The Daily Diversion Archive For November, 2003

Thursday November 7, 2003

For all of you who want to see more pictures of August, click this link. Nick has been good enough to install this lovely program on our little server. Just click on the link, click on the gallery and look at some photos. If you have the time, check out the slideshow option as well.

I'm feeling as though I should write something. My creative tank is full, but I'm a bit tapped for energy.

August is a pretty good baby. We had some feeding issues early on and he was a bit jaundiced when we brought him home. The jaundice made him a bit difficult to deal with, but presently his skin tone is healthy pink and he's pretty easy to deal with. We're getting into the swing of things as far as feeding. He's getting to be a healthy eater. He seems to be a bit upside down as to when he thinks night is. He sleeps a lot during the day and he's very up and aware at night.

He's smiled a couple of times. Sure, it could have been gas, but we're going to take it as a bit of a grin. He does get the knives of gas every once in a while, but they're almost always manageable. His worst night was his first one home when neither of us got a wink of sleep.

We are sleeping better and my wife has been doing the overnights. August sleeps enough for Sarah to catch a few winks at night, but mostly Sarah sleeps after I get up to take care of the baby. So if you're thinking of calling her at home, please wait until after 10 or so. I'd say I'm still getting about 5 or 6 hours a night, but Sarah's getting about the same, including her naps. I don't nap. I never really have.

I wish I could say some more stuff, but the baby is pretty much the only thing that's going on. Sure, there's the minutia of life to talk about-- because of the fact that baby is all, it makes the non-baby stuff I do seem like a big deal. I washed my car yesterday. I went to the electronics store. I went to Dunn Bros. to get some coffee beans. Celebes, ground for a cone, please.

Actually, the coffee thing is big. Sarah's been off her coffee for most of her pregnancy. During her first two trimesters, she had no taste for coffee at all. During her third trimester, she was able to enjoy lattes and decaf every once in a while. Now that she's had the baby, she not only likes coffee again, she wants coffee again. While she's not been drinking it, I've not been brewing it here at the house. I've just been catching a cup at work, but most of my caffeine intake has been soda. It's nice to have a big, black cup of coffee again. What's better is to be able to share it with Sarah.

I've been looking at TiVo again. I've also been considering buying a cheapie DVD player. We have 5 devices that play DVDs here at the house. Only one of them is a machine that can attach to the TV without dragging a laptop or a whole PC around. I think we could use a small one for the small TV in the bedroom. The kid will eventually sleep in the crib and when he does, it would be nice to be able to keep an eye on him while we watch a movie or three.

TiVo is just a damn good idea. I've been thinking seriously about it after about a solid week of TV here at the house. Let's face it, folks. TV sucks. Sure, I know that commericals pay for the content being broadcast, but I don't care. I hate to channel surf. I don't like to watch a lot of TV, but since the baby is dictating our schedule, we watch it. It's mostly for noise, but it's also a way to keep yourself awake when you'd much rather be asleep. I don't like to watch all the ads. They're loud, they're annoying and I really don't like to expose myself to that kind of crap. The power to skip the commericals, the power to watch what you WANT to watch when you want to watch it and the power to snag stuff off cable that you might want to watch is key. TV will become a much more active process. That's good.

Monday November 16, 2003

What's cool?

Cable TV in all the bedrooms, video cards that work and baby boys.

What sucks?

Dead video cards, the effects of sleep deprivation and gloomy weather.

We moved the TV room from the smallest bedroom to the bigger bedroom. It's nice to have the space. We also had the two uncabled bedrooms wired for cable. It's nice. I watched the Vikes get their asses handed to them from our bed. I didn't sleep because the game wasn't boring. It was interesting to see how the Vikes would shoot themselves in the foot this time. They seem to find new and interesting ways to lose games. What a waste of time.

