Lazing Around...

Sometimes staying home for two days on the weekend is the best thing to do. Because you get to -

a. Go swimming with your little family. First, I go and get in a few laps so that I feel like I've actually exercised. Then Vijay comes in, carrying little Peanut in her cute blue-and-pink suit. She sees me from a distance, spotting me by my distinct orange and black suit and starts crying 'Mama, Mama'. I swim over to the shallow end and Vijay dunks her into the water. I catch her and she spends the next twenty minutes happily splashing about in my lap. She is less suspicious than before of her floaty toys and it's good fun. I love living in a place that has nice pool - it's kept clean, not overly used, not overly deep, and the perfect exercise for a warm summer day.

b. Sort out your papers. Okay, I didn't actually sort out anything but I did cursorily glance through them to make sure that we still have our passports and other important things. And I did place them all in one neat pile in the corner of the room so that when I get another two-day weekend, I can actually dive into them and actually sort them out.

c. Have a healthy breakfast - just some Quaker Oats and Cornflakes. Nothing heavy. It feels so great to start out the day on a light note. However, the lunch of Chhola Bhatura that is now waiting for me might kind of ruin the effect of this one.

d. Spending more time in the park in the morning with your daughter - the two of us were just hanging out, and it was early enough not to be hot. Then little Victor, just a couple of weeks older than Peanut landed up and I was pleasantly surprised to see that Peanut actually played with him. They were very cute together, following each other around and copying each other. I watched from a distance, marvelling at this change in my daughter's personality. They were having fun, and then Vijay emerged from the gym and Peanut spotted him and went running straight to him. The two of them played together, crawling on the grass, and then Vijay pretending to use Peanut as Weights to round off his gym session. I spotted Victor wistfully peering from around a corner - he was afraid of Vijay but wanted to play with Peanut! I pointed this out to Vijay who was very happy, because the reason he's started gymming is to build up an impressive body to scare away Peanut's future boyfriends. I pointed out that Victor isn't even two yet but that didn't lessen Vijay's triumph at having scared him. 'I can take him', he declared. Even when we went home, little Victor followed us almost all the way, hoping that we would release Peanut to play with him. He refused to listen to the entreaties of his tailing maid, only turning away when Peanut finally got fed up of seeing him behind us and wagged her finger at him 'Baby! No!''. It was heartbreakingly cute.

e. A quiet glass of wine on Saturday night. No going out anywhere. It's really nice not going out anywhere! Really!

f. Watching FRIENDS. For the 18th time. It's on right now! And while I know all the dialogues by heart, I still enjoy watching the 4 episode back-to-backs - am going to sit on the sofa with Vijay and eat Chhola Bhatura and do just that right now.

And how was YOUR weekend?