Well, for about 10 days I've been suffering from somewhat polymorphic allergy/sinusitis symptoms. Andrea has succumbed to something similar but different, the usual 3-6 day lag behind/before me(this case behind) and Felix has two bottom teeth, so he's been wearing his crankypants pretty much off an on all day and definitely all night for the past week or so. And along with the super drool, he's also got some nose crusties and he's been doing this super cute (but I'm wondering if it is due to congestion or him possibly feeling some other sort of sinus irritation) thing where he scrunches up his nose and cheeks and blows through his nose in short bursts. It looks funny, like he's happy, but maybe he's just trying to blow his nose? And we're also worried he might be harboring an ear ache too, since when things start to go cranky for any reason, the first thing he does is starts going for the ears.
For me, I started out dealing with hard-core post-nasal drip and the occasional (sometimes frequent) uncontrollable spastic coughing. In the morning this coughing brings up a good deal of crud, but during the day it seems mostly to be a dry cough. I can't control it because what triggers the cough is a dry tickle/itch that feels like having a hair stuck in your throat and it only gets worse as you breathe and try NOT to cough. And the coughing causes headaches and is generally irritating to everyone around me. Starting this past monday the coughing has lessend a LITTLE, the post-nasal has tapered off a bit (but I still cough crud up in the morning, just less), but now I've started with come and go congestion and runny nose with the occasional sneezing. So it SOUNDS a lot like allergies...of course the OTC loratadine (10mg) doesn't seem to do diddly. Also, now it feels like my jaw NEAR one of my lymph nodes is tender... so who knows. We're at about day 10 or 11 so I'm wondering if it was viral it would be on its way out by now. I hope so. I've been sleeping on the couch so my coughing won't keep Andrea up more than she has to be (due to Felix's teething).
Andrea is congested, sore throat, body aches, fatigue, and in general out of commission due to her already grueling regiment of being Felix's milk maid. So, add to that the lack of sleep due to my coughing and Felix's frequent wakeups at night... This morning she hit the wall and I'm staying home to take care of Felix while she tries to rest up and regain.
Felix, with his super drooly mouth and little nubby teeth, has become very clingy in the past week. Sometimes he doesn't want to be put down. He actually seems to be giving us hugs sometimes and not just hanging on for dear life. He's almost completely mastered the stairs (he goes up and down but still has trouble getting starting going down) and his favorite thing is to crawl UNDER the furniture now, including going after toys that have rolled into hard to reach spaces. We've also seen him trying to climb into his pack-n-play, which is impressive and frightening at the same time...once he is able to master climbing up and over something like that, we're screwed.
So, it's the sick tending the sicker and minding the young here at casa de premidlife.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
mr. tooth
Felix's first tooth has come in. It's just a rough spot just breaching the bottom gum, but it is a tooth for sure. That helps explain why he has been so cranky in the evenings and frequently wakes throughout the night. Sure hasn't hurt his appetite any, though. He eats as much avocado, banana, mango, pear, lamb, yam, cereal, carrots, etc. as we can toss at him. And of course, he loves the teething biscuits. Whoever came up with those things was an evil genius. On the one hand, they are just the perfect thing for a baby to chew on, on the other hand, they convert from rock-hard biscuit to barley flavored slime in minutes and from barley slime to organic super concrete in seconds, adhering to any and all surfaces, including skin, that it comes into contact with.
good stuff. and the kids love it.
good stuff. and the kids love it.
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
a-day
For those who don't remember, today is Andrea's birthday.
I'm taking the day off from work so I can give HER the day off from work.
I'm taking the day off from work so I can give HER the day off from work.
Monday, April 23, 2007
antics
OK, let me get some things straight out there. I have very little issue with insects in their proper context. Take proper context to mean: not in my home, not in large volumes, not in any way which I could perceive as threatening to myself or my family.
I can look at a giant mound of an anthill teaming with millions of ants without even flinching, so long as this is happening, say, in a desert or some other remote location. But when I see ants in my house in numbers greater than, oh, five, and for periods of longer than, oh, as long as it takes to smash them all, then yes, I tend to develop an "issue" with said insects. The same goes for any type on insect (except for roaches...there is no acceptable quantity or duration for roaches). One spider is no problem. Fifty spiders, yes, i think I'd have a problem with that. One ant, no problem. Fifty ants of all different sizes, especially in a localized area, yeah, I have a problem with that.
My weekend was all but ruined by the ant invasion which started early last week. Why was it not until the weekend that I got really out of sorts? Well, that's when I did a little research and found out that we most likely are being visited by carpenter ants who are most likely interested in living in the walls of our house, if they are not already doing so (which I think they are). So, I develop what my wife considers irrational obsessive behavior regarding our uninvited guests.
"Why don't you get this worked up about any of our several OTHER more pressing issues, like getting the car an oil change or finding a nanny, instead of worrying about some stupid ants?"
I tried to explain it, but I think I failed. She got that it had a lot to do with control and unknowns. Mainly i got super panicked because I did some research and found out that carpenter ants like to move right in and set up shop and that to really effectively deal with them, you should probably hire professionals.
Here's where the big fear comes in for me:
A - This will require money. Possibly MONEY. It's difficult to find anything on the web about how much it costs to really deal with this problem.
B - This is something that will only get worse over time if not dealt with correctly.
C - From what I observe, there is quite a lot of room for ambiguity (are they already living in the walls? How much damage have they caused? How bad could it possibly be at this rate? Is this going to be an ongoing battle against nature? Is this going to make it harder to sell the house? How big of a mistake was it to buy this house in the first place? Did we get a sub-prime mortgage? Do we need to disclose that we had the house treated for carpenter ants when we try to sell the place? Did we get screwed by the people who sold us this house? Is this ant problem just and indicator of a larger issue with the house, like leaky pipes pipes somewhere that will slowly cause more and more water damage until one day the kitchen ceiling caves in and leaves us with thousands of dollars of repair work to do before we can even think of selling? Does my homeowners insurance cover ANY of this? etc...) and not too many places to turn to get those ambiguities resolved.
So I called Orkin to get a "free inspection/estimate" but I was able to get their customer service person to fess up to their standard treatment plan, which is a 1 year deal that comes with visits costing $275(first treatment), $80(30 days), $80(60 days), $80(90 days), $80(180 days). Well, I don't like the sound of that, but at least its something tangible.
Then I came across the website for a local pest control place that said, "Don't panic! Carpenter ants are a pest and they can cause damage but most likely they will not compromise your home's structural integrity if dealt with. Do NOT feel pressured to sign up for an annual treatment plan that costs you hundreds of dollars. We can provide you with treatment options that are much more affordable for homeowners." Basically, this is what I needed to see. A website that stated, in so many words, "Don't worry, you're going to be OK. Here's why..."
So I called them up and spoke to a guy there and he was also very reassuring. He explained how the big name places will require monthly visits, which used to be necessary, but that current technology (for killing bugs, I assume) doesn't need that anymore. Now they use a material that the ants don't detect and so they walk through it and carry back to the nest. Then, as they groom each other they end up poisoning and killing the entire colony. Sounds great, right? Well, yes, they do recommend follow up visits, but basically just twice a year, one at the beginning of the season (spring) and one in late summer/early fall. the reason being that even though you kill the colony or the satellite colony (like the one they are trying to set up in my kitchen walls, I imagine) you still need to prevent ants from re-infesting, which they are want to do unless you are able to seal up all avenues of access AND replace any of the attractants that drew them in in the first place (previously water damaged wood). In our case i think that's sort of unrealistic since this is like a one thousand year old house. So, I was straight with the guy and told him I panicked and called Orkin first and then later found his website. He said, "No problem. Definitely get their inspection." I told him that unless they told me something drastically different after the inspection than what their customer service rep quoted me, I'd be calling him back to have his guys do the treatment. his quote was basically half the price of what Orkin said, and required far fewer visits. So, really when you consider Orkin was saying that it would be about...$600 for one year's worth of ant treatment and about $400 each additional year, and this guy was saying it would only cost $250 for the whole year and then only $200 for each year after that...well, seems like a no-brainer.
Which is why I have regained my sanity, for the most part.
So that begs the question A asked me earlier. Why is this ant thing totally bugging me out when there are other pressing issues like the possibility of the car breaking down or us needing a baby sitter or some other such "unknown"?
Well, see, those are already sort of known unknowns.
I *know* that when it comes right down to it, i can take time off to watch Felix if absolutely necessary.
I also know that, if the car does break down in some way, I'm not necessarily at the mercy of the "professionals" or their ridiculous pricing schemes. I've owned cars for like, ten years. In this past year I have done what I consider to be a relatively major repair on my own at greatly reduced cost. And if the car is our of commission for a few days, a week, well, I know we can get around that too.
But when it comes to the house...I know very little about home-owning so whenever something comes up that is of direct or indirect impact to the house, our ability to live in it or at least extract out of it what we put in, I get VERY VERY nervous. I don't know if ants are a nuisance or a major major deal, if they will cost me $100 or $1000 or $10,000 (when we try to sell). And more to the point, I don't feel comfortable trying to do it myself when its not necessarily something that can be done effectively by the individual home owner.
So, pretty much anything that happens involving the house gets top billing in the anxiety show unless it is one of the few things that I already know about, like restarting the boiler, installing a new dryer, etc...
Lets just hope that the seam in the kitchen ceiling is due to the house expanding and contracting from the changes in season. Hope against hope.
I can look at a giant mound of an anthill teaming with millions of ants without even flinching, so long as this is happening, say, in a desert or some other remote location. But when I see ants in my house in numbers greater than, oh, five, and for periods of longer than, oh, as long as it takes to smash them all, then yes, I tend to develop an "issue" with said insects. The same goes for any type on insect (except for roaches...there is no acceptable quantity or duration for roaches). One spider is no problem. Fifty spiders, yes, i think I'd have a problem with that. One ant, no problem. Fifty ants of all different sizes, especially in a localized area, yeah, I have a problem with that.
My weekend was all but ruined by the ant invasion which started early last week. Why was it not until the weekend that I got really out of sorts? Well, that's when I did a little research and found out that we most likely are being visited by carpenter ants who are most likely interested in living in the walls of our house, if they are not already doing so (which I think they are). So, I develop what my wife considers irrational obsessive behavior regarding our uninvited guests.
"Why don't you get this worked up about any of our several OTHER more pressing issues, like getting the car an oil change or finding a nanny, instead of worrying about some stupid ants?"
I tried to explain it, but I think I failed. She got that it had a lot to do with control and unknowns. Mainly i got super panicked because I did some research and found out that carpenter ants like to move right in and set up shop and that to really effectively deal with them, you should probably hire professionals.
Here's where the big fear comes in for me:
A - This will require money. Possibly MONEY. It's difficult to find anything on the web about how much it costs to really deal with this problem.
B - This is something that will only get worse over time if not dealt with correctly.
C - From what I observe, there is quite a lot of room for ambiguity (are they already living in the walls? How much damage have they caused? How bad could it possibly be at this rate? Is this going to be an ongoing battle against nature? Is this going to make it harder to sell the house? How big of a mistake was it to buy this house in the first place? Did we get a sub-prime mortgage? Do we need to disclose that we had the house treated for carpenter ants when we try to sell the place? Did we get screwed by the people who sold us this house? Is this ant problem just and indicator of a larger issue with the house, like leaky pipes pipes somewhere that will slowly cause more and more water damage until one day the kitchen ceiling caves in and leaves us with thousands of dollars of repair work to do before we can even think of selling? Does my homeowners insurance cover ANY of this? etc...) and not too many places to turn to get those ambiguities resolved.
So I called Orkin to get a "free inspection/estimate" but I was able to get their customer service person to fess up to their standard treatment plan, which is a 1 year deal that comes with visits costing $275(first treatment), $80(30 days), $80(60 days), $80(90 days), $80(180 days). Well, I don't like the sound of that, but at least its something tangible.
Then I came across the website for a local pest control place that said, "Don't panic! Carpenter ants are a pest and they can cause damage but most likely they will not compromise your home's structural integrity if dealt with. Do NOT feel pressured to sign up for an annual treatment plan that costs you hundreds of dollars. We can provide you with treatment options that are much more affordable for homeowners." Basically, this is what I needed to see. A website that stated, in so many words, "Don't worry, you're going to be OK. Here's why..."
So I called them up and spoke to a guy there and he was also very reassuring. He explained how the big name places will require monthly visits, which used to be necessary, but that current technology (for killing bugs, I assume) doesn't need that anymore. Now they use a material that the ants don't detect and so they walk through it and carry back to the nest. Then, as they groom each other they end up poisoning and killing the entire colony. Sounds great, right? Well, yes, they do recommend follow up visits, but basically just twice a year, one at the beginning of the season (spring) and one in late summer/early fall. the reason being that even though you kill the colony or the satellite colony (like the one they are trying to set up in my kitchen walls, I imagine) you still need to prevent ants from re-infesting, which they are want to do unless you are able to seal up all avenues of access AND replace any of the attractants that drew them in in the first place (previously water damaged wood). In our case i think that's sort of unrealistic since this is like a one thousand year old house. So, I was straight with the guy and told him I panicked and called Orkin first and then later found his website. He said, "No problem. Definitely get their inspection." I told him that unless they told me something drastically different after the inspection than what their customer service rep quoted me, I'd be calling him back to have his guys do the treatment. his quote was basically half the price of what Orkin said, and required far fewer visits. So, really when you consider Orkin was saying that it would be about...$600 for one year's worth of ant treatment and about $400 each additional year, and this guy was saying it would only cost $250 for the whole year and then only $200 for each year after that...well, seems like a no-brainer.
Which is why I have regained my sanity, for the most part.
So that begs the question A asked me earlier. Why is this ant thing totally bugging me out when there are other pressing issues like the possibility of the car breaking down or us needing a baby sitter or some other such "unknown"?
Well, see, those are already sort of known unknowns.
I *know* that when it comes right down to it, i can take time off to watch Felix if absolutely necessary.
I also know that, if the car does break down in some way, I'm not necessarily at the mercy of the "professionals" or their ridiculous pricing schemes. I've owned cars for like, ten years. In this past year I have done what I consider to be a relatively major repair on my own at greatly reduced cost. And if the car is our of commission for a few days, a week, well, I know we can get around that too.
But when it comes to the house...I know very little about home-owning so whenever something comes up that is of direct or indirect impact to the house, our ability to live in it or at least extract out of it what we put in, I get VERY VERY nervous. I don't know if ants are a nuisance or a major major deal, if they will cost me $100 or $1000 or $10,000 (when we try to sell). And more to the point, I don't feel comfortable trying to do it myself when its not necessarily something that can be done effectively by the individual home owner.
So, pretty much anything that happens involving the house gets top billing in the anxiety show unless it is one of the few things that I already know about, like restarting the boiler, installing a new dryer, etc...
Lets just hope that the seam in the kitchen ceiling is due to the house expanding and contracting from the changes in season. Hope against hope.
Saturday, April 21, 2007
Friday, April 20, 2007
frigration
Today was a bonafide success at work. Everything was essentially all lined up and falling down right in a row by 10:30am so the rest of the day seemed like a formailty. Like a real Friday. We were migrating a major development group to our new source control tool using the process I had worked out two months ago. Yesterday the DBA didn't seem to know it was going on which was bad since they had to do most of the actual work (follow my documentation). Why was this migration a big deal? Because they had their source control environment set up in a very specific way in the old tool and I was able to move their existing settings, database (of metadata), and actual data to the new tool without them losing anything. Most of the other teams are not nearly as mature or complex as this team, so they were just taking a snapshot of their current state and uploading it into the new tool. Not this team. They basically pulled out of the old tool on Wednesday and when they log on the new tool on Monday it will be like nothing has changed (except increased stability and some improved functionality). This is a major win for my team because these guys are the last ones to go to the new tool (as far as we're keeping score...after we are "finished" the stragglers will be coming out of the woodwork...the old source tool goes down about 10 times a day, for real) and we delivered exactly what they wanted, when they wanted, and with as little impact as possible to their development. (we think). We'll know more Monday, but today felt like summer Friday afternoon.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
damn!
I just got hit with an idea that is soooooo freaking awesome that I'm afraid to even talk about it...but I alkso am in no position to make any single part of it happen, so whats the use of keeping quiet?
sigh...ever wonder if you accidentally got hit with someone else's inspiration?
sigh...ever wonder if you accidentally got hit with someone else's inspiration?
Sunday, April 15, 2007
teething
It seems that Felix is teething...for real. He's been waking up a lot more frequently at night, has his drool on 24x7, and he gets super cranky pretty quickly, especially at night.
Poor kiddo.
Poor kiddo.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
sprung?
