As I mentioned in my previous post, we were sick a lot in August. But there were days here and there that weren’t so difficult.
In the middle of the month, we were all doing a lot better and attended the wedding of our first au pair. She met her now husband right before the pandemic began, and as we all worked through the challenges of the pandemic, we were grateful that she had someone within our bubble to spend time with. We were then thrilled to see that their relationship bloomed and were honored to not only attend their wedding, but for Adam to be their ring-bearer. The event also marked the first time we went to any sort of life event since the pandemic began, and though we were somewhat apprehensive about it, everything went really well and we were comfortable with the whole affair. Adam carried out his duties and little Aaron had a wonderful time dancing when the floor opened up. The evening wrapped up with something Adam had been talking about for weeks: cake!
That same week I went into the office for the first time since the pandemic began, there was cake there too. What prompted the visit was the obvious seeing colleagues in person, but also to celebrate the release of the IBM z16 with a general release event. Wwe all enjoyed balloons, got t-shirts, and spent time chatting about our work and the launch. It was nice putting some names to faces, as there are some new hires since the pandemic began and I hadn’t been able to meet everyone in person. It was also nice to get to work in my office for a few hours, and make sure it was still there! What wasn’t there? An opportunity to charge our new hybrid car. Every single one of the EV charging stations was in use when I arrived. There are dozens, more than the last time I was in the office, but it seems we’ve all bought EVs or hybrids during the pandemic!
Unfortunately, whatever cold thing I had got bad again after this week of fun, and it wasn’t until late August that we all felt well enough to resume our regular weekend routine of farmer’s market, parks, and outdoor dining at our favorite lunch spots.
The Castro Valley Cruise Night landing at the end of the month was a nice evening out for us. I get endless joy out of living downtown in our little town. I’ve mentioned before that it made the transition from living in downtown San Francisco much easier, since I can still walk to a coffee shop and stores. But we have such a nice collection of festivals throughout the year too. Like the annual car show, it’s a fun opportunity to see a lot of classic cars, but instead the boulevard is open to traffic all the vintage and exotic cars are driving around, with people lining the boulevard to socialize and enjoy the sights.
Over Labor Day weekend we got back to our old dining routine as we all started feeling better and the weather warmed up. Then on Monday it really warmed up, too much! So we went to San Francisco for a morning, where it was a little cooler. Our only plans were to take a train ride (BART!) and then take a walk to let the boys enjoy the waterfront. We succeeded, but it definitely wasn’t cool enough, and we all felt a bit overheated as we settled down for lunch. It was nice to get to the city though, we hadn’t made a journey like that as a family before.
I welcomed in September with a promotion at work. And a lot of work. It’s a busy time of year for us with the annual event my team works on and compounded this year with the first in-person Open Mainframe Summit, and a launch event for the next IBM LinuxONE to prepare for. I am not sure I fully thought through adding in our first visit back to Philadelphia to coincide with all of this, at first glance it made sense because the summit is also my first conference in-person again and it’s in Philadelphia. What it turned into was a bit of a perfect storm of busy and stress, but I started writing this post on a flight with both kids chomping away on snacks next to me, so I guess I’m not doing too bad.
Which brings me to this, the visit to Philadelphia! It’s our first trip back to the townhouse since we rang in 2020 with New Years with family. We haven’t seen anyone in almost 3 years, so most of our family and friends back east haven’t even met little Aaron, indeed, they didn’t even see me while I was pregnant with him. It’s wild how much things have changed, and I didn’t quite realize it until we started getting ready for this trip, now with two kids. Plus, it’s a lot more to carry. It’s nice to be here, but work isn’t slowing down any and I sure have the next week cut out for me.