Grandma D. watched the kids tonight while Jennifer and I went out on a date. For a change, we abandoned our regular places and went downtown to the Gaslamp District. Originally,we intended to go to Blue Point, but Jennifer was less than impressed with their menu so we ended up dinner shopping up and down Fifth Avenue and ended up at Olé Madrid. I wasn’t really very hungry to begin with, so tapas were a perfect fit. Speaking of a perfect fit, they also had martinis, and I’m seriously more outraged over the price of cocktails than over the price of gas. $3.45 per gallon is a bargain compared to the $11.00 I paid per martini. I forget which tapas we ended up eating but they were all good, and it was really nice to get out of the house by ourselves as always. When you live in the suburbs it’s easy to forget how cool things are down in the city. After dinner, we talked and walked off our cocktails before deciding we were, in fact, old people who need to get home and go to sleep.

Tonight was to be an extra-special date night in which Anna & Tara were going over to some friends’ house for a sleepover. However, one of the kids at Tara’s daycare came down with hand-foot-and-mouth disease, which is pretty ugly, so in the event that Tara was incubating these nasty germs, we canceled. That kind of misery definitely does NOT love company.

Anna was super-stoked to be going over to her friends house, and as I picked her up from preschool, she and her friend could talk about nothing but the impending sleepover. I realized that if I broke the news before getting her into the car, there would be a scene of epic proportions. I waited until we were packed into the car and buckled into our respective seats. Note to self: move Anna’s booster seat to the passenger side of the car.

As a means of softening the blow, we went out to dinner at a restaurant, which is one of Anna’s favorite things to do. As the chef in our home, I don’t take this personally, because Anna is just as finicky at a restaurant as she is at home. We decided on Outback Steakhouse, which is not at all crowded when you arrive at 4:35pm.

Anna and I sat and ordered and played Tic-Tac-Toe on the kids’ menu, while Jennifer picked up Anna and brought her some twenty minutes later. Tara could hardly decide whether to eat or flirt with passersby. Eventually she came down on the side of flirting, while I popped food into her mouth. She ate mostly macaroni; occasionally I would sneak in a vegetable or some other food that didn’t agree with her and most of the time she would make sour face and begin rolling her tongue around her open mouth until the offending food was rejected. Tara did enjoy the music, occasionally wiggling back and forth or drumming on the table. Eventually our food and Anna’s patience ran out, and Tara and I went home for bed while Anna and Jen went out for ice cream.

As a treat for Anna yesterday, we took her to see Quidam, the new Cirque du Soleil show, or “Circus Olé” as Anna calls it. She was way excited.

The show started off with some rather scary elements–darkness, loud noises, a creepy headless guy –but Anna quickly adjusted an enjoyed the show. In particular, she liked the sequence where four little girls came out with their spools on strings that the spun around and threw high in the air while doing all sorts of tumbling. I may have to see if I can find one online for her… especially if I can find one made of foam rubber or something else that won’t break windows easily.

I was pleasantly surprised that the usual sequence including two large men doing a slow-motion homoerotic ballet was replace by a medium-sized man and a large woman. Still impressive, but slightly less awkward. One part of the show included a man doing various artful feats of strength while hanging from particularly long set of curtains. The man was wearing a tight flesh-colored suit, and it was of course at the quietest part of the performance when Anna called out “IS THAT A NAKED BUTT?” Most people around us were cracking up.

At the intermission we got about $800 worth of popcorn and pretzels and drinks, but we still stopped for dinner afterward at Bread Bites, the Oscar’s knock-off that Anna loves. We planned the day both as a reward for Anna’s good sleep habits of late, and as a special “big girl” activity that she didn’t have to share with Tara. I think it was a real hit.

I’m not going to apologize for the long stretch between posts, because while on vacation I have been so relaxed as to be practically gelatinous. You try putting together two coherent sentences when you’re a big amorphous blob of goo. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

I’m straining to think of what it was we were doing on Christmas. Oh that’s right, flying on a commercial airline in coach with two young children. I realize now that I was insane last year, and shame on you all for not having mentioned it to me sooner. Actually the trip was not nearly as bad as it could possibly have been. Anna was astoundingly well behaved on the plane, quietly attached to her DVD player and the blessed video Prozac contained therein. Tara was not so much misbehaving as failing to meet the “all children must be above average” standard we have here at We’re So Tired. Thus, she needed to be constantly entertained for the entire second leg of our flight. If she were inclined to recognize celebrities, I could have pointed out that sitting in my row were none other than Aretha Franklin and Barry Bonds. At least I think they were–since each of them occupied 140% of a coach class seat, I had to stand up periodically just to inhale, and was therefore a little woozy for most of the flight.