As in, has it become spring? have we become sprung? Yesterday turned into a nice day, weather wise, and its just supposed to get better over the weekend and into monday. Which is why A turned down the thermostat yesterday (the babysitter was sweating, it was so hot in the house) and then turned it back up before we went to bed. Well, Felix woke up lots last night, most likely because he was a little cold. I couldn;t tell because when you are only in your skivvies and it's o'dark-thirty in the morning/night you don't really notice the difference between 60 degrees and 70 degrees, you just know that under blankets is toasty and out of blankets is not. So anyway, finally around 5 thirty and Felix's umpteenth wake-up, which we'd been asssuming was for feeding since his diaper was not wet, I felt his icy little hands. OK, the kid is a lot like me, so it isn;t unusual for him to seem perfectly happy even though his hands and/or feet are icy cold. His hands are covered in drool half the time, which makes them extra icy. Anyway, as I hovered about at 5:30 in the AM and noticed that it seemed a bit cooler than I expected, and Andrea's complaints of "It is sooooooooo cooooooooooold!" finally started to get some traction. I went down and looked at the readout on the thermostat. 60 degrees. While this was the type of temps we've been dying for outside, its not exactly what we were hoping for inside (or some of us, anyway). WTF? I punch the temp setting and its sitting up at 74. Hrm. That's not good. I go down to the basement and check the furnace. Not running, not a peep, and the boiler is cold. It had been hot the day before, I remember because i had dried one of Felix's diaper wraps on a radiator. Hrm. I whip out the manual and start the process of restarting the boiler. Nada. I do it again. Nada. Crap.
I check out the thermostat, do the little reset thingy on it, put it back on the wall. Nothing. Crap.
So then turn it all off...no point risking gassing or blowing us up. I go up and try the stove and oven. They both work fine, so we still have gas. I even went down to check the meter while the oven was on and heard the reassuring (or frightening, depending on what month it is and how big that gas bill is) tchink tchink tchink or the little dials on the meter spinning.
I go back up to the bedroom where Felix and A are now sleeping (or at least A is trying to sleep while Felix is out like a drunken sailor) and pull out the space heater and turn it on. At least I can heat up the bedroom and finish out the night and tackle the boiler issues at a more reasonable hour.
"What are you doing?"
"I'm getting out the heater. The boiler isn't lighting."
"Well, call someone. It is f-f-freezing in here."
"It's Saturday morning, I doubt anyone is around..."
"Well you better call someone, now."
Sigh...
So I go into the closet and get the business card of the guy who installed the boiler just under a year ago and call him. It's about 6am now. I get his machine so I leave a message. 2 minutes later I get a call back. I think I woke this guy up. I think the boiler company he is the president of, he is also the everything else of. So, with him on the phone and Felix in hand (he decided that he needed to wake up and not go back to sleep...) we went to the basement to troubleshoot the boiler. After about 15 minutes of "Does it have one of these?" "Yes." "Push the button on it." "What button?" "There should be a button." "Oh, there it is. It's a switch." "Yeah, whatever, push it. Did you hear the relay throw?" "No." "Hrm. Ok...look for the..." we did this a couple times and finally I went back up to the thermostat and to calm Felix down (I had parked him in the dining room in the pack-n-play while i was fiddling with the boiler's electrical bits) and switched the thermostat's switch to cool then back to heat. Suddenly I heard a loud familiar "Cli-THUNK" of the boiler kicking on. I called the guy back (the call got dropped probably 3 times during this whole process) and said, "Hey, its working now. Thanks." And now we have heat, again. Which hopefully we'll get to turn off again...but anyway...the sky is clear, it's hovering around 30-40 degrees outside, maybe warmer. Supposed to get into the 50s today and 60s tomorrow. Felix and I walked to the coffee shop on the other side of the park and got coffee and breakfast burrito to share with the babymama (just me, not Felix). And all is relatively right with the world. Well, with that specific part of it at least.
I check out the thermostat, do the little reset thingy on it, put it back on the wall. Nothing. Crap.
So then turn it all off...no point risking gassing or blowing us up. I go up and try the stove and oven. They both work fine, so we still have gas. I even went down to check the meter while the oven was on and heard the reassuring (or frightening, depending on what month it is and how big that gas bill is) tchink tchink tchink or the little dials on the meter spinning.
I go back up to the bedroom where Felix and A are now sleeping (or at least A is trying to sleep while Felix is out like a drunken sailor) and pull out the space heater and turn it on. At least I can heat up the bedroom and finish out the night and tackle the boiler issues at a more reasonable hour.
"What are you doing?"
"I'm getting out the heater. The boiler isn't lighting."
"Well, call someone. It is f-f-freezing in here."
"It's Saturday morning, I doubt anyone is around..."
"Well you better call someone, now."
Sigh...
So I go into the closet and get the business card of the guy who installed the boiler just under a year ago and call him. It's about 6am now. I get his machine so I leave a message. 2 minutes later I get a call back. I think I woke this guy up. I think the boiler company he is the president of, he is also the everything else of. So, with him on the phone and Felix in hand (he decided that he needed to wake up and not go back to sleep...) we went to the basement to troubleshoot the boiler. After about 15 minutes of "Does it have one of these?" "Yes." "Push the button on it." "What button?" "There should be a button." "Oh, there it is. It's a switch." "Yeah, whatever, push it. Did you hear the relay throw?" "No." "Hrm. Ok...look for the..." we did this a couple times and finally I went back up to the thermostat and to calm Felix down (I had parked him in the dining room in the pack-n-play while i was fiddling with the boiler's electrical bits) and switched the thermostat's switch to cool then back to heat. Suddenly I heard a loud familiar "Cli-THUNK" of the boiler kicking on. I called the guy back (the call got dropped probably 3 times during this whole process) and said, "Hey, its working now. Thanks." And now we have heat, again. Which hopefully we'll get to turn off again...but anyway...the sky is clear, it's hovering around 30-40 degrees outside, maybe warmer. Supposed to get into the 50s today and 60s tomorrow. Felix and I walked to the coffee shop on the other side of the park and got coffee and breakfast burrito to share with the babymama (just me, not Felix). And all is relatively right with the world. Well, with that specific part of it at least.
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
whiteout
Welcome to spring, this wonderful snowy morning seems to say to me.
We finished version 1 of A's portfolio website and let me tell you, I seriously hate Internet Explorer and this process has just reaffirmed that sentiment. Needless to say, her website whic his chock full of javascripty ajaxy XHTMLy goodness does NOT look as it should on IE (any version). Hell, I don't even think it will show up on anything older than IEv6.x.
And I'm sorry, I know its supposed to be a usability best practice to bend over backwards to accommodate every ancient browser under the sun, but you know what? Do you REALLY want to get a job working for someone who uses that kind of crap? No. In Graphic Design you judge and are judged not only by your work but also by your ability to stay current. You do not do tomorrow's design for yesterday's browser, or client, or anything.
But mostly, I just don't want to have to remake the same site like 5 times just so some schmoe who can't keep up with what's current can look at a website.
Of course, next step it to add Flash to bridge the gaps if possible.
My dad, who used to work in interface design/usability gave the website a failing grade because it lacked user feedback. Of course...he only viewed it in IE. HA. But whatever. Mozilla provides plenty of feedback. Apparently IE doesn't even treat CSS the same as everyone else.
We finished version 1 of A's portfolio website and let me tell you, I seriously hate Internet Explorer and this process has just reaffirmed that sentiment. Needless to say, her website whic his chock full of javascripty ajaxy XHTMLy goodness does NOT look as it should on IE (any version). Hell, I don't even think it will show up on anything older than IEv6.x.
And I'm sorry, I know its supposed to be a usability best practice to bend over backwards to accommodate every ancient browser under the sun, but you know what? Do you REALLY want to get a job working for someone who uses that kind of crap? No. In Graphic Design you judge and are judged not only by your work but also by your ability to stay current. You do not do tomorrow's design for yesterday's browser, or client, or anything.
But mostly, I just don't want to have to remake the same site like 5 times just so some schmoe who can't keep up with what's current can look at a website.
Of course, next step it to add Flash to bridge the gaps if possible.
My dad, who used to work in interface design/usability gave the website a failing grade because it lacked user feedback. Of course...he only viewed it in IE. HA. But whatever. Mozilla provides plenty of feedback. Apparently IE doesn't even treat CSS the same as everyone else.
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
walkabout
It's funny. I signed up for the "all-in-one" package for this thing, which included the hotel that they had special booking in that is "attached" to the convention center. HA! I think the convention center and the Marriott share a parking garage or maybe one exterior wall. Anyway, the convention center is LOOOONG and all of the events are happening way down at the other end, which means I (and many of my geeky brethren) make the hike between the Marriott and the convention center D section frequently. I was worried that being out here with all my meals expensed would land me on the fat wagon, but with all this walking, and the fact that I have almost no other source of food unless I go out and buy munchies or snacks or something, I don't think I need to worry about that.
Well, I need to decide whether I get breakfast here at the hotel or check out what they are doing at the convention center.
Well, I need to decide whether I get breakfast here at the hotel or check out what they are doing at the convention center.
Monday, March 26, 2007
going back to cali
So I'm now in beautiful, overcast, colder than Minneapolis, San Diego, CA. I'm all checked into my room and I've registered at the conbvention center (and received a cheap feeling laptop bag full of "swag"). OK. Now I'm off to an orientation session to try and get the most out of this summit.
Ta.
Ta.
Saturday, March 24, 2007
mr. dad
I think maybe its is a generational thing, or maybe its a cultural thing, or maybe...who knows. But I find it funny that in the 80's a movie like Mr. Mom was, you know, a perfectly valid topic for comedy. And I'm not even talking about the PC movement or anything, I'm just talking about what I feel is a change in the overall assumptions about childrearing and who does what. I would like to think that in this day and age, the way that Andrea and I divide the work is not uncommon. Consider that in large part, girls grow up into women with the expectation that they will be working, having careers. And I don't mean that until now girls didn't have that assumption. So when it comes to kids, both parents are in the same boat. The only real difference is that for the first year the baby has biological needs that only the mother can fill (and of course, the mother is biologically impacted by the 9 months prior to birth and the several months afterwards), but other than that, there's no built-in assumptions that the mother does a,b,c and the father does d. Nope. These days, at least in my house, it goes mom and dad to a,b,c,d. In some cases, mom or dad has do do more b or d because of the current dynamics, economic forces, etc...but if all things are equal, the split is pretty close to 50-50.
These days, Mr. Mom is sort of a myth, and if he exists out there, I feel sorry for his family. Mr. Mom should be Mr. Dad.
These days, Mr. Mom is sort of a myth, and if he exists out there, I feel sorry for his family. Mr. Mom should be Mr. Dad.
mr. dad
I think maybe its is a generational thing, or maybe its a cultural thing, or maybe...who knows. But I find it funny that in the 80's a movie like Mr. Mom was, you know, a perfectly valid topic for comedy. And I'm not even talking about the PC movement or anything, I'm just talking about what I feel is a change in the overall assumptions about childrearing and who does what. I would like to think that in this day and age, the way that Andrea and I divide the work is not uncommon. Consider that in large part, girls grow up into women with the expectation that they will be working, having careers. And I don't mean that until now girls didn't have that assumption. So when it comes to kids, both parents are in the same boat. The only real difference is that for the first year the baby has biological needs that only the mother can fill (and of course, the mother is biologically impacted by the 9 months prior to birth and the several months afterwards), but other than that, there's no built-in assumptions that the mother does a,b,c and the father does d. Nope. These days, at least in my house, it goes mom and dad to a,b,c,d. In some cases, mom or dad has do do more b or d because of the current dynamics, economic forces, etc...but if all things are equal, the split is pretty close to 50-50.
These days, Mr. Mom is sort of a myth, and if he exists out there, I feel sorry for his family. Mr. Mom should be Mr. Dad.
These days, Mr. Mom is sort of a myth, and if he exists out there, I feel sorry for his family. Mr. Mom should be Mr. Dad.
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Gaaah!
I never seem to find time to write here, especially be cause there is so much to write about.
The rundown:
Felix now crawls, pulls himself to standing on furniture and pants legs, can do a lap around the first floor in his walker at subsonic speeds, eats solid food, feeds himself "crackers", and maybe this week will start sleeping through the night again. He's gotten over the hump of daylight savings time change, though I don't feel that I have yet. He is a "good eater" on most days and a good pooper on the following days. I can tell that he's excited about the prospect of using the toilet, but it seems like simply a novelty to him right now.
I got promoted to Systems Engineer in January. I must have mentioned that before. Hell, I haven't read my own blog in who knows how long so I don't even know what the last thing I wrote about was.
I'm going to San Diego next week for a Microsoft conference. That's neat.
I can not wait for warm weather because the gas bill is absolutely killing me. Of course, by the time cold weather starts up again I'll probably have just finished paying off this winter's gas bill. Good grief. You'd think that with the raises and promotions I'd be doing OK but the exponential rise in heating between November and March just completely yanked the rug out from under us, financially. I mean, seriously, it would almost make more sense for us to rent a studio apartment that has utilities included for the winter months and just shut off the heat and electricity in the house. Seriously. Anyway...enough about probably the most stressful thing in my life right now. As a rule, "there's always something" to knock the wind out of our sails. Well, I just keep saying to myself, "Just make it through winter, make it through winter...". Provided I am able to use that plan where they average your gas bill out over the year...I don't think we can do another winter like this.
We've been putting a lot of time into A's new portfolio website. I think it's pretty nice and I've gotten to learn a lot of little things that I dodn't know about, like how I can write javascript and use space-age technologies like "ajax". heh.
I think I learned from my dad that the sure way to get to work on your hobbies, or to at least do stuff that you consider to be fun is to make it something that the wife is asking for. You can spend an evening fiddling with websites and learning script languages if she requests your help on making a website. You can buy that new table saw if she asks you to build her a bookshelf...
...
..agg, and here i am coming back to this post like a day and a half later...
The rundown:
Felix now crawls, pulls himself to standing on furniture and pants legs, can do a lap around the first floor in his walker at subsonic speeds, eats solid food, feeds himself "crackers", and maybe this week will start sleeping through the night again. He's gotten over the hump of daylight savings time change, though I don't feel that I have yet. He is a "good eater" on most days and a good pooper on the following days. I can tell that he's excited about the prospect of using the toilet, but it seems like simply a novelty to him right now.
I got promoted to Systems Engineer in January. I must have mentioned that before. Hell, I haven't read my own blog in who knows how long so I don't even know what the last thing I wrote about was.
I'm going to San Diego next week for a Microsoft conference. That's neat.
I can not wait for warm weather because the gas bill is absolutely killing me. Of course, by the time cold weather starts up again I'll probably have just finished paying off this winter's gas bill. Good grief. You'd think that with the raises and promotions I'd be doing OK but the exponential rise in heating between November and March just completely yanked the rug out from under us, financially. I mean, seriously, it would almost make more sense for us to rent a studio apartment that has utilities included for the winter months and just shut off the heat and electricity in the house. Seriously. Anyway...enough about probably the most stressful thing in my life right now. As a rule, "there's always something" to knock the wind out of our sails. Well, I just keep saying to myself, "Just make it through winter, make it through winter...". Provided I am able to use that plan where they average your gas bill out over the year...I don't think we can do another winter like this.
We've been putting a lot of time into A's new portfolio website. I think it's pretty nice and I've gotten to learn a lot of little things that I dodn't know about, like how I can write javascript and use space-age technologies like "ajax". heh.
I think I learned from my dad that the sure way to get to work on your hobbies, or to at least do stuff that you consider to be fun is to make it something that the wife is asking for. You can spend an evening fiddling with websites and learning script languages if she requests your help on making a website. You can buy that new table saw if she asks you to build her a bookshelf...
...
..agg, and here i am coming back to this post like a day and a half later...
Thursday, March 08, 2007
I/O
Sometimes it feels like I'm living in binary. At work on any given day I'm either swamped with work or bored. On any given day I'm either happy or crappy.
Thursday, March 01, 2007
alive
Yeah, I've been a little lax in the bloggering. I'm alive, Andrea and Felix are mostly recovered from their bouts of cold, and life is sort of back to normal.
I'm busy as all get out at work, Andrea's super busy at home taking care of Felix and working on keeping the vestiges of her career alive until she can revert back to full-time focus on it, and Felix is, of course, super busy learning and developing, and being an all-around genius baby. He cruises around in his walker, fowards and backwards, and he's loving being able to stand by holding on the sides of his crib or pack-n-play. When placed on the floor, he can slither forwards but currently he only has reverse gear when crawling. He's eating solids pretty muchy every day, and a wide range from rice cereal, pureed veggies, and now pureed lamb, which seems boring and gross at first (think of a watery pate) but after the first spoonful he goes absolutely nuts for it. And now I know where the really really bad smelling poop comes from. He now has almost regular mini adult turds. GREAT.
