Baby Blase

Turns out the cute little house that we are staying in here in Truckee used to belong to old friends of ours who have since moved to Pennsylvania. So, where we’re staying for the summer will now be called “Ed & Sarah’s House”. There is a great backyard with a cute little garden where H enjoys walking through the weeds, delicately picking a single clover and bringing it the house for me. We have set up BlaseDesign on the kitchen table and cooked a few meals on the ancient wedgewood stove.

Here are some photos.

Listening: The Felice Brothers

Well, prepare to be. This is a little movie I like to call “Baby Walks, Hits Things with Sticks”. Riveting stuff.

I know just how excruciatingly boring videos are of other people’s kids, so, feel free to close your browser and never return to this site again. But, my parents took this video last week when they took H to Donner Lake and I’ve watched it, like, 25 times. I’m a total goober.

Listening: Built To Spill

Back when H was brand new Marc and I didn’t really have our heads about us we took some videos of the teeny-tiny and never shared them with you — H’s ever-loving internet pals. Most of the videos we’d actually never even watched either. It’s been a year and our brains have significantly recovered from the shock of allowing the helpless human into our home, so, it’s about time we share these moving pictures of his skinny-cuteness:

Listening: Wilco (in honor of the tour we are sadly missing)

HERE. And HERE. And HERE too (oops - photos from March that were never uploaded! Back when he only had 2 TEETH!).

Photo update includes this little gem of the kid attempting to share my burger:

Listening: Giantess

Elizabeth, the nanny, just texted Marc to tell him that she showed Finn a photo of Harrison and he giggled for 30 minutes. I’m sure that’s an exaggeration - like the time she said that he was talking (a flat-out lie) - but, still how cute is that!?

Listening: She Keeps Bees (new music Fridays! - new Dinosaur Junior, White Denim, Major Laser & now this)

I am writing this post after dinner with the grandparents - who have now become the kid’s absolute favorite human beings on the planet. We ate at FiftyFifty (for the third time this week - what? We have trade there!) and the kid was being ridiculously cute - more so than usual. This kid has become infinitely more cute AND more irritating in the last couple weeks.

I believe he has realized that there is a form of communication (you know - talking) going on out there in the world - that he understands but, that he cannot participate in and that SUCKS! So, even though he has the ability to convey a few words via sign language, his preferred method of communication is to YELL AT THE TOP OF HIS LUNGS:

“DAH. DAAAH. DAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Then when that doesn’t work:

“DAH. DAAAH. DAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

again. and again. and again.

Now, I understand that this means - “THAT”- “I WANT THAT — NOW!” - “WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU IDIOTS!? GIVE ME WHAT I’M POINTING AT - NOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWW!!!!”

All adults within earshot fight the fierce urge to scream back at him and say “Are you F-ing kidding me!? Stop screaming already! Where in the world did you learn to yell like that! You don’t see us screaming at each other like that do you?”

Can you imagine? “MAAAAARRRRRRCCCCCC!!!!! GET ME SOME COFFEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!! NOOOOOOOOWWWWWW!!!!! COFFEE. ME. NOW. COFFEE!!! COFFEE!!! COFFEE!!! COFFEE!!! COFFEE!!! COFFEE!!!”

The will power of the newly crowned toddler is something to behold and to fear. But, we are holding strong. We continue to respond with:

“Oh… do you want something?”

“Really?… OK… let me help you with that.”

And then roll our eyes at each other and silently wish for speech to find its way from his brain to his lips.

Tonight, after my parents left for the night, he was in a ridiculously good mood, and while we were playing on the living room floor he held up his leggo-man to Marc and gave his signature command of:

“DAH! AAAAAHHHHH! DAH DAH DAH!!!!”

Marc happened to be sitting near the lamp in the living room, so, I - being able to speak walnut-brain-toddlerease - translated to Marc that it was the child’s desire to have the leggo-man held up into the light of the lamp and then when the child gave word - the leggo-man was to be returned to the child as quickly as humanly possible.

This was indeed the correct translation, and when said leggo-man was returned to the child after being held in the light of the lamp, the child replied with:

“Aaaaaah.”