Upon reaching Grandma D.’s house at long last, we basically took over the entire house, littering it with suitcases, photographic equipment, chew toys, wrapping paper, clothes, and art supplies. In an effort to keep us outside, Grandpa T. promptly set the pool heater to “simmer,” but this only distracted us long enough to get out all the beach towels and leave them all over the house.

Two days later Auntie K. and Uncle T. arrived, bringing with them yet more presents and an excuse to litter the house with wrapping paper again. Some days later there was an large family gathering of the relatives who are now local¹. We all had too much to eat and were at this point just tearing wrapping paper into confetti straight off the roll just for fun. Or there may have been presents, I can’t remember at this point.

On one evening, Jennifer and I went out with Uncle T. and Aunt K. to a bar, where sat and talked and drank. Had we done this in any other part of the country¹, we would have sat around talking about times past and then look at the younger people around us, currently enjoying the sort of activities we were reminiscing about and realize just how how old we are. This being Florida¹, we sat around talking about times past and then looked around at the grandmas and grandpas using their AARP discount on body shots, and realized just how old were are.

Days later, we began our vacation-within-a-vacation, taking a trip to the Kennedy Space Center, and spending two nights in an oceanfront hotel on Cocoa Beach. The Space Center is very impressive, but we were disappointed by the lack of snooty restaurants in the area. We hauled our good clothes 2,000 miles across the country, and darn it, we wanted to get dressed up and have a rude waiter bring us overpriced food. We settled for a place with good food and a casual atmosphere, and wore our good clothes anyway. Back at our room, we sat on the balcony on the top floor of our nearly empty hotel, looking over the empty beach and listening to the waves.

(to be continued)

¹ All midwesterners are required to move to Florida when they get old. Really. It’s the law.

I’m trying to remember all the stuff that went on this weekend, but I’m sure that I’m going to miss a bunch. To me, it seems like all the weekends end up that way; we bounce from thing to thing, and lots of good, interesting stuff happens that I really want to blog, but I never seem to have time.

Thursday night, I was to go out and play volleyball, but the gym was closed, so I ended up going straight to the bar where the crew would have gone after the game. Friday was Jen’s night to go play at the same gym, and while the it was open, there was nobody else there to play. She ended up going for a walk.

Saturday, the two of us went out for a nice dinner in Del Mar. After two individual nights out, it was really nice to have some time together. Jennifer has done a great job of setting up date nights each week for the last month or so.

Sunday, our friends M. & K. dropped off their son C. for the night, as they were scheduled to give birth to their second baby early this morning (Monday). We still haven’t heard how everything went. As Jen was putting the two four-year-olds to bed, I went out to meet my friend R. As I write this, I’m realizing just how many nights I’ve been out this week–very unusual for a married-with-children guy like me. This coming week won’t be much different, as there are more evening events on the way.

Tonight, for the first time since college, I actually went into a library for the purpose of checking out books. As I spend time looking at great pictures on Flickr, I am very envious of some of the artistic ability of the photographers. I would really like to develop that ability for myself. I’ve generally approached photography as a way of capturing and preserving some of the beauty I see in the world. I would like to take the next step and develop the ability to create rather than merely capture. I checked one book on the history of photography; it has a nice selection of classic photos, and was one of the few books they had that was not about Ansel Adams. The other book was drawing tutorial; I think learning how to draw would help me plan out images I would like to create.

On Monday, Jennifer’s regular day off, I also took the day off. We sent the kids to their respective preschool and daycare, then spent the day off by ourselves.

We went for a hike at Torrey Pines State Reserve, which really is San Diego in microcosm; rugged cliffs, beautiful ocean vistas, and terrific weather. I took some pictures and we enjoyed the wonderful weather and scenery. In the ocean, we saw a whale migrating south, a seal, and pelicans dive-bombing fish.

After our hike, we drove south to La Jolla, where we had a nice lunch at Brockton Villa, a casual restaurant with an ocean view and a terrific menu. It wasn’t exactly the care-free getaway we were hoping for, but it was a really nice day to enjoy the fruits of our insanely high cost of living.

Anna and Tara spent the night at M. and K.’s house, so Jennifer and I had the first at-home date night in a very long time. By the time we were ready to go, I was really in no mood to go out for dinner; I had a very long and lousy day at work which left me without time to eat breakfast or lunch. After some deliberation, we stopped at the KFC drive-thru. We very rarely eat fast food, so this was something out of the ordinary for us. Sitting at our kitchen table, ignoring the toy-strewn disaster around us, it was wonderful to sit and talk not as parents, but as people. Without a menu to peruse or noisy patrons to ignore, we actually had the freedom to pay attention to each other for what seems like the first time in forever.

To top it off, we each got at least eight hours of uninterrupted sleep; an event so rare and precious in our circles as to inspire awe and jealousy among our friends.

