Ok so having twins does not lend itself to blogging, or doing anything else really on a schedule. But at least it's only been a month. In a month, these guys have become little bruisers with big personalities. They've been entertaining a steady stream of weekend visitors and saving their nearly daily meltdowns for about 4 p.m., after everyone leaves. Sleeping patterns are starting to emerge, though we the caretaking parents are not getting much more than 2 hours at a stretch (and for me, 4-5 hours total unless I "sleep in" until 10, or noon, which I have done once). They're eating like fiends. And well beyond the newborn stage, at around 10 lbs. each and very, very alert.

Unfortunately since they're growing so fast they're not going to fit into most of the mountains and mountains of clothes we've gotten from well-wishing friends and family. I've got 2 bags full of brand new outfits to offer up to preggie friends. Good to know: I won't buy clothes as baby gifts in the future myself. Instead, I'll give:

1. Baby books. Not everyone does these anymore because everything is digital, but it's nice to have a tangible keepsake. Plus where else can you put those locks of hair, birth announcements, and cute baby footprints? I bought my own from Rag & Bone.

2. Inkpad kit for taking baby footprints. Apparently they don't take footprints for the birth certificates in the hospital anymore. So you need a washable inkpad and perhaps some nice paper or a baby book upon which to do these.

3. Legwarmers. My friend bought 4 pairs for us and I love them. They're perfect to wear with a onesie on a cool day. And rediculously cute.

4. Photo albums. Nice ones. I bought 4 mini albums and really like the Kolo ones that hold 24 pics and have lovely linen covers.

5. Video camera. Flips get all the press, but actually the Kodak Playtouch reviews (and resolution) are better. At $200 or so, it's feasible that a good friend or family member could swing it, and you'll want to capture their stages as they fly thru them at light speed. I am thinking about buying a Kodak one.

6. Swaddling blankets. We did get some of these as gifts and we use so many of them, I will know in the future that this is the thing to gift. Flannel "Swaddle Me" brand is our favorite.

7. Toys. We don't really have many toys. Not stuffed animals. Toys. We got rattles, yes, and a few books, but only around 3 toys. I didn't realize that you might actually want some toys around at 3 or 4 months.

8. Stationery. Thank you notes, thank you notes, thank you notes.

9. Nightlight. I don't have one. We turn on the closet light and open the door a crack when we're night feeding. (Keeps the circadian rhythms in shape). But a cool nightlight like this one would be a great gift.

10. Target gift cards. You have no idea how much @x&$! you will buy at Target.

Life becomes a constant string of tiny celebrations: 3 weeks old today! First bath today! First ride in the stroller today! And on it goes. These little joys add up and fulfill the promise that already-parents always make to parents-to-be: "it's the best thing you'll ever do." I admit I was a little skeptical but I'm finding that it's true - it all does make life a lot more meaningful all of a sudden, even if the milestones seem silly to anyone but yourself (and your spouse, maybe the grandparents).

One thing I've been looking forward to writing up for this blog is a sort of roundup and review of the "stuff" I've found you truly do need and which purchases we've made that so far seem totally worthwhile. So much advice was doled out going into this and some of it made sense, some did not. For the most part you need diapers, wipes, and food. Plus a dozen onesies per baby (don't need socks or hats here in SoCal!) and maybe 4 or 5 swaddling blankets.

Besides that, here's what really DOES get used around here. My top ten products:

1. Burp cloths: Wow, we use these like crazy. For burping, as bibs during feedings, to wipe spit-up off little mouths, to wipe spit-up and pee off mom, the walls, and the furniture. We have about 50 of them, some terry cloth, some flannel, and a few that are just cotton diapers. Sometimes we lay them flat under the babies' heads in the cribs while they sleep, in case they spit up (you MUST save your sheets! Changing crib sheets is one of the hardest things I've had to do this entire month - avoid it).

2. Crib sheets: Speaking of sheets, you need at least two, one to sleep on, one as backup. But really, try to avoid having the change the sheets. We have the Dwell owls and Dwell chevron ones and I love them. Very hip. 100% cotton of course.

3. Sheet savers: We got the Circo ones from Target. These tie to the crib rails and you lay the baby or at least the baby's head on it so if he/she spits up, it soils the sheet saver, not the sheet. Then you just wash the sheet saver. Easy. No one told us about this.

