In a rare demonstration of his abilities, Ethan modeled for me his prowess in the fighting arts. Pictured below is Ethan assuming the “Fist of Two Heavens” stance, a deadly posture used only by the most adept practioners of the “Seven Babies of Wushan” style.
I am off to the glamorous, glitzy city of Detroit for a few days. While I built time into my trip to San Fransisco to walk around and see the sights, I decided that there was no need to do the same in Motor City. I’ll see all I need to see out of the cab window to and from the airport, methinks.
Ethan now smiles even more than he did when I left…amazing, infectious smiles that he has so far managed to conceal from the camera. But the little guy can only keep his guard up so long; I caught a few today.
Apparently clean laundry is the most enjoyable thing Ethan can imagine.
I am back in New York, just in time for the heat wave. What a strange twist that I went south to California for some cool weather before coming north to roast.
It was not easy being away from Laura and Ethan, and I have come back to find a bigger, cuter, more gurgly baby than the one I left a week ago. He smiles a lot more now than he did before, and now eats more than I did in high school. It’s amazing that he can change so much in the span of a week, but when he’s only seven weeks old that’s…well, I don’t do math, but a certain percentage of his life that is far more significant than it was of mine. I had planned to stay a little extra in SF to poke around, but ended up finding that I was more interested in seeing Ethan than I was in seeing anything more down there (though SF was legitimately pretty cool).
The rest of my summer has become spontaneously busy, with work cropping up here and in Detroit (huzzah! Detroit!) that I wasn’t at all expecting.
I’ll put up pictures of all things interesting (eg Ethan and
I’ve just arrived in San Fransisco…which is astoundingly clean. I’ll put up some pictures later, but my impressions so far are that there aren’t so many people; most of the people who are here are tourists; they have carpet on the trains; and you can get an AMAZING cappuccino for $2.50.
Ethan has become a connoisseur of all things bright and bouncy, lavishing them with his undivided attention. He is also eating more than one would imagine possible for someone his size, but hey, we’re talking about how cute he looks here, so lets examine this picture instead of discussing his insatiability…
I’m headed down to San Fransisco on Monday to do some work in Cupertino. It’ll be strange to be away from Laura and Ethan for a week, but exciting at the same time to go to California. I’ve already started missing them in advance…but at least it isn’t Nebraska or Utah or something. I’ll be coming back on the 17th, but hopefully will be able to put up some pictures before then.
The strange realization that I had was that, although normally a long session like the one I’m going to would be exhausting, I will actually be getting more sleep than I now normally would. Maybe I can get Laura to phone me five times between midnight and 6am just to keep me in the groove.
There’s an article in the Times today about a company called Farecast which predicts what airfares are going to be and gives recommendations on whether to buy or wait…pretty nifty. It’s only in beta right now, so it’s just a proof of concept, but it looks promising.
For now, if anyone is thinking of booking some flights, I would recommend Kayak, which is an absolutely amazing flight search engine which keeps you from having to jump between ten sites to find the best fare. The flexibility in narrowing your search is amazing, and it searches places you didn’t know existed.
Okay, let’s level-set here. I know you’re not supposed to expect too much of a six-week old baby. No jumping jacks, no clever comebacks. Really, when you put a kid that young on his stomach, you shouldn’t expect much more than a squirm or two. See illustration ‘a’.
This is pretty standard. Note the face plant. But why – you might ask – would I want to take pictures of my son grinding his face into the floor? Well, precisely because Ethan, dynamo that he is, has very unbaby-like powers…
Observe:
This is not trick photography, folks. What you’re seeing is Ethan raising his own head. No wires, no misleading camera angles…no stand-ins. And keep in mind, Ethan’s head is big. That’s a heavy load.
So there I was yesterday afternoon, snapping some pictures and generally being amazed when the unthinkable happened. Ethan – doing some rough calculations on the dynamics of having an extremely large head, an endearingly small body and the advantage of momentum…
…that’s right; Ethan rolled over. Of course, I only have a picture of just before he rolled over, because I was busy losing my mind just afterwards. Pretty heady stuff.
Alright, I suppose I should have mentioned something about Canada Day, but let’s just say there wasn’t as much fanfare attached to that date down here as there was for today. I celebrate the fourth in deference to my son; the American.
Ethan – for better or for worse – slept through the fireworks on his first Fourth of July…he missed quite a show. I thought I would commemorate the moment for him, for his later perusal (he’s a busy guy)…
The show – as I would have expected – was a pretty spectacular one…bombs bursting in air, that sort of thing. A small armada of private boats choked the Hudson to get a closer look at the goings on.
Just when I thought the show was over (and that my camera’s card was full) I saw all of the boats on the Hudson taking off like the rush out of a theatre…quite a sight!
Ethan had a big day out yesterday. James, Jo and Julie are in town this weekend, and we’ve taken Ethan out on the town. We hit Greenwich Village for some cappuccinos…
We had a little break in Washington Square Park yesterday afternoon so Ethan could have a spot of lunch.
We sat for a while and watched the world go by.
Ethan somehow managed to stick out the whole day, even hanging in there for a little dinner in the East Village.
