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< > November 2005

• Wed, Nov 30, 2005 11:16 PM

  ok, i suck. berate me. hit me about the head with large pastries, for i, reader, deserve it.
  
  my life, alas, took a turn for the hectic about 3 months ago, just as the initial shock of having 2 children should have become a more manageable form of chaos. what happened was this:
  
  1. i left yahoo after almost 10 years. (definitely a good, and long overdue, thing)
  
  2. i got swept up in a job with a startup in Palo Alto (yes, that Palo Alto - the one that's 350 miles away from Los Angeles).
  
  3. i became best friends with the stewardesses (sorry, flight attendants) of Southwest as I spent my days doing the start up thing (very fun, with nightmare moments) and my nights thinking "what the hell am i doing so far from family" (no fun).
  
  4. i left said startup and am now 2 weeks back in LA, theoretically relaxing, but it sure don't feel like it. yet.
  
  anyway, this blog's about the kiddies, not me, so lemme try to capture the last, oh, 9 months in one pathetically poor update.
  
  so here goes:
  
  1. THE ARRIVAL OF THE Z-MAN: first of all, my son is just the most beautiful thing on earth. i'll admit that it took me some time to warm up to zade when he was first born, as i was so enamored with kaya's daily new tricks, and i think both cho and i felt that zade got the small piece of the attention pie as he couldn't ask for it, or run into traffic, or generally call attention to himself from his prone, drooling position. but then, over the last few months, i've caught myself doing the same things i did with kaya when she was young - sneaking into his room at night, just staring forever at him (and, for the record, he IS the most handsome Hirsch to ever grace this planet), and marveling at his daily new tricks.
  
  2. ZADE WALKS! on thanksgiving day, zade was inspired by the turkey feast at our house and decided to walk 3, or 4, or 5, steps. he's not fully there yet, but he is finally appreciating the merits of 2, versus 4, legged transportation. it's funny how you can see kids preferring to crawl, and then, over a month or so, they realize that they can get where they want to go MUCH faster if they use those damn legs. pretty darn cute, actually.
  
  3. ZADE GOES TO HOSPITAL: every parent has their scary story, and we endured ours about 2 weeks ago. the family was out at a restaurant, and i took zade to the bathroom to change his diaper. he hates having his diaper changed, and he having a good ol' fit, and all of the sudden he just stopped and appeared to be staring at the ceiling. i thought it was odd that a young kid would stare so intently at a single thing, and then his eyes rolled up into his head and he started to turn blue and froth. he wasn't choking, and he wasn't shaking, it's as if someone had just pulled the plug and he had literally died right in front of me.
  
  i freaked. completely. i ran out of the bathroom with him in my arms and cho freaked and told everyone to call 911. our friend michael pounded him on the back to try to dislodge food, but he hadn't eaten, and, far worse, he simply wasn't responding to being hit (hard!) on the back. honestly, it's as if i now had one of those CPR plastic baby models, not a son. he simply didn't respond or move.
  
  the ambulance showed up in 45 seconds (wow - that's beverly hills for ya!), and he slowly, slowly, ever so slowly, came back to life. all in all, it took about 2 hours for him to come back to reality and behave like the zade we love. we believe he had a Febrile Seizure, which we've now learned it not uncommon, but holy shit, it's about the scariest thing you can possibly ever experience.
  
  4. KAYA RULEZ: let's not forget about the girl that i live for, my daughter. we are definitely, definitely in little girl land...princesses, disneyland, candy, you name it...she's growing ever more independent, smarter by the second, and definitely more opinionated. some specifics:
  
  - she still does QUIET TIME every day for 1-1.5 hours, except she now demands to wear her Angelina Ballerina costume, and then she sneaks out of her room and falls asleep (in costume) in a big fluffy chair in the hallway (see pictures). only my daughter.
  
  - she's in the WHY mode now, and it drives cho nuts. why is the grass wet? why is that boy crying? why do i have to do (fill in blank)?
  
  - we're leaving DORA in the dust, and she's now pretty much into anything that her cousin BEN or any girl OLDER than she likes.
  
