mamamusings: family

pimpin' our ride

The 3-year lease on our Subaru B9 Tribeca is up this month. Actually, it was up last month, and we had planned to extend it for another 6-12 months, but Subaru wouldn’t let us extend it for more than one month. Seems stupid…it’s not like used SUVs are flying off the lots these days, so it would have made more sense for them to let us hold onto it for a while.

So a few weeks ago we started the process of researching new cars. We had a couple of requirements—it had to be comfortable for both me (4’11”) and Gerald (5’11”) to drive, it had to have a good-sized back seat for the boys (Lane’s already 5’7”), it had to have room in the back for the dog (that ruled out sedans, despite one of the boys suggesting that she could ride in the trunk), it had to get better gas mileage than the Tribeca (not a very high bar), and it had to be affordable for us to buy rather than lease.

We test drove two cars—the Scion Xb, and the Pontiac Vibe—and liked them both. They’re both made by Toyota, and use identical 2.4 liter Camry engines, so it’s not a huge surprise that they were comparable to drive. After giving it some thinking time, we decided that since we liked them both, there was no reason not to go with the Scion, which cost $3000 less, and to add some bells and whistles to it since it would still be affordable.

On Monday we drove down to the Scion dealership and put a deposit down on the first new car we’ve purchased as a couple (we’ve leased some new cars, but not bought one). What we ordered was an Xb in the quite elegant “Blackberry Crush” color, with an automatic transmission, built-in touchscreen navigation system, XM satellite radio, and remote engine start (we do live in the great white north, where remote start is particularly wonderful).

The car we put the deposit on is about a week away, which gives us time to get financing through the RIT credit union (much better rate than we can get through Scion).

Here’s what the car will look like, courtesy of the Scion site:

The Xb has always proudly proclaimed its boxiness and iconocastic “ugliness.” They had an ad running in the dealership listing pros and cons of the car—cons were “Boxy. Ugly. People will stare.” Pros were “Boxy. Ugly. People will stare.” :) But the earlier models of the Scion were a lot boxier and a lot uglier than the 2008 and 2009 models. They’ve softened the edges, particularly in the back, so it doesn’t look so much like a cheap delivery van. I actually rather like the new design, and I like the interior even more (especially the dedicated iPod connector that allows you to control your iPod using the touchscreen stereo).

Owner reviews of the 2009 (and 2008) model on Edmunds.com are uniformly positive, and people are consistently getting combined city/highway mileage of 26-28mpg, which is substantially higher than the Tribeca gets. (And the Tribeca requires premium fuel, which increases the operating cost even more.)

We’re excited! More on this when the car arrives in our driveway…

coming up for air

Last week, my 95-year-old grandmother suffered a series of small strokes. This week has been a bit of blur what with hospital visits, social worker conversations, research on everything from stroke rehabilitation to long-term care insurance (for me, not her…nothing like this sort of event to remind you of your own looming future) to risks of theft in nursing homes, covering classes for my mother, and trying to manage my own full-time job and family responsibilities.

Today they moved grandma to the rehab floor of the nursing home associated with her assisted living facility. They’re not terribly optimistic about her being able to go back to the assisted living facility, but we’re going to hold onto her room there for another month just in case she proves them wrong (it wouldn’t be the first time she’s surprised us). The nursing home (sorry, “skilled nursing facility”) is considered one of the best in the area, but it still depresses me terribly every time I walk through the door.

Tomorrow, at least, I have no classes to teach, and few meetings to attend. There will be time to sleep a little later, take the dog for the long walks she’s been missing this week, and maybe even eat some healthy food. I feel better just thinking about it.

(And mom, if you’re reading this, you’re an angel. What I’ve done this week is nothing compared to what you’ve been doing. Grandma’s so lucky to have you.)

morgan settles in

After a few days of mild chaos, Morgan is definitely settling into the household. We had a couple of scares with her slipping her collars…the first time she got loose in the neighborhood, and it took 15 minutes to chase her down and lure her back to the car with treats. The third collar we tried was a Gentle Leader head collar, and that seems to be the winner. She hasn’t figured out a way to get it off, but it works wonderfully at controlling pulling, lunging, and jumping.

She’s sleeping beautifully through the night in the crate in our room, has had no problems with accidents in the house, and does really well when we let her just run in our fenced backyard. She’s still got some separation anxiety…she really really doesn’t like being left alone, even for a few minutes. But I no longer need to have her on a leash in the house, since she stays close to where we are.

We’ve arranged for the trainer I found online to come to the house tomorrow for one training session, and we’ll see how that goes. It’s starting to look as though she’s not so much aggressive with other dogs as she is excited about them, and it’s possible we may be able to try a group class.

All in all, it feels like she was really a good choice, and I’m already growing quite fond of her.

—

update, 2/3: A number of people have expressed concern about us “muzzling” her, or “strapping her mouth shut,” so I thought I’d clarify. The nose strap on the Gentle Leader does not keep her muzzle closed. She can eat, bark, yawn, and fetch a ball with it on. It acts a bit like a halter on a horse, not like a muzzle. The gentle pressure it exerts on her muzzle when she lunges or jumps, however, is a lot like the pressure that a dog pack leader would use when grasping her muzzle in his in order to exert authority.

Also, we don’t leave the nose strap on her all day. We put it on when she’s going for a walk, when someone new is coming over to the house, and when we need to work with her on training. The rest of the time we take the strap off.

update on dog/family integration

So far, so good. I completely misspoke when I said that Gerald wouldn’t want the dog in our bedroom, and he set me straight after he saw my post :) So last night we had her sleep in the crate in our room, and it was a big improvement. She settled right down and slept all night, and didn’t make any noises at all. We let her out when we got up a little before 7, and I took her outside so she could do “her business”. Taking her out was a lot less fun today, with the 24 degree temperatures and 40mph winds, so she won’t get the same long walks today that she got yesterday.

