Wednesday we played the University Club team. It is a really an interesting club. Many people from the city, and you can see they mean and do business. I was very surprised when I met Joe Cortes at the club. Thinking about it I have to admit it is not surprising at all as his ex-wife Sarah actually was the one who introduced me to the club a while ago. It is the first time I am back since then.
Anyway, this club is the top club in the league and of course we got our butts whooped. My match was not so obvious: I won the first game to 7, but then lost my focus and could not win another game. I lost the match 1:3, but that was the second best result in the team. Christopher pulled off a 2:3 and Frans and Jan got a disappointing 0:3.
As usual, once you have a squash permit for the evening, we played some more matches and my final match was against Christopher. He had a tough match with Jan before and had lifted some weights but anyway we played, and by the way I was not the freshest either. Long story short I beat him quite convincingly 3:1. This was the second time I had beat him in the first match we played on an occasion. He made more mistakes than usual and I think that might have been due to the lifting. We agreed we would have a real challenge match on Friday.
Friday came and we met at 1pm at the courts, both in good spirits, joking around as usual we warmed up comfortably and finally started our match. I won the first set but it was quite some action, some long and pretty nice exchanges, and I could win most of the long ones which made me confident and happy. The second set Christopher go his game together and fought back successfully. I was prepared for everything in the third and it did not start that well but I was able to keep it together and win the third. That did it and Christopher lost his composer in the fourth and last, because I won the game and match 3:1. This catapults me to the second slot in the team, leap frogging Frans.
So what is next? I will of course challenge Jan 🙂 our number one player.
Blake is now Four Weeks Old (Time Flies)
Blake today passes the four weeks and he is doing very well. He has almost lot all his yellowish skin color and his eyes are almost white as well. He is also already following what is going on to some extend. He can look at something and stay focused.
When he is sitting on his little rocking chair he seems to be watching the least interesting part of the chair, not the flashing lights or the wonderful little goldfish inside the turquoise fluid…., he looks at the blank metal structure (as he is becoming an MIT educated engineer, it is the most obvious thing to watch of course). He loves to take a bath with me and he also enjoys bonding with his Papi.
His brothers and his sister love him very much and always want to take him, just for a minute 🙂 Ana and I are very happy that this part works out so well this far.
Just as a little update on everybody else, here are the most remarkable things to remember: Markus is still not excited about his pre-school experience, but he does now go there without a big scene in front of the Fidelity Building. Once in the past it was so bad that a policemen at the scene helped struggling Ana. He took Markus in his arms and carried him into the building. It left an impression, Markus got all quiet and watched the policeman attentively, just a little scared. Good he did not hit him 🙂 as you remember Markus hands sit pretty loose.
Markus is going to the bathroom by himself, but he is having some issues. Wiping can turn into disaster and he does not call for help, at times he does not get his pants down quickly enough and a distinctive smell of urine clouds him as he does not tell anybody about his little mishaps. Sometimes he tries to fix them himself (you will find the damp clothes in a corner of the wardrobe) other times he leaves his clothes on saying it is not so bad: ‘Das ist nur ein bisschen, das ist nicht schlimm Papi’. But don’t get me wrong here, he is an adorable little happy fellow speeding around on his race track through the entire first floor (kitchen-living room-sun room-living room-entry-dining room-kitchen and so on).
Gisele on the other hand is a sweet girl, completely different from the boys. She loves to drink tea with her mum or even with Papi, but at times she throws a fit and that with all her forces. She has definitively a dark side: her voice becomes very dark and full and she screams with every fiber of her body, getting all stiff, clenching her fists and throwing herself on the floor. It can go on for a while. My best way to get her out of it is to let her be for a while and then giving her to opportunity to snap out of it by offering her the favorite pillow…. often it works, sometimes not.
Ivan is doing great all together. He is the oldest and most reliable. He does not need help with pretty much anything. He likes to go to school and the teachers in Kindergarten love him, pretty much as they did in Geneva. The homework though does not excite him too much — _boring_. Also it seems that he has a slightly week stomach. He has been having some troubles at times and vomits at nights (well correlated with excessive eating).
Just another Friday night
Another of those nights: kids in bed, Ana exhausted and me with some good cuban rum and my Brazil cigar in front of the computer solving an interesting analysis problem. Friday nights can be awesome. Soon the last Conan show to be watched….. Let’s see how he goes out with a bang 😉
Squash is pickung up further
After Blake’s birth I have slowly started up with squash again, and surprise, surprise it worked quite well. I finally had a chance to play some challenge matches. I played one with Christopher, which I lost and I played one with Najib which I won with a whopping 3:1. Well, of course this is dependent on the day but well I won this time. I had also already won the last two matches with (Apra)Tim.
The most prominent consequence of my victory over Najib is of course the fact that I am now the number 4 player on the 4.5 team from the MIT club.
