Sunday, August 30, 2009
Is Summer Over?
We have survived what should be the hottest and most humid days of summer. I think we got off pretty easy this year. We had about a week where the girls slept on the floor in our room every night so we could all share our single window air conditioner (we don't have more than that on principle). Four days ago the temps dropped in to the 70s as the remnants of tropical storm Danny came through. Today it was warmer but very pleasant. I bet we'll still get some sticky weather before summer is over, though.
Carol and the girls have been having lots of fun together. They've done several things with the neighbors. Karen invited Carol and the girls to their pool club; another day they all went together in their minivan to the naval museum at the former Boston Navy Yard; and last week they all went to Nahant Beach together.
Audrey has taken a sudden interest in the camera and wants to take lots of photos. What the heck, "film" is pretty cheap these days. She's pretty good at it! It's interesting to see what she thinks is worthy of recording. I think perhaps it's time to get her a camera of her own.
My work had a event of sorts at Great Brook Farm today. It had been planned since June for August 29th, but since Danny was passing through and it was forecast to rain the entire day (it did) they rescheduled it at the last minute to today. It wasn't very organized. The only details we got were a parking pass and tickets for ice cream and information that there would be a milking tour at 3:30. I'm not sure if not many people went or if the place is just too big, but we only saw one coworker the entire visit.
Great Brook Farm has been a working dairy farm since the 1940s but was purchased by the state in the 1970s. The working part of the farm is leased to a family who run it as a normal business, but that uses only 90 of the 950 acres of land in the park. It's a pretty old school dairy operation. No free range here. It was cool to let the girls see a little bit of where food comes from. One thing I learned: when you hear about cattle eating corn, it doesn't mean just the kernels (at least not for dairy cows). The entire plant is chopped up to produce silage; cobs, stalks and all. I also learned why vertical silos you see on farms are mostly in disrepair these days. They are too complicated and costly to maintain, so most farmers have switched to silage bunkers.
Audrey starts Kindergarten on Thursday and Charlotte starts preschool the following Tuesday. We went to a Kindergarten open house and met Audrey's teachers Mrs. Pietropaulo ("Mrs. P") and Mrs. Woods. Mrs. P attended Kindergarten in the room she has now taught in for 12 years. Both girls are very excited to start school. They got new backpacks and lunchboxes: Audrey chose Star Wars Clone Wars and Charlotte chose "Ni Hau, Kai Lan".
One final piece of transition: I've been meaning to choose new doctors and dentists for us but it hasn't been a high priority. Yesterday I broke a tooth - the corner of my molar with the only amalgam filling left in my mouth broke off. It's not painful or anything, but it is sharp and needs to get fixed pronto. So I guess I'll be choosing a dentist tomorrow.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Welcome Home, Tessa!
Labels:
family
Carol and I have been talking about getting a cat for a long time. Of course we wanted to wait until after the move and getting settled. Now that's done.
Carol and the girls made a couple of trips to the MSPCA last week to try to pick one out. They had a couple of good candidates. Charlotte is very leery of cats and very frightened of being scratched or bitten, so we didn't want a kitten. We also wanted a female because I've had males who developed spraying issues as they got older.
The MSPCA facility at Nevins Farm is quite nice. They have two "colonies" for adult cats. Each is a large room with lots of cubbies and a catwalk around the top of the walls and about a dozen adult cats roaming free. They also have small rooms where you can take a cat for some one-on-one time. Most of the cats are wearing name tags and there is information about each on a card on the wall (sex, age, traits).
If you're looking for a dog, they have large areas outside where you can take a dog for walk and play with it. They also have horses, goats, rabbits and a few exotics.
Yesterday we went back for the third trip and spent a couple of hours there. We had some one-on-one time with three different cats. The one we liked best was Tessa. She's a gorgeous, petite 1-year-old tabby. She seemed the most affectionate.
We kept her in our bedroom when we got her home. She spent the night there with all of us (it's an all-family bedroom on hot nights, with the air conditioner). Now it's 6:30am and she is exploring the rest of the house with the girls. She's very curious.
It's been 10 years since I've had a cat in my home and I've missed it. Carol and the girls are very excited, too. Welcome to our family, Tessa!
Carol and the girls made a couple of trips to the MSPCA last week to try to pick one out. They had a couple of good candidates. Charlotte is very leery of cats and very frightened of being scratched or bitten, so we didn't want a kitten. We also wanted a female because I've had males who developed spraying issues as they got older.
The MSPCA facility at Nevins Farm is quite nice. They have two "colonies" for adult cats. Each is a large room with lots of cubbies and a catwalk around the top of the walls and about a dozen adult cats roaming free. They also have small rooms where you can take a cat for some one-on-one time. Most of the cats are wearing name tags and there is information about each on a card on the wall (sex, age, traits).
If you're looking for a dog, they have large areas outside where you can take a dog for walk and play with it. They also have horses, goats, rabbits and a few exotics.
Yesterday we went back for the third trip and spent a couple of hours there. We had some one-on-one time with three different cats. The one we liked best was Tessa. She's a gorgeous, petite 1-year-old tabby. She seemed the most affectionate.
We kept her in our bedroom when we got her home. She spent the night there with all of us (it's an all-family bedroom on hot nights, with the air conditioner). Now it's 6:30am and she is exploring the rest of the house with the girls. She's very curious.
It's been 10 years since I've had a cat in my home and I've missed it. Carol and the girls are very excited, too. Welcome to our family, Tessa!
Friday, August 14, 2009
On My Ride Home From Work
Temps got down to the low 60s last night. It felt a little chilly when I first got on my bike this morning. The first hill about 1/2 miles from home took care of that. It got up into the 80s for a high and was a pretty sweaty ride home. But pleasant nonetheless.
