When I converted to "New Blogger" from "Classic Blogger", every comment ever left on my blog from a "Beta Blogger" has had the commenter's name removed and replaced with "anonymous". Rhonda first pointed this out, but I can't find any trace of JohnnyB, either. This only affected bloggers using beta, as the comments from all the classic users are still have their names there, as do all the comment using the made-up names Fat Moother is so fond uf.
However, it looks like fresh comments from "new-formerly-beta blogger" accounts are working.
You get what you pay for with blog hosting services.
Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Day 4 of 17 - 0 for 20ish
The potty training is going poorly. I'd like to issue a correction to a previous post. In that post, I talked about what a wonderful job MaxieC had done to poop on the potty. Well, one thing I did not mention was that he had been in the bath tub at the time of his declaration of needing to poop, and me yanking him out of the tub and setting him on the potty immediately. Oh, and it was a bubble-bath.
The next morning, The Mrs. calls down the stairs, "I think you missed something in the tub." I go to investigate.
There, sitting quietly along the side of the tub, is a poop log. A Code Brownie.
So I guess he was really 1 for 7 that day.
That remains his best day thus far. Monday and today he has had a zero success rate. Zero. The kid won't even sit on the potty for me. His mother can get him on for a little while, but he never does any bidness.
I am thinking it may be too soon. We shall see.
In other news, The Mrs. decided to take a bunches of MaxieC's old toys to the used toy store in order to make room for the new stuff for Christmas. She started collecting it last night, and MaxieC caught on to her pretty quickly and started hollering. Somehow, she assuaged his fears at the time.
This morning, she went off to the used toy store for like two hours (apparently, everyone in Fort TomCollins had the same idea, and they all saw the same weather forecast that said we'd have a blizzard for the next two days and decided to got there this morning). I got stuck making crepes for breakfast because of how long she was gone and on account of the fact she had promised crepes to HannahC.
Not that I'm objecting to making breakfast, mind you. I'll make breakfast with no objection. I object to crepes. Now, those of you who follow along probably figure this is because they're French, and I hate everything French just because it's French. Except French Canadians. I hate them because they're Canadians.
But I digress.
I hate crepes mainly because you can only cook one at a time, they take about 3 minutes each, and a meal is 5 of them. And with 3.5 people, you're looking at an hour (including mixing time). This is just a remarkably time-inefficient breakfast. Which is just fine for those French F'ks, cuz they have nothing to contribute to the world with their time other than sitting around making inefficient meals and, maybe, poking fun at the British and Spanish. I, on the other hand, had a brand new issue of America's First Freedom to read.
Anyways, in the middle of all this crepe cooking, The Mrs. came home. She was holding two puzzles in her hand, and I said, "Hey, don't we already have those?" She said, "Yeah - they didn't want these."
This is all MaxieC needed to hear. He started wailing, gnashing his teeth, and all that, about how he didn't want his toys to sold to the used toy store. He wanted them back. They were his. Kvetch, kvetch, kvetch.
So, The Mrs. applied time-tested logic.
She gave him the Rescue Rangers she had picked up at the store for him for Christmas.
The next morning, The Mrs. calls down the stairs, "I think you missed something in the tub." I go to investigate.
There, sitting quietly along the side of the tub, is a poop log. A Code Brownie.
So I guess he was really 1 for 7 that day.
That remains his best day thus far. Monday and today he has had a zero success rate. Zero. The kid won't even sit on the potty for me. His mother can get him on for a little while, but he never does any bidness.
I am thinking it may be too soon. We shall see.
In other news, The Mrs. decided to take a bunches of MaxieC's old toys to the used toy store in order to make room for the new stuff for Christmas. She started collecting it last night, and MaxieC caught on to her pretty quickly and started hollering. Somehow, she assuaged his fears at the time.
This morning, she went off to the used toy store for like two hours (apparently, everyone in Fort TomCollins had the same idea, and they all saw the same weather forecast that said we'd have a blizzard for the next two days and decided to got there this morning). I got stuck making crepes for breakfast because of how long she was gone and on account of the fact she had promised crepes to HannahC.
Not that I'm objecting to making breakfast, mind you. I'll make breakfast with no objection. I object to crepes. Now, those of you who follow along probably figure this is because they're French, and I hate everything French just because it's French. Except French Canadians. I hate them because they're Canadians.
But I digress.
I hate crepes mainly because you can only cook one at a time, they take about 3 minutes each, and a meal is 5 of them. And with 3.5 people, you're looking at an hour (including mixing time). This is just a remarkably time-inefficient breakfast. Which is just fine for those French F'ks, cuz they have nothing to contribute to the world with their time other than sitting around making inefficient meals and, maybe, poking fun at the British and Spanish. I, on the other hand, had a brand new issue of America's First Freedom to read.
Anyways, in the middle of all this crepe cooking, The Mrs. came home. She was holding two puzzles in her hand, and I said, "Hey, don't we already have those?" She said, "Yeah - they didn't want these."
This is all MaxieC needed to hear. He started wailing, gnashing his teeth, and all that, about how he didn't want his toys to sold to the used toy store. He wanted them back. They were his. Kvetch, kvetch, kvetch.
So, The Mrs. applied time-tested logic.
She gave him the Rescue Rangers she had picked up at the store for him for Christmas.
The Mrs. - Comedic Genius
As we've covered in the past, The Mrs. is a comedic genius. She mostly keeps her mouth shut when it comes to comedy, which is a big part of her genius, but when she decides to let loose, whoa Nelly.
So, yesterday HannahC was getting home schooled, and she was complaining that she wanted to go outside and play instead. Here is what transpired:
Bwaaaa-haa-haa-haa!
"The teacher is held accountable." It still kills me!
So, yesterday HannahC was getting home schooled, and she was complaining that she wanted to go outside and play instead. Here is what transpired:
HannahC: "I want to go outside an play. Why can't we have recess first?"
The Mrs.: "If you were at school, you wouldn't get to have recess first thing in the morning."
HannahC: "Why not?"
The Mrs.: "Because the teacher is held accountable [for your learning]."
Bwaaaa-haa-haa-haa!
"The teacher is held accountable." It still kills me!
Beta is Released
Blogger's beta version has reached release quality. That means I'll have to transition over to it. I'm hoping that doesn't mean I'll become a really crappy blog like most of the beta-blogs I've seen. I'm hoping it just means a little change in some interfaces that will be transparent to the reader.
We shall see.
[Update: OK I converted. When I look at the site directly it looks all f'd up, but when I preview it from inside the blogger editor, it looks just fine. I'll have to debug.]
[Update again: Well, I closed the window and re-opened it, and all is well. I dunno what's up with that. But there it is.]
We shall see.
[Update: OK I converted. When I look at the site directly it looks all f'd up, but when I preview it from inside the blogger editor, it looks just fine. I'll have to debug.]
[Update again: Well, I closed the window and re-opened it, and all is well. I dunno what's up with that. But there it is.]
Sunday, December 17, 2006
Day 2 of 17 - Really about today
The Mrs. was concerned about how I would describe the start of my vacation on the old blog here. She suggested this,
When I got my lazy butt outta bed this morning, The Mrs. prompted MaxieC to show me what he had on. Which was weird, cuz I was looking right at him. But MaxieC complies and immediately drops trou to show me his underwear. I think it was Mater underwear. That's right, folks. It was potty-training Sunday. An odd coincidence that Cavitation is potty-training one of his the same time we're potty-training MaxieC. Or perhaps it simply most convenient to potty-train over the holidays and this is no coincidence.
Little MaxieC was roughly two for seven in the potty vs. pants battle today. His success rate, though, was a much higher one for two when it came to the all-important poop. I got to be the master of ceremonies for the success there, and when he was done, we had this conversation:
Running the risk of turning into a Mommyblogger, I'll tell one more precious story about The Childrens. This one is about HannieC. As I mentioned earlier, we had seen Santa yesterday. Each of The Childrens asked for only one thing. Santa seemed genuinely surprised by that, and he even said, "Well, with such a short list, I'll have to think of some other little things to bring you so you have more packages to open up."
I was chatting with HannieC this afternoon about her Santa experience, and I noted that Santa seemed surprised she asked for just one thing. I guess that means most kids ask for a whole lot of stuff, I said.
"The vacation started out like all vacations do. Sick and hungover."Har, har, har. I was not hungover. She only wanted me to be. I was, however, sick. Bit of a head cold is all. But I've had to take some decongestants, and it has affected my mood by making me more pleasant than normal.
When I got my lazy butt outta bed this morning, The Mrs. prompted MaxieC to show me what he had on. Which was weird, cuz I was looking right at him. But MaxieC complies and immediately drops trou to show me his underwear. I think it was Mater underwear. That's right, folks. It was potty-training Sunday. An odd coincidence that Cavitation is potty-training one of his the same time we're potty-training MaxieC. Or perhaps it simply most convenient to potty-train over the holidays and this is no coincidence.
Little MaxieC was roughly two for seven in the potty vs. pants battle today. His success rate, though, was a much higher one for two when it came to the all-important poop. I got to be the master of ceremonies for the success there, and when he was done, we had this conversation:
Me, CherkyB: "All right MaxieC! You pooped in the potty!"So there you have it.
MaxieC: "There's a log in the potty!"