We also took her last night to get groomed at PetSmart, where they did a great job and she came out looking sleek and beautiful. She had no problem with the people there, but she barked like crazy at all of the other dogs she saw (which she also did when I took her on a long walk around our neighborhood). I know that aggression towards other dogs is a breed characteristic of chows, but I’m hoping with some obedience training we can reduce the extent to which she acts on it.

On the obedience front, I’m leaning towards having someone come to our house, even though it will be much more expensive than going to a class. Local group classes run about $100 for 8 weeks, the shelter we got her from gives us a discounted rate of $60 for 6 weeks but is a 30 min drive away, and the best deal I’ve seen for private training is a $199 for 4 sessions package. There are several big advantages to the private training, though. First, it means she won’t be surrounded by other dogs when we start out…it was really stressful for me dealing with her barking and lunging yesterday. Second, it allows everyone in the family to participate, so we’re all on the same page when it comes to interacting with her. And third, we can work around our upcoming travel schedule…none of the group classes start for at least two weeks, and I’ll be out of town for GDC in late February, and then our Bahamas cruise the first week of March.

Unfortunately, we didn’t plan on that additional expense, particularly right before we take an expensive family vacation, so we may have to wait to do the whole obedience training process until we get back in March. We’ll see.

Meanwhile, she’s definitely bonding with the family, and is affectionate, playful, and intelligent. I’m quite sure we got a dog that’s a good match for the family, but it will take a little time and patience for her to learn all the house rules.

Many thanks to those of you who’ve weighed in with public and private comments. It helps a lot to have advice from people who’ve been there and done that!

decisions, decisions

We’ve decided, after much family discussion, to adopt a dog, which is a pretty big deal!

Today Erin and Alex and I went to two animal shelters. Our original plan was to look at a pug that was at the downtown shelter, but it had just been adopted. So we headed out to the much larger suburban shelter, Lollypop Farm, to see what was there.

We looked at all the dogs, and picked three to visit with while we were there. Of those three, we narrowed it down to two. And that’s where we’re stuck—we liked them both, a lot, and couldn’t decide. The “adoption counselor” at the shelter suggested that we sleep on it and come back tomorrow, so that’s what we decided to do.

Missey is a chow/akita mix, who’s about 3 years old. She’s really sweet-tempered and mellow, and has the softest coat I’ve ever felt on a dog. The only problem with her is that she has a fractured rear leg that didn’t heal perfectly, and until we talk to the vet at the shelter tomorrow we don’t know how much long-term trouble that could potentially cause for her. It doesn’t seem to bother her at all…she trotted around the big visiting room with no limp or sign of discomfort, but the shelter would require us to consult with the vet first.

Morgan is a chow/shepherd mix who’s about 2 years old. She’s a little more energetic and playful than Missey, but not excessively so. She liked playing fetch with a tennis ball, and understood the sit command (which was very encouraging).

So, we’ll go back tomorrow, with Lane (and possibly Gerald) along to make the final decision. I’m excited. :)

our beautiful new living and dining rooms

We’ve lived in our current house for a little over ten years, and during that time we did basically nothing to the living and/or dining rooms. Until last month they still had the same icky beige carpet and white walls that they had when we arrived.

But at the beginning of November, we started a grand project to transform the space. We took out the old carpet (by “we” I mean “Gerald and Erin,” actually), had new bamboo floors installed, painted the walls a rich dark red color, had some of my photographs printed on canvas to hang on the wall, bought new lamps, purchased the Sony Bravia XBR4 46” LCD HDTV from Amazon, and rearranged the furniture layout.

The results? Spectacular.

It’s been lovely to be home on break and able to hang out in the new space and really enjoy it!

(For those who care, there are more photos on Flickr.)

conquering clutter

Is 45 too old to change a lifelong bad habit? I’m going to try to find that out this year, because I’m really, really tired of being surrounded by clutter. It’s what happens when two people who are packrats (“we might need this someday!”) live together for more than a decade.

As I sit here this morning, enjoying a rare moment of complete peace and quiet in the house (everyone else is sleeping late), I’m realizing that I’m not able to really enjoy this little oasis of calm because of the stuff all around me…colored pencils on the floor from Alex’s homework, two days of newspaper on the coffee table, covering up remote controls and ipods and flyers from the middle school, a backpack spilling its contents out onto an ottoman, cables CDs and yarn jostling for space on the end table. There’s nothing even resembling a clean surface anywhere around.
I picked up a book yesterday called It’s All Too Much, and I really like it. It starts with a discussion of why you’ve got the clutter, and about the relationships we have to our “stuff” and how that negatively impacts our quality of life. Then it outlines what looks like a manageable approach to paring down the amount of stuff you’re holding onto.

In June, when I was living by myself in a furnished apartment with only the suitcase of clothes that I’d brought, it was easy to keep things clear, and I really enjoyed it. When I walked in the door after work, the space felt welcoming and relaxing rather than overwhelming. I want to get that feeling back, and I know it’s going to take a huge amount of work and mental retraining (for all of us) to accomplish that.

things we're grateful for this week

• It was only his wrists, not his head or his spine
• We have great health insurance
• Gerald had the foresight to buy trip insurance for the cruise
• Microsoft is generously covering the change fees for us to fly home Sunday
• We have amazing friends and neighbors
• Erin is the best sister/daughter ever, with the patience of a saint

coping mechanisms for two broken wrists?

So, it’s starting to sink in for Lane just how helpless the two casts are going to make him, and that’s really tough for him. Any practical suggestions from my readership as to how to help him be as self-sufficient as possible, even with one incapacitated arm and one that has a cast from below the elbow beyond the wrist?

entrepreneurial ideas for teens?

Lane has decided that he wants to spend the summer earning money, but he’s unenthusiastic about lawn mowing and babysitting as income generating activities. Instead, he’d like to find a way to leverage his not inconsiderable computing skills into moneymaking.

