With the offer swimming before his eyes, Peter stopped in that day to the House of Bagels on California Street in Palo Alto to get a late breakfast. Still dazed, he thinks he left his iPad at the cash register when he paid for a bagel. Within 1/2 hour, he realized it was gone, and activated its built-in GPS tracking which has helped him find it whenever else it’s gone missing.

But this time, the iPad didn’t respond. Peter contacted the House of Bagels, which didn’t recall seeing it. Nonetheless, on the chance the thief had simply turned off the iPad, Peter sent a message which would flash when it was turned on asking for the iPad’s return, and continued checking in. On Friday morning, we received notification that the message had been delivered, indicating the iPad had been turned on again, even if just briefly.

Then, on Friday afternoon, the iPad popped back up with its location. Peter instantly got into his car to go to its location, and to his surprise, while he himself was still enroute, watched it move from Mountain View to a location near Kifer and Lawrence Expressway in Sunnyvale. When he arrived, the GPS had gone off again, but as it turns out, the thief had been found.

The last signal for the iPad came from within a business called Sami ePhone, which, among other services, offers iPhone unlocking. The person on staff then, Masood, told Peter he’d just missed the iPad by 15 minutes. It had been brought in by a chubby 20-something Hispanic dude, who gave a sob story about how he’d had the iPad for years,  but had forgotten his code. Masood told him he could unlock it, but if in that process, he discovered the iPad was stolen (as he would have given the messages Peter had sent), he’d have to report it to the police. Thereupon, the thief essentially said “nevermind” and left.

However, Massood had gotten the thief’s phone number, and furthermore, could describe the thief; he also had security video with the thief on it, as well as the thief’s car license number. And, so the chase was on.

Peter called the thief and told him he wanted his iPad back, whereupon the thief hung up and turned off his phone. Peter called back, telling him that he’d been made, and it would only be in his interest to turn over the stolen goods. Then Peter called the Palo Alto police, who told him a policeman would be calling him soon.

That evening, the Palo Alto policeman called, and just as Peter was speaking to him, the thief called back!! I overheard Peter telling the thief that this was his last opportunity to return the iPad before we’d have to press charges. Proving for the umpteenth time that thieves are typically complete freakin’ idiots, the thief then asked Peter for $500 for the iPad. His new story (quite different from the one he’d given Masood) was that he’d bought it from a “big black guy.” I’m sorry, but I have to admit sometimes I understand the jury in the O.J. Simpson case. It’s always a big black guy who’s name no one can remember who commits all the crimes scumbags don’t want to take responsibility for, isn’t it? Peter warned the thief of all the criminal charges he was facing by these actions, which now not only included theft, possession of stolen property, attempt to sell stolen property, but  extortion as well. The thief hung up on Peter, who recounted the entire conversation plus the copious information we’d already gathered to the policeman. Then I went to Maureen’s housewarming party, while Peter and the policeman worked on detective-y things.

On a hunch that the thief worked at the House of Bagels, Peter went there this morning, and give the manager the description and phone number of the thief. It turned out to be one of the employees, a new one who’d only been hired 2 weeks earlier, named Juan. The manager insisted Juan go home immediately and return the iPad; Juan tried to yet another new story, equally absurd, about how he’d gotten the iPad. After taking more than an hour to fetch the iPad (now without its leather cover), Juan returned and asked Peter to step outside to talk to a “friend” of his who was holding the iPad for him. Peter retorted he’d better bring the iPad in now, or we’d be siccing the police on him and his (undoubtedly also extortionist) “friend.” Juan relented, came back with his “friend” and the iPad, but still without any glimmer of comprehension on how very screwed he is, and what an idiot he was to steal the iPad and then try to extort money for it.

Anyway, the iPad’s back; the P.A. police will soon have Juan’s full name and address (as he last gave it to his employer, who I suspect is his employer no more.) There’s a lot of good guys keeping Juan from being the thorough scumbag he could be, which include the manager of the bagel shop, Masood at Sami ePhone, the Palo Alto police, and the scientists who built security and tracking into iPads and iPhones. I thank those heroes.

