Step-ghetti....

Censored - Easier to stop it before it happens than after....

2012-01-18T08:12:00.000-05:00

amalgamation...

2011-10-02T20:44:00.000-04:00

"Kindly let me help you or you will drown," said the monkey, putting the fish safely up a tree. (Alan Watts)

What is the right thing for one person is not necessarily the right thing for another. No special reason for posting this thought other than I heard it today from a friend and I've been doing a great deal of listening and reading of Alan Watts material. If you want to think about something other than the day to day grind of things I highly recommend you try listening to or reading Alan Watts. The material is centered around Buddhist and Taoist philosophy.

I've been using Google+ for a few months now and I really like it. It does bring up some interesting quandaries about identity and anonymity. I certainly think a lot more about what I write and where I write it.

Back in June I said I went on a secret mission. It wasn't really secret, I just wasn't sure what to say about it at that point. The gist of it was that I went to California to go on an interview. I am pretty happy with my current job, but sometimes an opportunity comes up that you just have to follow through on. This was one of those. I love California, especially around Monterey and San Francisco. The company flew me out and paid for my expenses. I spent the weekend there and had the interview on Monday, the day after Father's day.

On Father's Day I went to the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA, which was amazing. I drove up and crossed the Golden Gate Bridge, then went on a hike up the hill on the other side to get some great shots of the bridge and San Francisco. I was invited by a long time blog friend to spend Father's day afternoon with their new family and extended family. It was a great time. I got to meet and talk with a lot of amazing people that have done amazing things with their lives. They have the coolest fire pit I've ever seen, and there are red wood trees growing in their back yard! It was the best Father's Day I could have had having to be away from home. Computers, hiking, and wonderful people. I really wish SGG could have come out with me, it would have been just perfect then.

Alas, I did not get offered the job. They were definitely looking for someone with a computer software development background, and that isn't what I do at all. :-)

So all the boys are back , no more earthquakes or hurricanes (I hope). My son Brandon is now in 9th grade, his first year of high school. He seems like he is really liking it so far. Michael, the middle one, is in 7th grade and is now about 6'1" tall....he will be 13 years old this month. John, the youngest, is in 6th grade and is in his first year of middle school. Two of the boys are playing baseball, and the other is writing computer code. There is always something happening, and SGG has a giant calendar up on the wall to keep track of it all.

The dog has now gotten two squirrels. The first was a baby that was already dead and had been washed out by the hurricane. The second he got today, but we sort of saved it before he killed it. No telling if the squirrel will make it, but it did manage to get back up the tree.

We did manage to paint the shed over the summer, and we have a new driveway being put in this week...we think, and the garage door will be replaced soon. I've had to take the current door apart once to get it back into working shape until the new door gets here. I get to do a lot of little projects around the house, like fixing doors, painting, and keeping the lawn mower running. I had to replace the carburetor on the mower this weekend...I'm pretty sure there is a piece of dirt stuck in the fuel line inside the thing, but I couldn't get it out.

We had our first day of cooler weather today too. I am very glad it is finally here. It snowed in WV yesterday....and that means snowboarding season is not far away! :-)

Dogs, Earthquakes, and Hurricanes.....

2011-08-27T08:29:00.000-04:00

So, so much to catch up on....life is pretty crazy and when it isn't SGG and I collapse.

Did I say crazy? Because in the insanity we got a dog. His name is Blaze (Blaze-O, Blazer) and he is part Border Collie and part Black Lab. He is a year old and we got him from the SPCA. SGG said he looked adorable, I said he looked mischievous, I was right.

The dog is a very smart, energetic and lovable dog. The dog is very energetic. Did I mention he was energetic? The dog also doesn't come when called. That means that when he gets out we have a neighborhood meeting and everyone has to get involved. There is a lot of running and eventually the dog gets tired of the game. He'll stop when he wants to check out someone else's dog. I've even met people with other "problem" dogs. They taught me to accept the fact that one day I will be picking up the pup at the pound.

I finally found all the holes in the fence too. I finally had to tie 100' of rope to the dog and let him show me his final escape route. And he did.

Dog and Cat can almost cohabitate in the same room without the cat puffing out and hissing herself to death.

The dog is from Narnia by the way. When he doesn't know I'm looking, he gets up on his hind legs by the bushes and tries to walk along them to see the birds in them.

So Tuesday afternoon (8/23/11) I was in the middle of a conversation in the hallway at work when I had to stop ask "Are we moving? Is this an earthquake?" Sure enough. It was the first one I can remember feeling. The epicenter was about 150 or so miles away in Mineral, VA. Magnitude was 5.8.

Then we hear that Hurricane Irene is coming. So we packed up kids and dog and headed to see my friend in Blacksburg, VA...which is where we are now. We plan on doing some hiking and probably heading back Sunday depending on damage assessments/power/etc. As of the time of this writing, the storm has been downgraded to a Category I and is supposed to pass by off shore with only tropical storm winds and rain where we live.

Kids are gone so what are the parents doing???

2011-06-26T21:12:00.001-04:00

The younger two children just got on a plane to see their father for a couple of weeks. The oldest left over a week ago to see his mom for the summer.

I went on a secret mission to California, more on that later.

So what are the parents doing? We went to dinner at a Mexican restaurant, sat outside, and had a margarita. When we came back home, we retired to the.....computer room. We started talking a little bit about music, and had a very brief discussion about the song "Sugar Sugar". Since most of my Beatles knowledge comes from a song in the early 80's called "Beatles' Medley" from Stars on 45, I was insistent that "Sugar Sugar" was a Beatles's song, SGG said it was not and was actually sung by the comic book group "The Archies" . "Beatles' Medley" opens with "Sugar Sugar". I was wrong. My wife has extensive knowledge of the Beatles, and just about all music from the 60's and 70's. She is ABSOLUTELY never wrong about any music questions from that era. It would appear that I am ALWAYS incorrect though. You would be amazed at the amount I think I know but don't about that era. She laughs at me all the time about it, and it really cracks me up too. However, we spent an hour on YouTube and Amazon mp3 playing and singing songs from the 60's, 70's, and 80's and had a blast doing so.

Now, when it comes to 80's music, I usually have the upper hand. My loss I suppose for not having older siblings to show me the ropes. :-)

I hope your summer is off to as great a start as ours is.

The weather is warm with just enough rain. Softball is almost over for me and volleyball is just beginning. We expect to listen to a lot of music this year and get out more. NO MOVING HOUSEHOLD GOODS....mostly....maybe...

12 Week Body Transformation Challenge.....

2011-05-06T18:48:00.001-04:00

I was trying to get some other posts in before this, but I just haven't made the time and this is now...so here it goes.

When I joined the Anytime Fitness Gym just down the street back in January, they hit me up to participate in a 12 Week Body Transformation Challenge. At the end we have to submit an essay. The end is tomorrow, Saturday May 7, 2011. So here is my essay....

Total Body Transformation Challenge Essay

I have struggled with weight gain and loss for the past 15 years. My self image is one of fitness and my preferred activities in hiking, surfing, snowboarding, volleyball, soccer, softball, and much more outwardly shows this inward view. However, my combination of poor food choices and inconsistent exercise tend to keep me in a constant state of fat gain and poor physical condition. As I have aged it has become more difficult to pursue the activities that I really enjoy, and I am much more aware that visceral fat around my internal organs can have a significant impact on my health and my lifestyle. It is also very unappealing visually and makes me very self conscious about my appearance in public.

I have participated in various exercise and fitness programs in the past with varying degrees of commitment. Anytime Fitness seemed to me the ideal place to start yet another round with Body For Life. The Body for Life program is a great combination of weight training, cardiovascular exercise, and diet, but I never seem to be able to commit to it long term. When I started my exercising at Anytime Fitness, the USA Elite Trainers approached me about participating in the Total Body Transformation Challenge. I was reluctant because I felt like I knew a lot about exercising, was highly self-motivated, and couldn't really see where it would help me or was different from what I was already doing. I declined the invitation, but I kept thinking about it. A few things made me reconsider though. First, I had never worked with a trainer of any type before aside from my Body For Life book and logs. Second, I had never worked on a physical fitness goal as a team or in competition before. When I put some serious thought into this I realized that I was pushing aside something that could be a very valuable experience, and I couldn't have been more right about that.

First I want to tell you about how the trainers and the program helped me. Right from the beginning I was surprised at how much information they were collecting about my current body fat content and shape. I was not ready for that, and I seriously was not interested in knowing those things. Who wants to be shown infallible evidence of past failures? When we got our booklets and started reviewing the nutrition/diet guides, I was really surprised at how little I had ever paid attention to calories, fat, protein, sodium, and carbohydrates. Other programs hide this information or concentrate strictly on protein or carbohydrates. I am a person that likes math and seeing the differences in Basic Metabolic Rates and how all of the nutrition information relates to that was a very enlightening moment. While I was familiar with the 5-6 meals a day plans and other parts of the guide, I just hadn't ever had it laid out and explained with all the relationships like this before. Immediately I was glad I had joined the program. I have been very impressed with how much the trainers really got involved with us too. It hasn't always been easy to like them when they are pushing us past our comfort zones during our weekly workout sessions, but I wouldn't have accomplished so much without their expert knowledge and constant encouragement. I think it is important to note that even though you may know a lot about fitness, having an expert trainer that can observe and guide you can help you achieve so much more than you can by yourself. As humans, we just are not all that good at self assessment, even though most of us are convinced we are.

Secondly, I want to tell you about my co-challengers and how the team/competition aspect has helped me achieve my goals. I am a competitor, and if we are truthful with ourselves, most of us are. From the moment I began the competition I felt a heightened sense of urgency with my workouts and their intensity. Going to the gym everyday was already something I did, but I pushed every workout a little harder knowing that there were others that were doing the same. As we started our weekly workouts and I started seeing my co-challengers at the gym, I began to get a lot of encouragement by their presence and our conversations. I could see them putting forth tremendous effort everyday and it helped me to keep up that level of intensity in my own workouts. During the challenge, I pulled a calf muscle, locked up my lower back, experienced some extreme fatigue and stress, and at times just felt too tired to make it to the gym. Any one of these items would have derailed my program by a couple of weeks or months in the past. Knowing that my co-challengers were going to be at the gym really helped me find the energy and the motivation to keep going back and doing everything I possibly could. Talking about the diet and problems sticking to the numbers with my teammates also helped me to understand that this wasn't easy for anyone, and if they could stick with it so could I. It has been fantastic to see the physical and emotional changes in each of the participants. I can see that everyone that has made it this far has accomplished a tremendous amount and it shows outwardly and inwardly. I love coming to the gym knowing that some of them will be there, working hard, and enjoying the results. Rather than a competition, it feels much more like a team effort.

In conclusion, the Total Body Transformation Challenge has been a life altering experience for me. I believe that I am in about the best physical shape I have ever been in. I believe that what I have learned about nutrition I will continue to apply throughout the rest of my life, and hopefully it will continue to have a positive impact. I hope I can impart these lessons and knowledge to my children so that they do not have to go through all that I have been through. I now have to turn and look forward to some new goals and challenges because accomplishing something I did not think was possible at this point in my life has shown me that there is so much more that I can accomplish with the help, support, and encouragement from my family, my trainers, and my teammates.

Just something to think about....

