Something You Probably Didn't Know About Amy

My lovely wife is ambiwoobieous *. That is, she can use the woobie (that's the TV remote, for those of you not in the know) with either hand.

I'm so proud.

If you or anyone you know uses ambiwoobieous, you owe me a nickel :P

From the Mouth of a Child

When she was much smaller, Poet really loved her board books, particularly the "peek-a-boo" type. Problem was, she was very hard on them, and would tear off the flaps. Amy solved the problem the same way that any good red-blooded American would: she used duct tape. When Happy got old enough for the "peek-a-boo" board books, he was similarly hard on the flaps. One evening, probably seven or eight months ago, Amy was fixing a book when Poet wandered in. The exchange went something like this:

"Whatcha doing, Mommy?"
"Fixing Happy's book"
"Ooooh...." <long pause> "What's that?" <pointing to the roll of tape>
"Tape"
"Ooooh...."

Little did we know how much of an impact that conversation would have on her.

Back in March, we went to one of our favorite local parks. It's got a pair of baby swings, which the kids love, a pair of big swings, to which Poet is transitioning, and a twin slide, down which the kids race. When we got to the big swings, we saw that someone had wrapped the chains all around the crossbar and the seats were all cattywampus, so we couldn't use them that day.

"What happened?" Poet wanted to know.
"They're broke, Poet."
"Ooooh, broke. Fix it?"
"Well, I can't but someone will soon."
"Ooooh. With tape?"
<boggle/> "Sure, Poet, with tape."
"OK!"

A week or so passed by before we returned to the park again, and the swings had been fixed, a fact which hadn't escaped Poet's notice.

"THEY FIXED IT!"
"Why yes, Poet, they did!"
"WITH TAPE!"
"Yes, Poet, with tape."

Now every time we go to the park, Poet points out to us that they fixed the swings. With tape.

She's so adorable... :)

How Much Does My Wife Rock?

She got me tickets for opening day for my favorite baseball team. That's how much she rocks!

Thanks, Sweetie :)

with sauce?

I know this blog is turning into a story of the kids, but sometimes they are just too cute not share.

The big Christmas gift this year was a toy kitchen. One of the favorite games is having the kids make us some "food" to eat. They enjoy running from their kitchen (in the kitchen) to the living room where we usually sitting.

No matter what we ask for the immediate response from Poet is - with sauce? Heaven forbid if you say no!

Tonight we had:
ravioli, with sauce,
apple pie, with sauce,
soup, with sauce,
bread, with sauce.

It is fun trying to come up with items to add sauce too. Any suggestions?

Taking after Daddy

Poet and Happy, being toddlers, often get distracted by whatever shiny thing happens to cross their field of vision. When this happens, it's really hard to get them to focus on whatever it is that I want them to do. I'll raise my voice to try to get their attention, and sometimes I even have to grab them and physically turn them and/or pull them toward me, and even sometimes that doesn't work. Those of you who have parented toddlers know what I mean, I'm sure.

Tonight at the end of bath time, Amy was trying to prompt Happy that it was time to get it out, but he ignored her, contentedly playing with whatever bath toy had attracted his attention. She tried several times to get his attention, to no avail. Then, completely unprompted, Poet grabs his chin and shouted, "Look at me! LOOK! AT! ME!" Yeah. That'd be something I do and say on a regular basis. Everyone (including Amy and me) collapsed in giggles, but Happy continued playing, so at least I know he wasn't playing favorites...

The Obsession

Need a gift for a 1 or 2 year old?
This book gets a lot of love in our house.











(The only con- it is a paper book - not a board book)

Quote of the day

Over an hour into "nap" time today and the laughing and yelling and sometimes crying is still going on. We finally admit defeat- no nap today. We go into the kids room and ask- Why aren't you napping? Poet responds- " I don't know how".

Tech Company Without the Geeks

Working for a tech company, one should reasonably expect to be surrounded by some small amount of geekdom. Today at work, a few of us were talking about a particularly troublesome project, and I said, "Look, it's not like it's Kobayashi Maru or anything." My co-workers looked at me like I'd grown a second navel in my right cheek. Neither of them had any idea what I was talking about. A couple of hours later, the boss came in and I asked him, "If I said the phrase 'Kobayashi Maru' to you, you'd know what I'm talking about, right?" Nope.

Sigh...

