Nordic Device of Torture

I'm sure you've seen them in infomercials, at used sports equipment stores, or perhaps in the basement or garage of every third house in every suburban neighborhood. I speak of this device, created by the NordicTrack company -- the ski machine.

Now my beloved mother can hardly find her car in a parking lot without falling into an imaginary hole. She once tried to jog around the quarter mile block surrounding my parent's house and ended up with the type of abrasions normly reserved for someone recently dragged behind a moving vehicle. Yet for years, I watched her use this machine with the greatest of ease while watching whatever she had recently taped off of HBO, a channel to which they did not subscribe, hence the snowy picture and lack of what we in the industry call "vertical hold," but that's another blog (I'm still not entirely convinced of her purpose in using the ski machine. She's never looked anything other than "skinny" my whole life.)

So when my parents relegated their precious ski machine to the garage, Erin and I adopted it (as we're prone to doing these days), and it has been going to no use in a corner of our dining room ever since. So last night I missed my workout on the way home and decided to give the NordicTrack a whirl. Now the construction of the machine is simple. You stand on a pair of skiis roughly five or six inches off the floor -- just high enough to twist the devil out of an ankle if you slip off. Approximately waist high, depending on your height, is a brace which pushes into your midsection while you "ski." With your hands, you hold a jumprope looped through a tension wheel at the top, just to make sure no part of you has the ability to generate balance while using this thing.

I hopped on without any hesitation and tried to start skiing. I quickly realized that the tension on the skiis was too tight for a first timer, but Erin, my Biblical helpmate, unfortunately noticed this first. Without warning she dropped the tension lever to zero.

Now I'm sure my father, using a napkin over some Mexican food, could give a much more accurate drawn representation of what happened next, but I'll do my best. You see, in physics there's this whole equal and opposite reaction business. Basically the tension wheel is working against the skiis which are working against my feet and legs. If you remove the tension, the skiis are free to do as they wish, which is not provide a reaction against my feet.

The geekless version of this is that the skiis immediately shot out behind me sending me, more or less, horizontal. I didn't completely hit the floor though, as my face first slammed into the waist high brace which gave me enough to time to yell something starting with F or S before catching myself. After explaining to Erin that you can't just release ALL the tension at once, I regained my composure and repositioned myself on the machine. (She didn't hear my explanation through her tears of laughter.)

I began slowly trying to ski on the machine. I've skiied a lot in my life, and this felt like no skiing I've ever tried. I LIKE skiing, but this...this I didn't like. Erin's approach to using the machine is to reduce the tension to zero and sort of run on it. My approach was to set the tension at the midpoint and try to really ski on it. I eventually got to where I could stay upright, and I even eventually was able to get my arms into the act.

A couple of things I discovered during my half hour workout. First off, the machine forces your back to stay ever so slightly hunched, leaving you with incredible lower back spasms after the fact. I could hardly walk when I was finished. Second, if you try to stand upright a little bit to reduce the throbbing in your back, for whatever reason, the skiing motion just naturally stops. You find yourself suddenly standing there trying to catch your balance, all the while trying to figure out why the blamed thing stopped skiing. And finally, the brace that presses on your midsection really just pushes on your digestive system enough to create incredible gas throughout your workout. I had an ice cream treat at McDonalds prior to the workout (don't ask how this fits into the diet...it just does), and the combination of dairy and the waist brace made the lower section of our house pretty much uninhabitable by the end of the workout.

All in all, the experience made me realize that this is only an emergency option for missed workouts. I'd be better off to go out and run around the block or something. This ordeal also gave me a new respect for my mother. I'm sure she has absolutely no idea as to how or why she can use this device successfully, but such dumb luck is frequently on her side, so good for her. As punishment for Erin laughing so hard at me, I listened to the new White Stripes album at high volume throughout my workout. That'll teach her...

Diets Are Evil

Since I'm having trouble finding "lard ring" sized pants these days, I've decided that it's time to go back to dieting. Finding things to eat ranks right behind stillness as my favorite activity; therefore, succumbing to a need to lose some weight is exceedingly painful. Luckily, my lovely wife is also in favor of this plan, choosing to join me in the quest for flub reduction.

But such a partnership is bound to be frought with danger, and this one is no exception. While taking what Erin calls "a short walk" last evening (which really amounted to walking to the mailbox and back and then discussing how exhausting it was...due to the heat of course...) she informed me that she needed my assistance and encouragement in her efforts to begin working out in the evenings. Now any sane man knows that this is a loaded request, so rather than accept the challenge, I informed her that there was no freaking way I was getting involved in "motivating" her to work out.

She then informed me that all I needed to do was "ask if I've worked out today" or say "How are you feeling tonight, hon? Perhaps you should work out." Yeah, right. She asked me to do something similar for her eating habits some time ago, and I'm still trying to get the fork out of my eye. "Gee, hon. Do you think that cobbler is really the best dessert option for you?" "Hmm...Are you sure about that second helping?" I might as well just go ahead and cut off one of my own arms and beat myself with it.

Part of our dieting involves not eating after 7:30pm, which has always helped with weightloss in the past. Unfortunately this eliminates one of my daily staples -- the 10:30pm six scoop ice cream snack. Last night around 11, after my second full day of dieting, I was lying in bed, and I was hungry. Not just a little bit, but starving. I'd have eaten anything offered me. I was so hungry that I couldn't get tired. I finally went downstairs and discovered Erin in a similar state on the couch. I informed her of my needs, and she replied that "you've got to be hungry to lose weight." Grr.

"You can have something to drink," she offered. I almost called her a swear.

She also reminded me of the 7:30 rule. I asked if I could stay up another hour and then eat my breakfast. "Nope."

To make matters worse, she reminded me that I had not, in fact, missed any meals. I had eaten all three staple meals, just in smaller portions than usual. This just irritated me, so I went back to bed. It's going to be a long summer.

Grant Update

Well, the boy wonder is alive and well and ever growing.

While on vacation, Grant rolled over (from tummy to back) several times as four adults crowded around him in a circle applauding his every move. He has yet to roll over since home despite my attempted bribes.

He is also sitting up. He capsizes sometimes, but on the whole, he can sit for very long stretches.

After what was a difficult time sleeping on vacation, Grant is, on the whole (knock on wood), back to sleeping through the night. Whew. Vacation with him proved a bit trickier than expected (especially on the sleep front) as he didn't adapt well at all. Plus, staying in a condo with family meant that I was less willing to let him fuss as it would wake up family and condo neighbors.

Grant is trying all kinds of foods: carrots, squash, green beans and lots of fruits. The veggies are his favorite (green beans especially). This morning, he was eating a combination of oatmeal, prunes and bananas. Because he is teething and hence chews on his highchair more than the food, he ends up getting his meals everywhere (even all over his diaper!). The pictures don't do it justice, but here--in pictures--is what happened.

Vacation Wrapup

Although it will be hard to top Grant trying to belch the alphabet during a stage production, I thought I'd post a quick wrapup of the final day of our Wisconsin vacation. I spent today doing all those things you do after a week away -- getting the mail at the post office, an oil change on Big Whitey, etc. I knew I was home when I saw a group of employees at the local quicky lube place huddled around a car watching the driver trying to frantically start the engine to get it out of the bay for Big Whitey's entrance. One of the employees finally approached me and informed me that "he's got one of them breathalizer starters and he cain't get it started." It was 7:30am. Welcome to Brownsburg.

On Friday, we departed Egg Harbor around 9am and headed toward Green Bay. One of the follies I frequently make during family vacations is not finding a place to eat breakfast soon enough. I always tell Erin that "we'll find a place in a few miles" which usually turns into a few counties or a few states. Two hours without coffee in the morning, and Erin turns violent. Friday was no exception to this rule, except that I now had the twin cannons of Erin and the mother-in-law aimed squarely at my sloped forehead.

We exited Egg Harbor without food, but I promised we'd find something in the next metropolis -- Sturgeon Bay. As luck would have it, I took the bypass around Sturgeon Bay, leaving McDonald's as our only option. Not willing to yet accept an Egg McMuffin in defeat, Erin told me to press onward. I could hear the gun cocking.

Somewhere around an hour into our journey, I saw a sign pointing down a distressingly neglected road for the Cattail Café. By this point we had passed several dining options, but they had all failed the "is it still open?" test -- meaning one could not tell if the restaurant was still, in fact, a restaurant. After driving along County Road C for a stretch, we came across a metal framed barn which served as the Cattail Café. Upon entering, we encountered a clean, family run restaurant with a lovely breakfast menu and a handful of charming farm folk. My mother-in-law gave me the "I could wring your neck for this" look right up until her food arrived, at which point she agreed that this was an acceptable option.