And 2012 will be, well, another exciting year, I expect.

Kelly and Shiaw-Ling have the same birthday, 21 years apart, so more often than not, they’ve had their birthday parties on the same weekend. This year, Shiaw-Ling found out that the Hayes Mansion would give us a space in which to have a party, as long as we paid for catering. Shiaw-Ling also wanted to have a Mad Science party. The Hayes Mansion is used to catering to adults. Mad Science is used to giving parties for underage children, rather than playful 20-somethings. So, we decided to combine the girls’ birthday parties so we could mix up the fancy-schmancy with the kiddie science show.

The catering was still pretty pricey, but then neither Shiaw-Ling or I had known how much volume of food the mansion calculates per person. As we arrived, we were shocked by the volume of food we’d bought–and we thought we’d bought conservatively. So, needless to say, we had plenty of food to feed our friends, and then some.

We went all out on a Mad Science event, and Mad Science delivered two hours of theatrical experiments, like bubbling dry ice potions:

Some people came dressed appropriately as mad scientists,

and others (I’m pointing my finger at the 6-year-old girls) took turns appropriating Shiaw-Ling’s mad scientist goggles:

I did my part by telling Matt, Ichi, and Constantine all about the wonders and glory of mobile web widgets. Oooo, mobile web widgets are the future! Or, we could talk about femtocells! Ichi seemed intrigued. Matt confessed he wanted to send a Motorola Droid into outer space, especially if he could find someone to pay him to do it (FYI, that’s not me). Constantine reminded me he has other things to do, like his job.

After the mad science was over, and most of the 6-and-under crowd had gone home, Shiaw-Ling decamped from our party room into a hotel room in the mansion, where the party would go on with watching Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, and a night of playing Star Wars games. Neil stayed behind for the after party.

Peter and I recruited Ben to help us take our decorations (such as our spotlights) back, but this required a long walk around to the side of the mansion where there was a ramp. There, we discovered another event that was going on that night: PACE was having its annual auction and fundraiser at the mansion, with a 20s theme.

Here are some guests dressed for the event:

and one of the classic cars that had been parked alongside the mansion:

It was a lot of fun, but I don’t know if we’ll ever have such a fancy event again, at least not for a birthday!

I made sure to get there early, because I expected it would only get more crowded over time. Outside the store, several booths were set up with activities and information for preschoolers, and Kelly planted a cucumber seed in a small cup.

When we got inside, an exercise class had already begun in the children’s area, with a princess, Prince Charming, Carmen Miranda, and Scooby Doo as part of the background exercise team:

I’m jealous: Scooby-Doo never comes to my exercise classes. Kelly happily hopped around, trying to follow the instructions, and even did The Macarena for the first of what will undoubtedly be many times in her life.

Following a raffle ticket giveaway, we went to another area for a storytime featuring The Belly Book, and snacks. I think the latter got more attention than the book!  There was a short interlude to instruct parents on how to read to their children, but after 10 years of experience in the same, and with 2 children who can read independently, I think I can skip it. I followed Kelly to yet another area, where she got a recipe book, and made her own trail mix.

I reward her for her schoolwork with books, and Kelly was due for one, so we took a break to go book shopping. Kelly wanted to read all the books, but eventually settled on a Mo Willems book, Don’t Let the Pigeon Ride the Bus.

But then we distracted by the concert that was just beginning. The Papa Hugs Band put on a full kiddie concert with silly songs. For almost every song, there was a character or some zany action. For instance, here’s the Stinkbug from the Stingbug song:

On cue, the bug would spray the audience, and Kelly held her nose firmly closed.

while those who weren’t doing the same cried “Euuwwww!”