We interviewed babysitters over the past two nights and had some superstar applicants, all of whom we plan to use. Oddly enough, one of them was a girl I went to highschool with (she was one year behind me). In sort of happy/sad news, 3 out of 4 babysitters seem to be very successful and on track to be way more successful than either Andrea or myself feel right now (they were all grad students in medicine or Law, etc...).
But hey, whats important is now we have a stable of stars we can call on to take some of the heat off of us in case we want to go out or Andrea just needs a rest, and luckily none of them are demanding the $$$ that our last round of "Nanny" ads got us. This time we just said "Looking for occasional babysitters, great for college student" and thus got responses from all of these uber-high-quality grad students. sigh.
I'm busy as all get out at work, Andrea's super busy at home taking care of Felix and working on keeping the vestiges of her career alive until she can revert back to full-time focus on it, and Felix is, of course, super busy learning and developing, and being an all-around genius baby. He cruises around in his walker, fowards and backwards, and he's loving being able to stand by holding on the sides of his crib or pack-n-play. When placed on the floor, he can slither forwards but currently he only has reverse gear when crawling. He's eating solids pretty muchy every day, and a wide range from rice cereal, pureed veggies, and now pureed lamb, which seems boring and gross at first (think of a watery pate) but after the first spoonful he goes absolutely nuts for it. And now I know where the really really bad smelling poop comes from. He now has almost regular mini adult turds. GREAT.
We interviewed babysitters over the past two nights and had some superstar applicants, all of whom we plan to use. Oddly enough, one of them was a girl I went to highschool with (she was one year behind me). In sort of happy/sad news, 3 out of 4 babysitters seem to be very successful and on track to be way more successful than either Andrea or myself feel right now (they were all grad students in medicine or Law, etc...).
But hey, whats important is now we have a stable of stars we can call on to take some of the heat off of us in case we want to go out or Andrea just needs a rest, and luckily none of them are demanding the $$$ that our last round of "Nanny" ads got us. This time we just said "Looking for occasional babysitters, great for college student" and thus got responses from all of these uber-high-quality grad students. sigh.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
good...grief.
Felix and Andrea have come down with various versions of a "cold." He has a runny nose and nasty mucusy cough, she has a head ache, body ache, dried-out sore throat. I seem to have escaped the worst of it myself with just a slight headache one day last week and your usual winter craptacular nasal crud. Anyway, on top of staying up with Felix a lot at night because of his coughing, i was also on-call last week (ended at 10am today) and Sunday and Monday nights had stupid idiots calling me up between 1 and 2 am.
I stayed home monday to take care of Andrea and Felix. My dad is there today to help out, (Thanks dad!) which lets me go to work in good conscience. And holy howdy doody! Yesterday, while i was at home, but working (during their naps) my boss drops it on me that, hey, there's this Microsoft thing in San Diego in March and wouldn't I be interested in going? Hell yes. SO I spent a good chunk of today jumping through hoops to get my stuff lined up and wham bam thankya ma'am, I'm going on a business trip. I feel like I've finally grown up. And this will be my first time to California (though not my first time out west. I did go to Seattle over Memorial Day Weekend a some years back, but that's a different blog). So, wowzers. So much to happen all at once.
All this time we've been pretty lucky that Felix has been pretty healthy. This cold is enough to make me understand why people get so wigged out sometimes when their kids get sick. I'm just so worried that one of these times he's not going to be able to move all that crud and then we're in for a really wild ride...Hopefully he'll be turning the corner on this thing and start getting better because he sure seems to get at least a little bit worse each day, if at least not any better.
I stayed home monday to take care of Andrea and Felix. My dad is there today to help out, (Thanks dad!) which lets me go to work in good conscience. And holy howdy doody! Yesterday, while i was at home, but working (during their naps) my boss drops it on me that, hey, there's this Microsoft thing in San Diego in March and wouldn't I be interested in going? Hell yes. SO I spent a good chunk of today jumping through hoops to get my stuff lined up and wham bam thankya ma'am, I'm going on a business trip. I feel like I've finally grown up. And this will be my first time to California (though not my first time out west. I did go to Seattle over Memorial Day Weekend a some years back, but that's a different blog). So, wowzers. So much to happen all at once.
All this time we've been pretty lucky that Felix has been pretty healthy. This cold is enough to make me understand why people get so wigged out sometimes when their kids get sick. I'm just so worried that one of these times he's not going to be able to move all that crud and then we're in for a really wild ride...Hopefully he'll be turning the corner on this thing and start getting better because he sure seems to get at least a little bit worse each day, if at least not any better.
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
solids
As I mentioned, Felix is about a week or two into eating solid foods. So far he has eaten rice cereal, squash, potato, sweet potato, and carrot. his attitude towards these foods ranges from grudgingly tolerating to totally loving it. And with solid food comes....dun dun DUN, solid poop. I go away to work during the day and come back at night. Felix generally does most of his pooping during the day so there are times when I may go for several days without coming face to face with a Felix fece. As he has been eating more and more solid foods, his frequency of pooping has gone down, so for me the shift from the innocent, sickly sweet smelling yellowy poopums to the nasty, brown, solid, shitty smelling shit has been rather abrupt. The honeymoon is over.
And I wouldn't mind it as much, since he poops so much less frequently, but also his pee now smells like...well...piss, and he does that even more now. Not more frequently, but more voluminously. Sigh... my baby boy is growing up.
And it is another one of those wake-up calls that you realize you really are a parent when you find yourself wiping a poopy butt (or in Felix's case, prying that nasty brown mass out of his crack). Up til now it has been all rosy and runny and not at all like what you do for yourself in the bathroom. Well surprise, you are really doing the thankless job now. Now we're really in the shit.
Next week we're going to start in on the fruits. Bananas, mangoes (if we can find any), etc. No citrus, no raw apples either, but applesauce is supposed to be ok.
And I wouldn't mind it as much, since he poops so much less frequently, but also his pee now smells like...well...piss, and he does that even more now. Not more frequently, but more voluminously. Sigh... my baby boy is growing up.
And it is another one of those wake-up calls that you realize you really are a parent when you find yourself wiping a poopy butt (or in Felix's case, prying that nasty brown mass out of his crack). Up til now it has been all rosy and runny and not at all like what you do for yourself in the bathroom. Well surprise, you are really doing the thankless job now. Now we're really in the shit.
Next week we're going to start in on the fruits. Bananas, mangoes (if we can find any), etc. No citrus, no raw apples either, but applesauce is supposed to be ok.
amature oden
I was informed on Sunday that I would be in charge of dinner all week due to A's busy evening schedule. And on top of that, I was going to be going grocery shopping by myself("I don't care if we just eat sandwiches every night." -A). OK. So I needed to come up with a game plan because when I try to shop and cook according to what normally does in the kitchen six types of hell break loose and it's never pretty. So I decide I'll go into uncharted territory. I had read about the asian "hotpot" (every asian country seems to have their own variation) meal. Basically, you have a pot of broth that you get simmering and you throw in all kinds of everything. The differences between regional hotpots seems to be the specific types of ingredients and how you eat it. In some you add everything and then you simmer for a looooong time, in others you get your basic broth a bubblin with just a few key flavoring ingredients and then you have all of your other ingredients chopped and ready in bowls. You then toss in whichever ingredients you like and they cook up quickly. This usually means things like fish, pork, chicken, tofu, veggies, etc. You throw it in, was a minute, and pull it out. You then eat your cooked items with various dipping sauces. That's the chinese style, as I understand it.
Well, I decided to try Oden, which is the Japanese variation. This is the kind where you add your ingredients early on and simmer for hours. Traditionally you make oden using your basic dashi (broth of either konbu, shiitake, niboshi [sardine], or bonito flakes) and then adding your ingredients, all of them, and then just let that puppy simmer, adding water and shoyu as necessary. Also, you can keep adding ingredients as necessary. So I made my shopping list and picked up several basic items for making an oden. If it worked out well, we would have a new easy to make dish in our repertoire, and if it was a flop, hey, I took a risk. Oh, and also oden is considered a "winter dish" that is warming and filling.
So last night I made a double batch of konbu dashi (8 cups water, 2 pieces of konbu[plankton/seaweed/sea vegetable]) which gives somewhere between 6 and 7 cups of broth. Tonight I had A start the broth simmering as I was leaving from work. I only had her use 5 cups because I didn't want to use all of it and I didn't want it to be 8 cups of flop if it flopped. Well, I get home to the smell of...mmmmm...simmering seaweed. It actually smells nice for a while because it gives the feel of being near the ocean. It is only after an hour of simmering without adding anything else that it starts to smell too much like low tide. Well, the co-op we shop at has a semi-respectable ethnic/gourmet selection so I was able to get certain things like konbu, dried shiitake, and of course produce. Unfortunately they didn't have daikon raddish but I substituted black raddish. And they didn't have yam starch cakes or fish cakes or any of those truly "oriental" ingredients, which is fine, I didn't want to try this with seafood the first time...too much risk of things going wrong and being inedible. I picked up some produce that I thought would compliment the black raddish and broth, like green onion, leaks, potatoes. The recipe I was following also included boiled eggs. Well, I can do that.
So tonight I got home from work to the simmering broth. After it had been simmering for almost a hour and getting quite strong, I chopped the raddish, leaks, shalots, carrots, potatoes, and beef (I had picked up a pack of stirfry-ready beef strips). Keep in mind, when you do an oden with meat, you really should try to get the best cut of meat available and you should have it very thinly sliced. Since I was putting together the first-time low-budget oden, and since the butcher at the co-op did not have a deli slicer, I opted for pre-cut meat of relatively low quality. No biggie. Worst case scenario is I end up firing up the wok. Ok, so I've added all my ingredients and walked away. The idea is to let it simmer for at least 2 hours, making sure to add more broth, water, and shoyu to keep it liquid and from getting too heavy.
And, as i chopped stuff and added stuff I did a very cheffly thing and kept taking little tastes of everything before putting it in (not potato, of course, but everything else) and kept tasting the oden as is simmered along. Now, remember, I wasn't using any seafood or fish, but mostly pretty standard ingredients for your basic stew. I started to get a little disappointed when my japanese experiment started to taste like "basic beef and vegetable stew". Hrm. Well, after a couple hours of adding water and shoyu, I decided it was time to actually dig in and have myself a bowl.
DELICIOUS. Granted, the ingredients I used were not traditional japanese, but more traditional american, but damn....good stuff. The first bowl I had was just straight up stew. YUM. Half-way through it I added buckwheat soba noodles and more stew. WOW, even better! The second bowl was more noodles, more stew. DELISH! Now I decided that I wanted to dress it up a bit before Andrea had her first bowl, so I rehydrated a handful of shiitake, added the resulting shiitake broth (only about a teaspoon work, unfortunately) and the rinsed and chopped mushrooms.
Ok, keep in mind also that I'd been sampling and eating this stew all night for a couple hours now, and each time you just add more water, more soy sauce, and if you get low on other stuff, add more of it! I started out with a lot of veggies and stuff so I've not really had to add any more, just more liquid. It is nice and warming. Now, next time I'll try to go the extra steps to use some more authentic ingredients, and of course, the traditional way of eating it is to put karashi (hot mustard) on each bit before you eat it...but all in all, while not the most authentic, it is certainly a delicious tasting, hearty, homey, warming meal. I think I'll have this stuff for lunch tomorrow too. It'll go great with a sandwich. I can hardly wait! Finally, a meal that is better the longer you cook it!!!! no more over-cooking!
Well, I decided to try Oden, which is the Japanese variation. This is the kind where you add your ingredients early on and simmer for hours. Traditionally you make oden using your basic dashi (broth of either konbu, shiitake, niboshi [sardine], or bonito flakes) and then adding your ingredients, all of them, and then just let that puppy simmer, adding water and shoyu as necessary. Also, you can keep adding ingredients as necessary. So I made my shopping list and picked up several basic items for making an oden. If it worked out well, we would have a new easy to make dish in our repertoire, and if it was a flop, hey, I took a risk. Oh, and also oden is considered a "winter dish" that is warming and filling.
So last night I made a double batch of konbu dashi (8 cups water, 2 pieces of konbu[plankton/seaweed/sea vegetable]) which gives somewhere between 6 and 7 cups of broth. Tonight I had A start the broth simmering as I was leaving from work. I only had her use 5 cups because I didn't want to use all of it and I didn't want it to be 8 cups of flop if it flopped. Well, I get home to the smell of...mmmmm...simmering seaweed. It actually smells nice for a while because it gives the feel of being near the ocean. It is only after an hour of simmering without adding anything else that it starts to smell too much like low tide. Well, the co-op we shop at has a semi-respectable ethnic/gourmet selection so I was able to get certain things like konbu, dried shiitake, and of course produce. Unfortunately they didn't have daikon raddish but I substituted black raddish. And they didn't have yam starch cakes or fish cakes or any of those truly "oriental" ingredients, which is fine, I didn't want to try this with seafood the first time...too much risk of things going wrong and being inedible. I picked up some produce that I thought would compliment the black raddish and broth, like green onion, leaks, potatoes. The recipe I was following also included boiled eggs. Well, I can do that.
So tonight I got home from work to the simmering broth. After it had been simmering for almost a hour and getting quite strong, I chopped the raddish, leaks, shalots, carrots, potatoes, and beef (I had picked up a pack of stirfry-ready beef strips). Keep in mind, when you do an oden with meat, you really should try to get the best cut of meat available and you should have it very thinly sliced. Since I was putting together the first-time low-budget oden, and since the butcher at the co-op did not have a deli slicer, I opted for pre-cut meat of relatively low quality. No biggie. Worst case scenario is I end up firing up the wok. Ok, so I've added all my ingredients and walked away. The idea is to let it simmer for at least 2 hours, making sure to add more broth, water, and shoyu to keep it liquid and from getting too heavy.
And, as i chopped stuff and added stuff I did a very cheffly thing and kept taking little tastes of everything before putting it in (not potato, of course, but everything else) and kept tasting the oden as is simmered along. Now, remember, I wasn't using any seafood or fish, but mostly pretty standard ingredients for your basic stew. I started to get a little disappointed when my japanese experiment started to taste like "basic beef and vegetable stew". Hrm. Well, after a couple hours of adding water and shoyu, I decided it was time to actually dig in and have myself a bowl.
DELICIOUS. Granted, the ingredients I used were not traditional japanese, but more traditional american, but damn....good stuff. The first bowl I had was just straight up stew. YUM. Half-way through it I added buckwheat soba noodles and more stew. WOW, even better! The second bowl was more noodles, more stew. DELISH! Now I decided that I wanted to dress it up a bit before Andrea had her first bowl, so I rehydrated a handful of shiitake, added the resulting shiitake broth (only about a teaspoon work, unfortunately) and the rinsed and chopped mushrooms.
Ok, keep in mind also that I'd been sampling and eating this stew all night for a couple hours now, and each time you just add more water, more soy sauce, and if you get low on other stuff, add more of it! I started out with a lot of veggies and stuff so I've not really had to add any more, just more liquid. It is nice and warming. Now, next time I'll try to go the extra steps to use some more authentic ingredients, and of course, the traditional way of eating it is to put karashi (hot mustard) on each bit before you eat it...but all in all, while not the most authentic, it is certainly a delicious tasting, hearty, homey, warming meal. I think I'll have this stuff for lunch tomorrow too. It'll go great with a sandwich. I can hardly wait! Finally, a meal that is better the longer you cook it!!!! no more over-cooking!
Friday, February 02, 2007
work work work
With my team's "creative year-in-review presentation" out of the way (I did a 9 minute animated video based on LOST and using southpark-esque 2d animation, featuring my team) and one of my team mates having moved on to greener pastures, I am now full swing into the new year with several new tasks and projects on my plate. I have been BUSY as hell.
Sunday, January 21, 2007
fast food
Felix had his first "solid food" yesterday night in the form of rice cereal in breast milk. And, of course, he was a natural and didn't spit any of it out. A little bit dribbled out the side of his mouth while he was chewing, but otherwise he took it all right from the spoon and gobbled it down. He's really been chomping at the bit to start eating anyway, so I think he's been waiting for this.
Also, his 6 month appointment was on Friday. He's 18lbs, 4 1/4 oz, 27 inches tall. He's in the 70 something percentile for height, 60-something for weight, and high-fifty-something for head circumference. He's a growing boy. It was also the first doctor appt that he didn't have a major poop during.
