Tonight we had our first night out since Colette was born! Brian made the offer earlier in the week to baby-sit for Colette so we could have a night out. We didn't know if we wanted to go to a movie more or if we just wanted to go back to Borders for a night of reading. In the end we opted for books over Shakespeare in Love and Analyze This. I think we made the right choice.

Borders was packed, as it always is on weekend nights. On the way to the bookstore I told Jean I wanted to have a cup of coffee while we were there. Once we arrived, Jean grabbed a table in the cafe. She'd already picked up a knitting magazine and a cook book. I was curious to see if Guy Kawasaki's book had finally come out. About a year ago I tuned in to Kawasaki's keynote speech at a Builder.com conference. He gave his ten "Rules for Revolutionaries" on how you can change the world. It was inspiring. You can still listen to the speech if you want, and if you've got forty minutes to spare, I think you'll enjoy what he has to say.

I've been looking for his book, "Rules for Revolutionaries", ever since I heard the speech. It finally came out in January, but Borders didn't have a copy in their business section. It took the assistance of one of their help desk people before I could join Jean in the cafe, book in hand. I had picked up the current issues of both International Yoga and Poetry, but I found myself unable to put Kawasaki's book down. It's not as entertaining as his speech, but it does flesh out much of what he said. I kept interrupting Jean, who was flipping back and forth through her stuff and the Poetry magazine, to read her passages that struck me. She became more interested the more I shared, though I don't think I'm going to have to fight her to read the book first.

Within half an hour from when we sat down, a woman began to play a the piano in the cafe. Borders has musicians come in on Friday and Saturday nights, and I quickly got the sense that this pianist was a regular. She was very chummy with everyone in the cafe, and I sensed the place was on the verge of a sing-along.

By the time she played her third song, I knew I was right. She was playing popular show tunes from musicals. Jean, who enjoys this kind of thing, looked like she was ready to join in. I felt like I ("Mr. Stick-in-the-Mud") was going to hold her back from having fun, so I sauntered off to browse the poetry and Eastern thought sections of the bookstore.

Not once the entire evening did we wonder about Colette. I think the only time we even mentioned her was when Jean noted that she wasn't obsessed with thoughts of our daughter. We we got home at 10:15, Brian had Colette in his arms. She hadn't slept much at all, but it had been a quiet and easy night for them both.

It was nice to have a night off with Jean. Going to the bookstore instead of a movie gave us time to talk about all kinds of things (and yes, we did talk about Colette on the way to and from the bookstore). Jean looked great -- she's back into her pre-pregnancy clothes already, and it was a great night for us to be with each other.