in which justin flirts with my sister

the ethiopian dinner was a big success. my mother and sister really enjoyed the experience and even liked the food; i never thought i'd see my sister - she of the no sauce/no gravy/no condiments/no flavor fame - scarfing down collard greens. after dinner, we trekked through the 'hood to get to the gelato shop; i had chocolate lemon on one side of the cup and amaretto on the other - each delicious on its own but together a surprisingly good combination, too. i had a quart of chocolate lemon/donatella (hazelnut and cookies and cream)/cheesecake packed up for justin's grandma, and it's a good thing, too, because she wouldn't take any money for babysitting my nephew. this child is not even related to her, and it was a huge favor to us, and a great treat for my sister, but nothing we could say would persuade her. it's one thing for her to refuse payment for a quasi-family member for a one-time event, but it's quite another thing when we plan to use her regularly for babysitting in the very near future. she cannot keep the tapole for 30 hours a week and not take payment. it makes it very difficult. if we sit down with her before we turn the tadpole over and say, here's what we'd like to offer you, and she refuses, what can we do? not use her? (sigh) on a happier note, she demonstrated that our new couch recovers easily from baby spit-up. good to know.

but i've gotten off track. dinner last night. when i recounted my memory of when my sister was born, my mom corrected me. it was a monday, not a saturday, when we got the call that she was born - but i was home from school, because it was labor day. and we picked her up from the hospital two, not three, days later. otherwise, i got the story straight.

eating ethiopian requires sort of hunching over the communal bowl, and i realized when we sat down that i wore an inappropriate shirt - something i picked out of my transitional wardrobe - a crossover v-neck that i haven't quite filled out yet, so you can see all the way to france when i lean over. my sister also had a loose v-neck on, so justin said maybe she and i should switch seats (they were across from each other). then, on second thought, he said, maybe we should just scoot our chairs closer together. later, when my mom took a picture of us in front of the restaurant, he may or may not have grabbed my sister's butt at the same time he was definitely grabbing mine. this is what happens when one's very shy and introverted husband drinks ethiopian honey wine all night. consider yourself warned.

yesterday i learned that human resources mishandled my maternity leave, causing me to have to use two vacation days for sick days since i came back. on the upside, i now have four more sick days (where i thought i had none) and one more vacation day, so i will take off friday to spend the day with my family, and i will use at least two of my sick days for fridays this fall when i have a dr's appt first thing in the morning, and then i will spend the rest of the day, and the weekend, with justin. i figure since i had to waste two vacation days because of their incompetence, i'm entitled.

i've been engaged all day in a conversation with justin's oldest girl friend about the victims of hurricane katrina. i think i may consolidate my responses to the nonsense she sent me that started our conversation and post it here later. i'm pretty happy that i could have an actual non-hateful dialogue with someone so conservative. there may be hope for this country yet.