Also, his 6 month appointment was on Friday. He's 18lbs, 4 1/4 oz, 27 inches tall. He's in the 70 something percentile for height, 60-something for weight, and high-fifty-something for head circumference. He's a growing boy. It was also the first doctor appt that he didn't have a major poop during.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
pop goes the weasel
What a week. Work is super super busy. I've just been told that my promotion went through, so I'm now a Systems Engineer (no longer "Associate"), whatever that means. Winter heating bills suck, which is part of why I hate winter so much these days. Next year I think we'll hop on one of those set-billing-rate plans where they estimate your annual gas cost and then distribute it across 12 months, so you end up paying more per month in the spring, summer, and fall, but less in winter (this last gas bill was $300 and I expect January, February, and March to be even worse, even if I am able to get some heating holes patched). So, if I had been smart last summer when they gave me the option to start paying like $168 a month for gas I would have taken it. At the time, comparing $168 to an average gas bill of something like $30-$60, I went for the regular monthly billing because we had the baby and all and, as usual, when iopt for the "mo'money now" it always bites me in the ass later. You wonder how come you've gotten promotions and raises five times in the last two years and still its the beginning of winter and you're scratching out an existence from paycheck to paycheck? Oh, well, while your annual pay has gone up almost 30%, you've also lost the second family income, your monthly housing cost has gone up $1000 a month, and your monthly bills have gone up because you are now paying gas, sewage, water, garbage on top of electric, internet, and phonebill. So, apparently while it LOOKS like I've done a great job of increasing my net worth/earning power I have also increased my cost of living at the same rate. So...its sort of a sad statement.
On the one hand, it helps me rally look forward to warmer weather when we'll have a couple hundred bucks left over after paying bills, and on top of that we'll hopefully have those habits that allowed us to live through the winter, so maybe that extra money will add up somewheres and we can really start planning for our future. So far, we've really just been planning for now, doing for now. We have "plans", but they are really just goals that we're not able to put much substance behind as of yet. I'm still hoping that I'll get an increase at annual review time, which is in the next couple months. The way I see it, the promotion is a reflection of my over-all worth to the company and the expectation of what I will accomplish and an annual review increase is a combination of cost-of-living increase and merit for performance over the previous 12 months.
On the one hand, it helps me rally look forward to warmer weather when we'll have a couple hundred bucks left over after paying bills, and on top of that we'll hopefully have those habits that allowed us to live through the winter, so maybe that extra money will add up somewheres and we can really start planning for our future. So far, we've really just been planning for now, doing for now. We have "plans", but they are really just goals that we're not able to put much substance behind as of yet. I'm still hoping that I'll get an increase at annual review time, which is in the next couple months. The way I see it, the promotion is a reflection of my over-all worth to the company and the expectation of what I will accomplish and an annual review increase is a combination of cost-of-living increase and merit for performance over the previous 12 months.
Saturday, January 13, 2007
flipped the switch
Who turned off the global warming? Suddenly it's 5 degrees. Suddenly, the house is really really cold. When the temp was hovering around 20-35 degrees the radiators were doing a good job of keeping the house around 70-72 degrees all over. Now that the temp has drastically dropped and stayed down, upstairs is hovering around 70 and most of downstairs is too...but there's a drastic thermal layer at knee level where the temperature seems to drop to, oh, 40 degrees? Yeah, and I can actually feel the cold air flowing in through my swiss cheese 100 year old windows. Looks like I'm gonna have to really figure out what to do. Some windows we can shrink wrap, but others we'd like to be able to open and close the shade, so we need to figure out another way to seal them up.
I don't know why, possibly because its just a major change, but not having a dog anymore makes me feel like I'll somehow have more time to do things around the house. We are still feeling the reverberations of Ash's absence in major ways and I'm trying to keep positive about it. I do believe he stands a good chance of finding a home. I try not to think of the alternative. His absence is felt here in many subtle ways. Lack of constance activity, no clackety-clack of his nails on the floors, no loud baby-waking racket from his controlled falling up or down the stairs, and the kitchen and dining room floors are no longer magically free of dropped food bits. Andrea was cooking dinner the other night and I head, "Ahhh! What's all this?!" as she stepped on a dropped piece of mushroom or carrot or shredded cheese. Now she understands why Ash was always hovering around her legs while she cooked.
I find myself reflexively chastising Ash when I hear random house-settling noises, only to realize that there is no real noise and no dog causing it. Just a passing car or a rattling pipe. I think I'll slowly be cleaning up the remaining evidence of his presence, storing what's in good condition or memory worthy, and throwing out or donating everything else.
On the other hand, there are as many times every day when I feel liberated or relieved. It was a poor choice on my part to adopt Ash when I did, or even at all. My responsibility to care for him has influenced and even directed many of my past decisions and I shudder to think how my life may have been different had i not adopted him. We both benefitted, for sure, but we both also suffered as well. To not have that one additional, very large, responsibility looming over everything else is amazing. Andrea and Felix and Ash were not the only ones who were being held captive in our house. All of my travel decisions, living arangements, etc, have all been somewhat dictated by how Ash could be fit into the equation. Finding someone to house/dog sit, finding a place that ALLOWS dogs, and has a place he can be safely kept when I'm away, finding a place to kennel him, paying fines for barking complaints, losing damage deposit due to property damage, strained relations with neighbors, roommates, spouses, and family. Even as recent as Felix's birth, we had to work around Ash's special needs. We actually took Ash to the hospital and he stayed in our car while Felix was born. I brough him back home when my parents were able to come up and watch him, and obviously on the day of the birth of their baby's baby, the last thing they really wanted to do was stay at home to take care of the dog.
Anyway...I think it is due in large part to the drastic change in our family that everyone is feeling like we're in a new stage, like a new family paradigm is arising...
My last living grandparent, my grandmother, is having some medical difficulties. Should something happen that requires me, or me and my family, to make a trip somewhere, I can now do it. Arranging time off from work is easy, not much of an impediment. Now the only thing keeping us from going somewhere is our own resources and time, not the added difficulty of finding someone to be our surrogates at our house.
It feels like a new day. I hope it is like a new, better day for Ash as well. I miss him terribly, but I also feel tremendously relieved.
I don't know why, possibly because its just a major change, but not having a dog anymore makes me feel like I'll somehow have more time to do things around the house. We are still feeling the reverberations of Ash's absence in major ways and I'm trying to keep positive about it. I do believe he stands a good chance of finding a home. I try not to think of the alternative. His absence is felt here in many subtle ways. Lack of constance activity, no clackety-clack of his nails on the floors, no loud baby-waking racket from his controlled falling up or down the stairs, and the kitchen and dining room floors are no longer magically free of dropped food bits. Andrea was cooking dinner the other night and I head, "Ahhh! What's all this?!" as she stepped on a dropped piece of mushroom or carrot or shredded cheese. Now she understands why Ash was always hovering around her legs while she cooked.
I find myself reflexively chastising Ash when I hear random house-settling noises, only to realize that there is no real noise and no dog causing it. Just a passing car or a rattling pipe. I think I'll slowly be cleaning up the remaining evidence of his presence, storing what's in good condition or memory worthy, and throwing out or donating everything else.
On the other hand, there are as many times every day when I feel liberated or relieved. It was a poor choice on my part to adopt Ash when I did, or even at all. My responsibility to care for him has influenced and even directed many of my past decisions and I shudder to think how my life may have been different had i not adopted him. We both benefitted, for sure, but we both also suffered as well. To not have that one additional, very large, responsibility looming over everything else is amazing. Andrea and Felix and Ash were not the only ones who were being held captive in our house. All of my travel decisions, living arangements, etc, have all been somewhat dictated by how Ash could be fit into the equation. Finding someone to house/dog sit, finding a place that ALLOWS dogs, and has a place he can be safely kept when I'm away, finding a place to kennel him, paying fines for barking complaints, losing damage deposit due to property damage, strained relations with neighbors, roommates, spouses, and family. Even as recent as Felix's birth, we had to work around Ash's special needs. We actually took Ash to the hospital and he stayed in our car while Felix was born. I brough him back home when my parents were able to come up and watch him, and obviously on the day of the birth of their baby's baby, the last thing they really wanted to do was stay at home to take care of the dog.
Anyway...I think it is due in large part to the drastic change in our family that everyone is feeling like we're in a new stage, like a new family paradigm is arising...
My last living grandparent, my grandmother, is having some medical difficulties. Should something happen that requires me, or me and my family, to make a trip somewhere, I can now do it. Arranging time off from work is easy, not much of an impediment. Now the only thing keeping us from going somewhere is our own resources and time, not the added difficulty of finding someone to be our surrogates at our house.
It feels like a new day. I hope it is like a new, better day for Ash as well. I miss him terribly, but I also feel tremendously relieved.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
doggone
I took Ash to a shelter yesterday so he could hopefully get adopted by a new family. It was possibly the hardest thing I've ever done, even though it had to be done and has a good chance of providing all of use (Ash included) much happier outcomes. I bawled in the car in the parking lot for about 20 minutes afterwards. Please don't ask me about it or send emails.
Sunday, January 07, 2007
sunday morning post
Felix has finally gone down for his nap, Andrea is at the Y, and I'm here at home, finishing my coffee and scribbling some thoughts here.
First- news of the weird/disturbing nature.
Yesterday I discovered a breadstick on the outside windowsill of our front picture window. This was the thick style of breadstick that you might get with a plate of spaghetti. Alone this would seem strange. This is the third known incident of pastry being left on our porch. The first time I discovered a half eaten danish on the front porch railing. The second time it was a half-eaten bagel left in the bottom most corner of porch floor, on the alley side. In both of these cases, someone could have easily walked up the the porch and left said breads on our porch without really coming onto the porch. Once from the front, once possibly from the side by the alley. At first it was kind of funny and we noticed both instances shortly after a visit from Andrea's helper. Andrea thought it sounded like something she might have done (ditching a food item right before "arriving"). Well, this last time it was on the windowsill, as if someone were standing on our porch, right by the picture window, and carefully set their leftover food right on the corner of the sill.
So...yeah, a bit creepy. Andrea is very upset that Ash has never made a peep about these visits. I expect it is because he is asleep when this happens, so of course he's not going to hear it. For christmas from Andrea's dad we got a wireless video baby monitor system and an all-weather outdoor wireless camera that I will probably get mounted pretty quickly now that we have someone we'd like to catch. I'm suspecting it's some guys from the apartment building that are hanging around in the alley waiting for someone who think its funny to leave bagels or something on someone's house.
Well, we're gonna get that guy on candid camera. Of course, all of that does depend a bit on the final piece which connects to the computer via USB and lets you monitor and record to your hard drive. We also got a camera monitoring program from the same company that will do things like time-lapse and motion detection. And it will automatically encode the archives into divx format so it won't take up loads of space.
Well, thats all for now. Only took me 2 days to get this one post out...
First- news of the weird/disturbing nature.
Yesterday I discovered a breadstick on the outside windowsill of our front picture window. This was the thick style of breadstick that you might get with a plate of spaghetti. Alone this would seem strange. This is the third known incident of pastry being left on our porch. The first time I discovered a half eaten danish on the front porch railing. The second time it was a half-eaten bagel left in the bottom most corner of porch floor, on the alley side. In both of these cases, someone could have easily walked up the the porch and left said breads on our porch without really coming onto the porch. Once from the front, once possibly from the side by the alley. At first it was kind of funny and we noticed both instances shortly after a visit from Andrea's helper. Andrea thought it sounded like something she might have done (ditching a food item right before "arriving"). Well, this last time it was on the windowsill, as if someone were standing on our porch, right by the picture window, and carefully set their leftover food right on the corner of the sill.
So...yeah, a bit creepy. Andrea is very upset that Ash has never made a peep about these visits. I expect it is because he is asleep when this happens, so of course he's not going to hear it. For christmas from Andrea's dad we got a wireless video baby monitor system and an all-weather outdoor wireless camera that I will probably get mounted pretty quickly now that we have someone we'd like to catch. I'm suspecting it's some guys from the apartment building that are hanging around in the alley waiting for someone who think its funny to leave bagels or something on someone's house.
Well, we're gonna get that guy on candid camera. Of course, all of that does depend a bit on the final piece which connects to the computer via USB and lets you monitor and record to your hard drive. We also got a camera monitoring program from the same company that will do things like time-lapse and motion detection. And it will automatically encode the archives into divx format so it won't take up loads of space.
Well, thats all for now. Only took me 2 days to get this one post out...
Friday, January 05, 2007
reading
I'm just about through reading "The Catcher in the Rye". Andrea got it from the library and read it in like a day or two (she reads fast). Immediately she started theorizing that Wes Anderson must have been heavily influenced by J.D. Salinger. One search in Wikipedia confirmed this. I've been reading it so that we can talk about it. We've found that Felix seems more interested in observing us talk about stuff during dinner than watching us watch a show (or rather, trying to watch the show himself). Also, doesn't your life feel more worthwhile when you can read, digest, and discuss a good book with someone you live with? It is important to be able to talk about things outside of your domestic conversational realm like paying bills, doing house work, baby stuff, trying to further your career, etc. It is nice to have intellectually stimulating yet relationship-neutral discussion topics.
That and its nice to have adult conversations that remind us that we are two people who are married because deep down we really do like to talk to each other and can have some great conversations.
That and its nice to have adult conversations that remind us that we are two people who are married because deep down we really do like to talk to each other and can have some great conversations.
Monday, January 01, 2007
premidlife record year comes to an end
Well, as it says in the description, 2006 was the year that it all went down.
Work
House
Baby
Stepped across the adulthood line of no return (turned 31)
How did we say goodbye to the old year? Quietly. The happenings outside were making enough noise that we didn't feel the need to add to it. That and we're all out of fireworks and/or ammunition. I love how since some fireworks are now legal in Minnesota, ALL fireworks are apparently socially acceptable in Minnesota, even in an urban area. And how people feel more free to shoot their guns in the air in the hopes that it will be masked by/mistaken for fireworks. Anyway, I'm pretty sure we heard both gunshots and fireworks last night. I wonder if the ShotSpotter system is in place in my neighborhood yet.
Anyway, we started the year with snow on the ground, a baby in the crib, and Andrea winning at Scrabble. I think this may finally be her year.
Felix is cuter than ever and more gifted and talented and advanced than any other baby on the planet. We're already interviewing recruiters from various ivy league schools. It is a little tricky because so far Felix is undecided about whether he wants to focus his extra-curricular time on intramural lacrosse, judo, chess club, or advanced robotics and industrial design. He's pretty much undecided all around. We won't know for sure until he learns English.
In 2006 Andrea started working on her own magazine, ran an entire design studio essentially by herself (due to high turn-over in all other positions and an ever increasingly insane, bitchy, and wholly unreliable boss), ditched that job for a promising new position at a small furniture design company only to find out she got the old bait-and-switcheroo there(worse position, possibly worse boss), promptly dumped that steaming pile of pucky, went freelance and cranked out a monstrous product catalog for the worst client ever, all before delivering Felix in record time (something like 6 hours, start to finish). And that just brings us to July. After July she went full speed ahead on the mommy path and scaled back her designtrix-extraordinaire efforts just a tad. She joined the local printmaking co-op so that she could screenprint her work rather than shelling out money we don't have for sub-par digital printing. She sent in a poster to a movie festival/art gallery in Cincinnati which sold, and again submitted the same poster at the MCAD artsale where it sold as well. She completed the first in a series of ironic deco-modernist posters and hopes to finish the series in 2007. And of course she has survived being cooped up in our house day-in and day-out due to a very precocious Felix and a separation anxiety ridden german shepherd (more the latter than the former). All in all, a banner year.
Felix spent Jan-July in-utero then joined us on the outsid mid-July. From that point on he's been steadily leading the pack by a several lengths. He regained his birth weight in 2 days, doubled his birth weight in 2 months, and is constantly outgrowing clothing that it one to two age-sizes away. He's a very healthy and robust lad. He is interested in the world around him and he is very keenly aware that we have a dog, though he's not sure what it is for, yet. He reads and writes at the 3rd grade level and is just finishing a series of monographs about "My Pretty Puppy".
It has been a banner year for me as well. I started 2006 with a promotion at work, which included a nifty raise and a move to new new team. Then February I received a great annual review and another happy raise. Both of these played a big part in our ability to finance a house. So we started seriously looking at houses in January, put it on hold for about 2 months, then started again. On May 31, we closed on our house. Yay. We were moved in by June 15th. A month later Felix came flying out like cannonshot. I was present as partner, coach, and clenching-post. The summer seems to have been mostly uneventful aside from googling at Felix every chance we got. Little did we know those were the easy days! As he became more aware of the world, he became more demanding of us. It was no-longer feed me, change my diaper, put me to sleep. It became feed me, change my diaper, entertain me, take me out, show me things, let me watch TV, and I don't want to go to bed yet, I'm just going to wake up in 2 hours anyway so why not cut out the middleman and just let me stay up til then. Andrea and I worked pretty well as a team and the "lack of sleep" really didn't seem to be an issue for the first four months. In September I turned 31 AND made it rain in my kitchen while attempting to DIY some plumbing on the baby room's radiator. In October I got my 3rd raise of the year during the mid-year review. This one appears to be a "industry norm" level-set by HR (i.e. based on your reviews and your current position, we feel we should start paying you what the going rate is for people being recruited into this 'same' position across the industry), but who cares, its mo'money (sorta). Then in November/December I installed a new radiator in our car, saving us hundreds of dollars and gaining 5000 experience points, split between my auto-mechanic skills and manliness attribute. I think I went up a few levels in the process.
