At Mom's suggestion, I fired up Skype on my laptop for Sam and Jackson to talk this evening. Mom didn't think they'd talk very long, so she hovered next to Jackson while I sorta set Sam up and went to read. And we all know when I read, I'm gone to the world, so essentially Sam was talking to Jackson without my supervision. Which is where Kris came in.

Kris sat on the couch watching Sam talk to his brother. Every five minutes or so, he'd make some suggestion on what Sam should do over video. I'd giggle, relay it to Sam, and he's promptly do what we'd suggest. We managed close up eyes, views up the nostrils, screwed up faces, elbows, dog bites and whatever else you can imagine small boys will send over video to each other. I managed to stick my tongue close enough to the camera that the only recourse that could possibly happen was for my mom to return the favor.

Sam did, however, refuse to moon Jackson, even at Kris' encouragement.

I was most humoured, however, when Kris watched us for a while, then shook his head, commenting, "You have all the power of the Internet, and you sit there sticking your tongues out at each other."

Yep, that pretty much sums it up.

Sam keeps asking me, "Why do you keep taking pictures?" often with a variation on, "Why do you take so many pictures?" I try to explain to him how much he'll appreciate all of these pictures when he's 25 and trying to explain to his girlfriend that his Auntie Kitt really isn't THAT crazy, she just likes to BASE jump and swing dance and grow 4' tall pumpkins in her front yard, really, she's harmless. After all, his auntie took these great pictures of his yearly summer visits to her house. Why there's this one...

Okay, maybe his auntie really is crazy.

My new favorite picture of Sam, replacing the previous favorite photo of Sam

Dropping Sam off today was by far the easiest of these past three days. The ease was definitely aided by my lateness. I was wondering how long I would go before we'd be late. Answer: three days.

Three days is also how long it takes to establish a routine, apparently. I drop Sam off in the morning now, do a U-turn, park in the one-hour-max parking spots, wander into the local sandwich shop with free wi-fi, surf and work for 58 minutes, wander back to my car and drive to work from there after the traffic has cleared. I have enjoyed becoming lost in downtown San Jose again, remembering the streets and haunts and shortcuts from when I worked there oh so long ago. The city is much the same in the daytime; I have no idea how it is in the evenings.

After spending most of the time driving, I returned in the late afternoon to pick up Sam. I parked in the same one-hour-max parking spot and waited for the groups to be let out. When they were, I walked across the street to retrieve Sam. To my surprise, the girl supervising the group asked for identification. "Really?" was about the most I could ask, as I stood there dumbfounded. "Yes, it's policy."

While completely tempted to just say, "Sam, let's go," I instead stomped back across the street completely irritated, grabbed my passport, because, dammit, if you're going to make me show identification, it's going to be one you don't see very often, and stomped back across the street. As I shoved the passport onto the girl's clipboard, I commented, "I don't mind showing ID, and I prefer that you check, but I much prefer consistency. Don't ask me today when you didn't ask me for it yesterday." The girl avoided my eyes, muttering, "Thanks," as she checked the box next to Sam's name.

In retrospect, I should have been nicer to the girl. Kris commented that the reason she's checking today when she didn't check yesterday is probably because her supervisor was watching. People usually have a reason for going from casual to strict, and the boss' eye is the big one.

I may have to apologize to the girl tomorrow.