22 May 08

Emily is 5 months old today! Her most recent trick is to suck her toes.

At least it means she isn't pulling my hair. Instead of trying to talk she spends a lot of time blowing raspberries. No sign yet of her rolling over; in fact she goes over onto her side less frequently than she used to. I was very pleased to find that she has hit 7kg, and is about 68cm long (usefully, there are proper medical scales and measure in the babycare room at Akachan Honpo babystore). That puts her at 50th centile weight and 98th centile height, so even though she's been feeding poorly this month she's still growing fine.

A bit of a weary day today. Emily woke at 4.20 and would not go back to bed after a feed. I always have a nap with her after she's been up for a couple of hours and lately it has been a welcome 80-90 minutes long. Today, when I really needed it, she only managed 35 minutes. I decided to have another doze at her second nap; it took ages to get her down, and just as she succumbed the workmen next door started hammering and sawing. They've been there 10 days relaying the floor, but up until now I've hardly heard a peep out of them. It took another half an hour to get her off again, and that was only 30 minutes nap as well.

All in all, I wasn't in the best frame of mind for my meeting with Momoko. She is a 20-year old Japanese girl with a half-Italian baby boy of 7 months. She posted a message (in pretty good English) on the Tokyo With Kids website saying that she lives in Minato-ku and needed to make some friends. Waiting at the duly-appointed time and place I was somewhat alarmed to see her approach. She's very slim and was kitted out in black hotpants and vest top and bold zebra-print tights with black and gold patent loafers. Quite different apparel to the photo she'd sent previously. I wasn't sure that we'd hit it off, but actually we spent three hours in the park and appearance aside she was very easy to get on with. I'm not sure whether we should see her regularly though, as I was disappointed to find her feeding Michele sweet biscuits and undiluted juice. Those two teeth of his don't stand a chance.

It was such a hot day that I was thankful for the plethora of drinks vending machines. In Japan there is one on every street, even in country towns. Best of all, they are always in good working order and fully-stocked. I hate to think of the energy wastage in keeping the drinks chilled when standing on glaring sunshine all day though.