Mark and I at the start of Tour de Julian 2006

Sue has asked me to write a couple entries of our latest meanderings around the sunshine state.  The first was trip was to the “mountains” near San Diego for some cycling, and the second was a trip to the Californian Central Coast for some R&R.

So my workmate, Mark, roped me into a weekend of road and mountain biking on Nov 11/12 in the small town of Julian (http://www.julianactive.com/tour%20de%20julian.htm & http://www.julianca.com), which is a scenic hour drive inland from San Diego.  Off we went, wives and kids in tow.  Unfortunately Sue & Tau had come down with a case of the winter cold/flu, yet were willing to go along with the flow - mostly for my sake. 

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We hated the thought of trudging off to the mall to get Sears portraits but wanted some nice shots of Tau at this age. He’s really stable on his feet now and juuuuuust about trying to walk. Perfect.

So last weekend we went down to La Jolla Shores where we met friends James and Vix, who is pretty handy with a camera. We asked her to just go at it and take a few pics as we goofed off on the beach. She took over 300. Gotta luuurve digital!

Of course, with a toddler, half of them can be discarded. And to be honest, there are many where Tau looks ever so sweet and the parents don’t look so presentable. But there are a LOT that we just plain LOVE. Thank you Vix, you talented girl … and James for your artistic direction and lugging the diaper bag.

We’re probably gonna hold back on posting them though. Aw! No, seriously! Otherwise we’ll have nothing to send you for Christmas!

OK, OK. We’ll post them as soon as our Christmas cards are out and the family have received theirs in the mail.

We are progressing from the first tentative “nuh!” Here are the new variations:

• No-no-no-no-no! (head whipping left and right)
• No Nooooo! (more emphatically)
• Perfectly enunciated: Nooooh … nnnnnnoooow! (like a British stage actress sipping her tea)
• The strong silent type: Lips pursed, shaking the head, usually in response to a forkful of food he doesn’t want to eat
• Little finger stabbing the space between you … and a firm “NO!”

I’m sure we’re in for additional articulations in the coming months. To be fair, he also spent the ride home from daycare yesterday practicing his name over and over: “Tow … Tow … Tow-Tow … Tow!”