2011-04-29T19:33:00.000-04:00

I want to do a little exercise, a sort of mental visualization, for something I have been thinking of lately. Some may recognize certain world views or religions caught up in it, but for now it is simply just a way of looking at the world around us and not tied to any type of metaphysical, philosophical, or religious view point. It is just me making some observations about the macro and micro universes, talking about molecules and planets, and some general physical traits of the Universe itself. A little crazy and fantastical but I think it is worth it and you are welcome to read on if you wish have something kind of cool to think about.

There was a moment when the Universe came into being. I'm not going to expound on how or anything, it doesn't really matter. All that really matters is right now, for instance, and that there is in fact a Universe. We know through science at school that the Universe obeys certain laws and that the bigger things in the Universe are made up of smaller things. If we start at the galactic level, we know that the galaxy is made of stars, planets, dust, and other forms of large quantities of matter. Some of these things are found in loose systems called solar systems, some are not. As we narrow down to our experience we know that Solar Systems are comprised of planets, moons, asteroids, dust, comets, etc and generally are gravitationally tied to a central star or stars. Planets are large accumulations of matter in the form of molecules, atoms, protons, neutrons, electrons, and so forth. Right now, we believe that the smallest particle, the one that makes up the rest of them, is the theoretical Higgs-Boson that the Large Hadron Collider is trying to find. There are different levels of energy of these various forms of matter, and based on the energy level (temperature/vibration if you will), this matter exists in what we call states of matter. Solid, Liquid, Gas, Plasma, and a very cold condensate form very close to absolute zero.

One of the laws that we learn is that matter can neither be created nor destroyed. It can change form, state, etc, but it cannot be and then not be. We can change a lot about something, but we cannot really destroy it. Those atoms and sub-atomic particles will always be here.

Another theory about matter is the interconnectedness of it all. What makes up gravity? Why is matter gravitationally attracted to other matter? One theory is that all matter is connected through strings. As particles come together to form elements or atoms, as atoms form molecules, as molecules form larger structures, they are somehow all connected to all other matter in the Universe, and this has always been this way. If they are all connected through strings, then think for a moment about how all of these particles come together and form a human or any other form of life (or even inanimate objects), and how the weaving of those strings together might look.

If that is the case, then the atoms that make up the molecules, that make up the cells, that make up the tissues, that make up the organs, that make up our bodies are also all connected in some way. Now, also think about the fact that these sub-components that make up a human body have been around since the beginning. When the system that supports life breaks down, then those atoms and molecules get reabsorbed into the environment. The strings that were woven together become undone and get woven into other structures in various forms.

As we go from the macro view of the whole Universe, all the way down to the Higgs-Boson particle, we see that at some levels everything looks organized and controlled. At other levels, everything looks chaotic. These strings vibrate throughout the Universe. We know that vibrations and harmonies can be beautiful and fantastic. We also know that sometimes a certain frequency hits a harmonic interval, that can cause things to become chaotic and unraveled.

Just something to think about. I'll write more later about why I am doing this and what led me to lead you on this exercise.

It's all about the kids....

2011-01-31T08:41:00.026-05:00

Trying to get caught up a little bit. This post is really about our winter months and what things look like with the kids.....so I'm going back in time to January 2011............

It isn't really all about the kids, but at times it feels like it.

All three boys were playing winter sports this year. Two different basketball leagues, and one middle school wrestling. Also, my son is going to school out of district so SGG has an almost 60 minute commute in the morning to get Brandon to school and then get to work (they are in opposite directions). In the afternoons, I leave work around 3pm to pick him up, which adds almost an hour on to my commute.

One of the boys was in Boy Scouts, sort of, and the other finishing up Cub Scouts. So some scouting, practices all on different nights of the week. I am sure the neighbors thought we were like birds flying back and forth to take chicks to places and constantly bringing them food. Beginning in February I started the Body Transformation Challenge, so my days started around 4:30-4:44am and ended after 10pm.

The shorter and colder days mean less time in the sun for the boys, and they start to get a little cranky about that.

The boys can really eat too. They are all growing, and tend to stay hungry. The real problem is that only one is truly in his teens...so it only gets worse from here. Soon we will see how truly ravenous teenage boys can be.

catching up....Christmas...

2011-01-08T07:19:00.000-05:00

From 2010.12.25-31 Christmas Vacation

Ok, I know it has been a while. I've been waiting on a few things (pictures) but I can't wait any longer. They'll be added once I have them.

Things have been busy around here. Christmas was really good for us and the boys. I think everyone was really happy with what they got and SGG and I got to travel to Florida without the boys which is sort of what we wanted.

We left a moderately cold Virginia on Christmas morning and were soon in a sunny and warm Orlando, FL. The plan was to spend a few days in Orlando, then head to Ft Myers and maybe further south for the rest of the week. All in all that is about what happened.

Christmas day was really warm in Orlando. We picked up my step-Father, Gary, and then went to my Sister-in-Law's Aunt's house to spend time with my brother and his family. We had a few drinks which led to some skateboarding, some baseball, a lot of Frisbee, and more. It was a really fantastic time. I can recommend a cool Minnesota drink called a Tom & Jerry. Those were really good too.

While we were warm and having fun in Orlando, it snowed up to 14" back in Virginia Beach. While that would have been fun to some extent, without the boys it wouldn't have been nearly as great as being with family in Orlando.

It did get very cold in Orlando that night. They put out freeze warnings for the Orange Groves. Gary has a nice orange tree outside of his house that was loaded down with oranges. We would pick a few for some orange juice when we wanted some.

Sunday we tried to go to Sea World, but it was too cold. The news casters were teaching people how to scrape the frost and ice off their windshields with their credit cards and drivers licenses...which I thought was really funny. That afternoon we ended back at Gary's with four small children, three big children, and three women married to the three big children. There was another freeze forecast for that evening and it was fairly certain. I don't know what freezes do to oranges, but it appears to be a big deal. So, we picked the whole tree. The best quote from the whole trip was what my sister-in-law said when we were all done, "The kids will always remember picking a hundred million oranges off of Grampa Gary's tree." I believe they will. Hopefully I can get a picture from my family as I didn't take any, being too busy picking.

Monday morning we went to Winterpark to see where my mom and Grampa Gary got married. It is a beautiful spot. We even got our picture taken by a photographer that was waiting on a group to show up. She took our picture for free. :-) It was so cold though that I don't blame her client for not showing up.

From 2010.12.25-31 Christmas Vacation

There is a state park about halfway between Orlando and Daytona, called Blue Spring State Park. We had heard that there were a lot of manatees sheltering in the spring because it was warmer water than the river. We went there on Monday and we were certainly not disappointed. The spring was teeming with manatees. I had never seen one before. It was a truly awesome experience and we took lots of pictures.

From 2010.12.25-31 Christmas Vacation

That night we had dinner with the family again, everyone contributing something. SGG and I had our first experience with an iPad (and now we own one). My brother and I tried some dancing game...and everyone thought that was hilarious.

We were keeping a close eye on the weather. The intent going to Ft Myers and Sanibel Island was that we would camp for the rest of the week on Sanibel. When the temperatures were dipping into the low 40's and high 30's SGG drew the line. On Tuesday we headed south, but to a hotel, not a tent. On the way we went through some interesting towns as the GPS took us off the interstates and I swear we went back in time. I believe it was Winterhaven that had a McDonalds that looked like something from the 50's or 60's. One town we stopped in we couldn't find an open restaurant. It was sort of strange. What was even stranger was that the Droid kept wanting to take us back through there on the return trip. I finally just turned the navigation off and found my own way to the interstate. When we got there, the hotel hadn't cleaned all the rooms so it was several hours before we could check in. We went over to walk on the beach at Sanibel. I've only been there during winter months before, but it never dropped below 70 degrees. Being on the beach at 45-50 degrees was sobering and not very pleasant. The water was cold enough that I didn't think I would be getting in at all regardless of whether the temperature changed or not.

It was beautiful though. Billions of little seashells where the ocean meets the land. We left right around sunset and went back to the hotel. They still weren't ready for us so we waited. I think they cleaned our room last.

Wednesday was better. We got over to Sanibel and checked into our campground. We got the tent setup and were ready for adventure. As long as that adventure didn't include warm sunny weather. We walked down and rented a couple of beach cruiser bikes for a couple of days...and that is how we got around the islands after that. :-) We stopped in at a cool local breakfast diner place that was also part grocery store. There were several shops in an architecturally pleasing group with different parrots spread throughout. We rode our bikes down to take a tour of the island's nature preserve, J.N. Ding Darling Nature preserve. We got to see lots of different types of birds there, and a bunch of fish too. There were a couple of volunteers that we talked to about the various birds. It was a rather long bike ride. After the preserve we made the long trek back to the campground (the other end of the island) and crashed for bit. For dinner we just walked to a close by restaurant.

From 2010.12.25-31 Christmas Vacation

Thursday was still cold. We got up and headed out to do a kayak tour of Tarpon Bay after breakfast. Again, a lot more birds. Afterwards we pedaled through another nature trail hoping to see some aligators, but I think they were too cold to show themselves too. From there we pedaled up to the Seashell Museum. That was one of the coolest places we saw this trip. Not only did they have lots of great shells, they had all sorts of information about the critters that make and live in those things. Snails can be quite vicious. We rode back and decided that we wanted to spend Friday at Seaworld in Orlando and figured it would be better to drive back that night. We turned in our bikes and packed up our stuff. The one place I really wanted to eat, and trust me when I say that I think we planned the trip around eating, was a fabulous restaurant called the Bubble Room. It is on Captiva, just north of Sanibel, and we drove there. SGG was not biking and truthfully I was done with it too by that point. There is a lot of lore surrounding the Bubble Room and you should go read about it for yourself. If your journey takes you near Ft Myers and Sanibel, it is a must that you stop by and have a meal. I wouldn't plan on finishing it though. Guard your leftovers jealously and with great zeal. I'll tell you why next.

From 2010.12.25-31 Christmas Vacation

We drove back to Orlando that night, on the Interstate, and didn't have any issues or time travel experiences. The next morning we got breakfast and headed to Sea World. It was crowded, but with our passes from Busch Gardens here in Williamsburg, we got front row parking right in front of the Entrance. We had a great watching the dolphins, manatees, and so many other things. The lines for the rides were really long, but seriously? Why are there rides at Sea World?

From 2010.12.25-31 Christmas Vacation

It was New Years eve and we headed out from Sea World early to take Grampa Gary to dinner at one of his favorite places, the Boston Fish House. I remembered that we had tried this before, about 21 years prior, and they were closed. Sure enough, some checking showed that they were closed, but that they had opened a second restaurant north of Orlando that was open. We had a splendid dinner together, and New Years Eve was awesome. The only downside was that when we went back to the hotel to clean up before going to dinner, there had been a mix-up and our room had been cleaned, and cleaned out. They bagged up all of our stuff and put it in the office, and they threw out my Bubble Room leftovers. I am still bummed about it some three months later. It happens and I'm learning to get over it.

A little side note...at the expense of someone I know..
She was camping with her family in St Augustine and called her husband over to because she wanted him to see this opossum. He walked up and said that it wasn't an opossum, it was an armadillo. So, while we were at Sea World we saw an Armadillo...it looked a lot like an opossum so I thought I would share this picture with her.

From 2010.12.25-31 Christmas Vacation

It is an opossum, but I couldn't pass up the jab...especially since she gets me quite often about a camping trip we did one time in Yosemite.

