gentlemen, start your gorillas

Meet Gus.

Courtesy of a guy named Steve (and a friendly anasthesiologist), Gus arrived today at the Man's place to work, where the Man was deep in quarterly work hell. Can we postpone our anniversary? he'd asked me. I'll have that quarterly thing, and oh, but I'll try not to work over the weekends this time. Too much. I made supportive spouse noises - and promptly called Gus.
Sinking deep into his chair, gorilla here: you are in trouble, the Man wrote. Gus hunted him down, sang enthusiastically, quizzed him on baseball trivia, made suggestions for the presidential elections, and proudced a fistful of balloons. One badly hummed Benny Goodman song later, I've got it on video! the Man wrote. And came home grinning.

Happy manyth anniversary, hon.
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While the Man digs himself deeper into his computer, I am digging myself out. Tomorrow, I hope to discharge my latest project, just in time to figure out how to tackle the next. That just might be our anniversary present to ourselves. Several rather impressive anniversary gifts ago (there was something with dachsunds, but I really couldn't go into details), we decided to do a joint gift. We choose something that would benefit the family or the home, and use the planning as a chance to talk about our hopes and concerns for the home.

This year is the year that we refuse to be overwhelmed, and our anniversary present to ourselves is to toss out lots of the junk that's accumulated in the basement. The basement happens to be a pretty popular place at the moment, as our downstairs neighbors pack up in preparation for their first child and first home. Yep, they bought a place and are filling their chunk of basement, prior to moving out. If we reduce and they fill, it's a balance I might be able to live with. And put these plans all together, and you have a bustling basement.

Know anyone who wants a 1 bedroom in my neighborhood? Preferably someone who finds the thumping of small feet to be a soothing, pleasant sound?

Today, the neighbors were moving boxes in and out of the basement when our doorbell rang. The Eldest zipped down the stairs, through our apartment door and plunged straight down, into the depths of the basement. Yep, down.

To afford real basements in our neighborhood, there has to be a catch. Ours is that the basement access is through a hatch that opens in the middle of our shared hallway. So, if you open your apartment door and charge through, yep, there could suddenly be no floor under your feet. Cue Wile E. Coyote, and charge up the maternal stomach acid.

Down drops the Eldest, and I watch his head bang on the edge of the trapdoor. The very pregnant neighbor grabs his shirt, but he's going down - and then he's coming up. Underneath, a friend had caught the Eldest's feet. Between the three of us, we hauled him back over the edge and looked up...to see the horrified face of the guy delivering the kid's clotting meds.

Oh, good. We're going to need that, I said. And dissolved into slightly hysterical giggles. The Eldest looked at us all, scornfully. But it's my JOB to scare people, he said, and marched proudly back up the stairs. Thus enlightened, we adults stared at each other and went off to shake quietly in our respective corners.
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After the various bits of excitement in the day, dinner was celebratory if somewhat subdued (the celebration really started after the kids finished eating, when the Man turned up with an armful of fascinating balloons). We had a variant on this meal, with a block of tofu sizzled in the pan with the kasundi spices, and small sprigs (and slices of tree trunk) tossed into the sauce perhaps 2 minutes before I turned off the heat.

The kids ate it with delight, and had seconds. Except when they had thirds. But who could blame them? There was red, there was green, white and...fried potato. And it was just simple enough for my poor adrenaline-drenched brain to handle.

straight - down. He went straight. down. Good grief.