It was a, how shall I put this, fast paced Saturday for us. First, I ran my second 5K of the year in the morning. The last race I ran was longer than 3.1 miles, and this one might have been shorter because I came in at less than 27 minutes, and I wasn’t running hard enough to clock that good of a time. Oh, and I’ve been running like once a week, so it’s not like I’m on some great training regimen that cut my time down.
Well, somehow C. turned one today. Was it really a year ago that we dropped M. off at her grandparents' house and took S. in for a c-section? In some ways it seems like a lot longer than that. In others, the time has really raced by. The last two or three weeks have been pretty amazing. Not that she was developmentally delayed in any way, but she has suddenly blossomed.
Last week I bought a new cell phone. Not a huge deal, since something like 180 billion cell phones are sold each day. My old phone was actually in fine shape, for the most part. But after almost three years, it took as long as 30 seconds before an out-going call would connect with the network. I spent a ton of time last week scrolling through Verizon’s site, looking at the phones that are available, the discounts I qualify for, and then reading reviews of the phones on about a dozen different sites.
We’re in the midst of having quite a bit of work done around the house. It should all be wrapped up by the end of the week, and then I’ll share what we’ve done and post some pics to Flickr so you can see. So we’re pretty busy and I haven’t had a chance to wrap up a few posts I’ve started. But I did want to share some news on the girls.
9 - Not On Our Watch - Don Cheadle and John Prendergast. A book, and I know this will surprise you, about Darfur and activism, written by two of the most notable and active members of the movement. Don Cheadle you should all know. Actor in Boogie Nights, the Oceans movies, and Hotel Rwanda. Prendergast has worked in the White House, Congress, and UN with a focus on African issues and now works with several NGOs that are attempting to end the genocide in Darfur as well as near genocides in Somalia, Uganda, and Congo.
As I’ve mentioned, I’ve been working hard to get the music of the Beatles deeply ingrained in my daughters' heads. I figure if they get a solid base of Beatles, even with whatever regrettable music they listen to in their teen years (Hey, I’m just as guilty as the next person), they’ll eventually gravitate towards good music and be better people because of it. We now have a new lunchtime routine, at least on the days when S.
Even though it’s been nearly three years, when I hear M. yell out to me, “Daddy!” it still sounds a little strange. Me, a dad? But it also sounds magical, magnificent, amazing, etc. etc. etc.
I am now in possession of business cards that identify me as a writer and editor. Yikes, that sounds a little strange. More about the process of actually getting the cards in a second. I realized when they were delivered Sunday (Sunday delivery, very nice!) that this was kind of a big deal. I had business cards back when I worked the The Big C Corp. However, those were a bit of a let down.
Every baseball fan remembers You Make the Call. I think it should apply to real life as well. So here’s my conundrum. Friday, I was out running errands and sitting at a red light near a middle school as the kids were getting out. A series of buses were making the left turn onto my street. After my light turned green, the next bus continued through the light and made its turn.
Books, books, and more books. 5 - The Audacity of Hope - Barack Obama. I have a problem with books written by politicians, even those politicians I like. I can’t stop thinking about how they’re angling, positioning, and posturing. It’s hard for me to separate the words on the page from the next office they will seek. This book was no different. The entire time, I kept thinking, “This man is running for president.
I tried to dig through the archives a bit today to find an old post about the kid who, one day at the Carter’s store, just came up to me and started talking and asking questions, every sentence prefaced with the word “Hey.” M. is in that mode now. It’s fun for about five minutes. Seriously, listen to a kid say “Hey…” every ten seconds for five minutes and see if the cuteness doesn’t wear off really, really quick.
A lot of ground to cover and, suddenly, nothing but time to do so. Here goes. 3000 words? We’ll see. Grab a beverage and dive in at your leisure. A commenter asked Friday how I was celebrating the end of my grad school classes. Well, here’s what I did. First, I grabbed a big, fat carnitas burrito at Chipotle. Normally, I go with the vegetarian burrito. I figured I owed myself a little pork.
Just put the finishing touches on my final article. Kind of a shitty ending to it, but, you know what? I don’t care that much. Just glad to be done. I’ll print it off and drive it down to campus in a little while, and then I will have finished my grad school requirements. How about that? Seems like we have some things to talk about. Barry Bonds. Curt Schilling’s sock.
Tonight was my last class. Ever? I sure as hell hope so. I always said I would never go back to grad school, because undergrad was enough of a chore. Yet I did return for my Master’s. However, I think it’s safe to say unless they invent a Ph. D. that doesn’t require some kind of quantitative research, the next step is not in my future. My final article is due Friday, and I’m plugging away at that.
We braved the grocery store with both girls today. Normally I do the shopping while S. stays home with them. It was a typical day with two kids: C. was fussy the first 15 minutes we were in the store; as soon as her mood improved, M. started acting up. Loads of fun. While I was in line to check out, S. found a fountain with goldfish in it that kept M.
That’s what my father-in-law was calling me today, professor. The exciting entry on my calendar today was serving as a guest speaker at a local high school on the crisis/genocide in Darfur. Yes, as scary as it may sound, I was imparting wisdom on the future leaders of this country. And at the swankiest high school in the city, too. I corrupted the best and brightest! So how did this strange event come about?