4. Changing table: Who says you don't need one? We have the 3-drawer Babyletto Modo one and it's awesome. We store diapers and wipes in the top drawer, extra diapers in the second drawer, and clothes in the third drawer. It's hard to imagine how people manage changing and storing all their diapering supplies otherwise. Gotta have a changing table in my opinion. The great thing about the one we have is that it becomes an attractive mod dresser afterwards that a child can use for years.

5. Avent bottle sterilizer: We're prepping bottles all day and all night so once we wash a load, we pop them into the sterilizer which goes into the microwave for 2 minutes and we feel better about the cleanliness of our feeding gear. Hard to be thorough sometimes at 3:00 a.m.

6. Belly wrap: This is for mom to wear post-delivery to help flatten the belly by shrinking the uterus faster. It's basically like a large velcro-close ace bandage that wears like a girdle. You wear it all day every day and it really seems to work. I was back in regular clothes by week 3 and lost just about all my preggie weight by then as well. If your doctor doesn't provide one, Brooke Burke has a company that sells nice-looking, tightly-fitting ones -- I have one in nude lace. Check out BabooshBaby.com (you're welcome, Brooke).

7. Boppy pillow: Everyone says you need one and I wasn't sure why but what a life-saver this has been for helping prop up one baby while I attempt to feed both at the same time by bottle. Our fussy daughter seems to be helped with her reflux problems by being propped up in the boppy for a while after eating and sometimes we have her next to us on the sofa in it while she naps. You're not supposed to let them sleep in it unattended, so avoid that.

8. Medela Freestyle breast pump: I LOVE this pump. It's as powerful as larger, more cumbersome pumps but compact and portable. You can literally pump while walking around the house carrying the pump in your pocket or via the wrist strap. It runs off an adapter or a rechargeable battery. So glad I bought this one. And it comes with its own nice-looking tote bag, bottles, and a bottle cooling bag.

9. Nursing tanks: I bought 3 of these at Target (Gillian O'Malley brand) and they are great -- perfect for wearing anytime, esp. to sleep in. No need to spend $40 - these were around $12 each; I got one of them on clearance for five bucks. I also bought 5 nursing bras at Target - the modal ones are my faves. Again, cheap. About $13 each.

10. Chicco Keyfit 30 carseats: These are top-rated for safety and easy to clip into and get out of your car. They're great for small infants and supposedly fit kids up to 30 pounds. The only drawback is that they don't fit into most snap-and-go strollers. In that case we bought the Chicco Cortina Together Double stroller in matching "fuego" red and it works great. I didn't like the bulkiness of the stroller at first but after I figured out how to fold and unfold it and used it around the neighborhood a few times it was clear that a carseat stroller was the way to go for infants. Easy breezy.

Other than this, make sure you have some stationery and stamps on hand - lots of packages arrive those first few weeks! Thank-you notes are part of the daily routine.

Most. Surreal. Month. Of my life?

The twins are here! I have obviously been a little preoccupied what with 20 feedings per day, nanny research/interviews, thank-you notes, and housekeeping and am now going to attempt to summarize the incredible series of events and physical and psychological transformation I and Akhil and our household have undergone in just 3 weeks.

Wyatt Akhil Madhani and Liv Surya Madhani were delivered by C-section on Monday, August 9, 2010, at 10:35 and 10:38 a.m., weighing in at five pounds, 11 ounces and five pounds, seven ounces. 37 weeks and one day. No NICU time! We love them dearly and can't quite believe we're being entrusted to take care of these beautiful little people. They are apparently healthy, gaining weight like champs, and eating faithfully every two-to-three hours, much to their parents' exhaustion.

I on the other hand had a few post-delivery problems. I'd been to the hospital at the advice of my doctor for a stress test the Thursday before, and after 4 hours of monitoring, they sent me home, but I had to go back Sunday for another one. Apparently my blood pressure was up and down, and my platelets were dropping slightly. Not to mention my edema was becoming disgusting. Giant feet, giant legs. Signs of preeclampsia. It only gets worse, they said. They gave me a choice on Sunday: deliver that day or stay overnight and wait for my actual doctor to return from vacation and discuss with him. I stayed overnight in the high-risk unit; Akhil stayed with me. At 8:30 a.m. on Monday we decided with my doc to go for the open slot at 10.

