Fun for the Whole Family! (By Visiting the Whole Family)

Whew! That was a long but savored blog-break. Thank you, Person Currently Reading This, for currently reading this. I’m not planning to disappear for so long again.

Xmas with dogs: This image from our New England visits to warm homes and warmer hosts.

Representative image of Violet on Orange during the past week or so.

Of course, it was Christmas and New Year’s Eve. As I alluded to previously, Deepak and I have a young tradition of spending Christmas Eve and my aunt and uncle’s house in Manhattan Beach, then flying out Christmas Day to see his family. The trip back to New England (where his family lives) requires us to muster up our long-mothballed old winter clothes — what’s left of them after living for years and in several different residences in Southern California, at least — and steel ourselves for a week or so of early sunsets (3p in Boston is, lighting-wise, practically the middle of the night!) and well-intentioned but taxing familial scrutiny.

Bundled as best we knew how

By the grace of Mike Haddad (chief meteorologist of Storm Watch 9 team), we slipped back to CA shortly before the brutality of winter storm Hercules. We did, however, have one rather diluvial day, for which this child-sized poncho was bought.

Now, the familial scrutiny from Deepak’s side of the family isn’t like the kind from mine. Pu family relatives can tend to gawk, point and remain eerily silent, until they leave your sight and your ears practically combust off the side of your head due to your being feverishly discussed behind closed doors.

Ghost of Xmas Past

Middle School Deepak gawkily gawks at Not Middle School Deepak as he prints the football game tickets. Not Middle School Deepak becomes irate with Violet on Orange.

On the other hand, Deepak’s family has been effusive and attentive each time I’ve seen them. I’ve met most of them before, so on this latest trip, it was a combination of saying hello again to some and being warmly introduced to others.

Please forgive my functional hair — we’d just come off a particularly contentious round of Apples to Apples, and I’d frightfully broken a sweat.

After numerous photo shoots with Deepak, his brother and their friends of many years, we were unable to engineer the right posing that didn’t make Deepak look like an awkwardly superimposed add-in. Perhaps he was inspired by seeing all those childhood photos of himself.

Anna Kendrick’s “When I’m Gone” plays softly in the background

(Or Rick Ross’)

Family First: We didn’t go to the gym once! Luckily, Deepak has installed this pull-up bar in the bedroom doorway. Yes, I can comfortably do 1.5 pullups. ~Still got it~