Resolutions

I'm going to make some resolutions. After all, why wait for New Years to make resolutions that you are just going to break anyway? I don't intend to break them, but life usually gets in between me and my best intentions. So here goes:

1) Maintain a postive outlook. I've been obsessing on the negative stuff recently - I don't get enough sleep, I don't get enough exercise, blah, blah, whine. Instead I'm going to spend more time looking at what's going right - beautiful wife, handsome and healthy baby, no money troubles, my health.

2) Exercise more. This will be easier coming up since Oliver will be old enough that I can take him out in the jogging stroller. But I still need to make time for exercise. I might even be able to slip it in while vegging out in front of the TV.

3) Establish a consistent bed time routine. This is necessary for all concerned. We can start getting Oliver down earlier and make time to do things around the house without having to worry him waking up. It will also help me refrain from grouchiness when 4:45 rolls around.

4) Be a better parent. I need to make sure that the stuff that Oliver needs is getting done from washing his diapers to giving him baths, from reading bed time stories to playing with him. I think I've been good about some of the chore-type activities, but I need to be better. I also need to adopt the attitude that parenting activities are not something that I delegate to my wife. This also means that I need to get informed about some of our parenting choices and read up on choices that are to come.

5) Make time for family activities and do something with it. It almost seems like family time is what happens when I'm not doing something else. But while I enjoy it, it is generally not something that I look forward to per se. Instead I should put a little more effort into making family time a fun time.

My opinion on cars....

With any luck this will be less controversial than my opinion on babies. However, I somehow doubt that.

In my opinion, too many people drive the wrong cars for the wrong reasons. You can start with the obvious examples and work your way down. A Hummer in the jungle is a tool, but a Hummer on the freeway is being driven by a tool. A Suburban being driven around by a single person or with a single child has many more passengers than it should. SUVs that would break down if they were taken off-roading are an abomination on the face on the planet. I don't mean to say that there aren't reasons to have a large vehicle. People have large families. People have jobs that require them to haul stuff about. Country roads might otherwise be impassable in bad weather without a large vehicle. I can't tell you how many times I've begged, borrowed, or stolen time in a friend's large vehicle when I needed to get things from Home Despot. All of these are legitimate uses for a large vehicle. And if you are going to be doing any of these things it makes sense to own one and use it. But for those who never intend to use a large vehicle for legitimate large vehicle reasons, commuting and hauling your single child about urbanized roads are making poor use of these vehicles and the gas that drives them. And that is the most frequent use of them without question.

Sports cars - well I'll just quote from Crazy People "Porsche. It's a little too small to get laid IN it, but you get laid the minute you get out of it!"

Motorcycles are actually an incredibly fuel-efficient way to get a single person and little luggage from one place to another. And they are fun to ride. Are they dangerous? Yes, both because of other drivers and also because of the people who drive them. I was just in California and watched a pair of motorcycle riders zip through gridlock by riding between the lanes of traffic. Which might be fine until someone sees a way to move up a half an inch and changes lanes unexpectedly. Motorcycles also have their SUV (think American Chopper) and sports car (crotch rockets anyone?) equivalents. But I think a responsible rider on a sane motorcycle is a good thing. Will I ever be that sane rider? Doubtful, I see the appeal.

To put things into perspective I've bought two cars in my life. The first was a Saturn SL2 which got 33 MPG. The second is my Prius which gets 47 MPG. Both are comfortable and reliable. Barring a familial explosion my car will get me and mine where we need to go safely and efficiently. I'm not an incredibly green person. But in a world where the global supply of oil may run out within our lifetime and definitely within our children's lifetimes, doesn't it make sense to do what we can to start conserving it now?

In the mean time I get to watch my car pay off itself faster as gas prices continue to rise.

Good day - bad dieting day

Yesterday was a pretty good day. I started the day by running in the University City Memorial DAy runs. I ran both the 10K (sub 50:00) and the 5K (I finished...). I went to play D&D with my group during the mid-morning and into the early afternoon. I hung out with a pair of friends that I don't get to see much. And then I went to a BBQ with more friends and got to see the fun that happens when you put a pile of babies together in one room. We got to bed on time and even remembered to give Oliver his medicine. A good day.

But it was a terrible dieting day. I had two bagels, two bananas, root beer, and an orange slice at the race. Brunch over D&D consisted of hash browns, smoothies, and a slice of blueberry coffee cake. And I finished the day off by eating a hamburger with bun, chips, cookies, and an ice cream bar at the BBQ.