The delivery went fine - very quick! It was a bizarre experience. Your entire body is so numb you can see them lifting something heavy about 3 feet from your head and then you realize - oh my god, those are my legs! Like they've become unattached from your body or something. Then they're cutting, and all of a sudden, these fully formed humans come out and you just can't believe what you're seeing. First it was Wyatt, who looked absolutely nothing like what we'd expected. Some say he resembles my father? And then Liv, who is such a girly girl, you could see her eyelashes from across the room.

They let Akhil hold them for a photo or two then whisked them away to the nursery. I went into recovery and proceeded to have a hemorrhage about an hour later. That put me back in the OR, where I learned to revere my OB - and the incredible team of nurses who took care of me all day long and all week for that matter. I was in high risk two more days, unable to really do anything, with bags of blood and magnesium sulfate and other stuff hooked up to my wrist, exhausted, bloated, and in no shape to see or feed little babies. I didn't see them again until Day 2, and then, only once.

By Day 3, I was feeling pretty good, and they transferred us to a nicer, larger recovery room where we stayed 2 more days and had the babies with us the rest of the time. That's when we really started to try to get to know these little people. Who's fussy (Liv), who's chill (Wyatt), and who looks like whom in our families (no one, really???? So far).

Meanwhile I have to give a massive shout-out to the nursing staff at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena, who are incredible. In our isolation from the outside world for 5 days, they tended to my every need and then some and gave us unbelievable training all week on feeding, swaddling, nursing, sleeping... it was like a free week of Extreme Baby Boot Camp, and had I not had a C-section we would have missed out on all that. It also sort of warmed up our psyches for the intense life change we were about to undergo. It's true, the pregnancy really WAS a blip. These last 3 weeks are when the true work has begun. We feed every 2-3 hours, round the clock, and the kitchen has become a conveyer belt of bottle prep, pumping, washing, sterilizing, feeding, repeat, repeat, repeat. I lost all but about five pounds of the forty I gained by the end of my first week home, and can see my ankle and knee bones again. I've also been out for several short walks, twice with the twins in their enormous, new Chicco Together Cortina stroller. I stop and think about how uncomfortable those last few weeks and days of pregnancy were so I can relish my reclaimed ability to sleep, eat and move comfortably now. Well, sleep is an exaggeration - let's say, "catnap" - sleep is a distant memory. We're hoping to find a nanny to come and help out at the end of the Sept., when Akhil is back at work and our visitors have all gone home. And life resumes. With twins!

I'm obsessing. Am I obsessing? Maybe I am obsessing. But I suppose if you're going to obsess over anything in life, the impending birth of your children is probably the one that's excused and ok. Still, I wish I could make some greater use of this "rest time" I have before my due date and say, start my own multi-million-dollar business or enroll in business school or write the great American novel or save the world... or something.

Instead I'm constantly cleaning the house to make sure it's in tip-top shape before I have to go to the hospital, investigating the evil Internet, and well, just reading books and watching movies. Not much else. Meanwhile my head is obsessing in the background, incessantly thinking about the terrible warnings I've gotten from friends who tell me how horrific and hard this is going to be (thanks guys), how tired I will feel, how difficult marriage will become, how undesirable the lifestyle is, and how I need to understand that I will be entering "survival mode" where I will remain for months and months. Oh and maybe just maybe I will find the time to fall in love with the babies. They usually throw that one in at the end, for good measure.

Let's see what happens. I swear I will be honest about it once we're in it. I really will. But I am a little resentful of the consistently negative reviews I've heard about parenthood, especially considering what we went through to get here (3 years and 8 doctors), what we have had to and will continue to sacrifice ($$, time, travel, freedom, etc.), and where we were exactly one year ago (in the midst of radiation treatment for cancer). Could it really be as bad as they say?

