One More Shot

So…it’s been a few weeks since my last update.   Time flies.  #2 has already passed two months.  #1 has steadfastly refused to have anything to do with the potty, despite early success.

I’ve been trying to post a picture per day to my Project 365 set.  I think I’ve only missed one day so far.  Work progresses.  Life progresses.

Other than that, I’m just tired.  There’s too much to do and not enough time to do it.  Things, like this website, fall by the wayside.   Although now I have a lot more solo-parenting days with my wife’s new schedule.  Maybe I’ll take advantage of those moments after #1 falls asleep (or is at least in her room if not her bed) and before #2 wakes up from her frequent catnaps.

Maybe…

Click Me!

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a bit of a gadget head.  Not a hugely serious one, mind you.    I don’t go out and buy the latest and greatest things as they’re released.  I like to ponder them.  I like to examine them, talk about them, fantasize what it would be like to actually go out and buy the latest and greatest TV/Computer/Media Player/whatever.

More often then not I’ll actually end up convincing other people to buy the things I’m dreaming about.  Ask around.  It’s true.  I live vicariously through other’s purchasing habits.

But every once in a while something will come along that I do consider…

Like today.

Today Apple announce its newest toy, the iPad.  What’s the iPad?  It depends on who you ask.  Apple thinks that it’s the tablet computer that would have been hanging from a vine in the Garden of Eden.  Gadget review sites…they seem to think it’s a super-fast iPhone.  And a very limited one at that.

I’m not qualified to give you all the nitty gritty details on the actual device.  I’ve seen videos, produced by Apple and by review sites of the product, but I haven’t held it in my hands.  I’ve read some articles, but haven’t deep-dived into the details.  I’ve heard some, but not all of the arguments about why this product is great and why it sucks, and I have to say that I agree with both.  There are plenty of websites where you can get all perspectives.

The big question for me is…would I buy one?

I didn’t buy the iPod when it first came out.   I lusted after it, but I ended up buying a second generation one.

I also didn’t get the iPhone when it first came out.  I got an iPhone 3G.

In that line, I may just wait until the second generation comes out to make a decision.  The second generation version will no doubt address any downfalls of the first, including the lack of a camera/video camera.  Also, by that point it’ll be clear whether or not it can take on the Kindle and the Nook in the e-reader market.  I’m desperate to get into the e-reader arena, but I held back from buying a Kindle when it first came out due to cost and now I’m waiting to see which e-reader will end up winning.  The iPad seems to have a gorgeous interface for reading books and magazines, plus theoretically you could use the Amazon Kindle App for iPhone to read Kindle books on the iPad.  It’s very compelling, but I think it’ll take another six months to a year to see which direction publishers end up going.

On the other hand….it’s so pretty right now.  And I could afford one.

On the other other hand, I’ve been saving up for a new lens for my camera.

…I hate these types of decisions.

I think I’d wait.  I think I’ll wait.

Wait and see.

Click Me!

I’ve been dreading this night for well over two months now.

Tonight I’m solo parenting two children for the first time.  My wife teaches a lot of evening classes, and this is her first night of classes.  I’ve been on my own since I picked up the girls at 4:30.  I’ll be alone until sometime around 10 or so.

In some ways, it’s been a little easier than I thought it would be.

My eldest has thrown some spectacular hissy fits in her day.  Most times its over whatever little bit of nothing offends her two year old mind at the moment.   In fact, I’m pretty sure she’s yet to have a legitimate gripe.

But tonight she bordered on being perfect.  I was able to contain her to the kitchen for the most part.  She didn’t kick up too much of a fuss.

The stress of the evening did not come from Number 1.

No…it was Number 2.

Now, given the infrequency of my blogging over the last few weeks, I know that I haven’t mentioned this…but my youngest has turned into a bit of a reluctant pooper.  She’s had three bowel movements in about a dozen days.  Maybe she’s going through a growth spurt and is absorbing 99.999% of everything she’s getting from her mother’s milk.  Maybe she’s just shy.  I don’t know.  What I do know is that around day three of a four or five day sabbatical from pooping, she gets a little uncomfortable.    And then she gets a little gassy.  Which makes everyone around her uncomfortable.  (This girl can RIP one, lemme tell you.).

For most of the evening, Number 2 was either sleeping, farting, or crying.  Sometimes all at once.  This makes it difficult to go through the normal evening routines.  Routines that Number 1 has transformed into the cornerstones of her life.