Ah, will power, why have you forsaken me?

Favorites List

Book (ever) - Watership Down
Book (last year) - The Corporation
Color - Black
Drink - Guinness Stout
Food - Anything curry
Job - Computer lab consultant
Magic card - Gaea's Cradle
Movie (ever) - Schindler's List
Movie (last year) - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Quote - "I'll have what she's having."
Running route - Forest Park
Song (ever) - Bizarre Love Triangle by New Order
Song (last year) - Numb by Linkin Park
TV show (ever) - Quantum Leap
TV show (last year) - Amazing Race
Vacation Spot - Napa Valley

Not sleeping

The last couple of days have been bad days for sleep. Friday started at 4:45 and ran until 10:00 when I took a nap before going to the prerelease. The prerelease started at midnight and ran until 8:30a. Saturday I crashed from 10-2 and then had trouble getting to sleep Saturday night. Sunday morning brought a somewhat early wake up call from Oliver. Sunday we invited some friends over for dinner and didn't get finished until near 10:00. Monday started at 4:00am because when you're up anyway you might as well get going. I didn't get to sleep last night until near midnight. I "slept in" until 6:00 after a 3:00am wake up call from Oliver. Part of this is clearly my fault, but that doesn't make it any easier to remain upright.

Diet Day 1

Initial weigh-in 201 lbs.

I was generally good all day, but dinner at gaming last night was pizza. Chalk up two slices of badness.

I went for a run when I got home. It was much hotter than I gave it credit for being.

Prerelease

Last night I went to the midnight flight of Saviors of Kamigawa prerelease at the Fantasy Shop in St. Charles. I ended up going 2-2-1 drop and left to go home to my wife and child at 8:30am with no prizes but having had a lot of fun. I did get to run into Persephone who organizes a MtG group at Wash U. It might just have the time that I went, but I didn't see any of the familiar faces from previous prereleases. Usually when I go I run into the guys from Kansas City who prefer our prerelease to the one in their backyard, Brad who we used to play Magic with back when I worked at Amdocs, and some other folks who I'm good friends with for three weekends a year.

Just wondering - are those people drifting away from the game too?

Teething

For the past couple of weeks, Oliver has been fussier than usual and has been sucking on his hand constantly. I asked my wife if he could be teething and was told that it couldn't be that because babies don't get their teeth until much later. Well, it turns out that I was right. Oliver is getting two tiny choppers on his lower jaw.

Things are slightly different for me with him having teeth now. When I stcik my finger in his mouth, I need to flip it around from the way that I used to because teeth hurt when used on the front or side of the finger but feel fine-ish on the fleshy part of the finger. I'm sure things are much different for my wife since she's still nursing.

I'm not terribly surprised that he got his teeth in early considering that he's the size of several much older babies that we've seen, but it is still a pleasant surprise. At least when he's not fussy.

Back from vacation

I just got back from a vacation in northern California. One of my wife's college friends was getting married, and it seemed like a good time to take a vacation. Things at work have calmed down somewhat for both of us. The weather would be beautiful. We had both money and time. And it was really just time for a break.

So last week, we got on a plane for San Jose (and yes, we know the way). San Jose is in the right vicinity and is a good deal cheaper than SFO or OAK. It wasn't until we went to leave San Jose that we figured out why it was so cheap. The line for security in the morning would have put Space Mountain to shame. It took us a half-hour to get through the line and we ended up missing our plane home.

We had good luck with most of the places we stayed. We stayed at the Executive Inn in San Jose three of the six nights away. It was clean and had double beds. So my wife and Oliver took one bed and I took the other. The nights passed largely uneventfully, but it wasn't any place that I'd make a habit of staying despite the fact we did.

The hotel in Petaluma was beautiful with a nice soft king-size bed. I was originally not enthused about the king-sized bed because I thought that I might roll over on to Oliver, but the extra space and my general paranoia helped avoid that. All of us slept in and slept comfortably. The hotel was also located next to a park so I got to go for a nice run while we were there.

The motel in Napa was about as nice as the Executive Inn. We got a king size bed that was rather firm. I like firm mattresses, but this was one step up from floor. Again, I didn't crush my son. The motel staff could have been more helpful, but they weren't rude or anything so they get full marks.

