All right, Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up.

Just a bit off the side, please — and watch those ears! I need those!

WHOA — that feels funny!

Ah, getting that pesky hair off my ears is wonderful.

What…in the heck…are you doing to me???

Daddy had to hold my head a bit (I kept turning to see the action) so the stylist didn’t accidentally remove a cheek or something.

My god, I’m covered in PUPPYDOGS!

Yummy, fresh haircape! My favorite!

Janet wrote about her birthday and so forth, as one often does. My comment was such:

First off, a very happy birthday, if belated.

Secondly, I wanted to comment on the phenomenon of birthdays. It’s funny — every year goes by and still a part of me wants it to be a day that’s somehow different from all the other ones, but the older I get the less remarkable they are. Is that the case with everyone — do we always want the day to be special, even if it isn’t?

I rather think it’s silly of us to expect our birthdays to be anything of note, but there’s some small kernel inside me somewhere that does. I’m not sure where that comes from — childhood expectations? Flirtatious hopes for something miraculous? I don’t know.

I don’t even mention my birthday anymore when it comes for fear that I’ll be perceived as being an ass and self-centered. (not that I’m calling you an ass, Janet, this is just how I feel) The question is, how important are birthdays anyway? How should we feel about them, really? Does it matter once you’re ancient like me? (30)

Aren’t we a funny species in what we do, celebrating the day we are born but ignoring the date of conception;  getting all tied up about when we get married but not the date when we met someone.   Who picked these dates in the first place as being notable?

So, dear reader, your thoughts?    And for the record, it is nowhere near my own date of birth, so this is not a subtle plea for recognition.  It is, very much, something that’s always plagued my thoughts.

Nathan Pralle, 30, hefted the 4-foot implement onto his shoulder in a casual pose as he waited on the curb for his next target.    “You see, I’m a guy — I appreciate the macho things in life as much as anyone else; football, hotties, and the roar of loud engines,” he explains languidly, “but these bikers are really squaredancing on my last very last nerve in stock.”

The curve of the road that passes by his house, Pralle explained, has a fairly high traffic load for this small 900-odd person burb in central Iowa, especially on the sunny days of summer when everyone and their dog is out enjoying the few brief moments of gleeful warmth.    But such giddiness is not to be found in Pralle who has clearly had enough of the noise.

“They turn the corner and then hit the throttle as hard as they can.   Doing it once just to hear that roar is fine, ” he says as he shakes his head, “but what the fuck are they trying to prove by doing it EVERY SINGLE TIME???   ARGH!!!  And god help them if they ever wake up my baby son from his nap.   Do they have kids?   No, they have a chrome dick extension and it’s having size issues.   Time to change that stinky diaper, and I am not handling out Huggies,” he growls.

An approaching two-wheeler from the east halted our interview and the vigilante lined up to see what would happen.   True to his predictions, the Harley, complete with leather-bejeweled rider, turned the corner and started to lay on the typically loud YAP! YAP! YAP! from the straightpipes.  Pralle suddenly sprung into action, sprinting into the street, yelling like a banshee on a bender and waving the crowbar wildly over his head in a war cry.    The biker barely got turned around to inspect the commotion behind him when he was promptly beaned senseless and the bike’s exhaust was flatted into linguine before Pralle placekicked the muffler and yelled at the fleeing motorist, “Let’s hear the sound of those pipes NOW, fucker!”

Puffing heavily, he returned to his post, setting his “justice stick” down and against a
maple tree, but not before he added a small notch to a growing list on the trunk.   “Looks like today might be a great day to be me, a really crappy-ass day to be a biker,” he grinned with a smile that would send sane men scampering into the foliage.

So, if you like to surf the pavement on a crotchmobile in this lovely weather of summer, enjoying the beauty of the season before plunging back into the freezing cold of winter, a simple word of warning goes out to you — avoid main street Sheffield at all costs or at least, for heaven’s sake, don’t forget your helmet.

“Yeah?” I said, groggily.

“You folks still there in one piece?” he asked. “Sure,” I replied, “why wouldn’t we be?”

Turns out it had rained quite a bit in the night and since the ground and assorted bodies of water are already sufficiently filled, it had proceeded to flood out quite a lot of places, including his basement. I trotted downstairs and checked out the scene, prancing about the house in my skivvies, until I was reasonably assured that nothing was overly wet and/or missing.

I was just looking up local weather and news when he called again. “They said on the radio that they are evacuating the nursing home and want volunteers to help. You might want to go help your grandma.”

I blinked. “Gotcha…I’ll toss on some clothes and get moving.” I grabbed myself a quick bowl of some generic cereal and headed to the shower, got primped in my best “dirties”, grabbed my shitkickers, and headed out the door.

Upon driving to the end of main street, I was stopped by a familiar face in a fireman’s uniform. “Hey, Jeff,” I said out the window. He asked where I was going, and I indicated that I had heard that they needed help. “Sure,” he replied, “but go to the high school; they’ll shuttle you down there, we don’t have room for all the cars.”

Upon parking and jumping onto the fire equipment truck with a bunch of other folks from around town, we headed on down. The sight that greeted me was impressive; water in every direction up to and starting to flow over the driveways of the nursing home, trucks, piles of sand, sandbags, and lots of people. This was going to be interesting.