New Years Day we flew back to Virginia Beach!

Camera's seemed to be a difficulty with us on this trip, but here are the pictures we did get!

Link to the album is here

"That's actually my fault...."

2011-01-07T16:23:00.001-05:00

I pick up my son from school every day. The ride from school to home takes about 30 minutes. We learn a lot about each other during our 30 minute rides each day. I get to say things like "How was your day?" and he responds to everything with "Fine". I change it up to elicit other answers by asking "What was your least favorite event today"? etc.

Today we had a little discussion at the end of the commute, prompted by me spying a newspaper up on the roof of our house.

Me: "Why is there a newspaper on the roof of the house"?
Him: [Laughing] "That is actually my fault..."
(Honestly, I'm amazed he took responsibility for it.)
Me: "I know it is your fault, when there is a newspaper on the roof, it usually isn't anyone else's fault. How did it get there"?
Him: [Still Laughing] "Well, you know how I am usually pretty good at throwing things right where I want them..."
Me: [Interrupting him]: "Let me rephrase your statement, you are NEVER good throwing things right where you want them."
Him: "Well, not backwards maybe but..."
Me: [Interrupting again] "No, not ever."
Him: "Well, ok, but I was skateboarding down the driveway when there were no cars there, and I picked up the paper and tossed it backwards, and it landed on the roof."
Me: [Just staring at him]
Him: "I tried to get Michael to help by standing on the chair with the broom and scraping it off, but he wouldn't stand on the handles."
Me: [at least they aren't fighting....and I decide to let it drop there]

Written in the stars....

2010-12-19T07:36:00.004-05:00

Lately it has felt as though we went from Summer right into Winter around here. Temperatures the last couple of weeks have had highs in the 30's. It has meant that we have had crystal clear skies except for when it is raining or snowing.

I often pickup our youngest son, almost 11 years old, from his after school care program. One day this past week the sky was remarkably clear and there were no clouds at all. When I picked him up it was about 5pm. As I was commenting to him about the sky I couldn't believe I could already see a star and I pointed it out to him. It wasn't quite sunset yet. I told him it had to be a planet, but I didn't know which one other than I knew it wasn't Venus (not bright enough) or Mars (not red enough and too bright). When we got to the car I whipped out my Droid X phone, pulled up Google Skymap, and saw right away that it wasn't one planet, but two. Jupiter and Uranus were actually very closely aligned at that spot.

Christmas cards have gone out, but we may need to make some more. The picture above is what we used on them. It is one of the few (maybe only) that we have were everyone is smiling (mostly) and none of the clowns (boys) is goofing off. Those with children, and especially boys, might understand the difficulty of that task. My friend Liz says she only asks that they get one picture a year where everyone is smiling.

We got together with my dad, mom, and my brothers last week. It was a good time. We set up a wireless router/firewall for my dad. Evidently there were legends being formed about how slow their internet access was. My brother said he thought it might be the firewall, and they were trying to convince my dad to get our mom a laptop with wireless she could use throughout the house anyway. When we got the router working, we looked at the computer. It was really slow. I probably could have driven to California and back to get printouts of the Ebay web page faster than it was loading on the computer. After running through a few things I normally look at to help speed things up, I found the problem. He only had 384MB of RAM in his computer. I explained the concept of electrical information storage in RAM versus mechanical storage on the hard drive, and how electrons move near the speed of light, while a hard drive spins at something far less than that. I told him was using more than twice the amount of RAM that he had and that everything was having to go to and come from the disk. I said that most computers out there today come with 4GB of RAM as a standard, 10 times what he had. I used an analogy that if the average car in the US has 150HP, he had 15HP and was equivalent to cruising the information superhighway on a riding lawnmower.

Last night we got together with my aunts and uncles from SC. Beth and Joe live here in VA, but Larry and Jerri came up for a surprise visit this week. It was the first time that SGG had met Larry and Jerri. I didn't warn her first either. If the boys had come, I would have warned them. Lots of stories were told about them, about me (which SGG soaked up), and there was some drinking and karaoke. It was a lot of fun and always too short. When they start telling stories about me though, I quickly realize that my son is just like me in many ways, so there may be hope for him yet. :-)

I pulled the middle and tallest child out of bed yesterday morning and dragged him down to the gym. He is starting to play basketball and I figured it would be good to get down there and practice some. We were there for an hour and a half and he worked hard the whole time. He has some talent, and he has the height of a big guy, so if he practices he will do very well. Once you get him practicing, he doesn't want to stop. Of course, I am the one that is really sore for some reason. :-)

We are ready for Christmas. I think. SGG still wanders out and comes back with last minute items almost every day. We got the boys 15oz mugs with their pictures and names on them. The idea is that it becomes 'their' mug. The only thing they are allowed to drink out of. If it is dirty, they wash it. My friend Jeff in Richmond took his girls to a pottery place and they painted and glazed their own plates and bowls too. I love that idea and it is next on the list. :-)

I hope everyone has a great holiday, Christmas, Chanuka (Hanukka), Kwanzaa, Winter Celebration, Vacation, Snow Days, Boxing Day, Solstice Days, School and Work off days, , and a great new year!

edited to add:
Technology often can bring more problems than it solves, but in the hands of the right person it can do amazing things. My brother is an avid adventurist and dabbles in videography (cinematography?). The GoPro video cameras are tiny HD cameras meant to be mounted on helmet cams and other things to capture some of what many extremists do. Many people are now using improvised booms and other tricks to get awesome points of view on many day to day things, not just the outrageously adventurous. Below is just such a video of our time over at my parents place last weekend...technology is truly magical when it can capture the spirit and the views of a child at Christmas...

(Actually, I need to see if he can give me a different link.... )

:-)

Stuffing, Stuffed, and Stuff...

2010-11-27T13:59:00.000-05:00

Not necessarily in the order the title suggests.

So, it would seem that things break a lot around here. Refrigerator shelves, washing machines, computers, xboxes, cars, wall hangings, etc. There seems like no end to the stuff that needs to be done. Even the blog needs work. The back ground of this site drives me nuts, but I haven't decided what I want to replace it with.

One of the FEW things of mine that we kept in the merger of the two households was my kitchen knives. I have a nice set of VERY sharp kitchen knives. I'm not allowed to use them. When I do, I get to play doctor and use words like "laceration" "multiple lacerations" "sutures" "butterfly stitches" with duct, scotch, or any other type of tape laying nearby. I haven't tried super glue yet though. SGG did drop a knife this week and on the way down it stuck vertically into the side of the cabinet.

I went to Knoxville, TN for the funeral of my step-brother Steve. While I hated the circumstances, I loved being with my family there. I was really overwhelmed at how the community and their church responded and helped Wanda and Brianna out.

I got to do a presentation at a lunch and learn with my friends in Richmond on November 11. I am already very attention deficit, and when I do public speaking, I have to be very careful to try and stay on track. I easily fall into anecdotes and then lose where I am and where I am going. Sometimes I compensate by going really fast just to get through it. This time though, I could hardly talk as I had mostly lost my voice. To make things just a bit funnier, my friend Jeff changed up some of my slides and didn't tell me. He took some of my more cluttered ones and spread them out a bit. I kept looking at the slides thinking "I just did this slide, sort of". All was good though. I loved talking to the customers and my friends afterward too.

For Thanksgiving we haven't done a lot. The boys went to their respective bio-parents so it has just been SGG and I. It has been GREAT! We love our kids, but having some alone time is awesome too!

This video below is something that I started working on in the summer. A piano piece that my book blew open to one day while the door was open and I just started playing it. It is one of my all time favorite pieces too. This version is simple, but I still manage to mess up a few spots (I get so easily distracted either by things going on around me, or just the thoughts running amok in my head). I was trying to record it for our wedding, but was just to jittery to do it. The song is Pachebel's Canon. I hope you enjoy it. I'll also be doing this and Auld Lang Syne for my recitals in December.

I hope everyone had a great thanksgiving!!

We dressed up as hikers for Halloween....

2010-11-01T23:02:00.000-04:00

and all we got when trick or treating was these pictures...

The hiking also gave me lots of time to contemplate on the loss of my step-brother, a truly wonderful person. We did two four mile hikes, one in St. Mary's Wilderness off the Blue Ridge Parkway and the other was part of the Rip Rap trail just past Chimney Rock on Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park. Where are the kids? The younger two were with their dad, and the older one was with his grandparents. Two of them carved pumpkins and those pictures are below too...

The meaning of life is to live...

2010-10-31T22:12:00.000-04:00

and our lives take us on journey's that we never imagined were possible. Great things happen, not so great things happen, and often some pretty terrible things happen.

In 1989 my mom re-married to a man named Gary, a great thing. Gary is a truly incredible and amazing person. I have been very fortunate to have Gary in my life.

Gary also had two adult children, a son and a daughter. I don't remember the first time that I met Gary's son Steve, but I remember the second very well.

In 1998, my son had just turned 1 year old. We drove down to see my mom for a surprise visit. I let Gary know we were coming, but we didn't tell my mom. As far as surprises go, it was the best ever. That week, we spent a lot of time with Steve and his wife Wanda, and I left with memories that will last a lifetime. It was truly an incredibly happy moment in my life. After that visit I made a collage picture of what we did and it has been hung up everywhere I have gone. There is a photo of Steve, Wanda, my son Brandon, his mom, and myself that I put in the center of that collage. Steve was a very smart business person, a dedicated husband, a loving father, and a genuinely great human being.

October 29, 2010, a Friday night, Steve was driving by himself and was killed in a head on collision. I still cannot accept that he is gone and that there is nothing anyone can do about it. Steve was taken from this world far too early, he will be missed, and he will be very fondly remembered. He was married to Wanda for just over 13 years, and they have a beautiful 10 year old daughter together.

fun with lasers....

2010-10-30T07:57:00.000-04:00

An exercise you should do....

2010-10-06T17:55:00.000-04:00

Into recycling and renewable energy? Into conservation?

Try this for a day....then pass it on.

Go without your internal plumbing and running water for one day.

Get some bottled water as your only water source and see how often you wash your hands and how much water you use doing it, how often you use water for the most mundane tasks. How often you need water to flush a toilet. How about taking a shower? Washing dishes? Preparing meals.

As an alteration on this exercise, you can opt to get water by the bucketful from your furthest outside faucet for drinking, washing, bathing, etc to simulate getting water from a river or some other source.

There are many people on this planet that do not have the luxury of clean and reliable water. In many countries, farming and industry are polluting the few sources of water these people have.

You can also do the same with food, electricity, cars, etc. Take a day to remind you and your children how well you have things and how much others on this planet lack. Could you even walk to a local store to pick up food to eat for a day in your area?

There are some shoes you just can't really know what it is like to wear until you put them on and do it yourself.

The day to day stuff....

2010-10-02T08:24:00.001-04:00

Finally, the weather is changing!!!! Temperature feels like the low 60s for something like the first time since April. No more 100/90/high 80's days!!!!!!! I'm on the back porch, sitting on the futon with the mac book pro my work gave me (more on that later), watching the earth spin and take the sun from below the horizon through it's daily trek through the sky. The instant the light hit my face it started warming it up.

So, no honeymoon until December. We decided to wait until the kids were with their respective other parents and then go some where like Utah or Colorado to go snowboarding/skiing, snow shoeing, etc.