We returned to Big Whitey for our day's drive home. We had elected to venture through Madison, Wisconsin and avoid Chicago on the drive home. Erin has been wanting to visit Madison for some time, and over the course of the week she discovered a store in Madison which sold a particular baby carrier that she had been considering ordering over the Internet. After a quick stop at a Wisconsin cheese chalet and several hours of listening to Bill Bryson on the iPod, we arrived in Madison.

Madison proved to be a delightful college town, full of eclectic shops and non-chainable eateries. We made our first stop at Happy Bambino to look for Erin's baby carrier. The store carries a variety of hard to find baby products, and the staff were more than helpful in allowing Erin to try on the various baby carriers. Grant obligingly slobbered on all of the display models, leaving his sticky, damp calling card on virtually everything in the store. I will say that I was made somewhat uncomfortable initially by the black and white photographs around the store, featuring pregnant mothers posing in the nude, covering all the interesting bits with their hands, legs, etc. And just about the time I had gained control of myself, a hippie chick with tattoo covered arms entered the store and inquired if she could "use the chair." Apparently this is code for "can I plop out a boob for a bit to feed this kid" in mother-speak. This always proves a tricky situation for me. Do you look and smile approvingly in an "awe, that's a beautiful bonding thing you're doing there...with your boob...which is exceedingly large and inviting" or do you just avoid all eye contact, treating the exposed mammary like a missing eye or wooden leg? I could use some help on this...really...

Anyway, we departed the store with a new baby carrier and made our way to the row of shops running between the state capital and University of Wisconsin campus. Our shopping didn't last long, as it was approximately the temperature of a slightly active volcano outside, so we made our way to The Old Fashioned Restaurant on the square. I found this place through a bit of web research, and it turned out to be perhaps my favorite restaurant of the trip. It was an old bar featuring numerous beers on tap and a wide array of interesting sandwiches and lunch faire. My father-in-law and I enjoyed some $2 pints of some local brew and regained our color before venturing back into the heat.

Our drive was uneventful, save for a few near misses with dull looking individuals talking on their cellphones while driving on the freeway. Erin is sick of me saying it, but I really do think talking on a cellphone should be illegal while driving. Hands free or not, you can't convince me you're paying attention, but I digress. Having not eaten in nearly three hours, we stopped in Oglesby, Illinois for dinner.

Since I had taken the reins for the day with regard to selecting eateries, I bypassed the fast food options in favor of a small wooden sign off the highway pointing toward The Root Beer Stand. As we approached this traditional looking drive-in, it appeared to be packed with cars at the outdoor speakers, which warmed my heart. As we approached, it became apparent that the outdoor portion of the drive-in was now used merely as a parking lot, and all the patrons were inside. So we ventured inside (again, despite mother-in-law "we passed good food three blocks ago" stares.)

The Root Beer Stand proved to have wonderful, greasy, deep fried drive-in food in spades, and we wolfed down cheeseburgers, root beer, and various ice cream concoctions in large quantities. While waiting for our food, an elderly woman approached Grant and began cooing at him. I'm not sure cooing is really the right word though, as she had one of those old lady voices which suggested she was a mere two Winstons from talking through a hole in her throat. She insisted on touching the poor boy, and I feared at one point she was going to kiss him. Grant was a trooper though. He was actually rather engrossed with her, to be honest. In addition to her angelic voice, she was missing a tooth here or there. Grant was transfixed on a gap in her smile on the upper right side, and you could just see that he was trying to decide if he could put his finger through it. Eventually another baby entered the restaurant, and Grant was left only to wonder about his semi-toothed friend. Erin took note of the fact that the woman was wearing a sort of shirt/shorts one piece made to look like an American flag. This was at least the second time on this trip that someone wearing flag garb insisted on over-touching our precious child. This is a trend I will keep an eye on.

After Oglesby, we made our way through the remaining Illinois farmland and eventually emerged in Indiana. The vacation was made fun by the presence of family and our delightfully gassy son, as well as the usual array of food options I manage to find along the highway. We're off to Gatlinburg in a few weeks, which will provide a positively cosmopolitan contrast to the Wisconsin waterfronts. Dollywood, here we come.

Best...Kid...Ever

This evening, we ventured to an Italian restaurant called Villagios. Erin and I actually had breakfast at their sister restaurant, Village Cafe, this morning and were impressed with the food. Villagios had a nice range of options, offering everything from spaghetti with meatballs to various veal and seafood dishes. We all had great dinners, and we were excited to find a restaurant that we all enjoyed up here in the woods.

After dinner, we had tickets for a production by the American Folklore Theater. The show was called A Cabin With A View, an adaptation of "A Room With A View." We had made the decision, perhaps against our better judgment, to all go to this show and take Grant along for the ride. He's generally very good at going out to eat, church, etc, so we really weren't concerned about taking him.

We arrived at the amphiteater tonight, and I was immediately struck by how big an operation this really was. The theater is situated in the woods of the Peninsula State Park and featured seating for several hundred people, perhaps more. Our reserved seats were dead center in the fourth row.

This was already making the wife nervous. She would have felt much better had we had seats on the end so that she could bolt if Grant started getting wound up, but he's usually so content that it's not a problem. I convinced her that everything would be fine, and the show began.

Now before you get ahead of me, Grant did very well through the beginning of the show. He sat on my lap and watched and listened intently to the show. About 35 minutes in, he started getting a little restless. Erin decided that a bottle would do the trick, so amidst his fidgeting, I started feeding him. (Notice that I said this was Erin's decision. The assignment of such decisions to a particular individual are very important in these scenarios.)

Grant did, indeed, calm down a bit, which was a lucky break since we were in the midst of a quiet passage during the show. Imagine the climax of drama in your favorite film -- the moment where the lead gazes intently into the eyes of his leading lady, while she awaits him announcing his devotion. The amphitheater fell silent during such a moment. The tension had mounted as the lovers gazed into each other's souls. And then it happened.

B.....U......R......P.....

Not a little baby burp. Not a cute, cuddly little hiccup. This was a full on belch, similar to the one produced by a trucker following a stop at White Castle. It was loud. Very loud. Loud enough to elicit a laugh throughout the theater. Loud enough to stall the scene for just a second.

This was all bad enough, but once everyone else in the theater recovered, I lost it. I was still holding Grant, but I was doubled over, trying desperately to stifle my laughter. I was shaking. Completely unable to recover. The people in the rows behind and in front of us were laughing, although they had shifted their laughter from Grant to me. I was convulsing, sobbing, unable to contain myself.

I finally pulled it together, but everytime I looked at my baby boy, I lost it again. He made my evening. No, he made my vacation. I'll never forget that moment. It was priceless. He couldn't have timed it better if he'd tried.

Grant ended up sleeping through most of the rest of the play, although he did get a little antsy toward the end. After the show, several people were heard laughing about "the burp," and several people commented on how well he'd done during the show. I'm sure there were some questioning our judgment and sanity in bringing such a young child to the show, but it was worth it. He genuinely was not a problem, and I haven't laughed that hard probably since I was his age.

So Grant, you made my week. You truly proved yourself to be my boy tonight.

Splish Splashin' in Swede Country

With our Door County, Wisconsin vacation now in full swagger, I thought I would give everyone a glimpse into life here in Door County:









































Yeah, that's right. It's pretty much wiiiiide open. You get to use your imagination a lot. You imagine going out for a charming breakfast at a sidewalk cafe, but what you actually get is a place with copious numbers of pancakes and goats on the roof. You imagine going for a stroll along a side street looking at small boutiques and coffee houses, but what you actually get is a coffee house called the Chocolate Chicken across the street from a BP station. You imagine a romantic candlelit dinner at a small bistro, but what you actually get instead of candlelight is this:

Don't get me wrong. I'm not complaining. It is relaxing, and I could dream about what the possibilities are with a "chocolate chicken," but let's just say that there ain't just a whole lot going on up in this neck of the woods.

The picture of the bubbling cauldron above was taken at our dinner at the Old Post Office in Ephraim, Wisconsin last evening. We went to a traditional Door County fish boil. The fish was very good, although I'm not yet sure of the purpose of having everyone arrive early to watch the pot boil. I stunk like I'd worked at Long John's for the rest of the night, and I had a fair amount of ash in my hair, but the fish was tasty, and most importantly, there was lots of it.

Prior to dinner yesterday, we took Grant out to the pool for his first swimming experience. You can see just how stylin' he was in his new swimmin' duds. It's so refreshing to see the lad smile so brightly, not yet aware enough to realize that chicks don't dig man boobs.

