Zara's First Birthday

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Daddy Day Care

For weeks it seems I’ve been getting around to penning this post and as the days, weeks and months go by there’s always something better to do. So despite being kept up in the middle of the night by a very distressed little girl and not really thinking straight (guess that’s just part of the job – no, not the not thinking straight bit... that’s just me :)... the tending to screaming child for a whole hour in the middle of the night bit) and as there’s never going to be a better time, I figured I’d just have to get writing.

OK, firstly it needs to be said (though probably just for me) that Daddy Day Care was never a conscious decision on our parts. To borrow an aphorism from a favourite (and similarly unintelligible) investment thinker of mine, Nassim Taleb; “nothing’s as permanent as things that are temporary” and whilst I continue to actively (though somewhat too passively at times) pursue work I’m yet to get back into my career properly – and after a couple of false starts I find myself on the job hunt again. The hope of course is that this situation rights itself sometime soon but for the moment Nic, being the trooper that she is, has gone back to work a couple of days a week and we find ourselves surviving, rather than living as we’re meant to be.

Having gotten that off my chest, the bright side of this of course is that we’re both home with Zara most days (with Nic only physically at work on Mondays and Thursdays) and are pretty much taking an equal share in looking after her – even though mine’s a little more equal than Nic’s :) ... and I really do feel like I’m forever cleaning up after the both of them. That said, it’s interesting to note how her preference for either one of us changes from week to week depending on her mood – and perhaps on how much energy we’ve had for her in the most recent past – and how sad it is that most daddies, generally being off at work, don’t get to have the level of interaction with their babies that I’ve gotten so used to. As we’re finding out with so many things of course, everything that one does with their baby has consequences, so we wonder how showering Zara with entirely too much love and attention is likely to affect her later in life... positively we hope? But this does lead one to consider whether anything is really likely to affect the person that she already is? And whether 1; we’re actually likely to curtail our natural predisposition to hyper-parenting (this is clearly evident already – though I’ll go into this later) and 2; if this isn’t already part of the program anyway? (But perhaps I should spare you my metaphysical ramblings for another time).

With regard to hyper-parenting, we were watching a great documentary by the name of “Lost Adventures of Childhood” (highly recommend it) when we first came across the term and I reckon you really do have to ask yourself whether too much love isn’t potentially harmful to your child. I mean, is it possible (or indeed likely) that carrying Zara around everywhere for the first few months could have resulted in her being late to roll over? Was it why she hadn’t been weight bearing until recently? Is the fact that she’s not yet crawling in any way related to the fact that we wouldn’t just leave her alone on the floor for long enough periods? Is it healthy at all that we (though particularly Nic, if truth be told) would be so obsessed with over-researching and over-analysing every aspect of our child’s behaviour and ongoing development? And is all of this just a natural propensity for us to want the best for our children or have we somehow become conditioned to just wanting to out-do the proverbial Joneses?

I have a knack perhaps for relating everything back to Finance and Investment but as I ponder the above questions I keep thinking “stop acting like deluded Central Bankers arrogantly tinkering with a complex system” as you’re sure to fark thinks up – and God knows they’ve been doing a good job of it. (With regard to Central Bankers I could query the unintended consequences of QE2, soft commodity price speculation, food price inflation and social revolt in the Middle East – think the “butterfly effect” of Chaos Theory – but that could be even less intelligible than a metaphysics rant... and would no doubt simplify a very complicated state of affairs). The point is of course, that just as hyper-parenting is being found to have a multitude of unintended consequences – some as profound as loss of creativity, diminished social ability, etc – and as the development of a human being is hugely complex, perhaps we have a responsibility as parents to not over-do it, for fear getting it frightfully wrong. And maybe the natural way is the best way? This is not to say of course that we as parents we shouldn’t be aware of the way in which our little bundles of joy are developing (and being informed, taking steps to address developmental hurdles and the like are all part of the responsibility of parenting) but one should not obsess with regard to these things as they’re likely beyond our control anyway.

That being said, I’ve noted already that we have a natural predisposition to hyper-parenting and it’s perhaps for this reason that I’ve just spent 3 paragraphs cautioning myself against doing the inevitable :) – we’ll see.


With reference to the picture above, she had just gone 4 months when we first gave her a whole strawberry to play with to see what would happen... and lo and behold she did exactly what she does with most things; she picked it up and started chewing on it. And although we held off starting solids for another month or so (as her digestive tract was likely still too immature), we’ve since been subscribing to the theory that “babies watch you eat and will naturally start to taste and eat what you do, as and when they’re ready” (or Baby Led Weaning as it’s also known).

