After the unfortunately fierce bout of jet lag this morning, I made my way over to the Tsukiji Central Fish Market to get a piece of the organized chaos. It’s a sight to behold: seafood of all shapes and sizes is on the block in narrow stalls as little motorized carts tear through the maze of people and stalls to get everything where it needs to go.

The bounty for emerging unscathed was sushi breakfast. It doesn’t get fresher than this, assuming that you don’t want your food moving. And I don’t. There were absolutely insane lines outside of two of the shops. I overheard guys near the front of the line saying they were waiting about an hour already.

The restaurants aren’t much more than very narrow counters seating maybe a dozen people at a time. Even if every diner ate as quickly as they could and got out, there was just no way to get good turnover.

After toughing out the lines for maybe 20 minutes and not really getting anywhere, we threw in the towel and hit up a less-trafficked restaurant, named Yamazaki, between the two insanely popular ones. You know what? It was damn fine sushi to me. I’m sure there’s a little extra something in the other two super-popular places, but I’m not enough of a sushi connoisseur to know what I was missing. Here’s the plate that I took on.

…and I’m awake. Not all that surprising given that it’s around 1:00pm in California…yesterday. Ah, the joys of flying to the other side of the planet and crossing the date line. The flight was okay given that I didn’t have to go cattle-class (thank you, Dolby), but the number of things that were broken on that United 747 was a bit disturbing. One bathroom out of commission, in-seat power broken, air map not working, video screen flickering, thermostat not telling the truth, the list goes on. I should probably just be glad we made it in one piece!

The quest for Qoo got started in the half day that I’ve been here. I still haven’t seen the addictive kiddie drink in any of the omnipresent vending machines, but that doesn’t stop grocery stores from rockin’ the 1.5 liter variety!

Too bad it’s slated to rain all day today since we have a spare day before hunkering down in the Dolby Tokyo office. I’ll figure out a way to make the best of it.

Ah, the joy of living close to wildlife. A stray dog had been frequenting our yard to dig, poop, and eat that poop. So I dial up Oakland’s Animal Control and they bring over a large wire cage and a can of dog food. No sweat. I figure the hungry dog would be trapped within minutes of catching the scent of food.

Wrong. It was smart enough to eat some of the food but not trigger the cage door to close. Nothing happens for another day or two and then suddenly, the rest of the dog food is eaten, but the trap hasn’t been tripped. Another call to Animal Control. “Toss a piece of meat in there,” is their suggestion.

I wanted results so I busted out some sausage for the cage. What dog could resist sausage? I’m convinced I’d catch something so I put the cage over in the dirt and mulch since I didn’t want an angry animal crapping all over our deck. Well, some smartass decides to dig into the dirt, get under the cage, and eat the sausage through the cage rather than going in. Wonderful.

So the cage goes back onto the concrete with some more sausage. I get woken up at 4:00am by Tam mumbling something about a trapped baby skunk. Skunk? Hell if I’m going out there to deal with that. I go back to sleep. Sure enough, we caught ourselves one sausage-eating skunk, much to Xander’s delight.

I felt really bad for the Animal Control team who had to come out to free the skunk. Not a fun job and no pleasant way to do it. Lots and lots of garbage bags were used to block the spraying. On the plus side, they caught the dog somewhere else and got it back to its owner.

Kayden went in for her 5 month checkup and reconfirmed that she’s a big kid.

• Weight: 17 pounds, 3 ounce (90th percentile)
• Height: 26.5″ (90th percentile)
• Head circumference: 16.75″ (75th percentile)

The big news is the doc gave the green light for her to start on solid foods. She was beside herself with joy. And again, I use the term “solids” very loosely. She slurped down that gnarly looking rice cereal mess with the quickness. I still remember Xander’s first few tries with solids…he didn’t quite know what to make of it all and a lot of it was running out of his mouth. Not with this one. She was attacking the spoon and getting highly impatient with the slow delivery of food. It got to the point where Tam was letting her drink out of the bowl. Well, what can I say? She’s definitely a Shih.