Despite the fact that Baby B is constantly kicking me in the ribs, pushing her little legs against my stomach, and Baby A is torturing me with incessant hiccups, not to mention I have gained more than 40 lbs. I have to lose in 2 months or I'll die, I am striving to experience these last few days of pregnancy in a state of wonder and amazement that I have 2 almost fully formed humans living inside me, and that truly, my body has been exceptionally efficient at doing what it needed to do to get them here. I likely will never have this experience again. It's kind of sad, really. A friend of mine told me the other day that she wishes she could be pregnant again, just for a day. She misses it. That feeling that you're not alone, ever, you have a person/people with you every second of the day and you're sustaining them 100% - no one else can see them, feel them, hold them, just me. That's pretty cool. Maybe I'll miss it too. Hard to imagine, but I'd believe it.

Well, lounging appears to work - I lost 4 pounds since Thursday and have normal blood and blood pressure. No babies for today.

Day 7 of disability leave is definitely relaxing (coma-inducing, perhaps?) but now that I'm tethered to the sofa on "pre-eclampsia watch" it's a bit of a drag. I'll know tomorrow whether I actually have it, and then, it's quite possible that my 3 weeks of leave will be cut down to more like one. Are we ready for this? I don't think so!

I gained 6 pounds in a week - that was the biggest sign that things weren't perfectly normal. I hit the 35-week mark today though so whatever happens, the stats say the twins should be a-ok. I had to cancel plans for lunch and museum-hopping with Mai on Friday but she was kind enough to come over to keep me company for a couple of hours, and today, Akhil brought me a house-made pop-tart from Nickel Diner where he had brunch with a friend.

This blog could become very interesting, very soon! Check out our nursery (a work in progress). I love Etsy. We're still trying to figure out the stroller, the car, the nanny... all the big, expensive stuff. Anyone know a good nanny? (Who's willing to take care of twins, full-time, in Pasadena come November? Can't promise anything on their behavior.) Also, if you have a pool, I want to come over and live with you for the next few weeks. Seriously.

Progress report: Today I am at 34 weeks and 1 day and the babies are approaching 5 lbs. apiece while I'm approaching a total weight gain of 40 lbs. Translation: I am extremely uncomfortable but not sure if the trade-off -- premature labor -- would be a better option. I'm sure it's not, but also not sure whether I'd feel any better being post-C-section and unable to sleep because I'll have nursing duties every 2 hours! It's all getting almost a little too real now and now that I'm on disability from work, I have plenty of time to fret about it.

Meanwhile there is a lot of kicking going on and it's getting painful here and there. I just had an ultrasound where you could see the babies have HAIR, and are often wide awake with their eyes open in utero. So strange and miraculous -- but I have to admit, also a little freaky.

I wish there was a little break, maybe say, 48 hours or so, between labor/the birth and the caregiving kickoff so you could catch up on sleep, you know? I am terrified of the chronic sleeplessness that's coming. I suppose the insomnia I'm having now is training...

Wow, it's been almost exactly a year since cancer day - I remember clearly because it was our anniversary.

Well, where are we now? Drumroll please... instead of scheduling surgery for our anniversary, we went out to dinner at Mozza and gave each other lots of red roses and we're expecting twins, yes, our own twins, in about four weeks. (That is, if I can make it to my scheduled due date of August 11.)

Isn't that incredible? Akhil and I aren't the types to rest on our laurels, so we got to work after the drama of last summer came to a close, and by New Years Eve, we had a positive PG test. I wasn't quite able to believe it until the physical effects began to kick in (extraordinary nausea, the most obvious symptom. Oh, that was pleasant).

So my best intention now is to begin a new chapter with this blog, not just a chapter, an epic, and that would be the one where we talk about our family, our family of four.

I decided not to turn this into the tragic cancer blog but in fact, just a week after this last post in June, Akhil was diagnosed with cancer. All I can say is be grateful for your life. It's not all in our control!

So, now he's through all the treatment and they tell us prognosis is excellent. One has to roll with the punches. Can't curl up in a ball and stay in bed all day.

Just two days after the last radiation treatment it was off like troopers to Todd and Leah's wedding in Mystic, CT, complete with an authentic New England clambake rehearsal dinner. Akhil's parents graciously attended and we met all my long-lost cousins, aunts and uncles. Todd and Leah took off for Hawaii the next day, and we headed out for a blissful few days on Cape Cod and Martha's Vineyard.

Now, it's full steam ahead with work and life. It's hard to stay positive and thankful all the time but something like this really helps in a pinch. Perspective is a gift. Thank you.