So that's 06 in a nutshell.
07 looks to be more of the same :).
Work
House
Baby
Stepped across the adulthood line of no return (turned 31)
How did we say goodbye to the old year? Quietly. The happenings outside were making enough noise that we didn't feel the need to add to it. That and we're all out of fireworks and/or ammunition. I love how since some fireworks are now legal in Minnesota, ALL fireworks are apparently socially acceptable in Minnesota, even in an urban area. And how people feel more free to shoot their guns in the air in the hopes that it will be masked by/mistaken for fireworks. Anyway, I'm pretty sure we heard both gunshots and fireworks last night. I wonder if the ShotSpotter system is in place in my neighborhood yet.
Anyway, we started the year with snow on the ground, a baby in the crib, and Andrea winning at Scrabble. I think this may finally be her year.
Felix is cuter than ever and more gifted and talented and advanced than any other baby on the planet. We're already interviewing recruiters from various ivy league schools. It is a little tricky because so far Felix is undecided about whether he wants to focus his extra-curricular time on intramural lacrosse, judo, chess club, or advanced robotics and industrial design. He's pretty much undecided all around. We won't know for sure until he learns English.
In 2006 Andrea started working on her own magazine, ran an entire design studio essentially by herself (due to high turn-over in all other positions and an ever increasingly insane, bitchy, and wholly unreliable boss), ditched that job for a promising new position at a small furniture design company only to find out she got the old bait-and-switcheroo there(worse position, possibly worse boss), promptly dumped that steaming pile of pucky, went freelance and cranked out a monstrous product catalog for the worst client ever, all before delivering Felix in record time (something like 6 hours, start to finish). And that just brings us to July. After July she went full speed ahead on the mommy path and scaled back her designtrix-extraordinaire efforts just a tad. She joined the local printmaking co-op so that she could screenprint her work rather than shelling out money we don't have for sub-par digital printing. She sent in a poster to a movie festival/art gallery in Cincinnati which sold, and again submitted the same poster at the MCAD artsale where it sold as well. She completed the first in a series of ironic deco-modernist posters and hopes to finish the series in 2007. And of course she has survived being cooped up in our house day-in and day-out due to a very precocious Felix and a separation anxiety ridden german shepherd (more the latter than the former). All in all, a banner year.
Felix spent Jan-July in-utero then joined us on the outsid mid-July. From that point on he's been steadily leading the pack by a several lengths. He regained his birth weight in 2 days, doubled his birth weight in 2 months, and is constantly outgrowing clothing that it one to two age-sizes away. He's a very healthy and robust lad. He is interested in the world around him and he is very keenly aware that we have a dog, though he's not sure what it is for, yet. He reads and writes at the 3rd grade level and is just finishing a series of monographs about "My Pretty Puppy".
It has been a banner year for me as well. I started 2006 with a promotion at work, which included a nifty raise and a move to new new team. Then February I received a great annual review and another happy raise. Both of these played a big part in our ability to finance a house. So we started seriously looking at houses in January, put it on hold for about 2 months, then started again. On May 31, we closed on our house. Yay. We were moved in by June 15th. A month later Felix came flying out like cannonshot. I was present as partner, coach, and clenching-post. The summer seems to have been mostly uneventful aside from googling at Felix every chance we got. Little did we know those were the easy days! As he became more aware of the world, he became more demanding of us. It was no-longer feed me, change my diaper, put me to sleep. It became feed me, change my diaper, entertain me, take me out, show me things, let me watch TV, and I don't want to go to bed yet, I'm just going to wake up in 2 hours anyway so why not cut out the middleman and just let me stay up til then. Andrea and I worked pretty well as a team and the "lack of sleep" really didn't seem to be an issue for the first four months. In September I turned 31 AND made it rain in my kitchen while attempting to DIY some plumbing on the baby room's radiator. In October I got my 3rd raise of the year during the mid-year review. This one appears to be a "industry norm" level-set by HR (i.e. based on your reviews and your current position, we feel we should start paying you what the going rate is for people being recruited into this 'same' position across the industry), but who cares, its mo'money (sorta). Then in November/December I installed a new radiator in our car, saving us hundreds of dollars and gaining 5000 experience points, split between my auto-mechanic skills and manliness attribute. I think I went up a few levels in the process.
So that's 06 in a nutshell.
07 looks to be more of the same :).
Friday, December 29, 2006
twas the night before 'mas
I have an offline blog entry simmering on the back burner, collecting my feelings about this time of year, but I shall allow it to bubble and fizzle out for a while longer. Tonight is the night before xmas, part 2...
Tomorrow we trek up to St. Cloud, the new geographic center of the extended family universe ever since C and J moved to Fargo. So tomorrow we will be doing the xmas with my side of the family. And what is stirring in the house? Well, I FINALLY got Felix to go to sleep about 15 minutes ago, Andrea and her brother are in the dining room watching Home Movies and laughing quite a bit, the dog is off in his corner licking his paws in his typical OCD manner, and I'm in the basement, which still stinks of dog piss, quietly trying to figure out how to make video DVDs from AVI files in Linux.
For work I've taken it upon myself to drive the creative process for the next presentation. Our Star Wars themed version control movie apparently set the bar pretty high and other teams are feeling the pressure to produce something "creative" for January's quarterly meeting. Since the version control movie was done using stills of star wars figures, I htought I'd step this one up and try to do something that's animated. I have Anime Studio Pro which I think I can use to make 2d animations, sort of like South Park, but i need actual characters, etc and I don't know if i want to tackle trying ot draw them all...so then I decided to dabble with Poser, which is a 3D rendering program specifically for posing and staging scenes with human and animal 3D models. Spenty a good chunk of the day just trying to figure out how that program works, and ne4edless to say, it ain't easy to use.
Ah well...
Tomorrow we trek up to St. Cloud, the new geographic center of the extended family universe ever since C and J moved to Fargo. So tomorrow we will be doing the xmas with my side of the family. And what is stirring in the house? Well, I FINALLY got Felix to go to sleep about 15 minutes ago, Andrea and her brother are in the dining room watching Home Movies and laughing quite a bit, the dog is off in his corner licking his paws in his typical OCD manner, and I'm in the basement, which still stinks of dog piss, quietly trying to figure out how to make video DVDs from AVI files in Linux.
For work I've taken it upon myself to drive the creative process for the next presentation. Our Star Wars themed version control movie apparently set the bar pretty high and other teams are feeling the pressure to produce something "creative" for January's quarterly meeting. Since the version control movie was done using stills of star wars figures, I htought I'd step this one up and try to do something that's animated. I have Anime Studio Pro which I think I can use to make 2d animations, sort of like South Park, but i need actual characters, etc and I don't know if i want to tackle trying ot draw them all...so then I decided to dabble with Poser, which is a 3D rendering program specifically for posing and staging scenes with human and animal 3D models. Spenty a good chunk of the day just trying to figure out how that program works, and ne4edless to say, it ain't easy to use.
Ah well...
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
security guard pre-requisites
"I've lost my coffee mug. Can you look in your lost and found to see if maybe someone turned it in?"
"Sure........nope, no mugs here. Where did you lose it?"
Duuuuhhhhhhhhhhh.
If I knew where I lost it, I'd have found it wouldn't I, and it wouldn't be lost and I would be talking to you...
"Sure........nope, no mugs here. Where did you lose it?"
Duuuuhhhhhhhhhhh.
If I knew where I lost it, I'd have found it wouldn't I, and it wouldn't be lost and I would be talking to you...
out to get me down?
Sometime last week Google Calendar decided to start giving me some commentary every day. How depressing.
Friday, December 22, 2006
Thursday, December 21, 2006
gitterdone
I got my xmas early today when Sears delivered the new dryer. Of course, it wasn't without cost. When I approved the replacement, they told me to go to the SEARS website and look at the model they were going to purchase for us (they = home warranty company) to make sure that the measurements were OK. This is important, they said, because this is non-returnable, non-refundable. I'm thinking "It sits out in the open, not in a closet or enclosed space, how could it possibly not fit?" so I called back and said, "Yeah yeah, looks great. Gimme."
Today the delivery guys show up and I wave them around to the side door so they can take it straight down to the basement. The guy whips out his tape measure and measures the doorway. Uh....uuuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhh. He says, "I think this door is going to have to come off. In fact..." he looks down the stairs and measures the width of the stairway at its narrowest point. "I think you need a flatback dryer. This ain't gonna fit." no no no no no no no.
"Well, this is a warranty replacement and its non-returnable, so its gotta fit. Tell me, what do we need to do?"
He looks at the stairs. "Well, I guess if this could come off it just might fit." He's pointing to the sort of mantle-like piece of wood the runs along at the top of the staircase. I don't know how else to explain it....maybe as a "ledge" where I tend to set tools and other stuff that needs to go downstairs. Anyway, I get my hammer and give it a few whacks on the bottom lip and up it comes. "Well....OK." He says. I take off the door as well while he and his partner uncrate the dryer. By the way, at that moment it was starting to actually snowing the first real snow we've had this year. The attach their lifting straps and whatnot and start to move the dryer in. The round the corner and are starting to ease down the stairs when they stop. "It's not wide enough," the one guy says. "Whaddya mean? It looks like you're already on the way down?" I say. "Naw, it's starting to rub, it won't fit. We could force it but it'll get scratched."
"Scratched, huh?"
"Yeah."
"Will it dry clothes?"
"Well....sure."
"Then f-ing scratch it. I've got a 5 month old baby who's diapers we've been drying on the damn radiators for a week and a half. If you guys showed up with a blow-torch I would have been happy. I don't care if it has scratches, just et it down there. Christ, the OLD dryer was crap when we bought the house, a few scratches aren't going to bother me. I'm the only one who's going to see the thing anyway."
"OK, here we go."
And the pushed and there was the noise of scraping, but it turned out mostly to just be paint and wood on the stairs. The dryer was delivered to my laundry room and they gave me a power cord. Yeah, weird how dryers don't come with the power cord attached. Then the guy looks, "Oh, you've got a 3-wire outlet....this is a 4 wire cord." Uuuuuuuh.
"No problem, I'll go get a 3-wire from the truck." whew.
The new dryer is beautiful.
I put on the power cord, the feet, an d set about trying to level it. Then I attach the vent from the old one. Its tight, but it works. Probably want to get some new venting, but that's no biggie.
I level it, make some adjustments to the feet and plug it in....
...except that the cord doesn't reach the socket. No. no no no no no.
So I move the dryer enough that the cord just reaches and, of course, the vent pipe comes off. I climb back there and reattach vent. And find I'm trapped between a tightly stretched power cord and a tightly stretched exhaust vent. I end up doing some limbo action to get myself out of there. The dryer is about a foot more forward than the washer and, in its new location I'm going to need to adjust the feet again....but anyway, I power it up and it works. Smells like burning something, but apparently that's to be expected on a new heating element.
So, next small project...replace the ledge in the stairs. And get a longer power cord and exhaust vent.
Today the delivery guys show up and I wave them around to the side door so they can take it straight down to the basement. The guy whips out his tape measure and measures the doorway. Uh....uuuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhh. He says, "I think this door is going to have to come off. In fact..." he looks down the stairs and measures the width of the stairway at its narrowest point. "I think you need a flatback dryer. This ain't gonna fit." no no no no no no no.
"Well, this is a warranty replacement and its non-returnable, so its gotta fit. Tell me, what do we need to do?"
He looks at the stairs. "Well, I guess if this could come off it just might fit." He's pointing to the sort of mantle-like piece of wood the runs along at the top of the staircase. I don't know how else to explain it....maybe as a "ledge" where I tend to set tools and other stuff that needs to go downstairs. Anyway, I get my hammer and give it a few whacks on the bottom lip and up it comes. "Well....OK." He says. I take off the door as well while he and his partner uncrate the dryer. By the way, at that moment it was starting to actually snowing the first real snow we've had this year. The attach their lifting straps and whatnot and start to move the dryer in. The round the corner and are starting to ease down the stairs when they stop. "It's not wide enough," the one guy says. "Whaddya mean? It looks like you're already on the way down?" I say. "Naw, it's starting to rub, it won't fit. We could force it but it'll get scratched."
"Scratched, huh?"
"Yeah."
"Will it dry clothes?"
"Well....sure."
"Then f-ing scratch it. I've got a 5 month old baby who's diapers we've been drying on the damn radiators for a week and a half. If you guys showed up with a blow-torch I would have been happy. I don't care if it has scratches, just et it down there. Christ, the OLD dryer was crap when we bought the house, a few scratches aren't going to bother me. I'm the only one who's going to see the thing anyway."
"OK, here we go."
And the pushed and there was the noise of scraping, but it turned out mostly to just be paint and wood on the stairs. The dryer was delivered to my laundry room and they gave me a power cord. Yeah, weird how dryers don't come with the power cord attached. Then the guy looks, "Oh, you've got a 3-wire outlet....this is a 4 wire cord." Uuuuuuuh.
"No problem, I'll go get a 3-wire from the truck." whew.
The new dryer is beautiful.
I put on the power cord, the feet, an d set about trying to level it. Then I attach the vent from the old one. Its tight, but it works. Probably want to get some new venting, but that's no biggie.
I level it, make some adjustments to the feet and plug it in....
...except that the cord doesn't reach the socket. No. no no no no no.
So I move the dryer enough that the cord just reaches and, of course, the vent pipe comes off. I climb back there and reattach vent. And find I'm trapped between a tightly stretched power cord and a tightly stretched exhaust vent. I end up doing some limbo action to get myself out of there. The dryer is about a foot more forward than the washer and, in its new location I'm going to need to adjust the feet again....but anyway, I power it up and it works. Smells like burning something, but apparently that's to be expected on a new heating element.
So, next small project...replace the ledge in the stairs. And get a longer power cord and exhaust vent.
Sunday, December 17, 2006
weekend shmeekend
Actually, all things considered, it wasn't a half bad weekend. ACTUALLY, all things considered, it was a pretty good weekend.
Last Saturday I called in to our home warranty company because our dryer, which as been on its last leg since we bought the house (and has been steadily losing its toes), finally kinda kicked the bucket. The belt or drive wheel no longer gets enough traction to spin the drum if anything heavier than a wet sock is in it. So I called them up last Saturday and they said someone would call me within 24 hours.
Sunday comes and goes.
Monday comes and in the afternoon I call back to say, "Nobody called me."
"Oh," they say, "It says the contractor said they don't go all the way out there." Out there? out where? We live smack dab in the middle of the damn city. "I'll put you on the redispatch list."
"Uh, yeah, its been two days now, can you give it some sort of priority or something?"
"Yes, I'll do that."
Tuesday.
Wednesday.
"Hey, nobody has contacted me yet."
"What? Oh, it looks like the contractor doesn't..."
"Yeah yeah, Jon's Appliance...I had this conversation two days ago. We were supposed to be redispatched, with priority..."
"Um...whoever said that must have forgotten. I'll redispatch..."
"Yeah, look, we're on day 5 with no dryer and I have a 5 month old baby. I've had the same conversation twice now..."
"Here, let me transfer you to a service agent and they will handle this for you directly."
"Uh, thanks I guess."
Muzak.
"Hello, how can I help you?"
"I called in on Saturday..." story continues.
"Ok, I'll find a contractor right now, can you hold?"
Muzak.
"Ok, um, the only contractor I was able to get in touch with was...SEARS, and they can't get out there until Monday. Is that Ok?"
"Monday? No, of course that's not ok, but what the hell am I going to do? If that's the best you can do, I guess I'm stuck with it. Can't you keep trying other contractors and hope someone can get here sooner? I NEED a dryer. I'm drying diapers on my freakin' radiators."
...
UPDATE: So we're getting a new dryer. Will only be a week or so before it arrives... gah!
Last Saturday I called in to our home warranty company because our dryer, which as been on its last leg since we bought the house (and has been steadily losing its toes), finally kinda kicked the bucket. The belt or drive wheel no longer gets enough traction to spin the drum if anything heavier than a wet sock is in it. So I called them up last Saturday and they said someone would call me within 24 hours.
Sunday comes and goes.
Monday comes and in the afternoon I call back to say, "Nobody called me."
"Oh," they say, "It says the contractor said they don't go all the way out there." Out there? out where? We live smack dab in the middle of the damn city. "I'll put you on the redispatch list."
"Uh, yeah, its been two days now, can you give it some sort of priority or something?"
"Yes, I'll do that."
Tuesday.
Wednesday.
