What’s the occassion? We’re moving, for one. Technically we’re homeless at the minute, but the new owners of our old house (which is still going to be “Home” for some time to come, five years of emotional attachment to a place won’t disappear with a move) are letting us squat rent-free for the time being. We should be back in the proud land of propriety after tomorrow. So there’s work there, and gut-wrenching emotion because we’re so attached to where we were. Where we’re going is only a mile away, an easy drive, or bike, or even a pleasant walk away; but still, it feels like change, and that feels big.

And business is going well, or at least there’s gas in the tank now, which after months of subsisting on nothing and loans, feels really, really good. The ride itself is up and down, frequently occurring within hours of each other. There’s some excitement for the future, and a lot of trepidation because of the risk. But in the end, what would I rather be doing, really?

Of course this comes on the heels of vacation (see photos under the June page), which leaves all sorts of things dangling. At least I made the smart decision to read through GTD by David Allen while at the beach, which has immensely improved my organization and stress level. Highly recommended to anyone who feels like they’re juggling too much.

Despite the gorgeous scenery, I haven’t been taking many pictures, as that beautiful clear weather usually results in images with too much contrast, and landscape photography isn’t really my strength anyway.

The food’s been good as well, but after days of lobster, lobster, lobster, I think we’re ready for a steak.

Of course, all this work stress gets piled on in one month that contains basically everything else. Lots of traveling, Elliott’s 1st birthday, my 30th birthday. Reviewing the pictures, the end of June seems like a long, long way away, yet I can’t seem to remember much of what came between. If Betsey hadn’t been “blissfully unemployed” starting at the beginning of the month, I don’t think I would have made it through. August is looking to be wonderful, if I can manage to wrangle through a bunch of sticky or annoying issues at work.

Hey, look, a self-pitying blog entry! I must still be young at heart (or a surly teenager at heart).

We’ve started into the solid food: rice, barley, carrotts, apples, peas, beans, squash, and sweet potatoes. All seem to go down modestly well, and all things considered, the mess is a lot less than it could be. The boy grows, but seems to be going more longitudinal than latitudinal; we’ll be interested to see how he measures up at his six month appointment next week.

That’s the major developmental news, there was a “Da… Da” a week ago while Michael was changing a diaper, but given the lack of a repeat, we’ll have to say it was just Brownian Babbling, and not any real attempt to talk.

And in the belated news category, we took our first “real” hike with Elliott two weeks ago, making the 3 hour or so (used to be 2) trip up & down John Rock.  No good family pictures unfortunately, as Betsey was afraid to take the boy near the edge of the cliff, but some nice landscape shots showing the fall color.  Those should make their way into the photos section eventually.

Us: “And what did you do today?

Him: “Braaah. Pffff. Aaaaa! Ghhghhheh.”

To top it all off, he slept 9 hours in a row last night, without a single peep or mew to hear of. Of course, Betsey did have to get up at 2 AM just to make sure nothing was wrong.

Maybe its due to his shots, which he received last week, though he hasn’t had any noticeable ill effects (fevers, etc.) from them.  We skipped giving him a hepatitis B vaccine because an infant contracting an STD is just too damn weird to contemplate, too and too rare by our estimating to necessitate an additional burden on his immune system.

As far as “stories” go, only one stands out.  We were at the Wednesday night volleyball gathering at Betsey’s clininc, and Michael was lifting Elliott up above his (Michael’s) head and making kissy-happy faces at him.  And Elliott decided that would be a good time to spit up his most recent meal.  Right into Michael’s open mouth.  Of course, about a half dozen of our friends witnessed the occurrance, ensuring much laughter then and afterwards.

And that’s about all the news for now.

Obviously, this is a serious problem, something like a 750% increase in the proportion of children over just two years.  At his rate, by 2010, a gathering 20 adults will have to include accomodations for 421.8 children (one of them may be missing a foot or something, I guess that’s where the 0.8 comes in).  I don’t know why either of the major political parties is making an issue out of this, it really represents an existential threat to our adult culture and way of life.  Of course, we could always sell the kids on ebayby.com (damn domain squatters have already taken it) and make a  boatload of money, so maybe this isn’t such a problem after all.

At any rate, the important thing here is that two of our friends brought kids that I haven’t seen in five months or so, which is a lot considering they’re something like seven or eight months old, and so they’re HUGE in comparison to my memory.  At that makes me realize that Elliott will be there before we know it, and that kinda breaks my heart.