Here she is doing a food dance.

Kayden pointing to where the food goes.

And for the main event, Kayden eats…apparently it’s a spectator sport.

Two words: careful neglect. Plenty of that going on in this blog. So here’s a massively overdue update.

First, here’s how Kayden sized up three weeks ago on the massively lucky date of 8/8/08 (Olympics, anyone?) for her 4 month checkup.

• Weight: 16 pounds, 1 ounce (95th percentile)
• Height: 25.5″ (90-95th percentile)
• Head circumference: 16.5″ (75th percentile)

So she’s still doing pretty well in the eating department by holding steady in every category from last time. Here she is laughing evilly at something…don’t ask me…just stand back.

Kayden really, really wants to eat solid food. Every time she sees us eating, she smacks her lips and lunges at whatever food is in grabbing range. Xander, you may need to learn how to eat faster. Just warning you now.

It’ll be a few more months before we can actually give her solids, so in the meantime, it’s maximum gnawage on anything she can get a hold of. Toys, fingers, sleeves, and in this case, giraffes.

It’s a good life for Kayden and it shows.

Kayden is getting stronger by the day. And bigger, but that’s sort of a given at this point. Here he is doing her daily push-ups.

I’m definitely going to need loans to feed these two. That’s one mighty plump shrimp roll we’ve got there. Apologies to Xander for the bad haircut dad unloaded on him the other day.

And here they are enjoying a mild July afternoon outside with grandma.

Kayden passed the three month mark on the 4th of July and as a reward, was hauled to the pediatrician’s for some old fashioned fun. Reports indicate that she was fine until the nurse arrived with the tray of shots. Then all Hell broke loose. So either it was an unfortunate coincidence, or she remembered the last time around. This is in stark contrast to Xander where things go south AFTER he gets jabbed.

We got the usual measurements and they again verify what our arms and backs are confirming: she’s a big kid. The biggest change from last month was her weight bumped up to a higher bracket.

• Weight: 15 pounds, 1 ounce (97th percentile)
• Height: 24 3/9″ (90th percentile)
• Head circumference: 16.25″ (75th percentile)

So here she is at three months, showing off what little hair she has as well as her kung-fu grip.

Yesterday was Xander’s first day of preschool and by all measures, things went well. We were all wondering how he’d react after being dropped off. Was he going to be like me and have ferocious separation anxiety or be like Tammy, who had hardly any at all. It was pretty clear he reacted more like mom.

Xander went barreling in and barely looked back. He apparently barely batted an eyelash when mom told him that she was leaving. It sounds like he had a blast all morning until he got hungry and then was looking for mom for something to eat. We’re starting him on half days for now and I would have bet good money that he wouldn’t want to leave. But when mom showed up to pick him up, he jumped up, left all his things behind, ran to the door, and proclaimed, “ready to go!” I suppose we have nowhere to go but down from here. It’ll be interesting to see how the next week goes and whether or not the novelty wears off.

In the meantime, he’s absolutely going bonkers over his Thomas the Train backpack that we got him for preschool. Here he is after triumphantly returning home after his first day.

Meanwhile at home, Kayden is working out, doing push ups. And it looks like she’s plotting something too.

After brunch in Montclair with Audrey, Xander goes for a stroll with her. Too cute!

We got a 2 for 1 special and got both kids to the pediatrician on the same day. Here’s how Xander sized up…

• Weight: 32 pounds (90th percentile…and we feel every ounce of it)
• Height: 37.75″ (>97th percentile)
• Head circumference: 19.25″ (50-75th percentile)

He enjoys trying to be helpful with Kayden. Most of the time, he just insists his Elmo doll needs a diaper change when she needs one.

The other thing he enjoys doing is picking toejam. Every time time socks come off, he just goes at it with his toes.