"Hey, nobody has contacted me yet."
"What? Oh, it looks like the contractor doesn't..."
"Yeah yeah, Jon's Appliance...I had this conversation two days ago. We were supposed to be redispatched, with priority..."
"Um...whoever said that must have forgotten. I'll redispatch..."
"Yeah, look, we're on day 5 with no dryer and I have a 5 month old baby. I've had the same conversation twice now..."
"Here, let me transfer you to a service agent and they will handle this for you directly."
"Uh, thanks I guess."
Muzak.
"Hello, how can I help you?"
"I called in on Saturday..." story continues.
"Ok, I'll find a contractor right now, can you hold?"
Muzak.
"Ok, um, the only contractor I was able to get in touch with was...SEARS, and they can't get out there until Monday. Is that Ok?"
"Monday? No, of course that's not ok, but what the hell am I going to do? If that's the best you can do, I guess I'm stuck with it. Can't you keep trying other contractors and hope someone can get here sooner? I NEED a dryer. I'm drying diapers on my freakin' radiators."
...
UPDATE: So we're getting a new dryer. Will only be a week or so before it arrives... gah!
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
looks like it worked
Day 2 with no messy coolant leak forming under the car...course, it has been raining all day yesterday so it was hard to tell, but this morning I checked again and it looks like the new radiator was the solution. With this sort of thing I'm always paranoid that I'll go through great expense or great effort and only partially fix the issue or in the process uncover other equally serious issues. Hasn't happened in this case yet.
NOTE TO SELF: Need to fix headlight.
NOTE TO SELF: Need to fix headlight.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
conquest
YAR!!!!!!!!!
I finally finished working on the car. Tonight was another grudge match against the engineers at Ford. It was slow at times, frustrating, but in the end I won.
I installed new transaxle oil cooler lines, which was as hard as removing the old lines, as well as installing a new fitting on the tranny because the plastic "quick connect" clip (because nobody would actually buy a "This is going to take you 45 minutes just to install this line connect") broken when I removed the old line. And "removed" is putting it politely.
Once the new lines were in, I felt OK attempting to remove the radiator. Turns out the guys at the Taurus Car Club are right, you do NOT need to take off the bumper to replace the radiator. Besides, all of the hard stuff is on the engine side. If you really wanted to make removing and installing the radiator easier you'd remove the power steering pump, the alternator, and the AC hoses. Anyway, the whole radiator part only took about an hour, and most of that was just trying to remember where all those bolts went. I only ended up with one bolt leftover, and actually, I think I know where it goes and it is non-essential.
So, now the heat works great and so far as I can tell we're not leaking coolant...a little oil and maybe a teeny bit of brake fluid (at one of my last services I was infromed of some seeping or weeping from the brake master cylinder or slave cylinder? Can't remember which. Passenger side front wheel is all I remember). So, anyhow, I started Sunday around 2:30pm and finished Tuesday at about 1:45am. All told, the radiator only took about 2 hours. Most of the remaining time was spent driving around (tonight) looking for a replacement fitting or yanking on tranny oil cooler lines (last night and some of tonight). If I were to do this again, I expect it would take me maybe 3 or 4 hours total.
And the only known casualty is my passenger side head light bulb, which was the older of the two and was probably going to go out anytime.
We still need to have the cooling system flushed, though, but I'll let JiffyLube do that in a week or two.
Right now i have so much testosterone...
I finally finished working on the car. Tonight was another grudge match against the engineers at Ford. It was slow at times, frustrating, but in the end I won.
I installed new transaxle oil cooler lines, which was as hard as removing the old lines, as well as installing a new fitting on the tranny because the plastic "quick connect" clip (because nobody would actually buy a "This is going to take you 45 minutes just to install this line connect") broken when I removed the old line. And "removed" is putting it politely.
Once the new lines were in, I felt OK attempting to remove the radiator. Turns out the guys at the Taurus Car Club are right, you do NOT need to take off the bumper to replace the radiator. Besides, all of the hard stuff is on the engine side. If you really wanted to make removing and installing the radiator easier you'd remove the power steering pump, the alternator, and the AC hoses. Anyway, the whole radiator part only took about an hour, and most of that was just trying to remember where all those bolts went. I only ended up with one bolt leftover, and actually, I think I know where it goes and it is non-essential.
So, now the heat works great and so far as I can tell we're not leaking coolant...a little oil and maybe a teeny bit of brake fluid (at one of my last services I was infromed of some seeping or weeping from the brake master cylinder or slave cylinder? Can't remember which. Passenger side front wheel is all I remember). So, anyhow, I started Sunday around 2:30pm and finished Tuesday at about 1:45am. All told, the radiator only took about 2 hours. Most of the remaining time was spent driving around (tonight) looking for a replacement fitting or yanking on tranny oil cooler lines (last night and some of tonight). If I were to do this again, I expect it would take me maybe 3 or 4 hours total.
And the only known casualty is my passenger side head light bulb, which was the older of the two and was probably going to go out anytime.
We still need to have the cooling system flushed, though, but I'll let JiffyLube do that in a week or two.
Right now i have so much testosterone...
Sunday, December 10, 2006
the saga continues
Good grief, somebody shoot me please. First of all, those jackasses at the service shops are f-ing full of shit. Second of all, Ford is f-ing full of shit to build a car around an f-ing radiator. I will never buy another ford. Probably. Unless its a Lincoln or something...whatever.
I spent almost all of today working on that goddamned radiator and curently I'm feeling somewhat defeated. It was looking bleak when I couldn't figure out what the instructions meant when they said, "Remove radiator mounting bracket assembly" and thought for sure I was going to have to remove the bumper cover and just the thought of doing that was very overwhelming. Here's why. The Haynes manual does this super nifty thing where to install a radiator is explained in less than 20 semi-detailed instructions. However, you'll find that step 11 is "Remove bumper. See chapter 8 for details" and so you go to chapter 8 and find the "remove bumper" section and it has 10 steps, step 5 is "Remove headlamps, see section 2" and step 12 is "remove fender liners, see section 4" which is another 8 steps, one of which is "Remove the wheels". I imagine this is the scenario that the service shop is trying to sell to me. HOWEVER, it just so turns out that the hard part about removing a radiator from a 97 Mercury Sable is the fact that the hoses all connect on the engine side of the radiator and there is little to no room to work. Keep in mind, this would be absolutely the same scenario if you took the whole front end off. The worst part is that the transmission oil cooler lines use a little plastic quick disconnect "tool", which, of course, only works if your line fittings are not rusted to your radiator, like mine are.
So, after getting off to a great start, floundering for a little while, then having a eureka moment and blazing away, I end up feeling defeated by a pair of poorly places and solidly stuck transmission cooler lines. So I had to give up for tonight. The only option I have is to cut the lines off the radiator so I can remove it, then I'll need to install new lines along with the new radiator. Which probably isn't a bad thing...just another operation I wasn't counting on and which on the face of it SHOULD be relatively simple and hopefully low cost. Right? And I take some small consolation that had I gone with a service shop they would have called me to let me know "Turns out your tranny cooler lines were rusted to the radiator and we had to cut them off, so you'll need new ones of those installed which will take 2 more hours and $200 in parts..." or something along those lines.
Mainly I just feel like I've let my family down, stranding us without a car for who knows how long. Hopefully I can get these lines at an auto parts store for a reasonable price and hopefully there are no more surprises. Oh, and I absolutely HATE spring wire hose clips. What a horrible idea those are.
And to top it all off I felt like shit (maybe it was just because I was practically swimming in antifreeze all day) because I was missing my son. I'm not supposed to be away from him like this on the weekends.
I spent almost all of today working on that goddamned radiator and curently I'm feeling somewhat defeated. It was looking bleak when I couldn't figure out what the instructions meant when they said, "Remove radiator mounting bracket assembly" and thought for sure I was going to have to remove the bumper cover and just the thought of doing that was very overwhelming. Here's why. The Haynes manual does this super nifty thing where to install a radiator is explained in less than 20 semi-detailed instructions. However, you'll find that step 11 is "Remove bumper. See chapter 8 for details" and so you go to chapter 8 and find the "remove bumper" section and it has 10 steps, step 5 is "Remove headlamps, see section 2" and step 12 is "remove fender liners, see section 4" which is another 8 steps, one of which is "Remove the wheels". I imagine this is the scenario that the service shop is trying to sell to me. HOWEVER, it just so turns out that the hard part about removing a radiator from a 97 Mercury Sable is the fact that the hoses all connect on the engine side of the radiator and there is little to no room to work. Keep in mind, this would be absolutely the same scenario if you took the whole front end off. The worst part is that the transmission oil cooler lines use a little plastic quick disconnect "tool", which, of course, only works if your line fittings are not rusted to your radiator, like mine are.
So, after getting off to a great start, floundering for a little while, then having a eureka moment and blazing away, I end up feeling defeated by a pair of poorly places and solidly stuck transmission cooler lines. So I had to give up for tonight. The only option I have is to cut the lines off the radiator so I can remove it, then I'll need to install new lines along with the new radiator. Which probably isn't a bad thing...just another operation I wasn't counting on and which on the face of it SHOULD be relatively simple and hopefully low cost. Right? And I take some small consolation that had I gone with a service shop they would have called me to let me know "Turns out your tranny cooler lines were rusted to the radiator and we had to cut them off, so you'll need new ones of those installed which will take 2 more hours and $200 in parts..." or something along those lines.
Mainly I just feel like I've let my family down, stranding us without a car for who knows how long. Hopefully I can get these lines at an auto parts store for a reasonable price and hopefully there are no more surprises. Oh, and I absolutely HATE spring wire hose clips. What a horrible idea those are.
And to top it all off I felt like shit (maybe it was just because I was practically swimming in antifreeze all day) because I was missing my son. I'm not supposed to be away from him like this on the weekends.
chasing geese
I now dedicate December as National Mechanical Failure Month, or, perhaps, National Bad Luck Month, or even National Don't Count Your Chickens Before They Hatch Month. Definitely making it (if it isn't already) Empty Your Bank Accounts Month.
So, here's the story:
Andrea's dad offers us an early xmas present - he said he'll cover to cost of labor to get the radiator replaced. So I call up the place that gave me the best estimate, which involved buying a radiator from a radiator salvage place and then taking it up the street to a service shop to have it installed. They quoted me 3.8 hours (like the other places did) and an hour after I dropped it off, 20 minutes into the hour bus ride BACK to Minneapolis (both of these places are over in old St. Paul, on Rice Street) for work (late, by the way) I get a call from the shop. "Uh, there's an asterisk on the deal. Turns off this is a six hour job cuz that bumper has got to come off." Just like the first place I took the car to said. "Well, forget it then. I'll be back this afternoon to pick it up." Grrrrr. Even though the labor portion was being gifted to us, I'm not going to bump up the gift cost by hundreds of dollars. So I already bought the radiator ($75). I call another shop and ask them why this 3.8 hour job would suddenly turn into a 6 hour job? They say, "Doesn't make sense to us. None of our guys can remember ever having to take a bumper off to install a radiator." So I of course hit the library again, this time checking out the Haynes manual for my car and looking at the AllData database again (which one of the shops quoted me as having the alleged asterisk, which I could not find) for the service instructions. The Haynes manual mentions removing the bumper cover. The AllData instructions don't mention the bumper or bumper cover at all. So I scour the web, again, and this time I come across the Taurus Car Club which has tons of info in the forums. Lots of people saying that you don't need to remove the bumper, that the radiator comes out the bottom. Hrm.
Sigh. Ok, I have the part, and Andrea's dad had volunteered his garage and tools before he offered to pay for the service, so I decided I'd be taking him up on that (I'm going over today to try to do this repair...you can bet there will be an entry about how that goes) offer instead.
So, yesterday (Saturday), we're going about our semi-regular weekend schedule, which includes doing adult people laundry (instead of the baby people laundry I do at least every other day). I had started the laundry Friday night and dried half of our laundry over night. Saturday morning I was drying the first load of darks (always heavier due to the jeans, etc) and I thought I smelled burning rubber. Oh Great. Yeah, the drive wheel or belt or whatever on the dryer is slipping and won't turn the dryer drum if more than maybe a handful of socks are in there. Well, this thing has been on its last legs since we bought the house, and in the past month is has gotten louder and louder (screechy and scraping), the door latch broke so I'm holding the door closed with a 2x4 with angled ends (works pretty well, actually). Well, with cloth diapers we can't really afford to have the dryer out of commission for more than about a day. Luckily, all of our appliances are covered by our home warranty, so we pay $55 deductible and someone comes and looks at the dryer and at worst fixes it and at best, replaces it. I'm going to try to get this thing replaced if at all possible. Talk about a silver lining on this past dogshit week. But I'm not really expecting that. But who knows...maybe the time it takes to fix the dryer will be more than the cost to just replace it...I'm not looking for a nice stainless steel industrial grade dryer (though that would be nice), just your basic front loader that was made before 1980. Our current dryer is a Monkey Wards brand dryer, if that tells you anything about how old it is. So, the guy from the appliance place hasn't called me yet (supposed to get a call within 12 hours? Riiiiight) to set up the appointment. I expect they will call me on Monday when they check their messages. Which means I'll probably be taking a half day sometime this week to deal with that...
And now, after continuing to drive the car with not much trouble at all (heat works after awhile, car is not over heating, but still see fluid leaking) I'm starting to worry that the leak might not be in the radiator at all, but could be a hose or the reserve tank. But the first service shop, the ones who actually DID diagnostics, a pressure test, etc, said that it was the radiator and thus delivered the quote for 6 hours work, $600. AND THEN EXTRA TO FLUSH. That's what gets me. Shouldn't a cooling system flush be fucking included in this type of service???? That's one of the reasons I may not go back to that place. So far the only thing they have going is that they are close to where we live.
Ok...enough for right now. Perhaps my next entry will be when I am glowing with the satisfaction of DIY done good and having saved $$$.
And of course, to further put worry bees in my bonnet, my dad asks me, "Did you ask a Ford dealer what they would charge for the service?" No, of course not, I assumed they would cost more than anyone else. "Bad assumption..." he says. Well, whatever their quote, I'm past the point of no-return. Right now my biggest concern is what am I going to do at Andrea's dad's house for 3 hours while we wait for the engine to cool...
So, here's the story:
Andrea's dad offers us an early xmas present - he said he'll cover to cost of labor to get the radiator replaced. So I call up the place that gave me the best estimate, which involved buying a radiator from a radiator salvage place and then taking it up the street to a service shop to have it installed. They quoted me 3.8 hours (like the other places did) and an hour after I dropped it off, 20 minutes into the hour bus ride BACK to Minneapolis (both of these places are over in old St. Paul, on Rice Street) for work (late, by the way) I get a call from the shop. "Uh, there's an asterisk on the deal. Turns off this is a six hour job cuz that bumper has got to come off." Just like the first place I took the car to said. "Well, forget it then. I'll be back this afternoon to pick it up." Grrrrr. Even though the labor portion was being gifted to us, I'm not going to bump up the gift cost by hundreds of dollars. So I already bought the radiator ($75). I call another shop and ask them why this 3.8 hour job would suddenly turn into a 6 hour job? They say, "Doesn't make sense to us. None of our guys can remember ever having to take a bumper off to install a radiator." So I of course hit the library again, this time checking out the Haynes manual for my car and looking at the AllData database again (which one of the shops quoted me as having the alleged asterisk, which I could not find) for the service instructions. The Haynes manual mentions removing the bumper cover. The AllData instructions don't mention the bumper or bumper cover at all. So I scour the web, again, and this time I come across the Taurus Car Club which has tons of info in the forums. Lots of people saying that you don't need to remove the bumper, that the radiator comes out the bottom. Hrm.
Sigh. Ok, I have the part, and Andrea's dad had volunteered his garage and tools before he offered to pay for the service, so I decided I'd be taking him up on that (I'm going over today to try to do this repair...you can bet there will be an entry about how that goes) offer instead.
So, yesterday (Saturday), we're going about our semi-regular weekend schedule, which includes doing adult people laundry (instead of the baby people laundry I do at least every other day). I had started the laundry Friday night and dried half of our laundry over night. Saturday morning I was drying the first load of darks (always heavier due to the jeans, etc) and I thought I smelled burning rubber. Oh Great. Yeah, the drive wheel or belt or whatever on the dryer is slipping and won't turn the dryer drum if more than maybe a handful of socks are in there. Well, this thing has been on its last legs since we bought the house, and in the past month is has gotten louder and louder (screechy and scraping), the door latch broke so I'm holding the door closed with a 2x4 with angled ends (works pretty well, actually). Well, with cloth diapers we can't really afford to have the dryer out of commission for more than about a day. Luckily, all of our appliances are covered by our home warranty, so we pay $55 deductible and someone comes and looks at the dryer and at worst fixes it and at best, replaces it. I'm going to try to get this thing replaced if at all possible. Talk about a silver lining on this past dogshit week. But I'm not really expecting that. But who knows...maybe the time it takes to fix the dryer will be more than the cost to just replace it...I'm not looking for a nice stainless steel industrial grade dryer (though that would be nice), just your basic front loader that was made before 1980. Our current dryer is a Monkey Wards brand dryer, if that tells you anything about how old it is. So, the guy from the appliance place hasn't called me yet (supposed to get a call within 12 hours? Riiiiight) to set up the appointment. I expect they will call me on Monday when they check their messages. Which means I'll probably be taking a half day sometime this week to deal with that...
