So much has been happening over the last two months, yeah I know I say that every time I don’t have the time to post news and views, but it’s so true this time.

While I was in London (Ontario, Canada), Eve learned to do two things.

a) She learned a quick commando crawl across the floor

b) She now shakes her head quite vigorously when she is happy/excited/interested.

All this happened when Trish was at her mom’s place in Albany, OR. I missed out, but she has put repeat performances quite often. Over the last couple of weeks she has gotten quite fast across the floor. Sometimes she gets over excited and while doing her crawl at double time across the room, she nose dives with a loud bonk as her head makes contact with the carpet, flips onto her back, lies there for a few seconds while she recovers, then flips back onto her belly and continues like nothing interrupted her. Quite a sight to watch.

Jai, a very old friend, has been at our place for about 10 weeks now and it has been a lot of fun. His wife came to visit during the Fourth of July weekend and they headed off to Yellowstone for some alone time. It’s quite amazing that Jai and I are such good friends because we are so different. He is doing his MBA at Sloane and his internship at Apple, which is why he is crashing at our place. He has cooked a few times for us and it is quite refreshing to eat something at home that we wouldn’t normally make.

Around the same time that he arrived, I headed off to DC where his wife Madhur lives and works (for the World Bank). That was one of the wettest weekends I had seen in a very long time. I went to Georgetown once but did not have any time to walk around the capital of this country. I will be there in another 2 weeks, so that might be interesting.

On the 1^st of July, we did Eve’s “Mukhe Bhaat”. This is an old Indian tradition of feeding the baby rice for the first time. This is supposed to be the transitionary phase for the baby, when she starts eating other things, besides the staple of mom’s milk. There is some religious significance to it, but if you know me, you'd know I don't do anything even slightly religious. We had 6 other couples come with their babies. Quite a lot of fun. Tricia dressed up in a sari, but I could not find my kurta for the life of me. That was the day I arrived from DC, so not too much time. We cooked cool of Friday and I cooked as much as I could on Saturday before people got there. We even made payesh and mishi doi. A first for both of us. As someone I know would say… Super spanky.

Half way through July, Eve started pull herself up. She has been using the bookshelf, my laptop bag, even us when we are sitting down. It usually ends in a nosedive, but so far I see no permanent damage. A couple of days back she pulled herself to a full standing position and has been trying to walk too.

For a while she started sleeping better, but for the last couple of nights she had a horrible time. Everytime she would wake up, she spent a lot of time screaming, We aren’t sure why. I guess this too shall pass. Unfortunately I have left Tricia to handle that by herself while I am on a flight right now to Tampa, FL. Another 30 minutes I should be there.

The other interesting thing that happened was that we went camping after ages. We pulled out our sleeping bags, tent, lanters and a couple of chairs among other things and off we went to a nice campsite near Muir woods. This is about 60-70 miles from our place, so due to city driving, took us about 2 hours to get there. We set up our tent late evening and had dinner with Rachel and Jonah. Both our babies had a great time crawling around. Eve did really well and slept nicely and so was in a great mood every time she woke up. On Saturday we had a nice breakfast and headed off to a hike. We hiked all the way to Muir woods, about 2 miles away and got back just in time for an early dinner. Now that was a good dinner. Tri tip grilled beef, thinly sliced, with awesome bratwursts, chili, baked potato, salads and we topped that with some decent wine. Yeah, a very good dinner. With some brownies and Jonah’s pie for dessert, we were one set of happy campers.

Sunday we packed up and headed back home, which was one heck of a drive since we hit bumper to bumper traffic on 101. We have learned to take 280 North to the city from now on. Especially if we have to go further north of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Work has been taking up all my time these days and I am hoping that things start to slow down as soon as we hit beta. I will be traveling constantly for the next 3 months and maybe even more to Europe. Like I mentioned earlier, right now I am on a flight to Tampa, Florida, from where I will drive to Sarasota, about an hour away. I will head back to San Francisco next weekend and return to Sarasota on Sunday. The Friday after that I will head over to DC and then head back to SF on Thursday. I will then be in SF for a week before I head of LA for 2 weeks. I am hoping that Trish visits me there and we will catch up with Aunt Kathy, Mili, Sameer and my dad. Only Aunt Kathy has met Eve. I will then be at the HQ for a month before I am shipped off to India for a couple of weeks. I’m hoping to use my comp days to spend time with Pia/Vicky/Dad and the kids, before I return. Again I’m hoping Trish can join. This will completely depend on what the doctors say about Eve’s immunization. Polio seems to be the biggest fear. Both Trish and I aren’t too concerned, but why take unnecessary chances?

Last month we put a down payment for Toyota Prius. We have requested the charcoal grey with tan interior. This is a package 7, so it comes with voice activated navigation, rear view camera, keyless ignition, full onboard diagnostics among other nifty things. It is running us more than $30,000. But anything for the environment right? The EPA rating for the car is 55 mpg. We should get the car any day now. There is such a huge wait for it, that it's amazing. The demand outstrips supply many times over! This car is clean, efficient and quick, like German lovemaking.

The frickin aircraft is boiling hot and I have the seat in the far right corner, no leaning back. This is the second leg of the flight. I had an exit row on the way to Charlotte, NC but the short flight to Tampa has a crappy seat. Win some, lose some. We are getting ready to land… so, over and out!

# posted by carrotcurries.com @ 1:27:00 PM