So what have we been doing in the mean time? Not a lot. Taking a break from all the wedding preparations!

We have been focused on the day to day routine. SGG and I both work, but we work semi-staggered schedules. I go into work earlier in the morning and come home earlier, she goes in a little later, and comes home a little later. My son Brandon goes to an out of district school and so we must provide transportation for him. SGG takes him in the morning, and I pick him up in the afternoon. It makes for a much longer commute now for SGG, but she gets about 20 minutes alone with him every day. We had definitely talked about this a lot even before I moved in July. Her sons Michael and John both ride the buses to their schools. In the afternoons, I get home with Brandon about the same time that Michael gets home. They are required to get chores and homework done before they can go out or play on computer/xbox. Our chores are setup so that they just have a couple of small tasks that should take them 5-10 minutes each. We haven't been too strict on them yet, so that they could get used to it, but we are clamping down on that. Outside of that, they are free to do pretty much what they want to do. The boys organize different things to do together, or go off with different friends, or go off to different structured activities. It gives them time both together and apart.

SGG and I coordinate dinner. A few times a week I'll cook stuff and a few times a week she does. We both go to the store to get things we need. I have a few things that I do, such as piano lessons and sports, that take some coordinating too. Softball was supposed to end this week, but we had two rain out nights and so we will have two makeup games. Volleyball started last week, but I couldn't go to the first game (more on that in a second). The boys have scouts, and two will be starting a lacrosse clinic on Sundays this weekend.

So mostly mundane routine. SGG and I try to make sure we have time to talk in both the early morning and in the evening (being rather strict on bed time routine on the boys). We pick a show that looks interesting, get it on itunes or netflix, and watch that together. We'll often lay in bed and watch them on the Mac Book Pro. Currently we are watching Dexter, in season 4, and I'm not sure if we are life imitating art or art imitating life. I am also trying to sync up the two different camera feeds from the wedding and that is proving a little difficult. :-)

SGG and I had planned a whitewater rafting trip for the week after the wedding, but she started reading about the Gauley River and decided she would be better off relaxing at home. After doing my own reading and finding out after the trip that an Ocoee River Guide drowned there the weekend of our wedding, I think she was the smarter of the two of us. However, I wasn't backing out of the group since almost everyone else did. So, there were four of us that went. It is a 6 -7 hour drive from here to Fayetteville, WV. Those of us that went have known each other for a couple of years so it was a good ride up. We were going to raft the Lower Gauley River. Good choice. It is a good combination of challenging and relaxing without being too life threatening. I got thrown out once on a huge hit/bounce that I expected to go a different way, and was in the water again, but held on with my legs and awesome abs as the raft seemed to go sideways and almost flipped. Other than that, I was on the front of the raft the whole time, soaked by rapid after rapid the whole day, and thoroughly loved the experience. Wildwater Expeditions, and our guide Karen, were fantastic. The bus ride to and from the river was every bit as exciting as the rapids. :-) I left Friday afternoon and came back Sunday evening.

That same weekend, my son spent the weekend with the boy scouts and participated in their Scout Olympics. He had a fantastic time too. He shared a tent with a boy from Germany (his parents are here with NATO).

SGG's boys were with their dad for the weekend.

SGG spent some time with some of her girlfriends, and got a massage on Sunday morning (which on Sunday morning I was quite jealous of).

Brandon and I had an interesting excursion this week. We decided that we both wanted to see Inception. When I picked him up from school, we checked the Droid X to see where it was playing. I then called SGG to see what she thought (she has seen it already) and to see if she had other plans for us or not. She thought it was a brilliant idea. She took Michael to see Despicable Me after she got home. Brandon and I got to the theater about 10 minutes late. Since there was no one watching it, they hadn't started the movie or the previews. It was like Brandon and I had our own theater and they played the movie specifically for us. What a great movie too! So much to think about, so many layers.

Remnants of tropical storm Nicole rolled through here Thursday, shutdown work due to flooding for part of the day, and rained out my softball game.

Friday night I played my first game of indoor sixes coed volleyball. We had a great time and got creamed every game. We have a lot of inexperienced players (myself included) and are usually just happy to get a couple of points. We are getting better though. My legs really hurt this morning....getting old. SGG and I are looking to do some local hikes today. We also have a DATE NIGHT tonight! Brandon is with his Grandparents this weekend going to the mountains and apple orchards. Michael is spending the day with a friend of his, and John will be with us most of the day.

:-)

It isn't finished, it isn't just beginning...it is something else entirely

2010-09-21T20:03:00.001-04:00

A chapter has ended, but another has begun...and one of many with these same characters. SGG did a great job pulling this all together. She had some fantastic help from our friends Carol and Andrea. The wedding was about as perfect as anyone could hope for. The boys did their part, I didn't do too badly, and SGG was perfect. The weather was fantastic, the minister was awesome, and the catering was incredible.

Our wedding was Saturday afternoon, about the time most of the back yard would be in the shade of the trees (it was a lucky guess). The boys did an affirmation, and two of them read scripture (Old and New testaments). The ceremony was short and amazing. Everyone seemed to have a great time! The kids especially. :-) You can see in pictures and video below.

Some funny conversations with the boys:

Friday night before the wedding, we were talking with the boys at the table. SGG's oldest son, Michael the soon to be 12 yr old, asked "Mom, are you going to cry at the wedding?" SGG responded with "Maybe, are you?" Michael said, "Am I supposed to?"

Saturday night, after being admonished by me for taking 2 liter soda bottle to throw and explode on the street, my son says his uncle, my brother, "If you don't want to get me in serious trouble, you might want to hide the video!" My brother, unperturbed, said "The question is still, did he or did he not have a mentos?" :-) Some of those videos are below....

As for this chapter, it is just beginning, but I learned early Monday morning that for a fellow blogger, his book had ended. Jim Everson, Depot Dad, fellow single dad, courageous soul, and inspiration to those that knew him or read his blog, lost his battle with cancer. Keep his family in your thoughts and prayers. You can read a little more here and here.

My new brother-in-law sent SGG and I these thoughts:

FAITH….

Is not being able to see the Ocean at the end of a small stream…

But believing in your heart that it is there …waiting to embrace.

Our Real Journey…

Begins midstream…having navigated the hazards and falls and currents

Which life and former love threw at us…

Only to prepare us for our one Matched Soul.

The List

2010-09-05T08:53:00.000-04:00

The list. The list of things that need to be done for this or that. The list of things for the wedding. The list of things to buy for school supplies. The list of things that need to be done for the boys to go to school. The list of things that need to be put away. The list of things that need to be fixed. The list of groceries that need to be bought to replace that which the boys eat. There is at least 1 gallon of milk everyday that gets added to that list.

You could put it all into one monster list. A list that is alive. It grows. It changes. It cannot be completed. So we add things to the list like, "Have fun", "see a movie", "get sushi", "go hiking", "go kayaking", "go bike riding", "write in your damn blog."

This morning it is very cool outside. Not exactly crisp, but very comfortable. Waking up, I started toward the kitchen to make some coffee. There are three boys strewn about the living room. One is mine, one is SGG's, the other is not ours. They were up late watching a movie. I am hoping they weren't up all night. There is popcorn all around, and cushions for various incarnations of forts. There is a fourth boy, SGG's youngest, somewhere else in the house. I quickly read through email, news, and computer news, then grab a cup of coffee and head outside.

The temperature is around 70 or so, very little humidity. I call it perfect. The sun is rising. I walk around front, through the wet grass to get the paper. The grass and dew feel amazing to my feet. There are crickets and other bugs chirping. There are blue jays screeching and flying about catching chirping bugs. We can hear other smaller birds in the hedges. A pair of cardinals has taken up residence in the hedges too. Occasionally there are some gigantic crows cawing, and we have an Osprey that seems to lose it's way, or get really excited from time to time. The cat loves to join us on the back porch to investigate all these sights and sounds too. The tree rats, otherwise known as squirrels, are running all around. They are cute, but the pine cone chips they chew up are annoying. I am pretty sure they are throwing pine cones at the cat. I don't blame them for that last part, but I pick the cat over them. The mess the squirrels make is horrendous.

We are a little low on creamer today, so I experimented. NOT worth repeating.

I think a boy on a bike just passed by pulling his little sister on something that looked like a scooter with a string.

The wedding list is nearly complete. The boys are ready for school. The chores lists have been posted. The rules lists have been made. The lawnmower will be fixed today. The list of things SGG is no longer allowed to do is growing so that things like the lawnmower don't keep breaking. The washing machine is next to be rectified, and SGG didn't have anything to do with it breaking. The ice maker on the refrigerator needs to be investigated, ducting into the the computer room needs to be re-sized, various small problems with my computer network continually plague me. We are splitting up the nights for cooking and I need to get some groceries for those nights. Right now, breakfast needs to be made. :-)

My son's great grandparents celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary last night. You just think about that for a little while.

We went to Busch Gardens yesterday. We really had the best time. It wasn't very crowded. The youngest boy didn't want to ride the roller coasters, so after we road the Lochness Monster and the Griffon, SGG and her son John went to watch the animal shows. I took her oldest, Michael, and my son Brandon to ride the rest of the roller coasters. The lines were very short every where. The Alpengeist was closed. We rode in the front of Apollo's Chariot. The boys loved that. Their hair was blown almost completely backwards from the wind. We then went back to ride the Griffon in the front row. By that time we had to meet SGG and John back at Big Ben. On the way back we went through some of the animal exhibits. The boys got to "pet" a boa constrictor. We also saw a wallaroo. They had pictures of a two toed sloth up and I asked about it. They said they do have one, but it is in training that day. That really puzzles me. What do you train something that rarely moves and just hangs around to do? We saw an Owl on the way back too. The weather was so nice, and while there were a lot of people, it really wasn't very crowded. It really was a great time.

Changes and more changes...

2010-08-25T20:59:00.000-04:00

Changing some pictures and stuff on the blog. Let me know what you think, but only as long as you like it. :-) I am not a HTML, CSS, JAVA person, but I play (hunt) around for what I want and sometimes come out with something that is close enough. The background image here is one of those things. I created a collage in Google's Picasa, basically making a border down each side of the page, but the HTML somewhere here said to tile the thing. So it did, and what was right is left, left is right, and where there were two are four. I'll keep looking at it. The previous picture was a mountain at Snowbird in Utah.

I figure, since I am moving furniture and stuff all over the house now prepping for the end of summer and the wedding, I might as well move this around too.

The invitations have all been sent out. Procrastination is my super power, so you probably have no idea what this really means in terms of my world. It is more than significant. Especially considering the fact that I do not write ANYTHING with pen or pencil, and I almost NEVER put anything in the mail. Both border on phobia levels for me. SGG has been very concerned that she will never see my handwriting. I'm serious. :-) I also don't have anyone's postal address, just their email. SGG was not amused when I hinted about just scanning the invite and emailing it out. Nope, not one bit. So with minimal foot stomping, addresses were collected and invites were sent.

Now, I feel rather vindicated in the scan and email idea, since we have had two people so far think that the RSVP email address we put in there was an evite and couldn't navigate to the site. :-)

I am sure someone may try to video conference the event with their cell phone, but they are own their own if they do. I certainly am not planning to.