Me, CherkyB: "That's poop."
MaxieC: "No. It's a poop log!
Running the risk of turning into a Mommyblogger, I'll tell one more precious story about The Childrens. This one is about HannieC. As I mentioned earlier, we had seen Santa yesterday. Each of The Childrens asked for only one thing. Santa seemed genuinely surprised by that, and he even said, "Well, with such a short list, I'll have to think of some other little things to bring you so you have more packages to open up."
I was chatting with HannieC this afternoon about her Santa experience, and I noted that Santa seemed surprised she asked for just one thing. I guess that means most kids ask for a whole lot of stuff, I said.
HannieC: "Yeah. I have pretty much everything I need, yet you and Mommy keep buying me more."HannieC, Super-genius.
Me, CherkyB: "Well, it's mostly just Mommy buying you more."
HannieC: "She's turning me into a little Veruca Salt."
Tag This.
I was catching up on some of my blog reading this evening, and I was reading about how Rhonda got tagged by NavieA-B. When I got to the end of the post, I was looking at the list of blogs that she tagged, and I was wondering to myself, "Self, she tagged Cavitation, but she didn't tag Me, CherkyB. Rhonda and I go way back, and she was just introduced to Cavitation's blog on Wednesday. I wonder what's up with that."
Then I sat and I pondered. Being a remarkably (remarkably!) intelligent person, I almost immediately said, "Oh sh!t. I bet that NavieA-B tagged me in that long, rambling, and difficult to read because of the bizarre jumble of font sizes, colors, and even languages post that I didn't make it all the way through before giving up."
So I went back and tried to read it again, but still to no avail. So I scanned to the end, and sure enough, she tagged me. Now, much like The JohnnyB, I'm not a "participator". Not unless there's something in it for me. But, since NavieA-B is one of my better customers, I'll play along a little.
The rules as they are stated by NavieA-B:
- Find the nearest book.
- Name the book and the author.
- Turn to page 123.
- Go to the fifth sentence on the page.
- Copy out the next three sentences and post to your blog.
- Tag three more folks.
Her font color. Not mine.
OK, so here goes:
"Official Bartender's and Party Guide" by Mr. Boston. (One of my favorite authors, I might add.)
1 dash Bitters
Mix with cracked ice and pour, with ice, into chilled parfait or hurricane glass with a salted rim. Garnish with a lemon wheel.
Page 123 happens to be in a chapter called, simply enough, "Tequila." Not one of my favorite chapters, but it is a favorite of the ladies.
I'm not tagging anyone else. I'm like the guy at the wedding who will do the chicken dance, but I'll be damned if I'm going to pull people out of their chairs to join.
Then I sat and I pondered. Being a remarkably (remarkably!) intelligent person, I almost immediately said, "Oh sh!t. I bet that NavieA-B tagged me in that long, rambling, and difficult to read because of the bizarre jumble of font sizes, colors, and even languages post that I didn't make it all the way through before giving up."
So I went back and tried to read it again, but still to no avail. So I scanned to the end, and sure enough, she tagged me. Now, much like The JohnnyB, I'm not a "participator". Not unless there's something in it for me. But, since NavieA-B is one of my better customers, I'll play along a little.
The rules as they are stated by NavieA-B:
- Find the nearest book.
- Name the book and the author.
- Turn to page 123.
- Go to the fifth sentence on the page.
- Copy out the next three sentences and post to your blog.
- Tag three more folks.
Her font color. Not mine.
OK, so here goes:
"Official Bartender's and Party Guide" by Mr. Boston. (One of my favorite authors, I might add.)
1 dash Bitters
Mix with cracked ice and pour, with ice, into chilled parfait or hurricane glass with a salted rim. Garnish with a lemon wheel.
Page 123 happens to be in a chapter called, simply enough, "Tequila." Not one of my favorite chapters, but it is a favorite of the ladies.
I'm not tagging anyone else. I'm like the guy at the wedding who will do the chicken dance, but I'll be damned if I'm going to pull people out of their chairs to join.
Day 2 of 17 - About Last Night
For those fans who have been anxiously awaiting a new post, I apologize for the delay. I wrote a brief little thing yesterday, but for some reason blogger kept giving me an error when I tried to post it. It finally cleared up this morning and posted.
Yesterday was a busy day. I spent all of my free time (which was about 20 minutes) working on describing some things I had done for work at my past job. When you change jobs within The Company in the middle of the year, there is a lot of paperwork towards the end when you have to account for everything.
We took The Childrens out for a sushi lunch in Old Town and then to see Santa yesterday. HannieC was very worried. She said that she really had not been good enough this year to get a good toy from Santa (a bug catching kit that she wants) and was worried that he might call her out on that. But, you know Santa, always want to keep you guessing. MaxieC for the first time told Santa what he wanted, but he refused to sit next to Santa. Maybe next year.
El Torito's party was pretty OK. It started out a little slowly, as the keg had a bit of a foaming issue, but then MoustachioP's son figured out the trick and got the brew flowing. I, uh, broke my diet a little bit and had some snacks. Quite a substantial amount, perhaps.
El Torito is one of those sad stories - people used to depend on him to have parties all the time, and that lifestyle suited him well. Then he got married, and as happens to all men, marriage drove all the fun right out of him. Well, last night he put on a bit of a performance to show that the old El Torito is still alive in there somewhere, just crying to get out. I was a joy to behold.
Me, on the other hand, I don't even know who I am anymore. I had a couple beers and a couple bourbons, and then I drank Pepsi the rest of the night. This was because I had no other way home than to drive myself. There were all these happy, drunken people doing shots of tequila, and when that was gone, Captain Morgan (ack), and I was sipping my Pepsi and chowing down all the appetizers.
At the end of the night (~1:30am), there are eight of us left. Five are staggeringly drunk (well, hard to say if MoodyT was staggeringly drunk as he had to sit down about a half-hour before that and hadn't moved much since then) and three are stone-cold sober. And Me, CherkyB, I'm one of the sober ones, and I'm driving a drunk guy home.
I don't think anything like this has ever happened to me before.
I gotta tell you, though, I still enjoyed standing around in a room full of drunken co-workers. And I had a hell of a lot of fun with CJ's digital SLR. I got a tremendous photo of El Torito in a drunken whoop that I think we're going to have to blow up into a poster. CJ better not delete that.
Now for the best part, HannieC has had a cold for the last few days, and she's been trying to hand it off to me. When I got home around 2:15am, I went up to the bedroom and got into my nightime attire. I noted MaxieC was in my spot on the bed. But my nose was running something fierce. So, out of the goodness of my heart, I went downstairs to the bathroom to blow my nose so as to not wake The Mrs. or MaxieC. I then went to the kitchen and mixed myself of a glass of Emergen-C, which is something StinkyJ swears by for combating colds and with which I had some marginally good luck over the Thanksgiving fiasco.
Yesterday was a busy day. I spent all of my free time (which was about 20 minutes) working on describing some things I had done for work at my past job. When you change jobs within The Company in the middle of the year, there is a lot of paperwork towards the end when you have to account for everything.
We took The Childrens out for a sushi lunch in Old Town and then to see Santa yesterday. HannieC was very worried. She said that she really had not been good enough this year to get a good toy from Santa (a bug catching kit that she wants) and was worried that he might call her out on that. But, you know Santa, always want to keep you guessing. MaxieC for the first time told Santa what he wanted, but he refused to sit next to Santa. Maybe next year.
El Torito's party was pretty OK. It started out a little slowly, as the keg had a bit of a foaming issue, but then MoustachioP's son figured out the trick and got the brew flowing. I, uh, broke my diet a little bit and had some snacks. Quite a substantial amount, perhaps.
El Torito is one of those sad stories - people used to depend on him to have parties all the time, and that lifestyle suited him well. Then he got married, and as happens to all men, marriage drove all the fun right out of him. Well, last night he put on a bit of a performance to show that the old El Torito is still alive in there somewhere, just crying to get out. I was a joy to behold.
Me, on the other hand, I don't even know who I am anymore. I had a couple beers and a couple bourbons, and then I drank Pepsi the rest of the night. This was because I had no other way home than to drive myself. There were all these happy, drunken people doing shots of tequila, and when that was gone, Captain Morgan (ack), and I was sipping my Pepsi and chowing down all the appetizers.
At the end of the night (~1:30am), there are eight of us left. Five are staggeringly drunk (well, hard to say if MoodyT was staggeringly drunk as he had to sit down about a half-hour before that and hadn't moved much since then) and three are stone-cold sober. And Me, CherkyB, I'm one of the sober ones, and I'm driving a drunk guy home.
I don't think anything like this has ever happened to me before.
I gotta tell you, though, I still enjoyed standing around in a room full of drunken co-workers. And I had a hell of a lot of fun with CJ's digital SLR. I got a tremendous photo of El Torito in a drunken whoop that I think we're going to have to blow up into a poster. CJ better not delete that.
Now for the best part, HannieC has had a cold for the last few days, and she's been trying to hand it off to me. When I got home around 2:15am, I went up to the bedroom and got into my nightime attire. I noted MaxieC was in my spot on the bed. But my nose was running something fierce. So, out of the goodness of my heart, I went downstairs to the bathroom to blow my nose so as to not wake The Mrs. or MaxieC. I then went to the kitchen and mixed myself of a glass of Emergen-C, which is something StinkyJ swears by for combating colds and with which I had some marginally good luck over the Thanksgiving fiasco.