Grant was all excited about the swimming experience at first. He got to wear new shorts. He got to run around with no shirt on. He got to wear some kind of funky waterproof diaper (which I'm fairly sure was also being donned by some of the older patrons of the evening fish boil). He was all good until he got to the water, and then he wasn't too sure of what was going on.


After I got in with him and dunked him a few times, all was well. He truly enjoyed himself, and we were relieved to see that he was fearless in the water. He took offense to me saying that after putting his head under, he had "Al Sharpton Hair," but I'm sure he'll eventually forgive me.


All in all, the pool was a successful venture.

This morning, Erin and I left Grant with the grandparents and headed out for a hike at Cave Point Park on the Lake Michigan side of the county. We had seen it touted as "the highlight of a Door County vacation" so we were excited to see it.

Indeed, it was lovely, but you could walk from one end of the park to the other in approximately 3 minutes. I'm not saying it wasn't pretty. But I think it says something about a place when your competition is a pancake house with goats on the roof and some boiled whitefish.

After our hike around the park, we went to the Cana Island lighthouse for a look around. I took note on the stroll to the lighthouse that the wife had chosen her Mennonite garb for the day.

She assured me that these were "Gaucho pants" but I can't see Gaucho, Harpo or Karl wearing any such thing. Perhaps tonight we'll go for a ride on a covered wagon...or Erin can show us how to churn butter in those duds. In any case, I'm sure it'll be exciting.

Vacation to...Milwaukee?

On Friday afternoon, we loaded up Big Whitey with Big White'uns, namely Erin and I plus Erin's parents and the Grantster, and headed for our vacation in Wisconsin. Following a brief debate which I, predictably, lost regarding whether or not we would try to go through Chicago or around it, we began our trek.

We arrived in Chicago around 2pm and took the Skyway into downtown. All was well until we hit the north side of town, at which time we gained admission to the "Greater Chicago/Milwaukee Parking Festival" for the next couple of hours. I repeatedly brought up the debate which had just occurred as we left Indy, but all it served to do was remind me that I was the only person riding in the van who had not at some point held the last name "Gunst."

Upon arriving in Milwaukee, our predetermined destination for the evening, we began looking for restaurants. Never settling for an Applebee's or the like, we drove downtown and dined at the Water Street Brewery. (You pretty much HAVE to eat at a brewery when in Milwaukee, right?) The food was good, but it was obvious by the duller-than-usual stares that we were all pretty beat. My father-in-law and I dropped the women-folk at the hotel and went out for a quick night cap (at Applebee's, no less) where my father-in-law chose not to remind me that I would never win debates like the one had earlier in the day.

On Sunday, we decided to take in a tour of the Miller Brewing Company. I would have preferred to have toured one of the smaller brewries in town, but the timing just wasn't going to work. We arrived at Miller at around 10am and took the first tour. The gift shop where the tour started was what you would expect -- old beer bottles featuring the Miller emblemn from bygone eras, a timeline showing the history of Miller, and a healthy selection of Asians with large photographic ensembles awaiting the tour.

The tour was enjoyable, if nothing remarkable. It did end with three samples of Miller beers and their associated imports, which made the whole thing a-o.k. The samples confirmed what I had suspected throughout the tour -- I don't like anything brewed by Miller. I tried High Life, touted as the "champagne of beers." I don't much like champagne, and I definitely don't need it in my beer. I tried Miller Lite. No go. I tried MGD. Tolerable, but if anything else was available, including water, I'd probably go that direction. My father-in-law had the right idea. He chose to get three samples of Foster's, which is imported by Miller. The servers didn't seem to mind serving him three of the same thing, and he didn't have to endure the lingering taste of Miller Lite for the rest of the day.

One interesting fact we learned on the tour was that up until some time in the 1980's, the employees at the Miller brewery could drink as much as they wanted (or could) while on the job. This had to provide an amazing work environment. Nothing says OSHA like four drunk guys and a giant vat of beer or a fork lift. It's a wonder that every other bottle of the "champagne of beers" didn't feature a "finger from a drunken employee."

After Milwaukee, we made our way on up to Door County, Wisconsin. We're still getting settled, but I'll try to post throughout the week. I have discovered, though, in my first 24 hours here that a) there are no mini-golf places featuring animatronic cartoon characters and b) three out of four people are an expert on infant sleep patterns and how to improve them (especially if they're all related).

Will I ever learn?

Today I made a dumb mistake. I'm tired and have a headache, so I should have been extra aware of the potential for this type of mistake, but foolishly, I paid the warning signs no heed.

The mistake made its appearance in the choice of outfit. I decided to wear a new white top, testing it out before our vacation up north starting on Friday. But, I'm no fool. I know Grant is capable of spit up beyond equal or measure, so I brought along a blanket and a burp cloth to fully cover myself as we ran some errands. Of course, you know where this is going. Grant, who just started eating some other foods and who had just happened to have some carrots for breakfast, decided that my white shirt was an empty canvas for his Jackson Pollock like beginnings. But, no worries, I treaded around the library with a carrot and formula spit up stain down the front of my shirt like it was part of the outfit. Not a soul was fooled. Nothing says "new mama" like the spit up stain wearing, minivan driving, baby talk talking woman who is balancing 5 library books in one hand and a 20 lb baby in the other.

Here's a couple of pics of the cutest baby on the planet. Aside from his evil work in producing the most embarrasing shirt stain in history, Grant was quite the ladies man at the library. Several grandmas came up and asked to hold him (he didn't so much as even burp in their arms??) and the library lady almost waived my late fees because she thought he was so cute. Almost.

Here's a pic of Grant: Like Father, Like Son

Work Related

My company just announced the creation of an "Employee Motivation Committee." Methinks the formation of such a committee is a prime indicator of where your company stands. It's sort of like forming a "Committee For the Exploration of Alternate Employment Options" or "Committe to Begin the Cleanup of Future Unoccupied Office Space."

Another facet of life in a Chinese company that I find increasingly blog worthy is the selection of Western names by my Chinese cohorts. It has become fashionable for Asians to select a western name like Bob or Louie when dealing with Americans. It always cracks me up to meet a guy who I know is named Xiangxian, only to have him introduce himself as Pete.

Recently we've seen an upswing in the selection of fruit names. I met recently a woman named "Apple." We thought that was somewhat entertaining until we met her friend "Cherry." Nobody had the heart to tell her that Cherry would probably be more likely found on the local stripper pole rather than at a multinational corporation.

Just this morning, I saw an announcement welcoming Mr. Robin Sin to a certain company. I couldn't figure out why it was making me giggle, but then it hit me.

So here's to you, Mr. Robin Sin, Jesus loves you more than you will know. Whoa, whoa, whoa, indeed.

My wife is so cool...

Last summer, you may recall that I diverted our vacation drive to Hilton Head through Athens, Georgia, hometown of my favorite band of the last 30 years, R.E.M. Erin was excited beyond all ability to contain herself at getting to see the various clubs they'd played in during the early 1980's, restaurants they own, etc. While trekking around Athens spewing various bits of R.E.M. trivia, I mentioned that Peter Buck, R.E.M.'s guitarist and the one on the right in the picture, had lived in Indiana for a while as a kid. She asked me if I knew where he'd lived, and I told her I didn't, and as far as I knew, he'd never really spoken about his time in our fine state in interviews.

We wandered around Athens for a few more hours, headed off to our beach vacation, and I never thought any more of that brief conversation. My lovely wife, on the other hand, decided that it would be a nice gesture (and a sign that she was actually paying attention to my inane music babble that day) if she wrote a letter to R.E.M.'s Athens office requesting info from Pete Buck regarding his stay in Indiana.

Now while R.E.M. isn't quite as huge as they used to be in the U.S., they're still wildly popular overseas, and the home office, I'm guessing, still deals with quite a bit of fan mail. Couple this with the fact that the three members of R.E.M. live in various other parts of the country now, and I figured there was little chance of her hearing anything back from that letter. In fact, she mailed the letter in September but didn't tell me about it until many months later, at which point she was thouroughly disgusted with the lack of a reply and had decided to shun R.E.M. forevermore. I tried to explain to her that these were busy guys with fame on an international level and that I didn't think it was realistic to expect a reply, but she was unconsolable.

Jump forward to last night. I brought in our mail, as I do every day on my way in from work, and amongst the five or six offers for a Capitol One card was a letter addressed to Erin in her own handwriting. We both immediately tossed it aside as a reminder from a dentist about an appointment, but eventually she tore it open. As she removed the letter inside, I immediately recognized the signature, in handwritten ink, of one Peter Buck.