The residents, as it turns out, were already evacuated to Ridgestone Golf Course, a local club with a rather sizable restaurant space. I smiled as I imagined my grandmother sitting up at the bar and ordering a cold one.

So, instead I busied myself by jumping in on the sandbagging, helping to offload bucketloads of completed bags and forming a chain of sandbags in a ring around the structure three deep. Three hours and some 1,500 bags later, we were not only done with the barrier for the care center but managed to fill the better part of the back of a dump truck with bags as well in preparation for coming weather. Dirty, soaked to the bone (it didn’t fail to piss down rain while we were working, of course), tired, but happily so, I headed back to my car and then home to shower and spend the rest of the day relaxing and getting minor things done.

Later in the afternoon, after most of the excitement had let off, we went for a small drive and collected a lot of pictures of the flooding. I post them below for your general enjoyment and amusement.

I’ve never really been involved in any sort of emergency assistance/recovery/prevention/whatever and I have to say that today was a wonderful experience, even given the circumstances. Seeing people from all sorts of statuses, creeds, backgrounds, and experiences come together simply because they were a community and, by god, we were not about to let a staple institution of our town get destroyed was nothing less than inspirational. It made me have some brief hope for humanity in general by seeing what a small but organized effort could accomplish given the opportunity.

Now — on to the pictures! (remember, you can click on the thumbnail to make them bigger)

The sidewalk leading north from our street to the city swimming pool park, and the poor schmuck’s backyard that suffered as well.

I don’t think this guy will be mowing lawn very soon.

This was, at one point, a corn field. I doubt the viability of it now.

This is an empty lot and in the background, Sukup Manufacturing, which also flooded out somewhat.

On Gilman Street (C-13) headed east and our first glimpse at the care center and the line of sandbags on the west side.

The south side of the care center and its front lawn, deeply under water. You can clearly see the sandbag line here. I didn’t personally work on this side; I was on the crew on the reverse (north) side, but the idea is the same. It’s not really rocket science — sand, in a bag, stacked. Kinda self-explanatory.

The eastern driveway into the nursing home and the east ditch. The brown gunk is floating, rotting corn stalks from last year; the water there is about 3′ deep at the bottom of the ditch and, as you can see, is already flowing over the concrete. You can also see the pile of reserve sandbags in the background by the line. We left several such piles in the case that something broke and/or had to be bolstered.

The parking lot of the Sheffield Vet Clinic, looking north.

Looking north along Highway 65, across Gilman Street.

Looking south along Hwy 65.

The pumps at Casey’s General Store (NE side under water) and the intersection of Gilman and Hwy 65, ditches full.

The north ditch by Hwy 65. The water here is probably 3′ deep at least.

The massive amount of suction at one of two culverts attempting to empty the ditch as fast as possible. The culverts are about a foot wide at the intake and I’ll bet the suction would rip the hair right off your leg or worse.

The output of the culvert above and the southern ditch. Given the speed of the water rushing through, you suddenly realize that this is a A Lot Of Water.

Looking west along Gilman Street and the south side of the Vet Clinic, ditch full and getting worse.

The front of the Vet Clinic. Hope those doggies remembered their boots!

A very wet, muddy, sandy, tired, but satisfied me after the adventure in the morning. Why is it that sand can get into the deepest of crevices with little or no effort? Yike!

I have a few friends in the forces at the moment. One is in Iraq right now and regrets getting involved in the Army in the first place because she’s stuck in that hellhole. Another is going over shortly and he’s excited for it simply because of the experience he’ll get in his field, but isn’t very amused at the idea of leaving his family behind.

But the one that really flabbergasts me is a woman I know through my wife who is going into the forces simply because it’s good money. What???!? Are you crazy? Sure, being a mercenary or an assassin is good money, too, but you could end up DEAD, very easily, and what good is the money then?

I simply cannot fathom what goes through these folks’ heads. Do they not read the news? See the pictures of people brought back in boxes? Families torn apart because their father or mother is a corpse thanks to some random bomb or bullet in a foreign land?

If I’ve heard it once, I’ve heard it a million times — “Oh, the recruiter says they won’t send me over.”   Bull.   Shit.   Folks, they’re thinking of reinstating the draft for the love of god, and you think they’re not so short on people that you won’t go over?   Hah, Hah, and Double Hah.   If you trust the word of the military, I have a pretty golden bridge out west that I’d love to sell you.

Don’t get me wrong — I have nothing against the troops and I support their work greatly. Of course, I disagree with what they’re doing in the first place, but my beef is with the administration, not the movers and shakers of it. Never would I want them to think that I didn’t stand behind the fact that they’re throwing themselves on the line regularly for various causes. Much like being a mortician, I’m not sure I could do it, so I’m glad someone can.

My incredulousness is with the fact that people are currently entering the forces willingly for such inconsequential things such as money or education. Surely this isn’t responsible — who says, “Sure, I’ll take a high death rate for myself in exchange for some CASH!”? Yes, the government makes is MIGHTILY appealing — tons of sign-on bonuses, education credits and assistance, etc. But they know that a) nobody wants to do it right now because of the situation and b) there’s a high chance of ending up as a shrapnel pincushion. So they sweeten the deal until dollar signs cloud vision and reason both.

What do you think? Is it still smart to enter the military despite the facts at hand, or are these people just being twits? I have to think the latter, but perhaps my thinking is clouded or skewed.