I’d love suggestions from readers about options he could explore. His skills include 3D modeling, Second Life construction and programming (in the teen grid, but it uses the same language and modeling tools as the main grid), digital music conversion, blogging, podcasting, and video editing. (I’m sure I’m missing things, but perhaps he’ll read this and tell me what to add. :)

summer plans

Because I’m tired of explaining this to people. Now I can just point them here. :)

This summer, our family’s travel schedule is pretty complex. Here’s what we’re going to do.

June 2, I fly to Seattle, and Gerald will come with me for just the weekend. He’ll head back home to be with the boys on the 5th, and will stay in Rochester with both of them until school ends on June 22nd.

When school is out, Gerald and Lane will fly to Seattle to join me, and Alex will stay in Rochester, splitting his time between my mom and Erin (who’ll stay in the house all summer).

In late July, Gerald will fly home with Lane, pick up Alex, and fly back to Seattle. Alex will stay with us there ‘til I finish up at Microsoft Research on August 17th.

Then we’re planning to head out on an Alaska cruise for a week before returning home.

That means the boys each get four weeks with me and Gerald in Seattle, and four weeks in Rochester without us (but with Grandma and Erin). They’ll each get a chance to be an only child for a while, and everyone gets spared the sibling rivalry for eight weeks.

The down side is that I won’t see Alex for nearly two months—so I may have to take a quick trip back to Rochester somewhere in there to get my fix. :)

time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping...

Holy moly, how did it get to be mid-May already??

My older son turned thirteen yesterday, which means I’m now the parent of a teenager. Wow.

Only 2.5 weeks ‘til I head back to Seattle for the summer.

The day after I arrive in Seattle, Gerald and I celebrate our fourteenth anniversary. We rock!

But between now and then there’s grading, grading, and more grading. And packing. And time with the kids, who’ll be in Rochester for most of June to finish school. (Then they’ll each split the summer between Rochester and Seattle—first Lane for four weeks in Seattle, then Alex.)

I’m feeling a little overwhelmed at the moment. But in a mostly good way.

we both love ice cream

In June, Gerald and I will celebrate our fourteenth anniversary, and I’m as much in love with him today as I was when we married—if not more so.

Yesterday I started watching the movie Little Miss Sunshine, which Gerald (and Erin) both loved, and said I absolutely had to watch. And you know what? I hated it. I chuckled maybe once, and spent a lot of time shaking my head in disbelief. When I quit watching at the halfway point (when they’re stealing the grandfather’s body out of the hospital), Gerald scoffed at me, saying I’d given up just before everything turned around. So I watched the rest of it tonight. And disliked it just as much.

I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised. He loves Scrubs, too, which I hate. And Arrested Development, which I hate even more. He hates musicals, which I adore (I grew up watching them with my dad). He hates fantasy books and movies, which are my favorites. He has zero interest in any kind of computer game.

And yet.

We love each other. We enjoy each other’s company. We laugh at each other’s jokes. We complement each other’s strengths, and accept each other’s weaknesses. And we both love ice cream.

I’m a lucky woman.

help erin find a job!

I know there are a good number of folks in the Rochester area who read my blog, not all of whom I know well. So this is for all of you…

My stepdaughter is looking for a job here in the area. She’s been working for a local restaurant since she arrived in town, but it’s a less than ideal work environment, and I’d really like to help her find someplace better.

She has significant experience in food service, having left an excellent job as head bartender at a large country club in the Birmingham area. But she also has strong retail background (she managed a music store in Alabama), and she worked for me for several years as office manager for my internet training and consulting firm.

She’s also incredibly smart, enthusiastic, and personable. She’d be an asset to any organization that was lucky enough to hire her.

Leave a comment here, or send me email at mamamusings { at } gmail { dot } com if you’d like a copy of her resume.

Thanks!

have yourself a merry little christmas!

Being back in Rochester for Christmas this year is a Good Thing. We have a real tree again, instead of the artificial one we settled for in Seattle. We visited Weez’s house tonight for a Christmas eve open house that featured wonderful food prepared by her mom, and we’ll see her and her family again tomorrow when they stop by our Christmas Day open house. This year our holidays are all the brighter because Erin’s living with us, and it means there’s that many more presents under the tree. Tomorrow I’ll post pictures of the aftermath :)

Right now I’m in the midst of a baking extravaganza. Cookies and brownies and biscotti, oh my! It smells wonderful. I’ve got Big Bad Voodoo Daddy’s “Rockabilly Christmas” playing, which always makes me happy. (One of the things I didn’t put in the “five things you probably didn’t know about me”—because so many people know it already—is that I love Christmas music.)

May your holidays be happy and warm and filled with friends and family and food and love!

beautiful new appliances!

Last week, my husband went down to visit his mother in Alabama. While he was there, he admired her beautiful new stove and washer/dryer. The result? She bought a set for us.

Yes, that’s right. A new washer, a new dryer, a new stove.

And not cheap ones, either. Really, really beautiful items.

The washer and dryer are the Whirlpool Duet HT set, which are high-efficiency units that use significantly less water, power, and detergent than usual units. They’re also huge, which makes it easier to laundry for a family of five.

The stove, which I picked out tonight at Sears, has me so excited about baking again. It’s a Kenmore electric range with a true convection oven (and automatic conversion of time/temp from standard ovens to convection), a glass cooktop with five burners (one high-power unit that boils things super-fast, a warming spot, two regular size burners, and an expandable burner that can adjust to the pot size), and a warming tray, ideal for when one food item is done before others, or one family member gets home later than the rest.

The convection oven made it more expensive, but I did a good bit of research last night, and it really seems as though it’s worth it. This article in particularly was pretty convincing, as was the significantly higher baking rating that Consumer Reports gave the “true” convection ovens it reviewed. And I bought a unit that (a) was on sale at Sears, and (b) I managed to get an extra $100 discount on.

So I’m feeling pretty grateful tonight for my mother-in-law’s extraordinary generosity. These are gifts that will get years and years and years of use, that will cut our energy bills, and will result in better food on our tables. That’s quite a gift!

giving thanks

One of the greatest gifts of recovery is learning to see the world through new eyes, with a focus on the things to be grateful for rather than the things to resent. So these days my gratitude list is far too long to fit into a blog entry.

