Terrible twos

Last week I had to go to Palm Springs for work, and in the morning before I caught my plane, Devon and I went to Crissy Field to go to the beach. It was one of those unseasonably warm days in San Francisco (a byproduct of global warming) when it actually made sense to go to the 50 degree ocean. The beach was loaded with people (on a Tuesday), especially toddlers. One little girl rigth near us kept running to the water, getting her feet wet in the waves (and squealing) and then running back to her mother up on the dry sand.

Devon, should we race down to the water and get our feet wet?
No. It's too much water for me.

She got her feet a tiny bit wet but mostly contented herself with playing in the sand. It's been interesting to watch this beach evolution. When she first went to the beach, she was really excited by the water (in Hawaii) and spent a lot of time splashing around in it. That even happened later at colder beaches when we went to Sea Ranch and other places. A few weeks ago, when we went to the beach with Keri and Arne up at Point Reyes, she got really splashed by the first wave we saw (up to her waist), and it frightened her. It seems like since then she hasn't really wanted to get into the water at all. It makes me a bit sad, I wanted her to enjoy the beach. We'll see if we can change that -- it might require another visit to Hawaii or somewhere else where the water isn't bone-chillingly cold. She did have a great time running around on the beach and playing in the sand, though, so I think Devon considered it a great time.

Devon has been having a hard time lately; she's been crabby and has had a few temper tantrums. On Sunday we all went to the east bay to look at plants as part of the backyard project, and as we were close to leaving Berkeley Hort, I realized that Devon needed to have her diaper changed. I mentioned this and she immediately yelled, No, no Mommy! She didn't want me to touch her at all and wanted nothing to do with a diaper change. I decided to force the issue since we were going to be heading back over the bridge and I was hoping that she'd fall asleep on the drive. This was probably the wrong decision -- next time I'll just leave her be -- but I went into the bathroom with her and proceeded to have a full wrestling match disguised as a diaper change.

The entire time she was screaming at the top of her lungs, and I can't even imagine how it sounded (the bathroom was right next to the cash register, which had a line of about 20 people at it). It was a total mess; she stepped in the diaper (full of goopy poop), I got it on me and then we hadn't brought any wipes so I was trying to use toilet paper to make both of us presentable enough to get back in the car. The entire time she was kicking and screaming and when I finally got her clean diaper on (no pants even), I handed her out to Walt to bundle off to the car. It continued in the car, where she kept telling me that she wanted to put her "poopy Pull Ups" back on and we had about 15 minutes of screaming until she calmed back down.

My mom told me that she had 4 temper tantrums yesterday when she was visiting her. We're going to try to modify some behavior and make sure we're not reinforcing the idea of getting attention for negative behavior. Devon was pretty unhappy that I was out of town last week as well, so that probably didn't help either. Hopefully we'll get over the hump on this and will be able to get back on an even keel.

On an entirely unrelated note, I experienced a bit of the Google halo when I went to have lunch there with my friend Avinash. I definitely got caught up in the free food, collegate atmosphere and fun amenities (like silly colored bikes to ride through the campuses). I was especially impressed with the food, which is almost all organic and very healthy; I had a shot of wheat grass juice followed by a lunch of duck and fish plus lots of yummy extras.

I was taken with that because I like to eat, but I had also recently participated in a focus group for Intuit's facilities team. During the focus group I mentioned that I thought the food could use an upgrade and that the company should consider using organic food, etc. It was like talking to a wall - I was not speaking language anyone understood (or cared about). The weird thing to me was that the other employees in the focus group didn't seem to care either; I could see how the facilities people might bristle at that suggestion, but I thought employees would embrace it. I finally ended up revising my argument to plead that they not use "eggs" from a carton, since a single egg is cheap and almost as easy to use as a carton of egg-like stuff. Sad.

At any rate, the whole thing made me see the appeal of Google (at least at first glance). Avinash mentioned that part of the policy is that employees have 20% of their time free to do whatever they want. And he termed the philosophy "faith-based" (I loved the irony of Avinash working within a faith-based initiative): the company gives loads of responsibility to young and unseasoned employees and gives them room to fail. Or they do something like provide free food, which doesn't have a clear ROI, with the faith that this will make workers happier (and hence more productive). It seems like a very interesting culture -- although I think I'd feel very old there. The employee base is extremely young, so there's a certain exciting energy but there's also a college dorm feeling too...