June already, in fact, June 14. Wow. It's a glorious weekend. We had rain yesterday but today it cleared up mid-afternoon while we were at the Descanso Gardens, where they were hosting a scavenger hunt/wildlife demonstration/Cobra auto show. Yeah, odd combo, but they were. They had 4 original Cobras there, as in, Cobra, the sports car; they had 10 replicas as well. And then for the kids, there were going to be real, live cobras, as in, the snakes. Well, they're doing something right because the place was packed.

I'm enjoying a view of our seriously blooming garden with the door wide open and the smell of neighbors' BBQs drifting into the house. Debating whether to try moving the mat again on this photo I'm putting into the UCLA show in a couple of weeks. Exciting! Not the Guggenheim or anything, but I was flattered. This is the pic, of Multnomah Falls in Oregon. Akhil and I were up there over a 4-day Memorial Weekend mini-cation last month. We stayed in Hood River 2 nights, hiked the Eagle Trail, drove up to the Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood, and then drove out to Cannon Beach to spend a night there and see Haystack Rock. We bought loads of books at Powell's in Portland, beach-walked in Ecola State Park, and made it all the way to the Evergreen Aviation Museum in McMinnville to see the Spruce Goose.

Next month, Akhil's off to England. I'm headed to Chicago. And both of us will be at the Hollywood Bowl for Eric Clapton.

Two readers this week! Alright, I'm getting there... Well, we've missed four months of exciting updates here, including the fact that my brother got engaged between Christmas and New Years, and the wedding is August 15 back in the 'hood, in Mystic. Chronicling the lead-up to that happy occasion would've made for a great G-rated soap opera. Akhil and I celebrated Christmas here in Pasadena, where we made an entire 12-pound turkey just for him, me and our friend Mai, whose boyfriend couldn't make it because of the flu. I froze a bunch of leftovers. We headed to Boston for New Years weekend, and in the snow and bitter cold, we met up with Todd and his bride-to-be for dinner in the South End. She's lovely.

Between January and now we have been working like fiends, though not as bad as last year, at least for Akhil. We did spend a weekend in San Luis Obispo for my dreaded birthday, and in March, stretched a business trip for Akhil into a long weekend for both of us in La Jolla, after he spoke at a robotics conference there. I took the subway in L.A. for the first time ever, followed by the train, yes the train, also first time ever (this first-time stuff applies only to the west coast; on the east coast I didn't even own a car), to get to San Diego, which was eventful in itself. Once you're underground, you could be anywhere. It wasn't hard, or scary. Nothing compared to say, the C train in NYC. So a friend suggested a San Diego restaurant to us called Cafe Chloe and I just want to sing its praises -- excellent, up there with Sonoma in terms of quality food, wine, and service. Go! On Sunday of that weekend Akhil rode his bike up Mt. Palomar, a badge of honor for those cyclist types. Our garden is off-the-hook this year -- you should see our roses. We got a new President (thank the good lord for that), finished our taxes (not fun), and my mom is, at this moment, recovering from surgery in New Hampshire. That's mostly it for significant events of Q1 '09.

Oh yeah, and Akhil bought a wok. And made fried rice in it. Twice. That, too, is eventful.

I highly doubt anyone is reading this blog, but at an event recently hosted by my friends at FranklinAvenue.blogspot.com, amid a whole crew of L.A. bloggers and fans, someone brought it up and I thought, damn, I better update that thing, just in case. Needless to say, since that last post, we made it back home from Tokyo and have been through a lot more drama since then.

For a moment though, back to November: I raved and raved about our Japan trip for weeks until people got sick of my spiel. In a word, it was FANTASTIC. Kyoto was a friendly, approachable, somewhat mystical combination of gorgeous, ancient temples and Japanese gardens and a super-modern consumer/shopping/fast-food lifestyle. We stayed at a ryokan, traditional, Japanese style inn, called the Three Sisters Inn Annex, and walked or took the bus all over, from the bamboo forest to Golden Temple to the surreal Path of Philosophy. Kyoto is one of those cities that feels like it exists just for travelers to enjoy it, but it's actually a major center and the former capital of Japan. It was of the only cities that was spared during WWII, and consciously so, due to the efforts of a Western scholar who persuaded the Allies to leave it alone as the preservation of the cultural treasures there would be "good PR." And it was. Tokyo was also spectacular. Sure, it's a big city, but if you can handle NYC or London, Tokyo is similar, but easier in some ways, because the transportation is smooth. We spent 3 days there, 3 days in Kyoto. Can't wait to go back.