There are high points from this year, however. On the big picture level, I’m so grateful to be back in Rochester, surrounded by family and close friends. I’m grateful that our house is full of people and love and laughter every day. I’m grateful for my family’s good health.

On the micro level this morning, I’m grateful that we have enough food to keep Lane sated (he’s growing at the rate of an inch a month right now, and his appetite has grown along with that). I’m grateful that I got to sleep late this morning, that Alex seems to be getting over his cold, and that Zicam seems to be keeping me healthy. I’m grateful that I remembered to buy eggs yesterday. And I’m grateful that my mom’s making a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner for all of us.

Last, but not least, I’m grateful for you, all of you who read and comment on this blog. Thanks for keeping me connected to the web in a way that matters. Best wishes to you all for a happy, joyous, and free Thanksgiving.

getting our money's worth out of our insurance

I spent the first three hours of my morning yesterday in the pediatric emergency room with my almost-ten-year-old, who was making a barking noise that scared the crap out of me. Turns out he had croup, nothing life-threatening, and was back in school today.

Tonight, just as I was settling in to do some grading, Gerald called me upstairs in a tone of voice that made me stop what I was doing and hustle. He was having a severe nosebleed, which wasn’t stopping when he applied pressure to his nose. He’s a former paramedic, so when he said I should call 911 I did, and the ambulance just took him off to the same hospital we were at yesterday. The paramedics didn’t seem overly concerned (they asked him if he wanted to be transported to the hospital, rather than immediately bundling him off), but I figure we’re better safe than sorry.

Add to that the fact that on Friday my doctor sent me off for a CT scan to try rule out any particularly scary potential causes of a severe sudden-onset headache I’d gotten earlier in the week, and I’m extremely grateful that one of the benefits of my job is excellent health insurance. (And that we’re back in a town where we love our doctors and have great medical facilities.)

[Oh, the CT scan was completely normal. Nothing to worry about.]

All in all, however, I’d prefer not to be getting quite so much of my money’s worth out of my coverage.

magical

It’s too bad that the term “fairy” has taken on such a negative meaning in our language, far from the benevolent context of Cinderella’s “fairy godmother.” If it hadn’t, I would have titled this post “fairy stepdaughter,” as an homage to the remarkable changes in our household that my fabulous stepdaughter Erin has wrought since she moved in with us a few weeks ago.

I don’t know what it is about Erin, but she manages to bring out the best in all of us. Having her in the house on a day to day basis has been such a positive thing. We’re all happier. The house is cleaner—not just because she cleans up (which she does, and that’s wonderful), but also because she sets an example that the rest of us can cheerfully follow. We’re eating family dinners every night, and taking the time to enjoy each other’s company.

Actually, as I think about Disney characters, she’s really more of a Mary Poppins—but younger, blonder, and with a decidedly more delightful southern accent. And we’re lucky to have her.

middle school supply hell

I spent three hours last night sorting, labeling, and organizing school supplies for my older son’s first day in middle school. I had a two page list of supplies, organized by subject…English, Math, Social Studies, Science, Home & Careers, Health, Spanish.

Conspicuously absent from his schedule were Art, Music, and Technology. Apparently they get only a half year of each of “exploratory areas,” so in January Home & Careers and Health will be replaced by Art and Music. I really don’t like that this means he has no classes focused on non-text creativity for the next 4-5 months. Even worse, however, was the discovery that seventh graders at his school have no instruction in technology or computers. They use computers in some classes, apparently, via “mobile labs” of laptop carts that teachers can requisition. But that’s not the same as learning about technology. For my kids, that’s not a big deal, since they get so much informal instruction at home. But I know that’s not true of all their friends, and I’m less than enthusiastic about the curriculum that it looks like he’s locked into.

Why aren’t we homeschooling again this year? (Regular readers know that we homeschooled both the kids last year in Seattle.) One reason: they don’t want to. They missed their friends terribly, and for them school is all about the social networks. The “learning” is a necessary evil they have to suffer through in order to bond with their peers.

At any rate, the supplies. As my gamer friends might say, OMFG! Three 2” binders, four 1” binders, 2 notebooks, 3 folders, black pens, red pens, markers, colored pencils, highlighters, white board markers (wtf?? the kids have to supply these??), erasers, two rulers, a scientific calculator, book covers, post-it notes, graph paper, lined paper…and I’m sure I’m leaving stuff off. Gerald bought the supplies last week, and I sat down last night to label and stuff binders (Science? That one needs highlighters and markers and a notebook with a 2” binder. Math? One of each size binder, a calculator, the graph paper, a ruler, pencils.) Even after the bags of stuff he’d bought, we turned out to be missing key items (“The colored pencils! Where are the colored pencils?!?”), so he headed out to Target at 9pm. I kept working on prepping items, calling him every ten minutes or so with another missing item. (“Oh, crap, there’s no cartridge for the label printer!” “Hmmm, maybe we need some of those pencil/pen bags that snap right into the binders.”)

Did I mention that this took three hours?

At any rate, when we were done we’d filled his backpack with the 1” binders, single subject notebooks, and loose items (pens, pencils, kleenex, etc), and filled a second canvas totebag with the 3” binders and his summer homework. (If I get permission from him, I’ll post it here—it’s fabulous.)

How all that will fit in his locker is beyond me. Gerald bought a locker shelf unit that Lane put into his locker this summer on “visitation day” at the school, and I’m hoping it’s sturdy enough to hold up under all that crap.

My stepdaughter, who’s now living with us (yay!) watched in disbelief as all this went on (and helpfully offered me a drink midway through :), asked “What do the poor kids do?” Good question. We didn’t shop the sales this year (usually I’m obsessive about sale flyers and comparison shopping), so we spent close to $200 on supplies for the two kids. That’s insane. But even with the best shopping habits, I don’t see how you could fill all the requirements on that list for under $100. Ridiculous.

