Vacation recovery mode...

We are still in vacation recovery mode, at least B & I are. C had to go back to work today, although he spent some hours over the weekend at the office catching up (otherwise he would not have gotten much done today...). B & I had a slow start & didn't even get to filling out our weekly schedule until lunchtime. I made sure to make rice for lunch, which is comfort food for both of us & soemthing we haven't had since before vacation. B usually just has it with shoyu (soy sauce) & eats his with hashi (chopsticks). I often have temaki handrolled sushi, but today I didn't feel like making sumeshi (sushi rice) so I made myself 2 onigiri (rice balls) with umebishi plums & goma shio furikake, with some home-grown tomatoes on the side... yum! I finally found umeboshi that I can handle. They are usually soooo sour that I can't eat them, but I found some "honey" umeboshi & they are mild enough that they are more like pickle & less like torture :) B won't touch japanese pickles of any sort. I think he'd like the goma shio (salt & black sesame seeds) because it's so salty, but it looks too weird to him so he won't try. He is getting a bit more adventurous, food-wise, though, thanks to becoming vegetarian. C has a beanloaf recipe that he's made for years, with kidney beans & cheese & bredcrumbs & eggs & onions baked together. We added green pepper to the mix some years back to spruce it up, palate-wise, & it's quite nice with ketchup (for C) or salsa (for me). B has never touched it, or any casserole for that matter, but when C made it for dinner yesterday, B surprised us & asked for some. He had it with ketchup & asked for seconds... It's very nice to have another meal that we can enjoy as a family!

This afternoon, after quiet reading time, we played a Star Wars Trivial Pursuit DVD game lent to us by my chiropracter. She had noticed B reading the "Young Jedi Knights" book at one of my appointments & told him she would bring the game for him to try. She said her daughters loved it. B had taken a stab at it before vacation, but had not read the instructions & ended up watching some of the questions & not understanding how the game worked. So we set it up & figured out how to play, but even though he was beating me big-time, he kept getting frustrated when he'd miss a question & kind of pissy. I do not tolerate this sort of behaviour when we're playing games, so I gave him a couple warnings. He complained that he was at a disadvantage because he hadn't seen the last 2 movies, but I reminded him that he'd read not only the Scholastic novelisations, but the comics, too... & besides, he was winning! Eventually, he began ticcing because of Jabba the Hut (who sometimes scares B), so we decided to declare him the winner & put the game away. I let him watch the "PR's" (Power Rangers, but he's requested that I not say the name) to get his mind off Jabba, & after snack he played on the computer. Tomorrow we will do more "stuff", I promised myself...

Getting B to bed this evening took an hour & both C & myself, tag-teaming. B was restless, not comfy on the body pillow, not comfy off it, flipping his pillow over because of thoughts... When I came up to take my turn C was telling B a funny story about his encounter with a skunk this morning on the way to work (both parties survived, I'm hapy to say). I lay down on the bed, on the other side of the body pillow, & tried to get B to settle. When the thoughts would make him moan I'd poke him gently until he giggled. I made comments about his & Rufus' butts in japanese (we're learning to use adjectives in sentences), which also helped to distract him. After what seemed like an eternity of wriggling, B drifited off. Since we've been home we've been listening to 1/2 hour of HP & the Half Blood Prince on tape, then going up to bed, but I told C that I think I'll go back to reading him to sleep. It's a lot less tedious for me & B seems less wriggly as he listens to me read... C also mentioned that they had planned, while chatting during C's shift at bedtime, to watch some of a HP movie before bed tomorrow night, so I could take over after they finish with the movie. We also decided that B needs to get back into some physical activity, so maybe we'll take a walk around the block tomorrow, too. Hopefully this will help him relax & settle to sleep better.