Each day we all slept in. We took turns napping until it was time to get food. My wife generally drew the earlier shift and then it was my turn. It's amazing how much easier to care for a baby when you don't have to get up at any specific time or accomplish anything.

Oliver is a good traveller in general. On most of our flights he was either asleep, nursing, or playing with us. The few times he cried were generally due to needing a diaper change. During the car rides he spent most of his time sleeping. But during the non-sleeping times he was fussy because he was teething.

One day on our way back from San Francisco, we decided to take CA Rt 1. It was beautiful and Oliver was well behaved for the most part. However at one point where he was fussy and my attention was partly on what was going on in the back seat, a deer trotted onto the road. I spotted the deer and slammed on the brakes, but too late to avoid hitting the deer. No one in the car was hurt and the rental car wasn't damaged, but the impact appeared to have hurt the deer relatively badly in the hindquarters. When I went to see how it was doing it struggled to get up and away from me. I called 911 and relayed my story. They had trouble pinpointing my location, but said that they'd send animal control. I drew an arrow towards where the deer was with my foot, but since there wasn't anything that I could do we ended up taking off. And of course, Oliver screamed most of the way back home.

We visited the San Francisco Museum of Natural History, but of course that was precisely when Oliver decided to take a nap. So my wife and I got to look at some cool looking fish and other aquatic animals. And just as we were going to leave, Oliver woke up. So he did get to see some of it. Since they were doing construction on the museum at the time we were there, they gave us free passes for the next time we were there. We ended up adding the free passes to our wedding present to my wife's friend.

My wife and I are budding oenophiles, so a trip out to the West Coast generally means a trip to Napa and Sonoma counties. We visited a number of places that we had been before. Some we liked and some didn't measure up to where they were at before when our tastes were somewhat less refined. Peju scored high on both taste and fun while Simi was far behind expectations.

Wine tasting with Oliver was a different experience. First, my wife couldn't really drink much as she is still nursing Oliver so it was really more of a tasting for her. Second, we were carrying Oliver around in the Baby Bjorn which meant that his head and hands were near the glass carrying the wine to our mouths. We quickly determined that I was the best one to be carrying him since I'm just that extra bit taller to adequately clear his head. And third, people get a kick out of babies especially when they are well-behaved. Not exactly a major finding, but it was nice to see that people weren't grouchy that we had brought a baby in with us.

It was probably the last time we'll be able to do that for a while, but it was a good trip for us, travel troubles and dying deer aside.

My opinion on babies...

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Every parent is an expert on raising his or her own child. Every child is above average.

That said... I'm entitled to my opinions -

There are reasons to not breast feed your child. You may be taking drugs or medications that you don't want to pass on to your child. You may be dead or in a coma. And that about covers it. Breast feeding is healthier for your child than bottle feeding. It provides immunities and nutrients that can not be replicated. It helps heal the mother from labor. It provides comfort to a child. It is always the right temperature and carries easily. Breast pumps are not very expensive and can be used to supply an artificial demand to keep supply high for the working mother. With a little effort you can store enough milk to keep your baby fed while you are at work. It may not be for everyone, but in my opinion it should be.

There are tons of old wives' tales that give indicators on what sex your baby is. Are you carrying high? Are you hairier than usual? On and on they go. But modern medicine has much more reliable determinations of sex in the ultrasound and to a lesser extent amniocentesis. But just because you Can do something doesn't mean that you Should do something. Let your baby have its privacy. There is no need to start gendering your child before they've even left the womb.

Pacifiers can be a great tool. Some babies need something to suck on to soothe them to sleep. Some babies are very collicky and having a pacifier keeps them from eating on a full stomach. But pacifiers are way over used by the majority of parents to the point of becoming a parenting crutch. If the baby's awake, stick the plug in before they start making noise. If I see one more five-year-old tooling around with a plug in its mouth, I'll scream.

Interview with err... Houdini's Hips

1. You wanted to and you didn't. Do you now wish you had?

I wish I had gotten up to go race last weekend. But the trip up was so long and the sleep was so brief. I'm probably better off for having slept longer though.

2. What do you want for dinner next Wednesday?

Well, next Wednesday I'll be flying to California so I think a decent hamburger would be a goal. Or the mythical "good airplane food." I'm not picky - just as long as it doesn't make me sick to my stomach.