Nowadays I listen to a lot of public radio while driving to and from work, simply because it allows me to get some information into my life about news, culture, and other interesting topics while mostly avoiding the incredibly irritating commercials that plague about 68% of the airtime on commercial radio.   In the mornings, I alternate that with Bob & Tom, depending on my interest level.    That statement alone has caused the death of about 50% of the Twin Cities white collar population from being terminally aghast.

One thing that has really gotten to me of late is how much detail you can hear in your broadcast when listening to the reporters speak.   Now, I’m all for clear radio and wonderful reception, but when I can hear Michele Norris‘ saliva glands squirting, I think we’ve gotten a bit too realistic.  For that matter, I guarantee that unless I was tonsil deep in a passionate kiss with her, I wouldn’t normally hear those sorts of inflections in normal conversation, let alone broadcast at 100,000 watts to the surrounding countryside.

I’m sure NPR, being the quality organization that it is, has dumped excessive amounts of cash on the state-of-the-art microphones and studios to accompany their reporters and compliment their well-suited voices.    But can we back it off a little?    The clarity is wonderful; no matter if I am running the A/C or passing a semi, I never lose the conversation or mis-hear a word.    But do I really need to hear your tastebuds begging for Cheetos?

Brace yourself for a slew of short blog entries this week. I have a lot on my mind, but no time to draw any of them out in long postings, so you’ll get short, concentrated entries with lots of room for expansion in your fervent commentary. That is, if you comment. Which you should. I think.

Until now, that is. Maybe the perils of age come with a few pearls of glory.

My father came over with his overpowered tiller on Sunday afternoon and proceeded to beat the tar out of the soil that had lain dormant over the long winter, cussing slightly because I had thought it best to drown it in a few inches of compost, leaves, and grass clippings for good measure. But the old bear of a tiller was the victor in the long run, slapping it into submission, and by evening I had a good plot going.

Normally I would let it sit there for a few days, but I thought I should get a jump on it and tossed handfuls of seeds into hoed trenches, all the while attempting to space them correctly but not so accurately that I would be chagrined for being a pompous anal git.

In this pursuit I discovered a wonderful invention — seed tape. For the uninitiated (as I was, prior to this season), seed tape is where they take something very similar to toilet paper and lay the small seeds of some unfortunate plant (a lettuce mix in this case) between the layers, pre-spaced and pre-mixed for your pleasure. And pleasure I did as it took a ton of frustration out of the process and instead replaced it with maniacal glee at the prospect of planting an entire row of lettuce in 30 seconds or less.

In total, I laid down 4 rows of peas, 3 of yellow onions, 2 of lettuce salad mix, 2 of parsnip, 1 of peanuts, and 3 of green beans. For markers I tried something new, hacking foot-and-a-half lengths of 1/2″ PVC pipe with a saw and hammering them into the ground at the head of each row. That took up about half of the length of the garden.

For the rest, I was planning on planting our usual OMG array of tomato plants. We found out the first year that the red fruit grows extremely well in our soil and, since we love doing things with them, they are our typical “bumper crop” item. However, we buy plants, not seeds, and I had yet to obtain them.

Tuesday evening after work, I decided to find a greenhouse I had seen advertised in Charles City where I work. Since the alternative was either Wal*Mart or a local greenhouse about 15 minutes from home, I thought it couldn’t hurt to check it out.

I tell ya, I’ve found my new favorite greenhouse.

The place is immaculate with this huge array of absolutely gorgeous flowers that makes me want to terraform my entire backyard and house into perpetual flowerbeds. I wandered up and down the aisle just taking in the flood of colors and scents, pure candy to the eyes.

The vegetable section was small, but the quality was not diminished and I was able to pick up 32 tomato plants of 3 different varieties, pay my $17.50 for them, and head on home. Upon arriving home, I checked the darkening sky and radar and decided that I could make a run for it. Over the next half hour I ran, sweated, dug, shoved, planted, and covered all of the plants and still had 5 minutes to stand and watch the sky before the floodgates opened and dumped one of the most gorgeous rains ontop of us.

I love rains like those…start in the evening, done by morning, and a steady yet full downpour that really soaks and settles the ground, cleans the air, and generally makes everything go from simply greenish to GREEN.

And, for the first time, my garden was completely in the ground, leaves and dreams turned towards the skies, taking in that first deep soaking. I smiled to myself as I exited the house this morning, glancing towards my well-saturated garden, and internally patted myself on the back for figuring out the game like the gardeners that I admired. I might not have it all figured out, and the weeds are just as likely to grow this year as any, but I’ve won the first round. Bring on the summer!

It was originally diagnosed as eczema, but was elevated to an, “I don’t know,” status by the head dermatologist at the Forest Park Clinic in Mason City and we were referred up to pediatric dermatologist Dr. Jennifer Hand at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, to find out exactly what it was, perhaps why it occurred, and what to do about it. So yesterday I took a day off work and we made the 2 hour drive (and tank of $3.60/gallon gas) up to submit Keston to some poking and prodding and hopefully find some answers to his issues.

The trip was essentially worthless and utterly frustrating. The head dermatologist in Mason is convinced it is *not* eczema, yet once we got up there, the Dr. Hand gave him a brief glance and was like, “It’s just eczema. He looks great. What’s the problem?” Which is nice — he was having one of his good days, rare though they be — but it doesn’t give us many solutions for the nighttime itching and his outburst of rashes from seemingly nothing. Also, wouldn’t you do more if the head of the dermatology clinic in Mason doesn’t even know what the hell it is???

