Adventures in public transport

Day 1

With my January All-Zones pass secured I started my new public transport work life this week. I got a pump for the tires on Jesse's bike and a lock to bring with me. The 6:40 train will get me to to the stop closest my work at 7:45 leaving me a mile ride to work. It was lightly raining and though I thought to pack an extra pair of pants last night before going to bed, I didn't remember to actually do it in the morning. I made it to the train just fine and it was running a couple minutes late. I got to the stop by work at 7:50 and was 3 minutes late coming into work. I also had a wet muddy strip on the back of my pants and lost my glasses some where along the way. It was an uncomfortable day squinting and trying not to go anywhere so that no one would see brown stain on my bottom. I made it back to the train but missed the 5:15 train that would get me home at 6 and so had to wait for the 5:25 train. It was a good ride back with some vetern bike commuters that set me straight on things like reflectors, lights, and most important: Fenders! I couldn't get on the Yellow line train that would drop me off by the house so I rode from the Rose Quarter back home up a little hill. The bikes gears were not working and the peddles would slip as the gears caught and switched making impossible to peddle hard. I made it home tired and dirty and having learned some good lessons. I need a bike of my own, it needs fenders, I need an extra set of clothes anyway, and I am going to enjoy this.

Day 2

Knowing that I need to get my own bike and not yet able to do that I left the bike at home and took the train/bus option today. I needed to get the 6:29 train in the morning to make it to work on time and I missed it by 2 minutes. That meant waiting another 15 minutes for the next one and missing the bus connection by work that would get me to work on time. Knowing I was going to be late I sat back and read with the other commuters. At the Sunset Transfer Center there was a fare check, the first one I have experienced in the few times I have taken the train. A couple of people got pulled off for not having fare but it was a pretty quick check. I got a ride from work to the station and made the 5:15 train with no problem. I made it home to Ribs, beans and Salad and far dryer and cleaner then the day before. I learned that 15 mintues is not enough time to get up, have coffee, and make it to the train so an earlier alarm was in order.

Day 3

Alarm went off at 5:45 this time and I awoke with a terrible headache. I called into work and went back to bed. No train today, we will see how Thursday goes.

Moving day has passed

Yesterday was moving day and it was probably the single hardest day of work in my life. I have worked long hours off shore, worked in the heat at summer camps, did some time as a roofer, and even worked a day in the heat at a station set up to get rid of household hazardous waste in 100* weather and even that was easier then yesterday. The day started at 6:30 AM, before the sun came up but long after the rain had started. We finished up after 7 PM with the rain still going strong and the sun long since down. There were washing machines to come out of basements and headboards made of lead to come down stairs and go back up at the new house. It was exhausting and wet and hard but it is over. We have boxes piled in room but they no longer have to come out of trucks through the rain. After lowering the last Dryer down the basement stairs of the new house I went into my new room and felt defeated. I thought I would take a hot shower and then grab a blanket and just sleep on the mattress. I could make the bed tomorrow before Kate got home. I went in and had a bath in the great claw foot tub and when I came back out My friend Carly had made my bed up. I'll be honest with you I cried a little when I saw that. I was so tired and sore and that beautiful gesture was more then I could hold in. Right now we are on the same page with this house and we are really preferring each other and I hope that it will last a long time. There are going to be tough times that come up and communication will break down but I hope we can continually come back to times like this.

Day 7

So far we have been to the beach everyday since we have been here and our mid-westerner farmer tans are turning into slightly less pale versions. There is a salt water pool at the house as well that we have been dipping in, Henry loves it, Finn not so much. I am on Day 4 of working at home and my first official day with everything working as it should. The first couple of days the phone was not working and since that is the bulk of my duties I did a lot of sitting around responding to emails in a lightening fast manor that would imply i was on top of it. I want to show that despite not being in the office I am on top of my game. Work starts at 5 AM and ends at 2 PM leaving a lot of time for fun in the sun. We have ventured into Kailua to walk around and yesterday on our walk saw Hurly from Lost. Having lived in Santa Barbara and run into our fair share of celebs we knew the drill. But it was oddly fitting to be in Hawaii for a couple of days and already run into a Lost cast member. of course I would have preferred Evangeline Lilly but you take what you get.

