Mind the (5 day) gap

It's been a whirlwind trip to London - my first 'long haul' flight away from the little man has occurred right before his first birthday, and I miss seeing, hearing, holding, and playing with Zachary. And I miss his mommy very much as well, and can't even imagine how she continues to be so amazing and incredible with Zachary while daddy is across the pond. I haven't exactly 'missed' the weather, as it pretty much came with - overcast, 60s, and frequent showers. (Of course, last week it was apparently 'glorious', and this week it looks like it's nice in Seattle, so just poor timing on my part.) Glad I brought an umbrella, especially since I forgot my coat. On the plus side, I have gotten to see two other youngster friends -- or their parents at least; I keep visiting in the evenings, and the kids are already asleep (hopefully for the night).

The night I arrived, I fought the urge to go to sleep at 5 pm, and wandered out of central London to visit for dinner with friends N & S (and their young sons J & R). It was so good to catch up with them (as well as grabbing and enjoying a tasty kosher burger). Son J (not yet 3), allegedly asleep, even heard me come in and wanted me to come say hello. His room was totally dark, and by the time I got up the stairs, he was mumbling that he just wanted to be back asleep. Ah well, good to almost see him. Baby R (now 3 months old) slept through the whole time I was there, so we'll have to just keep looking out for posted pictures for the time being.

The next day I was off to Brighton for work, and then planned to meet up with friends T and B and their son T (just days older than Zachary; Meh and then I spent a lot of time with T and T in our parent/baby class and subsequent playdates - a picture of the two boys together can be found at end of this blog post). My meetings ran long, and the trains and taxi took a little while, so I ended up arriving just after T's bedtime and didn't get to see him. But his mom (mum?) T and I had a lovely dinner together, I fawned over their amazing English home (complete with greenhouse-like dining area and a large properly-maintained garden of course), and we exchanged pictures, videos, and tales of the two boys. She also had me write little notes in the gifts we'd sent T for his birthday this past week, two of our favorite books. Oh, and I got to see another of his birthday gifts, a customized (customised? Sorry, I'll stop now) book about T (with cute cutouts of a photo of his face placed on each of the illustrations), and one page (as well as the back cover) talk about him playing with his best friend Zachary. Awwww! It actually says Zachery (so begin the challenges of misspelled first and last names for the little man), but it was so super cute and fun to see.

Today was setup for my conference. Everything is mostly looking to be in good shape; hoping that things go well - for the first time I'm actually in charge of all content coordination, not just my own track, so it's been a little more interesting gathering and tracking all 43 talks and 26 speakers. But hopefully the ~350 people who come tomorrow will get a lot out of the presentations and discussions! The conference is at Chelsea Football Club, so we got to walk down towards the pitch and check things out in between setup. I still say organizing a friendly (e.g. a soccer/football match) for the attendees would be a blast, though I'm not sure the club would agree. :) After set up, I took the speakers out to dinner at one of Meh and my favourite London restaurants. (As I understand it, friends M & K took a cooking class at this same restaurant's "home office" in Thailand during their vacation there.) It was yummy, and very nice to be able to celebrate everything being wrapped up and hopefully ready for tomorrow.