  5. EXPERIENCE: It's funny, but we're really parents now...cho and i have almost 4 years of parenting behind us, and i find it much easier to enjoy the kids now, and worry less about germs, and injuries, etc. it's still stressful - it will always be - but it's a beautiful thing to go to Amama's house and watch kaya disappear upstairs with ben, while zade crawls around on his own, exploring his world. we can relax a bit, and yet still be engaged.
  
  6. NEW FAVORITES: my new favorite thing to do, bar none, is check on the kids at night. for the longest time, we couldn't, as kaya was a light sleeper and she'd totally bust us tip-toeing into her room. but now, in her own bed (minus the bedguard that she asked us to remove), we go in nightly to see her inevitably upside down and backwards, with her little girl purse next to her and angelina in her arm. we then head next door to zade, who's often sleeping in the downward dog position (go figure), always quiet and serene. i just love the fact that it takes us 5 minutes to do this routine - it's like our family is so big that we have to go into 3 whole bedrooms just to see everyone sleeping. it's quite a grounding, reassuring feeling.
  
  i'm kinda just rambling, happy to be writing, but admittedly blanking on the little special things that make every day so great. today, i took kaya our to breakfast as per usual (blueberry pancakes at Snug Harbor, not our usual Izzy's), and then she was off to school for 3 hours. i got to pick her up, and we had some pizza and pasta before her swim lesson. she was very, very excited to see Teacher Ashley (though we now call her Cousin Ashley as she's not allowed to teach at the pool we go to) and she loves running up and down the street, reading Tiki-Tiki-Tembo-No-Sa-Rembo, and eating anything fried.
  
  WAIT! DON'T STOP READING YET! Ok, so i'm not shitting you...my 13-month-old son can sing. really. he hums, to be exact, but he is completely in tune and can now perform the following:
  
  - twinkle twinkle little star
  - jingle bells
  - london bridge
  
  ...and about 5 other songs. it's totally nuts...one of those scary genius smart things...
  
  ok, i'm gonna run now and i promise that entries are better when they're fresher...consider these leftovers, and i'll cook for you next time you stop by. in short, despite my sometimes stressed appearance, life is good.

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• Mon, Nov 28, 2005 11:48 PM

  ok, i suck. berate me. hit me about the head with large pastries, for i, reader, deserve it.
  
  my life, alas, took a turn for the hectic about 3 months ago, just as the initial shock of having 2 children should have become a more manageable form of chaos. what happened was this:
  
  1. i left yahoo after almost 10 years. (definitely a good, and long overdue, thing)
  
  2. i got swept up in a job with a startup in Palo Alto (yes, that Palo Alto - the one that's 350 miles away from Los Angeles).
  
  3. i became best friends with the stewardesses (sorry, flight attendants) of Southwest as I spent my days doing the start up thing (very fun, with nightmare moments) and my nights thinking "what the hell am i doing so far from family" (no fun).
  
  4. i left said startup and am now 2 weeks back in LA, theoretically relaxing, but it sure don't feel like it. yet.
  
  anyway, this blog's about the kiddies, not me, so lemme try to capture the last, oh, 9 months in one pathetically poor update.
  
  so here goes:
  
  1. THE ARRIVAL OF THE Z-MAN: first of all, my son is just the most beautiful thing on earth. i'll admit that it took me some time to warm up to zade when he was first born, as i was so enamored with kaya's daily new tricks, and i think both cho and i felt that zade got the small piece of the attention pie as he couldn't ask for it, or run into traffic, or generally call attention to himself from his prone, drooling position. but then, over the last few months, i've caught myself doing the same things i did with kaya when she was young - sneaking into his room at night, just staring forever at him (and, for the record, he IS the most handsome Hirsch to ever grace this planet), and marveling at his daily new tricks.
  
  2. ZADE WALKS! on thanksgiving day, zade was inspired by the turkey feast at our house and decided to walk 3, or 4, or 5, steps. he's not fully there yet, but he is finally appreciating the merits of 2, versus 4, legged transportation. it's funny how you can see kids preferring to crawl, and then, over a month or so, they realize that they can get where they want to go MUCH faster if they use those damn legs. pretty darn cute, actually.
  