My video card finally gave up the ghost. It was a stormy 10 months of service. The first one made it a month when the fan's blades slipped down its axle. The blades then started hitting the heat sink and that made a TON of noise. I took it back to my favorite local PC parts place and they swapped me for a new one. Three months later, I started having trouble with my machine. I took the machine apart and found the GPU fan had stopped. It had been dead for quite some time. It had been dead so long that the paper top that covered the top of the fan had started to yellow. Heat had built up so that the adhesive glue that held the small heat sinks to the RAM chips had become soft. This caused the two heat sinks on the bottom side of the card to fall off. One hit the bottom of the case, the other hit the back side of my TV tuner card and blew out the audio section.

Worse yet, I had dead stripes in DOS screens. I couldn't read the BIOS pages, nor could I read the startup pages in Win2k and XP. The computer was crashy and I was constantly fighting it to do dual displays. Well, it had been two weeks since I'd even logged on to it when I sat down at it this weekend. I did some updates and rebooted. The damn thing didn't come back up.

I swapped out the video card with another, far lesser one I had laying around and everything was absolutely fine. Not as nice looking, to be sure, but fine. That's really not too cool.

I've carped enough. If anyone out there wants to pony up a couple of Bens for a just-back-from-the-bleeding-edge video card, I'd be good with that. I need a TV card as well. Dammit.

Tuesday November 25, 2003

What's cool?

Friends who bring you excellent dinners, sleep and snow.

What sucks?

Shovelling snow, that gauzy sleep-dep feeling and headaches.

Our friends Stephanie and Barry came over last night bearing some of the best salmon I've ever tasted. You guys rock. Big thanks for dinner.

It's getting to the point where sleep is starting to feel really, really good. I'm not getting much of it, you see. A person takes for granted what they can readily have. Once it becomes rare, an appreciation of it's former abundance is gained.

Wow, am I babbling.

I'm late with this announcement as well. Congratulations to Illya and Kirsten. They got married on Friday. It was a small ceremony in a small court room on the 9th floor of the Hennepin County Government Center. Other than the judge mispronouncing Illya's name, it was all good, really. If you have something to say to my recently wedded friend, send me an email and I'll relay the wishes.

Personally, I never thought it would happen. Then again, I never thought I'd get married, either. It wasn't that I thought I'd never meet the right person, it was more that I didn't think I could BE married. I was wrong and I was wrong about Illya as well. Congratulations again to the both of you and here's hoping you both have happiness all your days.

I got a freebie at the excellent burger place in our building today. The woman who owns the place was at the cash register and just pushed my money away. She smiled and said, "Happy Thanksgiving." How cool is that?

The Maxima is pretty decent in the snow. This is something of a relief as the Grand Marquis is not that good in the snow. Handling a rear wheel drive car in the snow is a skill that needs practice and I know I don't have nearly enough practice in it to be "good" with it. I'm hoping to drive the GM tomorrow to see if I can sharpen my skillz in it.

Thursday November 27, 2003

So it's Thanksgiving and I'm truly in awe of the sheer amount of things I have to be thankful for. I know everyone with a blog and journal is doing this, but it IS Thanksgiving and so I feel I really ought to give thanks. Especially this year.

First and foremost, I'd like to give thanks for my lovely wife Sarah and our beautiful child August. If this was the only thing I had to give thanks for, it would be well and truly enough. But wait, theres more...

I'd like to give thanks for my buddy Illya finally finding someone he could spend the rest of his life with. He got married last Friday and I couldn't be happier for him.

I'd like to give thanks for my excellent dog Brutus, our nice house, our generous friends, our nice cars, our new street, my laptop, Comedy Central, DSL, Remote Desktop, my iPod, our fireplace and our bed.

I'm also thankful for my mom for not only bringing me into this world, but for taking care of August when we need her to. I'm thankful for my aunts and uncle on my dad's side of the family. They're the greatest and have always been behind me giving me the support I've needed whenever I needed it. Martha, Carol and Paul, Leon and Alice, thank you very much for all you've done. I love all of you.

Naturally, I'm also thankful to be living in the greatest country on earth in one of its greatest states. It's nice to be able to write what I think here and elsewhere and not fear for my life because of it.

There's much more to write, but the baby needs me right now.