At one point, Papa Hugs encouraged his audience to toot along by handing out kazoos, and later, he got a bubble machine going which got all the children (including Kelly whose stretched up hands are near the front) to rush the stage:

By this time, I’d had enough exitement, especially considering that I was planning on bringing Kelly to another storytime later that day. But Kelly wanted to stick around, so we went to see Elina Wong give a presentation on her book about child-friendly activities in the Bay Area. The book was appropriate to the occassion: it was all about things to do when you get off the couch, and it looked appealing and well done. However, talking about your book in the slot right after a concert at which kazoos were distributed was clearly not ideal. Kelly saw enough to know she wants to go strawberry picking at Gizdich Ranch, but eventually she came around to my feeling that it was time to leave this big party scene for others.

All in all, at least for the 2-1/2 hours we were there, it was fun, zany time. The staff seemed slightly surprised at the robust attendance, but I wasn’t.

Kelly has been wanting to have a party for a while, and I finally came around to the idea of an Easter party. Kelly’s already collected a list of dear friends she talks about (it’s a collection of modern girl names: Pearl, Crystal, Haley, Kaitlin, Gilly, Megan, Gracie, Sierra, Annika, etc.) and I figured I could put together a few crafts, an egg hunt, and some carrot cake to make my daughter happy. Peter and I settled on the best place and time to the Friday park day of Kelly’s three regular home schooler park days, and put out the invite.

The party was a success: Kelly had about seven of her favorite peers (two of which were non-homeschooled friends of hers she knows from storytimes and community center classes) and they had a merry time playing on the playground, and searching for eggs. Here’s Kelly and Kaitlin finding eggs together:

The older children weren’t left out either: they hid the eggs for me and I had plenty of crafts on hand for them as well as for the little ones. I made my favorite carrot cake recipe, which is frighteningly healthy: with no refined sugar, whole wheat flour, carrots, zucchini, and pineapple. It is actually delicious, but those who are suspicious of such things were grateful another mom brought two big boxes of donuts to nullify that health attack.

The next day, Neil’s boy scout troop helped put on a big community egg hunt at Schallenberger Elementary School. There were 6000 eggs and children were released in stages, according to age. Kelly was already a seasoned egg scooper. When her age group was released, she bounced past her peers to the deep end of the field to be able to grab more eggs, so more the faster. Here she is (in the pink dress on the right) running out:

In this case, the eggs were plastic, with candy inside and the ocassional “golden ticket.” Kelly lucked out with SIX golden tickets, which she redeemed for trinkets, like a faux camera, with which she and a friend clicked pictures of each other and me:

We figured that was enough egg hunts, but wouldn’t you know it: the Easter bunny reappeared while the children were out playing on Easter Sunday, and we had another Easter egg hunt in our back yard.

With Kelly, the holidays are all out. Cinco de Mayo is coming up, so I’d better start planning now.

The first was nominally a five-year-old’s birthday. Surprisingly, for a girl who’s not been in institutional school, Kelly’s enjoyed just as many kindergarten-age birthday parties as Neil did at her age. Instead of her schoolmates, she has her friends from the homeschoolers’ park days; her friends from Andrew’s storytime; and her friends who are the little sisters of Neil’s friends. It’s still not enough for her by the way, and she complains about not having constant access to another trove of friendships within a classroom, but I digress.

This party was a party for the little sister of one of Neil’s friends in Morgan Hill. And it was as much a party for the adults and the older sibling as it was for the little girl whose birthday we were celebrating. The parents, Kelton and Allison, typically have birthday barbecues, which pleases all. The children play amongst themselves and finish off with the cake and birthday presents. The adults get to hang out and nominally supervise, while eating barbecued food and drinking. That’s probably what birthday parties were always like before the advent of the bounce house and party pony, and this is a lot less stressful and fun for the grown-ups, too.

I surprised myself at being able to hold my own in party conversation. It helps that I am just completing a tech writing job which is still top secret, which probably makes it sound a little cooler than it actually is, and that I was hanging out with other people with tech jobs. The wine was good (as always), but I had to drive home in the rain, so I had to settle for one glass of some good stuff, and enjoy gourmet sodas instead.