My Personal Insomnia Cure

Meet Bear. He lives in a big, blue house with his friends. Bear is Poet's current fave in the realm of DVD watching. Every night after dinner, she marches into the living room, points at the TV, cocks her head like a sad little puppy, and says "Bear?" Only you know it isn't a question, no sirree, it's a demand. Well, more like a threat: Play Bear for me, or you won't know a moment's peace for the rest of the night. But I digress. This post isn't about Poet, it's about Bear, and his effect on me.

Our routine, once Bear has been demanded, is for me to sit in my seat and start the DVD, then Poet jumps up in my lap while Happy dances in front of the TV. I recline the chair, I hit the play button on the remote... and I'm out. I have no idea why, but for whatever reason, I conk within two minutes of the video starting. No, it's not the chair, or the position, because I sit in the chair often, and even frequently recline. It's Bear. He's magic, I tell you. I've slept through an entire three episode event before, even with Poet getting bored and jumping down, and the kids playing noisily nearby. It's kinda weird, but it's almost worth me buying a TV/DVD combo for the bedroom and putting the darned thing on continual play overnight. Almost, but I don't think Amy would approve...

Thankful

There are moments in our days that sneak in our hearts for us to hold tight. Tonight was one of those moments. I never thought I would hear singing in our houses. We did not know what the cleft or the repair would do to Poet' speech let alone her ability to sing. Well she has been on a singing kick for the last few days- Jingle Bells and Frosty the Snowman (or Mailman), " Here come the Geese" Ring Around the Rosie, and " What's in the Mail today?" just to name a few.

I love that she sings with passion and dancing, I love that she sings duets with Daddy, I love that she sings to make her brother happy, I love that she sings.

You Know You're Getting Old...

Being a man of a certain age, my annual physicals now include a very... uncomfortable... routine: prostate exam. My first one was yesterday. Yay. I'll not repeat the details here, as this is a family-oriented blog, but I'm certain that a quick perusal of your search engine would give you that information, in the unlikely event that you've been living under a rock. Now, I'm not saying that the experience was even remotely enjoyable. Not at all. However, I will say that it wasn't nearly as bad as I'd thought it would be. In fact, it's not even the worst medical experience I've had in the last five years. That'd have to go to the tube incident from a few years ago. As opposed to the tube, this procedure was over and done in a matter of seconds. So, here's the PSA for all you men of a certain age out there: just suck it up and get it done. A few seconds of discomfort is a small price to pay for early detection of a potential problem.

Thank you, and God bless America.

The End of an Era

Today, I've lost a friend. I met this friend way back in 1997 when I moved into a house with long-time friend, Cooper, and now-friend, Xabu. I think he was there right when we moved in, because neither Cooper nor Xabu takes credit for bringing him in. He was there with us, mostly hanging out in the kitchen, all the way until I bought my house in NE OH, and followed me to my new place. So devoted a friend, he even came with me to Central OH when I moved here six years ago. He has seen me find the love of my life, get married, and become the father of two beautiful young kids. But today, my friend ran out on me, and I have to say, I'm somewhat sad. It'll be very, very hard to replace you...

Anyone know where I can find a restaurant supply store in the Central OH area? I need another gigantic roll of plastic wrap...

I Apologize In Advance...

... to anyone who clicks on this link.

Stats

Before I forget or lose the little scraps of paper is a better name for this post.

We had two birthday's in the last few weeks- that means the all important trip to the pediatrician for a check up.

Poet turned two at the end of November.
She weighs in at 26 lbs. 4 oz. and is 35.5 inches tall. If the old wives tale is true I see a basketball scholarship in her future! Wow 5'11"

Happy turned one last week (wow that was a fast year!)
He weighs a respectable 22lbs. 6 oz 5oth percentile
He is 30.25 inches tall 65th percentile
His head circumference is 18.5 inches - 75th percentile.

Everyone is doing fine the doctor is happy with how they are developing.

Job (hopefully well) Done

For those of you whose eyes gloss over when the talking turns to a technical, here's an executive summary for non-nerds:

Today was my last day at my now-former company. This was a tough two weeks, and I unfortunately got done very little of what I set out to do.

Non-nerds can stop here, if you wish, as the rest of this post will describe the last two weeks of my employment. You have been warned...