The boy have been sleeping a little later each day so that they now get up closer to 6:30 AM instead of 4:30. We are all in bed by 9 around here so the early hour isn't so bad. Mandy is here for a couple more days before heading back to Texas and then on to Afganistan. It has been a nice transition to see how she handles Jake so that we can keep things as routine as possible. There are a few pictures on Flickr and more coming.

The song of the keyboard

Right around this time of day 2:30-3:00 I get really sleepy. There is a lull in the phone calls and the rhythmic tapping of keys that fills the office, calling out to me to crash my face on the keyboard, that tap tap tap like the sirens of Ulysses luring the ships to the rocks. I get up and walk around, grab a cup of tea, get the blood flowing but I know that the last two hours of work are going to be a fight for conscienceless.

The time between

For the last month I have been working long hours at work and getting less sleep then usual. It seems like a good warm up to the sleepless nights of a newborn but for the next few days I will be in the in-between. The extra hours at work are over and the baby is not here yet. With Finn at my parents house there is a strong possibility that I could sleep until noon tomorrow, maybe longer, and that idea sounds good. I am in no way comparing because I will always lose, but I am really tired. I feel weary and unhealthy and in need of some sun. The odd thing is that I am really happy. This busy time has been really great and Kate and I have had a lot of fun together.

Mommy kissing Sata Claus

We went and saw Santa on Saturday and Finn was not at all freaked out by ole St. Nick. He was pretty freaked out the night before when he saw Santa in Clatskanie but momma went up there with him so he was OK. He listened in to Santa and pointed out his Gaga and Papa in the crowd. I bit of a shout out to his posse. My work had a Santa Saturday for the employees and their kids and it was really great. You could create a naughty and nice list for Santa to refer to when talking to the kids and we got to wrap a toy for Santa to pass out. We didn't take advantage of all that but will next year for sure.

Very, that's how cute he is, very

It seems I am perpetually apologizing for not updating and that reeks a bit of arrogance. I guess I have this picture of people checking each day for new content and going away with a cloud over their day when they find nothing there. That is probably not the case but my apology comes also from a place of wanting to write more and not getting the chance to and so it ends up being an apology for me more then anything else. A blog is at heart a diary of sorts and our diaries are meant to be more personal. Most of the time that I am writing it is more to myself as the audience then anyone else but I am always aware of who may or may not be reading this and there fore tailor and smooth where rough edges might have done just fine. I am rambling and wandering and all I wanted to really say was that I don’t have a computer at home and work seems to be a poor place to update so I have been negligent in writing what I have wanted for that I am sorry. I apologize to any disappointed readers and I apologize to myself for not stoking the flames narcissism that have roared wildly despite my neglect.

Now that I have that out of the way I wanted to talk a bit about how freaking cute my son is. Finn is now 17 months and walking away like a champ. He took longer to get there then his contemporaries but he is going full board now. His vocabulary is increasing from Ball and Car to a wider palate of phrases and sounds to make sense of his world. He calls Kate ‘mama’ and he calls me ‘gaga’. It used to be ‘kaka’ but he found that word was closer to cracker and didn’t want to confuse us. He loves cars and points them out screaming ‘car, car, car’ until we say yes Finn that is indeed a car. You are a very astute young lad finding a car on this freeway at rush hour. He has also created some much more complicated language for trucks. For the trucks he says ‘papa’ and shakes his head no. This comes from the fact that his Papa Bing drives a truck but he is well aware that isn’t indeed papa or his truck. He has heard the word truck, he can say the word truck, but he chooses instead this complicated process of audible and physical action to convey the meaning because he is a complicated, complicated individual.

A couple of nights ago Kate and I were driving around to fill a Birthday/Thank you basket for my mom and Finn was in the back checking out the scene. We had a pop station on the radio and there was a non-descript pop princess song on that was catchy but empty. Finn started singing along in ‘Ba ba ba’s but doing so in such a condescending tone that there was no doubt he was my child. It was like he was making fun of the song while humming along in true Indie-rock snob fashion. His uncle John would have been so proud of him.

It has been tough going back to work and not being with him all day but I have come to really enjoy those final few steps on my walk home when I know that soon I will see Kate and Finn. I know that they will both smile at me and be excited that I am home and that feeling is intoxicating. I am not sure it makes up for missing so much but it definitely softens the blow.