some random thoughts...

• Next Thursday, we're packing the boy up in the car and doing a whirlwind tour of Alabama. We'll come back with plenty of photos of Coleman and the extended family he's not met yet.


• There's something very sad about owning a book you've never read.


• I'll be ordering the new microphone as soon as we return from Alabama.


• Sinus drainage is possibly the most miserable feeling on earth.


• I think there's something uniquely beautiful about fine grained wood with a light brown stain.


• I love it when Coleman smiles at me for no reason. It lets me know I've not screwed up yet.

a visit from pop...

in case you were wondering....

For those of you who are curious, I used the Electric photo from the second 26 Things for the Photo Friday challenge this week. The challenge was Industrial.

my own grandpa...

pegged...

mr personality...

Sure, they're cutest when they're newly born and tiny, but as they get older they become infinitely more interesting. Little by little, over the past couple of months, we've begun to see his personality emerge. It's fun to watch as he morphs from a helpless, delicate little mass of simi-human, poop machine to a distinct little self-willed individual. And he's got the will, let me tell you. His vocabulary may yet be limited to variations on cry and whine, but he knows how to use them quite effectively.

The best, though, is watching him learn to communicate those things outside of anger and discomfort. First came the coo, where he's not quite making words, but you're certain he's trying to make his mouth form them. From there emerged the first glimpse of the smile. Big, wide grin attachment (which I'm sure we paid extra for) that will melt your heart the first time it appears simply because he saw and recognized you, not as the torturer who shoves the bulb syringe up his nose or locks him up in a crib to sleep, but as the dad who makes zerberts on his neck and tickles his tummy and sings him silly little songs before bed.

Each new day is a new little discovery. A little giggle here. A little more head control there. How he tries to pull his ear sometimes when he nurses. A curiosity and wonder at everything he can see. His love for ‘dancing' and ‘jumping' when you hold him up to stand. How he just hates to go to sleep and fights with every fiber to stay awake. Just how strong those little muscles can be. How much he loves to sit in the bouncy seat and how quickly he learned that he can make it light up and play music by kicking his feet. It's all amazing.

two'fer tuesday: funny boy...

[Voting closed. I thought this one would be much closer...]

spam spam spam and more spam...

Lately, the efforts by junk emailers to bypass spam filters and fill your inbox with advertisements for v.i.a.g.r.a and have moved beyond simple creative spellings and hacker speech. The spam filters are getting too safisticated for that to work anymore. These days, my in box is filled with spam emails whose subject lines are filled, sometimes to overflowing, with simingly random words having nothing to do with the actual content of the email. A few weeks ago, I started to save off some of the more interesting ones to share with you: *

• mush fell


• dependent dessert esther


• bart chosen doug


• getty bismuth cola ear


• bloke commentary allusion


• biennium albright desecrater sewage silicon


• atavistic attendee boreas flourish encumber


• hanoi cotton apparel rejuvenate promote


• rivalry bismarck burnout crag


• recovery momentous newell berniece


• impassable byword documentation infertile catholicism bermuda escherichia sagina


• deconvolution harlan flux horse


• bespoke belly myra gaucherie sage proximate malleable ambulate audubon anyway kaleidescope albeit alto centenary arhat arrogant hefty.


• doghouse indianapolis indicate barnes porcupine


• pen chaise gaseous monochromatic ambivalent


• horsefly elm


• elect cinema fifteen junkerdom


• schoolgirl redactor gyrocompass anglican arboretum


• cuddle macrame hazard burnish hierarchy


• bushnell pewee domain hygrometer


• bouffant condescension chip


• drafty philosophy brunette lair engle


• pious aeolian disturbance


• chaperon footwear


• griddle deflater fire midterm harpoon

As interesting as some of these are, nothing beats the email I recently received from a Mr Wendell Flynn: Do you want a hupsychopathicge slguthrieong? Why yes, Wendell, I've always wanted one of those... But only if the price is right...

* Possible band names are italicised. If you see any I missed, leave a comment...

not much, but annoying...

bed time for baby...

Coleman's Lullaby

Little Coleman go to sleep
Close your eyes and dream away
In the morning, when you wake up
There will be a bright new day
But for now it's time to sleep
The sun has set
The day is done
Little Coleman go to sleep
Sleep and dream my precious son.

my least favorite color...

all about the audio...

Brand New Strings [mp3]

two'fer tuesday: music macros...

[Voting closed. And yes, I promise not to skip out on the storry this week, Bert.]

penny for your thoughts...