I've had the chance over the past 10 years of meeting many of my musical favorites. I've had dinner with some of them, I've met them after shows, etc, but R.E.M. has always been just big enough to not be easily approachable, in my mind. I once sat at a bar next to Mike Mills (left in the picture above) but didn't say anything as he was being hounded by other people. And Peter Buck? Well Pete has always seemed like the cooler older brother in R.E.M. who would let you hang out with him, but only so he could make fun of or injure you later. He seems like a good guy, but not one to suffer fools or fans lightly. This has just been my impression. So when it occurred to me that Erin was holding in her hands a letter signed by Peter Buck, I about destroyed a piece of furniture getting to it.

As it turns out, her letter managed to make it through the Athens office to the hands of Peter Buck. Her letter was very clever, and I'm sure her wit was what got the letter into Buck's hands. She basically said that she was unfazed by his fame, but she had a psycho husband who dragged her around Athens and to R.E.M. concerts. I'll take being dragged through the mud if it got a response.

The letter we received in response was a fairly detailed document of his time as a kid in Indiana. Not a form letter. Not a "thank you for contacting R.E.M." type thing, but a "Hey Erin, Your letter was cool. Here's what I can remember..." I was floored, as was Erin. She immediately took my position that R.E.M. is the coolest band on the planet, and that Peter Buck is most assuredly the nicest man in show business. We're in the process of framing her letter next to Pete's response. It will take a prominent position in the hallway in our house, right next to Grant's picture and the ones from our wedding. There will be a fee to view it.

Thank you, Peter Buck, for taking the time to reply to her letter. And thank you, cool wifey. You're amazing. When R.E.M.'s next album comes out, I'm sure there will be an ode of some sort to Indiana, rooted in Erin's letter to Peter Buck.

Fishin' with grandpa...

As many of you know, my grandfather in southern Indiana has been having some medical difficulties over the past few weeks. I've been fortunate enough to get to spend some time with him in the hospital, which has led me to reminisce about various trips and things I've done with him in my lifetime. I've had the unusual experience of growing up with all four of my grandparents still living, so I've built up a wealth of stories with each of them. But the one that my grandfather most commonly recalls involves a certain fishing trip...

When I was in the fourth or fifth grade, my grandfather decided to take me and my two older cousins on a fishing trip in northern Minnesota. The chance to take a vacation with my cousins was exciting enough, but I had never been on a trip alone with my papaw (what we Hoosiers call our grandfathers...) at the time, so it was a grand event for yours truly. Papaw drove my cousin Derek and I, while my cousin Boomer awaited our arrival in Minnesota. (The secondary purpose of the trip was to pick him up at summer camp.)

On the drive up, we stopped somewhere in Wisconsin and did the only thing that makes sense when you're in Wisconsin -- we bought cheese. I think my cousin and I bought about five pounds of cheese, because I can remember we ate string cheese almost continuously for the rest of the drive that day. My grandfather is a pediatrician, so he understood that eating several pounds of cheese will leave one in a world of hurt later on (actually, common sense would tell this to most people, physician or not) but obviously this escaped Derek and me. I can remember papaw laughing his head off at us later that night as we lay in intestinal distress.

Upon arriving in Minnesota, we headed for Boomer's summer camp. I can remember we wandered around the grounds for a while looking for any sign of my cousin. In the mean time, we were introduced to a guy standing waist deep in the lake. This particular introduction sticks with me, because I remember as my grandfather reached out to shake the guy's hand, he emerged from the lake naked. I wasn't accustomed (thankfully) to seeing naked adult men, let alone emerging from swampy lakes, so the scene of this dude rising out of the lake has stuck with me. It seemed odd to me at the time, and to be honest, it seems slightly odder to me now. So naked guy, I hope you realize the impression you left on me. Ick.

We stayed in a little motel in Ely, Minnesota, and the only restaurant nearby was an A&W. Every morning we'd hop out of bed to go for breakfast at the A&W. Actually, the cousins hopped out of bed, while papaw crawled. He slept with one of the three of us each night, and I snored, Boomer turned perpendicular in the bed, and Derek kicked, so I think he slept about six minutes each night. Breakfast was a highlight each day for the cousins. My grandfather may have been a doctor, but he never ate food that made any sense. He's fond of ice cream with sunflower seeds or potato chips on it, or ketchup on cottage cheese and such. So for breakfast at the A&W each day, he ate a salad with ranch dressing. I have no idea why. Similarly, in keeping with supporting healthy eating habits for his grandsons, we ate coney dogs and root beer floats at 7 am each morning. We thought it was the greatest thing ever, but I have a feeling papaw probably realized his mistake each evening as we drew the windows and doors of the small motel room closed. I think the only time he ever gave the A&W employees any indication of his profession was when he'd say things like, "No, no Bret David. You can't order a second coney dog for breakfast," as though that second coney dog was where the pediatric line of good judgment was crossed.

Our experiences fishing on the lake were less than productive. We spent a lot of time clanking around in the boat, and papaw spent most of his time fixing tangled reels. This led to a lot of ham fistedness on his part, which usually concluded with a rod and reel in the lake. We easily fished more rods out of the lake than we did blue gill or pike. The other thing all of the cousins remember is that papaw could never hear what any of us were saying. He's notoriously hard of hearing, and at one point, he hammered the boat into a rock at high speed. He scolded Derek, who had been assigned "rock watch" at the front of the boat, and Derek would have replied, had he not been hoarse from screaming "ROCK!" for the previous five minutes.

My other memories of that trip involved papaw and the car. If memory serves me, it was a blue Ford LTD. At one point, we were nearly demolished by a pickup truck that ran a stop sign in Virginia, Minnesota. I think it was the same day when we made a left turn onto a street, and Derek asked the seemingly innocent question, "Papaw, I've never seen a street where you look at the backs of the stoplights instead of the fronts." It quickly occurred to papaw that we were going the wrong way up a four lane divided highway. He was unfazed and quickly drove the LTD through a small patch of private property in an effort to join the proper lanes of traffic.

There were lots of other great memories on that trip, but the thing that will forever stick out in my mind is how much I enjoyed spending that time with my grandfather. I wouldn't trade it for anything, and if you haven't done something similar with your own kids or grandkids, I couldn't make a stronger recommendation. At 84 years old, papaw still lights up whenever we speak of that trip, and I do much the same.

(More pics of Grant will be here shortly!!)

Lost in Translation

In my current job, I have interactions via email every day with people from all over the world. Since my company is based in China, the majority of these interactions are with individuals from China or Singapore. I've discovered that being able to translate from what is commonly referred to as "Chinglish" or "Engrish" is quite a skill. The words I receive in the email are, indeed, in English, but deciphering the meaning can be somewhat difficult.

Just this morning I received a software bug report alerting me that the "Tv has a poop voice when change sound mode." Now I've worked on a lot of televisions in my career, but never have I thought to myself, "Gee, this TV seems to be making a strange noise. Let's see, what could it be. I think it's making a poop voice. Yes, that's definitely it. A poop voice." Since Grant's arrival (well, let's be honest, my whole life) I've dealt with quite a bit of poop, and not once have I noticed it had a voice. Erin may disagree.

I've also recently received emails imploring our team here in Indy to "jump in the tricky and implement the software risky controlling immediately." Yep...that was my response also.

Regarding a hardware problem I discovered last week, I received this in response from an engineer in China:

"I did not why indy dont know it. This kindly information should be pulished before Indy found out."

Hmm.

All of this is part of the joy of working in a global environment. I'm sure there's some Chinese dude blogging at this very moment over in Shenzhen trying to figure out what "gone up amongst the lillies" or "where the rat bit the woman" means. Good luck with that...Nobody in California can figure those out either.

Memorial Day

How is it possible to have a three day holiday weekend in which you don't even spend enough time at your own home to mow the grass?

Such was our Memorial Day weekend. I'm not complaining. We got to see nearly every member of my side of the family for approximately 11 seconds each, and we got to see some of Erin's extended family for around 8 seconds each. Pretty successful, given the timetable. I think we put about 400 miles on Big Whitey which cost us about $100, so that's depressing. On the upside, Grant delighted his road worn parents by sleeping completely through the night last night. I thought the wife had taken a nip off the bottle this morning she was so giddy. Hopefully this will become a trend.