The next day I got to go to a baby shower for a fellow homeschooling mom, Krissy. Normally, homeschoolers tend to be somewhat private (or at least distracted by their children) so it was a rare treat to go to a fellow homeschoolers’  house for a child-free party. The mom-to-be happened to be one of those super-nice people, and all her chosen guests were the super-nice people in the group. So I’m not sure how I got an in, but I guess I have my moments of being nice too, at least in the presence of the super-nice. I had several firsts there, too. I had fondue, which I’ve known about forever, but never remember having. It used to be too 70s to be cool, and now that it’s cool again, I was stuck in my 90s culinary habits. I also did “the identify baby food by taste” game, which is a baby shower staple, but considered too much of an old staple to have been at any other baby shower I’d ever been at. Needless to say, I completely failed at identifying the baby food.

Krissy got lots and lots of clothes for her expected son, including what I think was a sample of every newborn boy onesie currently available in Macy’s. If he ends up becoming a male fashion model, Krissy knows who she can blame.

My next weekend has no parties, though I may have to go to a beach house to model my beach geek look for my new column in Santa Cruz Magazine.

This last week has been one of great anxiety.

Charybdis and Scylla was in session for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and Inaugural Day (a new holiday for San Jose Unified, at least this year.) It left me feeling weirdly out of touch with the hordes of people weeping with joy and dancing in the streets as our new president took office.

My client had me return some hardware I was using for my writing gig, and I have yet to get a replacement. I tell myself to just be patient, but I have a collapsing economy around me, and it just makes me nervous.

I put Kelly on the list for a charter school in another district. They were very nice, and best of all, it has parents sign an agreement, i.e. if your child can’t show up for class on time, or is disruptive, he’s out. Unfortunately, her odds of getting in are long, because (reasonably enough) the school gives priority to families within the district. But once again, I was reminded that in our local district’s magnet school, Kelly is unwanted.

A few days later, Kelly told me she got time out in her dance class because she tired of dancing and watched the other students in the mirror instead. I despaired as to whether I’ve ruined her for elementary schools already.

On Friday, I tried to book rooms for the San Diego Comic-Con, a process which has freaked me out for years. I think it’ll turn out ok, but once again, the hotel rooms have nearly doubled their room rates again since just a few years before. I can’t argue with the rules of extreme demand and limited supply, but that doesn’t mean I’m happy about it.

So now I’m back to work. Hopefully my gig will continue well.

In March, we drove to LA in my new car to a really awful comic book convention. But the children got to see LA and I got one of my favorite new shirts there.

Then Peter went to Germany, to a comic book convention, just as gas prices climbed to an outrageous level that put me on a driving strike.

Human Computing moved into new offices downtown, which are ever so much nicer, and better located, than where he used to be, in the office building purchased by, er, Ray. I’m sure I mentioned the new offices are across from the basilica, and I didn’t get around to mentioning that the new office building management put up spectacular Christmas decorations, on a level to match those at Christmas in the Park.

Neil found a boy scout troop to join, and I officially became a homeschool teacher. At the beginning of the summer, Neil found some neighborhood friends, which lightened my concerns about his social life. Little did I know that by the end of the year, I’d be homeschooling my daughter, too.

I also saw the San Diego Comic-Con again for the first time in several years, took full geeky pleasure in seeing Jim Butcher and Steve Coogan, and managed to keep myself sane by taking it in in only small portions.

We took an epic cross-country journey which let us see friends and family, as well as see and understand our fellow countrymen, plus get to know some of our most important national monuments. While we were traveling, the economy apparently decided to go to hell. But at least we knew all our other countrymen were in the same situation, no matter their situation or philosophy.

I have to say that I never expected that the fallout from Happy Happy Lenderman would be as dramatic as it turned out to be. I figured the banks were eating their lending mistakes, but it turned out the whole mess gave them massive indigestion–and the rest of us have to pay up now, too.