I heart Tokyo. It's 4:31 and I got up with the Wall-E crew at 4 so the driver, Leo, can take me to the Tsukiji fish market. It's gonna be a tough day! But then I wasn't sleeping so well anyway.

Yesterday was a whirlwind; a quick-e tour of what seemed like the entire city, with Leo stopping for a few minutes in every place between here and Asakusa. Traffic in L.A. is NOTHING compared to this. You sit, and you sit, but you can people-watch while waiting for the lights to turn and there's plenty to see, from the tragically hip to the tourists. We made it to the Sensoji temple, where we lit incense and pulled the smoke toward us for "good luck;" to Kiddieland en route to the the ultra-cool and youthful Harajuku 'hood, made a very quick stop at Harajuku itself, and then the Tokyo PR team took us out (graciously including me) to a shabu-shabu restaurant at Shinjuku -- the crazy neon skyscraper neighborhood, where most of "Lost in Translation" took place. I've got a few minutes before we set off again. After the work is over for Akhil and co., we'll take a train to Kyoto and stay until Saturday. Who knew there was so much to see right here in Tokyo? It's an incredible, lively, energetic and welcoming place.

19 hours door to door but I'm here, in Tokyo, where Akhil's been since Friday. We're at the Westin Hotel at the Ebisu stop in the southwestern part of the city and it's perfectly gorgeous - high 50s, clear and sunny. I can see Mt. Fuji from the room.

So far the uneventful 12-hour flight, 2-hour train odyssey and 30-minute walk to find the hotel from the subway station are about all I've had time to experience. I took an hour walk around the 'hood this morning and found it quiet and pleasant, the people who've helped me find my way around so far kind and generous. I just took out a map in the subway station and two people stopped to point me in the right direction, didn't even ask. Akhil and the Wall-E team should be back from their TV spot tours in a half hour and then we're off to sightsee. It's late fall and true to what the guidebooks promised, the fall colors are everywhere.

LIke I said, I live for vacation. The in-between periods this year have been pretty darn boring. We get up, we work, we come home at 8, we eat, we watch the tube, we sleep. That's 5 days a week, with weekends for chores. That's life! No, wait, that can't be life. Ok, I gotta change something.

Fortunately, an impromptu vacation is coming up: Japan. Akhil has one more Wall-E premiere to tend to, and it's in Tokyo -- during THANKSGIVING week. Talk about inconvenient. A perfect opportunity and excuse, I suppose, for me to tag along. He flies the week before, on Thursday, and I'll join up with him and crew on Monday. The premiere is Tuesday night. On Wednesday we'll take the train to Kyoto for 3 days. From what I've read this should be an incredible trip! Narita airport, however, is nearly two hours away from Tokyo. Can you believe that? So I need to get myself from Narita to Tokyo, on no sleep (and we all know I'm a sleep wimp), and from wherever that drops me to the Westin Hotel. From there I will relive "Lost in Translation" in its entirety.

This fall is winding down already but we finally, after 10 years here, found the one place within day-trip distance where you can actually pick apples. Yucaipa! There's foliage there. Yes, really, foliage. In L.A. Cider donuts, actual orchards, cider presses too. But they don't really do Macintoshes. That's what I think if when I think of apple-picking, New Englander that I am. We settled for Pink Ladies and WInesaps, and Akhil made an apple pie. He ate most of it. I liked his peach one better. Snowline has the cider donuts, Willowbrook had the Winesaps -- and a pot-bellied pig named Blossom.

Like the rest of time, the seasons, life, that last two months of summer started rolling on faster and faster until suddenly the whole darn thing was gone. All I did for most of it (besides work and harvest tomatoes) was anticipate our Labor Day week vacation, this time to Europe. We've been back two weeks already. It felt very spur of the moment, since we didn't really plan until July, and the experience really took me away. I felt like we'd been gone a month.

