Early Birthday Blocks

Around here we don't necessarily believe in waiting until your birthday to open presents. At least not the one that UPS leaves in a bag on the snow out in the ditch. After all, we live in a world of instant gratification -- who wants to wait?

Grandpa and Grandma got Emma these dado cubes from FatBrainToys and the first thing she did with them was make a crown and ask me to take her picture. They are cool though, I wonder if she'll let me play with them or I need to sneak them out of her room after she falls asleep?

Cailin is in Double Digits!

Well, hard to believe it, but Cailin Rose turns 10 years old this weekend. It's hard to believe that I'm that old. Of course looking at my friends with babies or no kids and it's hard to believe we got started that early!

For her birthday Erin took her to Manhattan to spend the weekend seeing the sites, etc. Maybe I'll have her make the next post when she gets back. In the meantime, Marlee, Emma and I are eating pizza in the basement and watching Harry Potter V for the umpteenth time. Life is good.

Snow Donuts

We got our snow yesterday, and late in the afternoon I stopped working and took Emma and Marlee out to the pasture to try out the four wheeler in the snow. Emma went first and I think she's a natural. This would be her first experience burning donuts. Not bad for a girl who hasn't even turned five yet. She loved it! She also started doing controlled slides at full speed, even steering to correct for the slide. That I didn't get on video, but maybe next time. There are advantages to living in the country.

Superbowl Ads

This is the time of year when the media likes to rehash old Superbowl ads in anticipation of this year's. And I click right through them like a good consumer. But there is one that reminds me of parenting and I like to reference it throughout the year. It was from EDS, although most people at the time had no idea who they were or that the commercial was even about them. I think this came out in 2000, the same year they won the contract from the US Navy for NMCI. Nothing but good vibes there. Anyhooooo, enough worthless words -- here's the link:

Herding Cats

Enjoy.

Closet Doors and The Sheet of Plywood Theory.

Erin and the girls got back from Seattle Wednesday after a nice time on the red eye. At that point the closet was a little behind schedule. The color we (I) picked out (the picture doesn't do it justice) needed a third coat. The closet doors were piled into the room where my friend had helped me deposit them a couple of days earlier. Tools, drop cloths, etc were scattered all over. I think Erin just about had a nervous breakdown from the mess. But, she took a nap and by the end of the evening the doors were installed, new lights were working, and the mess cleaned up. It was a sheet of plywood kind of day. For those of you unfamiliar with The Sheet of Plywood Theory, let me explain:

A lazy foreman in a yacht yard I was working at once told me about this theory. Before he was foreman he had to actually pretend to work in order to get paid. He and one other guy were working on a hull. The other guy (who was a hard worker) was running all the electrical and other systems below decks. Important and tedious work that didn't look like a lot when you were done. The lazy guy did almost nothing all day. But late in the afternoon he started putting up some sheets of plywood where the joiner bulkheads would go to separate the staterooms, etc. That evening the owner came with the head of the yard to look at the progress and was ecstatic to see the interior taking shape so quickly. It didn't matter that the sheets of plywood took almost no time and probably weren't even correct or permanent. The client had SEEN progress. This man was congratulated by his boss on a job well done and the hard-working guy in the bilges got no credit for anything. The moral is that while all that other necessary stuff takes a long time and is really what makes the project successful in the end, it doesn't make the same impression on the client (spouse) as those days when big pieces (sheets of plywood) come together and allow her to visualize the end result.

Erin lives for sheet of plywood days. Now to install and paint the trim. With any luck we should have our clothes in there next week.

Gotta Love Drywall

I really don't like drywall. But I seem to be getting better and faster at it from pure, painful repetition. (Of course the same concept could be applied to learning how to break bricks with my head.) The new master closet is almost done. Today the third coat of mud was still drying, but tomorrow we make dust and then paint. (And install the doors frames.) I think the time as come to head to the HD and pick up some paint and other supplies for tomorrow's activities.

We Go

The family is out of town, so I finally get to spend some time messing with my computer. First let's du Ubuntu. Now think of all the other things that can be done..... In the meantime look at a friend's blog and decide that while I can never achieve his level of geekdom, I can try. So let's start this blog and see how it works. Maybe it will fall flat and this will be the last entry.

Oh, and let's try posting a picture....


To explain, this is just a random sky shot I took last fall and used today for the Ubuntu background. Which reminds me, it's bleeping cold here. Aiming at 4 degrees before wind chill tonight.