Sigh.

Of course, it started off badly — we were about 5 minutes late so we were rushing, driving through Rochester in the pissing rain, trying to find the parking garage, but that was no problem — we got there and checked in fine. However, when I checked in, the receptionist said, “Oh, is that paperwork for the doctor?” indicating the referral letter and the sheet of all Keston’s prescriptions and diet. I confirmed that it was, and she said, “Oh, ok, I’ll take that and make sure she gets it.” I thought that was nice, so we settled down into the very pretty and subtlety-lit waiting room.

But when it came time to see the doctor, we asked if she had seen the paperwork and she’s like, “No, what paperwork?” She sent the nurse after it, but the receptionist had run off to lunch and the nurse just came back and shrugged her shoulders. The doctor seemed unfazed by this and although we said we could wait for them to find the papers, she just said to continue on, she knew what it was and didn’t need to see the referral (which, in that letter, the doctor in Mason explains why he thought it *wasn’t* eczema). So we had to explain what was going on from memory, his entire history and meds/foods/etc. even though we had written it all down already (my wife has been extremely organized with it all, bless her).

So she weighed him (22lbs now, good thing we got the new car seat today) and briefly examined him and then she pulled out a sheet of suggestions for handling eczema and listed everything off, but we’re already doing everything on the sheet so she was like, “Oh, well, you’re doing good then. Carry on.” We did get another different antihistamine to try at night and yet another OTC skin cream but that’s about it. She said that Keston is nothing compared to some of the kids she sees whose eczema is so bad that they stop growing and get sepsis and staph infections. Which is nice enough to know that we’re not an extreme case, but we still feel like the poor sod shouldn’t have to wake up every hour or two at night itching and tearing up his skin.

So we left feeling very much like we had just completely wasted a tank of gas and an office copay. We went off and did some mild shopping and poking around Rochester, stopped to get supper at TGI Friday’s, decided we didn’t like the look and prices on the menu, and instead ended up at Famous Dave’s. As we did I kept getting madder and madder about the situation and now I’m really pissed about it. So I don’t know what to do at this point, but I think we got fucked and someone’s going to hear about it.

I mean…if we’re doing all we can for Keston and there’s nothing up with him but the eczema and so forth, fine. I can deal with that and we’ll keep on doing what we’re doing to control it. (She said most kids grow out of it by 1 years, but then they usually get asthma…joy.) But if it isn’t, I’m going to feel really bad that we were blown off and, at the time, I didn’t have the balls to tell the doctor she was being a daffy bitch (and or hunt down the stupid bint of a secretary and give her what-for for losing our goddamned paperwork).

Sometimes I envy Type A’s ability to speak up at the moment, whereas I always think about what I *should* have said at the time and then kick myself later. Hindsight…GAH!

For those of us around the Midwest, Mayo is touted as being one of the premier health care centres around, garnering the business of presidents and international dignitaries and handling thousands of cases a year. While I realize that my son’s skin problems are probably small potatoes in the the large scheme of things, don’t we deserve a fair whack at the resources as well, especially if we’ve been explicitly referred there?

My good friend Henry recently introduced me to Bad Buddhist Radio, a podcast by Ryu Cope, a guy who is putting some practicality and sense into a rather old philosophy. I’m not all caught up with the episodes (there are over 50 now), but I’m loving it so far and it has caused me to muse more than once in the past few days.

When most people think of Buddhism, they think of it as a religion. Ryu clears this up pretty quickly in his first episode, telling some history of the school of thought and detailing the story of Siddhārtha Gautama, an ordinary guy who decided that life had some figuring out to do, and basically came up with four universal truths about life and an eight-faceted way of dealing with the difficulties therein.

The stuff about gods and religion and karma and so forth came years after Gautama got his vision for a better way of living, and Ryu is into bringing back the “true” Buddhist system of philosophy, discarding all the “add-ons” and liberal interpretations of the four noble truths and eight-fold path and just going back to the way that he thinks Gautama meant for people to think about his ideas.

I tell you, it’s been both an eye opener to some new ideas and an awful lot of nodding on my part, confirming much of what I’ve come to believe in my life; the concepts of seeing a situation as it truly is instead of through our own personal filters and bias, of living a life of truth and honesty because it truly is the best policy, and making sure that what you do is motivated by true and honest intention and not because someone else is making or influencing you to do so. Ryu is very articulate and has really opened my eyes to the Buddhist philosophy and I am eager to explore other interpretations and texts of it.

I think that, while Ryu is probably a bit brash and simplistic for someone out there looking for thick, heavy philosophic discussions, he is a fresh, very palatable speaker and keeps his audience well-entertained during his show while dishing up a good tutorial on the thought school and giving you something to think about at the end of the day.

If you’re even a little bit curious about Buddhism, I’d highly recommend his show, even for an overview of the philosophy. The Bad Buddhist is fun, amusing, and if you’re not careful, you might even learn something or find a new way of viewing the world. I know I have.

I really should find a time to write during the day that doesn’t correspond to my brain shunting its resources into my legs to keep them vertical and my eyes to keeping them open. I sat down, finally free to do some typing, and my brain decides to go out onto the balcony, have a smoke, and spit on the cab drivers waiting in the alley below. This is not conducive to the sort of writing that you might expect out of a blog entitled, “PhilosYphia”, but more to the sort of crap spewed forth on the social pages of the local newspaper on an idle Thursday.