Other changes have included getting all the pictures from my previous residence hung on the walls here. We can't do them all (I had a lot), but we are filling up the place. Also, technology has exploded around SGG. She said she woke up one night and the whole house was humming. Gigabit ethernet, servers, workstations, laptops, wireless-N, droids, etc....She has learned how to work the media center pc, pulling up TV, movies, blu-ray, and netflix. Netflix has become the center of our relationship. In an effort to keep her up later, we started watching Dexter. We are totally "wrapped" up in it. Dexter "captivates" us. It entertains us to "death". What a great show.

All in all, things are moving along very well. My son comes home Saturday morning. :-) Who knows what will happen after that.

I am a facebook fake, and a twitter twit....

2010-08-16T22:09:00.000-04:00

What?

I've turned off chat in facebook. I have locked down all my settings to friends only (or at least I did several weeks ago). I have removed a few "friends". I don't play ANY facebook games, poke, or anything else. I rarely log in, and I seldom run through the huge list of updates. At most I get through 24-48 hours worth. It is rare that I ever even look at anyone's profile. I have managed to become almost anti-social on the worlds biggest social networking site. I don't know whether that is a good or bad thing. I am a facebook fake.

Twitter I found useful for just a couple of things. One is there are two accounts that give updates for the City of Virginia Beach, and another that gives updates for traffic in Hampton Roads. I follow them and a few single parents and that is about it. The only thing I do less than updating facebook is tweeting on twitter. I am a twitter twit.

You could say I am following suit with my blog, but I like my blog. I like being able to type more than a few lines of text for an update. I don't know how many people find my blog through my facebook profile, but I would guess very few. Actually, I have those statistics in google analytics for the most part. I don't post updates to the blog on facebook though. Sometimes on twitter...as I am doing with this post. But, since I don't really cover really juicy topics here, just the fun things we do, does that make me a bland blogger? :-) If you made it this far into the post, I am so sorry. I love sentences and words, and I love putting them together. I love rhymes and writing poems, but more than all that I love alliteration. I am always an all-out alliterer. Even if I have to make cruddy crap up to get there.

What is in a name?

2010-08-15T21:04:00.001-04:00

I'm trying out some new names and descriptions, so you may see some changes over the next few weeks...

I think we are finally finished with the old house I was renting. I have said goodbye to all my neighbors. I will miss them.

We are getting settled in to SGG's house. We nearly have all the boxes emptied. We are going to buy a shed for stuff. The garage is overflowing with stuff. We have stuff that needs to go up in the attic. We surely are over stuffed. This is after two yard sales, several trips to thrift stores to offload stuff, and several trips to the dump.

We have been putting up pictures. You would be surprised how many I have to put up. We have been re-arranging stuff.

SGG has been getting used to some new sights, sounds, and smells...and I have also to be fair about it.

Things have been so busy, but we are hoping things settle down soon.

I skipped 150 pages of my piano book and started learning Pachelbel's Canon. I didn't mean to, but the wind blew the pages to it one day and I started banging it out. I think everyone is tired of hearing it now, but I need to smooth it all out. Maybe when I have it done I'll record it and play it here. I may have to record and play it in sections. :-)

And just in case you did see that the title and description changed and you read it...no worries about the cat. In fact, I have few stories about that ferocious feline to tell you...but a little later.

edited to add:
I also meant to put in a plug for craigslist. I have a practically new washer and dryer that I bought when I moved back to Virginia Beach four years ago. Think about it, how much laundry does a single guy and his son really do? So I put them on craigslist around 11am Saturday morning and they were gone by 2:30pm. I have previously purchased one thing through craigslist, my primary camera lens for my Nikon. What a really cool service. I know, I'm not telling anyone anything they didn't already know.

A letter from my mom....

2010-08-09T22:25:00.000-04:00

On Saturday July 31, 2010 I received a letter from my mom. Probably not too remarkable until you consider that she died from lung cancer February 7, 2001. SGG was going through the cookbooks I was putting into the yard sale and found this sheet of paper. She started asking me about the letter, but I didn't know anything about it. I looked at the sheet of paper and I couldn't believe it. It is a short letter, and more of a poem than a letter really. I don't know when she wrote it, and I don't know if she ever intended me to see it. I can't tell you how often I have a question and I reach for the phone, my mom's number flashes through my head, and I realize I can't call her. I had been wondering what my mom would say about the impending marriage, and what she would say about SGG. I can't describe how awesome it was to get a message from my mom and get to share it with SGG and the rest of my family.

Here it is below:

To my son, [Crazy Computer Dad]
When I became a parent,
I was overwhelmed with love.
I was such a proud parent,
and thanked the stars above!
When I became your parent
you were the greatest gift to me.
watching you learn to walk and talk,
you were such a joy to see!
And now you are a parent,
and this I must confide,
I still count my blessings daily,
for my gifts have multiplied.

All my love, Mom.

Moving, combining, cleaning, selling, donating...

2010-08-08T09:12:00.000-04:00

You would think it would all be done by now, but it is not. The saga is far from over. There are still little things to be done here and there. There are still boxes that need to be opened and sorted. There is the garage that is now so jam packed you can barely get in there. There is the attic that stuff, once all sorted, needs to have stuff put in it. Last night we had crab legs for dinner. I went looking for my crab stuff, and couldn't find it. SGG said, there is "another box over here", and sure enough it was in there. Is there some strange unexplored and undefined law of physics governing moving boxes? What is the source of their staying power?

Yard sales make for interesting times. Mine was a couple of weeks ago, during one of the three hottest days on record ever here. Combine that with 99.999999999999% humidity and you have a formula where bodily water loss exceeds the body's ability to replenish it. Everything was cheap, and some stuff was free. For some reason the ad didn't make it into Craigs List, but we essentially sold everything. That was the goal. I had to shuffle a few pieces around the city, and we made appointments for people to pick other stuff up. In my typical "do it all" crazy mentality, I had also scheduled a backpacking trip that I had to be at a carpool point at 11:30am that morning. I figured I would just pack it all up around 10:45 (or be done hopefully), but with so many people coming back, etc, I had to cancel the trip.

The most comical moment I think came when an elderly lady stopped by and wanted the twin bed mattress and frame set. Economically priced at $10. The problem was that she didn't have a way to get it to her house. I didn't have my tools with me to break it down. This was a large metal frame, but light, that was part of a bunk bed set that my son has been using for 8 years now. Earlier this year I took the bunk bed down to one bed. The lady lived about 2.5 blocks away. I told her if she couldn't find someone to get it, we would bring it over there. Worst case I would just carry the thing (in the heat and humidity). She could find anyone, and it wouldn't fit in SGG's vehicle, so I carried it over. I didn't really want to have to break it down. We would bring the mattresses over a little later.

Turns out carrying it wasn't the hardest or craziest part. It really was no problem getting it there. However, she must have the smallest house in the neighborhood, and at 105 Degrees, 119 heat index, was trying to get by without AC. The frame would barely fit down the hall, and had no chance of fitting through the doors. She got a little mouthy at this point, complaining about how she maybe didn't want it if it wouldn't just fit. I got to practice a little transcendental meditation. I went back to borrow my neighbors tools, essentially an allen wrench and a pair of channel lock pliers since one bolt was stripped. In short order the bed was disassembled, put back together, and had the bunky board and mattress on it. I left puddles of sweat everywhere as she didn't have the windows in that sun facing room open (and no AC).

Once all of that drama was done, we concentrated on cleaning the place up and getting unpacked/combined at SGG's. We had a gigantic yard sale at her place the next weekend (last weekend). She also invited a few friends over. I made coffee and bagel egg sandwiches for the ladies, in addition to moving all the heavy stuff out front.

SGG's two boys came back from New York last Sunday. I've been working on getting network connectivity to the rooms. The transition has gone fairly smooth so far.

We definitely need a shed. Between bikes, lawn tools, recreational gear, etc, we are packed to the gills.

This weekend has been a lot more relaxed. Still a lot to do, but we decided to take it a little easier. This morning, we've been sitting on the back porch drinking coffee, reading the paper, talking about the state of the country, making jokes, and now I'm writing out our adventures. Or at least a little slice of them.

Work is going well, and much less stressful! A blessing really with all the house stuff.

A project/idea came to me recently, inspired by my recent blog book project. I may start taking my photo albums and doing another blurb book for each year, writing up stories about the pictures as I go. I have almost all of those photos scanned in, due to another multi-year project. SGG's eldest son was going back through the book I made for her again, for like the 20th time. He was very intrigued, asking questions about the pictures, reminiscing about various activities.

Why doesn't anyone seem surprised....

2010-07-23T10:38:00.000-04:00

Most everyone is saying "they knew it was just a matter of time"...or "Only surprised it didn't happen sooner"

SGG and I (along with my son and her two boys) are getting married. We've chosen a date, September 18, 2010. Just a small ceremony with family only, then a larger reception later.

The picture above was taken two weeks ago at Bear Island/Hammocks Beach State park. The island is in the Outer Banks chain near Jacksonville, NC. It offers a ferry to take people over to the beach, but services there are limited/primitive. The camping is awesome. The views are awesome.

Since that weekend I have been moving. Packing, moving, cleaning, packing, moving, cleaning....endless repeat. Practically everything is out of the old house now. There is still so much to do. GRRRRR.

Enjoy the pictures below!

PICTURES
slideshow

News -----

2010-07-04T18:12:00.001-04:00

My son is with his mom in NC for the summer. He called last week with this dilemma...an abbreviated version of the conversation follows:

Brandon: "Dad, tell my mom to let me pick the ticks off of me by myself."

Me: "You have a bunch of them?"

Brandon: "Yes, and she wants to check me for more and pull them off."

Me: "Ok. She is your mother you know. Where did you get the ticks?"

Brandon: "Down in the woods by the dried up creek."

Me: "Did you have fun?"

Brandon: "Yes, we had a great time."

Me: "You know if you wear bug spray, it will help keep the ticks off you in the first place."

Brandon: "I know Daaaaddddd."

(Nice to see things never change)

Me: "Well, I think that you should have no problem pulling them off yourself, but there are places you can't see and your mom is going to have to check those. It is a good compromise and one I think you are going to have to submit to so start thinking about it."

Me: "Ok, let me talk to your mom."

Me: " I think he is old enough to pull the ticks himself. He does it here with no problem. I told him that there are places that he can't see/get to, and that he should let you check those places, as embarrassing as it may be. It is a good compromise and you shouldn't have any problem with him submitting."

His Mom: "Thank you"

The next night I called to see how it all went.

Brandon: "Well we got the ticks off and my mom won't let me go in the woods anymore."

Me: "Ok, did you let your mom check you for more ticks?"

(he responded MOSTLY jokingly...)
Brandon: "Yes. I told her that I hope she gets Alzheimer's and that memory is the first to go."

On another front, another long term relationship has come and gone, or maybe it has gone through a metamorphosis. More on that soon.

Summer....

2010-06-24T23:59:00.000-04:00

Is in full swing.

New job is in full swing.

Looking for new house is in full swing.

Volleyball is in full swing.

Softball is wrapping up...and I'm looking for a soccer league.

It has been sweltering hot here, we happen to have both heat and humidity. The beach can make it tolerable though.