Akhil's friend Monika, who lives in Seattle now but hails from Konstanz, Germany, had invited us to her after-wedding (she was officially married in Hawaii) wedding on the island of Mainau, in the Bodensee, earlier this year and we decided we'd go and make a vacation out of it, even though we already went to Maine this summer. Two vacations - what luxury! I was good and ready -- both of us were. We started in Zurich, spent a couple of days in Lucerne and the area around the lake, and then made a break for Lake Como, Italy.

We only got a couple of hours walking around in Zurich; since it was a Sunday it was quiet. Not much open. But we managed to find the street where the Omega headquarters store was, and the Bucherer store - possibly the same one where I bought that watch I can no longer find when I was there in high school. Lucerne was somewhat quaint; I think I thought of it as a big city back in 1990, before I'd ever lived anyplace. We walked all over on Sunday afternoon and stayed in a hotel right on the river, overlooking the Chapel Bridge, which looks exactly as it did 17 years ago.

On Monday, the weather was a little bit off, so we took a drive around Lake Lucerne. At one point we stopped in a residential area and walked down a footpath along the lake, where we passed a house where we could hear someone practicing accordion. From there we drove down to Brunner, then drove back up the other side and took a detour all the way out to Interlaken, the gateway to the most dramatic mountain area in Switzerland, and where the skiing's supposed to be great.

On Tuesday, after breakfast on the terrace at our hotel, we browsed the watch shops one last time and took a look at the Lion Monument, which is a memorial to Swiss lives lost during the French Revolution. Without getting a chance to eat any Swiss food at all, not even fondue, nor buy chocolate, schnitzel, or timepieces, we took off for Italy, the highlight of the trip.

I have to say, as beautiful as the mountains and lakes in Switzerland may be, Italy is truly something else. As soon as we hit the border, it seems, the contrast was evident. The Italian cultural influence starts to appear once you come through the Alps where Locarno, on Lake Maggiore, and Lugano are located. We stopped in Locarno and got our first, foamy cappuccino and it only got better from there. At the border, the architecture and even the light seemed to change; we entered Como and within minutes began the tricky one-hour drive up some insanely narrow, winding roads, high in the hills above the lake, to Bellagio.

Both of us have been to various parts of Italy at one time or another in the past, but the Como area is a little different, with steep hills, a mountain backdrop, and relative quiet, compared to, say, Venice, Rome, or Milan. One nice thing about the roads on the east side of Lake Como is that there is no way any tour bus is gonna get itself around those bends; Bellagio seemed not to have too many buses, I'm guessing, for that reason. And good thing, because it's a tiny, lovely village, with steep cobblestone streets, gorgeous, old pastel pink, white and gold buildings, a ferry terminal, and lots of flowers. As far as the businesses go, I don't think I saw one that wasn't there to cater to the tourist population, though. Once the Vegas hotel opened, the American throngs started coming to see the real deal, our hotel host told us.

We checked in, parked our rental mini-Mercedes and didn't touch it again for 2 days. The way to get around is by ferry and they make it easy and reasonable. We had a rediculously indulgent dinner Tuesday night and turned in early; little did we know the rain was a-comin'. It started that night and continued on and off until we left on Friday. The "attractions" in the area are the centuries-old villas, especially the gardens, so we planned our two days in the area accordingly. On Wednesday we spent most of the day in Varenna, at the beautiful gardens at Villa Monastero and then lunch (pizza, of course) by the water. Back in Bellagio we headed over to Villa Melzi before dinner.

On Thursday, we took the ferry to Lenno, and hopped a taxi boat to Villa Balbianello, which is the locale used to represent the planet "Naboo" in the Star Wars, Episode II. It was stunning, mainly the gardens, but especially the view of the place from the water, high up on a small, roundish peninsula. After the villa tour we walked the Greenway footpath they just put in from Lenno to Tremezzo, where we took a gelato break, and onward to Menaggio. A few miles of exercise will do a tourist some good in Italy. Curses, tiramisu, panacotta, gelato!

Dinner that night was the amazing Italian dinner we had been hoping we'd find -- I had pappardelle with porcini mushrooms; Akhil had pasta arrabiata, and of course we had wine, and prosciutto-melone, and panacotta, and breadsticks. Good thing we were leaving the next morning otherwise we'd have need to buy an extra plane ticket. We strolled around awhile for a last, fleeting chance at spotting George Clooney (not), but by 11 a.m. we knew it was time to put the car on the ferry over to Cernobbio and get started on the journey back to the "other" side of the mountains, to Germany.