Okay, rant done. Hopefully they’ll both have wonderful first days back in school. I teach ‘til 6, so I won’t be there when they get off their buses, but I’m looking forward to hearing about it over dinner.

kudos to the rochester apple store

This summer, we promised to buy Lane a new computer. He’s been doing a lot of cool stuff with borrowed time on the family computer, and a barely-hanging-on, nearly six-year-old Powerbook, so we wanted him to have a decent machine he could call his own.

Last night we headed out to the Apple Store at Eastview Mall, and headed home with a shiny new MacBook (and iPod Nano, and printer, both of which were free after rebate). We turned it on, and started in on the process of transferring files from the old computer to the new. We watched impatiently as the time remaining dropped from 45 minutes to 30 minutes to 7 minutes…and then stopped. Full stop. No animation on the progress bar, no sign of life whatsoever. We waited. And waited. Finally I tried rebooting…only to be greeted with a flat, grey screen. I tried again. Same thing. I tried putting in the system software DVD and rebooting from that drive, which seemed to work (after a lengthy delay). But two steps into the welcome sequence it froze, and generated a kernel panic screen. I followed the instructions on the Apple web site for what to do if your MacBook won’t start. No luck.

Needless to say, I was not a happy camper. I was quite sure that I’d have to (a) wait forever for a genius bar appointment the next day, and (b) end up having to send the machine back to Apple and wait an indeterminate amount of time for them to return it.

This morning we got to the store right after it opened, and I walked up to the cash register with the machine. I explained briefly what had happened, and the young man at the register quickly called over the manager. The manager listened to my (highly detailed) tale of woe and said “Sounds like you did everything you were supposed to. Let’s get you a new machine.” <blink> So not what I expected to hear.

“But what about the receipt,” I asked. After all, I’d been told quite clearly the night before that all the serial numbers had to match up on the receipt for the Nano and printer rebates to be honored. “Not a problem,” he replied. “We’ll generate brand-new receipts with the new computer’s number on them.”

Ten minutes later, we walked out of the store with a(nother) brand-new MacBook, which started up perfectly and has been making Lane happy all day.

It’s quite amazing how much good customer service can do to turn a bad out-of-box experience into a great one. You can bet I’ll be buying all my equpment there from now on. (They even gave me my faculty discount based on my RIT ID!)

imperfect exchanges

Things we found in our house when we returned that hadn’t been here when we left:

• Table runners. Five or six of them, mostly unopened in their packages. Apparently these were very important to them. I’ve never actually used on any of my tables, so I’m unclear as to the appeal.
• Dozens and dozens of empty bags—from Old Navy, Gap, Talbots, Target, Nordstrom’s, and other stores. Some carefully folded and stacked, others stuffed inside of each other. These people shopped a lot. Why they preserved the bags so carefully and then left them behind is a mystery.
• A drawer of men’s bathing suits. Whoops. Somebody packed in a hurry, I guess.
• A 3”×5” hole in my son’s bedroom carpeting. Not on the edge of the room, mind you, or under a piece of furniture, but right smack dab in the middle of the room. Mysterious and annoying. The pad is still there, but that section of the carpet was neatly excised. Other stained patches were left behind, so there must have been something really heinous on that spot for them to have gone to the trouble of cutting it out.
• Two DishTV receivers and a DSL modem, all neatly boxed, but with no return information.
• Lego bricks stashed in various places, carefully hidden to cause maxium foot injury upon discovery.
• A small, pink satin pillow with “Very Important Princess” stitched onto it.
• A tiny pink and blue satin-edged “blankie” that I suspect one of their kids misses now.
• A quart of long-since-expired buttermilk in the fridge. Ew.
• Two oddly-shaped brown things in the freezer that we still can’t identify. Any ideas?

Things we expected to find upon our return, but didn’t:

• Our towels
• Our sheets
• Our pillows
• 8 bowls that matched our plates
• Our coffeemaker (happily, we had an extra in the basement)
• Their forwarding address

The lack of sheets and towels is a major annoyance—I’ve had to buy emergency supplies for all the beds and bathrooms, but am holding off on stocking up too much until we see if we can track them down. (Our neighbors have an email address for them, apparently.)

The family was really nice—she took early retirement from an executive job with a major corporation to raise the kids, and he was in Rochester to do a one-year surgical residency. She and her mother and the kids headed south to their new 6,000-square-foot home in Tennessee a month before he did, and I suspect that he simply didn’t realize that the sheets and towels (at least some of them) were ours. So I don’t see this as malicious theft, merely an inconvenient (for us) error.

We tried to give the left-behind Dish receivers to the Dish installer who came to set up our system on Saturday, but his supervisor said he couldn’t take them since they were technically not our property. And Frontier Telephone says that if we drop off the DSL modem it will prevent a $100 charge (to them, not us). We probably will do that, since it’s not too far away.

It is irritating that they didn’t provide any contact information—which means not only can we not send them any of the things they left here, we also can’t send them what remains of the security deposit (after deducting the cleaning and carpet replacement and new towels and sheets…). But it could have been far, far worse—for the most part, the house and its contents are in decent shape, and we’re really happy to be home again.

home sweet home

Wow, it feels good to be home. Warmly welcomed by neighbors, kids having a great time with friends, takeout food from our favorite Indian restaurant en route to our table.

The house feels small and a bit shabby compared to where we’ve been living, but it won’t be hard to spruce it up, and I’d rather have it than all the mini-mansions in Seattle. Walking down the warm sidewalk to visit with neighbors, watching the evening thunderstorm approach, listening to Lane laughing and hanging out with his buds…it’s all good.

update on gerald

Gerald took himself to the hospital this morning, where they said he had bacterial gastroenteritis, and weren’t sure if it was from the tap water on the boat or the raw oysters…both of which we’ll be avoiding for the rest of the trip. They rehydrated him, gave him something for the cramps, and sent him back with an Rx for an antibiotic to kill off what’s left of the bacteria. He’s napping on the boat now, and we’re hoping to have him back to full strength soon.