I'm kinda ready for the boy to become a talker. You might suspect it's due to the pure frustration of trying to guess just what exactly he's crying about. Is he tired? Wet? Dirty? Constipated? Hungry? Is his outfit too small? Maybe he's just tired. Is he just trying to give us a headache? Are we bad parents? Could he just be tired? I'm tired.

Sure, it's hard trying to guess why he's crying, but that's not why I'm impatiently awaiting his first words. No, I'm interested in what he's thinking. He gets these expressions now and then that make you think he's thinking. It's only natural to wonder what he's thinking about.

Though truthfully, some of the times I might guess he's thinking, he's just... making. And if he's anything like his dad, he might be thinking things I just didn't want to know about. Either way, we'll just have to wait and see.

the end...

I finally finished playing Uru...

dreaming of warmer weather...

sorry, but the data is conclusive...

And the best sci-fi/fantasy movie trilogy is...

on the move...

I'm moving the 'zu to a new host tonight so you may see some interruptions in service today.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

two'fer tuesday: music makers...

[ voting closed ]

some suggestions, please...

I need to update my blogroll. There are a few i've been reading that I should add and, sadly, some I've not been reading (for various reasons) that need to be removed. I'll probably add a links page and place all my links there, keeping only the ones I try to read daily here on this page.

Here's where I'd like some help from you. I'd like suggestions for blogs journals that I should be reading. I'd love to hear about anyone who writes well and who posts new thoughts regularly. Leave a comment and clue me in to what I'm missing. Thanks...

the questions of fatherhood #341...

Exactly why can't babies keep their urp on their own clothes? Huh? Tell me.

Don't they know there's a change for them in the bag, but none for us? Or is it because they know this, that it tends to miss them completely and land on us?

Oh well... Guess it wouldn't wouldn't be so bad if he didn't smile knowingly right after. This just makes working on a Saturday that much more special...

little bundle...

happy birthday...

Coleman turned two months old today. Do yourself a favor and make sure to see photos 22 and 23. Too much like the funny...

[ Month Two Photos ]

full circle...

With just a little more cloud coverage, one may have imagined the nearly placid lake to resemble a shadowy Siberian steppe, small rifts and pleats, blown here and there by an open wind gilding its surface. And yet, despite the stealthy onset of twilight threatening to plunge temperatures lower than a JLo neckline, a warmth hung in the air reminding all that this was no tundra. Even with the softest step, they felt the shoreline plant-life give way beneath their treaded soles. The spongy vegetation seemed to reach toward the depths of the lake, or was it climbing from them? At that time it seemed a chicken/egg type argument. Regardless of how it started, by now they existed co-dependently.

To her surprise, bending over the rippling pool she met more than her reflection textured by pebbles and weeds and time. The watery vines seemed to reveal to her a truth she had yet to see. There in nature�s mirror next to her own grainy image shone the echo of youth in all its splendor. She studied the figures, side-by-side, different and yet the same. Almost simultaneously the two water people reached forward as if reaching from the sand. And then it happened. Her finger breached the liquid surface, as did her son's and the two separate reflections wavered and dispersed.

As her son's mimic rippled into her own, she realized that the two of them were not so different from the water and weeds. They called to each other. They gave each other life and vibrancies anew. It didn't matter who came first or who gave what to whom. They taught and learned from each other. They were reciprocals. She now knew that one cannot learn without maturity, nor mentor without youth.

two'fer tuesday: moments of our lives...

Hi Shane,
My wife and I had a lot of fun selecting the images for your meme. We thought that it would be appropriate to choose ones that would be most conducive to telling a story - instead of just being pretty.

The first picture we chose is a picture of my wife and son playing by the water of a lake with the waves reflecting a cloudy sky.

The second picture is a ambulance in the snow.

We chose this picture because it was dramatic and very different from the first image. I then reviewed your archives and then noticed that the images were grouped under a thematic heading. We hadn't thought of that, but after some reflection it seemed that the two images represent two aspects of life.

The first image represents the wonderful moments that we all have -- like a quiet moment between a mother and son by peaceful lake in a beautiful place. The second image represents the more dramatic aspects of our life. For example, when someone is sick and needs help.

It just so happens that this mother and son were in such a situation. So in consideration of these thoughts, we felt the pictures were related after all. And perhaps a heading for them would be something along the lines of "Moments of Our Lives."

With very kind regards from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada,

Dale

[ Voting has closed. ]