Our presidential election went well, but I’m not as excited about our president-elect as some other people are. Frankly the over-the-top adoration of him creeped me out, and I see a ordinary (perhaps egotistical) man who’s facing a tough situation, with an awful lot of overly-high public expectations. This tongue-in-cheek article from the Onion probably encapsulated my view of Barack Obama’s victory best.

But I go into 2009 in good health, with my family, and with a good freelance writing gig. For myself, I know 2009 won’t be as exciting as 2008, but it should be a’right. I hope all my friends and family will have a great new year, and if there are any rough spots that they’ll sail through them quickly.

Our holiday season started with Thanksgiving. Our Thanksgiving was low-key, and we just had steak and potatoes instead of a turkey we’d be not eating for the rest of the week. I turned one of my army of fall pumpkins into a pie, and Peter had the children help him make an apple pie that turned out beautifully:

Peter got up early the next morning for the Black Friday specials, but it wasn’t really anything special. He bought an XBox at Target, but none of the other offers we’d seen in the paper or online were compelling this year.

The next weekend, we went downtown early for the San Jose Christmas Parade, which is always wonderful. And even better this year for us, since Peter’s office is right downtown and faces down upon the parade route. Nontheless, we went downstairs for a street level view closer to the park where an announcer told us who was who and the performers would play or dance for us as they passed by. We saw middle-school-to-college-level marching bands (the San Jose State marching band being particularly impressive), beauty queens, balloons, local politicians, all sorts of dancing troops, and of course, the star of the show, Santa Claus. The parade has no particular theme, so we also saw the Sons of Liberty celebrating the Fourth of July, and Darth Vader and Storm Troopers, but that’s really a big part of its charm, too.

Santa was taking a break between the parade and taking Christmas wishes as the Santa House, so in the interim we bought and decorated Christmas trees for our home and office. Then Kelly and Neil waited to see Santa. Some protest was going on over by the Basilica, but they were incoherent, so we couldn’t figure out if they were Proposition 8 protestors, anti-Capitalism hippies, or Mumbai massacre awareness folk. The only sign we could make out was “Honk for Peace” even though honking for peace actually disturbs the peace, and everyone (including terrorists) is always saying they want peace.

Anyway, for the first time, Kelly actually got up the courage to talk to Santa directly, and she told him (as she’d written earlier) that she wants a pogo stick and a stuffed-animal kitty. Neil told Santa he wants A New Kind of Science, even though I think Neil’s already read that tome twice over. Santa reminded them to leave out cookies for him, and gave the kids candy canes after we’d all posed with him.

The next week turned out to be less hectic than I was afraid it would be, and on Tuesday evening, we decided to go the Christmas party at Borders, where our favorite storytime person, Andrew, works. To our surprise, at the 6 pm starting time, we were the only guest for the party, but it meant Kelly got 2 storytimes, and our whole family participated in coloring Christmas tree decorations. I took a break to walk around the mall, during which more children appeared for the party, and Kelly won some prizes in a snowman toss and Santa Says. At 7, I was back to enjoy the highlight of the party: a group of carollers Andrew had gathered together from his family and church.

The songs were deliciously Christmassy, unlike the watered down for political correctness and fear of Christianity songs in public schools. Kelly adored it and even adopted a caroller as a temporary grandmother.

The next day, I had to take her to our favorite thrift shop so she could get Christmas-themed clothes like the carollers had. She now has a top with candy canes and a playtime-friendly red velvet dress. But she’s still wearing her Superman outfit most of the time, because nothing says festive like…super-heroes.

So, thanks to Andrew, Santa, and Kelly, we’re slowly catching on to the Christmas spirit.

This year’s theme was “poverty.” Very kindly, Shiaw-Ling held off on the fashion portion of her party until we got there, because as it turned out, 3 of our 4 family members were to be 3 of the 4 models for the  show. And both Loretta and her sister, Maureen, became the designers. Can we see dynastic lines already forming? The only outsiders trying to break into this cabal were Joe (as model) and his girlfriend Mimi (as designer, as I volunteered her.) The challenge was to create a high-fashion design made completely of garbage Shiaw-Ling had placed on a table.