After I drink that, I head back upstairs. The Mrs. is standing at the top of the steps with her arms crossed across her chest. It goes like this:So there you have it. No good deed goes unpunished.
The Mrs.: You drove home like this?
Me, CherkyB: Like what?
The Mrs.: Like this!
Me, CherkyB: Like what? With a runny nose?
The Mrs.: Needing to drink a big glass of water before going to bed so you don't get a hangover!
Day 1 of 17.
All is calm. We had sushi for lunch. Nobody has barfed thus far. Off to a birthday party for El Torito shortly.
More to follow.
More to follow.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
A new blog of the week
After a great run of approximately 3 weeks as Blog of the Week, one of the longest periods a single blog has held on to Blog of the Week title in Me, CherkyB history, Rhonda's Blog is now passing the coveted crown to another upstart on the scene, Cavagnaro Blogger. That's right, folks, the hinted at blog by Cavitation now has enough posts to be able to be linked to. Originally conceived as a lazier replacement for the family website, it has morphed into a forum for his unique form of moaning, bitching, and complaining. Plus the occasional pink-shirt fun poking.
So everyone head right over there, and make sure you leave a tag saying CherkyB sent you, as Cavitation bribed me with a bottle of Dave's Insanity Salsa to become Blog of the Week, and I want him to know he's getting his money's-worth. Though with my crowd of readers, it'll take months of referrals for him to make $4.99 in AdSense clicks. However, I do have a lot of surreptitious readers from work (including possibly my boss's boss, JoeyB), so this plug will no doubt return a tremendous amount when it comes time to solicit the bizarrely-named "360 feedback" for the annual performance review. See, already it's paid off.
Now, let me level set you ahead of time. Cavitation is new to blogging, so his blog is a little rough, and his style is still developing. But I want you to all go back and look at your first posts before you cast the first stone. Hell, I deleted my first post after a couple days since it was so bad. So head over there and leave some encouraging words. And make sure you say you heard about it here, or I don't get my cut of the ad revenue.
So everyone head right over there, and make sure you leave a tag saying CherkyB sent you, as Cavitation bribed me with a bottle of Dave's Insanity Salsa to become Blog of the Week, and I want him to know he's getting his money's-worth. Though with my crowd of readers, it'll take months of referrals for him to make $4.99 in AdSense clicks. However, I do have a lot of surreptitious readers from work (including possibly my boss's boss, JoeyB), so this plug will no doubt return a tremendous amount when it comes time to solicit the bizarrely-named "360 feedback" for the annual performance review. See, already it's paid off.
Now, let me level set you ahead of time. Cavitation is new to blogging, so his blog is a little rough, and his style is still developing. But I want you to all go back and look at your first posts before you cast the first stone. Hell, I deleted my first post after a couple days since it was so bad. So head over there and leave some encouraging words. And make sure you say you heard about it here, or I don't get my cut of the ad revenue.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Something Not to Do ™ 5
Let's say, purely hypothetically, that you had gone to Target to buy a new scale. But, being a man and all, you let it sit in the bag in the hallway while you started preparing to hang Christmas lights outside. This because you had to hang the Christmas lights during the daytime so you could see what you were doing, whereas you could open the scale box anytime due to the magic (magic!) of indoor lighting. But also because a new scale isn't all that exciting. It's not like a new lawn tractor, or a new 18V lithium-ion drill, or even like a new 6-pack of beer. It's just a scale.
But, you live with a woman. To a woman, a new scale is as exciting as diamond pendant earrings, or a surprise getaway to Paris, or an unopened pint of Häagen-Daz and a pair of sweat pants. That is to say, it is simply irresistible.
So, let's say, again purely hypothetically, your The Mrs. tears into the box with the kind of enthusiasm normally reserved for Christmas morning little blue boxes with red ribbons that say "Tiffany & Co." and sets up the scale in the downstairs bathroom. When you come wandering by, she is standing on the floor staring at the scale. She says, "It seems a little low."
You step on, note that it is exactly what you though you weighed, and step off. Then you say to your The Mrs., "Hmmm...You get on it again."
So she does.
Then you look at it and say, "Yup. You're right. It does read low."
That would be Something Not to Do. ™
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But, you live with a woman. To a woman, a new scale is as exciting as diamond pendant earrings, or a surprise getaway to Paris, or an unopened pint of Häagen-Daz and a pair of sweat pants. That is to say, it is simply irresistible.
So, let's say, again purely hypothetically, your The Mrs. tears into the box with the kind of enthusiasm normally reserved for Christmas morning little blue boxes with red ribbons that say "Tiffany & Co." and sets up the scale in the downstairs bathroom. When you come wandering by, she is standing on the floor staring at the scale. She says, "It seems a little low."
You step on, note that it is exactly what you though you weighed, and step off. Then you say to your The Mrs., "Hmmm...You get on it again."
So she does.
Then you look at it and say, "Yup. You're right. It does read low."
That would be Something Not to Do. ™
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Monday, December 11, 2006
Ooo-ooo that smell
It seems like, after having stepped in it, I am recovering nicely. Perhaps this is because I have so much experience with stepping in the poo, as The Mrs. so kindly points out in the comments. Perhaps it is my cat-like ability to always land on my feet. I'm not sure what it is. But, clearly, I am better than you.
I do, however, need to replace my water heater. That wouldn't be such a big deal, excepting I have one of those Brilliant! idea things whereby the hot water heater and furnace are combined into one unit. A design so bad that the manufacturer offers incentives to rip it out and replace it rather than to fix it all the time (and risk a big lawsuit over what a piece of crap it is). I'm debating whether I should rip it out now, in the dead of winter, or try to make it until spring and have it die on my in mid-deep-freeze-February. What is wrong with it this time (three things in total) I could get the home warranty to fix for $55 maybe. Maybe I can do that an wait until spring.
A couple very strange things happened today. Very strange indeed. First, one of the managers at work today accused me of exuding leadership. His exact words: "You exude leadership."
I'm telling you, the altitude affects your mind around here.
Then, at dinner, The Mrs. said that my last couple posts included a bizarre number of inaccuracies. In particular, she disagreed with the transcription of her telephone discussion with her mother about MaxieC blowing the saxophone-whistle in my ear. She claimed some of the dialog she actually said to MaxieC, not to her mother. I complained that I did a pretty good transcription given the fact that I was asleep at the time, but I offered to post one of my infrequent corrections posts nonetheless, since I certify truthfulness of my stories.
Oddly, if you read that post and the first comment, it seems remarkably appropriate.
The Mrs., however, has not yet given me the details of how she wants the correction to read. You will all have to wait with bated breath, as do I.
I did, however, maintain my rapier wit when challenged by The Mrs. I said, "This is because I haven't been drunk when posting the last couple days. I've cut way back. I don't need the empty calories."
Heh.
My diet is coming along nicely. I have lost no weight at all thus far, so I wouldn't call it a complete success. But I don't feel as fat. That makes it a limited success so far.
That is all.
I do, however, need to replace my water heater. That wouldn't be such a big deal, excepting I have one of those Brilliant! idea things whereby the hot water heater and furnace are combined into one unit. A design so bad that the manufacturer offers incentives to rip it out and replace it rather than to fix it all the time (and risk a big lawsuit over what a piece of crap it is). I'm debating whether I should rip it out now, in the dead of winter, or try to make it until spring and have it die on my in mid-deep-freeze-February. What is wrong with it this time (three things in total) I could get the home warranty to fix for $55 maybe. Maybe I can do that an wait until spring.
A couple very strange things happened today. Very strange indeed. First, one of the managers at work today accused me of exuding leadership. His exact words: "You exude leadership."
I'm telling you, the altitude affects your mind around here.
Then, at dinner, The Mrs. said that my last couple posts included a bizarre number of inaccuracies. In particular, she disagreed with the transcription of her telephone discussion with her mother about MaxieC blowing the saxophone-whistle in my ear. She claimed some of the dialog she actually said to MaxieC, not to her mother. I complained that I did a pretty good transcription given the fact that I was asleep at the time, but I offered to post one of my infrequent corrections posts nonetheless, since I certify truthfulness of my stories.
Oddly, if you read that post and the first comment, it seems remarkably appropriate.
The Mrs., however, has not yet given me the details of how she wants the correction to read. You will all have to wait with bated breath, as do I.
I did, however, maintain my rapier wit when challenged by The Mrs. I said, "This is because I haven't been drunk when posting the last couple days. I've cut way back. I don't need the empty calories."
Heh.
My diet is coming along nicely. I have lost no weight at all thus far, so I wouldn't call it a complete success. But I don't feel as fat. That makes it a limited success so far.
That is all.
Sunday, December 10, 2006
It's beginning to look a lot like
your momma.
Today was my day to sleep in. What that means is that The Mrs. gets up with MaxieC, but leaves the bedroom door wide open so that the rising sun comes through the entryway clerestory window and shines directly in my eyes. Then I get up and close the door. Then FreddyC gets up and barks at the closed door so he can go out. So I open the door and then close it again. Then five minutes later, he barks again to come back in. So then I let him in and leave the door open enough for him to go in and out.