Listening: Grizzly Bear

Because I found this website and have not been able to do anything but, laugh hysterically.

Listening: Andrew Bird (because it’s soothing and it helps me forget that I got up at 5:30am) Also - I think he should spend more time writing and less time posing for photos - what IS that!?

We made it to Truckee and there are more than a few things that I had forgotten about this place - good and bad.

1. It is stunning up here.

2. There is a ridiculous amount of never-ending road-work.

3. The train passes through and stops downtown blowing it’s charming whistle for all to hear.

4. The train passes through and stops downtown blowing it’s charming whistle for all to hear ALL night.

5. There is NO HUMIDITY. And believe it or not Austin-folks - that’s a bad thing.

6. It was 30-something degrees last night - the kid had to wear 2 sets of PJs.

7. You will ALWAYS run into someone you know here. Last night we didn’t get up here until about 5:45pm and we had no food to give the kid and Safeway and then cooking would have taken too long so we headed to FiftyFifty for dinner where we were served by our dear friend Bryan Chaffe and ran into Ben “the nicest guy in Tahoe” Martin and Elisa Dinallo. I am doing all that I can to fight the urge to become an even bigger hermit than I already am. Not that I don’t love having great friends in this town and enjoy running into them - it’s just that I am crazy.

8. There is something beautiful and depressing about the fact that not much changes in downtown - but, we are spoiled in Austin - there is a new restaurant opening every week it seems and we rarely leave the house. So there you go.

9. People always kinda stare you down while you’re walking around. It’s because everybody knows everybody and they are checking to see if they know you. It used to be cool - 9 years ago when we first moved here, because people used to stare you down and give you a nice smile and a nod whether they knew you or not. But, now, it’s colder - people have been jaded by the years of tourists taking over their town and turning their forests into SUV-parking. I miss that about the “old” days.

We are really happy to be here. And will be even happier when my parents get here to help with the kid tomorrow so we can get some work done.

Listening: Beulah

We went to a show on the Monday night before we headed to CA. We rode our bikes. Arrived early for a pre-show Lonestar in an icy-cold backroom with a few old chairs at The Independent. We sat and talked like we hadn’t done in a long time. One beer became two while we listened to the opening band from our cozy perch behind a wall around the corner from the stage.

Little Joy came on to play a really short set. Or did it just feel like it because I spent a HALF HOUR in line for drinks only to find out that they had run out of beer… and soda…!? LAME LAME LAME! But, it was OK because we were out - with adults - well sort of…

Halfway through the show I realized that we were surrounded by black-X-marked hands. I mean… Surrounded! By kids who are at the very least 13 years younger than us! Doing that math kind of freaked me out. 13 years! Seriously? When did we become so freaking old?

I was still feeling all indie and cool (even though it was a 20-year-old kind of cool) until the next day, when I found out that a few guys from Cold Play were there and claiming Little Joy is their new favorite band. BUMMER.

Listening: Anathalo

We all (Me, Marc, the kid and two cats) made it to California. Marc’s trip, thanks in large part to Chuck, was the shortest duration to date.

Me and the kid attempted to fly out on Friday at noon. The flight was delayed due to a dead battery. We had to sit on the plane for 45 minutes before learning that we would have to de-plane, wait for an hour, find out that the battery could not be repaired, that they would have to fly in another battery - from ARIZONA?, and that the earliest the plane could take-off would be another 5 hours from then. So, I - as calmly as I could - demanded that my bags and car seat be released from the plane and sent to baggage claim so that I could take my pissed-off toddler home. An hour and a half later we were home. It was a terrible way to spend five hours, but, it could have been worse - I could have been the lady behind me on the plane who obviously had it really bad: “This is ridiculous! I got a drink at the bar before this flight and now - it has probably WORN OFF! This kind of thing ALWAYS happens to me!” (I did not make this up or exaggerate for comic effect. The situation reminded me of this. Seriously - why are we all such idiots?!!!)

I got us a ticket for the next morning (6am) and we tried again. Luckily we had banked so much karma that Saturday’s trip was pretty much a breeze.

So, we’re here. Woohoo!

Listening: Everything is AMAZING and NOBODY is happy! (Louis CK on Conan)