If it wasn’t so hard to type while driving, I’ve had all sorts of time to do so. But the other drivers get really pissy when I’m coming at them on the wrong side, so I should probably stop doing that.

I was ever so grateful that the weather was sunny today, even if the wind was a bit on the chilly side, and the rest of the week is promising to be more of the same if you can trust the weatherman, which you shouldn’t, of course. As I told some people awhile ago, the only reason that meteorology exists is because folks can’t accept the fact that weather is an unpredictable phenomenon and it’s just something you can’t control. No, they prefer to have someone say, “It’s going to be sunny and 70 on your wedding day” rather than say, “Look, it’s a week away, I have no freaking CLUE.”

We went for a lovely walk after a long night of not sleeping with Keston (up every hour or two, he just will not sleep for long periods) and pushed the pram through the 1.5 mile path that we’ve traced through the town, stopping to talk to some friends on the way. It’s amazing how many people were out and about, but it seems to always be that way in the summertime. We really do hibernate during the winter and come out of the woodwork when it gets warm. I’m so ready for it.

The rest of the day consisted of baking (roasted potatoes, a carrot cake, and white rolls), cooking (T-bones on the grill, a roast in the slo-cooker, and peas in the nukerator), and some well-deserved cleaning (some vaccuuming, dishes, laundry, and bagging the crap out of my commuter car). Nothing like a weekend to spend doing WORK.

Of course, there’s the playing with the baby and taking care of him. Although he was a complete and utter shit last night, depriving us of almost any quality sleep at all, he was perfectly wonderful the rest of the day, which is absolutely his saving grace. Smiling, giggling, playing, following me around the room, wondering where I’ve gone when I leave the room or his line of sight. I tell ya, it’s a total kick to be not only recognized but wanted by a kid.

So hey — a mediocre day, turned passable by a child. Go figure.

On that note, my brain has reminded me that there’s a balcony and a wonderful crop of targets awaiting, so before it steps out, I leave you with a few photos of my son from yesterday’s professional shoot. Enjoy.

PS — Oh, c’mon — nobody’s going to comment on the previous post?   How random do I have to get to get some love, people!?

PPS — My wife kicks it with a camera, word.

Sitting in glory in the middle of poo

What does a shoe do on a bed of glue?

Whollop the head of a smelly grue.

The light of the sun spits in my eye

and rakes the nails across my thigh

For what? I say, and I sigh

a simple slice of a spicy crow pie

Beans, beans, you’ve heard this before

Aren’t something your doggie should smear on the floor

A right-wing nut is knocking the door

But the mailbox flag will give him what-for.

The marker fumes are strong today

In a silky, satiny, moist sort of way

“Tho’art heady!” might some of you say

It’s perfect to sit in the river and play.

Let’s jump on in:

Taking It to the Next Stage — I suddenly had this extreme urging to do some acting again today. I haven’t been on a stage in character since freshman year of college which makes it about 11 years ago, but I still miss the thrill of it all. There’s just no time in my schedule to put in for nightly rehearsals, alas. Gah.

Experts-Exchange Sucks — For those of us in IT, there’s a website called Experts Exchange that allows people to ask technical questions and get responses from supposed “experts” in the field. It used to be open for anyone to read and view, but now they charge you a membership to view the answers to questions and to participate. The problem is that Google is allowed to spider their pages and so when you search on a problem, oftentimes EE is the first few links on the search, but you can’t actually see the answer. Sometimes Google has it in the cache, but not always. So they suck because they waste my time over and over.

Jesus is NOT Your Personal Coach — I’ve had it up to *here* with folks that use Jesus as their personal trainer, coach, or motivator, but only when they’re ahead in the game. Athletes are always responsible for this — “Well, I’d like to thank Jesus for this opportunity to score big for my team” — or call upon Jesus or God to help them win a contest (Big Brother, anyone?) as if God favors the believer. This is a really good reason why most religious whacks are considered to be mental twinkies, folks. If you have nothing else better in your pocket than your religion, you have issues. Quit using it as your personal crutch or fairy godmother. Either that or be sure to blame God when everything goes to hell as well — I mean, c’mon; let’s be fair, hrm?

A Weekend for US? Surely not. – Sometimes it seems like all of our time is spent trying to please everyone else in life but ourselves, doesn’t it? We were home all weekend this week and it was wonderful; we didn’t have to go anywhere or do anything in particular other than take care of ourselves. I got the hallway painted, lots of dishes done, a bunch of food cooked for the upcoming difficult week, and played with my son a fair whack (got puked on once, just for good measure). It’s not that we don’t like our family and friends, but it’s good to be apart sometimes, too, ya know?

Mitsubishi, Is It Always Cold in Your Offices? — I am really, really unhappy with the automatic climate control system in our 2007 Mitsu Galant Ralliart. It’s intended to keep the temperature at whatever you set it and make it nice and easy to control. If you’re doing air conditioning, it works really, really well, but with heat it’s either 62F or above, and you get no lower choices. Now, I don’t know about you folks, but when I go outside in winter, I am wearing a good insulated leather jacket, gloves, and probably something fairly cozy underneath. I’m naturally warm anyway, so this is a great get-up for me to stay unshivering. In reality, I only need the car to be a mere 50 or maybe 55F to keep me happy, but the lowest is 62, so what the hell? My options are HOT or OFF. I think that’s rather limited, don’t you?