But this means I can hear MaxieC. Not a quiet kid, that one.
Then, finally I get back to sleep. Eventually, I will be awakened by this, coming from right next to the bed:
Then she took me aside and asked, "Is this a trip we can all go on?"
Now, I thought for a minute. She's asking if I'll be buying Christmas presents at Target, I think. But maybe I just want some alone time after the fiasco that was yesterday. But I know I'm not allowed alone time on weekends because The Mrs. considers my time at work to be alone time.
She has, to this day, absolutely no idea what my job is like. I've explained it many times, but it's as if she'd stuck her fingers in her ears and said "blub blub blub blub" every time for all she has absorbed about it.
So I said, "Yes."
Oh joy. The whole fambly is now off to Target. The Mrs. has decided to make a side run to the pet store (which is right next door) to return all the unopened hamster Christmas presents, given the untimely demise of dear Angibelle. And she's decided we should buy a whole bunches of lights to put on one of the trees in the front.
One of the trees. Keep that in mind.
The shopping trip went pretty smoothly, all things considered. The only squabble was when MaxieC and HannieC both wanted to put the credit card into the magic credit-card sucking device that Target so uniquely has. This was resolve by letting MaxieC put the card in, and then letting HannieC sign the screen. (I may have helped her a little bit with my signature.)
When we got home, it was 11:45, and The Mrs. suggested we start hanging Christmas lights. I put my foot down. No. It's time for lunch.
As per usual, The Childrens ran around like crazy idiots during lunch. Except for MaxieC, who sat quietly and ate the bread off his sandwich (to which he required to have more mustard added) without touching the innards.
I was sitting there, minding my own bidness, quietly eating my sandwich, when HannieC came up and shrieked as loudly as she could right into my ear. To which I, quite naturally, responded by yelling, "Jesus F'cking Christ!" It being the holiday season and all.
The Mrs., always the smart-arse, said, "Have you had enough parenting already today?"
I am apparently very bad at this parenting thing. But that's OK, since it doesn't pay anywhere near as well as blogging does.
The Mrs. then said, "I wonder how long it will be before we hear that one come out. I bet it'll be when your parents visit, and MaxieC will yell it at your mother."
Maybe.
We went outside shortly thereafter to being with the Christmas lights. The plan was to string icicle lights on the fence across the front of the property on the left side of the driveway, and then to light up the 15' pine tree in the center of the yard. The Mrs. was going to handle the fence lights, and I was going to light up the tree.
Fatal flaw - no one was assigned to watch The Childrens. I figured we'd just let them play in the front yard, which is 5x the size of our old back yard. And there's no traffic on the street or anything. HannieC did fine, riding her Big Green Machine around. MaxieC, being two, headed straight for the Koi pond. He got out his leaf net, and started fishing out the leaves. The Mrs. could not handle it, since we couldn't see MaxieC behind the bush in front of the pond, and fretted up a storm.
So we had to take turns watching MaxieC.
We ran into troubles in the lighting plan right off the bat. The icicle lights said you couldn't string more than 3 strings together, each string was 10 feet, and we had about 80 feet to do. So we decided to light up 30 feet on either side of the driveway. This required me to figure out how to run an extension cord through about 30 feet of 15" diameter drain pipe that passes under the driveway, but I did that in short oder with some lengths of conduit that came with the garage and could be fitted together to make a pipe that long.
Then I wired up the tree while The Mrs. tried to get MaxieC to nap. HannieC tried to help me, but mostly she just played on the stepladder. Here is the view from in front of the icicle-lit fence and the tree behind it. The smaller tree to the left of center is one of the neighbor's trees. This is pretty much all we had planned to do.
But then The Mrs. noticed that we had some lights leftover. So she decided to light up the little bush in front of the Koi pond. Then, she also decided we should light up the 20' pine on the right side of the driveway. This required a trip to Ace Hardware, since I didn't have any lights for that tree, not did I have enough extension cords and whatnot.
I took MaxieC with me to Ace. They have free popcorn. He loves that. He fell asleep in the truck on the way home, so I left him there while I wired everything up.
But The Mrs. was not done. No. She discovered even more lights, and wired up two more little evergreens by the Koi pond. Of course, I didn't have the hardware necessary to power this, as I bought only what I needed on the last trip to Ace, so it was back to Ace again. When I got in the truck, MaxieC woke up. He wasn't all that happy about going back to Ace, but whatever. Here is the right side of the driveway, including the 20' tree lit up in green, the icicle fence, and the three bush/trees around the Koi pond.
This is the view west (left) from the driveway. The neighbors outdid us. I'm sure next weekend will involve many trips to Lowes and Target and Ace until we reach parity.
I guess I never posted a picture of our big, fat, and slightly bent Christmas tree. Here it is:
And while I was digging through the camera memory, I found a Thanksgiving turkey picture. This picture I like to call, "That's right - it's almost MaxieC's birthday."
Today was my day to sleep in. What that means is that The Mrs. gets up with MaxieC, but leaves the bedroom door wide open so that the rising sun comes through the entryway clerestory window and shines directly in my eyes. Then I get up and close the door. Then FreddyC gets up and barks at the closed door so he can go out. So I open the door and then close it again. Then five minutes later, he barks again to come back in. So then I let him in and leave the door open enough for him to go in and out.
But this means I can hear MaxieC. Not a quiet kid, that one.
Then, finally I get back to sleep. Eventually, I will be awakened by this, coming from right next to the bed:
The Mrs.: No, Maxie. It's Daddy's turn to sleep in. Don't wake him up.I got up this morning with purpose. I was going to go to Target to buy a scale. There's no sense in cutting out between-meal snacking if you can't track the progress. The Mrs. asked if I had plans for the day, and I said, "Yes, I'm planning to go to Target."
The Mrs. [talking into the phone]: Poor DaaDaa. He's asleep, and MaxieC wants to blow the whistle in his ear. Yack yack yack yack.
The Mrs.: Maxie, stay off the bed. Daddy is still sleeping.
The Mrs. [talking on the phone]: MaxieC is climbing up onto the bed now. He really wants to blow that whistle in CherkyB's ear. Yack yack yack yack.
The Mrs.: Maxie, give me the whistle.
MaxieC: It's a saxophone!
The Mrs.: OK. Give me the saxophone. Don't blow it in Daddy's ear. He's still sleeping.
The Mrs. [talking into the phone]: Yeah, he's very upset I called it a whistle. It's one of those slide-whistle things, but it's shaped like a little, yellow saxophone. Yack yack yack yack.
The Mrs.: Maxie, no.
MaxieC: TWEEEEEEETTTTT!!!!!!!
Me, CherkyB: Ow.
The Mrs. [talking into the phone]: He blew the whistle right in CherkyB's ear. It's OK, though. He wasn't asleep. He was faking. Yack yack yack yack.
Then she took me aside and asked, "Is this a trip we can all go on?"
Now, I thought for a minute. She's asking if I'll be buying Christmas presents at Target, I think. But maybe I just want some alone time after the fiasco that was yesterday. But I know I'm not allowed alone time on weekends because The Mrs. considers my time at work to be alone time.
She has, to this day, absolutely no idea what my job is like. I've explained it many times, but it's as if she'd stuck her fingers in her ears and said "blub blub blub blub" every time for all she has absorbed about it.
So I said, "Yes."
Oh joy. The whole fambly is now off to Target. The Mrs. has decided to make a side run to the pet store (which is right next door) to return all the unopened hamster Christmas presents, given the untimely demise of dear Angibelle. And she's decided we should buy a whole bunches of lights to put on one of the trees in the front.
One of the trees. Keep that in mind.
The shopping trip went pretty smoothly, all things considered. The only squabble was when MaxieC and HannieC both wanted to put the credit card into the magic credit-card sucking device that Target so uniquely has. This was resolve by letting MaxieC put the card in, and then letting HannieC sign the screen. (I may have helped her a little bit with my signature.)
When we got home, it was 11:45, and The Mrs. suggested we start hanging Christmas lights. I put my foot down. No. It's time for lunch.
As per usual, The Childrens ran around like crazy idiots during lunch. Except for MaxieC, who sat quietly and ate the bread off his sandwich (to which he required to have more mustard added) without touching the innards.
I was sitting there, minding my own bidness, quietly eating my sandwich, when HannieC came up and shrieked as loudly as she could right into my ear. To which I, quite naturally, responded by yelling, "Jesus F'cking Christ!" It being the holiday season and all.
The Mrs., always the smart-arse, said, "Have you had enough parenting already today?"
I am apparently very bad at this parenting thing. But that's OK, since it doesn't pay anywhere near as well as blogging does.
The Mrs. then said, "I wonder how long it will be before we hear that one come out. I bet it'll be when your parents visit, and MaxieC will yell it at your mother."
Maybe.
We went outside shortly thereafter to being with the Christmas lights. The plan was to string icicle lights on the fence across the front of the property on the left side of the driveway, and then to light up the 15' pine tree in the center of the yard. The Mrs. was going to handle the fence lights, and I was going to light up the tree.
