southern end of the park. And I mean lake, like a real lake, not like the pond at Powderhorn. We looked at the ducks then headed along another path back north up into what I expect was more the middle of the park. We came across more open areas where people were letting their dogs run. Felix was getting bored and tired (I wasn't letting him out of the stroller because the grass was still wet with dew...and I'm a little paranoid about all the dogs) so we headed back west eventually. Under a tunnel and then out the other side I could hear water rushing. It was "The Ravine" where Felix and I had walked yesterday. We came out into familiar open area and went past the dog beach, through the park, and then home. Felix was revved up at home and wanted to play. I finally got him down for a nap, at which everyone else who was awake went back to bed to try and get more sleep (except me).

Last night we put a dent in the unpacking process. We didn't unpack so much as move things around to free up a lot of the space we'd been hogging with poorly situated furniture and boxes. ALso, yesterday I put together our new bed from IKEA. Today I will finish it up by assembling the drawers that go in its base. I also assembled Andrea's desk and moved all of our various shelving units around to get them out of the way. We now seem to have some living space, and I imagine it will only get better as we get things put away. Andrea and Glen are trying to get the kitchen in order, contact papering the cabinets and drawers so we can put our flatware, dishware, and food away. I can't wait till the kitchen is up and running. There's so many options for eating out, but it really does get tiresome. It will be nice to get back to some of our standard home cooking. We need to do a grocery shopping trip, for real.

Tomorrow is my first day at my new job. I'm a little nervous, as I guess is to be expected. I mean, you interview, you talk to the people, you get a job description, etc., but you never really know what its going to be like until you get there and get started. And, of course, just like in Minneapolis, going to work will be a sort of escape from home. I'll have my morning and evening commutes, but while I'm at work, I'm not thinking of home things. It will be nice to get back to the technical side of my life. For the past weeks I've been locked in non-technical mover/builder/packer/unpacker/stacker/mechanical mode.

And I'm sure I'll be sopping up the remnants of the address fiasco for a couple more days, but all in all, things are looking pretty good. We only have a short list of things for the landlord to fix/get fixed/reimburse us for fixing. I don't know that he did much of a run-through for the previous tenants. They cleared their stuff out and they did a little paint touch up here and there but it doesn't seem that they cleaned very much. Or perhaps they just assumed we'd be repainting. But there are a few doozies, like the doorknob (or lack thereof) on the bathroom door.

nycyoulater

Well, we have made it. All of our stuff is up the 3 flights of narrow stairs and we officially "moved in". I expect we'll be unpacked in time for spring cleaning.

My dad and I drove the big yellow truck cross-country and met up with Andrea, Felix, and Glen who stayed behind to close up shop and then flew out here on Saturday. I think it is safe to say that they had the harder time of it, living without furniture or regular conveniences while trying to manage a baby and a full schedule of house cleaning. Felix came through it OK I think though he put some serious wear and tear on Glen and Andrea who were like zombies when we met them at the apartment. I had it much easier by far. My only difficulty was trying to keep my ass from going numb or my neck from getting sore during the bumpy bouncy ride, or trying to keep my armsa and legs from freezing solid from the arctic wind coming from the AC for 1200 miles. We had beds (or couches) to sleep in every night and wireless internet too. We stopped for meals at rather regular intervals, had a bag full of goodies to munch between meals. The sound system in the truck was fu so we attempted to listen to an audio book for ab out 5 minutes before giving up, same with the radio on the next day. All in all, the drive was not too bad. Dad drove day 1 and 3 and I drove day 2. I think the unloading was a lot harder than the driving, for sure. I wish we had chloroformed and packed up a couple of our truck-loading helpers. Hey, free trip to nyc.

So, with wireless internet at each evening stop I had high hopes of blogging the trip as a serial. We can all see how that ended up. The first night we got in at about 2am. That was in Toledo at grandma's house. The second night we arrived at the Days Inn in the Poconos at about 11pm, but the "wandering wifi" was so damn slow it was painful to use. We finally arrived in Park Slope at about 2pm. Our internet isn't getting installed until the 6th, but luckily someone nearby has left their wireless open with no encryption. I think it's OK for me to borrow it for the next couple days so long as we don't do anything bandwidth intensive like downloading shows. The Tea Lounge just down the street also has free wifi.