I gave notice of leaving the company on Friday, Nov 6. I had planned to spend the next two weeks cleaning up (and in many cases writing) varying documentation for which I'm responsible, so that those who have to pick up where I left off could make a smooth transistion. As my main job involved testing our application, I figured on fleshing out as much of the testing plan that is rattling around in my head as possible. That plan lasted until Monday when I got to work and found that I had no internet connection. You see, one of the other hats that I have been wearing is IT Brigade member, so I set to work figuring out what went wrong. It didn't take long. Our domain controller, which for varying and sundry reasons did not have a backup, had died over the weekend. Domain logins, DNS, DHCP, all gone. And since the domain controller had died a rather permanent death, recovery wasn't going to be easy, especially since none of us IT Brigade folks actually have any idea how any of those things mentioned above really work.

First thing was first, try to restore some semblance of connectivity, at least within the office. We had no spare hardware anywhere, other than a 32-bit Ubuntu box which was designated to be a new firewall. We really would have liked to have installed a Windows server, since that had been what we'd used before, but we only had available licenses for a 64-bit server, so for the time being, we did the best with what we had. My coworker and I managed, through a lot of trial and error, to get DHCP and DNS mostly working by the end of the day, but we still had no way of getting people logged into our network. We spent part of Tuesday trying to figure out how to turn our new DHCP/DNS server into a domain controller, but ended up going out and purchasing a new 64-bit box anyway (what a bargain, managed to get a low-end system for under $300). Got the domain controller set up by the end of Tuesday using our 64-bit server license, then spent Wednesday through Friday moving DNS/DHCP over to the Windows server and trying to configure the Ubuntu box to be our firewall and VPN server. By Monday, we had most everything mostly working. Then came Tuesday.

Just before lunch on Tuesday, people started complaining that they were losing their internet connections again. We spent the rest of the day Tuesday poking and prodding everything with absolutely no success, and were finally successful in getting permission to bring in outside help. Wednesday was spent with the consultant we brought in, and by the end of the day, we'd gotten our network talking to itself again, and everyone once again connected to the outside world. Thursday and today were spent tweaking things so that the VPN worked, and the servers which need to be externally accessible still were.

So, all those tests and other documentation that needed to be written? Not so much. I was able to do a little verbal and demo-style knowledge transfer, so not everything is lost. But the coworker that is taking over for me is smart. Way smart. Smarter than I've ever been, even when I was smart. I think he'll do OK. And he has my number, just in case.

Here's hoping that the new job has no networking responsibilities for me...

Sassed!

Somewhere along the line, Poet is picking up quite an attitude. Consider this conversation last night:

BMT: Poet, time to sit in your seat and eat your dinner...
Poet: What-EVER!!!

She sounded just like a teenager...

Now, I know I didn't teach her that. I might have to have a chat with her daycare teachers...

Reason #3429 why we love our kids

Amy and I live in a fairly small house, so to conserve space, Poet and Happy share a bedroom. This has its ups and downs, but has so far worked out pretty well. Particularly well for the kids at nap time.

Often when we put the kids down for a nap or for the night, they'll jabber at each other for a while before drifting off. This afternoon, the amount of jabbering was off the charts. There was the usual babbling, there was Poet shouting "NO!" followed by giggles, there was some loud banging, but very little sleeping going on. When we finally went to get them two hours after we put them down, we weren't sure what we'd find, but were completely surprised by what we saw.

• Both kids had both removed their pants and a sock, which were on the floor next to the loveys they'd tossed.
• Poet had also removed her diaper and peed all over her bed.
• Both kids were dancing in their cribs, laughing and jabbering.

When asked if they'd had fun, Poet looked at us, smiled and said "yep!"

Normally we try not to laugh when the kids do something that they really shouldn't but ends up being really funny, but we completely failed. Maybe next weekend, we'll set up a video camera to record the action :)

Per Pap's Request

As requested by Pap...

Moving along...

After over three and a half years with my current place of employment, I'll be moving on starting December 1. The metaphorical "pastures" aren't necessarily any greener (every job has its good and bad), just different. The new position will be with another startup, which will make three out of the five jobs I've held. I'll be working with a few ex-AOLers, which will be pretty exciting. The position I'm moving on to is a contract position rather than full-time salaried, which has its benefits and drawbacks. Oh, and one big plus is that this will be a "work from home, all the time" position. W00t!

So, in summary, I wish my soon-to-be-former company the best. I still believe in the people and the product. And I eagerly look forward to settling in with the new company. Hopefully it'll be a long and profitable partnership for all involved.

This post is brought to you by the number 4

The Count says four!

4 walkers in the house (ah ah ah)!

Way to go little man!