News of the day? We might get a cat tomorrow. Stay tuned.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Acclimatizing
I wasn't looking forward to the extremes of Boston weather when we decided to move. The hot and humid summers and the long, cold, snowy winters both seem like hardship to me relative to Seattle's moderate climate. But so far I (and we) have been doing just fine.
For one thing, the weather in the Northeast has been unusual this spring and summer. Boston had a very rainy and cool May and June before we arrived (while Seattle had a very unusually warm and sunny May and June). As of last week neither New York or Boston had seen a 90-degree day since summer started. We also had unusually un-humid weather our first couple of weeks here. We've had some humidity since but it's bearable.
Yesterday it was 79 degrees at 7:30am and it felt normal. I guess that means I'm already used to it.
I tend to walk fast, so when I was taking the train to work I had a couple of days when I would arrive at work pretty sweaty. Now that I'm riding my bike to work it's no big deal. When I get to work I strip down and just sit in the locker room for 5-10 minutes radiating heat and evaporating sweat. But then I get to take a shower. My helmet pads never dry out: I have my helmet hanging in front of a fan at the moment to try to get that to happen tonight. It's pretty gross putting on a helmet that has pads still wet with yesterday's sweat.
Speaking of biking, I've been biking to work every day for a couple of weeks now. It is just over 11 miles and takes me 40-45 minutes. I can feel my conditioning starting to come back - I'm not huffing up the hills as much as when I started two weeks ago.
The cyclists in Boston are completely nuts. Most don't obey a single traffic law. I wonder if I'll adapt to the local riding style, but I don't think so. They blow right through red lights. I'm sure if you asked one of them, s/he'd say they look and that they know no one is coming, but they don't slow down enough for a real look. No, thanks. I'm not in that big of a hurry. There's also only maybe 50% helmet usage.
During my commute in rush hour, I can travel much faster than cars. One evening I noticed a red pickup because he passed me aggressively. We leapfrogged several times as he kept getting stuck in traffic. The last time we saw each other was 6 miles after our first encounter. Given the traffic, at pretty much every light I can ride between traffic and parked cars and pass 20-30 cars. Some drivers will try to squeeze to the right to block cyclists from doing so, but we can wriggle through a pretty small space. Very slowly, of course, because you never know when a door is going to open on parked car.
For the most part I find the drivers to be pretty respectful of my safety. As I reported before, my route is surprisingly quiet except for a few major intersections. I'm enjoying bike commuting very much.
For one thing, the weather in the Northeast has been unusual this spring and summer. Boston had a very rainy and cool May and June before we arrived (while Seattle had a very unusually warm and sunny May and June). As of last week neither New York or Boston had seen a 90-degree day since summer started. We also had unusually un-humid weather our first couple of weeks here. We've had some humidity since but it's bearable.
Yesterday it was 79 degrees at 7:30am and it felt normal. I guess that means I'm already used to it.
I tend to walk fast, so when I was taking the train to work I had a couple of days when I would arrive at work pretty sweaty. Now that I'm riding my bike to work it's no big deal. When I get to work I strip down and just sit in the locker room for 5-10 minutes radiating heat and evaporating sweat. But then I get to take a shower. My helmet pads never dry out: I have my helmet hanging in front of a fan at the moment to try to get that to happen tonight. It's pretty gross putting on a helmet that has pads still wet with yesterday's sweat.
Speaking of biking, I've been biking to work every day for a couple of weeks now. It is just over 11 miles and takes me 40-45 minutes. I can feel my conditioning starting to come back - I'm not huffing up the hills as much as when I started two weeks ago.
The cyclists in Boston are completely nuts. Most don't obey a single traffic law. I wonder if I'll adapt to the local riding style, but I don't think so. They blow right through red lights. I'm sure if you asked one of them, s/he'd say they look and that they know no one is coming, but they don't slow down enough for a real look. No, thanks. I'm not in that big of a hurry. There's also only maybe 50% helmet usage.
During my commute in rush hour, I can travel much faster than cars. One evening I noticed a red pickup because he passed me aggressively. We leapfrogged several times as he kept getting stuck in traffic. The last time we saw each other was 6 miles after our first encounter. Given the traffic, at pretty much every light I can ride between traffic and parked cars and pass 20-30 cars. Some drivers will try to squeeze to the right to block cyclists from doing so, but we can wriggle through a pretty small space. Very slowly, of course, because you never know when a door is going to open on parked car.
For the most part I find the drivers to be pretty respectful of my safety. As I reported before, my route is surprisingly quiet except for a few major intersections. I'm enjoying bike commuting very much.
Lesson Learned
Labels:
family
There's a family-run ice cream place not far from our house called Soc's. We've been going there once a week or so after dinner for a treat. Last night Carol and I decided to go but we didn't tell the kids that was where we were going. I just said, "Girls, get in the car. We have a surprise."
They started guessing.
"Is it a puppy?"
"Is it a kitty?"
And a few other equally out-of-scale-relative-to-ice-cream guesses I can't remember.
When we pulled into the ice cream place, Audrey was very disappointed. The poor girl has a very active imagination and had convinced herself she was getting something really special. We felt bad.
Next time I'll just say, "Do you guys want to go get ice cream?"
They started guessing.
"Is it a puppy?"
"Is it a kitty?"
And a few other equally out-of-scale-relative-to-ice-cream guesses I can't remember.
When we pulled into the ice cream place, Audrey was very disappointed. The poor girl has a very active imagination and had convinced herself she was getting something really special. We felt bad.
Next time I'll just say, "Do you guys want to go get ice cream?"
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