And now, after continuing to drive the car with not much trouble at all (heat works after awhile, car is not over heating, but still see fluid leaking) I'm starting to worry that the leak might not be in the radiator at all, but could be a hose or the reserve tank. But the first service shop, the ones who actually DID diagnostics, a pressure test, etc, said that it was the radiator and thus delivered the quote for 6 hours work, $600. AND THEN EXTRA TO FLUSH. That's what gets me. Shouldn't a cooling system flush be fucking included in this type of service???? That's one of the reasons I may not go back to that place. So far the only thing they have going is that they are close to where we live.
Ok...enough for right now. Perhaps my next entry will be when I am glowing with the satisfaction of DIY done good and having saved $$$.
And of course, to further put worry bees in my bonnet, my dad asks me, "Did you ask a Ford dealer what they would charge for the service?" No, of course not, I assumed they would cost more than anyone else. "Bad assumption..." he says. Well, whatever their quote, I'm past the point of no-return. Right now my biggest concern is what am I going to do at Andrea's dad's house for 3 hours while we wait for the engine to cool...
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
ah to be a stay at home dad
I took off two weeks (vacation) to stay home after Felix was born. Other than that, I've never taken more than maybe 5 days of vacation at a time, and 90% of the time I only take off a single day. So, I tend to accrue vacation time quicker than I use it. In fact, in the past month I've taken off three days (including today) which is a lot, if you ask me. I've taken off one day each week for the past three weeks to stay home and help take care of Felix. This is as much a benefit to me (getting to spend a whole day with Felix is great, especially when its not a weekend day) as it is for Andrea (having someone else around to occupy Felix, as well as another adult person to talk to during the day helps break the isolation, just a little).
Now, I work with people who I have a hard time imagining they have any vacation time left because A) I've been here longer and B) they seem to be on vacation all the time. Mostly doing half-week stints at least once a month and a spare Monday or Friday during at least one of the other weeks that month. And, for people (I'm saying "people" because I don't want to single a person out, even if not using any names...who knows who reads this thing anyway, right? Learned THAT lesson already!!!) who take so much time off...they also seem to be taking the most sick days too.
It does make me a little self-conscious, taking these days off, but at least I planned them well in advance and picked them strategically to try and have the least impact on my team. Some people barely give any notice and don't seem to take into account the fact that they may even be on-call when they are scheduling their "vacations" (last minute or not).
I'm all in favor of having a healthy work-life balance (its why I'm home today), but it is possible to be leaning too far in the life direction to really be fair to your work. Of course...who knows whats going on behind the scenes.
Anyway, I'm home today and I feel pretty good about it since I did more than my part to keep things running and even advance them along the way. The big project I'm working on, the one I have been working on since October (where I replaced that guy, who is now back...and I'm still doing most of his job on the project) keeps getting held up by technical issues. And each time, what do you know, who figured it out, wrote a little script, or debugged a piece of code, that got everything back up and running? Me. I am a troubleshooting mofo fo' sho'. (*snicker* Felix's monogram is FSHO, F'sho'!)
Right now is the "quiet" part of the morning when Andrea and Felix are still trying to squeeze in another hour of sleep. I put quiet in quotes because, on this day, the garbage trucks in the alley next to our house start at about 5am. Apparently the dumpsters for the apartment building across the alley are a target of opportunity for every single waste management company, as it sounds like no less than three different trucks have pulled in, picked up, and slammed around those f'ing dumpsters. What is this, garbage truck school?
And in other news, my Linux home initiative is still underway. The main computer was reloaded Linux, then returned to the previous Windows install (different drives) when I couldn't get Samba working the way I wanted it (rather, I didn't know how to set it up) which cut us off from our night time entertainment (big no-no) on nights when no netflix arrived. I have since switched back to Linux, have samba working, bit torrent working, and, through the glory of VNC, I am able to do almost everything without going down into the basement. So we are now Linux in the basement and using our laptops (OSX and WinXP) in the rest of the house. And it is relatively seemless. The other nice thing about VNC (better than Windows Remote Desktop, I think) is that it is fast and unobtrusive. If i have 10 minutes, I can pop onto the Linux box remotely, work on something, and then put it down as quick as necessary if Felix or Andrea call. Current Linux project I'm working through is getting Wine (a Windows "integration layer" to allow running Windows programs almost natively in Linux) to work so I can still take advantage of certain Windows programs that are particularly useful, like DVDShrink and DVD Decrypter. The main trouble lies in the fact that I'm running 64-bit Linux and not every software package is available in binary format (precompiled) for 64-bit systems. The nice thing is, with a little extra work (or if you tap the right resources, with someone else's little bit of work) you can usually compile these applications yourself or wait for someone else to do it for you, and voila! It usually works.
Now, if I could only find a way to make the dog much quieter as he tromps up and down the stairs....THAT would be a big win.
Now, I work with people who I have a hard time imagining they have any vacation time left because A) I've been here longer and B) they seem to be on vacation all the time. Mostly doing half-week stints at least once a month and a spare Monday or Friday during at least one of the other weeks that month. And, for people (I'm saying "people" because I don't want to single a person out, even if not using any names...who knows who reads this thing anyway, right? Learned THAT lesson already!!!) who take so much time off...they also seem to be taking the most sick days too.
It does make me a little self-conscious, taking these days off, but at least I planned them well in advance and picked them strategically to try and have the least impact on my team. Some people barely give any notice and don't seem to take into account the fact that they may even be on-call when they are scheduling their "vacations" (last minute or not).
I'm all in favor of having a healthy work-life balance (its why I'm home today), but it is possible to be leaning too far in the life direction to really be fair to your work. Of course...who knows whats going on behind the scenes.
Anyway, I'm home today and I feel pretty good about it since I did more than my part to keep things running and even advance them along the way. The big project I'm working on, the one I have been working on since October (where I replaced that guy, who is now back...and I'm still doing most of his job on the project) keeps getting held up by technical issues. And each time, what do you know, who figured it out, wrote a little script, or debugged a piece of code, that got everything back up and running? Me. I am a troubleshooting mofo fo' sho'. (*snicker* Felix's monogram is FSHO, F'sho'!)
Right now is the "quiet" part of the morning when Andrea and Felix are still trying to squeeze in another hour of sleep. I put quiet in quotes because, on this day, the garbage trucks in the alley next to our house start at about 5am. Apparently the dumpsters for the apartment building across the alley are a target of opportunity for every single waste management company, as it sounds like no less than three different trucks have pulled in, picked up, and slammed around those f'ing dumpsters. What is this, garbage truck school?
And in other news, my Linux home initiative is still underway. The main computer was reloaded Linux, then returned to the previous Windows install (different drives) when I couldn't get Samba working the way I wanted it (rather, I didn't know how to set it up) which cut us off from our night time entertainment (big no-no) on nights when no netflix arrived. I have since switched back to Linux, have samba working, bit torrent working, and, through the glory of VNC, I am able to do almost everything without going down into the basement. So we are now Linux in the basement and using our laptops (OSX and WinXP) in the rest of the house. And it is relatively seemless. The other nice thing about VNC (better than Windows Remote Desktop, I think) is that it is fast and unobtrusive. If i have 10 minutes, I can pop onto the Linux box remotely, work on something, and then put it down as quick as necessary if Felix or Andrea call. Current Linux project I'm working through is getting Wine (a Windows "integration layer" to allow running Windows programs almost natively in Linux) to work so I can still take advantage of certain Windows programs that are particularly useful, like DVDShrink and DVD Decrypter. The main trouble lies in the fact that I'm running 64-bit Linux and not every software package is available in binary format (precompiled) for 64-bit systems. The nice thing is, with a little extra work (or if you tap the right resources, with someone else's little bit of work) you can usually compile these applications yourself or wait for someone else to do it for you, and voila! It usually works.
Now, if I could only find a way to make the dog much quieter as he tromps up and down the stairs....THAT would be a big win.
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
when it rains it pours
So, over the past few days we have made some hard decisions and some unfortunate discoveries. It's been good news-bad news the whole time.
Turns out our heater isn't broken, its just that we're low on engine coolant! That's good.
We're low on coolant because there is a coolant leak. That's bad.
Auto service place says, "You're absolutely right, there is a bad leak in your radiator." That's sorta good.
"And by the way, we found a leak in your oil pan. AND we're going to charge you $45 to tell you you were right in the first place." That's bad.
"To fix your car, we will charge you $1000!" That's good for them. Bad for us.
I hope that my silent scowl while paying $45 is correctly interpreted as "F-you bastards for telling me nothing i didn't already know and having the balls to charge me for it." That's highly unsatisfying.
I get quotes for the same work from various radiator shops around town that are all much lower than this place. That's good!
None of the quotes are under my new $100 policy regarding this car. That's bad.
I can buy a reconditioned, warranteed radiator for about $75. That's good!
Supposedly this model and year of car is a bitch to do radiator work on, which is why all the estimates were so high in the first place. That's bad.
My father-in-law has volunteered his garage and tools and to help do the work ourselves. That's good.
It's still going to cost at least $75+ and probably an entire day of work to do it ourselves, and if we screw something up could put the car out of commission (always an option when I'm involved). That's bad.
The dog had diarrhea and shit in the middle of the living room in the middle of the night. That's bad.
I got to mop the entire downstairs of the house, a chore that was long overdue. That's good.
The dog did it again two nights later, this time pooping in the living room and in the dining room, both in the exact locations where we either put Felix down on his play mat or where we sit his bouncy seat. Seems like something more is going on. That's bad, bad, bad.
We do some soul searching and finally decide that the dog needs to go live in the country. That's bad and good.
Suzanne is going to lend us her crate so we can more easily contain and minimize clean up the dog when Andrea goes out. That's good.
If the dog can actually be crate trained, he might not need to go live elsewhere. That's really good. Good for everyone.
Dog still needs to be trained, which is time consuming and the whole reason why he hasn't been trained yet. That's bad.
Andrea and Felix will still be trapped at home during the day until we can use the crate...and even more so now that it is so cold and the car has no heat. That's BAD.
And of course it is getting very cold and we have a drafty old house, which means our heating bill has already started heading for the ceiling, which is just bad in general, but not our most impending bad news. I would consider that to be part of the general ambient seasonal badness.
I honestly think that Xmas is the magical wonderful time it is for children specifically because they never know what their parents are going through.
Turns out our heater isn't broken, its just that we're low on engine coolant! That's good.
We're low on coolant because there is a coolant leak. That's bad.
Auto service place says, "You're absolutely right, there is a bad leak in your radiator." That's sorta good.
"And by the way, we found a leak in your oil pan. AND we're going to charge you $45 to tell you you were right in the first place." That's bad.
"To fix your car, we will charge you $1000!" That's good for them. Bad for us.
I hope that my silent scowl while paying $45 is correctly interpreted as "F-you bastards for telling me nothing i didn't already know and having the balls to charge me for it." That's highly unsatisfying.
I get quotes for the same work from various radiator shops around town that are all much lower than this place. That's good!
None of the quotes are under my new $100 policy regarding this car. That's bad.
I can buy a reconditioned, warranteed radiator for about $75. That's good!
Supposedly this model and year of car is a bitch to do radiator work on, which is why all the estimates were so high in the first place. That's bad.
My father-in-law has volunteered his garage and tools and to help do the work ourselves. That's good.
It's still going to cost at least $75+ and probably an entire day of work to do it ourselves, and if we screw something up could put the car out of commission (always an option when I'm involved). That's bad.
The dog had diarrhea and shit in the middle of the living room in the middle of the night. That's bad.
I got to mop the entire downstairs of the house, a chore that was long overdue. That's good.
The dog did it again two nights later, this time pooping in the living room and in the dining room, both in the exact locations where we either put Felix down on his play mat or where we sit his bouncy seat. Seems like something more is going on. That's bad, bad, bad.
We do some soul searching and finally decide that the dog needs to go live in the country. That's bad and good.
Suzanne is going to lend us her crate so we can more easily contain and minimize clean up the dog when Andrea goes out. That's good.
If the dog can actually be crate trained, he might not need to go live elsewhere. That's really good. Good for everyone.
Dog still needs to be trained, which is time consuming and the whole reason why he hasn't been trained yet. That's bad.
Andrea and Felix will still be trapped at home during the day until we can use the crate...and even more so now that it is so cold and the car has no heat. That's BAD.
And of course it is getting very cold and we have a drafty old house, which means our heating bill has already started heading for the ceiling, which is just bad in general, but not our most impending bad news. I would consider that to be part of the general ambient seasonal badness.
I honestly think that Xmas is the magical wonderful time it is for children specifically because they never know what their parents are going through.
Friday, December 01, 2006
"working at home"
I'm doing a domestic shift today, staying home with Felix to give A a break. Started the day off right too...Ash kept waking us up last night so at 4:00am I took him out back so he could pee. Came back in and went to bed. An hour later he was back at it. I shushed him and went back to sleep. I eyes snapped open twenty minutes later to the smell of dog shit. Right in the center of the living room. Ash has his issues, but incontinence isn't really one of them unless he's left alone in an enclosed space (in which case he gets freaked out, pees (or poops if the space is large enough), then freaks out even more because he just peed or pooped and knows it was the wrong thing to do. Anyway...the point is, our routine is to go out between 6:30 and 7:30am for a skate/run/walk/bikeride around the park. On weekends we might not make it out until 9, maybe 10am. So, he's demonstrated the ability to hold his poo for quite a while in the morning. So on the one hand, I guess I should have paid more attention when he was insistent, but on the other hand, I thought he was just being a brat (over the past few months he's been getting worse with requesting attention, competing with Felix). Wrong again! Anyway, so I cleaned it up. Thus started my "day off" which isn't a day off, its just a day working at home, on home stuff. So, why not start the day with a dirty nasty job? Ugh. In a few minutes I'm going to be washing all of the floors, which I might as well have done had the dog not dumped in the living room since its been at least a month and a half since the last time I did...maybe even longer, so they really could use it anyway.
Felix fell asleep on my shoulder while I wrote this. I don't think that he has fallen asleep in my arms since he was a month old. I coul be wrong. Maybe every time seems like the first time?
So, warning, I'm about to do the proud parent thing:
Every day Felix amazes us. Parents out there are probably nodding their heads while non-parents are probably smirking and making little gagging pantomimes. That's ok, I used to do the same thing. Honestly, I'm still a little wierded out when other people are interested in even just hearing about my kid, and they get all "awww" and "yeah, that's so great". I'm like, "What? Yeah of course *I* think he's great and I'll tell you he's great...but why are you getting so jazzed up by it?" I think babyhood is something of a drug and people like to get a contact buzz or something. Whatever!
I have yet to punch a stranger for touching my child without permission, but just you wait...it just might happen this shopping season. And now, back to work.
Felix fell asleep on my shoulder while I wrote this. I don't think that he has fallen asleep in my arms since he was a month old. I coul be wrong. Maybe every time seems like the first time?
So, warning, I'm about to do the proud parent thing:
Every day Felix amazes us. Parents out there are probably nodding their heads while non-parents are probably smirking and making little gagging pantomimes. That's ok, I used to do the same thing. Honestly, I'm still a little wierded out when other people are interested in even just hearing about my kid, and they get all "awww" and "yeah, that's so great". I'm like, "What? Yeah of course *I* think he's great and I'll tell you he's great...but why are you getting so jazzed up by it?" I think babyhood is something of a drug and people like to get a contact buzz or something. Whatever!
I have yet to punch a stranger for touching my child without permission, but just you wait...it just might happen this shopping season. And now, back to work.
Friday, November 24, 2006
hobbies
OK...so since Felix came along I've sort of put most of my hobbies on the back burner because I want to do my fair share of child-rearing and currently that means trying to take care of him as much as possible when I'm available (a.k.a. not at work) and also give Andrea as much of a break from it as possible since she is the one who is, essentially, doing that job full-time and after hours on-call as well (he still wakes up at least once a night for feeding). So the hobbies I kept up with are mainly ones that can be done on the bus ride to and from work (scribbling story outlines in my notebook, watching TV shows on my laptop). Andrea has essentially put her career goals on hold to raise Felix so I think giving up my after-work entertainment and hobbies like aikido and taking apart/putting together computers (and associated computer tinkering) is not that huge of a sacrifice in comparison. And of course, both Andrea's full-time career and my part-time hobbies, are not gone for good, just on hold until Felix lets us resume them to whatever degrees we can.