Tomorrow we’ll send two of the four boys back to Bellevue for a few days. Hopefully Lili won’t notice that we’ve swapped one of her children for one of ours…or, if she does, that she won’t mind. :) Over the weekend we’ll set things back to normal configurations.

And tonight we’ll grill steaks and bake potatoes, and watch the fireworks over Pleasant Harbor from the top deck of the boat.

magical morning

Gerald got in late last night, and took the boys from tears to laughter in minutes. I fell asleep listening to them horsing around up above me in the hot tub.

And I was right…everything was better this morning. I woke around 6am to the sound of wind chimes, the feel of a cool breeze through the window, and a view of green pine trees against a clear blue sky.

Today we’ll figure out what we need to feel comfortable here (more food, for sure; more lights, definitely), and tomorrow when we’re back in Seattle for a party I’ll stock up at Target.

I realized this morning that staying here is much less like the hotels that we’re used to staying in, and much more like the cabin in northern Ontario that I used to vacation at with friends, back in high school and college. Not much to do there but eat, sleep, fish, swim, read, and listen to music. Here we add a bit of high-speed computing, some TVs that we can hook up a DVR to (and play back the many episodes of Family Guy that my kids recorded before we left), and easy access to several nearby parks. It’s all about perspective—which we always seem to have more of when Gerald’s here :)

I’ve been trying to remember when the last time I took a real vacation was—a vacation of more than a day or two, with nothing to do but relax. I honestly can’t remember, and that’s not a good thing. So I’ll use this month to make up for it.

endings are hard

It was a hard day for our family today. Moving is always stressful, and saying goodbye to a house that you’ve come to think of as home is particularly hard for kids. Add to that the fact that we took our hedgehog, Cecil, back to the pet store today, and that I can’t get the internet connection sharing to work properly yet (the pc sees the network and can join it, but doesn’t get an IP), and that the lighting on the boat is really poor, and that the boys didn’t get nearly enough sleep last night. So tonight has been rough.

The boat is lovely during the day…lots of deck space to hang out on, and room to wander outside. But as it grew darker tonight, it became clear that the lighting on the boat leaves much to be desired. We can’t find any light at all in the bathrooms, and the few lights we have found are dim and depressing. It’s rather like camping out…which is not so good for me or Lane, since both of us dislike camping :)

Tomorrow, when the sun’s out again, we’ll see what we can do about improving the internal lighting. We need to locate the few outlets, perhaps procure some extension cords, and head into Port Townsend or Port Angeles to see if we can find an inexpensive lamp or two to brighten up our evenings a bit. We’ll pick up some DVDs for the boys to watch on their computers, too. As I told Lane, everything will seem easier and less depressing in the morning. I hope I was right…

july plans

It’s hard to believe it’s been nearly a year, but June 30 is my last day at Microsoft. At work I’m wrapping up some projects, and working on ways to continue others from 2800 miles away. At home, I’m pricing shipping options for household goods, weeding out the kids’ clothes, and trying not to panic about the packing to be done. (No last-minute second thoughts, at least not yet. It feels good to be going back.)

The wrinkle in our relocation plans is that while our lease here ends on June 30, our tenants in Rochester will be in our house until July 31. So for the month of July, we’re technically homeless. And because I’m scheduled to speak at MSR’s faculty summit in mid-July, we need to stay in the NW area until then.

So here’s our plan:

• June 30-July 13 we’ll be aboard Sabbatical, with a few trips into the Seattle area for parties
• July 13-July 16 is still undetermined. We might stay with friends in the Seattle area, we might spend a few nights at the condos on Crystal Mountain that the boys liked, we might head to Ocean Shores for a few days. Still working that out.
• July 16-18 we’ll be at the Bellevue Hyatt for the faculty summit
• July 18-31 will be a slooooow trip down I-90, stopping at national parks and roadside attractions along the way. Definitely a few days in Montana—Scoble’s photos made me think that we really need to soak up some of that scenery. Yellowstone, Badlands, Mount Rushmore. Possibly a few days in Ann Arbor, staying with my cousin and her family and showing the kids the places I lived when I was a student (if they haven’t been condemned and torn down…) What else? Are there must-see spots along 90 that you think we should visit?

Not a bad way to spend a month, I think.

The boys (and I) were a little worried about Internet access during our month of transience, but they don’t need to worry any longer—I just received my new Verizon EVDO card, which gives me high-speed internet almost anywhere! (In fact, I’m posting this entry from the bus on my way to work…how cool is that?) I figured I’d take advantage of my 20% MSFT employee discount while I could, and order it this month. I did the one year contract (can’t do it for one month, alas), but given that I’ll probably be traveling a bit next year, it will be nice to have broadband access without paying airport and Starbucks surcharges. I won’t be able to use it with the MacBook Pro, alas, since it’s a PC Card and the MBP uses a different card format. I could buy another card in the right format, I suppose. But I have another plan.

I’m also ordering a new Vaio SZ240 laptop—which weights in at under 4 pounds!—as our primary traveling machine, since we won’t be able to set up Gerald’s desktop in most of the places we’re headed. I’ll still be getting a 17” MacBook Pro, but I cancelled the order that they kept delaying, and my department will order me one for my return in August. I love my 17” powerbook, but it’s a bear to carry around, and I’m looking forward to having a lightweight, fully-featured laptop that I can use when traveling.

So that’s how plans are shaping up.

how to ruin a perfectly good saturday afternoon

I’m sitting in the living room this afternoon, contemplating the boxes that need to be filled with stuff to be shipped back home, when the phone rings. It’s my aunt, up in Marysville. I ask how she is, and she hesitates. “Oh, Liz….oh, dear…can I talk to Gerald?” That’s very odd. They like my husband, sure, but why would they ask to talk to him first? I ask what’s wrong, and she says again “Is Gerald there? Let me talk to him.” Now I’m worried.

[And if you are, too, let me break out of the narrative for a second to tell you that everything ends up fine.]