So, this morning Felix was ready to go at 7:30am. He was probably ready much sooner but I wasn't. Andrea is still trying to regain her sanity from three days of sleep deprivation. I packed Felix into his stroller and off we went in search of my Sunday morning cup of coffee. First we went to one of the gazillion little grocery markets near our house and bought some Felix necessities so we could easily feed him through out the day as well as a couple odds and ends for the rest of us. It's great having all these little markets but we need to find a bigger grocery store that offers better prices. There are a couple that are a little further away (haven't checked prices yet). The little places are great when you need something quick, but not what we should be using for daily or weekly shopping trips. Anywhoo, we loaded the groceries into the stroller and one bag around my wrist, walked for ab out 5 blocks back past our street and found as place thats open 24hrs (remember, its 7ish on a Sunday/holiday weekend) and got me a large coffee. I think it was $1.25. Not bad. Caffeine in hand, and Felix happily munching on a banana (then a nectarine), we headed on our real walk. We went back up our street, past our house, and on to Prospect Park, which is a block and a half away from us. Walking through the park, it looked like there had been some serious partyin there last night and a lot of the guests were still there! Seemed strange. Then I realized what was going on. This is Sunday before Labor Day. I'm sure that there were lots of people grilling out in the park yesterday and the people I was seeing this morning were staking their claims on the BBQ grills for today's grilling. See, grilling is only allowed in specific areas of the park. We walked on, further into the park.

Nearer the middle of the park is a huge open area with rolling berms and slopes. The park was covered in dogs. Ah, the Sunday morning dog people were out and their dogs were mostly running free. Coffees in hand, poop-baggie dispensers at the ready, the dog people of Brooklyn were letting the dogs out in force. Everyone was very well behaved. Those are the two things you see all over Park Slope: Babies in strollers and well behaved dogs. Back to the park. There is some water at the park, some ponds and streams. At one of the ponds there is a fence or gate the runs out into the water, creating a small dog beach and swimming area. Wet, well behaved, dogs.

We walked around a bit, saw some of the waterfalls Glen had mentioned yesterday, and headed home. Felix was asleep by the time we reached our front stoop and covered in nectarine pulp. I was tempted to leave him there so I could bring in the groceries but instead I just left the stroller. On my way back up with the stroller and Felix we ran into our downstairs neighbor, whose name just so happens to be Felix too. He has a daughter that I think is a little younger than our Felix. We said good morning and he said, "How was your first night in New York?" "Oh, it was OK, I think." "What about this little guy?" "You didn't hear him?" "Thick walls," he said with a big grin. I guess so. You probably only hear him crying if you are on our level or perhaps if you are outside and the window is open.

Back up in our apartment, the place is a disaster, but a sort of nicely controlled one. Everyone else is still in bed. I cleaned Felix up and after he played around for a while I was able to put him down for his nap. Finally, he's able to get a regular nap.

My dad seems to have taken well to the neighborhood. He said, "Some part of me envies you living here." "Yeah," I said, "the part that doesn;t have to carry furniture up 3 flights of stairs." Actually we weren't too rough on him. He mostly stayed in the back of the truck and handed stuff down to us, only being pulled in for heavy heavy lifting when he, Glen, and I carried the credenza up. It was heavy, but not nearly as difficult as we thought it would be. It turns out the most fearsome furniture we moved up was the queen mattress, which I had to use brute force to bend in unnatural ways to get it up the last flight of stairs. As I described it to my dad, we had to "taco" it. Never miss the opportunity to use the word taco as a verb.

So we are effectively moved in. All we need to do now is get our essentials unpacked and situated and then set about arranging and decorating, etc.

I think dad really likes it here, except for all of the walking. Apparently his hips give him trouble when he walks too far.

We are now New Yorkers. Even dad, who is an honorary New Yorker since he seems to enjoy sitting out on the stoop and watching people go by.

Today has started out fairly well.