In my so far two matches (played when there was one injured/travelling person) I lost 0:3 and more recently 1:3. Yesterday finally we had another away mach in Natich, MA (cross courts). We (Chistopher and I) drove with Frans’ wonderful Lexus 4×4 and had a good squash heavy conversation between the three of us. When we arrived at the club we changed quickly and I started as the first one to play number 4 match with John. At the same time Christopher got his match started. I was in good spirits and had my head relatively straight, which was not the case in my last league match.
In the first set we were feeling out where everybody was and I was glad to get a bit ahead and keep it that way. In the second set I changed nothing played long and hard and won in a somewhat tighter battle but I felt rather confident. The third set in the end I just kept the game at a fast pace and John lost his composure and I brought it home without much problems. This was a great feeling and we had a beer together. I played some more sets with various people and enjoyed my first league victory. Hopefully more to come. The same evening Christopher (3) lost his match 1:3, Frans (2) lost against a 17 year old very well playing kid 0:3 and finally Jan (1) brought a whopping 3:0 victory to the table. So MIT won this battle, which has pushed us up a little but it will not be enough to get to the playoffs. Frans dropped me off at home which was awesome because Ana did not even have to get up to pickme up.
Tomorrow I have a challenge match with Najib…. I need to start challenging the likes of Christopher and Frans 🙂
Grosi took off
Today we spent our last day with Grosi before she went back to Germany. We did the usual driver service for Ivan and Markus and meanwhile Gisele stayed home with mommy and Blake. We also had a quick run to the shoe store on the schedule to get grosi a new pair of healthy shoes. After some good lunch and a slow afternoon we packed the bag and got the last round of kisses and I dropped my mom at the airport. She was worried about the automatic check-in but as she had to check in her bag it was not necessary to use the automatic check-in. So I got her smoothly on her trip.
Back at home, Ana and I quickly realized we were back to zone defense with just two instead of three. When I brought the kids to bed I took a poll to figure out what the kids thought about grosi’s stay. They all said that it was great that she was here 🙂 though their favorite activities with grosi were different: Gisele loved the extended Animal Bingo sessions with grosi and the phantastic ‘tela bagels’, Markus loved the baking and the construction of ‘Kugelbahnen’ and finally Ivan enjoyed baking cupcakes, watch TV with grosi and play in the playroom upstairs with grosi.
So it sounds like that we need grosi back pretty soon. Ana and I were of course also thrilled as we could just breath a little easier with anything we were doing the last few weeks.
A Quiet Sunday….
Today we enjoyed the last Sunday with Grosi here in Arlington. We went shopping for a jacket for Grosi, some shirts for my father, a fountain pen for Angela and well for anything nice we could find to improve our house.
First we went to Burlington Mall just to look through the fountain pen collections for Angela and Ana found a nice one. We also quickly checked through Potterybarn to see whether there are any interesting furniture, after being lucky yesterday in the Outlet Mall in Wrentham with a wonderful leather Ottoman, made from the same leather as the sofas and seats (fits perfectly between our two seats in the living room). We found a nice little side table which would have fit nicely at the entrance, but they were not sure whether they had it and finally as I was not 100% convinced either we did not buy it. At some point though we need to cleanup that corner as the gloves and hats for the kids need a place, as well as Ana’s handbags which are dangling from the pantry, ready to fall at the slightest touch.
Anyway the kids started to decay and we quickly left and drove to the Freshpond mall to have lunch at Chipotle. It was great as usual but I was surprised how much the kids ate. They usually are happy with one burrito bowl but this time they also ate a large fraction of Grosi’s soft tacos…. she did not complain and we had a good snack after we came home, but that was later.
After Chipotle we went to TJMax and hunted down some jacket for Grosi and two shirts for my father. I got myself three PJ pants which should saturate my needs for PJs for the next 5-10 years 🙂 . I also wanted to get some cigars, but forgot that the store was closed on Sundays. We ended up having the kids watch some movies while they we went shopping and looking after the kids in a round robin surveillance scheme. It made me think of Ana with four kids all alone while I am in Europe.
After all business was concluded we finally made our way home and had a relaxing ‘merendola’ where the kids again put away amazing amounts of food. I am wondering where they put the food. Well, to be honest, with Gisele I got the idea after I cleaned her heavily filled diaper twice.
Before getting out the Leapster and the Didj we did play a round of ‘Fang Mich’ where Ivan tried to catch the five mice I was running…. he was complaining that I was to quick, loved it!
Later in the evening we enjoyed one of the best classical recordings of the century: Beethoven’s Triple Concert by Richter, Rostropovich and Oistrakh under the conduction of von Karajan. The night was completed with the Mondschein Sonate from my all time favorite played by Friedrich Gulda. It is a pleasure to be able to listen to all of those wonderful recordings.
The New Year in the Paus Haus
Yesterday we had another relatively slow day. After the usual breakfast ceremony we figured that it would be best to give the mother a rest with Blake and that we would pack up the kids and do something, like going to a playground or going shopping etc.