While it’s a little more complicated than that, and as you can see from the above there’s generally a lot of cleaning up to do for Daddy afterwards, we question why it is that we would all mindlessly follow the path of force feeding our children the same, ubiquitously pear flavoured, pre-packaged, inedible slop? Is it simply a case of convenience (read laziness on our parts) or have the marketing efforts of the food industry been successful in convincing us that puréed baby food could in fact be better than fresh whole foods? I wonder but am betting that prior to the 50s, when H.J. Heinz Company started marketing the nutritional benefits of their manufactured mush no one had ever thought to put beautifully softened chicken pieces (that Zara ordinarily goes nuts for) in a blender like my mother did the other week as she added “Trust me son, this is the best way”. C’mon! Without boring you with the details (think digestion starts in the mouth!), having been giving her finger foods for 4 months now, she eats pretty much everything (including fish, broccoli, zucchini, etc), has developed great fine motor function, is excited at feeding time and goes ballistic when she sees blueberries, blackberries, raspberries and the like... much better we reckon than having to deal with a child that screams and purses their lips every time their parents start making aeroplane sounds in an attempt to convince them that Golden Vegetable Mash was in fact made for human consumption. :)


Re the above picture, there isn’t really much to say other than this was Zara’s first camping trip at Booderee National Park near Jervis Bay in October and that you have to admit she looked super cute hanging out with Maya in her little camping chair. Just thought I’d throw it in. Nor is there anything particularly noteworthy re the swimming one below other than perhaps persistence pays off – and that Daddy’s looking pretty buff :). We tried countless times to get her in the water earlier this summer before she finally became comfortable, happy and even eager to go for a dip either at Balmoral or any of a number of swimming pools. She absolutely adores it now.



Getting back to my hyper-rant about what goes on in Daddy Day Care’s head as he’s looking after his little munchkin, let me address those questions regarding the developmental effects of over-loving our little ones. For the past month we’ve been taking our little girl to Gymbaroo and since having started to look into the various developmental milestones that babies all go through (with a view to getting there first of course :)) for the past couple of months we’ve been doing little else beside encouraging independent play and ample floor time. The thinking here again we reckon is profound in its simplicity; the normal, sequential development of a human being is a miracle of nature and altering it in any way is foolhardy, reckless or worse. Which is to say that that while our efforts as parents to improve on nature through the use of aids and props is often well intentioned it is ill-informed and the current thinking in Neurophysiological Psychology is that there’s a strong connection between a baby’s early physiological development and an individual’s future academic and intellectual abilities. Put another way the theory purports that certain types of movement are required for the creation of particular neural pathways and skipping or by-passing certain developmental steps (or expediting a baby’s learning to walk par example) could be having extraordinarily detrimental effects on our offspring. We look at the alarming rates of ADHD in our society, falling literacy and numeracy levels, dumbed down school curricula and yet we never think to ask whether that Product Manager from Fischer Price, who in their creative wisdom invented the Walker or Bouncinette or whatever, had any idea that they could be stymieing the intellectual development of future generations – damn Product Managers!



Anyway, changing the tone slightly (to tone deaf some would argue :) – see pic above... I say you gotta teach ‘em the classic bass riffs first!) Zara’s been having a whale of a time over the last few months. Just days from exactly 9 months old she’s weighing 7.9kg, she’s 71cm tall, she’s just starting to creep forward (not quite commando-ing yet but she’ll get there) and we’ve just detected the first bottom incisor. And whilst Zara’s been busily learning about the world and her place in it her parents have been equally busy learning what it means to be parents. Noting too that in just a few months we’ll be celebrating her 1st Birthday, we can’t believe how the time has flown, how much she’s changed in that time and how greatly she continues to enrich our lives. We look forward to the all the lessons that we’re still to learn from our little girl and sharing them with you next time.

‘Til then, keep swinging and all the best.

Conversations with Zara

There I was saying that I’d have lots of material for this blog... and 3 months later I finally get around to putting up some photos of Junior (or Juniorina – technically speaking).

It’s funny that we had this strong feeling that we were having a boy... I don’t know how we had convinced ourselves of that. I mean we had settled on a girl’s name; we had thought either Tara or Alexis (which is why we chose neither)... And given that the best boy’s name we had come up with was Aston – you know Deebs for short (that’s after DB9 for those ignorant of how we choose to refer to Supercars in the Goulasz family) – not to mention that I hadn’t yet forced a consensus around this brilliant name, we just figured Murphy’s Law meant we were having a boy. Anyway, before I give you the punch line... which you already know; we had a beautiful baby girl we named Zara... we need to rewind back a couple of days... So there we were, literally sitting on Balmoral Beach in the middle of winter as Nic’s labour started.