  3. ZADE GOES TO HOSPITAL: every parent has their scary story, and we endured ours about 2 weeks ago. the family was out at a restaurant, and i took zade to the bathroom to change his diaper. he hates having his diaper changed, and he having a good ol' fit, and all of the sudden he just stopped and appeared to be staring at the ceiling. i thought it was odd that a young kid would stare so intently at a single thing, and then his eyes rolled up into his head and he started to turn blue and froth. he wasn't choking, and he wasn't shaking, it's as if someone had just pulled the plug and he had literally died right in front of me.
  
  i freaked. completely. i ran out of the bathroom with him in my arms and cho freaked and told everyone to call 911. our friend michael pounded him on the back to try to dislodge food, but he hadn't eaten, and, far worse, he simply wasn't responding to being hit (hard!) on the back. honestly, it's as if i now had one of those CPR plastic baby models, not a son. he simply didn't respond or move.
  
  the ambulance showed up in 45 seconds (wow - that's beverly hills for ya!), and he slowly, slowly, ever so slowly, came back to life. all in all, it took about 2 hours for him to come back to reality and behave like the zade we love. we believe he had a Febrile Seizure, which we've now learned it not uncommon, but holy shit, it's about the scariest thing you can possibly ever experience.
  
  4. KAYA RULEZ: let's not forget about the girl that i live for, my daughter. we are definitely, definitely in little girl land...princesses, disneyland, candy, you name it...she's growing ever more independent, smarter by the second, and definitely more opinionated. some specifics:
  
  - she still does QUIET TIME every day for 1-1.5 hours, except she now demands to wear her Angelina Ballerina costume, and then she sneaks out of her room and falls asleep (in costume) in a big fluffy chair in the hallway (see pictures). only my daughter.
  
  - she's in the WHY mode now, and it drives cho nuts. why is the grass wet? why is that boy crying? why do i have to do (fill in blank)?
  
  - we're leaving DORA in the dust, and she's now pretty much into anything that her cousin BEN or any girl OLDER than she likes.
  
  5. EXPERIENCE: It's funny, but we're really parents now...cho and i have almost 4 years of parenting behind us, and i find it much easier to enjoy the kids now, and worry less about germs, and injuries, etc. it's still stressful - it will always be - but it's a beautiful thing to go to Amama's house and watch kaya disappear upstairs with ben, while zade crawls around on his own, exploring his world. we can relax a bit, and yet still be engaged.
  
  6. NEW FAVORITES: my new favorite thing to do, bar none, is check on the kids at night. for the longest time, we couldn't, as kaya was a light sleeper and she'd totally bust us tip-toeing into her room. but now, in her own bed (minus the bedguard that she asked us to remove), we go in nightly to see her inevitably upside down and backwards, with her little girl purse next to her and angelina in her arm. we then head next door to zade, who's often sleeping in the downward dog position (go figure), always quiet and serene. i just love the fact that it takes us 5 minutes to do this routine - it's like our family is so big that we have to go into 3 whole bedrooms just to see everyone sleeping. it's quite a grounding, reassuring feeling.
  
  i'm kinda just rambling, happy to be writing, but admittedly blanking on the little special things that make every day so great. today, i took kaya our to breakfast as per usual (blueberry pancakes at Snug Harbor, not our usual Izzy's), and then she was off to school for 3 hours. i got to pick her up, and we had some pizza and pasta before her swim lesson. she was very, very excited to see Teacher Ashley (though we now call her Cousin Ashley as she's not allowed to teach at the pool we go to) and she loves running up and down the street, reading Tiki-Tiki-Tembo-No-Sa-Rembo, and eating anything fried.
  
  WAIT! DON'T STOP READING YET! Ok, so i'm not shitting you...my 13-month-old son can sing. really. he hums, to be exact, but he is completely in tune and can now perform the following:
  
  - twinkle twinkle little star
  - jingle bells
  - london bridge
  
  ...and about 5 other songs. it's totally nuts...one of those scary genius smart things...
  
  ok, i'm gonna run now and i promise that entries are better when they're fresher...consider these leftovers, and i'll cook for you next time you stop by. in short, despite my sometimes stressed appearance, life is good.

  Comments:
  Add a comment:

  Name:    Email: 
  Comment: 
  
   Notify me of scrapbook updates