The weekend started with a wedding for some friends from church on Saturday in Bloomington. Erin and I were both in the wedding. Erin was chosen to say a prayer, and I was asked to read (!). I spent several minutes before her prayer trying to coach Erin into saying something enlightening. She kept giving me all this business about praying for God's mercy and grace. I told her that God's mercy and grace could be best shown through a mercifully short ceremony followed by a graceful after-wedding buffet, which did indeed turn out to be true. The reception was at a lovely Italian restaurant in Bloomington called Tutto Béne, which offered a cozy atmosphere ensconced in exposed brick, couches, and high ceilings. Apparently the place was a factory at one time and more recently a muffler shop. The restauranteers have done a nice job exercising the exhaust fumes. I was excited to find out about this place, since every time we eat in Bloomington we end up at Texas Roadhouse or the Olive Garden. I have no problem with either of those restaurants (both will feed me until I'm sweating, which is my criteria for fine dining), but it is nice to take in a local experience from time to time, and I have no doubt we'll return to Tutto Béne in the future.

Sunday we attended a high school graduation party for one of my cousins. She made it through high school with a diploma and without a child, which is always a source of pride for us Hoosiers. Now she's off to Indiana University to study hard and discuss conservative politics with her fellow acadamians (her parents read this, you know). Congratulations, Kate! Your accomplishments are helping make up for the rest of us!

Yesterday we had lunch with some of Erin's extended family from California who join us each year for the Indy 500. Having grown up in Indy, I'm always fascinated by people's devotion to the Big Race. I've never attended the event and have generally writtten it off as merely a source of traffic tie ups and hearing loss, but others think it's the greatest thing since "all you can eat." In any case, it was fun to introduce Grant to more family.

So for the rest of this week, we intend to lock our doors, unplug our phones, and hide out in our house watching "24" and whatever shows up from Netflix. Please don't call after 8pm.

Lord of the Dance

The video won't due the absolute cuteness justice. Let's just put it this way... he has a way of keeping his body still and just bouncing his legs which makes him look like he's the lead in the RiverDance. PRECIOUS!

Pitchin' In

I realize we've had lots of posts in the past couple of weeks. I told Erin the other night that life in the past month has started to blur into little bloggable moments, and at this point, the blog is really a diary with which we will hopefully remember the craziness of our own lives. If you, dear reader, find something worth your time, that's an added bonus. (I realize that this bonus, more often than not, will be pictures of Grant and not me rambling. I'm aware.)

Another bloggable bit happened today here at Enginerd Central. We had a company pitch-in to celebrate the arrival of summer, an event likely not noticed by some of our staff who haven't been exposed to natural light in a very long time. Someone actually "pitched in" with Little Debbie brownies that were cut in half. Only an engineer would "pitch in" with something you could buy from the vending machines.

The other thing I found humorous was that there was a large conference room with tables and chairs reserved for the event at which there were a fair number of people eating -- from our finance and marketing departments. The engineers were gathering three times as much food on their plates and escaping potential mingling in under 30 seconds, rushing back to their cubes, food already in mouth. I would have started laughing if it hadn't been so difficult to run with a chicken leg in my mouth.

Food, Flowers, and a Fat Baby

Bret and I (with grandparents in tow) headed down for our third annual trip to Madison, Indiana for the amazing Madison in Bloom fesitval. Madison is a quaint river town (Ohio River) which boasts hundreds of Civil War era homes and a bustling and large main street complete with antique stores and ice cream shops. The "in bloom" part of the weekend includes trapsing through these homes' gardens and oogling the landscapeing prowess of their retiree owners.

Here's a cute candy shop along the downtown street. Bret was customer numero uno.


However, this year with baby Grant and a scorcher for the record books, Madison in Bloom could have been easily called "Sweaty baby with diareaha day." Grant's bowel system was not happy which lead to diaper change after diaper change, more often than not on the backseat of our new van. To top things off, we decided to carry Grant in a backpack carrier to make maneuvering through the gardens easier. I made it about 4 blocks with the backpack; Bret, fortunately, had more fortitude and made it the rest of the trip. Unfortunately, thanks to the heat, Baby Grant was one sweaty, stinky and soiled mess.



This year's gardens left a lot to be desired, but the day, gardens or not, made for a great late spring tradition. This Christmas, we will head down there for a candlelight tour of the insides of the homes. So, Madison is quickly becoming a biannual destination for us.

Part of why carrying Grant was so tricky is because he's a bit of a pork chop. His four month doctor's visit was last Friday, and Grant weighed in at 19.5 lbs. I checked out our dear friends, The Long family, to see what Grant's buddy Kaya weighed, and I found that her nine month report had her weighing in at under 16 lbs. What can I say? Our baby likes his food. He has already outgrown his bucket car seat, so this weekend included finding a new throne for the boy wonder.

Memorial Day weekend is super busy, complete with a wedding, a graduation party and family from California. As long as Grant keeps the same shorts on for longer than 5 minutes, we'll be tickled.

For Sale

This weekend was our annual neighborhood garage sale. This provides the prime opportunity to watch people heap all their crap on their driveway so that their neighbors can rifle through it, eventually moving some portion of it to their own driveway to be placed on sale at next year's community garage sale. It's one of nature's beautiful cycles.

One of the things I find so intersting about these sales is the need people feel to critique the items which you're in the process of getting rid of. We stopped by one house so that Erin could look at one of these little customized trash cans which allows you to deposit soiled baby diapers without having to breathe the fumes later. After she inspected it and decided not to purchase, another neighbor strolled by and from the sidewalk yelled, somewhat angrily, "You can do the same thing with a normal trash can." He had no interest in the item, and it wasn't as though he were preventing someone from making a $5000 mistake. He just felt the need to gripe for his own satisfaction. Very odd. I also find it interesting that neighbors will angrily argue over the price of items, none of which is more than $5. Nothing creates a sense of contentment and neighborly love like a community garage sale.

This year our addition to the collective pile was a "Thighs of Steel" VCR tape and a large L-shaped computer desk which has followed me through about 50 moves, including one to California and back. It has served me well, but it basically filled one of our bedrooms, so last week we bought and assembled a much smaller desk with the intention of selling the old one for a meager profit at the garage sale. So Saturday morning we lugged the old desk onto the driveway from its resting place in our dining room. And why one "Thighs of Steel" VCR tape, you ask? Good question. Bored at one point with the lack of action in our driveway, I sauntered over for a lecherous glance at the thighs in question on the front of the tape and discovered it was a male's thighs of steel. Why my wife owned this item, she could not explain, but it was a sign of the slowness of our morning that this caused me such disappointment.

Erin's dad and I manned the desk while Erin and her mom went off looking for clothes and toys for Grant. I found this intriguing, given that Grant has more clothes than Ralph Lauren, but what do I know? After a few minutes, Erin returned with a few items, including a handful of CDs.

Now you may be asking why she would be buying me CDs, when I've been selling CDs over the past few years. It all goes back to LaLa. I've been trading CDs on LaLa for the past year, but I've now run out of "trade fodder." Basically I want to keep all the stuff I have, but I'd still like to receive new stuff. So she agreed that a good approach would be to buy CDs for less than a dollar at garage sales, if they were albums that people would want on LaLa. So this garage sale provided my first opportunity to look for "trade fodder."

Along with the handful of CDs, she excitedly informed me that one of our neighbors was selling a couple hundred CDs down the street, and Erin made the call that it seemed like good stuff for LaLa. So Dave and I hopped in the car and started making our plans to pay as little as possible for as many CDs as possible.

Sure enough, the guy had tons of CDs that were all in pristine shape. And on top of it, most of the CDs were of the "best of" variety by big name artists over the past 30 years (The guy had been a DJ in a former life. What a score!) He wanted $1 per CD, but I asked him how much he'd take for the lot. He replied with an uncooperative, "Count them" which garnered an eye roll from his wife, who most assuredly wanted to forget his DJ'ing days and regain the space in her bedroom occupied by the CDs (this is starting to sound familiar.) In my mind, this was a sure sign that he wasn't the bargaining type, but Dave and I had discussed our strategy on the way to his sale. My approach at this point was to simply pull out the CDs I wanted and knew would trade, and then I'd offer him like 80 or 90 cents for each of them. Or, perhaps, I'd say, "Gee, looks like about 200 CDs, I'll give you $180." As I readied my general offer for the lot, Dave immediately began counting and quickly announced that there were "at least 400 CDs here." So I began the selection process.