3. Which fictional character would you be, if you could be any fictional character?

Professor X from the X-Men. Telepathy is cool.

4. What's your least favorite part of being a parent?

The loss of free time is my least favorite time about being a parent. I have a lot of hobbies. I try and exercise regularly. I like to read. I even find myself wanting to get work done around the house. But between parenting and all of the family obligations that pop up after having a child, I haven't gotten to do any of that at the level that I might have wanted to in a long time. I'm adapting to it, but still not my favorite thing.

5. When we were in college, what inspired your interest in mentoring young people with developmental disabilities?

What drew me to Natural Ties was that it was less focussed on a service that one person would provide to another person and more focussed on the idea that you could be friends with people with developmental disabilities. Natural Ties had sprung from a friendship between Pat Hughes (who was a member of my church) and his friend Jay. They had just started hanging out when Pat was a member of a fraternity at KU. Later he had turned it into a sort of grass roots organization that worked to pair up college age folks in a similar fashion. I had heard about the organization from my mother and contacted Pat. He talked to me about it and it sounded good. Then we made presentations on campus to people who were interested. But the organization never really took off. The piece that I missed was that I could be friends with a person with developmental disabilities. At the time I was so busy with everything else that I didn't have the time or follow through to make the time to connect with the person that I would have become friends with.

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Confessions of a former sensitive ponytail guy

One of our family stories was "Me and the Goats." One time my mother brought my older brother and I to the petting zoo. My brother as he was wont to do escaped my mother's grasp and ran off. She told me to stay put and chased after him. Minutes later with child in tow, she came back to where I should have been and couldn't see anything but a big flock of goats. Then from the center of the flock she heard a little kid's (ha!) voice, "Hey you! Stop that! That's my hair." My mother waded into the goats using her purse like some sort of feminine martial arts weapon and rescued her youngest. After hearing this story growing up it's no surprise that from a relatively young age, I wanted to grow my hair out.

My parents were not supportive of the idea of me with long hair and whenever it would finally grow long enough to be unruly, I would get sent to the barber and get shorn. So during my freshman year college I grew it out. It got long enough that my bangs covered my eyes, a new record. One day a friend of mine said that he was going to shave his head. Disbelievingly, I said "If you get your head shaved, I'll get my shaved." The night before the head shaving, I met K at the campus bar. We ended up going back to her dorm - and getting sexiled into the hall. We talked while she played with my hair. The next day she called and asked if I wanted to go hang out with her. "Sure, " I replied. "I just need to get my head shaved. 3:00 OK?" "Okay, I'll see you later." She was a bit surprised when I showed up bald. I think that my high school friend who I escorted to her was a bit more surprised when I showed up looking like a recruiting poster marine. Or as she said, "Your head looks like the tip of a giant uncircumsized penis."

Bout with the world of baldness aside, I grew my hair out again - this time into a skater cut. A skater cut is something like a reverse mullet - long on top, short on the sides. It got long enough that I could draw it back into a short ponytail. I liked the hairstyle because it was relatively low maintenance and I could enlist anyone with a steady enough hand to cut my hair. And talk about low maintenance. The sides and back washed like short hair and didn't need to get combed. The top drew into a ponytail and only needed a quick comb and a ponytail holder to look presentable. But when the corporate world beckoned, I got a "normal hair cut."

At some point when I was dating my wife, I said that I wanted to grow my hair out again. She said that if it made me happy I should do it. But no skater cut this time. And so I grew my hair out again. It got to shoulder length by my wedding and was to the tip of my shoulder blades when my first child was born. But I wasn't real happy with it and decided that I would get it cut some day. Then I was going to donate it to Lock of Love some day. When my wife's hair stylist said that she'd cut it for free, some day became Thursday. First she did the big chop (well over 10 inches). Then at my request she styled it into a mullet for a picture for one of my friends who has an unnatural affinity for mullets. And then she cleaned it up into my current hair style.

Reactions to post-chop have generally been favorable. My mother was overjoyed and my brothers are no longer ashamed of me. The people at work think that it makes me look younger (Great! I was already the baby of the group. And people if you want to say that I look younger 21 is a compliment. 18 isn't quite so much.) My friends think I look better. And my high school friends didn't realize that there was a difference because I look like I did then (or at least how I did back then bloated).

How do I feel? Meh. At some point I'll grow it back out. But for now it'll do.