I bring the phone up to Gerald, who speaks briefly to her, says “Let me find out what’s going on,” and hangs up. He says to me “Before I say anything, you need to keep in mind the source of this information.” I’m getting increasingly worried now. “Your grandmother called them to say that your mom and Don [my stepfather] were killed in a car crash.”

I sit on the edge of the bed, trying to process this information.

My grandmother is in her 90s, and in an assisted living facility. When I saw her a few weeks ago, she was having a lot of trouble confusing past and present, dates and times. Gerald’s right to be cautious. But…I’m still starting to freak out.

“How does she know this?” I ask. He doesn’t know. He points out that nobody has confirmed this information from another source, and that it’s coming through extremely unreliable channels.

I try calling my mom’s house. No answer. I call her cell phone. No answer. Now I’m starting to worry. She often doesn’t answer her cell phone, so it doesn’t necessarily mean anything. But still…

I can’t find Don’s cell phone number, so next I try to figure out if there has indeed been a fatal car crash in the area. I call the Monroe County sheriff’s department, and they are remarkably unhelpful. If I don’t know where the supposed crash took place, they can’t find anything out. “How many fatal car crashes are there in the county each day?” I ask. Doesn’t matter. They’re useless. I hang up.

Next I call the assisted living facility where my grandmother lives, and explain (while trying not to fall apart) the situation. Can they have a nurse or aide talk to my grandmother and find out how she got this information, I ask. I don’t want to call her directly, because I assume she’s overwrought. They’ll do that, they say, but it may take a little while because they’re changing nursing shifts. I leave them my phone number.

I check Google News for anything about a fatal crash in Rochester. Nothing.

I finally break down and call my grandmother directly. An aide answers the phone, and confirms that my grandmother is indeed very distraught. “How did she get this news?” I ask. The response is that my grandmother hasn’t heard from them in 36 hours, when she believes they were leaving for Boston, and thus has determined that the only possible explanation for the lack of contact is that they were dead. I start to remember how bad my grandmother is at dates and times of travel. I had to tell her at least five times at dinner last month that I was leaving for Seattle the next day, and she still didn’t seem to have remembered it properly when I left.

I’m starting to calm down a little now.

While I’m on the phone with my grandmother, Gerald locates Don’s cell phone number and calls it. He gets Don on the phone, which I can hear while I’m talking to the aide. Don is apparently fine, as is my mother. I relay this information to the aide, and promise that I will have them call my grandmother right away to reassure her.

I call my aunt, and tell her we’ve spoken to Don, and that everyone is fine. She is (appropriately) apologetic for scaring the CRAP out of me.

Gerald’s cell phone rings. It’s my cousin in Ann Arbor, who’s close to my mom, checking to see how I’m doing. Gerald, and then I, tell her the good news. We commiserate.

I pour a glass of wine. A big glass of wine. It’s not very good wine, and has been in the fridge for several days, but I really don’t care. I’m drinking it for its medicinal properties. It would be nice if my hands would stop shaking.

My mother calls, trying to figure out what all the fuss is about. I explain. She apologizes. Three times. It’s not her fault, obviously. Going 36 hours without calling her mom is not in any way irresponsible. But I don’t think I’ve ever been as relieved to hear her voice.

I hang up, and get hugs from my son (who’s been listening to all of this) and Gerald. I drink some more wine.

And now I’m blogging it. Because only by writing this down, I think, will I see any humor in it. Or be able to let it go.

flickr/family serendipity

In the fall of 2004, I posted on Flickr a series of century-old photos of my father’s side of the family that he had scanned into digital form. One of them was a beautiful formal family portrait of my grandfather, his parents, and his four siblings—that photo actually won an informal award from the “old photos” group on Flickr.

In the caption of the photo, I noted that my grandfather’s younger brother had emigrated to Brazil, and that the last my father had heard of his three aunts was that they’d gone to Australia. I had pretty much resigned myself to not ever knowing what became of that whole side of my family, because I really had no starting point for doing that research.

Yesterday afternoon, I received a new comment on the photo—from a Daniel Loebmann in Brazil. I suspect that he searched Flickr for the term Loebmann…and up popped three of my old photos. I followed up with a message to him asking what the family connection was, and he turns out to be the grandson of my grandfather’s younger brother Salo—which makes him (according to Gerald, my most reliable family tree decipherer) my second cousin.

Even more exciting, he had information about all of Salo’s descendants, and even about the three mysterious aunts—whose names, it seems, were Vali, Erna and Ruth, and who also eventually relocated to Brazil.

My dad and I are totally astounded and delighted by this Flickr-fuelled family reunion, and I’m thinking about trying to find a time to take a trip down to Brazil to meet some of my long-lost cousins.

So, how cool is that?

cello construction

My stepfather, Don Reinfeld, is a cellist for the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. He’s currently having a new cello built for him by violinmaker David Wiebe, who recently sent him a series of photos of the cello in progress. Don has just posted them on Flickr—it’s really fascinating to see the instrument taking shape!

There’s an essay documenting the entire process of creating another cello on Wiebe’s site—it just cries out to be put into blog form, don’t you think?

christmas latkes

Like me, my kids are growing up in a mixed religion household. So our Christmas dinner tonight consisted of way too many latkes (potato pancakes), made with my father’s traditional recipe.

The kids opened their presents this morning—Santa (and their grandparents) were very, very good to them. They’ve spent the day playing with their new Nintendo DS’s and games, as well as their Fly Pens (which I think will be extremely useful in making homeschooling a little more fun).

I got a combo charger/FM transmitter for the video iPod that Gerald got me a few weeks ago, some Happy Bunny slippers, a nifty wind-up flashlight to keep in my car, and something that I scoffed at when I first saw advertised, but which we’ve used three times today and promises to be a very useful addition to our appliances—a combination egg-and-muffin cooker. It’s easy and safe enough for the kids to operate, which makes it better than many alternatives, and it’s super easy to clean (just one tiny non-stick pan that has to be washed, and it can be done in about 20 seconds). As ridiculous at it seems, I rather like it. I also got a new cast iron skillet (pre-seasoned!) to use for cooking latkes, since we left my much loved and well-seasoned pan at home in Rochester.

