And we're back!

Hey! I'm NOT dead! Isn't that great?

I'll do a little version of 'hitting to all fields' now.

Am I becoming a flight snob now?

I've just recently returned from a one night (and next day) work trip to Miami. As expected, it was hotter than Hell. Work-wise, it went well, which is nice. I took an early flight back (yeah!) but first was full so no upgrade (boo!) but what are you gonna do?

I'll take that deal every day of the week and twice on Sunday

Since our sitter (who is great, btw) was on vacation last week, I took last week as a vacation week and watched the sprout all week long. It was a pretty amazing experience, spending so much time with her. I'm glad I did it. It only reinforced my thought that (if the $ were not an object...) I would be a stay at home parent, no doubt.

That smell on the DC Metro? That was me.

The week before that, I spent a week in SCADA training in Washington, D.C. Now, I've always wanted to go there and see the National Mall and all the memorials and all that. And this was the perfect occasion to do so. Training was Wed--->Fri so I flew out Tuesday morning and did some site-seeing for the rest of the day. I took the DC Metro from Vienna, VA, into the city. I walked around for almost 6 hours. It was hotter than Hell and I was major-league sweating. I'm sure by the end of the day, I reeked. It was so bad I washed the clothes at the hotel.

Now that everyone's grossed out...

I have to say, DC was amazing. I saw the Air & Space Museum, Capital Building, White House, Supreme Court, Washington Monument, FDR, Jefferson, and Lincoln Memorials. Vietnam Wall, Korean War Memorial, and the new WW II Memorial. I also saw the Holocaust Museum.

Someone with my same first and last name is on the Vietnam Wall. I plan to see what I can find out about him.

Since 9/11, all the areas around the White House are pretty locked down. You can't even walk up to the fence anymore. What a drag. I did take a zoomed in picture of some guys standing watch on the roof though, which was kinda cool.

All in all, it was a great trip. Even greater since I earned the certification I was there for in the first place. But what stays with me is the memorials to so many of the people that made this country what it is. I don't think they make people like that anymore.

It's a whole new ballgame.

Boy, I haven't posted in a while. At least, beyond the different question/answer stuff I post now and then. Anyways, some catching up to do.

Our little one is now scuffling around the floor and pulling herself up to stand against just about anything. It's pretty amazing to see. It seems so cliche to say that time has gone by so fast, but it does not seem so long ago that we were at the hospital begging her to eat a half an ounce so we could finally take her home. Now, she's eating Stage 2 foods and regularly draining her bottle. Last night (and this morning) I went into her room in response to her making some noises to find her standing up in her crib and clutching onto the top railing. It's simply amazing.

Work has been pretty busy. I have not been traveling as much as I used to but I have a trip on tap for June. Ottawa, Canada for a week. At least it's not over Father's Day. I'm not sure what there is to see there but if there is I'm sure we (I am going with someone from work) will see it. No baseball team though, so that's too bad.

I've found that the combination of watching Tivo and listening to my iPod in the car has totally made me intolerant of commercials. I just can't stand them. If they could find some way to target them towards things I actually use, that's fine. But the majority of them are for beer (no thanks) or insurance (already have it in multiple forms) or for other products that I have no use for. Just about the only ones I enjoy are the funny ones (a rarity) or ones advertising new products like a new dish at Olive Garden or something. There has to be a better way, because literally 95% of the ones I see are for stuff I have never and would never purchase.

I think much like a person who drives in a ton of traffic ever day becomes numbed to it, and a person who doesn't gets bothered by the slightest amount of traffic, I can't stand commercials at all because most of the time I don't have to listen to them.

On that subject, when I listen to the Cubs games on the radio commercials are unavoidable. There's a beer commercial (at least I think it might be Old Style) where a guy talks about 'local traditions' with the catchphrase "It's a local thing"...the only problem is that these commercials are so annoying AND it seems like the guy is just reading various bits of Chicago trivia off of a script. I can't stand them.

Some days I find myself getting really annoyed at the smallest thing. Maybe I'm too busy at work or not getting enough sleep. Who knows, but I'm sure it's annoying my wife and friends.

I was able to order this, which I was very happy about. Wedge is one of my favorite characters.

I've decided that instead of aiming at last year's model of LCD TV I will most likely choose this year's model, which has 3 HDMI inputs. I'll mostly likely get it from Grants and try to get a good price and financing. Timeframe is TBD because I still haven't found a nice stand for it. I think the TV will end up getting mounted to the wall. I think this will make the front room look bigger. (oh yeah, and my 30th is months away...)

After looking at the ticket stub I have for Borat (dated 11/10/2006) I discovered it's been some time since I've seen a movie. I would like to see Spider-Man 3, Fantastic Four 2, and Pirates 3 and Shrek 3 can go hang for all I care, since I can't stand Shrek. Oh yeah, and I WILL go see Transformers on or around the release date. Hello, it's the original voice of Prime!

Podcasts I listen to:

Tony Kornheiser show on Washington Post Radio
Official Lost Podcast
Battlestar Galactica Podcast
Jim Butcher.com Butcherblock Podcast
ESPN's Eye of the Sportsguy Podcast

Baby-fresh Scent

baby dazed

Picture time...



More later.

September Showers

We had our baby shower this past Sunday. It was at the same place as our wedding shower. When we got there the room was hot so I went back home and got a fan so Court wouldn't be too warm. Unfortunately, the fact that I wore a Bears jersey under my shirt made me constantly sweat the whole day. Oh well, at least they won.

We got a ton of stuff. Today we'll be going to get our baby furniture. Amazon points, baby!

The shower was nice. The whole thing is really not my deal. I'm uncomfortable with being (near to, anyways, since Court is the real center) the center of attention with these types of things. Add in all the baby stuff on top of that. I wonder why we need so many of these baby outfits considering sometimes it seems we do laundry so often I wear the same 3 pairs of socks every week. There seems to be some type of device for every baby scenario, and I'm sure the stuff we have barely scratches the surface. It's amazing.

I got to see my Godson, which was nice. Pretty soon there will be a lot of babies/children around with our kid, my Nephew, and my Godson. I've said before that I am not much good around babies since it seems they are just really fragile and holding one is just an excercise in making sure you don't drop it. I can't wait for them to get older.

My BIL tells me that once our baby comes I'll really start to understand it all. I'm sure he's right but I can't stop thinking about what my Dad thought/felt when it came to me (and my sister) and how things ended up working out as they have. I already know I've done things I can't imagine my Dad would ever do (registering for a baby shower, I don't think so) but what's that mean, really? The true test is being a real *team* with your wife (or husband) and facing things together...a case where my dad (seemingly) made things worse rather than better.

I find myself looking forward to our kid really coming into his/her own rather than just being something that's passed around like the most fragile thing ever.