In the end, I bought 50 or so CDs for $30. Not a bad deal, and they're already trading like mad on LaLa. Erin and her mom ended up buying some clothes and toys, but nothing too huge. Although it was rumored that Deb waited until Dave was mowing in the back yard before unloading her loot from the car. And the desk, you ask? It sat with nary a bit of interest all day. So at about 9pm, as I was just getting ready to cede defeat and move it back into the dining room, a friendly family with a UHaul stopped for a look. They were tough bargainers, and I ended up even helping them heave it into the truck.

Next year we should have tons of our own baby clothes and toys to put out on the driveway. Oh wait, we're having eight kids first. Yes, I'm listening, dear.

I Love the BMV

I went to the BMV today to register Big Whitey (the Kia Sedona) and transfer the plates from our now dearly departed Elantra. It has already been a fiasco getting the title for the van, as the dealership "lost" it. (This seems concerning...The one thing I wouldn't expect a dealership to do is lose titles.) But after six or seven weeks, I finally got the call that the title was available, so I headed over to the nearest license branch to take care of the plates and registration.

The BMVs in Indiana have been under great pressure to get their act together over the past year. The average wait time at the BMV had grown to something like six days, not to mention the fact that you could get a state issued ID from the BMV if you had proof of being a living organism and nothing else, so a new BMV czar was elected and he set off trying to straighten out a badly broken system.

So I headed into the BMV with optimism that this experience would be better than those of years past. As I entered, my first clue of the improvements was that there were only a handful of people seated, waiting for their names to be called. In previous trips, you would walk in and be handed a number, "7" for example. You'd look at the electronic monitor and it would be on "4," but you knew that this meant there were at least 100 people in front of you. I actually had been told on multiple occasions to leave and return in three or four hours. It was ridiculous.

So I plopped in the chairs and waited. Sure enough, only a few minutes passed before a clerk called my name. As I approached the clerk, I noted that her demeanor suggested that she probably wasn't a recent charm school graduate. She dryly asked me what I was there for, and I replied that I needed to "transfer the plate from this old car," and handed her the registration from the dearly departed Elantra, "to this car," and handed her the title for Big Whitey. She stared at both for a moment and said, "there will be a charge for being late on requesting the title." I quickly handed her a check from the dealership for the title trouble, which she accepted, but I could tell that she was already developing a lack of trust in me.

Next she began analyzing my old registration.

"Where did this come from?" said with a face that suggested it was a forgery.
"The license branch in Brownsburg."
"Hmm...I don't recognize the name," as though she knew all BMV employees statewide.

After she decided that it was a legitimate document, she began hammering away on her computer, sighing approximately ever 15 seconds. After taking my Mastercard to pay the appropriate fees, she printed off a long receipt and the new registration and sent me packing.

Despite her prison cheeriness, I was pleased with the experience. Short and to the point. As I walked out toward the van, I noticed that the plate number on the registration did not match the plate from the Elantra which I had placed on the van that morning. Instead, the number on the registration was for our Sonata, which we still own.

I immediately turned on my heels and headed back inside. My clerk, we'll call her Helga, was nowhere to be seen, but luckily the branch was empty so another clerk called me up. As I was explaining the situation, Helga reemerged and inquired as to "what (he's) doing back?" I explained the problem, and she rolled her eyes and plopped back in front of the computer.

She then inquired of another clerk, "Can't he just switch the plates on his van and Sonata when he gets home?"

Now anyone with enough fingers to hold a pencil can tell you that this won't cut it. For starters, she effectively "sold" my Sonata, as far as the state's computers were concerned. I started to protest and was told, "Let us try and fix it before you butt in, sir."

Everyone needs a moment to be reminded of their rage management skills in a given week, and apparently this was my opportunity. I sat quietly while she and her coworker discussed whether this was a viable option. After another couple of minutes, I said "This isn't going to work. I'm going to have a mess when I renew my registrations next year, not to mention if I get pulled over. Plus the amount of excise tax I just paid was based on the wrong car."

She sighed heavily and said, "I'm not supposed to void nothing out. That's what the commisioner said."

"I don't think you have a choice."

"But it'll go on my record."

She then stared at me as if waiting for suggestions. I shook my head and said nothing, although my face and internal being was shouting, "I don't care what you have to do, just fix it. Your record is of no concern to me."

At this point, her supervisor emerged from the shadows and said, "You don't have a choice. You'll have to void it and start over."

Much sighing and rolling of eyes ensued. As she began punishing her keyboard again for her mistakes, she showed her coworker something on the screen and said, "See how I got confused?" She then mumbled, "Who buys two Hyundais, not to mention the same year?"

Again I shuffled to my happy place and resisted the urge to protest. After much mumbling to herself, the printer spit out new receipts. She showed me that I would be getting a refund for the overpaid tax due to her error, and she handed me a new registration for Big Whitey which was correct. I gathered up my belongings and headed for the door, resisting the urge to give her a piece of my Korean car drivin' mind.

As I reached the door, her supervisor reemerged and began reading her the riot act about her lack of customer service skills. She was also hammering on her about the fact that apparently she never logs out of the computer when she goes to lunch, leaving the terminal open for potential abuse. I felt bad for her, for a second. But then I was happy that SOMEONE now appeared to be managing the BMV.

Overall I'm glad it's over with, and Big Whitey is serving us well. I'm getting 16 MPG which means I swear a lot at the gas station. Perhaps in the coming weeks, Helga will get the opportunity to pump the gas for one of my "stupid Hyundais" after she's booted from the BMV.

Competitive Momma?

Over the last couple of weeks, I've overheard Erin singing to Grant at various times. Erin has a wide repertoire of show tunes and hymns that she could peel off (in stark contrast to the English pub singalongs which I serenade Grant with.) But I've noticed an interesting phenomenon in that she seems to select the same hymn nine times out of ten.

It all goes back to a couple of years ago when we visited with Erin's cousins out in California. They had an adorable new daughter with cute blond hair and enough personality, even as a baby, to light up the room. But she also had a talent that bordered on a superpower -- she could sing one particular hymn from beginning to end. Now I've seen kids sing, but this kid wasn't old enough to even be focusing or drooling with any distinction, but in actuality, she could not only sing this hymn but speak in more complete sentences than many Hoosiers. I'll never forget watching her -- "Jesus, name above all names. Beautiful Savior, Glorious Lord." Very cute. Also a tiny bit scary to those of us who are just finishing Hooked On Phonics.

Now that we have our own wunderkind, I can see it glowing in Erin's eyes. Grant will sing. Oh yes, he'll sing. And he will sing that hymn from cover to cover before he turns 12 months. She would never admit it if I asked her, but I fully expect to see Erin with a set of hymn flashcards before she heads to California this summer. I figure by that time, her cousin's daughter will be doing calculus and playing chess. Such is life in a competitive family...

Pinch me, please

It might have been the best Mother's Day ever because it was my first, but let me tell you, yesterday was extra special to me. After four long years struggling with infertility and the Grace wait, yesterday felt like it was a long time in the making.

Grant and Bret made me waffles for breakfast, and then Grant, I assume with his American Express Card, bought me the greatest gift an overstressed, overworked, underslept working Mommy could ask for: a full day at the spa, complete with facial, massage, pedicure, manicure, and even lunch. I felt completely and utterly spoiled.

But the real spoiling is the fact that Grant Nicholas is my perfect, dreamboat son. I felt like the day was more about him in the end... his gift of motherhood to me. We said a very special prayer for Grant's birthmom, knowing how hard the day must have been for her. We sent her lots of gifts (none nearly as good as the full day spa package), but we wanted her to know that we did not forget her gift to us as well.

Since our marriage, Mother's Day has been secretly hard for me. Sure, I can try to concentrate on my mom or Bret's mom or even our grandparents and aunts, but truth be told, there was always a struggle about being childless for another year. I still think the holiday is "overdone," but eating that homemade walnut and cinnamon waffle while dreaming about toe nail color, I came to realize that it was okay to overdue things for at least this first year.

Cleaning Lady Encounter Part Deux

This morning while my fellow co-workers and I were standing around discussing the plight of our careers, my favorite cleaning lady came through. She was pushing a trash barge through our hallway, collecting anything with a "Trash" sticker on it. A few days ago, I placed a dead computer and monitor outside my cube, and I had noticed that the computer disappeared, but the 21" monitor (of the old heavy tube variety) was still hanging around.

As she walked by us, she pointed at the monitor and blurted out, "I not picking dat ting up."

I quickly replied, "I can pick it up, if you'd like." At which point I grabbed the monitor and quickly heaved it over the side of her rolling rubbish tip. As the monitor landed with a "thud," it threw off the balance of her cart, dropping the front end to the floor so that it could no longer be pushed.

The cleaning lady glared at me with a stare that said, "Dat's strike two, gringo. Tree strikes, you out."

