Relatives from my father's side of the family (the one with the convoluted family history) came over from Daet. I ended up getting appointed official babysitter, my two sisters having escaped from the job by some unknown means.

Saturday, of course, was quite a busy day for me. Two of my friends are taking a multimedia class that requires the submission of a trailer. Naturally, they chose to do the trailer for a game they're working on. For that, they needed a rotating video of a girl using the computer. Guess who ended up volunteering for this no-budget production? ;) It was a lot of fun. We managed to finish at midnight. Although Eric and Dennison weren't completely satisfied with the video, they figured it would do. I was okay with doing a reshoot (hooray for phenylethylamine!), but they decided to wrap up.

The next day found me in bed until three. After a quick discussion and much protest ("What do I know about babysitting? I'm the youngest in the family!"), it was decided that I would babysit the kids. Oh joy. So much for a day of quiet e-mail and conversation... I found out about my task while on the phone with Eric, and he made me choose between letting him come (but he's working on a paper!) and letting him ask Jerome for reinforcements. I resignedly allowed him to go and inform Jerome as long as his message didn't imply "Sacha insists". It had to be more of a "Sacha wouldn't really mind." Important difference! It was, after all, Sunday, a normally off-limits day.

Jerome came while we were playing Monopoly on the roofdeck. He did quite well - a flurry of trades helped all of us get monopolies, but luck would have all of us landing on his properties! Then the kids decided to start a pillowfight in the room on the roofdeck... which of course led to my hiding under some pillows and claiming non-combatant status. Arko (one of the young girls) seemed to have been particularly picking on Jerome, and all of them even ganged up on him and tickled him. =) He was a good sport, though, even entertaining them with (of all things) soap opera impersonations. That was probably brought on by Arko's insistence that I was married to someone in the States and that I had children already...

Arko apparently decided to be my chaperone, insisting on always interposing herself between me and Jerome. It was kinda funny, even. She banned us from winking at each other, talking in another language (Japanese was _very_ useful, even with my limited vocabulary), and even talking in 'advanced' English (jargon was also quite useful).

Still, I can say that I rather enjoyed taking care of the kids. We survived, barely, although I'm not sure if the stuffed toys did. Now it's back to work and school and everything else.