Swimming, smiles, soothing, and...styles? Something.

Sorry it's been a while my loyal readers. Some things have been happening, and a lot of things have been not happening. For instance, I've been NOT getting teaching jobs; the consistency is comforting I suppose. Today I got a letter in the mail from a school district I applied to a while back, and it turned out to be for an elementary teacher position. I'm not an elementary school teacher, so that worked out pretty well. It has gotten to the point where I'm not sure I want to be a teacher. Don't worry. I'm not giving up on any dreams. In fact, now that I think about it, I've already blogged about this. Anyway. That's what's NOT happening. What has been happening is this: video games. Oh, I'm afraid so. There's been a couple great games called Braid and Shadow Complex on Xbox Live, and they are both fantastic. Braid is a puzzle game that deals with time and stuff and it's got this AMAZING ending. I loved it. Shadow Complex is like Metroid only different. It's really cool too. Kate and I have been watching Heroes and decided that season 4 was very good and it is too bad the show was canceled. Season 5 was going to be the last season anyway. Shame. A darn shame. I've also been reading 1984 a little bit, and the jury's still out. I think I'm enjoying it, but I also think there are things going on that I'm missing. It's hard when you're reading these books on your own and don't have a professor to tell you what you're looking for.

Yesterday we took her in to the doctor's office because we noticed one of her pupils dilates differently than the other one and it wigged us out. Turns out, this is actually somewhat common. The doctor said he'd seen in a couple hundred times and it has never been anything to worry about. He suspected it was actually much more common, but parents don't notice. So kudos to us for being attentive parents. We may take her to an ophthalmologist, but only if it's free. If it's nothing to worry about, then we can afford to not spend money we don't have anyway. While we were there, the nurse said she was ahead of the development curve because she would turn her head to look at things. It's always nice to hear your baby's advanced. That must be why TAG parents are such jerks. Generally. Like when you taste something delicious that's also super healthy, you want to eat it all the time -- any time you are inhibited from eating it you throw a fit. It's evolution. Anyway, the nurse noticed Aislin would turn her head to look at things rather than simply tracking with her eyes. That's advanced for a three month old. She gets it from her mother.

Lately she's been kind of fussy. Well, it alternates. We just went to a wedding in Portland and she was a pleasure through the ceremony and the reception. She was also wonderful at the doctor's office. She would smile at strangers and be perfectly happy to let strange family members hold her. But then the past few days she's been inconsolable. Kate thinks it may be due to the chocolate she's been eating, but that's no excuse to stop eating chocolate. But it's the best one I've heard yet. "Don't eat chocolate: it makes babies cranky and therefore Father's life much harder than it needs to be." Whatever.

While we were at this hotel, we took her into the swimming pool for the first time. We're pretty sure she loved it. At first she was apprehensive, but soon she was smiling and having a good time. We took her out when she started to shiver, and then when the cold set in (you know, the cold you get after swimming when you're all wet and it can be 100 degrees Fahrenheit and still be cold) she started to cry. Mom got this great picture of her smiling in the pool. She had this cute pink bathing suit. It was adorable.

She spends more of her time awake now. That's ok as long as she wants to be awake. Sometimes, she just wants to be asleep. Fortunately for me, she's found her thumb at long last. She self-soothes a little when she's fussy and wants to sleep. Today she even fell asleep in the high chair. It's pretty funny because she doesn't have a sibling to show her how to suck her thumb and no one else around but me, really, and I sure don't suck my thumb, so she doesn't make a fist. She just sticks her thumb in there and the rest of her fingers come too close to poking out her eye. Nah, it's not that perilous. I support this thumb-sucking. For now, at least.