Cubical Embarrasment

A few weeks ago, I received a voicemail with the following message (names have been changed to conceal identity, well, all except for mine, but anyway):

"Hi Bret, it's Yolanda. I need to setup an appointment to get your blood. I can do it at your work, your house, wherever is convenient. Have a nice day!"

Now I sat and tried to figure out for the life of me why some woman would call and want my blood. The whole thing was just odd. You would expect something more like, "Hey Bret, it's Yolanda from the 'Indiana Blood Center and Vampires Guild' and we need some of your blood for some noble cause blah blah blah." But this message had none of that. This sounded more like a producer from Maury Povitch trying to con me into a paternity test or something. But then again, very few engineers or engineering students have been featured on Maury's show, given the almost zero likelihood that they managed to find a girl to even take to Wendy's, let alone back to "the teleporter" or whatever other Star Trek themed room was featured in their apartment.

Anyway, I digress. I called Yolanda back and made an appointment for her to meet me at work. In the mean time, she still gave no indication of her intentions with my blood, but I figured out that I recently applied for some additional insurance at work which (apparently) requires a blood test. No sweat.

So Yolanda arrived at my office yesterday with medical bag in tow. I escorted her into the building and asked where we should make the transaction. "Anyplace with a flat surface where nobody will be freaked out by me drawing blood." In an engineering facility, such an event is likely to draw a crowd, but only in an effort to see who can make the blood come out faster or who can design a machine that checks the blood for malaria on the spot or some such. So I told her we could do it at my lab bench.

Now the area around my lab is almost completely vacated. I'm about three days from switching cubes and labs, and I'm pretty much the last man standing in our area, so it's pretty empty. Yolanda dropped her medical bag, pulled out a scale, a tape measure, and a whole pile of blood drawin' gear. This was already a little more intense than I expected, but alas.

She took my weight and height (inseam is still less than waist...sigh) and then told me to roll up my sleeve. All is well. Nobody is around. She takes the blood, and I begin to help her gather up her things. Just as she caps the last vile of blood, I see, in slow motion, her reach into her medical bag and pull out a small plastic cup. Simultaneously out of my other eye, I see one of my coworkers round the corner just in time to hear Yolanda say:

"Okay Mr. Hawkins. You fill 'er up and bring it back to me."

Coworker halts. "Uh, I'm obviously interrupting something here."

Now first off, when handed an empty cup to fill, it took me a second to remember that this was not one of the fertility doctor appointments of the past few years. Talk about an embarrasing scenario. Next I explain, politely, to Yolanda that I can't very well walk half way across our floor with a cup of my own urine in hand. (Although this isn't something that seems COMPLETELY out of the realm of possibility in our building.) She didn't even have a lid for the cup! So I convinced her to wait outside the Men's Room, which she did.

After I left her the, uh, goods, I escorted her out of the building. After an awkward handshake (followed by a good, solid up-to-the-elbows scrub for yours truly) I trudged back to my lab to find and apologize to my coworker. He took it in stride, although I'm not sure he bought my "it's for insurance" routine. Ah well...

I need my tunes

With last year's purchase of the iPod, I do almost 100% of my music listening on the iPod rather than CDs. This almost immediately created a bit of a dilemma for listening in the car. My car has a CD player and cassette deck, so I've been using a cassette adaptor (remember when we needed these for CDs?) Erin's previous car had only a CD player, so I purchased this little gadget to broadcast the iPod on the FM band, but this has never worked well in Indy. We've got scads of little stations which block out the iPod, and on the highway, everytime you pass a truck you hear something by Merle Haggard, and everytime you pass a kid under 21 you hear the previously described "backin' my thang up" genre. Apparently everyone has one of these FM modulators these days.

Now that we've purchased Big Whitey (aka our Kia minivan), I have been struggling with how to correct this life and death situation, since this is the car in which we'll be taking our long road trips to exotic locales like Bedford and Gatlinburg. I did my research, and discovered this little head unit from Sony. For us geeks, this thing has several nifty features. It has a USB jack on the front so you can play MP3s from a USB jump drive, it has an auxillary line in jack so you can run anything with a headphone plug into it, and most importantly, it has an iPod cable so you can control the iPod directly from the head unit. Oh joy.

So I rolled Big Whitey into a local installation shop to have this thing installed. You should have seen all the installers jump to get a chance to pimp my Kia. They offered me some spinny rims and 22s, but I politely declined. After 30 minutes of ripping and tearing on my brand new dash, it was done. We jumped in the van and immediately hooked the iPod up. (Well, we hooked the iPod up after a chorus of "everything else on the dash is gray but that thing is black." Grr.) It played flawlessly. Beautiful. I was listening to a song by The Beach Boys and decided to use the Sony to jump to a track by The Who. I pressed "Skip Artist" and waited. About three seconds later, it went to The Beatles. I pressed it again. About three seconds later, it went to Big Star. Oy vey. I have over 300 artists on my iPod, so I could conceivably go from the first artist to the last by pressing "Skip Artist" 300 times over the course of 15 minutes. This is easier said than done at 80 mph.

The moral of this story is that doing your research doesn't always uncover these little implementation difficulties. All of the sites online say this is the best player to use with an iPod, but obviously this is a technology that still needs some work. Plus, I figure Apple will change the cable I need for the next generation of iPod leaving me with a big, black, useless cable extending from my dash in a few months. (I'm sure that won't happen, honey. Just kidding...) In the mean time, this solution works great if you're just listening to a mix on the iPod, and if you want to jump around between artists a lot, you can always use the auxillary line in with the headphone jack. It just don't sound as purty.

Oh yeah, one other funny part of the story. The installer forgot to connect my antenna to the new headend, so I only got the three strongest stations in Indy. After ripping my new dash apart a second time, it all works much better.

Sometimes being a geek is tough...

Grant goes multi-lingual

This morning I was charged with taking care of Grant after mommy headed off to inflict literature on her high school students for yet another day. As Erin headed out the door, she told me that a good way to distract Grant from poor parenting for a few moments is to pop in a Baby Einstein DVD. Score. This would give me just enough time to get cleaned up for my day of inflicting, well, doing whatever it is that I do for another day.

So I grabbed the first DVD I could find. I hopped in the shower, and the next thing I hear is "Die Kuh sprang über den Mond" and "Ein, zwei, drei, vier, fünf." It was very surreal. Apparently I managed to pop in a language video which defaulted to German as the first language. I wondered for a brief moment if I'd actually just tuned the TV to the History Channel, but I had not. In any case, I can just see my cute little boy looking at me in a couple of years and saying, "Vati ist eine Kuh." (That's "Daddy is a cow," auf Deutsch.) There were all sorts of hypnotic colors and things swirling around on the screen while various things were spoken in German. They could have been telling Grant to do just about anything, and my three years of German in high school wouldn't have helped me a bit. Hopefully next time I'll grab a DVD that helps Grant do something more useful, like mow the grass or make daddy an omelette.

Just like his pappa

For those of you who have seen Grant lately (and especially for those of you who have picked up the precious bundle), you know one thing for sure: our boy wonder loves his food. And this week did not disappoint. After four long months of nothing but formula, formula, formula, Grant has started on rice cereal for a meal a day, and who would have thought that this small culinary steping stone was like discovering gold. He pants, crys, wails, (dare I say) hisses if the spoon carrying his cereal is less than prompt. He has a special talent with his cereal, common to babies the world over, no doubt, in that he is able to transport the cereal to any part of his body. Last night involved both a bath and a q-tip to get all the cereal off (and out of) his body. The fact that his hair is so tightly curled doesn't help. Have you ever tried to get clumpy and wet cereal out of an afro? Didn't think so.


But his love of all things food is not the only area of his life where Grant is strikingly similiar to his Daddy. (Do you know anyone else with so many blasted blog posts about food?) Grant also likes to sleep like his Daddy (sans the blaring music from the IPOD... that'll take a few years). Exhibit A. I love my two boys.

At the zoo...

Saturday morning, we decided to take Grant for his first trip to the Indianapolis Zoo. The Indianapolis Zoo of my youth was located in a city park on the east side of town, and if you could dodge the gunfire as you made your way from the parking lot, you were likely to see some animals. Erin and I recently drove through the park where the old zoo was located, and I was shocked at how small the grounds were. The foundations of all of the old zoo facilities are still present, so it was sort of an eerie vision of what I remembered. The new Indianapolis Zoo, opened 20 years ago in the heart of the Indianapolis tourist district, is generally safe, and you're likely to see perhaps three, maybe even four animals.