No Heart In It — While talking the other day about the lack of sales of tickets to my barbershop show coming up this weekend, my wife commented, “Nobody’s heart’s in it,” and it made me pause to think — you know, she’s absolutely correct. Have you noticed it lately? The heart has gone out of a lot of people for lots of things — hobbies, work, life in general. Why? Well, there’s a lot of negatives going on right now — the housing market taking a dump, medical expenses rampaging middle America, idiots in the White House, serious fear of a recession, less jobs, less well-paying jobs, higher food and fuel costs, etc. In short, we’ve lost any sort of spark in our step and spring in our eyes for much other than buckling down, working hard, and maintaining the status quo. I have a great fear that if the country slumps into a full-blown recession our hearts will go down the tube right along with it, and I’m not fond of looking forward to that.

Speaking of No Heart — Insurance companies and medical bills are plaguing us once again. Almost weekly I have to deal with one or more things that aren’t getting filed correctly with insurance or yet another bill coming through from something or other with my son’s birth and my wife’s surgery. Collectors are starting to call and we got approved for a repayment plan that is higher than our biggest car payment. Our crappy-ass drug plan goes through Express Scripts which is anything BUT and ends up being almost more hassle than it’s worth. (You know it’s bad when you prefer to pay full price than to file it with insurance.) It should NOT be this hard to get good, consistent coverage for healthcare given what we have to pay to get this. If I was paying this sort of money for a meal at a restaurant and got the service I have so far, I’d storm out and leave my meal behind. While I don’t think universal health care is the answer, I can fully see why people are hopping mad and demanding it — they’re tired of being treated like shit by companies that simply don’t care if you have a hard time of it.

We Are Too Desperate For Entertainment — This I have decided after watching TV shows get harsher and stranger the more they try to milk the ratings and get viewers, and the American public is apparently lapping it up. Reality shows are pushing the boundaries as much as possible, pitting violent extremes of personalities against one another just for the clash of it all. (”Let’s see what happens when we trade spouses between an African-American upper middle class suburban family of five and a white-trash family of skinhead Mississippians.”) Mind you, I wonder about the people volunteering to be on these shows — they’re clearly not right in the head, or money speaks volumes, but wowzers — can you get any lower? And we sit back and watch it all, like a train wreck where it’s so horribly you can’t possibly take your eyes off it.

—–

Never have I looked forward to summer so much as this year, when I can get outside, breathe some freshly mown grass, listen to the birds, feel the warm air on your skin, and watch the sun set. My soul needs it about now. There’s plenty of space on my front step if you care to join me.

I want to write so much to you about what you are like and how far we have come in the first 138 days of your existence upon this planet, but everytime I try the words come jumbled to my head and I cannot sort them out to save my life. How very changed we all have become since that chilly November day! You most of all, of course, but Mummy and I have both grown and stretched in ways that we didn’t think were possible. I have read that your brain changes once you become a parent, realigning thanks to hormones and the stresses of taking care of a child, and perhaps mine has — I’ve become unable to formulate a decent sentence about the one thing that consumes most of my free time aside from work. Your daddy desperately needs a nap, I think.

I remember driving home that day we left the hospital to bring you back to Sheffield; I remember thinking that this was it, we were a family, and off we went to our own adventure, bolstered by all the advice and care that we had received at the hospital, through books, and by conversations, and confident we could keep on going. At the same point, however, I remember wondering what in the heck I was doing? Was this really real, and would we actually make it?

There is nothing like a baby to keep your reality in check, however. Between constant demands for feeding, changing, entertainment, and sleep, you were a handful right from the start, filling our lives with mounds of poopy diapers, bottles to wash, and early-morning feedings. It wasn’t so much a matter of trying to figure things out as it was a plight for survival. Our lives were transformed simply by your expressed need to live and grow.

Slowly we all grew towards each other, figuring out how everyone worked, where tolerance lay, and what the expectations were. I figure Mummy and I adjusted the most, but I wonder how many times you gave us some slack on purpose, knowing that, despite our many fumbles and guesses at how next to do something, we were trying our hardest and did whatever we could to make you happy.

And now, here we are, over 4 and a half months later. You are now a fuzzy-headed little boy, weighing in at a whopping 19 pounds, 14 ounces and 25.5 inches long, sliding neatly into 12-month outfits and causing your mother no end of headaches as she sorts clothing, trying to find something that will fit you. You are anything but fat, just a solid kid. “Built like a brick shithouse,” as they say, and you look like you could weather just about any storm thrown at you.

You are the insatiable cat, just daring curiosity to come around the corner and whack you over the noggin. Your favorite spot is upright, as you can scan the room and take everything in; lying down simply doesn’t hold much of a fascination to you and, unless you are sleepy, only drives you nutty as you attempt to check out the room and everything in it. You can just see the little sponge in your head working overtime to try to process all of the information slamming into it from every angle and it’s fascinating to watch your gears grind and ears steam.

In the past two weeks there’s been a definite mental change in you — you’re starting to really pay pointed attention to particular things instead of randomly gazing around and looking at stuff. When Mummy or I talk, you’re focused on us…on the conversation…and more than once we’ve caught you tennis-gaming between us as we speak. Your gaze is now smarter, more concentrated….I love looking into your eyes because they usually shine with an eager, amused look. Your internal commentary would probably fascinate me if I only I could hear it.