Fatal flaw - no one was assigned to watch The Childrens. I figured we'd just let them play in the front yard, which is 5x the size of our old back yard. And there's no traffic on the street or anything. HannieC did fine, riding her Big Green Machine around. MaxieC, being two, headed straight for the Koi pond. He got out his leaf net, and started fishing out the leaves. The Mrs. could not handle it, since we couldn't see MaxieC behind the bush in front of the pond, and fretted up a storm.
So we had to take turns watching MaxieC.
We ran into troubles in the lighting plan right off the bat. The icicle lights said you couldn't string more than 3 strings together, each string was 10 feet, and we had about 80 feet to do. So we decided to light up 30 feet on either side of the driveway. This required me to figure out how to run an extension cord through about 30 feet of 15" diameter drain pipe that passes under the driveway, but I did that in short oder with some lengths of conduit that came with the garage and could be fitted together to make a pipe that long.
Then I wired up the tree while The Mrs. tried to get MaxieC to nap. HannieC tried to help me, but mostly she just played on the stepladder. Here is the view from in front of the icicle-lit fence and the tree behind it. The smaller tree to the left of center is one of the neighbor's trees. This is pretty much all we had planned to do.
But then The Mrs. noticed that we had some lights leftover. So she decided to light up the little bush in front of the Koi pond. Then, she also decided we should light up the 20' pine on the right side of the driveway. This required a trip to Ace Hardware, since I didn't have any lights for that tree, not did I have enough extension cords and whatnot.
I took MaxieC with me to Ace. They have free popcorn. He loves that. He fell asleep in the truck on the way home, so I left him there while I wired everything up.
But The Mrs. was not done. No. She discovered even more lights, and wired up two more little evergreens by the Koi pond. Of course, I didn't have the hardware necessary to power this, as I bought only what I needed on the last trip to Ace, so it was back to Ace again. When I got in the truck, MaxieC woke up. He wasn't all that happy about going back to Ace, but whatever. Here is the right side of the driveway, including the 20' tree lit up in green, the icicle fence, and the three bush/trees around the Koi pond.
This is the view west (left) from the driveway. The neighbors outdid us. I'm sure next weekend will involve many trips to Lowes and Target and Ace until we reach parity.
I guess I never posted a picture of our big, fat, and slightly bent Christmas tree. Here it is:
And while I was digging through the camera memory, I found a Thanksgiving turkey picture. This picture I like to call, "That's right - it's almost MaxieC's birthday."
Saturday, December 09, 2006
I'm still alive
Thanks for asking.
It was a horribly rough day. I got up with MaxieC at some ungodly hour that started with a 6. He was cranky. Very cranky.
When The Mrs. finally waltzed out of bed almost four hours later, she announced she was going to Toys'R'Us to buy something for HannieC that was only on sale that day.
She left without feeding us breakfast.
MaxieC and HannieC fought with one another the whole time The Mrs. was gone. She was gone for an obscenely long time. Must have been close to an hour and a half.
Then she came home and immediately went out somewhere else with HannieC. I can't remember where, or any of the details. Maybe I imagined it. But I know MaxieC screamed the whole time she was gone, and she came home with Sonic.
Then, while we were eating, she said, "You know the GPS/backup camera thing in my van? Today it did something weird. It kept asking me to enter a code."
Did it display the map?
"I dunno. I didn't notice."
So I had to go check. Sure enough, everything worked except the GPS, which kept asking for a code. I remembered something about this being an anti-theft feature from when I picked up the van. I checked the manual. Yup, it asks for a code if the GPS has been unplugged from power.
This is doubly bad. First, I dunno where the stupid little card is they gave me when I picked up the van, and second, the GPS has not been removed from power. That means there's a loose connection somewhere, and I can probably expect it to lose power right at the most inopportune time sometime in the future.
I was angry. Angry because I had lost the little card. Angry because I had spent an extra $7000 to get a Honda over a Dodge, and this kind of stuff was what was not supposed to happen in a Honda. Angry because now I was angry in the middle of my lunch, which was my first meal of the day, and I was starving. And angry because I had already lived through 6 hours of non-stop 2-year-old hollering, and it was just past noon, and The Mrs. and HannieC were going to see The Nutcracker a 1pm, leaving me home alone again with screaming MaxieC in less than an hour.
Bruce Banner used to say, "Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry."
I watched for it, but I didn't turn into a giant green monster.
I found the card right where I thought I had put it. Of course, I didn't look there right away, because I forgot right where I had put it. Then, when I did look there, I missed it by a few inches and didn't see it. Took me about 20 minutes to get back to searching the same spot over again (big house), and then it turned right up. I punched in the code, and the GPS was again happy.
The Mrs. then took off with HannieC. MaxieC hollered.
And hollered.
And hollered.
He refused to take a nap, as he generally won't nap without The Mrs. putting him to bed.
Two/three hours later, The Mrs. called to say she was sitting at a railroad crossing waiting for a train to go by. She did it just to annoy me.
Eventually, she got home with HannieC, and then the two childrens started at it again.
My head was killing me, and I had had it by this point. I was reduced to arms-length backhands to try to keep The Childrens from screaming in my ears and climbing on me. It was like a living pinball machine. No matter what I did, they just kept coming at me, all hollering and such.
The Mrs., always a wise-arse, said, "Why don't you stop parenting for a while," and she took The Childrens off somewhere upstairs for like 6-7 minutes. It was my only reprieve of the day.
It was a horribly rough day. I got up with MaxieC at some ungodly hour that started with a 6. He was cranky. Very cranky.
When The Mrs. finally waltzed out of bed almost four hours later, she announced she was going to Toys'R'Us to buy something for HannieC that was only on sale that day.
She left without feeding us breakfast.
MaxieC and HannieC fought with one another the whole time The Mrs. was gone. She was gone for an obscenely long time. Must have been close to an hour and a half.
Then she came home and immediately went out somewhere else with HannieC. I can't remember where, or any of the details. Maybe I imagined it. But I know MaxieC screamed the whole time she was gone, and she came home with Sonic.
Then, while we were eating, she said, "You know the GPS/backup camera thing in my van? Today it did something weird. It kept asking me to enter a code."
Did it display the map?
"I dunno. I didn't notice."
So I had to go check. Sure enough, everything worked except the GPS, which kept asking for a code. I remembered something about this being an anti-theft feature from when I picked up the van. I checked the manual. Yup, it asks for a code if the GPS has been unplugged from power.
This is doubly bad. First, I dunno where the stupid little card is they gave me when I picked up the van, and second, the GPS has not been removed from power. That means there's a loose connection somewhere, and I can probably expect it to lose power right at the most inopportune time sometime in the future.
I was angry. Angry because I had lost the little card. Angry because I had spent an extra $7000 to get a Honda over a Dodge, and this kind of stuff was what was not supposed to happen in a Honda. Angry because now I was angry in the middle of my lunch, which was my first meal of the day, and I was starving. And angry because I had already lived through 6 hours of non-stop 2-year-old hollering, and it was just past noon, and The Mrs. and HannieC were going to see The Nutcracker a 1pm, leaving me home alone again with screaming MaxieC in less than an hour.
Bruce Banner used to say, "Don't make me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry."
I watched for it, but I didn't turn into a giant green monster.
I found the card right where I thought I had put it. Of course, I didn't look there right away, because I forgot right where I had put it. Then, when I did look there, I missed it by a few inches and didn't see it. Took me about 20 minutes to get back to searching the same spot over again (big house), and then it turned right up. I punched in the code, and the GPS was again happy.
The Mrs. then took off with HannieC. MaxieC hollered.
And hollered.
And hollered.
He refused to take a nap, as he generally won't nap without The Mrs. putting him to bed.
Two/three hours later, The Mrs. called to say she was sitting at a railroad crossing waiting for a train to go by. She did it just to annoy me.
Eventually, she got home with HannieC, and then the two childrens started at it again.
My head was killing me, and I had had it by this point. I was reduced to arms-length backhands to try to keep The Childrens from screaming in my ears and climbing on me. It was like a living pinball machine. No matter what I did, they just kept coming at me, all hollering and such.
The Mrs., always a wise-arse, said, "Why don't you stop parenting for a while," and she took The Childrens off somewhere upstairs for like 6-7 minutes. It was my only reprieve of the day.
Friday, December 08, 2006
I really stepped in it
Sometimes you do something that seems like a good idea at the time. In fact, you talk it over ahead of time with a few people you might actually trust, and they even think it's a good idea. Then you think about it some more, and you say to yourself, "Self, I know you used to think this was a bad idea, but maybe that was due to some fear of failure or fear of the unknown. But it's something that really needs to get done, and this is a great opportunity for yourself, self."
So then you goes to your boss and you says, "You know, I been thinkin' it over, and I think I wanna do this particular job." And then your boss says, "Hey, that's greeeaaaaat. Somebody really needs to do that. What an excellent opportunity."
But you can't help but think that in the split second between when you said you wanted to do that, and when she responded, there was kind of a startled look. And you wonder. Startled because it's so great to find just the perfect someone to do the job that no one wants, or startled because someone you had heard wasn't a complete dumb-ass just signed up for something for which all roads lead to great suffering and almost inevitable doom, a suicide mission? But you say, hey, my boss seems to genuinely care, and she'd tell me if she thought this was a big mistake.
