MegaNYC

Im on my way home, on the megabus, after just over 7 hours hoofing it all over Manhattan. Even with sensible shoes my feet and hips are Tired. After confirming one interview, then losing that one to sickness, I managed to wrangle another meeting. So today I figured out how to find my way to the Two UN Plaza building (in the rain) and had a very nice chat (got to use my voice recorder toy - hope it worked well!) with someone who was able to give me lots of insight tid bits and some contacts too. It has begun! Talking face to face really is better than over the phone.

I also bough z. a little Unicef doctor toy from the Unicef store with a white coat that says "UNICEF" on it, so she can have a white coat like her daddy. And I lost my scarf. But I also finished knitting a scarf on the way here - dearest Sophie's birthday present (several days late and it hasn't even left for London yet...sorry!). And after that whole shabang I caught an hour in MOMA before it closed. I sat on a comfortable bench, pulled my feet up and stared at Monet's lillys. I am not so in love with Monet prints. But I was in love with the real deal. LoVe. The three panel piece in particular. Could look into that forever. There were of course many other fantastics. The one above was a particular favorite on this trip.

This megabus has worked out pretty well. costs less than gas and tolls (and especially parking) would cost and wifi to boot. of course significantly cheaper than amtrak. im sure ill be doing this again. next time I am finding places to eat before I get there. I sure did a lot of random walking trying to decide where to pull up a chair.

Big Sky Love

Nebraska. Big Sky. I miss this!

Things and Places in Lincoln that I wish I could take back to baltimore:

Wonderful bike trails across the city and around the Zoo.

Zesto. Yum.

Indigo Bridge Bookstore - this was new to me on this trip and it is so realio trulio great. Right next to the wonderful Ivana Cone. I had the most excellent coconut muffin (made by Maggies, also a favorite) and a great latte while Zoe played with toys and books. I hope this place does well because it was Awesome with capital A.

Black Market, a store for consignment clothes. great prices. great stuff. great prices. did I say that already?

Oso Burrito. The best. drool.

Wildwood, an ocean side carnival

Wildwood NJ has the longest boardwalk in the country, or maybe its the region, or the city, im not sure, but it is long. It is filled with amusement parks, tee-shirt shops, tons of wonderful terrible food, tattoo parlors, ski ball, and every ounce of carnival excess you might want. In the morning the boards are full of families riding bikes that look like flinstone cars, or bikes that look like giant tricycles, and normal bikes too. At night the boards are full of a crazy mix of those same families and older youngsters wearing '09 shirts and being cool and getting drunk. It is a special kind of vacation. A vacation my husbub has taken since he was Z's age and we have gone many times together. Its partly about the ocean and even in the winter we like to go and listen and watch it roll in and out. Its largely about the food - hoagies pizza boardwalk fries carmel apples and ice cream cones. We spent most of this past week there. It stays mostly the same year in and year out, although I am filled with glee to report that this year the paintball game which for several years prior has had a manikin at its entrance (displaying the character you get to shoot at in the game) that vaguely looked like osamabinladen, but also disturbingly like some portrayal of general arabness (which had gained this game-place some notoriety and some tv news time, noted by the giant sign "as seen on tv!") had redressed its manikin to look like Dick Cheney. I also want to report something that you will think I made up, but is true. Walking by a tattoo parlor we passed a girl, 18 or 19?, walking a smidge wobbly, talking on her phone, saying: "he totally shouldnt have let me get a tattoo, im sooo drunk. Are you going to break up with me? You totally have to marry me now!!"

And that, my friends, is Wildwood NJ. Well, part of it anyhow.

happy at home

So many things to talk about. Here is a relatively randomly generated list:

Glad to be home. And really glad ms. zo has gone back to happily sleeping in her crib for good long bouts of time at night. It was all about co-sleeping on the road, which was nice in the cuddle department and not so nice in the get-good-sleep department.

So proud of my baby girl who rocked as super traveler for three days of driving to Nebraska and a long flight home with too many hours in Chicago (but thanks for the rocking chairs in the airport, thats nice!)