Mummy and you have been having all sorts of photo shoots, and you’re really becoming a natural at posing and tossing on a smile that could crack plate glass. You’ll probably hate us both for all the pictures we have you in and the dumb things we’re having you do or wear, but I guess that’s part of parenting — making your kids embarrased. Right?

I love that I can make peals of laughter erupt from you just by tickling your ribs or making a funny face from across the room. Your laughter is like sunshine on a dragonfly on a wind chime — fun and tinkling and utterly enrapturing. A sad kid you’re not — happy smiles all the time, even when you’re sick or just got shots or are sleepier than a sack of rutabagas. I haven’t the faintest idea how you manage to be so cheerful all the time, but keep it up — the world’s a pretty cynical place, you deserve a few good years yet.

You’re still not sleeping through the night, up every few hours for food, but you’re getting better. Mummy and I keep trying to find out what’s wrong with your food (fixed that one!), your skin (maybe fixed — so far, so good), and your sleeping (still working on that) because we want you to be happy and healthy. I hope you never think that we aren’t in this for the long haul; if you ever doubt, I’ll show you the insurance claims, hrm?

I could go on for ages about you and what you’re doing and how you are to be around, but Daddy’s readers would start to yawn and glance at their watches. Plus, how do you accurately describe the wonderful way you smell when you snuggle your nose into my neck, or the feeling of your arms around me, gripping me tight? How can I possibly capture in words the infinite way you look at me, how no matter how heavy you get I never want you to leave my arms, and how I can’t think about you for very long without tears coming to my eyes?

I think I’ll just stop right here.

Love, Daddy

P.S. — I would caution my readers against using Jim’s Cash Generator for supplying your main income stream — it doesn’t appear to be working out for Jim very well.

I, and no doubt many others in this area of the country, appreciate your overwhelming optimism and unbridled enthusiasm at the prospect of upcoming warm weather and copious amounts of sunshine.

I do, however, question the depth of your judgement at already having put forth the effort to crack out giant buds on the ends of your branches. A bit early in the season, perhaps? Maybe you’ve overlooked the fact that, not a dozen feet away, the lawn is currently buried in five fucking feet of snow such that when I tread upon it, I am now standing level with the top of the picnic table.

This does not bode well for your success.

I only say this out of love and concern for your well-being. I am as encouraged by the brief teasings of weather as you are, but you don’t see me sticking my willy out in it just yet, do you?

I highly recommend instead a Disney vacation and a return to local climes somewhere around mid-April.

Cordially yours,

Nathan

First up, some shots of the two Airbus 319 jets that I rode on, the first from MSP -> EWR, the second from PHL -> MSP. As some of you know, I *love* commercial airliners, so this is like aviation porn, minus that whole copulation thing:

Next, we have a glass of the “Wee Heavier” Scottish ale that I had at the Nodding Head Brewery in downtown Philadelphia which was, unfortunately, a wholly worthless experience. On Wednesday night I walked 12 blocks at 10:30pm to find this brewery and sample its wares to only be greatly disappointed and leaving after 2 tries. At least the walk was nice.

Next, some scenes from the inside of the Sheraton Philadelphia City Center hotel where I spent one night, a much nicer hotel than the Sheraton Meadowlands in East Rutherford, NJ, but still way overpriced for what you got.

A big-ass clock that they had in the lobby; it wasn’t even running, so it was impressive only in stature.

The dining area of the hotel where they served breakfast, mixed with a kabob of angst:

The entrance, complete with bellhops and smoking hobos:

The lounge with a baby grand piano outside. I thought about tinkling the ivories, but they would have fined me for it, I suspect:

The view of Philly from my hotel room; note the dirty windows and my shitty camera:

The view of the NYC skyline from my corporate offices — mmmm……Jersey:

A really shockingly bad photo of Manhattan at night, taken from the parking lot of the Chart House restaurant in Weehawken:

This, folks, is why memories are not captured with Samsung.

I took off today for a business trip until Thursday to the corporate offices in East Rutherford, NJ. The drive to ALO was quick and easy; we go to Waterloo so often these days that we should probably have a personalized parking spot, other than the fact that nobody wants to be associated with Waterloo in the long term.

ALO is a very cute, clean little airport and the people were quick and friendly. I got checked in very fast and then sat around, watching the plane that was to grab us fly in from MSP on FlightAware, so I knew it would be late getting in. Little did I know that “late” would end up being the word of the day. I figure I at least deserve a funhouse full of screaming furniture for as much as I’ve heard or used that word.

The Saab 340 turboprop finally arrived and we got on board. My initial seat was 01A which is the left-hand single by the front exit, a rather cramped spot. As it turned out, the flight wasn’t fully booked, so I chose to move back a couple of rows, first sitting on the right aisle seat in the 3^rd row and then switching to the left-hand single to look out the window and watch the festivities.

This turned out to be a poor decision for a number of reasons – one, we quickly ascended above the cloud deck and there was nothing to see except miles of a fluffy white carpet beneath us which, while pretty, is nonetheless supremely boring. Watching the GE turboprops do their thing was equally fascinating for a short period of time but, after marveling at them for awhile, then briefly considering the trajectory of the props were they to suddenly fly loose (they’d take out the guy ahead of me, nicely enough) and my chances of being shredded into bloody confetti by a supersonic blade gone wrong, they lost their rosy glow and I was left to my own mental devices to keep me entertained.