For the last couple years, since our child-free Western Carribean cruise, we have been seeking to reproduce “the cruise effect”–the liberated feeling that comes with putting our responsibilites aside for a time. We know it’s within our grasp for short periods of time, but it’s so hard to let go of all the unresolved issues and logistical juggling that make up the bulk of our daily interaction. Our $12 date surpassed any $150 meal I’ve ever had.

The challenge now is to do it again. and again…

This weekend I was the pinnacle of productivity. Yesterday I managed to get a lot of things done while simultaneously doing 873 loads of laundry. I’m fairly sure I haven’t been any further than the mailbox since Friday. Today, while Jen was taking a quart of change¹ to the Coinstar machine, I made a stack o’ crepes which will later this week be layered with a dairy-free duxelle and sausage for a couple dinners’ worth. This dairy-free diet which Tara has imposed on Jennifer is really getting to be a bummer. At the same time I was perfecting my spatula-free crepe flip, I was reading Pippi to Anna and photographing myself. Let’s see Alton Brown do that.

Tara is being fussy these last couple days because of some diaper rash and yet another cold. Poor girl. She did have a bright moment when we put her and Anna into the bathtub together; the two of them loved splashing together, though Tara is not accustomed to Anna’s long baths. Afterward, both girls napped poorly.

Tonight, C. is coming over, and we’ll go out for dinner… somewhere. I feel like a steak, Jen likes sushi. Somewhere with both would be ideal. The Sand Crab cafe could be good too.

In other news, Flickr must no longer be cool, because I’m all into it now. Most of the new pictures will be showing up there, so get yourself an RSS reader so that you can be magically notified when I put new pics up. I’ve been putting new ones up all week long, but I imagine that won’t last forever. Also, you’ll want to see the “Flickr RSS Widget” on the left sidebar, because it pops out a bunch of new photos when you click on it. I’m going to change the button graphic because “Flickr RSS Widget” doesn’t mean much to most people and “Click here for photos” would be more obvious. Click there for new photos.

¹ Apparently, a quart of change = $120. We don’t steal the quarters out of the change bucket.

This morning, Anna and I put my mom and grandma on a plane to go back to their respective homes. When we arrived home, Anna lamented, “We have no grandmas.” Sadly true.

The week featured a trip to the zoo, some shopping, lots of cleaning, some lounging, and a lot of really good food. Every time I see my grandma, I can’t help but indulge in freshly made tortillas, eggs, bacon, and potatoes–my comfort food. Other than eggs and the occasional bacon, I rarely eat any of it anymore, but this week I was just out of control. I can’t help it.

My leave is now over, and I’ll be heading back to work on Monday. We are starting preparations for the acceleration in morning routine this change will necessitate¹. Monday is Jennifer’s day off, so it will be a dry run for us. We need to have bags packed and ready to go in advance. Morning routine will need to be executed quickly and with as little guidance as possible. I’ll be trying to get out the door as quickly as possible, leaving Jennifer with the brunt of the work, so that I can get out of work as soon as possible to pick the kids up, spend some time with them, and make dinner.

Last night, Jen and I got out to see Wedding Crashers. We both thought it was great. I have to say that I think Rachel McAdams looks a lot like Jennifer Garner, but I give the edge to Rachel. Nevertheless, it was just was what we were looking for at the time. I’d even see it again.

Also, what with date night going on, I forgot to take my Strattera, so I took it this morning. Ick. The side effects mentioned are drowsiness and nausea, and I probably would have fallen asleep if I didn’t feel so sick to my stomach. On the upside, I think I actually felt the positive effects today; I hardly felt like I was fighting to keep focus at all. I’d say I got a fair amount of stuff done. The real test comes Monday.

¹ That sentence sucked. Cut me a break, I was once a professional technical writer.

Tonight we went to see Cowboy Junkies at Humphrey’s By The Bay. It was a pretty good show, but they managed to play about a two-hour set without doing any songs from The Trinity Session, which is my favorite, and the only album Jen knows by them. Luckily their new stuff sounds mostly like their old stuff. The only thing I could have done without was the excessively long and monotonous instrumental sections, and the opening act, Keren Ann, who had a lovely voice, but had some trouble playing guitar, and desperately needed someone to set up her pedals correctly. I was surprised that the singer Margo, is a big fan of Bruce Springsteen, who I have always thought was a mealy-mouthed old goober. All of the intermission music between the opening act and the main event was Bruce Springsteen muzak.

I almost forgot that we had dinner at Umi Sushi on Shelter Island. The atmosphere left a little to be desired, but we were in a rush anyway, so everything worked out. They had a very nice sushi menu with pictures and descriptions of the 40+ different rolls they offered. We tried five or six and were not disappointed. We’d definitely go there again if it weren’t all the way down on Shelter Island. Price was very reasonable as well.

Anna and Tara are spending the night at M. & K.’s, but tonight is a school night…