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We had a baby shower for Maria today. My in-laws arranged for it at the Vassar College Alumnae house, the same place Maria and I married. I was a bit preoccupied the last time I was there so I didn’t appreciate how nice a place it was. It sure trumped the usual casual catering and homey situation. I think people had a good time.

When the women began with the gifts, I gathered up the guys and trooped over to the Julliet Billiards for a few games of pool. Great idea. We enjoyed ourselves. The ritual of the baby shower is a rite of passage, I suppose, or a form of hazing. None seem to like doing it- going, “ooooh” and “ahhh” over the tenth plush toy or onesy- but they have to and they’ll be damned if they’re going to let anyone get out of it.

There is a lot of stuff. It wasn’t until I packed all of it into the car that I realized that this kid already has more things than I do. Who knew you needed all this just to have a baby? Not me. If I were a little (more) crazy I’d think it was a plot by the maternity-industrial complex to force parents to buy crap goods.

To my frustration I have neither the time (the usual reasons) nor the place (no electricity or space in my landlord’s garage) to do a full annual service on my motorcycle myself this year so I took the advice of a couple of folks I know only through email lists and had my R100GSPD serviced at AMOL Motorcycles in Dumont, New Jersey. Great service, they did a top notch job. They even did little things not on the list like tighten the loose nut holding the right-hand mirror stem. It annoys the hell out of me when I can’t get that to stay and I left it just to see if they would do it but they took care of that detail too. Nice.

While I was at their shop, I ran into a fellow (Hi Johnny!) I met through SBONYC. He confirmed their reputation and said he has his work done there.

Since I had the bike and it was a perfect day and I needed to scrub in the new rear tire, I went for a short ride- a bit over a hundred miles- through Northern Jersey and Southern New York before coming home. Need to be a little cautious for the next hundred or two miles just in case the mould release compound is still slick. With a bit of luck, I’ll get out again this afternoon.

Took Friday off and went up to Skowhegan, Maine for the weekend to visit friends. We’ve been before but I always forget how remote it really is and how, in dialect, “Yuh can get theyah from heyah, but not direct.”

I spent Saturday most of reading, watching movies and banging on my laptop. The cats made sure I was well attended to. Maria took off with Holley to go antiquing and picked up a bunch of tchotchkas and a dresser for the baby’s things that’s also the right height for use as a changing table.

Coming back today we covered the roughly 425 miles with a stop for breakfast at The Maine Diner, a slow roll through the construction on Route 1, a fast stop in Kittery at the outlets, avoiding a crash that closed West-bound I-84 and lunch at The Sycamore Drive-in and still made it home in a little over eight hours. I’m starting to like the Honda.

In the mail was notification that I’m officially an airhead. ABC#8357.

Some of you probably knew that before I got the number to prove it.