Since tonight’s also the first night of hanukkah, the latkes seemed appropriate for dinner (when the holidays don’t overlap, we often get chinese takeout for Christmas dinner, another modern Jewish tradition). Cooking the latkes takes several hours (if you factor in peeling and grating potatos and onions, and getting the batter and oil temperature exactly right…) So now I’ve collapsed onto the couch, stomach full-to-bursting with those oh-so-unhealthy treats, and I’m off to Azeroth to try to level my character up a bit tonight.

Merry/happy hanukkah/christmas to you all!

(Oh…and many, many thanks to all the people who helped us out on yesterdays wifi question—you all rock!)

holidays far from home

It’s been odd preparing for the holidays this year. We have a lot of traditions associated with the season back in Rochester—chief among them the ritual trek to Stokoe Farms to stalk and kill a wild tree.

This year all of our decorations and holiday accessories are stored in the basement of our house in Rochester, so we’ve had to start from a blank slate. I caved this year, and we bought an artificial tree—I just didn’t have the time or energy to figure out where to go for a comparable tree-cutting experience here, nor did I want to deal with the traffic. And we haven’t got any ornaments on it yet (though it did come pre-lit; very convenient, I must admit). I bought a couple of make-your-own-ornament kirom Michael’s yesterday, and the boys and I will spend some time today making those.

The tree is up in our family room, where there’s also a fireplace—just like back home. The difference here is that this is a gas fireplace, which starts up from a light switch on the wall. Poof—instant flames. Again, convenient—but not quite as satisfying as building a wood fire yourself.

And did I mention the traffice? OMG—the traffic. What a nightmare. That alone is reason enough to return to Rochester at the end of the year. A simple trip to Target, which in Rochester takes us less than an hour round trip (including shopping time) takes 3-4x as long here, and the stress level is exponentially increased with each additional 30 minutes in traffic.

While we don’t really miss the sub-zero temperatures and blowing and drifting snow of home, we were feeling a little homesick for Christmas-y look of snow. So we took a trip up into the Cascades on Saturday to visit a little Bavarian-themed town called Leavenworth. We went with my friend Lili and her 3 kids, and we all had a great time. The town’s a little (well, more than a little) hokey, but the setting is gorgeous, we got our snow fix, and the kids had a blast wandering in the little christmas shops. We also acquired some ridiculous and very fun hats while were there.

All in all, we’ve little to complain about this holiday season. We’re happy and healthy, warm and safe, in a beautiful place with friends and family nearby. It may not be the same as it’s ever been, but it’s still a lot to be grateful for.

So, that’s the holiday report from the diaspora. May your season be full of warmth and love and laughter.

reflections on home

The boys and I got back from Rochester late (very late) last night. Part of me feels like I’m home today; another part feels as though I just left home behind. It’s an odd feeling—to be not-quite-at-home in either city.

This ended up being a stressful visit—trying to squeeze months’ worth of visits and dinners and meetings and conversations into a handful of too-short days. My apologies to all the people I didn’t have time to really spend time with on this visit—especially Steve (who helped save the day in my mom’s class!) and Eric (who’s going to be stuck packing up a box of things I left in my office, without even having gotten to see me while I was there).

I had some amazing home-cooked food while I was there—Weez’s eggs benedict and home fries, Tona’s delicious enchiladas, Jenny’s always-wonderful potato kugel, and my Mom’s signature homemade crepes for breakfast. As rushed as I was, I felt loved and welcomed by friends and family, and it was a good reminder of why we’ve grown so fond of Rochester. It’s the people, stupid! (It was also nice to spend some time in my RIT office, with its enormous window. One of the few things I don’t like about my working environment at Microsoft is how little natural light I seem to encounter on most days.) Rochester is definitely where I’m most connected to friends, family, and community, and it was wonderful to see the people I care about while I was there. But being back in Seattle really makes me happy, too—the mountains are a big part of that, but so is the fact that I’m taking a lot of an enjoyment in the work that I’m doing and the people I’m working with.

Many thanks to the people who sent get-well wishes for my grandmother. I’m delighted to report that she seems to be doing much better—they’ve stopped the internal bleeding, and rehydrated her, and it appears that her kidney function is returning. When I spoke to her on the phone before we left (Alex had a cold, so visiting seemed unwise) she sounded cheerful and alert—a big change from how she’d been when I saw her a few days ago. I’m hopeful that she’ll be back in the nursing home within a few days, and from there back to the assisted living facility where she feels so much more at home.

best laid plans

World of Warcraft is taking a back seat today, because my 93-year-old grandmother’s health has taken a turn for the worse, and she had to be moved to the hospital last night (she lives in an assisted living facility here in Rochester, but had taken a fall two weeks ago and was in the rehab unit at the affiliated nursing home).

As a result, I’m actually teaching a class today to cover for my mom, who’s over at the hospital—it’s an experimental writing class, so I’ll be talking about online narrative forms. God bless you, Jill, for putting so much great stuff online!

gratitude

My life has been a tapestry of rich and royal hue
An everlasting vision of the everchanging view
A wondrous woven magic in bits of blue and gold
A tapestry to feel and see, impossible to hold.

—Carole King

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays—I associate it with family and warmth and food and laughter. Amazingly, I’ve never had to make my own Thanksgiving dinner. Most years I’ve eaten at my mother’s house (where I wish I could be this year, as well), and there have been a few wonderful and memorable Thanskgivings with Gerald’s family in Alabama. (The contrast between the two is fodder for another post at some point…)

This year we’re far away from both of those gatherings, but we’ll still be celebrating with family. We had planned to go up to Marysville to spend the day with my uncle and aunt in their house on the sound. Plans changed, however, when my 93-year-old grandmother took a bad fall in Rochester and had to be hospitalized for fractures of her