And it's not until about a week later that you're sitting there in your little cube, an inhumane space not fit for human inhabitation yet somehow perfectly fit for keeping "resources", and you say to yourself, "Self, what is that smell?"
So you sniff around, and you realize it's coming from your foot. You examine the bottom of your boot, and there wedged deeply into the waffle, you see a big, steaming pile of "What did you volunteer for, you dumb-ass?"
And so it begins.
I realized yesterday that I've gotten fat. Like, somehow almost overnight, I have developed a big beer gut. I mean, I'm no JohnnyB, but at the rate things are going, I will be by summer. Last time this happened, I switched to diet soft drinks, and the gut immediately faded. But I never went back to non-diet soft drinks, so what is my next step?
I thought about it a lot. I wondered if I should give up beer for a while and do the patented GerryP vodka-tonic diet, only with diet-tonic (fixing the fatal flaw of the GerryP diet, which accidentally ended up substituting high fructose corn syrup for beer residuals and led to a weight gain of about 5 lbs during the dieting phase). It seems awfully drastic to give up beer. I've done it before a couple times, but it's not very much fun.
What I've decided is this: this is seasonal fat. All I need is some short-term quick fix to tide me over until the grass starts growing again and I have to mow it every week. So I've decided to cut out the between-meal snacks. Particularly my habit of eating ~1/2 bag of potato chips every night right before bed. I finished up all my Halloween candy at work last week, so that should also help. And I did 60 situps while HannieC was in the tub. That'll probably hurt tomorrow.
I was going to photoblog the belly, but I decided against it. I'm not sure it would achieve the celebrity that other, less successful, bloggers' body parts have. If I really cared for my readers, I'd go out and buy a scale so that we could track my diet progress. But I don't really care.
And neither do you.
So then you goes to your boss and you says, "You know, I been thinkin' it over, and I think I wanna do this particular job." And then your boss says, "Hey, that's greeeaaaaat. Somebody really needs to do that. What an excellent opportunity."
But you can't help but think that in the split second between when you said you wanted to do that, and when she responded, there was kind of a startled look. And you wonder. Startled because it's so great to find just the perfect someone to do the job that no one wants, or startled because someone you had heard wasn't a complete dumb-ass just signed up for something for which all roads lead to great suffering and almost inevitable doom, a suicide mission? But you say, hey, my boss seems to genuinely care, and she'd tell me if she thought this was a big mistake.
And it's not until about a week later that you're sitting there in your little cube, an inhumane space not fit for human inhabitation yet somehow perfectly fit for keeping "resources", and you say to yourself, "Self, what is that smell?"
So you sniff around, and you realize it's coming from your foot. You examine the bottom of your boot, and there wedged deeply into the waffle, you see a big, steaming pile of "What did you volunteer for, you dumb-ass?"
And so it begins.
I realized yesterday that I've gotten fat. Like, somehow almost overnight, I have developed a big beer gut. I mean, I'm no JohnnyB, but at the rate things are going, I will be by summer. Last time this happened, I switched to diet soft drinks, and the gut immediately faded. But I never went back to non-diet soft drinks, so what is my next step?
I thought about it a lot. I wondered if I should give up beer for a while and do the patented GerryP vodka-tonic diet, only with diet-tonic (fixing the fatal flaw of the GerryP diet, which accidentally ended up substituting high fructose corn syrup for beer residuals and led to a weight gain of about 5 lbs during the dieting phase). It seems awfully drastic to give up beer. I've done it before a couple times, but it's not very much fun.
What I've decided is this: this is seasonal fat. All I need is some short-term quick fix to tide me over until the grass starts growing again and I have to mow it every week. So I've decided to cut out the between-meal snacks. Particularly my habit of eating ~1/2 bag of potato chips every night right before bed. I finished up all my Halloween candy at work last week, so that should also help. And I did 60 situps while HannieC was in the tub. That'll probably hurt tomorrow.
I was going to photoblog the belly, but I decided against it. I'm not sure it would achieve the celebrity that other, less successful, bloggers' body parts have. If I really cared for my readers, I'd go out and buy a scale so that we could track my diet progress. But I don't really care.
And neither do you.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Slow, Lingering Death
I hear Dr. Adlerberg, one of my oldest and dearest friends in the world, and his lovely wife had a baby on Saturday. I hear this from my wife, who heard it from his wife. Not from Dr. Adlerberg himself. Apparently, he's to worn out from the birth to send out an announcement. But, hey, I understand the suffering that is new babyhood. Congratulation to Dr. Adlerberg and JennyH.
We're mummifying a chicken. That's a non sequitur, in case you were wondering. We started on Saturday. It's a science/history project for HannieC's homeschooling. She's studying ancient Egypt, and the book has a mummification project. It seems pretty straight-forward. You start with a chicken, remove all the guts (which you can mummify, but the book says they'll still smell even after mummification (we chose to toss them)), wash it out with hot water, and then wash it with alcohol (it suggests isopropyl, but notes the real Egyptians used wine. I'll be damned if I'm wasting good drinking alcohol washing a chicken, though that bottle of peach schnappers hasn't been touched in years.).
Then, you make a mixture of 1 can of salt, 1/2 can of baking power, and 1/2 box of baking soda. To this you add nutmeg, cinnamon, and cloves. Then you stuff the chicken with it and put it in a baggy with the remainder. You change the mixture whenever it gets damp, which is after the first day, then like two days after that, and at progressively longer intervals for about 40 days. Then I dunno what happens, but it involves linen and olive oil. I'll let you know when we get there.
We did the second change of stuffing today.
HannieC named her chicken. She had been quizzing me about which end of the chicken was which, and she learned that the little hole was the head end, and the big hole was the butt end. Then, she named it, "Lucy."
When she heard the name, the Mrs. accused me of having named it. I don't know why.
Hey, I got my first payment ($111.81) from Google AdSense (the doods that put the ads on Me, CherkyB) on 11/27, a mere 8 months and one week after I started blogging. I'm pretty sure that won't even cover the amount of JD I've consumed while blogging during that time period, but I probably would have consumed roughly the same amount anyways. The Mrs. only threatened to divorce me due to excess blogging twice during that time, and only accused me of having an affair with a commenter once, so overall, I think it has been a big win.
Especially when you consider the joy and happiness I've brought to the world through my blog. Not to mention the great insight and learning.
A big win for everyone.
Let me thank you for your patronage. Well, let me thank those of you in California, New York, and Colorado, in that order, who have accounted for nearly 100% of my ad clicks over the last quarter. The rest of you can GFY.
It's poker night tonight. I'm not there. I would lose most of my AdSense earnings if I were, as MoodyT somehow always managed to bust me. I wish I didn't suck at poker, but I do. We can't smoke cigars during MoodyT's poker nights, hardly anyone drinks anything, and they're usually over by 10pm. It's very different from StinkyJ's poker nights.
I'm trying to figure out a way to make the title to this post relevant. I can't.
Such is life.
We're mummifying a chicken. That's a non sequitur, in case you were wondering. We started on Saturday. It's a science/history project for HannieC's homeschooling. She's studying ancient Egypt, and the book has a mummification project. It seems pretty straight-forward. You start with a chicken, remove all the guts (which you can mummify, but the book says they'll still smell even after mummification (we chose to toss them)), wash it out with hot water, and then wash it with alcohol (it suggests isopropyl, but notes the real Egyptians used wine. I'll be damned if I'm wasting good drinking alcohol washing a chicken, though that bottle of peach schnappers hasn't been touched in years.).
Then, you make a mixture of 1 can of salt, 1/2 can of baking power, and 1/2 box of baking soda. To this you add nutmeg, cinnamon, and cloves. Then you stuff the chicken with it and put it in a baggy with the remainder. You change the mixture whenever it gets damp, which is after the first day, then like two days after that, and at progressively longer intervals for about 40 days. Then I dunno what happens, but it involves linen and olive oil. I'll let you know when we get there.
We did the second change of stuffing today.
HannieC named her chicken. She had been quizzing me about which end of the chicken was which, and she learned that the little hole was the head end, and the big hole was the butt end. Then, she named it, "Lucy."
When she heard the name, the Mrs. accused me of having named it. I don't know why.
Hey, I got my first payment ($111.81) from Google AdSense (the doods that put the ads on Me, CherkyB) on 11/27, a mere 8 months and one week after I started blogging. I'm pretty sure that won't even cover the amount of JD I've consumed while blogging during that time period, but I probably would have consumed roughly the same amount anyways. The Mrs. only threatened to divorce me due to excess blogging twice during that time, and only accused me of having an affair with a commenter once, so overall, I think it has been a big win.
Especially when you consider the joy and happiness I've brought to the world through my blog. Not to mention the great insight and learning.
A big win for everyone.
Let me thank you for your patronage. Well, let me thank those of you in California, New York, and Colorado, in that order, who have accounted for nearly 100% of my ad clicks over the last quarter. The rest of you can GFY.
It's poker night tonight. I'm not there. I would lose most of my AdSense earnings if I were, as MoodyT somehow always managed to bust me. I wish I didn't suck at poker, but I do. We can't smoke cigars during MoodyT's poker nights, hardly anyone drinks anything, and they're usually over by 10pm. It's very different from StinkyJ's poker nights.
I'm trying to figure out a way to make the title to this post relevant. I can't.
Such is life.
