By Guus , 28 June 2015

Weekend with the boys

Yesterday morning we spent with the boys and we took care of some long-overdue chores. It was raining all day. In the afternoon Ginny came over for a very nice visit.

Then in the evening we spent some time cooking together.

The boys slept amazing last night. We put them to bed at 10.30 pm and they didn't wake up until 6.45 am. We fell asleep again afterwords and I woke up very late. A great start of the day.

Topic
dailylife
By Guus , 25 June 2015

Four month check-up Leo & Adrian

The boys went for their four month check-up and everything looks good. They didn't cry this time when doctor Kim examined them, but of course there were a lot of tears when the vaccinations came. Adrian couldn't get the rotavirus vaccine because he had an upset stomach, so we'll go back with him next week.

Adrian was 15 lbs 9 ounces (7.0 kg), Leo was 15 lbs exactly (6.8 kg). Length Adrian 25 3/4" (65 cm), Leo 25 1/4 (64 cm).

The babies slept for a long time after they came home and had a warm bath to lessen the pain on their legs. It took longer than normal for them to fall asleep, clearly the injections hurt.

Topic
dailylife
By Guus , 24 June 2015

Fast run

It's been a while that I felt I ran nice and fast. Tonight was such a night. I ran on Monday also but I had a lot of energy and the weather was great.

My absolute record on 4.5 miles in 42 minutes, and I'm still four minutes away from that. But still, for a summer evening this was a respectable result.

By Guus , 22 June 2015

Without Nora

Now Nora is in Bulgaria it seems like we have so much extra time! For the first time in months I ran after dinner. I felt strong, even though it was only 90 minutes after I ate. The W&L track is being redone.

By Guus , 21 June 2015

Tough Choices

This is the ninth book I read in preparation for the 2016 Presidential Elections.

When I set out to read all books by Presidential candidates this year, the library turned out to be a wonderful resource. But unfortunately our library doesn't carry Carly Fiorina's latest book Rising to the Challenge: My Leadership Journey.

I knew very little about Mrs. Fiorina, so decided her 2006 book Tough Choices would as good a start as any. It describes her career at AT&T and Lucent, and later her work as CEO of HP.

Obviously, this was a period in her life that was about running companies -- not running for office -- so it didn't tell me much about her political ideas or ambitions, but it was a good book. I have worked with several people who were AT&T and Lucent, mostly technology folks, so I feel some affiliation with those companies. It was very interesting to read about the work of a CEO.

Throughout the book I started to like Mrs. Fiorina. She seems like a good manager. Cares about people, knows her stuff... At the same time, it is very hard to judge her performance from her own memoir, and in particular the final fight with the Board at HP was hard to gage. That's fine, this is an autobiography not a journalistic work. Clearly, Mrs. Fiorina has been a trailblazer as a female in big corporate tech businesses.

The book tells me little about her quality as political candidate. The little I've read about her so far seems to indicate she has not been very successful as a Republican candidate and she is struggling to make the threshold for the first TV debate. On social issues and foreign policy her ideas are fundamentally different than mine. The beauty about reading books like these is that you get to know and respect a person, even if their ideas and experiences are vastly different.

By Guus , 20 June 2015

Nora to Bulgaria

Tonight Nora will travel to Bulgaria to spend the summer with her grandparents. She is traveling with Lelya Snezha from Washington tonight, and with a layover in Munich she'll arrive in Sofia around 6.00 pm local time.

Last year she spent a few days without us in Middenmeer and she did very well. This time is much longer -- 8 weeks in total -- but she will be in excellent hands. It is very special that she can spend time with her grandparents in Perushtitsa.

We will miss her terribly, and I'm counting the days (56 to go) but it will be a great experience for her. It will also allow us to spend some more time with Leo and Adrian.

Topic
dailylife
By Guus , 13 June 2015

YMCA barbecue

Last night we went to the barbecue of the YMCA across the street. We met Eric, Lori and Eric there and saw several people we knew.

Nora and Eli spent some time in the bouncy castle, but then it started raining with thunder and lightning so most activities were halted. We went to the pavilion in the back where the food was and had a nice hamburger and hotdog. A taste of summer.

I spoke with several people from Y itself, including someone who is working on the redesign of the building. They hope to have a plan by the end of the year, which is exciting.

Topic
dailylife
By Guus , 9 June 2015

Voting in the US for the first time

Today I voted for the first time in a U.S. election and it felt great.

I've always enjoyed following politics. For years Sasha and I have followed the Presidential campaigns and watched many debates, and since a few years I also started following the local Arlington politics more closely. I became U.S. citizen in January and today I could finally cast my vote.

The boys woke up around 6.00 am. That's too late to really go back to bed, though also too late to really feel rested. In any case, I was at the polling station at 7.00 am I was voter number 8. The election was a Democratic primary for the Arlington County Board. There were six candidates running for two open positions. The general election will be in November. The candidates were all quite similar to each other; I ended up voting for Fallon and Cristol.

Someone asked: "was it everything you hoped for?" and yes, I am very happy that I can vote now and I was really a bit emotional when I left the polling station.

The last time I voted in an election, then in the Netherlands, was over ten years ago.

Topic
arlington
By Guus , 6 June 2015

"I also wanna see!"

Sasha and Nora were sitting at the table and I wanted to show Sasha something. All of a sudden Nora says: "I also wanna see!" -- in perfect English.

We pretended that we didn't understand -- never mind the fact that Sasha and I mostly speak English together, haha. Clearly, her English is getting better and starting to creep in her regular life. Obviously we want her to be fluent in English, but her speaking Bulgarian and Dutch well is also very important to us and the only way to make that happen is have her speak those two languages exclusively when she talks with us.

Her Dutch is very good though. Here are some of the things she just said:

"op maandag als baba Snezha komt ga ik een taart maken want Meneer Prascho wordt weer jarig"
"in die koffer, in die tas, zit nog meer Duplo. Ja. In die tas zit nog meer eten. Er zit[ten] ook nog aarbeien voor taart.

(I guess it is time for her breakfast, haha). She makes jokes in Dutch too. Asides from saying "maar weetje wat het is baby", she made her own joke words: sneeuwpoepje and hagelslak

Topic
dailylife