What can I say about the labour without boring the life out of you and me both? It was my brother that said in the middle of a private Ante Natal class full of emancipated fat women and their neutered husbands (who had indicated that the pain of labour was just off the chart – literally, they were standing at 11 out of 10 or something while Art alone stood at 2), that women produce endorphins which mitigate the pain of labour and that it shouldn’t be such a big deal... and ironically following the birth of Amelia, there he was virtually in tears recounting the emotion of the experience. Then every other time you get given a ‘contraction by contraction’ account of your friend’s ‘chai’ (defined as a happy pant wearing, uber-yogic, enlightened, spicy milk tea drinking), ‘Earth Mother’ birth experience as they quietly scorn the fact that you weren’t quite able to maintain that perfect back bend whilst meditating in the bath through the second stage of labour. Worse still, you could find yourself mates with some nutter who thinks subjecting their friends to a video of the whole ‘beautiful’ experience (particularly the close up shots of their partner’s vagina) is appropriate during the course of a dinner party... these things happen... though I’ve never been able to look at Agnes quite the same way since then :) Kidding of course, I can spot these nutcases a mile away but have it on good authority that these horror stories actually happen!

So how was our “Birthing Experience” I hear you ask? Just like everyone else’s; private, intimate, emotionally charged, unexpected and with a little bundle of joy to look after at the end of it. Mother and child came out virtually unscathed (forgoing the minor forceps marks on Zara’s head) and at the end of the day (perhaps 60 hours from the first contraction to delivery), despite Nic – the drama queen – claiming she’d been to hell and back and those last minute disclaimers that she could be up for an emergency caesarean, it was but a very brief episode in the new life of our gorgeous little girl.


As I was recalling the whole birthing experience with a friend the other day, I thought what a distant memory that is now. How much has happened since. And how much importance we had placed on that one event. In fact we were probably a little more relaxed about it than that but when I see how our friends tend to want to out-compete one another with regard to the birthing experience and the pressure that that puts on each would be mother I think that’s neither healthy nor normal. And when I hear Nic saying that some random woman from mothers’ group said to her “You did what? Why didn’t you just get an early epidural like any normal person?” I think that’s almost a breath of fresh air... I mean we shouldn’t discount the importance of birth and obviously the ideal is an unassisted water birth while doing the downward dog but that tends to be the exception rather than the rule and the fun just starts when you bring the little munchkin home anyway... you then need to work out what the hell you’re supposed to do with it.

I don’t really want to give you a day by day account of what’s been happening in the last 3 months – you can imagine it’s mostly comprised of eating, shitting and sleeping, as my father-in-law so eloquently once put it – but there are a number of initial observations I want to make. Firstly, in response to the father-in-law, they don’t just eat, shit and sleep... far from it. In fact, even in their first weeks their needs are much more sophisticated than that and while 3 months in I don’t pretend to be anywhere near as receptive as mum to the variety of cries that she makes, I know already that she’s a complicated little girl with varied needs – for example she’s got the shits right now as she doesn’t want to go down for her afternoon nap despite being very tired. Further, I’ll add that a mate once said to me “yeah the first 6 months were hard but following that you start to get something back” and I think “what are you farken talking about... I’ve been getting a whole range of expressions and responses right from the first weeks... and given that I know how great a child you have, I can only conclude that you were totally oblivious to that whole stage of their development, you numpty!”

Finally, just a couple of points on the grandparents: It needs to be said firstly that training the grandparents is never going to be an easy process. Whilst we’ve started on ours, they’re proving quite resistant to the proposition that they got everything (and I mean everything) they did with us pretty much wrong :) Of course they retort with “but you came out OK” (which may not necessarily be the case for a start) but I guess 2 things need to be said; 1 the research on early childhood development has come a long way since their time (a very long way in fact across every aspect of childhood development with most current theories in conflict with the beliefs of the time) and; 2 parents are always going to take responsibility, and make their own decisions in the best interests of their children, so they don’t need their parents telling them what to do. Despite this of course, grandparents, who are often suffering from a bad case of baby amnesia and don’t actually have any recollection of what it was like in ‘their time’, won’t be told and the battle of wills has only just begun... we’re sure to be successful in the end but the training will likely be ongoing (with the odd fallout I’m sure) for at least some time to come.

So how’s our little girl getting along then? She’s now 3 months old now. She’s 5.3kg and 60cm long – meaning she’s long and skinny. And of course I’m totally biased (as I’m supposed to be) but she’s absolutely amazing. In fact we can’t believe how animated and full of life she is. Like a nutcase I recall proclaiming only a couple of weeks ago, at her first wedding, that she’s already started babbling the word “herro” (in response to our often saying ‘hello’ to her) – so she’ll be stringing full sentences together in a few weeks no doubt – and while that’s no longer the activity of the moment we can see how much more curious she’s getting about everything as the days go on. Gone now are the spasmodic, Peter Garret-like arm movements and we’ve convinced ourselves that she’s started to recognise her hands. Best of all of course are the myriad expressions that she’s always giving us; starting with that beautiful ‘I’m so happy to see you daddy’ expression when she gets up, followed by a long stretch, those surprised and inquisitive looks, the ‘feed me now mummy, I’m hungry’ demand, to the countless smiles and most recently even the occasional laugh.