Germany's not quite Italy, but they do have decent wursts, sausages ... heavy, fatty meat products in casings. Akhil wasted no time in getting one, in a french-style bun with mustard, at the rest stop once we crossed the border back into the German-speaking part of Switzerland. The German border is actually on the Bodensee, a.k.a. Lake Konstanz, and we crossed it late, about 5 o'clock, and located our waterfront hotel.

The Bodensee is Germany's largest lake, and is bordered by Austria, Switzerland, and Germany. The area we were in was a surprisingly tranquil, agriculture-rich place; we didn't have time to take the ferry and explore but we did get to see the college town of Konstanz and the gorgeous gardens on Mainau. We ran into Monika on a walk Friday night and she invited us to her father's home on the lake for cocktails Friday evening. On Saturday we dressed up and headed over to the island.

Mainau is now open to the public but the island is still officially owned by the Swedish royal family, with a particular duchess inhabiting the castle where Monika got married. The duchess, and most of her family, was at the wedding. Through a family connection, Monika has spent a lot of time on Mainau and they've all come to know each other well. Post-wedding, we toured the gardens, along with all the regular tourists who were there; the dahlias were incredible. The daytime reception was held inside the castle, with champagne and tiny jars -- yes jars -- of food. The evening reception was a regular dinner held at the local brewery. We met some interesting people, who made it clear to us that living in Europe and visiting Europe were two very different things.

Three countries, seven days; great trip. When we got home, Akhil immediately purchased an espresso maker.

Yeah so we had an earthquake. It was really quite roly in my NoHo office. The building's on rollers. Ten seconds of mayhem, but then it stopped, and everyone went back to fighting over access to the printers at work. 5.4 on the Richter scale. That was my biggest ever! Not a picture frame askew, at home.

Saturday we spent the whole day out in Malibu. Visited the Adamson House, got some snacks at Cross Creek, at that awesome deli there, walked out to Surfrider Beach, and went to the art festival. But man, Malibu is getting crowded! We were both pretty sad. When we moved here, and even five years ago, it was still a little bit of a sleepy, groovy getaway. But now it's like an extension of Santa Monica. Where are all you people coming from?! After that we got a parking ticket while doing the ridge hike at Temescal Canyon. They mean business. Urth Cafe on Main Street in was NOT crowded, for once. Cuz' everyone was in Malibu.

It's always fun when you find a new restaurant good enough to add to your ol' standbys list and we found one just down the street from here, on Colorado Blvd. near Pasadena City College, called Daisy Mint. It's an "Oriental Cafe," officially, but mostly it's Thai food. "Uncle" Akhil (our niece, Ava, came into the world on Monday) got the pineapple curry with duck and I got the garlic string beans with chicken. Tasty! And the place is cute and cozy.

One thing I do love about SoCal living -- the Farmers Markets. We've got one just down the road from our house every Saturday. I made it over there this morning, and bought garlic, squash, almonds, a flat of strawberries, baby spinach and a substantial bouquet of flowers for less than $15. I'm bowled over by the enthusiasm that even the hippest of the hip have for such an old-fashioned, back-to-basics concept. And everybody brings their own shopping bags/baskets. Supposedly Mickey Rooney was there. I never spotted him myself but that was the buzz. If that's not a feel-good, almost star sighting I don't know what is.

Akhil got back from his Euro tour this eve at 7:30. I tried to get him to have a reunion dinner with me but he was asleep in the car within 5 mins, and already in bed. Oh well. Maybe tomorrow.

"The Bear" is on the run. Yeah, that's right, the Bear, as in "BJ and the Bear" as in the real-live monkey co-star, Mo the Chimp. Apparently he was misbehaving recently (at 42, he's still biting people) so he was taken away from his caretaker owners to live in a sanctuary for wild beasts. Well, Mo is no dummy, and darnit, he's a celebrity! Cage, schmage. He let himself out of his digs, and he's currently at large, somewhere in San Bernardino county. On the news during traffic this morning, the news lady said if we see Mo, we should "keep our distance," and call the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Office.

Only in.... thas' right, L.A.