My piano lesson book happens to have some good Irish music in it. I've been playing it. Found Auld Lang Syne a few chapters ahead, but I didn't have any problem playing that at all. :-)

Went to see Sister Hazel at the beach tonight. Always a good time. I wish they would play more from their Absolutely album, but I also have a feeling that most of the songs there are too emotional for that type of scene. However, they did play "This Kind of Love". It is a piano song and one of my favorites. They mentioned they had the sheet music for sale...so I bought it at the exorbitant price there... I don't know any of the band members names, and I wouldn't know any of these people if I met them on the street, but I ran into some recent new friends, Stacey and Marissa, and they were standing in line to get their picture taken and shirt signed by the lead singer. So I got in line with them figuring it would be neat to get my sheet music signed...and I got a picture below. Stacey and Marissa are below that...

Books and adventures...

2010-06-02T13:06:00.001-04:00

Just to let you know...SGG LOVED the book I made her for her birthday. Basically it was this blog from all of 2009, with all the pictures we took in 2009. She kept saying that she wanted to get a bunch of the pictures printed and put into an album, so that is essentially what I did. The book really turned out amazing. The surprising thing is that the three boys seem to like it more than anyone! They are always flipping through it.

It appears that the book has made some enemies for me though. I have lost nearly every male friend I have. The conversations usually go something like this....

Girlfriend of SGG: "So, what did Mike get you for your birthday?"
SGG: "He wrote a book for me. He wrote about all the things we did in 2009 and put in all the pictures. It is a huge coffee table type book."
Girlfriend of SGG: "Wow! That is amazing!"
Significant other of Girlfriend of SGG: "You SUCK dude. It is guys like you that make the rest of us look bad."

I'm really not kidding about that.

My son has joined the Boy Scouts and is involved with a really active troop. In the last month he has been on two weekend trips and has really had a great time. One of those was a two night camp out with several hikes that SGG and I went out to as well. It was a great weekend of hiking and fun for all. This was over Mother's day weekend...Both hikes are fairly easy and offer great scenic views.

My son also had his 13th birthday this past month! Five more years. :-) We had a great Pizza party for him and one of his favorite pizza places where they also have free video games. He got to have a very special ice cream cake from Cold Stone Creamery as well. He gets two parties every year, one with me and one with his mom and both were great this year.

SGG and I went on a short kayak trip Sunday morning since all the kids were gone this past weekend. In addition to a lot of cool birds we happened to startle and were startled by a mother deer and her fawn. The fawn was so small that it didn't look like it was more than a day or two old. It had a hard time getting out of the mud it was in, and it's mother LEFT it. The little deer was left bleating out for it's mother as it had no idea where she went. Not wanting to be a part of some comical news story about a couple being attacked by a deer, we left rather quickly.

So another school year is closing out. Two more weeks and the kids all leave for at least most of the summer. :-)

Beach volleyball is starting again and softball has already been in swing.

Step by Step...

2010-05-16T10:50:00.000-04:00

Not every step is a step in the right direction.

Not everything broken can be fixed or patched.

Sometimes you have to let go in order to keep moving forward.

Learn from past mistakes and find a way to avoid them in the future.

Pain and problems are persistent, but so is joy, hope, and happiness.

On May 7th my son had a major meltdown at his daycare provider. Probably one of the worst ever. Step by Step, Tear by Tear, we get through it. We talk about people, their reactions and perceptions, his reactions and perceptions, and try to set the clues and actions that can be considered in the future...he knows the conversations and finishes my sentences for me. He knows what I'm going to say and why. He is remorseful, but we both know that the next time it happens he may still not be able to change course.

Stress at my current job hit an all-time high recently, and a conversation with a manager convinced me that this was the end of the line...no more solutions possible. I build various philosophical sayings based on situations with my job...it helps me to remember the obstacles and the paths around them. Apathy never goes unpunished. Until you forget what you think you know and what you think is possible you will never know what is truly attainable. Don't believe everything you think. You can't fill a full cup.

On June 1st I start a new job. So on to new obstacles and challenges, and hopefully less stress.

Interesting new scam....or maybe not new...through services like Craigslist

2010-04-27T19:07:00.000-04:00

Here's the deal. I'm out of the country, visiting Nigeria on urgent business. I can't be there to have you sign a lease, but I need a renter right away. You send me the first months rent, $800, to my address in Nigeria and I'll send you the keys to the house. When I get back, we can sign the lease.

This is a bit of a new twist on a classic scam.

I was talking to a real estate agent today and this is what he told me. Sounds crazy right? But he gets calls about his properties all the time from people that saw an add on Craigslist for a property at about half the going rent. They drive by to look at the house and then see his sign. They call the agent/property manager, fortunately, and not the number or email in the Craigslist add. They've been duped, almost. Some are not so lucky.

The Internet is not nearly as safe as you think it might be.

A Blurb in the Life of a Single Father...

2010-04-26T17:58:00.001-04:00

At risk of SGG seeing this before she gets back from Sacramento, since I am apparently in a writing mood, I published the 2009 posts of this blog, and all my favorite photos from 2009, into a book on Blurb. I called the book "Life, Laughter, Love, and Lunacy in 2009". Right now each of those words feel redundant as if they are all the same all rolled together. The book is 234 or so pages long. SGG doesn't know I actually published it yet. My son was amazed at it and loves it. He thinks SGG is going to flip over it. I hope so. It was a lot of work.

I like it so much that I think I may do the same with the rest of the blog and pictures. I got the largest version of the book and it turned out fantastic.

SHHHH! Don't tell SGG! It is a secret. It is for her Birthday.

Spring is in the air....

2010-04-26T17:47:00.000-04:00

....and up my nose, all over the house, the blue car is now yellow and the yellow one is more yellow...so on and so forth. The back yard needed major work so Brandon and I tackled that Saturday. I feel like dirt and pollen is still caked in all my air ways. Were the water warm enough, I would have headed straight to the beach to get cleaned up.

Sunday, today, is brisk with blue skies and no humidity. It reminds me of Monterey, California...and absolutely no chance of fog.

I am going to jump around for a bit here...so hang on.

My son made 1 A and 4 Bs for his fourth straight Honor Roll report card. :-) All indications are he will do even better this last quarter.

We had an IEP eligibility meeting a few weeks ago. They changed his IEP from Emotionally Disturbed (ED) to Asperger's. This is a good thing. All the faculty agreed that Brandon was doing incredibly well. It was in fact the first time that I had met any of his teachers this year....which is a welcome change as I usually know them all pretty well by the end of the first week of school. Brandon will be going back into the AVID program next year too! He is VERY excited about that.

I've been working on the Atkin's Diet and exercising more and more. I feel great and there are some areas I can't believe the difference in. I like to play sports and one of the first things I noticed was how much easier it is to sprint in softball. Another thing is jumping in basketball. My legs feel like they used to. I love the Body For Life workout and right now the diet and exercise is just what I need.

I'm feeling sort of Kindle-y all over. After hearing from a couple of friends first hand about the Kindle, I finally got one. After reading the manual, and yes I always read manuals (manuals help me understand how I can put the product to use in ways that weren't imagined by the maker), I grabbed several classics that I always intended to read and Isaac Asimov's "Foundation". Rather interesting to be reading that for the first time in 2010 on electronic ink and electronic paper, i.e. Kindle.

Sad as it is...it has taken me two weeks to complete this post.

Volleyball is just about here again and I can't wait for that...because that means summer is here again.

Happy Pi Day!

2010-03-14T12:10:00.000-04:00

3.14 and then some.....an infinite decimal with no repeating patterns that we know of yet. The ratio of the circumference of a circle to the diameter. At least that is what the paper says.

I went snowboarding with some friends from work on Tuesday of this past week. It was amazing. 64 Degrees, slushy snow (good for snowboards), and no lines. While we went all over, we spent most of our time in the terrain park doing jumps and things. One of the best snowboarding days ever...and one of only a hand full of times that I've been with more than one person.

The weather magically went from being nearly or below freezing every night and highs averaging 45 during the day (for over two months) to being about 50 degrees in the morning and up to 70 or so during the day. EVERYONE (SGG and three kids) is a lot happier. :-)

Happy Fat needs to go...and it has. I had a friend tell me once that during the first year of a relationship both participants gain 10 lbs of "happy fat". You go out to eat a lot, etc. Due to one injury or another, sickness, etc my exercising hasn't been as consistent as it needs to be. In January I read this about visceral fat. That moment I started the Atkins diet. The weight has been consistent in coming off, but I haven't been as consistent with my exercising. A lot of stress at work isn't helping my moods and motivation when I get home either.

I have been doing much better with piano practice and lessons though.

I have a huge drive and desire to learn additional languages. I don't know why. I took three years of German in high school and I enjoy reading and speaking it when I can. For some reason, reading it is no problem, listening and speaking is a problem. I started working on Spanish a few years ago when I was going to Mexico. I need to get back to that. I also want to learn Japanese, Chinese, and French. Really, I just want to be able to understand a little of the structure of the language, and be able to hold a simple "Hello, how are you, how much, where are the bathrooms, I don't understand, Excuse me, I'm sorry, thank you, you are welcome," etc type of conversation. I doubt I'll ever be fluent, but give me a little bit of the code and I can unravel a lot more when exposed. I've thought about spending a month at home where my son and I learn and talk as much of a certain language each month, and rotate through. Saying "Guten Morgan", "Wie Gehts", "Aufwiedersehen", "Wo ist es?" "Wie viehl?" "Guten abent" "Schlaf gut" "Es ist sehr gut" "ich habe hunger" "ich habe durst" "Ich weiss" "Du weist es nicht". The last two being the bulk of conversation between my son and I lately..."I know" "You do not know". SGG laughs hysterically whenever I try to pronounce anything French. :-)

The Lighthouse....

2010-02-28T19:58:00.000-05:00

SGG and I were both childless Sunday morning. We had a nice breakfast at IHOP and then headed to the north end of VA Beach for hike. We hiked out to Fort Story/Cape Henry and up the Old Cape Henry Lighthouse. It was a beautiful day and I wish I had brought one of my real cameras. All I had with me was my droid.

After going up and down the lighthouse, we walked on the beach back to the car. Along the way we found a treasure trove of shells.

All the way around it was a great hike and a great day. We still can't believe we found so many shells.

A very nice end to a bit of a hectic weekend.

PHOTOS

Out of the mouths of teens....

2010-02-26T06:05:00.002-05:00

Comes, amongst a host of other things, drama. While mine is not quite yet a true teen....he is close enough.

It is fun to watch as his world views change. He is gathering information here and there and applying it. He makes conclusive judgments about this world and the rest of us in it. He is certainly passionate about his views and willing, unfortunately, to defend them. Often his timing for discussion and the subject is off, which makes him a little more frustrated and gets him into trouble.

His most oft uttered embittered war cry is "You never listen to me!" I hear this several times each day. The reality is that I have heard, processed, understood, and subsequently disagreed with his premise and evaluation of whatever he is talking about. What he is really trying to say is that he is correct, I am wrong, and because I didn't agree with him that I must not have been listening.

Sometimes I don't have the time or energy to explain why I say no to some of his requests. The other day this happened again and he became very angry that I wouldn't let him go somewhere and I wouldn't take the 30 minutes needed to explain it and get through HIS process. I understand this, but he also needs to learn some patience and sometimes trust that things will work out in his favor. Escalation will often ensure that things definitely will not workout in his favor.

So I told him to have patience. To which he responded:

"Patience? I don't have patience. I want answers to my questions. I need to have those answers. I have YOUR intelligence! I have my mother's impatience! I have BOTH of your attitudes!"