Monday, December 04, 2006
Fascistic
fa·scis·tic 
[fuh-shis-tik] of or like fascism or fascists.
I don't know what it is with these idiots. I go out drinking with them dutifully every Thursday, and yet they accuse me of making up words. You'd think a bunch of neo-Marxist Democrats would have heard of the word "fascistic". You'd think they'd have used the word themselves numerous times in their rants about Bushilter. But then again, I'm not sure Air America even airs in the Fort TomCollins area.
Just to be fair, it's not obvious that the whole lot is a bunch of neo-Marxist Democrats. Back in San Schmose, the whole fat camp lot was. Except maybe the foreign guy. I'm not sure they officially let foreign nationals register to vote so as to be Democrats in California. Not unless you're the right kind of foreign, i.e., you don't have an education or any hope of a decent job or speak any English. Then you can register to vote all you want.
It's possible, for instance, that the Hamburgler is not a Democrat. And possibly El Torrito. The rest of the lot sure as hell is, though.
I was talking to Tinfoil today via IM, the deployment of which probably is responsible for $10 of the lost of value of The Company's stock, and he actually said this to me, "I need to drink more."
Yes, well, so do a lot of people. But the real leaders step up to the plate and do it. The others just talk about it. I'll follow-up next week to see if Tinfoil a leader or a talker be.
CJ is only allowed to Fat Camp once a month now, word has it.
Discovered that Cavitation is a mommyblogger! Only his blog seems to be about last week's Giants loss to the Titans cuz the guy didn't tackle the quarterback. And in his one and only post (oddly titled "Friggin' G-Men"), he made reference to me, CherkyB. If he could slip in a couple shots at The JohnnyB and then let me rename his blog, he has a shot at being the next Blog of the Week. (A title still held by Rhonda, since you keep the title until displaced.) If not, he'll remain on the watch list. But at least we'll all get to make fun of his momospherism. I'm not going to post a link, but I'm sure you can find it if you need to [nudge nudge wink wink].
I got to go to one of those "parent" things after work today. It was performance day at dance class, and what this entails is the kids dressing up in performance-like garb (which as far as I can tell means HannieC wears a tutu in addition to her leotard), and then having a normal dance class for the first 45 minutes where they practice their performance piece with all the parents watching, then they officially perform the piece twice in a row (roughly 1 minute long each time) with all the parents watching, and then they play freeze-dance for 5 minutes with all the parents watching (praying that this is the end), and then they do some other stupid game with all the parents watching (and praying), then they have cookies (amen). MaxieC got to participate in the freeze dance. I got to spend most of the time out in the playroom with him, with him bored out of his skull.
See, The Mrs. had handed me this big bag and said, "I brought lots of stuff for MaxieC to do for when he gets bored." But all she brought was books. Lots of books. One was a coloring book, but MaxieC didn't want to color. One was a Crayola Magic Finger Painting book, but MaxieC didn't want to finger paint. Everything else was a reading book, and he didn't want to read a book. I dug and dug and found a yo-yo. MaxieC is much too little to yo-yo, but I stood him up on a chair and tried to teach him. He had fun for about 2 minutes. Then he demanded "something to play with".
Luckily, a little girl about MaxieC's age showed up with a toy barn, a horse, a lion, and a unicorn. She sat at the little table, so MaxieC started running in circles around the table. Circling his prey? She looked at me and said, "He's running around the table."
Yup.
"I want him to play with me."
Hey MaxieC, why don't you play with this little girl?
He sat down on the other side of the table. She handed him the lion and said, "See this black spot. I drew this on it. Then my daddy yelled at me and I cried and he sent me to bed. It wasn't fair."
MaxieC did not respond. Good boy. Don't let them draw you in to their little victimization mind-games.
Then she started talking about her unicorn. She said, "This horse has this funny bump on its head. I don't know why, but it doesn't come off. It's stuck there."
MaxieC said, "That's a unicorn, not a horse."
The girl said, "I don't know what this bump is."
MaxieC said, "That's a horn. It's a unicorn, not a horse."
She said, "It's the baby horse."
Then MaxieC looks at me as if to say, "Jesus H., pops, this place is lousy with Democrats." Then he looks the girl straight in the eye and goes, "It's the sister, not the baby."
I'm still glad he didn't just say, "It's your momma."
On the way home from dance, HannieC rode with me. She was very excited as she found one nail and many nail holes in the mantel over the fambly room fireplace, and she wanted to move the Christmas stocking in there. Except we'd also have to move the Christmas tree. Then she was very concerned that Santa might come down the wrong chimney, as he was clearly used to coming down the fambly room chimney, and we were putting our stockings in the living room (having four fireplaces is problematic for the Santa thing). Then she was concerned that we were just laying our stocking on the floor, and Santa might not see them and accidentally step on them and get them all sooty if he came down the chimney feet first. She was also very concerned that Santa couldn't get in through our fireplaces, as they are gas fireplaces that have a fixed glass panel across the front. Man, the lies you are forced to make up on the fly for this Santa business, it's starting to really weigh on my conscience. She better figure this out soon, or I'll crack.
I'll probably at some point have to tell her that "Democrat" is not a synonym for "moron", but is actually a synonym for "self-hating megalomaniac". But let the little kid have her dreams, right?
[fuh-shis-tik] of or like fascism or fascists.I don't know what it is with these idiots. I go out drinking with them dutifully every Thursday, and yet they accuse me of making up words. You'd think a bunch of neo-Marxist Democrats would have heard of the word "fascistic". You'd think they'd have used the word themselves numerous times in their rants about Bushilter. But then again, I'm not sure Air America even airs in the Fort TomCollins area.
Just to be fair, it's not obvious that the whole lot is a bunch of neo-Marxist Democrats. Back in San Schmose, the whole fat camp lot was. Except maybe the foreign guy. I'm not sure they officially let foreign nationals register to vote so as to be Democrats in California. Not unless you're the right kind of foreign, i.e., you don't have an education or any hope of a decent job or speak any English. Then you can register to vote all you want.
It's possible, for instance, that the Hamburgler is not a Democrat. And possibly El Torrito. The rest of the lot sure as hell is, though.
I was talking to Tinfoil today via IM, the deployment of which probably is responsible for $10 of the lost of value of The Company's stock, and he actually said this to me, "I need to drink more."
Yes, well, so do a lot of people. But the real leaders step up to the plate and do it. The others just talk about it. I'll follow-up next week to see if Tinfoil a leader or a talker be.
CJ is only allowed to Fat Camp once a month now, word has it.
Discovered that Cavitation is a mommyblogger! Only his blog seems to be about last week's Giants loss to the Titans cuz the guy didn't tackle the quarterback. And in his one and only post (oddly titled "Friggin' G-Men"), he made reference to me, CherkyB. If he could slip in a couple shots at The JohnnyB and then let me rename his blog, he has a shot at being the next Blog of the Week. (A title still held by Rhonda, since you keep the title until displaced.) If not, he'll remain on the watch list. But at least we'll all get to make fun of his momospherism. I'm not going to post a link, but I'm sure you can find it if you need to [nudge nudge wink wink].
I got to go to one of those "parent" things after work today. It was performance day at dance class, and what this entails is the kids dressing up in performance-like garb (which as far as I can tell means HannieC wears a tutu in addition to her leotard), and then having a normal dance class for the first 45 minutes where they practice their performance piece with all the parents watching, then they officially perform the piece twice in a row (roughly 1 minute long each time) with all the parents watching, and then they play freeze-dance for 5 minutes with all the parents watching (praying that this is the end), and then they do some other stupid game with all the parents watching (and praying), then they have cookies (amen). MaxieC got to participate in the freeze dance. I got to spend most of the time out in the playroom with him, with him bored out of his skull.
See, The Mrs. had handed me this big bag and said, "I brought lots of stuff for MaxieC to do for when he gets bored." But all she brought was books. Lots of books. One was a coloring book, but MaxieC didn't want to color. One was a Crayola Magic Finger Painting book, but MaxieC didn't want to finger paint. Everything else was a reading book, and he didn't want to read a book. I dug and dug and found a yo-yo. MaxieC is much too little to yo-yo, but I stood him up on a chair and tried to teach him. He had fun for about 2 minutes. Then he demanded "something to play with".
Luckily, a little girl about MaxieC's age showed up with a toy barn, a horse, a lion, and a unicorn. She sat at the little table, so MaxieC started running in circles around the table. Circling his prey? She looked at me and said, "He's running around the table."
Yup.
"I want him to play with me."
Hey MaxieC, why don't you play with this little girl?
He sat down on the other side of the table. She handed him the lion and said, "See this black spot. I drew this on it. Then my daddy yelled at me and I cried and he sent me to bed. It wasn't fair."
MaxieC did not respond. Good boy. Don't let them draw you in to their little victimization mind-games.
Then she started talking about her unicorn. She said, "This horse has this funny bump on its head. I don't know why, but it doesn't come off. It's stuck there."
MaxieC said, "That's a unicorn, not a horse."
The girl said, "I don't know what this bump is."
MaxieC said, "That's a horn. It's a unicorn, not a horse."
She said, "It's the baby horse."
Then MaxieC looks at me as if to say, "Jesus H., pops, this place is lousy with Democrats." Then he looks the girl straight in the eye and goes, "It's the sister, not the baby."
