A whole month of 2022 and so far no zombies (knock on wood). Not bad, not bad. I still got my reservations about what comes up next month. But for now, let's just take a moment to reflect: first month of the year was kind of a doozy. It's a hard month to start on regardless, even without the whole World Plague Reboot Part 30495. April may be the theoretically cruelest month, but these crazy temperature fluctuations in January ain't no easy thing either. It's been COLD! And then warm and rainy. And then...occasionally just really nice enough to forget that it's actually either witches titties or tsunami outside.
Gotta snug in tight to keep warm.
It's been a bit of a rough fortnite for reasons that are hard to articulate and mostly just come down to "sometimes things gotta be churned through and processed eventually, and when it's time, it's time." I feel really lucky to have had some super awesome folx get my out of my head and lavish love on the kiddo when I wasn't able not to be in my head. It takes a village (and a new tv and and a lot of games and a Nintendo Switch) at the very least.
But most definitely January wasn't nearly all bad.
Our New Year's Resolutions basically boiled down to "be more awesomer to ourselves" and now our home is definitely a wee bit extra lit these days.
So... I promised we'd get a bigscreen tv and...
Well you'll notice if you've been stalking us, because honestly I don't let most of you into my household (sorry, but y'all have outside-world residue on you and haven't taken the necessary ablutions to come into my glorious and immunologically-histrionic presence). But we did rearrange the furniture in anticipation of... well you'll see.
We walked around downtown for a while and it's darned cute. Also it was cold. And Andrew had to pee. So we went to the actual musuem. Which was kind of cool. Lots of different artists featured Somewhat small. We also watched some glassblowing in action before heading back north.
I forget what this was called and we were terrible at it. But Allan loved it anyways. It involved getting an animal and then making everyone else guess what the animal is by laying down rings around various qualities of the animal. This is not as easy as it sounds. But it gets a lot easier when Allan whispers very very loudly "What color is a cheetah??" We got very good and guessing any animal other than what Allan had just announced she had in her hand in a semi convincing manner before finally callingn it right. She loved that game. Loved it.
Our deliciously happy-manic sweet sweet unicorn baby child. Isn't her missing teeth gap adorable??? The second tooth was a fortunate do-over since the first one disappeared without occasion. My mom just happened to notice it was missing a few weeks ago and... shrug! Baby teeth are friggin' tiny! No way that was ever getting found. Allan suggested maybe she swallowed it, but who knows. So when Allan happily spat out the second, we immediately entrusted second one to the creepy little human-parts packet of her baby book. Yes the envelop says "first tooth" but - close enough - we're not the most ethically up and up parents in the world. Still we try to preserve ooky and somewhat strange vestiges of childhood in our obligatory first-child shrine kind of way. It's our duty.
Play Civ!! Among other things.
GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAL
But not quite yet.
Few weekends ago, we actually got ourselves to exploring a bit instead of waiting around all weekend for a magic tv to appear. I've decided that I actually don't know the surrounding area nearly all the well and there are a lot of cute places in the vicinity with just a little extra drive.
Like Tacoma!
No, not the place where the airport is.
Seatac/Seattle-Tacoma is named that because it's in between Seattle and Tacoma which is actually a pretty cool city with a shockingly high crime rate still. It was worse when I was younger though. It was the kind of place you just don't go to. Also it smelled terrible because it was full of paper mills. Funny thing is those are gone but the smell persists as you enter the metro area. It gets better downtown. But it's on that gentrification path of everything around here. And the site of UW Tacoma. Which is a beautiful mid-city campus of stairs and probably also buildings.
Also, Chihuly - glass dude (the man who makes pretty glass, not a man made of glass) - is from Tacoma. So he has a presence there.
I decided i wanted to see the Chihuly Bridge of Glass. Which is next to the Museum of Glass. Which is right by the Waterfront of Glass and the Train Depot of Glass.
This is the path to the bridge and the museum is mostly housed underneath that strange giant pyramid tepee thing.
the bridge itself is super cool. Lots of neat pieces all accompanied by the stench of rather piquant urine
Across the bridge is the courthouse which is this super duper f-ing neat old deco train station festooned in about as much glass as everything in that area (i.e. a TON)
On the way back from Tacoma (this is a lie: it was not at all on the way, but we wanted to go anyways) we discovered a game store called Meeples. They have a cafe where you can borrow games to play there, but also have a rental library. Necessitating our very first Family Games Night!!