That said...I think I'm finally going to make the switch from running Windows to Linux as my main home OS. Ubuntu has gotten to the point where I feel I can really, honestly, replace XP as the OS on the "main" computer. And part of the reason for this is particularly BECAUSE of my hobby reduction. What are the reasons for using Windows? Because you need it for A) most commercial software B) almost ALL commercial games. Honestly, I don't buy a lot of software. Almost none, really. I've "sampled" quite a bit of software and many games (in the past, not really so much at all in the recent past).
But what do I do with my home computer right now? I download TV shows. I burn DVDs. I browse the web. Maybe do some email. And every once in a while run a webcam to capture police raids in my neighborhood. Mostly my home computer just sits and downloads TV shows and then serves them up to us to watch on a laptop somewhere else in the house.
So here's the thing: I don't have time for games, especially not the super whizzbang new games that come out now. I'd love to, but don't, probably won't ever, have time (or even money) for doing video editing (other than the once-a-year fun project at work). My current hardware, which will not see any major upgrades in the forseeable future, is not cutting edge and probably won't support Vista anyway. So, as the next MS OS is coming out, I might as well move completely off of MS. ALSO, Andrea is a Mac user and I can't imagine that the communication between a Linux computer and her Unix-based OSX laptop could be any worse (and probably even better than) than that with a Windows machine. And to top it off, I have an AMD64 processor that is going to waste running standard XP (I never made the leap to Xp 64 because it sounded like a LOT more work and poor peripheral support). Why not run a 64-bit Ubuntu which is much better (and freely) supported?
So, maybe sometime in the next few weeks our mother's helper will provide enough slack for Andrea that can trickle down to me and allow me to reload my computer with Ubuntu... we shall see.
And by the way, boy is it ever dead at work on the day after Thanksgiving.
That said...I think I'm finally going to make the switch from running Windows to Linux as my main home OS. Ubuntu has gotten to the point where I feel I can really, honestly, replace XP as the OS on the "main" computer. And part of the reason for this is particularly BECAUSE of my hobby reduction. What are the reasons for using Windows? Because you need it for A) most commercial software B) almost ALL commercial games. Honestly, I don't buy a lot of software. Almost none, really. I've "sampled" quite a bit of software and many games (in the past, not really so much at all in the recent past).
But what do I do with my home computer right now? I download TV shows. I burn DVDs. I browse the web. Maybe do some email. And every once in a while run a webcam to capture police raids in my neighborhood. Mostly my home computer just sits and downloads TV shows and then serves them up to us to watch on a laptop somewhere else in the house.
So here's the thing: I don't have time for games, especially not the super whizzbang new games that come out now. I'd love to, but don't, probably won't ever, have time (or even money) for doing video editing (other than the once-a-year fun project at work). My current hardware, which will not see any major upgrades in the forseeable future, is not cutting edge and probably won't support Vista anyway. So, as the next MS OS is coming out, I might as well move completely off of MS. ALSO, Andrea is a Mac user and I can't imagine that the communication between a Linux computer and her Unix-based OSX laptop could be any worse (and probably even better than) than that with a Windows machine. And to top it off, I have an AMD64 processor that is going to waste running standard XP (I never made the leap to Xp 64 because it sounded like a LOT more work and poor peripheral support). Why not run a 64-bit Ubuntu which is much better (and freely) supported?
So, maybe sometime in the next few weeks our mother's helper will provide enough slack for Andrea that can trickle down to me and allow me to reload my computer with Ubuntu... we shall see.
And by the way, boy is it ever dead at work on the day after Thanksgiving.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
scare tactics
Andrea and I have been reading Richard Dawkins's latest book, "The God Delusion" and it has been fueling some very interesting discussions between us. Not debates, mind you, just discussion. Not to shock anyone (unless you've been asleep for oh, I dunno, several years) but we're both atheist. As the resident religious escapee in our equation (she didn't have a religious upbringing, I was raised Catholic...sort of) I am often asked for background or insider knowledge about what she is learning from Dawkins's book. And before you all go frantically running off to Amazon, let me warn you, if you are deeply religious this book will make you uncomfortable, and likely angry, due to Dawkins's unapologetic, openly hostile view towards religion, all religions. And also know that there are several reviews posted that make it sound like a bad book. Well, take those reviews with a grain of salt. If you Google phrases from the reviews, you may eventually find the ACTUAL authors of the reviews and not the stupid plagiarists who are clearly on a campaign to badmouth Dawkins. OK, that caveat aside, its a very good read if you are atheist or agnostic (may put the final nail in your religious coffin if you are agnostic) or an open minded, free-thinking, religious person. (snicker)
Anyway, the final chapters of the book deal with Dawkins's own proposal that religion in general does more harm than good, especially to children. You might be wondering what sort of wacko childhood this guy must have had to be so vehement opposed to religion and his likening religious education to child abuse. Well, it turns out that he doesn't have a religious upbringing. Which actually makes a lot of sense.
Ok, so what I'm getting at is that Andrea is discovering all of these things she never even knew about Catholicism (it is a frequent example in his later chapters, though throughout the book all religions are made fair game), some of which she finds quite scary. Last night she found out about the good old Catholic "emergency bathtub baptism" clause. She read the anecdote from the book about a young Jewish boy, Edgardo Mortara, in Italy in the 17th Century who was forcibly taken from his family by the papal police so he could be given a Catholic upbringing. Turns out his baby-sitter was a Catholic teenager who secretly baptised him when he was sick because she was afraid he might die and go to hell. Andrea asked me if I had heard of this practice (the ability of anyone to baptise anyone else if they thought the need was there, not 17th century Papal policies). My reply was, "Oh yeah. Everyone has heard about a friend of a friend being baptised by their aunt because they were sick and no priests were available, you know, just in case. I don't think the Catholic church preaches about babies going to hell anymore though...i think now they just hangout in limbo or something." She was mortified.
Anyway, the final chapters of the book deal with Dawkins's own proposal that religion in general does more harm than good, especially to children. You might be wondering what sort of wacko childhood this guy must have had to be so vehement opposed to religion and his likening religious education to child abuse. Well, it turns out that he doesn't have a religious upbringing. Which actually makes a lot of sense.
Ok, so what I'm getting at is that Andrea is discovering all of these things she never even knew about Catholicism (it is a frequent example in his later chapters, though throughout the book all religions are made fair game), some of which she finds quite scary. Last night she found out about the good old Catholic "emergency bathtub baptism" clause. She read the anecdote from the book about a young Jewish boy, Edgardo Mortara, in Italy in the 17th Century who was forcibly taken from his family by the papal police so he could be given a Catholic upbringing. Turns out his baby-sitter was a Catholic teenager who secretly baptised him when he was sick because she was afraid he might die and go to hell. Andrea asked me if I had heard of this practice (the ability of anyone to baptise anyone else if they thought the need was there, not 17th century Papal policies). My reply was, "Oh yeah. Everyone has heard about a friend of a friend being baptised by their aunt because they were sick and no priests were available, you know, just in case. I don't think the Catholic church preaches about babies going to hell anymore though...i think now they just hangout in limbo or something." She was mortified.
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
spousal support
Oh no! Blogging from work again!
Just kidding. I took the day off to take care of Felix. Last Friday we had a woman come and "mother's helper" for Andrea for a couple hours as an interview/trial. Sounds like she'll work out! I had already taken a day off for this week and next week to stay home and give A. a break. Felix is taking his second nap so I'm talking this chance to catch up my blog a little bit.
Work is great. As great as it can be I guess, meaning they are still paying me and my job doesn't suck. Work takes on a new flavor when you have a kid. On the one hand, going to work every day provides a lot of structure and regularity and a small respite from the times when Felix is having a bad day. Lately he's been congested so we have to suction out his nose. Not fun for him, not fun for us. Also, he seems to sleep less and less during the day, and he pushes bedtime back further and further. He usually sleeps through the night, or at least until about 4 or 5am. But when he gets tired, instead of falling asleep, he gets cranky. But over the past couple days he's gotten a lot better. I think, as the administration might put it, we've turned a corner, we'll stay the course!
Actually, Felix is a pretty happy baby. Its just that he gets to a certain time in the evening when he is done for the day but he doesn't want to admit it. That's when he gets grumpy.
I was playing with him on his butterfly mat/toybar the other night when he, out of nowhere, just rolls over from laying on his back. I was looking right at him. He just sort of went up on his side and then whump, rolled onto his tummy like it was nothing. "Uh....honey...Felix just rolled over onto his stomach." Andrea rushed into the living room from the kitchen, "He did?!?!?!" "Yep."
See, up to this point I've been missing the first times because they usually happen at work. "He just rolled over onto his back!!!!" "Oh yeah, he's been doing that for a couple days now," she says in an offhand manner. "WHAT??? Why didn't you tell me that?" "I did but you weren't listening..."
So I finally got my own Felix First. And I got another one today. He fell asleep while I was bottle feeding him. Bottle feeding has been something of a necessary evil around here and he usually only eats just enough to stave off complete hysteria. When he nurses with mom, of course, its the most relaxing thing in the world so he frequently falls asleep or continues to sleep-nurse. Well, no sleep eating from the bottle.
And he's awake...gotta go.
Just kidding. I took the day off to take care of Felix. Last Friday we had a woman come and "mother's helper" for Andrea for a couple hours as an interview/trial. Sounds like she'll work out! I had already taken a day off for this week and next week to stay home and give A. a break. Felix is taking his second nap so I'm talking this chance to catch up my blog a little bit.
Work is great. As great as it can be I guess, meaning they are still paying me and my job doesn't suck. Work takes on a new flavor when you have a kid. On the one hand, going to work every day provides a lot of structure and regularity and a small respite from the times when Felix is having a bad day. Lately he's been congested so we have to suction out his nose. Not fun for him, not fun for us. Also, he seems to sleep less and less during the day, and he pushes bedtime back further and further. He usually sleeps through the night, or at least until about 4 or 5am. But when he gets tired, instead of falling asleep, he gets cranky. But over the past couple days he's gotten a lot better. I think, as the administration might put it, we've turned a corner, we'll stay the course!
Actually, Felix is a pretty happy baby. Its just that he gets to a certain time in the evening when he is done for the day but he doesn't want to admit it. That's when he gets grumpy.
I was playing with him on his butterfly mat/toybar the other night when he, out of nowhere, just rolls over from laying on his back. I was looking right at him. He just sort of went up on his side and then whump, rolled onto his tummy like it was nothing. "Uh....honey...Felix just rolled over onto his stomach." Andrea rushed into the living room from the kitchen, "He did?!?!?!" "Yep."
See, up to this point I've been missing the first times because they usually happen at work. "He just rolled over onto his back!!!!" "Oh yeah, he's been doing that for a couple days now," she says in an offhand manner. "WHAT??? Why didn't you tell me that?" "I did but you weren't listening..."
So I finally got my own Felix First. And I got another one today. He fell asleep while I was bottle feeding him. Bottle feeding has been something of a necessary evil around here and he usually only eats just enough to stave off complete hysteria. When he nurses with mom, of course, its the most relaxing thing in the world so he frequently falls asleep or continues to sleep-nurse. Well, no sleep eating from the bottle.
And he's awake...gotta go.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
chips are down
So it was an eventful election day. Most of minnesota went respectably blue, though we still have a red governor and the crazy jesus candidate in the sixth district won as well, so there's another bible-thumping, gay-hating, science disbelieving, Dubya disciple walking into the halls of Congress in January (or whenever the turnover date it). But, i am proud to inform you, I voted for and helped elect the first muslim Congressman of the USA, ever. Good job me.
Of course, these US Senate races will be undetermined for probably...oh I dunno, until Bush is out of office. Yeah, Virginia and Montana, I'm talking to you. Ohio is so happy that they got to shirk the mantle of being at fault for our current administration. Are you sure you guys want to know what that feels like by not doing right? As if there were ever a time NOT to be depending on Virginia and Montana to go all sensible on us...
Ah well. At least the future is a little brighter.
Of course, these US Senate races will be undetermined for probably...oh I dunno, until Bush is out of office. Yeah, Virginia and Montana, I'm talking to you. Ohio is so happy that they got to shirk the mantle of being at fault for our current administration. Are you sure you guys want to know what that feels like by not doing right? As if there were ever a time NOT to be depending on Virginia and Montana to go all sensible on us...
Ah well. At least the future is a little brighter.
Monday, November 06, 2006
weekend warrior
So the weekend is over and I'm back at work, drinking my coffee and getting the feel of my professional surroundings once again. The weekend was blissfully uneventful insofar as I did not go anywhere or "do" anything. I was basically the babydaddy all weekend which is nice and tiring at the same time. On the weekends I get a slight taste of what Andrea does all day every day and so learn to appreciate even more that she is able to stay home with Felix.
Not that nothing happened, it was actually a weekend rife with activity and circumstance.
A) Dad came up on Thursday night to help me do some emergency plumbing (no, not radiateors again, NEVER AGAIN) on the kitchen sink which had essentially completely fallen apart both top and bottom in the course of a day. Technically not the weekend, but it was close enough.
B) Mom and dad stopped by to drop off some clothes for Felix (a big bag from Dave and Anne, THANKYOU!) since he's outgrown just about everything. I think he's going to be not just a big kid, but possibly a tall kid. We think Andrea might have some tall genes we don't know about.
C) Sunday night when Andrea's dad stopped by to visit us (Felix) for dinner he brought apple pie. Unfortunately Felix was so congested and it was "that time of day" so he was pretty crabby and not very excited to see anyone, so grampa only got to hold and bounce and dote in Felix for about half of the time he was there. And his drivers side window got smashed in while his car was parked on our street. While helping him sweep up the window glass, we found what appeared to be a broken glass bottle in his car, so it would seem someone threw a glass bottle from a moving car or otherwise hurled it through his window. I don't think this should really reflect on our neighborhood badly since it was probably someone who does not live here who did this. That's the problem with living in a decent neighborhood surrounded by bad neighborhoods. The people going from one to another bad area tend to fuck it up for everyone. Its like, just because you're an asshole who doesn't have anything and you hate your life doesn't mean you have to make everyone else hate you too, by tagging on houses or smashing windows or doing other property damage. Asshole.
so, hey, just in case this is a popular past time for the local assholes (we got our window smashed a while ago too) make sure you have comprehensive with no glass deductible if you plan on parking on our street after dark. Just a suggestion. Or I can point you to a good glass place that had good turn around. And a drivers side window costs about $220 if you pay out of pocket. They charge your insurance like twice that if you have insurance (which we didn't at the time, we do now!).
Ok, now I'm back to work. It has also been the most uneventful on-call week for me (knock on wood). Only 1 more day to go.
Not that nothing happened, it was actually a weekend rife with activity and circumstance.
A) Dad came up on Thursday night to help me do some emergency plumbing (no, not radiateors again, NEVER AGAIN) on the kitchen sink which had essentially completely fallen apart both top and bottom in the course of a day. Technically not the weekend, but it was close enough.
B) Mom and dad stopped by to drop off some clothes for Felix (a big bag from Dave and Anne, THANKYOU!) since he's outgrown just about everything. I think he's going to be not just a big kid, but possibly a tall kid. We think Andrea might have some tall genes we don't know about.
C) Sunday night when Andrea's dad stopped by to visit us (Felix) for dinner he brought apple pie. Unfortunately Felix was so congested and it was "that time of day" so he was pretty crabby and not very excited to see anyone, so grampa only got to hold and bounce and dote in Felix for about half of the time he was there. And his drivers side window got smashed in while his car was parked on our street. While helping him sweep up the window glass, we found what appeared to be a broken glass bottle in his car, so it would seem someone threw a glass bottle from a moving car or otherwise hurled it through his window. I don't think this should really reflect on our neighborhood badly since it was probably someone who does not live here who did this. That's the problem with living in a decent neighborhood surrounded by bad neighborhoods. The people going from one to another bad area tend to fuck it up for everyone. Its like, just because you're an asshole who doesn't have anything and you hate your life doesn't mean you have to make everyone else hate you too, by tagging on houses or smashing windows or doing other property damage. Asshole.
so, hey, just in case this is a popular past time for the local assholes (we got our window smashed a while ago too) make sure you have comprehensive with no glass deductible if you plan on parking on our street after dark. Just a suggestion. Or I can point you to a good glass place that had good turn around. And a drivers side window costs about $220 if you pay out of pocket. They charge your insurance like twice that if you have insurance (which we didn't at the time, we do now!).
Ok, now I'm back to work. It has also been the most uneventful on-call week for me (knock on wood). Only 1 more day to go.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)