So proud of my little brother who rocked as Tommy in his highschool's production of Brigadoon.

In Nebraska I had the chance to record a couple tracks for a lullaby cd my mom's group Baby Needs Shoes is working on. Lots of fun. The first time anyone sang while nursing a baby in that particular studio...probably not common in any studio. And Zoe may make an appearance as well. We tried to record cute cooing sounds, but she was mostly interested in yelling in a way that wont really jive with a lullaby album.

While hanging out at my mothers I watched daytime tv for the first time in forever and saw one of those morning "news" shows, you know that one where they go outside and talk to the screaming people, Good Morning America I think. Anyhow, they did a little bit about how many resources the average person uses in a lifetime and they talked about disposable diapers. My thoughts about this rambled so long I have decided to make it a separate post - so see above.

Zoe had her two month shots today and I almost got teary. Poor thing has been hurt so few times in life so far. Wish I could always protect her from pain. I don't actually think that vaccines cause autism, and I do think that vaccines save lives. But I nevertheless couldnt help but think about it and feel a little worried...

I got a spinning composter for my birthday! Yay for the husbub who took up a collection among family. N0w to start diggin in the dirt. We have plants still in the ground from before winter...the broccoli has bloomed in lovely little yellow flowers. Who knew broccoli produced lovely little yellow flowers? But unfortunately only tomatoes and broccoli seedlings have grown, the eggplant and pepper seeds failed to rise up. shucks.

Yay for roasting marshmallows in the backyard! (see pics :)

my current worry

Zoe doesnt like to nap anymore. She has slept fantastic at night lately, but not so much during the day. I got great amounts of work done in her 3 hour morning nap of time past. But apparently she believes she has outgrown that. I am a bit worried about the dissertation proposal that I am presenting the second week of may, which has tremendous amounts of work to be done - work that first requires a few brilliant solutions to be worked out, which requires time. But this evening my family arrives (which of course means that today and yesterday my bits of time were spent cleaning) and then on Sunday Zoe and I will get in the car and drive back to Nebraska with them. Yes, Baltimore to Omaha. Its going to be a very, very long drive. When I get back there will be about two weeks to do all that brilliant dissertation stuff. I hope the fates are on my side, because it will take serious amounts of luck.
Meanwhile, even when I have a moment to do so, I cant seem to think about International Organizations or academia. Just not in the groove.
When Im back I will tell the story of the long road trip, cd recording, brother's star role in his musical, and Zoe's first plane ride - all planned during this grand adventure.
wish us luck.
please.

San FranTastic

I am back from my quick little getaway. In two and a half days I packed in some serious activity: professional, rejuvenating, and fun. The conference that took me on this excursion went well enough. The time in a quiet comfortable hotel, cozy bed and relaxing bubble bath was fantastic. A tiny holiday from mommyhood can do much to energize the spent spirit. But of course my favorite part was visiting some of my favorite people. Now I want to move west. Go West! yes. lets.

And Here is the store and community center that I wish was in Baltimore. Thank you Sara for finding it and taking me there. And here is the diaper cover that I got while I was there, which I had been coveting for its adorableness while it has been sold out in zojo's size at the online store that I frequent for its free shipping on covers policy. No shipping when you buy in person! So much better to buy in person anyhow. So fun to be at a store that let me do so!

So thankyou friends for a wonderful time. So glad to have finally introduced you to each other. Next time I'll bring ms zj and her papa and well have even more fun.

green and crunchy

reporting live from seattle.

cindy's couch, where i used to spend the night several nights a week for over a year when it was in no.lib. phila, now its in fremont seattle, it hops from hip neighborhood to hip neighborhood and im always pleased to visit it.

its so green here. green and crunchy and so very different from baltimore. and from philadelphia. kind of amazing how different places feel so powerfully different when the actual specific differences are not that overwhelming. ok, there are numerous actual specific differences too. but there are nachos and margharitas on both the east and west coast, which is a great relief as far as we are concerned.