Oh yeah, we did get a real tv in between Tacoma and Games Night. You can see it in the background. But hardly living up to the game rentals in this instance.
The balloons were not from Meeples, but they did embody the spirit of Games Night and actually I was having a really emotionally brutal night that night and I gotta say: it was calming. I'm not sure I'm cut out for meditation, but I think I really could spend a good twenty minutes mindfully trying to keep a small white balloon in the air. I'll have to give it a whirl.
Downside and plus-side: I can't actually use my phone cuz both hands are occupied. It's a little withdrawal inducing but fun too.
Andrew dressed up because he's awesome. You might recall this shirt was our Christmas matching entry. Allan put hers on for bed in her father's honor!
Allan really like the little kid version of Ticket to Ride. She had her own unique strategy that didn't remotely target the stated end goal of the game (building train lines from certain stations to certain other stations), but she was tickled. Totally tickled and that's ultimately what mattered.
And yes once the child is away and we've played the surprisingly stressful Forbidden Island (the island is flooding and the water is rising faster and faster!!!) We now can kick back with our giant ass big screen and ...
just wait.
Yep it's even more dramatic in bigscreen world. Soccer is lit! I've been watching Paris Saint-Germain in the French Whatever and it's great. They are bombtastic several layers of players deep. It's ... it's nice. So much ... beautiful beautiful form. Just stunning stuff. No really, there are some comely gentlemen on there (many of whom are not technically young enoguh to be my children yet so that's something), but it's all about the game. I am only watching for the goals.
I actually like that soccer is generally a very low scoring game. Most people find that a dull deficit but to me it actually opens up the possibility for a less powerful team to have a lucky shot and upset everything. Adds suspense.
Like last week, Ecuador tied Brazil (Argentina rightfully beat Chile and I got lost in the Paraguay Uruguay match... there was a lot of soccer and a lot of chips and a lot of child screaming "when do the ads come on??? Give me more chips!!").
This is big, by the way. I learned during my tango days in BsAs that Brazil and Argentina are the dominant forces in the Americas and up there for the world. (As such they are rivals and it's fun when your roommate is from Brasil and you want to watch the game at a bar!)
I learned... absolutely nothing about Ecuador when I was in Buenos Aires because... they are not a dominant force. Ecuawha? That's what those fiesty little Castellanos would have said if I'd asked. They are not remotely equal teams. But ... it happened. WIth only a minimal amount of bizarre fouls that seriously involved throat kicking and rockette level face crushing. When you aren't as technically proficient a team, you gotta turn to your strengths and MMA brawling apparently is right there. I was so lost for so much of that game, honestly. But some actual kicking of soccer balls (possibly other kinds as well) did occur in places. It was... an... interesting game! And kind of an exciting result in the end.
So yeah, the big screen is proving its worth
In so many ways! I'm not great at our new Nintendo, but who the f cares. This thing is FUN. Our lovely realtor Sierra loaned us Mario Galaxy and I'm addicted to playing the hat to Andrew's Mario. We also have a bunch of the classic games and Mario Kart! It's hard to describe but "like crack" sort of starts ya off in the right direction.
I have been out of the house as well in the last couple weeks I swear. Allan still has been going to school (in person, miracle of Omicron miracles)!! And we take walks sometimes, and... sometimes it's even nice out and...
... or is that just a really beautiful image on the screen saver of our fancy new tv? You'll never know!!!!
And of course there are always chores. Being six, Allan is clearly old enough to take on some more and help with things around the house like
Doesn't everyone's strategy for folding involve sitting on a pile of clothes and then burying yourself underneath it and then throwing handfuls of clean clothing at passersby and then... hey eventually jamming them into the proper drawers? I think just about everyone. Got to get a system, you know!
Anyways, as you can see we are charging into February fully locked, loaded and twirling our joysticks wildly.
I'm really hoping the next month is one big into healing and happy times for everyone. But at the very least, there will be chocolate and candy hearts and that goes a long way towards everything.
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