Anyway, Conversations with Zara have only just started and while she may not exactly have the most engaging things to say just yet, she nevertheless has no trouble capturing the undivided attention of her rapt parents... and her toys seem to really enjoy whatever she’s saying too.


‘Til next time a Goulasz has something to say... Herro!

Into the mind of Mosman

Let me start with a brief explanation (whether this is at all possible in my case) of this blog, its title, its origins and how it's hopefully going to be somewhat eclectic and possibly about everything and nothing in particular, with some (and perhaps lots of - depending on how completely obsessed we actually become) photos of Junior thrown in for good measure.

Picking up from that last creative work of art of ours "Goulaszes on Tour" we've since hocked those stanky backpacks of ours and settled into life on what we like to refer to as Planet Mosman. We coined the name soon after arriving back to Australia, whilst living in this same Avenue Rd apartment with Nic's mum Gill, and it has to be said that it did start off with a slightly pejorative connotation... you see the majority of those that live on the Planet are a little... how should I put it... totally farken up themselves? It goes without saying that Aussies generally rank themselves pretty highly (particularly the totally uncultured yobs 'finding themselves' in the youth hostels of the world) but I think when you find yourself being demeaned by every other well to do Mosman housewife as she's picking up some French pastisserie for the girls at the Bridge Club that morning, you're given a unique perspective and some of the people of Mosman definitely live in a world of their own.

My time working at Confiseur as a barista wasn't without its fair share of laughs though. In fact I'm still mates with the owner Philippe and it always puts a smile on my face when I recall how the big crazy Frenchman (really lovely guy actually) would reach for his great big rolling pin and act out what ought to be done with some of these twits that would come into the shop. As I recall, there are too many anecdotes involving obnoxious, up themselves clients and to the chagrin of his wife Marylou, I think it was only my relationship with Philippe that saw me keep my job, as I was definitely responsible for a few lost clients... but I mean how can you not respond to being told that "the service is always poor in here" with "you know you're not obliged to come in here again don’t you Ms"?

Without digressing too much, I had initially thought to call this blog "Latte Art on Planet Mosman", as at the time, whilst working as a barista and trying to re-embark on my professional career as an investment analyst, not a day went by without something hilarious happening involving at least one of the crazy cast of characters from the local patisserie. And this too I guess kind of added extra colour and depth to the name Planet Mosman... as with the exception of the nouveau riche with whom there's just no dealing wherever you are, meeting various interesting individuals from the area and engaging with them provided an acute insight into the strong sense of community here in Mosman.

As luck would have it, one of the relationships that I struck up with a Mosmanite from the shop led to what I like to refer to as the "Yum Cha Sessions" – one of the early inspirations for a blog which would have made for some insane content. Due to the sensitivity of the information at the time I couldn’t post it, but you can imagine how funny two 29 year old entrepreneurs (kids with too much money), this bloke with no understanding of finance as our CEO and me, discussing the roll out of a new consumer financial product over Yum Cha could have been. Hilarious!

What followed was even funnier still and could have also represented supreme entertainment value. The Investment Bank that I had been courting on behalf of the Yum Cha crew said our idea “passed the laugh test” (little did I know at the time that they all did) and following a spectacular falling out with my would be business partners, I somehow found myself being given the designation of Associate Director by the most morally corrupt individual I’ve ever met. What could have been called “The View from The Ivory Tower” – as the offices were located near the top floor of one of Sydney’s most prestigious buildings and provided an amazing vantage over Sydney harbour – was an absolute disaster, as well as a lesson into how not to do things... and whilst I would have been sued for taking the mickey out these corporate advisory spivs, I reckon I would’ve definitely got a laugh out of doing it.

It was at this time and just prior to me going in for a knee reconstruction (all those dismounts skiing and of course I had to do my ACL surfing didn’t I?), that Nic and I decided that we weren’t getting any younger and we should start trying for a family. The thinking was that no one actually falls pregnant on the first go... there’s never going to be the right time... and should we continue to put this off we’ll end up missing out on something we really want altogether. So I guess we should have expected that 6 weeks later we would find out that Nic is pregnant.

So what’s this blog going to be about? Just that hopefully... all the stories yet to be told from our lives on Planet Mosman – a name we now use quite endearingly to describe this beautiful part of Sydney. And given that it’s been nearly 9 months since Nic falling pregnant and that we continue to live a very colourful life, textured with all manner of hilarities, excitements, hardships and adventures, and particularly as we’re just about to start on the most crazy one of them all – Parenthood – there’s going to be no shortage of material that we want to record and share with those friends of ours interested in reading it.

And if not at least we’ll have a web page for Junior.