We all knew Loretta, seamstress/designer and Project Runway maven extraordinaire was the odds-on favorite. Peter and Neil won spots on her team, though Maureen managed to snatch up me (and Kelly.) Loretta quickly came up with cyberpunk outfit that would have made Vivienne Westwood proud:

Maureen got everyone’s ire by stealing the plastic tablecloths, but it was perfectly within the rules. So she had more conventional materials, so to say, to work with. And it sure didn’t hurt that Kelly insisted on becoming part of the show, and Maureen had her assistants fashion a complementary outfit for her. And then, when introducing her design, Maureen presented it as a complete concept: trailer trash prom queen and her illegitimate daughter. We threw rubber bands out to the judges and walked along the runway. And even though I had no idea what I looked like, I worked those tablecloths and wire hanger crown, which wasn’t always easy as it was sticking against me.

My team won, but that was perhaps only because it was Neil’s first runway experience, and he didn’t have the male model swagger. If we’d let him watch the American “Make Me a Supermodel” with us (not to be confused with the fat-girls-and-waddle-walking-boys British version), I think the challenge would have been even tighter. Joe and Mimi put on a good effort with a daring 21st-century Kabuki look, but it’s tough when you’re up against Bickfords and Beavers. Joe was a very good model, but I don’t think he’s going to drop his plans for a career in aviation just yet.

The next day, our whole family scrambled to put together a party for Kelly. As I posted earlier, it miraculously came together, and Kelly and her friends had a good time, and lots of sugar.

I was bittersweet, though, since I pulled her out of school the next week–especially when I realized at this party, that the girls Kelly chose to hang out with were the bright and behaved ones. I still miss her having regular playmates, though the homeschooler’s young elementary park day and our two weekly storytimes are helping make up for it.

I still wonder if I can give her anything as good as that, and if I am depriving her of regular friends. Yesterday, I had her out of school, so I had a go at teaching her while working with Neil. Since she can read more now, she spent the first hour simply reading to herself, and then she was happy to color pages, and work on educational games on the computer. In the afternoon, the homeschooling co-op had a big Thanksgiving party, so I took her there. Though it was big and hectic, she enjoyed it; and even though it was chaotic and noisy at times, even with 40 largely boisterous children, it wasn’t as stressful as the class with 20 children. And the Thanksgiving pageant some of the children put on was was as colorful as modern public school history is bland: the homeschoolers’ play noted religious discrimination, marauding Indians, and deaths by hardship. Kelly, however, was most impressed by Samoset, the Indian who helped the pilgrims.

Kelly had her birthday party on Sunday, and she wasn’t as unpopular as I feared she was. She had three last minute acceptances (a fair response to last minute invitations), and she had two party crashers, who were also welcome. Peter started the girls out with making cupcakes. Neil led the girls in making rocket decor for their balloons, which they then launched. Then they decorated the cupcakes, played Pin the Tail on the Donkey, broke open the Shawn the Sheep pinata I’d made, had cake and ice cream, watched Kelly open her presents, and played with them. Peter and I were exhausted afterward, and I actually fell asleep at 9. But it was a good party, IMHO.

On Tuesday, I took Neil and Kelly to another homeschoolers’ park day, where Neil connected with some other nascent engineers, who dug out the sand pit in order to create a new civilization. Kelly ran off as usual, but this time I had my eye on her, and each time as she broached the horizon, I caught up with her and swung her by her ankles. Unfortunately, she liked that, so she ran around even more, so I had to do that too. But it was better than losing her and finding her on the edge of a lake.

I returned to taking her to regular storytimes, which provide her with better version of the best she got out of kindergarten. So now we see the unimitable Andrew at Borders, and the marvelous Miss Mary the Librarian at the Cambrian branch library. And I joined some other homeschoolers in a nature hike this afternoon, where Neil went to great care to make sure she didn’t fall off a cliff or get eaten by a mountain lion.

So things are better and I may soon be able to hand the position of World’s Worst Mom to someone else.