Day 1 of mother visit down and I’m still sane

Well, I’m still straight-jacket and padded-cell free. And day one of my mother’s visit is over. So far, it’s actually going pretty well. I think her marriage has mellowed her.

Finally figured out her husband’s last name. Still don’t know if she took it as her last name too. Also found out a little about him. He’s a professor of electrical engineering at Beijing University. Quite a prestigious background from what I can make out. He seems really nice actually. He didn’t talk much at first, but he started talking more towards the end of the evening. I was worried he didn’t speak English, but of course, he does. And quite well. And he seems to have a sense of humor, which I hope he imparts some of to my mother.

Amusing how they know each other. They were elementary school chums. Yep, they met in elementary school in China way back when. That’s actually rather sweet. I also discovered that my mother used to play professional basketball for China. I’m totally stunned by that revelation. But apparently she did the pro-basketball circuit for two years. Huh. She never told me. But then, what else is new? She didn’t tell me anything when I was a kid, under the misapprehension I was “too young to understand.” *snort*

Went out to eat at Satay House. They’d never had Thai food before. There was a lot of dithering over the menu, but when the food came, they commented that it was a lot like Chinese food. Heh. Then we brought them back to our place and showed them our home and Hobkin. My mother poked Hobkin in the face, which I now remember is her way of introducing herself to animals. She jabs them in the nose. For some reason, most animals don’t mind this and think she’s great. Hobkin was totally “WTF is this woman poking me in the face for? Mommmm, make her stop!” He didn’t snap at her, which surprised the hell out of me, because if any other stranger had poked him in the nose he would’ve at least huffed or growled at them, but there was some definite tail raising. I told her to stop poking him in the face. Hobkin seems to have forgiven her, although he was a bit freaked at having strangers in “his territory” again.

My mother brought a photo album with her of me when I was around ten years old. Aside from amusing Matthew to no end (he thinks I was an adorable little girl; I think I was a total dork.) It had a lot of pictures of me with my guinea pig. I really loved that piggy. I’m glad to have the pictures.

I gave her and my step-father (that still feels weird to type) a copy of Hitting the Skids in Pixeltown and the issue of Leading Edge that “Second Daughter”‘s in.

Also discovered that macular degeneration runs in my family. Good to know. I’ll tell my ophthalmologist the next time I see her.

So far, this isn’t so bad. But now we gotta figure out what to do with them today.