and i've never been to boston in the fall

Okay, so maybe this is still fall. But I like to think it is winter so I can tell the truth when I sing along with Larry the cucumber and his silly, silly songs.

This week, I left Wayne and Paela to their own devices and hopped a plane to Boston for a job interview. They survived the two days I was gone, and so did I.

I actually really enjoyed the people I met and felt pretty good about the interviews, chatting with 15 different people in six and a half hours. The flights there and back again were pretty exhausting though. Especially the leg from Denver to San Jose, when the plane dropped several feet and people screamed. Others just giggled nervously. I said a quick prayer and clutched the arm rests -- I did so want to actually make it home to Wayne and Paela. Then I tuned in to United's flight transmission channel, to listen to the pilot asking other pilots or control or whoever whether turbulence got better up higher, and the answer was no. Eventually it got better, but after we landed the pilot claimed he hadn't seen it that bad in the 38 years he's been flying. The flight attendant said she had seen worse, though. I don't envy her job.

I was pretty lucky that Camilla and Victor agreed to entertain me when I arrived Thursday night, and they made me a yummy dinner and we had a nice time chatting before they had to say good-bye and drop me off at the hotel. Such a fun evening.

I kept calling Wayne at every opportunity. Apparently they were up to fun times while I was gone. Paela got to go to the bookstore! Her favorite kind of window shopping of all time. What's not to love? Especially at the local used bookstore that also has two store cats roaming around and friendly people to play hide and seek from or wave at. She wandered up and down the aisles, met some new friends and played hide-and-seek with her daddy, especially when she could sneak in the tighter spaces.

They also made it to the ward dinner Friday, where Paela was in love with the ham and cheese (especially the cheese) and Wayne followed her little roamings all over. One of the two days Paela got to paint for the first time! Wow what an adventure. Wayne was very brave, that's all I can say. There was a very messy girl to clean up afterwards, who was sad that Daddy told her not to eat the paint. She got some fun paintings done in the time she had though. [Because I have a long history of painting, I'm also very cognizant of the dangers of the chemicals in paint. Red based paints were traditionally made from highly toxic metal alloys as well as ochre based paints. While things were going "smoothly" while she was making a huge mess on herself, when she grabbed a handful of acrylic ochre paint and stuffed it in her mouth, I probably shouted loudly enough to make her jump through the roof. Granted, most paint suppliers have substituted the toxic materials in these paints with non-toxic synthetic bases, but my gut intuition got the best of me. As a result, I had one sad, sniffling baby to clean up in the tub, even after I kept apologizing profusely for overreacting. Thus, the picture.]

We were very glad Paela got over the hand, foot, mouth disease relatively quickly. This made the two days they were by themselves doable. Of course she has another cold by now, but it's pretty mild.

Oh, and early in the week, Wayne finished the last of his projects for the semester, and later found some tricks that will make the project even cooler. I guess he's at the point in his education that projects no longer end just because you presented on it in class. Fun times.