It’s opening day, excuse me, Opening Day. I’m preparing for a ten hour orgy of baseball with a little college hoops thrown in for good measure. S. is working tonight, so I’ve already instructed the girls that there will be no nonsense tonight as daddy gets his baseball on. I’ve already got ESPN on, and checked in on a few games on MLB Audio. The Internets are a beautiful thing. I think the Royals are going to surprise a lot of people this year.
I think I’ve shared this before, but since it’s being repeated more and more, it deserves another mention. M. has this strange habit of calling certain things “the peoples’….” The most common example is “the peoples’ water.” She always wants “the peoples’ water.” We have no idea where this came from. I’ve actually paid attention to some of her shows this week to see if I can pick the reference up there, but have yet to find a connection.
On our last trip to the library, we picked up a CD of Beatles songs sung by kids. A lot of them are completely intolerable to adults, but hey, I had to start indoctrinating the girls with good music. Each time we hop into the family truckster for a journey somewhere, M. asks, “Are we listening to Beatles music, daddy?” This morning, C. and I were watching VH1 Classic while waiting for M.
The end of the season always sucks. Unless your team is the last one standing, in our winner-takes-all world, we too easily forget about the bulk of the season and focus on the ending. And in most cases, endings are never good. Is it better to lose by 50? To lose by one at the buzzer? Something in between? Any way the season ends and something that brought us great joy has been taken away.
Worst Game Ever And I have no idea how I’m going to sleep tonight. I hate grinders. There’s nothing fun about them. Granted, I’m just happy with the win this time of year. But if we’re going to win by three, I’d much rather it be 82-79, or something that actually resembles modern basketball like that. There was a point, midway through the second half, where I started to feel like the hoop gods were rearing their ancient heads and preparing to punish us again.
It was 80 here today. Yet we still have a pile of month-old snow out in front of our house. Well, all good things must come to an end. Or so the cliche tells us. This blog is going to die a quick, unsympathetic death in about a month. Don’t worry, I’ll still be blogging and filling your free time with the genius that is me, just not here. I’ve been frustrated by many aspects of Typepad over the last six months or so.
Is there any way we can just have Kansas and Texas play every week? We would be guaranteed something great every time, based on what we’ve been treated to over the past eight days. What a game in OKC on Sunday. Unlike the previous game, which determined the regular season champion and the top three seeds for the conference tournament, this one really was for little more than pride. If that’s what it was for, every player on the court played for every ounce of their pride rather than coast until the games really matter next week.
It’s been a fantastic music year, so far. The Shins’ new album is excellent, as are those from The Broken West, Feist, and Son Volt. Leaked tracks from new albums by Modest Mouse, Wilco, and Maximo Park all show tremendous promise. Lurking in the distance is a new Radiohead album. However, so far this year it’s been all about the new Arcade Fire album, Neon Bible, which was officially released today.
Collected semi-coherent ramblings after Saturday’s Kansas-Texas game. What’s the old saying, there are two sports in Texas: football and spring football? That can be applied to about any level or school in Texas. High school, the University of Texas or Texas A&M. That may be changing a little, with the emergence of Texas over the past 7-8 years and the more recent ascent of A&M in basketball. It’s not fair, in a way, that Texas fans got to watch Vince Young for three years and now get to watch Kevin Durant.
Well, the blogger and his girls survived the weekend without the wife/mom. There were only a couple blow-ups each day, most involving M. refusing my orders to 1) Keep her hands off of her sister’s head, 2) stop touching her sister’s face, 3) stop pushing/pulling her sister, or 4) just getting the hell away from her sister. At least we were both consistent, me in my orders and her in her refusal to follow them.
Nothing too special to report about day one. The girls were, for the most part, well-behaved. M. had a 30 minute period where she refused to stop touching C.’s head, no matter how many times I told her to stop. When I was trying to get everyone out the door for a quick trip to Target after dinner, she asked me if we were going to Costco at least 8000 times.
S. left for her girls’ trip bright and early this morning. Not even bright and early; she left the house before 5:00. Yikes. It’s just me and the girls for the next 96 hours, give or take. This is my first time with the girls for this long, believe it or not. I’ve lucked out with S.’s schedule at work changing a year or so ago and she no longer working any 24 hour shifts.
Last week included a couple important firsts. First (uh-huh, uh-huh) C. now has some teeth. As of Sunday evening, depending on your definition, she had between two and six teeth. Her two front, top teeth were the first to pop through and are very visible now. One of her other upper teeth is peeking through. Then, at least two bottom teeth had pushed through by this afternoon, although it was tough to see them.
I love those random moments when you remember someone from your past and it makes you laugh and smile. Today, while unloading the dishwasher or folding laundry or some other domestic chore I tackle with aplomb, I suddenly remembered my boy Pops. I know a few of you remember Pops, too, but for those who have no idea who Pops is, skip down to the jump and read more. I spent the better part of the 90s working at a warehouse in Lenexa, KS, shipping hardware supplies to stores around the country (Later, when I switched to the night shift, I got to drive a forklift all night.