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Mom and dad came to visit this weekend. All in all, a good visit, I think. It was nice to see them and really it was much sooner than I had expected to see anyone. Sure, Shawn popped in a couple weeks back, but he's so random that I wouldn't be surprised if he showed up on the moon.

I have realized something: for all of our non-going-outness, we don't really spend much time in our apartment. On Friday and Saturday the weather was mostly rainy (finally clearing up Saturday night) and though we attempted to keep up our usual routines with mom and dad in tow, it was harder than I expected, and even harder to remain at our house. Its not like we don't hang out here...but we just generally don't hang out much at all. We're running to the store for this or that, picking up or dropping off laundry, dry cleaning, groceries, taking Felix to the park, fixing Felix breakfast/lunch/dinner/snack and or same for ourselves...it was having other people around while we were doing a scaled back version of this that made me sort of see it from outside of myself. I don't know what their actual impression was, but I imagine that my parents must think we do nothing but run around the neighborhood and wash dishes all day long, pausing only to make cross-country forays into the park. But, in a sense, that IS what we do on the weekends because that's when we have time for it. All week long there is only time for one or two things and then its dinner, bath time, dishes, bed time. But when I'm not so self conscious about it the cooking and cleaning and everything just blends in with the breathing and trips to the park so it doesn't feel like we're doing so much more. I dunno...

My advice if you are going to visit us or people like us (meaning New Yorkers with small apartments and young children) and you are not going to get a hotel or motel room (or even if you do get a room somewhere) that magically provides free car-service to anywhere, is to start training early (as if you were training for a marathon, seriously...we walk a lot around here and we don't even think twice about it, another thing that became blatantly obvious to me once mom and dad got here), make sure you have comfortable shoes, appropriate rain gear, and arrive with only as much stuff as you feel comfortable carrying for a whole day (not that you'll have to, just that its a good way to judge your level of packing...and you never know, you might have to, especially if you do get a room somewhere). Also, since we have a relatively small apartment, we don't have much in the way of guest accommodations. The most luxurious thing we have is our couch which folds down into a slightly less-than full-sized bed, but only considered luxurious in so far as it is slightly less firm than the wood floor. We have a queen-sized air mattress but...well...nobody in their right mind considers that a preferable accommodation. I guess you could say that whatever you would do to pack for backpack camping would go a long way towards preparing you to visit people in New York. And besides, you won't be here long enough to have spare time to fritter away with solitaire or emails or whatnots. if you get a break, like the baby is sleeping, you take full advantage and take a shower, run to the coffee shop, or maybe just sit on the couch and take a nap because the only time you KNOW you will get to do that again is the next time you happen to put the baby down for a nap, which is a whole week away since someone else does that for you while you are at work.

What I'm saying is that to really get the mosy our of visiting new yorkers is to be like a new yorker; crafty, calculating, flexible, and relatively fit. The reason why there are double-decker buses driving all around the "sights" in Manhattan is NOT because you couldn't possibly see them all without driving from one to the next, not the case at all. Its because it would otherwise involve a lot of planning, plotting, and above all, walking. Now, we didn't do any sight seeing with my folks and from my previous paragraphs you should be able to understand why. I don't think we could have done it if we wanted to.

Andrea came to New York four years ago and has, in her heart, been a new yorker ever since. I feel like I was a closet new yorker as well. Finally, I'm somewhere that things move at a more brisk pace. Everything is faster, more rapid, go go go. And I'm not one who likes pressure, but I definitely like not getting stuck behind people who are moving slow for no apparent (or even for apparent) reasons.

Case in point: Felix lived in Minneapolis for 13 months and never learned to walk. We've been in New York for two months now and he's walking, running, skipping, jumping, and climbing all manner of things. Now, I know my math may seem a little bit republican, but a little bit flawed in its reasoning, but it's truthiness math, I know it in my heart that it is right. Don't try to confuse me with facts and logic.

Well, my time is up. I need ot get to bed so I can start tomorrow anew.

Oh, and it absolutely kills me to see people wearing down jackets in 50 degree weather. I wore a thin wool sweater over my button-down shirt but I couldn't stand to have my sleeves rolled down for more than 20 minutes. That is something I hope I don't lose, my temperature control.
g'night