Finally, just before I was about to put Number 1 to bed, Number 2 found release…and thus inner peace.

So right now both of my girls are passed out.

Not a bad way to end my first evening solo.

Click Me!

This blog is kind of like my bed time routine these days:

In the evening I tell my wife that I’m tired.  She asks me to carry my youngest up with her as she needs to have a snack and pump.  I shuffle upstairs, set my child down, check on my eldest (who is usually snoring), and head to the bathroom to brush and gargle and floss.  Once done, I check on the youngest, who has usually spit out her pacifier by this point and is pissed, and I turn on the TV.

“TV…” I whisper quietly, “…amuse me.  Make me happy.  Take away the cares of the day.”

I blink…

…and it’s about an hour later.  My wife is (not-so-gently) nudging me awake as I’ve somehow fallen asleep sprawled across both sides of the bed in an effort to gently but insistently hold a pacifier in my youngest’s mouth.  The TV is still on, but it’s a different show altogether.

This is my blog.  I start it up with every intention of posting each day, with a new picture to boot.

And all of the sudden two weeks have gone by with nothing on the blog.

Sorry.

Everyone and everything is still fine.  We think.  My youngest has not pooped in nearly four days, but pees quite a bit, and toots like a foghorn.  My eldest still loves the younger.  I’m still taking pictures and have been posting random pictures to my Flickr feed.

See you in two weeks.

So…I swear this evening that my youngest daughter, a delicate flower of an infant and a utter delight, let loose with something so loud and unpleasant that there was, for the briefest moment, an echo reverberating around the house.

No, I have not been watching the Georgia Tech v. Iowa game.

The game is on as my wife is watching.  But I am not watching.

The volume is …more than a whisper.  But I am not listening.

My wife is openly mocking the television.   But I am not participating.

I have no way of knowing that GT is currently losing 17 – 7 with just under 12 minutes to go in the fourth.  Because I…am not…involved.

Georgia Tech:  stealing defeat from the jaws of victory and glory from the grasp of ignominy since I’ve been paying attention to football.

As many parents have discovered, there’s a point in time (usually sometime in the evening before/during/after the bedtime rituals have begun) where you find your voice rising with small flecks of anger and frustration embedded in the cold iron of your parenting.  At the same time, you’re desperately trying to suppress a bubbling laughter as a small nude terrorist who happens to be related to you by blood crosses his or her arms and sticks out their bottom lip in defiance.

It’s an interesting point of inflection.

We’ve been pushing the potty training angle this past weekend.

…there have been ups and downs.

The downs may have left stains.

One of the small joys I have in life is perusing mail-order catalogs.  It’s a nice, leisurely way to spend a few moments getting my shopping fix without actually ever buying anything.  And it’s one of the reasons I so enjoy coming up to my in-laws home in Madison.

On a monthly basis, my mother-in-law receives enough catalogs to be personally responsible for the deforestation of a small Latin American country.  It’s not that she orders from the catalogs, or even orders from any but one or two of them on a semi-almost-regular basis.  Catalogs are like rabbits and wire clothes hangers.  Turn your back on two of them, and pretty soon you’ll have a flood.

In any case, we showed up at our in-laws home this evening to spend a quiet New Years Eve watching some movies and enjoying free baby-sitting the company of family.  As usual around the holiday season, the kitchen counter contained a stack of catalogs about a half a foot high that had arrived just today.  Tossing aside the ones that didn’t interest me, I settled in to explore the wonders of the modern consumer culture.   I especially enjoy looking at the Catalogs of Crap (Lillian Vernon, etc).  But occasionally I branch out to the more classy options.   Today I found a catalog for the Vermont Country Store.  I flipped through the pages to pre-qualify the magazine for reading.  Finding the promise of hand-crafted this and old-fashioned that, I added it to my stack.

Gradually I worked my way through the magazines until I returned to the Vermont Country Store for a second, more thorough, look.  Page after page showed my initial assessment to be correct.  This was a folksy, quality magazine filled with expensive versions of simple things that your great-great grandparents might haver purchased for a few pennies at the local Five and Dime.

And then I turned the page…and found myself reading some very sensible and practical descriptions of …adult entertainment devices.

No.  I’m not kidding.  I was somewhat taken aback

This is why I love reading catalogs.  You never know what you’ll find in even the most staid of catalogs.

It’s been a busy few days.