And being that I couldn't refute any of those statements, I conceded that battle to him....but he still lost the war.

:-)

Droid...

2010-02-23T06:39:00.002-05:00

Not a long post...but my Droid continues to be useful and amazing in many ways.

I have an xbox game called Rally Sport. When you are driving, it has a small window in a corner that shows you what the next turn is. It lets you know how sharp it is, etc. It gives you a couple of seconds to prepare for it.

When driving to WV to go snowboarding the other weekend, we had to leave at night and drive nearly 7 hours to get there...arriving around 2am. The last 2.5 hours of the drive is all switchbacks in Blue Ridge Mountains of VA and WV. Up, down, curves, some ice, some snow, lots of salt and sand. The entire western half of VA was still under snow from the recent snowfalls.

My Droid had loaded the maps and was providing turn by turn directions to get to Timberline, WV. So after midnight, on a road with no lights, my only real indication of what was coming came from the Droid. It showed me what was coming up, how sharp the turn was, where the straight-aways were...essentially I was driving by instrumentation...it was awesome! :-)

To SGG on Valentine's Day....

2010-02-16T20:40:00.000-05:00

The really easy way,
Is to buy a card and token,
But they really can’t convey,
The feelings I want spoken.

I want to take you in my arms,
And pretend that we can dance,
I love the way we turn our hours,
Into adventure and romance.

Just this moment nothing past,
Is all that we really get,
Though I want each one to last,
The best hasn’t got here yet.

Khaki pants and hiking boots,
Hiking cities and the trails,
Love is adventure at its root,
And I hope ours never fails.

So this is what I want to say,
On this snowy Valentines day,
In 40 years we’ll be old and grey,
I will still love you in every way.

New title for the Blog?

2010-02-16T19:52:00.003-05:00

No. But lately it should be more like "A month in the life of a single dad" because that is about how often I post.

Why? Glad you asked, I was going to tell you anyway.

Mostly I have been very frustrated at work and that would have come out here. I say too much at work as it is and so I have been working on new and different ways to release some of that tension. I will certainly maintain that WRITING is probably the most cathartic activity ever. However, I write publicly, not privately, so I refuse to write about it here. It has taken me away from here, and a few other activities I really enjoy and now something really has to change. Something possibly drastic.

Now that I've expertly led you to the edge, I will not let you fall in. Rather anti-climatic but that is as far as it goes.

Now on to other happenings...some good and some bad.

About two days after we got back from the Keys, I got a phone call from one of my aunts that one of my uncles had passed away. For family reasons that I am not all that aware of, I wasn't real close to him, but he was my mom's brother. He is survived by his wife, a brother, and two sisters. He did not have any children. I went down for the funeral and it was good to see the family together without any squabbling. After the funeral we drank, and sang, and there is rumor of some crazy blogger singing and dancing with his son on video...but that can't be substantiated so don't believe anything you hear.

My son has been doing great in school. After two grading periods he is still on the honor roll with one A, three Bs, and a C. His social skills teacher is recommending that he go back into the AVID program and it looks like he may not even need to be in the social skills class next year. I'm still waiting to have an official meeting with the staff about that so keep the fingers crossed. His behavior, attitude, and level of responsibility are markedly improved.

Brandon is also trying out for wrestling. It is the first activity that he has really gone all out for. He didn't pick up a starter position yet, but he is working really hard and I am extremely proud of him and all the work he has been doing.

If by any chance you start to get the impression that things are running smoothly, let me correct that right now. Yes, things are going well, but the boy is becoming a teen. It has only just begun and I'm tired of the attitude. I tell him to put something up and I get "I know Dad, you don't have to keep telling me!" But, when I asked him 15 minutes earlier, he didn't do it, and 15 minutes later he still hasn't done it. He asks me to help him with homework, then laments loudly that I am doing it wrong. Lets be clear about this. I LOVE math, and every time there has been contention over a problem for his short existence, I have been right every time. I know he really doesn't want to be told he is wrong, and he really doesn't want to do any work. Typical teen boy? I think so. Anyone who suggests that he might be like is dad is wrong and will be banned from the blog. Watch me do it. :-)

SGG and I can hardly believe it has been over a year since we met and started dating. We're both struggling with growing boys, job issues, etc, but we really try hard to find time to do things we enjoy. Sometimes it is something small, and sometimes we get to pretend we don't have children anymore! :-) At least for a few days.

So...one of the projects I have been working on is creating a book for her and I. I've imported my blog from the biking incident in December 2008 through the vacation in the Keys ending in January 2010 into Blurb. I'm also importing pictures and doing some editing. I might be finished by March. It is exciting for me, something really new, and challenging. I would really like for it to be around 200 pages, which means it will be a lot of pictures.

A common theme in the past year with SGG is that we love the memories we have already made together. I look back at each post and each picture (and I have the 2500 or so pictures I marked as favorites all over both of our houses) and truly cherish each of those moments, as well as those that you'll never see pictures of here! And I probably won't talk about except in vague/veiled references like this one. :-) Of course, Rachel said sort of the same thing about her mattress, and then went on to not be very vague...

I do have more to write about, but I have to move on to some other things this evening!

The picture above is Brandon in the snow this weekend. :-)

Laughter is the best medicine....

2010-02-15T21:16:00.002-05:00

usually. As I type this, my son is laying in bed with an ice pack on his left eye and two motrin in his belly. A few moments ago he was crying about it all, now he is laughing. What made the difference?

We have had a pretty long weekend and we are both really tired. SGG, my son, and I left Friday evening to go skiing/snowboarding at Timberline Four Seasons Resort in West Virginia. It was looking to be an amazing weekend for it. The past week or so they have had close to 4 or 5 feet of snow dumped up there. For the mid-atlantic it is the best I have ever seen.

Brandon has never really picked up snowboarding, but keeps insisting it is what he wants to do. At 12 years old, and it being a small resort, I figured I'll just let him go by himself. He'll either figure it out or he won't. I've been putting him into snowboard camps and lessons for the last six or so years, and about all he has really wanted to do is eat snow and throw snowballs. I almost didn't take him this time because of it. He still doesn't want to follow protocol, doesn't want to lace his boots up correctly, and half a dozen other things, but he can make it up and down the mountain on his own, chewing his gloves the whole way, and can make his turns. He wants to do it his own way, and though it makes me a bit frustrated, at least he can do it on his own and I can go do my thing.

The first day (Saturday), at the arranged meeting time, we found him in the lodge, in the bathroom, crying and saying he couldn't breathe. He couldn't tell me what was wrong. After getting him dressed back up (still not sure how he got everything off if he was feeling as bad as he said), we got him to the first aid station. The paramedic looked him over, and he was looking just as pathetic as he possibly could. They couldn't find anything wrong, but did finally manage to get out of him that he hit a snow bank and fell on a chunk of ice. They put him on a little bit of oxygen. His nose was stuffed up so they had to put the tubes in his mouth. He would close his lips, suck on the hose, then open his lips and breathe out. I told SGG, and loud enough for Brandon to hear, that he looked like a fish trying to breathe air. Brandon when from pathetic looking to laughing...and wasn't happy about it. A few minutes later he was back to scowling. To show it, he had sucked the tube deeper into his mouth. On either side, the tubes came out and stuck out like whiskers. I then told SGG that he looked like a catfish now and he started laughing again.

I went and got the car to take him up to the house and before you know it he was fine again and playing with the rest of the kids.

He got in a lot more snowboarding on Sunday.

So how does this end with him and an ice pack tonight (Monday)?

I went to put him in bed at 7:30 since we had had a long and tiring weekend. My legs are killing me, and I was sick all weekend to boot. I still might be. He begged me to let him read for a little bit. I did. He is reading "Ender's Game" by Orson Scott Card. One of the best science fiction books ever.

Around 8:30 I tell him lights out. He has to use the bathroom so I let him. He then has this bright idea to run around the house doing something with his lip. I tell him in increasingly irritated tones to get in bed. He runs to the bathroom to admire his lip trick in the mirror. I tell him again to get in bed and he just stands there. I reached in to provide some direction, because I feel at this point the near teen has forgotten where his bed is. He ducked to avoid my grasp and hit his eye brow on the counter. While I want to lecture him on how much better this would have turned out if he had only LISTENED to me in the first place, I instead get a washcloth and wet it down to put on his eye. I know it doesn't help much but usually it starts to make him feel better. I then get him moving toward his room (and his bed) and then returned with an ice pack and some motrin.

He is still crying at this point.

I tell him he can tell his classmates that "They should see the other guy, he had two of these". To which he starts laughing. He then asks, "how bad is it?" I tell him he doesn't want to know, but it will be better tomorrow. I then told him he can tell his friends, "I shouldn't have kissed that girl," and he starts laughing again. He has placed the washcloth over his entire face, including his mouth, with the ice pack on his eye. I tell him to move the wash cloth from his mouth. He says "Why?" I responded, "Do you have to do the opposite of everything I say? (he laughs) I don't want it around your mouth because I don't want to have to explain to your mom tomorrow how you suffocated just because I asked you to move it and you said no." And for some reason he laughs some more.

As I turned out the light, he mentions that this is going to suck tomorrow. I tell him that the good thing is that if he keeps the ice pack on it, it will suck less every minute from now on. To which he laughs again.

Spammanation

2010-01-31T09:33:00.002-05:00

Lately I've been getting some comments with links in them.

Do not click on them. I don't think they are overtly malicious, but I don't have the time to analyze them so I can't say.

It also means I need to set the blog back to requiring a login to comment.

If you want to leave a comment with a link in it, I have contact information in my blogger profile that you can send to me first, otherwise I'm just going to delete it.

:-)

It is important that you NOT trust random links in email or other places. If you think your Anti-Virus product or firewall will protect you, you are wrong.

...and more dreaming...

2010-01-03T22:15:00.001-05:00

12/30/09 Wednesday
Wednesday we had big plans. Snorkel trip to Looe Key from Bahia Honda State Park.

We have a GSI mess kit with an MSR pocket rocket burner that we made coffee and oatmeal with Wednesday morning. The over eating was really getting to us.

We stopped in at Tilden's Scuba Center to rent a full wet suit for SGG. After being there a few days we figured she would need a full suit and I would wear the shorty I brought with me. The people at Tilden's were great.

We then continued on to Bahia Honda to check in for our snorkel trip. Good thing we did, the line to get in was long, and then when we got in we found the trip was canceled due to wind and seas. We immediately turned around and went back to Tilden's to try and get in on their 1:30pm trip. We were in luck, they were going and they had room.

We got our stuff on the boat and talked to the group from Boston and the other from Atlanta. The picture above is from the Sombrero Light.

Our luck didn't hold. The 2-3' seas turned to 3-4' seas. At one point the boat turned sideways to the waves and all of a sudden I was staring into a wall of beautiful blue water. I was almost sure that it wasn't going to crash on me. It did not. The boat easily slid up the wave. They told we couldn't get it, it was too rough. Grrr.

When we got back in we headed back to Bahia Honda, hoping that we could snorkel from the shore there. The waves, temperature, and visibility were all against us there too. When we got out of the water I stepped on a sand spur. Part of it is still in my foot 2 weeks later. I'm working on getting it out though.