I'm still glad he didn't just say, "It's your momma."
On the way home from dance, HannieC rode with me. She was very excited as she found one nail and many nail holes in the mantel over the fambly room fireplace, and she wanted to move the Christmas stocking in there. Except we'd also have to move the Christmas tree. Then she was very concerned that Santa might come down the wrong chimney, as he was clearly used to coming down the fambly room chimney, and we were putting our stockings in the living room (having four fireplaces is problematic for the Santa thing). Then she was concerned that we were just laying our stocking on the floor, and Santa might not see them and accidentally step on them and get them all sooty if he came down the chimney feet first. She was also very concerned that Santa couldn't get in through our fireplaces, as they are gas fireplaces that have a fixed glass panel across the front. Man, the lies you are forced to make up on the fly for this Santa business, it's starting to really weigh on my conscience. She better figure this out soon, or I'll crack.
I'll probably at some point have to tell her that "Democrat" is not a synonym for "moron", but is actually a synonym for "self-hating megalomaniac". But let the little kid have her dreams, right?
Saturday, December 02, 2006
Incoherent Rambling
Some days, you really have something good, and some days you just do it out of obligation.
That's a blogging-marriage metaphor, in case it was too obscure for you. Sometimes I wonder if being a Me, CherkyB reader actually lowers your IQ, or if it's just you.
I'm not going to warn of a CJ-quality post tonight, because last time I did that, I ripped out a masterpiece. But here we are at paragraph three, and I still haven't thought of anything much to say. And I've already insulted both my readers and CJ. That doesn't bode well. I've pretty much got that old standby of insulting The JohnnyB in my back pocket in case of emergencies, but after that, the well is dry.
We'll have to see if my good friend JackyD thinks of anything for me to write about along the way. Until then, I'll fake it.
We've been having a bit of a cold spell here in the Fort TomCollins area. We've had snow on the ground for 5 days now, which I am told is unusual. I've now gotten a good feel for the excitement that is driving a pickup truck on hard-pack snow and ice in rear-wheel drive mode. These uphill starts from stoplights on highly crowned roads are a bit problematic, since they neither plow nor salt anything other than main streets around here. But, hey, my years of driving in snow and ice in the Barfalo/Rottenchester metro areas have really paid off. In the five days, I have only made a right turn and ended up facing left once. And that was one of those "this is a really big intersection with no traffic at all, and I wonder if I can power slide through the turn like a sprint car" kind of things.
The answer, as it turns out, is no. Same answer I got about 18 years ago when I was driving a friend's IROC-Z back from bowling league in the rain (cuz he was too drunk to drive it), and he yelled, "Punch it!" when I was making a left on campus, and, well, I had never driven an IROC-Z before, and I punched it, and I ended up facing right. I learned then that when you are driving drunk people home, it's often not the best idea to take their advice on how to drive.
I think we won the championship that year.
So The Mrs. had me come home from work early on Friday to take HannieC and her friend from across the street, LizzyS, sledding. Our subdivision sit atop a hill, looking down upon the riff-raff that is "the meadows" below (though the meadows has recently added a golf course in an attempt to raise their level of cachet), and there is a whole bunch of open space up front isolating the housing plots from the main drag. There's an OK-sized hill (perfect for a 6-year old) up there, and so we all piled in the pickup and headed there. I mostly kept the truck in 4wd mode so as to not do anything too exciting with The Kiddies on board.
The hill turned out to be pretty good, but the girlies turned out to be a couple of lazy, flabby babies. They went down the hill maybe 10 times each, and then they kinda just stood there looking stupid and complaining of being bored. Then, along came a couple boys who were going over the jump (made of plywood and 2x4's) and one of them was riding a snowboard instead of a sled. They sat and watched the boys for like 20 minutes, then got bored again and asked to go home.
Then, naturally, they had a discussion about how tomorrow was Saturday, and they could go sledding for the entire day.
Riiiiight.
That's a blogging-marriage metaphor, in case it was too obscure for you. Sometimes I wonder if being a Me, CherkyB reader actually lowers your IQ, or if it's just you.
I'm not going to warn of a CJ-quality post tonight, because last time I did that, I ripped out a masterpiece. But here we are at paragraph three, and I still haven't thought of anything much to say. And I've already insulted both my readers and CJ. That doesn't bode well. I've pretty much got that old standby of insulting The JohnnyB in my back pocket in case of emergencies, but after that, the well is dry.
We'll have to see if my good friend JackyD thinks of anything for me to write about along the way. Until then, I'll fake it.
We've been having a bit of a cold spell here in the Fort TomCollins area. We've had snow on the ground for 5 days now, which I am told is unusual. I've now gotten a good feel for the excitement that is driving a pickup truck on hard-pack snow and ice in rear-wheel drive mode. These uphill starts from stoplights on highly crowned roads are a bit problematic, since they neither plow nor salt anything other than main streets around here. But, hey, my years of driving in snow and ice in the Barfalo/Rottenchester metro areas have really paid off. In the five days, I have only made a right turn and ended up facing left once. And that was one of those "this is a really big intersection with no traffic at all, and I wonder if I can power slide through the turn like a sprint car" kind of things.
The answer, as it turns out, is no. Same answer I got about 18 years ago when I was driving a friend's IROC-Z back from bowling league in the rain (cuz he was too drunk to drive it), and he yelled, "Punch it!" when I was making a left on campus, and, well, I had never driven an IROC-Z before, and I punched it, and I ended up facing right. I learned then that when you are driving drunk people home, it's often not the best idea to take their advice on how to drive.
I think we won the championship that year.
So The Mrs. had me come home from work early on Friday to take HannieC and her friend from across the street, LizzyS, sledding. Our subdivision sit atop a hill, looking down upon the riff-raff that is "the meadows" below (though the meadows has recently added a golf course in an attempt to raise their level of cachet), and there is a whole bunch of open space up front isolating the housing plots from the main drag. There's an OK-sized hill (perfect for a 6-year old) up there, and so we all piled in the pickup and headed there. I mostly kept the truck in 4wd mode so as to not do anything too exciting with The Kiddies on board.
The hill turned out to be pretty good, but the girlies turned out to be a couple of lazy, flabby babies. They went down the hill maybe 10 times each, and then they kinda just stood there looking stupid and complaining of being bored. Then, along came a couple boys who were going over the jump (made of plywood and 2x4's) and one of them was riding a snowboard instead of a sled. They sat and watched the boys for like 20 minutes, then got bored again and asked to go home.
Then, naturally, they had a discussion about how tomorrow was Saturday, and they could go sledding for the entire day.
Riiiiight.
HannieC, Demagogue
On Wednesday, I was looking for a DVD to load up for The Childrens in the basement TV room, and I saw that we had Elf. This is what next transpired:
Me, CherkyB: Hey, we've got Elf. Did you get it from the library?How about that.
HannieC: Yeah. It's a great movie, except it has this Democrat elf who sneaks into Santa's bag when Santa visits, and Santa takes him to the North Pole and makes him an elf and raises him.
Me, CherkyB: How do you know he's a Democrat?
HannieC: Well, there's this time when he goes to a big city and he eats bird poop! He thinks bird poop is candy! That's just so stupid. It's like he's being really Democratty Democrat. That's what Democrats do.
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
I've Got Nothing
I gotta tell you, it's been nice being back at work finally. It's a lot less hectic than being at home on vacation with the fambly. I even got back all rejuvenated and found myself caring about work. Actually caring. Someone today even accused me of "being all worked up" about the quality of our cache power rollup and how this showed that I cared about getting things right.
Then, of course, I talked to StinkyJ, and he reminded me in his inimitable, subtle way, why it is that caring about work is a giant waste of emotion. I'm sure that wasn't his intention, but he's not much of a motivational speaker. We actually go so far as to try to prevent him from giving motivational speeches when there is trouble brewing at work.
We got a couple inches of snow today at the homestead, and I went out after dinner to play in it with HannieC. MaxieC refused to go out because it was "too dark", though oddly he got up at 5am this morning and declared "it's light out and time to get up" when it was equally dark. HannieC, also in her inimitable style, decided to ride the tire swing. She decided to spin around in it really fast. Right after dinner.
So our time in the snow ended with barfing through the hole in the tire swing. Going to work apparently just caused everyone to save it up for when I get home. I'm sure the dog will be out there tomorrow cleaning that up.
He likes ham.
Then, of course, I talked to StinkyJ, and he reminded me in his inimitable, subtle way, why it is that caring about work is a giant waste of emotion. I'm sure that wasn't his intention, but he's not much of a motivational speaker. We actually go so far as to try to prevent him from giving motivational speeches when there is trouble brewing at work.
We got a couple inches of snow today at the homestead, and I went out after dinner to play in it with HannieC. MaxieC refused to go out because it was "too dark", though oddly he got up at 5am this morning and declared "it's light out and time to get up" when it was equally dark. HannieC, also in her inimitable style, decided to ride the tire swing. She decided to spin around in it really fast. Right after dinner.
So our time in the snow ended with barfing through the hole in the tire swing. Going to work apparently just caused everyone to save it up for when I get home. I'm sure the dog will be out there tomorrow cleaning that up.
He likes ham.
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