Between work and Westley, we decided to take it easy for Thanksgiving and invited Melody’s parents for a hot pot lunch. We went to Roseville for Black Friday shopping, and spent most of our time comparing comforters and towels at Macy’s, but ultimately returning and rebuying everything for the 10% cash back. We also return our new 8-qt Instant Pot for a more manageable 6-qt size, and our new 2nd gen Echo Show for a cheaper version. The only thing we didn’t regret was the Mehfil buffet. We headed to Vacaville the next day, detouring through unexplored areas of Yolo County to avoid the freeway traffic, but ultimately left empty handed from HomeGoods and BBB. On Sunday, after dim sum brunch with colleagues at HK Islander, we went to Old Sac for Westley’s ride on the Polar Express. Our Railroad Museum membership allowed us to score first-class tickets for the French Quarter car, where we enjoyed hot chocolate, cookies, music, and dancing on our ride to the North Pole to see Santa and his elves, and a gift of a silver bell. We returned to Old Sac for soupless XLB and boring beef noodles at i-Shanghai Delight, just missing the Theater of Lights show before heading back. At home, we embarked on the new Assassin’s Creed Odyssey as Kassandra, the first female protagonist in the series. Aside from new features like fighting sharks and evading bounty hunters, we were content with the return to form with interesting narrative, stealthy sneaking, and satisfying drop-kills. With disappointing reviews for Fallout 76 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and my inept foray into Fortnite, we were glad to find a new game to keep us occupied on these cold winter nights.

We had planned to recycle last year’s monkey costume for Halloween this year, when Westley came home from Target with my parents sporting a new Spiderman outfit. Fortunately, the fall time change gave us an excuse to delay his bedtime, and I got out of clinic in time to take him trick-or-treating. We stopped by the Glassberg’s again, where Bri-Bri took him to their neighbor’s house to feed some fish. He didn’t take long to overcome his shyness and figure out the “trick-or-treat” and “thank you, bye” routine. By the time we returned home, grandpa was still on candy duty, but almost committed familicide with a Reese’s peanut butter cup. For the rest of the week, I dined out with Melody before she left for a meeting, and took my parents to try spicy dry pot and all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ before they left for NYC. By the time I returned to work last week, it was business as usual – grant applications, progress reports, lab lunch, and busy clinic. Our department had an efficiency consultant visit, but they missed my only clinic day. Fortunately, the Democrats managed to inch past Republicans to retake the House in yet another nail-biting midterm election. It would’ve been a perfect opportunity to take off for Veteran’s Day weekend, if not for my still-unfinished DoD grant, a mysterious fever with no other symptoms, and the deadliest fire in California’s history making the surrounding air nearly unbreathable with smoke. Aside from a brief outing for dim sum with in-laws, we spent most of the long weekend hunkered down with Westley’s Legos, books, and his very first board game as I hummed to the tune of “Smoke gets in your eyes.”