Ana approved of my shopping list and off we (mum and I) went with the kids to drive to the Shaws in Belmont, along Pleasant Street.
When we arrived a light snow fall started, small, fine snow flakes, but we were not yet really alarmed. We got our shopping done comfortably, letting the kids do some searching and finding and got to the register, where of course some woman had purchased something nobody knew the price off and got stuck for a while. After the price was determined and we got our stuff through the register we stepped outside in the intense snow fall. The streets had already about 1-2 cm of snow on them and it was clear that we would not get up our driveway. We made another short stop at the TJMax to buy a toaster and I found a nice A-B-C rug for the kids and two sheet sets for our bed, which we really needed quite urgently, but no toaster. By now the streets had more like 3-4 cm of snow and we only gave the driveway a half-hearted shot. Of course we got stuck and finally left the car on the street.
We carried up the rug and some groceries and I dropped them off inside. Afterwards I cleaned up the driveway, which was pretty quick, using my new shovel technique. I brought up the car and emptied the remaining groceries. It continued to snow while we where getting lunch and had our usual early afternoon routine, with ‘grosi’ taking a nap and me selecting and printing more photos for the family album.
Later I noticed that we had forgotten to get wine and champagne to start the new year in style. I went off to buy some in the little Woburn mall (the one with the Whole Foods Market) after having cleaned the driveway, again. It was an interesting ride as the streets were not yet cleaned and it was continuing to snow. I got down the driveway fine and also got down the hill quite fine but after getting my 2 bottles and wine and Italian prosecco I had to continue uphill…. I just barely made it with advanced sliding techniques. When I was back it was 17:20 which was well in time for the central European new year. I got myself a good cigar and started to to the final shoveling of the premises. The city had also decided that it had stopped snowing which I concluded from the snow trucks finally plowing all roads around our house.
I got in right in time to connect our big TV with the computer which was sending directly from the ‘Plaza d’Espagna’ in Madrid the bells to the new year. Ana and my mother had prepared the grapes and we ate them as prescribed one with each toll of the bell until we had all twelve eaten. The kids were not yet really into it but they have some time to get used to it. Of course we opened our prosecco right after the bells and had a good sip, kisses and best wishes.
We called around through skype/phone and found Robin, Nacho, Pup …. it was fun and the new age of high connectivity seems to be hitting the ‘older’ generations. It is a lot of fun!!
Blake at Home for a Day
Time flies and Blake is already at home fro more than 24 hours. Today at 13:00 we had a doctor’s appointment with Blake at MIT in Cambridge. Ana had a bad night, of course, and Mum and I dressed the kids had breakfast with them and went to the playground at Brackett (the one with the long slide). Before going there we check out the roman catholic church of Saint Agnes. The path according to google.maps is about 1.2 miles (~1.9 km, 23 min walk). Mum thought that she could walk there easily. We will drive her of course if it is cold or she does not like the exercise.
After the short trip to St. Agnes we continued to the playground and noted that the place was completely deserted. After we got out of the car we quickly understood why: It was amazingly cold (at least -8 C) and there was a stiff wind blowing over the playground which is right on top of a little hill. Even with a very decent wrapping of everybody and some running we were not able to stay longer then 20 mins when everybody was glad to get back into the car. We decided it would be a great day to enjoy the jungle book from Walt Disney, which we did.
Ana had meanwhile recovered well and gotten some Zzzzs to help her over the rest of the day. We let the kids watch the movie and minded our own business for a while. Cleaning the kitchen, printing some photographs and reading e-mail. Jodie came by and left us a pre-cooked dinner — spaghetti with cheese to be just put into the oven — how nice of her. At 12:15 we got everybody ready to drive to MIT medical, where we arrived in time for our appointment with Blake. Blake is in excellent shape, he had turned slightly yellowish, as babies usually do in the first days, but otherwise everything was fine. The little murmuring heart noise the pediatrician heart on the first visit was also gone, as expected.
For lunch we went to Chipotle which has recently taken over the first spot in kid preferences over McDonald. The lunch was great, with the usual complications of who wants what 🙂
Afterwards we went home, Mum got a good rest, the kids played Didj, Leapster and dressed the dolls. A relaxed afternoon everybody minding their own business without much interference of conflicts. I have to say, having your own house, which has lots of room for minding ones own business is fantastic and keeps family peace. In the course of the afternoon I finished a large fraction of the photo album for my parents and I made some nice photos like the one below of our FOUR kids.
Here is the short description of our little quartet.
Proud parents, again
I am a proud father again: Blake Unai Lothar is born. Mom and baby are in terrific shape. See for yourself at http://cpausmit.dyndns.org/~paus/baby/blake/blake-unai-lothar.html
Winding down
Allright, I think I send all the e-mails and of course I must have forgotten a bunch of people but I think I will leave it at that…. but I am not yet really tired. Here is a little movie I made of Blake.
Well, it is the first movie I upload, so please take it easy with your comments that it does not work 🙂