Secondly, there was an annoying passenger seated behind me, one of those guys who insists on introducing himself to everyone and finding out their life story…you know the type. “I’m from New Hampton!” Congratulations. I’m from Mars – can you shut the fuck up now? Thoughts of using my laptop bag as a pile driver wafted briefly through my cells as I grated my teeth at his zippiness.

I’m not a crank on flights; I just prefer if Mr. Saccharine isn’t vibrating in the seat next to me.

The flight itself was calm enough with only the slightest of bumps of turbulence. The pilot even tried to make up some of the time we lost by powering down in the descent – it’s quite something to whiz through the cloudcover, engines cranking out on full, at a downward angle. I give my kudos to the brake manufacturers.

The landing was superb although it was a bit disturbing to have the ground appear after the landing gear went down. The fog and mist had built up to cottony proportions, so you have to start wondering if we were making a fueling stop in Care Bear land or something when that happens.

The boss and I grabbed supper at TGI Friday’s, a place that never ceases to satisfy in portions large enough to choke a gazelle, and this was no exception. Crab quesadillas, parmesan-crusted chicken, Italian salad, and cheese tortellini, along with an Oreo-cookie cake to round it out left me feeling overly full and cramped. We found our gate and settled down to wait for the flight.

I wasted my time IMing the wife since the freaking wireless Internet in MSP costs. WTF? Who pays for wireless Internet in places like this anymore? Sure, you can’t possibly strip us of all our money for a flight, you have to squeeze the rock a bit harder to get that last drop of blood out. Thank you, airport stockholders.

Our vantage point was nice for awhile since we were right beside the runway and could watch planes landing and taking off, although they were all NWA flights and, I’m sorry, but Northwest has one of the crappiest standards known to man — grey and red. Ugh. C’mon, people. Use a little creativity. It just reeks of shittiness.

I people-watched for a good portion of the time, too, as there was a lot of subjects worth observing. We had the old African-American gravelly jazz singer, complete with guitar case, who talked in laughs to his companion. Then you had the prissy, tanned princess who was supremely annoyed at having to breathe the same air as us mere mortals. There was the lone, single girl with her copy of a feminista novel, stringy hair, green hemp bag, water bottle, and long flannel overcoat was sitting across the way, looking depressed and man-hating. And what waiting area wouldn’t be complete with the token businessman in his full suit and tie, reading the WSJ, and peering at the miscreants over his glasses and the debutante, sitting there with gloved hands clenching clasped purse and something that looks like a deep-fried sea urchin propped on her bouffant.

The most amusing person at MSP, however, was the woman boarding us at the gate. She was, if you’ll forgive the phrase, so fresh off the boat you could smell the seaweed. I harbor no hard feelings towards any race or nationality, but you wonder how she got a position of making announcements over a loudspeaker to a primarily Midwestern clientele in broken Engrish. “We bord you! We bord you now! Grit in pane. Aaaaaaaaah rowse!” NWA, you stun me with your efficiency.

Speaking of – remember that lament about the word, “late”? Try 34 minutes late out of MSP, given that we had to first wait for other passengers to connect to our plane; then we had to wait on the tarmac for 20 minutes while they de-iced the plane, a process that is fun to watch, but that took them far too long to get moving on; finally a long, long wait in line as they coordinated us into the arrival and departure patterns.

The late folks included Jerry and Mary Backpacker, a 60-something couple wearing matching khaki corduroys, burgundy thermal turtlenecks, and carrying matching full backpacks that they proceeded to shove and cajole into the overhead bins, straps and buckles pummeling me in the head. They then sat behind me and gushed over the in-flight magazine at loud volume for most of the rest of the flight, making me once again desire to whack someone over the head with a water bottle.

Thankfully, the A319 eventually rose into the air and we had good weather most of the way, minus the 5 minutes of rollercoaster-level turbulence as we passed through rainstorms over Green Bay, WI. Nicely enough, the pilot cranked the plane up to 39,000 feet and put the pedal to the metal, taking us the 940+ nautical miles from MSP to EWR in 2 hours, 5 minutes. I also had a row entirely to myself, a luxury that is rarely afforded but always appreciated. Alas, I was unable to find a comfy position to sleep, so I simply resorted to listening to MP3s, visiting the lavatory, and then finally typing some blog material.

Other colorful characters on the flight: The flight steward with his black pants pulled up so high his buckle was at nipple level, the Indian man that left his seat and went forward to talk to his companions every 5 freaking minutes, and, as previously mentioned, Randy and Sandy Backpacker who cracked out a huge bag of tangerines mid-flight and proceeded to peel a half dozen, making the entire place smell nice but irritating me to no end with their giggles. I was nervously waiting to see if the blanket and pillow fort would go up and/or if I would hear the sticky sounds of copulation as they hit the Mile High Club for a sandwich.

EWR is laid out like a drunk – curvy and all wrong in most places. Thankfully my boss knows where he’s going and swiftly wiggled his way through the mess, but I would have easily been lost as hell. We got a Dollar rental (a Dodge Magnum) and careened through the streets of New Jersey till we got to our hotel, safe an