NaomI I moaN

Daniel and his folds. He is sooooo cute but moves around quite a bit so taking non-blurry pictures of him is impossible

Two moving targets relatively still for the second

Daniel sitting in the Circle of Neglect pointing to his erupting tooth

Oliver finishing breakfast

Daniel all bundled up ready to go

22 weeks with Oliver in the background

The baby is kicking harder and harder but I always miss it when she suddenly grabs my hand to feel it.

Sweet treats at the bakery in Brookline. I bought some very tasty ruggelach there

View from Rainbow Bridge of Niagara Falls. We were on this bridge for a long time yesterday. Naomi could have taken a better picture if she would have just stood up through our moonroof but that would be work. She took this by reaching blindly from the moonroof. Note to Canadian Customs: Check out why it takes the Lane 7 guy three times longer than the Lane 6 guy to do the same job. Note to self: stay away from Lane 7.

Sunset from Shanna's terrace. A more interesting shot would have been to waddle down to the beach and take a picture of the Boston skyline to the west-yes Boston is almost due west (and somewhat north) of Shanna as she is on a pennisula sticking out into the ocean.

Pleasure Bay-South Boston

To get to these series of causeways that eventually leads to Castle Island takes 3 miles of running (6 mile round trip). To run on the causeways to get to Castle Island is an 8 mile round trip-more if I actually run on the island, which I did Tuesday. Logan Airport is just an island over to the north so the planes fly very low overhead. The Castle in question is actually an old fort

The start of the causeway which thankfully, is not cement unlike the path leading to it. It is very refreshing in the summer to be out in the water. Not so much with the northeast wind in the winter

Naomi on Carson's Beach about a mile from Shanna's apartment. Her complex can be seen as a series of red brick buildings. The white building is the JFK Library on Columbia Point



We are finally home after the grueling 13 hour drive with Naomi's throbbing music still resonating in my head. When we were not studying microbiology, we took turns listening to 'our' music.The roads were clear and sunny but Canadian Customs was a bitch. Outside of Buffalo is an electronic billboard with estimated times for the various crossings: the Lewiston crossing (one that the Tom-Tom suggests) was 60 minutes plus vs the Rainbow crossing (0-30 minutes which turned into 45 minutes due to me guessing the wrong lane). There is a 3rd crossing but it flashed too quickly for its abbreviations to make sense to me. Everytime I see the name "Rainbow Bridge", I think of that sad poem people send you when your dog dies saying how happy your doggy is on his side of the Rainbow Bridge happily cavorting painfree now that he is dead. But with all the mist kicked up by the falls and sunlight, rainbow spottings from this bridge are quite frequent and thus the name. Note to self: if you are the only one in the car capable of reading a map, don't be driving when you have to make a change of plans or memorize all possible routes ahead of time. I think I know the path now. Another issue was trying to cajole Naomi to move during our stops so she wouldn't develop thrombophlebitis or a bladder infection from avoiding peeing. She still has an infection despite treatment. Her own OB was useless but Shanna's friend the OB sent in a script for us. Lots of moaning the entire week with her telling the both of us that we don't know what pain is. Oh I think we do and it has red hair. She didn't want to hear how the second trimester is the easy one-wait until the third if she wants misery and how at this time while pregnant with her and being 19 years older, I was running 5 miles a day whereas she can't walk 50 feet feet in less than 2 minutes.

Due to her condition, baby bootcamp was a bust although I think she did absorb some mothering skills from Shanna. She also received lots of baby equipment. In her rare good moods, she did interact happily with Daniel and would rock him to sleep. Most of the time she wanted to just lie around and moan. On our last day, she wouldn't go to Oliver's music class or to our trip to the North End, which normally she'd enjoy. As it was sunny, I did drive her to the beach (usually one can just walk to it-or in my case run to it) and it cheered her up somewhat. She was mad at herself for wasting a potentially good time. There won't be many opportunities in the near future to be on vacation. She still has a very romanticized version of what motherhood will be despite seeing Shanna night after night trying to quiet a sick, fussy baby. Her baby won't get sick and she thinks she knows how to make them happy. Shanna at one point said how embarassing it is to have a teenage mom for a sister. I guess it suggests that we are low class somehow. But just try being the mom of a teenage mom with people pointing their fingers and tsk-tsking your obvious failure as a mother. Their precious sweeties would never get into this situation, they were taught right from wrong..blah, blah, blah. F them.