I really don't get it. You wander throughout a beautiful facility, complete with multiple places to buy ice cream and chili dogs, yet you very rarely see any animals. You see faux grasslands and jungles, with lots of trees and rocks, but you don't see animals. Presumably they're off being groomed or bathed, because it's actually more rare to see wildlife within our zoo walls than outside in the wild. Grant didn't seem to mind the lack of wildlife. He was far more interested in the various signs and people wandering about the grounds. I spent approximately half of our time searching for an ATM so that I could buy food to assuage my irritation at not getting to actually see monkeys and polar bears. I was eventually calmed by a root beer float from Dog 'n Suds.

On Sunday, we made our way to our our local outlet mall. It was such a gorgeous day that we decided it was worth a trip out. The outlets gave Grant a chance to flash his award winning smile and dimples at all the ladies. They generally returned the gesture, except in one case where a young African American girl shouted at a rather unneccessary volume, "Look at that Butterball!" I chuckled, while Grant paused his struggle to find his thumb to find another finger with which to reply. All in all, we had a nice stroll around the outlets, and it gave me a chance to engage in checking out some of the true wildlife in Indiana -- the citizenry of southern Indiana.

There was the usual parade of mullets and oversized pickups, but I noticed two relatively new phenomenon. The first was the striking number of men over 50 sporting not one, but two earrings -- one in each ear. I call this look "the Harrison Ford," and he looks just as silly. As a general rule, if you're having to trim the hair in your ears for your earring to be visible, you've probably passed the age (by decades) when you should even be considering wearing an earring. The other thing I saw multiple times was men wearing what I have heard traditionally referred to as culottes. I can remember my mom scouring TJ Maxx for these when I was little, but I guess I didn't realize they'd made their rounds to the menswear department. I have to say, I'm not a huge fan. There's something just a little too "Anne of Green Gables" for me when I see a dude in short pants with little bows at the bottom. In one case, I saw a guy with a mullet, two earrings, culottes and a Big Dog T-shirt. It was sort of like a male redneck version of a supermodel. Delightful.

We had a lovely weekend, and we're definitely glad to be rolling into summer here in central Indiana.

All Grown Up

I know that there are a million firsts that Grant has yet to conquer, and I know that I'll love each stage for the new things I learn about our sweet baby boy, but I must admit that I find myself thinking, "Don't you dare grow up one more bit." I look at the first pictures of Grant, and he has changed so much. He is in such a sweet phase of babyhood right now, smiling and laughing (and sleeping through the night)! I know there are his first words and first steps and his first day of school, but truth be told, I want each stage to last longer than it does. I want him to be a baby for several years... a toddler for a dozen... a kid for a long, long time... and even a teenager for a lifetime...

Here are some recent pics of our not so little guy (official four month weigh in in 20 days).
Here he is in his exersaucer (his favorite toy):

Here he is sitting up. He can't (obviously) pull himself up to a sitting position, but if placed in one, he can stay up for long stretches (read: several minutes):

The shirt says it all.

Not Fair

I had on nice shoes all night; I only changed into the flip flops towards the evening's close. Bad husband.

Yikes

This is about as bad as it gets, folks.

Two tired, rapidly aging adults having their picture taken at prom, nearly 15 years past their own proms. The picture looks a little blurry. Normally I'd say it was bad photography, but in this case, I think someone was trying to do us a favor.

I'd like everyone to take note of the shoes worn by my lovely wife. No shoes at our wedding and flip-flops at prom. It's all about style at our house.

Prom and the morning after...

Some mornings go better than others when a small child is involved.

Now that Grant is sleeping more soundly during the night, his wakeup time in the morning has become somewhat more erratic. Sometimes he wakes up at 5:30am. Sometimes he wakes up at 7:30am. This creates a dilema when mommy leaves at 6:30am, and mamaw arrives at 7:15am. This leaves Grant a critical 45 minute period during which he can remind daddy that while he no longer routinely pees in my face, he's still thouroughly in control of the situation.

This morning, he woke up at 6:15am. No sweat. I'll feed him, mommy will leave, I'll put him in his boppy on the bed, I'll take a shower and cleanup, and mamaw will arrive. I began the feeding. At about 6:30am, Grant looked at me, smiled, and deposited the contents of his embiggened (my favorite Simpsons word) stomach onto me, the carpet, the recliner, etc. "Cleanup on aisle Grant."

After finishing the feeding and mopping, it was about 6:45am. I placed him on the bed, carefully surrounding him with towels and boppy to ensure that he wouldn't be able to move and that any further spewage wouldn't land in the approximate location of where daddy's head would be when it hit the pillow later tonight. I hopped in the shower (actually, I don't much hop anywhere at the moment given my increasing girth.) About 45 seconds into my shower, Grant started screaming his head off. In my rush to be a not-so-delinquent father, I forgot that we have shower doors that you have to duck under the frame of which to exit the shower. After beaming myself and recoiling into the tub, the volume of Grant's scream escalated, although it was somewhat hard to hear over my own screaming. I shimmied across the slippery bathroom floor and picked up the youngin'. He quit crying. Nice. I put him back down. About 45 seconds later, more screaming.

I wrapped up my shower, hitting only the highlights (actually, more like low-lights, but I digress), and exited. After calming Grant down, I began shaving. More screaming. I ran, semi-clothed, to the front windows in hopes that mamaw had arrived. Lo and behold, she had. After waiting what seemed like an eternity, mamaw made it into the house and calmed Grant while I finished getting ready. What a morning. I'm not sure if I have deoderant on, and there's a relatively high possibility that I'm wearing Erin's underpants, but I made it out the door and only a few minutes behind schedule.

In other Hawkins Happenings, Erin and I attended prom at the school where Erin teaches this weekend. As the junior class moderator, Erin has put in countless hours setting up the prom, so it was fun to see all of her hard work in action. Similar to last year, I was horrified by some of the dresses worn by the high school girls. It's all burlap for Grace when she arrives. Several girls had on a type of long dress that was separated all the way down the front until just above the waist. As I told Erin, that's not a dress, it's an invitation. It was held closed by one little piece in the middle, which resulted in a lot of high school guys angling for a side view. One of the other chapperones noted that one particular young lady spent a good deal of her evening in the restroom "taping her boobs in" to prevent them from falling out. Trust me. If it were my kid, those suckers would be taped in with duct tape. Of course, it wouldn't matter since she wouldn't be wearing it outside (or inside) the house anyway.

Once again this year, prom was held at the lovely Indiana Roof Ballroom. A couple of policemen were brought in to keep an eye on things. I took note of the fact that if I were a high school kid forced to outrun an officer of the law, these were precisely two of the officers I'd want chasing me. Shortly before dinner, Erin was informed that they were to be fed. I dared her to tell them that they didn't need it, but she obliged and provided a meal. The event went off without a hitch, and neither officer was forced to expend any calories.

Much like last year, I spent the evening trying to ignore the complete lack of taste displayed by the DJ. I heard not a single song by R.E.M. or the Beach Boys all evening. Instead, I heard every song released in the last five years which admonished me to back up some part of my body. I was told to "back that a** up" and "back that thang up." I have no idea what my "thang" is, but I'm relatively sure nobody wants me backing it into them. I also was incensed that the DJ laughed at me when I asked him how many CDs (let alone records) he carries with him. In order to DJ a prom, you need a laptop. That's it. I can't believe we're still paying these guys. I should have told him to back his "thang" out, and I could have DJ'd the whole deal. Erin was mortified when I reminded her that in just a few short years, Grant will be backin' his "thang" up, too. Of course, he may be doing it alone if he doesn't stop spitting up on people.

All in all, prom went off without a hitch, and many people were telling Erin how lovely a job she had done. At 11 pm, all of the kids filtered out into the streets of downtown to join other late night revelers (a firemen's convention was in town) in doing whatever they do late at night on a Friday night with 50 bars around. I shudder to think...

Oh, the places you'll go...

This week has proven very interesting for me at work. For the past few weeks, I've been working on a project primarily being developed in Shenzhen, China. Some of the work on that project is also being done in Shanghai, as well as Bangalore, India.

Yesterday, I also began work on another project where the work is split between Shenzhen, Beijing, Tokyo, and Singapore. I've already been approached about going to Bangalore, and there's a good chance I'll end up in these other locations before the end of the year as well. Oh yeah, there's also a group in the Netherlands on one project. Craziness. Business trips USED to mean Denver, San Jose...maybe even Chicago. How engineering has changed...

I'll be sure to keep everyone posted on my travels. Imagine the bizarro foods I'll be able to try between now and fall...