After we dried off we went and found another geocache in the park. From there we decided to keep heading south west and go eat in Key West. :-)

We watched a beautiful sunset and moonrise on the Reynolds Street Pier. Then we walked down to the Southernmost Point Buoy that marks the southernmost point in the continental United States. We had our picture taken there of course. There was a line but we sort of bypassed that.

Then we went in search of Duval Street. It wasn't hard to find. If you didn't want to follow the people, you could just listen for levity, or look for lights. We passed a party train full of very happy and friendly people. We were invited on, but there was hardly room. :-)

We explored a small art gallery and spend a lot of time talking to the owner about the various artists. We then made our way to Mangia Mangia. Mangia Mangia is a wonderful pasta cafe. We had a delicious meal. I don't know why we didn't share the entree as has become our custom. There was no way we were going to finish them individually, or later. We didn't have a refrigerator to keep them in for later either.

The people of Key West had some great holiday lights and decorations up too. We got a few pictures of those while we were walking.

We passed by the Southern Keys Cemetery on our trek back to the car. This was interesting as the graves were almost all above ground. Some were stacked on top of each other, several high.

SGG must have been feeling a bit skittish. An orange cat was walking up behind her, and to make sure she wasn't surprised by it, I told her that there was an orange cat coming up to us. She turned to look a nearly let out a full on scream. The cat's nails could be heard digging into the pavement as it raced away. SGG doesn't know why she did that, but it was certainly funny to me. :-)

We headed back to the campground to get some sleep. Honestly, between sleeping bags, the air mattress, and the standard campground noises you would have thought that we weren't sleeping well, but maybe the fresh air is good for us. We slept pretty well nearly every night.

12/31/09 Thursday - New Years Eve!
We got up Thursday morning to head to The Hungry Tarpon for breakfast. We fed the tarpon first. These are huge fish that will come a little way out of the water to get the small bait fish we were offering to them. The Pelicans know what is going on and they will certainly try to steal the fish for themselves. SGG was holding a fish out and a Pelican's beak came through the lattice work and stole it from her. At the same time I was looking down and what looked like a pair of scissors started snapping at the air trying to get the fish I was holding. When we were out of bait we walked over to the restaurant to get some breakfast. It was an amazing meal.

We headed to Key Largo to get on a snorkel trip out there. We booked one on a catamaran. and then walked around the marina until it was time to go. I got some better de-fogger stuff at a dive shop and some desiccant for my underwater camera.

We watched a number of tropical fish make their rounds through the marina too.

We took some pictures of THE African Queen also!

When we got out the to reef, the water was pretty rough again. We got lots of pictures of our two snorkel sites. It was really quite a challenge as the seas were picking up. SGG got a little sea sick and almost didn't go in at the second site. Some of the more exciting fish we saw were a number of Barracuda and a Grouper. The coral was amazing. I also saw the biggest Parrot Fish I have seen yet. The pictures tell this story better than I can so you should watch the slide show below to see it all.

After we got back we shared a Wendy's Frosty on the way back to the campground.

We got cleaned up and then went out to eat and celebrate New Year's Eve. We predictably went back to The Hungry Tarpon. We shared an appetizer, an entree, and desert. It was all truly delicious. We watched the moon rise and just sat and talked under the lights outside on the deck of the restaurant. It was enchanting. They have a non-toxic organic mist that smells faintly of lemons that sprays every once in a while. It is a special formula designed to keep away the no-seeums that can ruin an experience with painful skin bites. We walked around the empty marina for a bit and then headed back to the campground. We were beat. We had decided that the next morning we would eat breakfast there again and then rent a dual kayak to paddle through the mangrove tunnels and potentially see sharks, fish, crocodiles, and more.

We slept soundly until midnight. Noise makers, fireworks, and people shouting lasted for almost an hour before it all finally died down and everyone went to sleep. Some people just kept partying though.

01/01/10 - New Years Day! The trip home.
At around 6am we got up to pack up everything and get ready for the journey home. We got to The Hungry Tarpon around 8am to eat before heading out on the kayak. We had fried mahi mahi, eggs, grits, and toast. You may be finally getting the point that we really LOVED the food here.

At 9am the kayak place opened and we were the first to get our boat and paddles. We headed out through the mangrove tunnels and west to the other end of Matecumbe key. The tunnels were amazing to paddle through. When we got to the west side we found an American Crocodile with the help of some other kayakers. Then we paddled north a bit and went through some tunnels to head back east. In those tunnels we saw some small sharks. I explained to SGG that the white stuff on the leaves we passed was bird poop. She didn't believe me at first. SGG was the spotter, navigator, and photographer on this trip. It wasn't as exciting as we had hoped, but it was fun and interesting anyway. It was a beautiful end to the trip.

Once I got changed, because a passing motorboat swamped us a little, we headed back to Ft. Lauderdale. The trip back was uneventful, and the Droid did it's job admirably with it's turn by turn directions. We were a little early for the flight out, but we kept busy getting caught up on news and gossip. :-) An Italian couple across from us at the airport had a little boy that couldn't speak any English. That didn't stop him from communicating and playing with an American boy about his age. It was really fun to watch all of them.

It was also impressive how many people from other countries we ran into. Languages and dialects from all over the world. Contrary to what you may think about South Florida, there really wasn't that many Spanish speaking people about either. If you speak a second language, I highly encourage you to brush up on it before you go. You may find it more useful than you think.

Really it was an enchanting time in an enchanting place with an enchanting person. All of which have woven themselves into my heart, mind, and soul. If you go, I hope you experience the same. You won't want to leave, I certainly didn't.

Flying into Newport News, it was snowing. We were still wearing shorts. It has been cold ever since. It was brutal at first but I'm getting used to it again. I miss the 80 degree days in the Keys.

All the pictures from the Keys are here.
Slideshows from the last couple days below:

Dreaming of Warm Blue Waters....

2010-01-03T09:23:00.002-05:00

So SGG and I have been planning a vacation. We had an idea over the summer about going somewhere while the kids were with their respective biological parents over the Christmas break. We picked the Florida Keys. We have both been here before but we haven't really been able to see and do the things we really wanted to do. This time we did. While some other fantastic blogs were talking about vacations with kids...we were looking forward to some serious adventures without kids.

12/28/09 Monday
We had a 5:45 am flight. I'm not saying we barely got there in time, but we weren't early. We almost didn't have a seat in our connecting flight in Atlanta but that worked out fine. Either way we weren't too stressed. We were happy just to be in route.

When we got to Ft. Lauderdale, things went smoothly getting our luggage (A giant duffel bag and a giant backpack), and getting the car. I asked for economy/small, but figured I would get a four dour import. They gave us a Mustang. I really didn't like it. Pretty to look at, but a pain to see out of to drive. I hooked up my Droid, and said "Navigate to Bahia Honda Key, Florida", and drove out of the garage.

We didn't even have a place to stay. We were just going to look around and call some campgrounds on the way. When we got down there we found out that this is considered the busy week of their year! We did find a campground with an opening for the week at Fiesta Key Resort. It is a nice campground at mile marker 70. The facilities were good, but we were only there to sleep and in that regard it was great. Everyone around us was very friendly and fun to talk to.

We had some differing opinions on getting the air matress blown up, and all we had was a pump that hooked to a car outlet. After two false starts we compromised, picked up the tent with the mattress in it, brought it to the car, and then carried it back. The tent doesn't weight but 2 pounds so that was easy.

We really tied the tent down good, and good thing because the wind came that evening and really tried to blow everything away. That is another way of saying that it also got really cold (well, mid 50's). The tent both kept us warm and sheltered from the wind. Backpacking classes back in the spring really paid off. :-)

We walked around the campground, and settled in to watch the sunset, which was gorgeous.

The only thing left to do for the evening was go find a place to eat. SGG looked through her guides and we decided on the Barracuda Grill on Marathon Key. It was a great choice. The food and service were magnificent. They also confirmed two things for us. It was their busiest week, and the temps were going to be a bit cooler than normal.

12/28/09 Tuesday
In the morning we began our adventure in earnest. We went to breakfast at Little Italy on Long Key. The service and the food was good here and it was a good start to the day. We then looked up and did a geocache on Long Key. There is a very well hidden local trail that will take you through the mangroves and buttonwoods, explaining exactly what these are along the way. After that we headed to Bahia Honda Key State Park.

On the way there we picked up a few more supplies at the local K-mart. We found a nice double action hand pump for air mattresses and some other necessities.

We spent a big part of the day at Bahia Honda. We booked a snorkel trip out of here for Looe Key the next day, and then proceeded to explore the park. We went walking through the water along the beach, we found some iguanas here and there, and lots of coral and plants washed up along the shore. Bahia Honda is a beautiful spot with some sheltered coves that are good for swimming, snorkeling, and sun bathing. We did a geocache on Bahia Honda (with the Droid), and then headed back to the campground.

After getting cleaned up, we headed back out for dinner. When I was looking up geocaches in the morning, I found this one called the Hungry Tarpon. They mention the marina and the restaurant in the cache description. As it was dinner, we didn't look for the cache, but I will tell you that you will have a hard time finding better food anywhere on this planet. Chef Joseph at the restaurant 'The Hungry Tarpon' at Robbie's Marina is AMAZING. He is a French Chef that has been cooking in the Caribbean for a long time. He came to The Hungry Tarpon April 2009. SGG and I both agree that you can't get better food in the Keys, or maybe anywhere. We had Conch Fritters to start, then SGG got the special shrimp and goat cheese pizza, while I got 'Buck Starks Native Recipe' (Snapper). We had no room for dessert but we weren't worried. We knew we would be back, and with bigger appetites. I have often thought that my dream vacation would be to go to Italy or France and eat, but I now I'll just dream about going back to Matecumbe Key and eating at the Hungry Tarpon. Seriously, I am not kidding.

Have to finish the next couple of days tomorrow. Here are some pictures and the slide shows from these days though....

Pics
More Pics

So much to write and so little time.....

2009-12-26T12:00:00.000-05:00

A year ago my son and I got Guitar Hero World Tour for Christmas. We had a great time playing the game and trying to surmount the challenges it presented. It also exposed both of us to new music and I purchased quite a bit because of the game. One group in particular I have really fallen for is Paramore. There is something about the way they put their music together that REALLY appeals to me. They may have a way to go on their lyrics, but their music and vocals are the best out there in my opinion. What makes this striking really is that they are practically teenagers. I can't imagine what it must be like to be doing something you love as a young person, to have your music and visage in one of the most popular video games of the year, and to be opening for acts in concerts that in my opinion they should be the headliners for. I went to see No Doubt only because Paramore was opening for them. Gwen Stefani and crew are a great group, but I really can't wait to see how Paramore grows and matures.

About the time I heard Paramore was coming back in concert in October as a headliner, their tickets had already been sold out for over a month. Their latest album, "Brand New Eyes" is fantastic through and through and has some great songs where they are working on expanding their style. I also created a channel in Pandora for Paramore and it instantly generated more music that is very similar in style which also generated more music purchasing. I refuse to buy music from iTunes anymore. While the client is good and easy to use, I have other devices I like to play music on and iTunes DRM doesn't work there. In general, Amazon MP3 is very easy to use and the music purchased there works on everything (Except Nintendo DSI which doesn't play mp3s at all).

Hallelujah - by Paramore:

So, I haven't just been listening to Paramore all this time.

Brandon is doing great in school. He was making all A's through most of the first nine weeks, but started slacking towards the end and finished with straight B's (But very high B's that would have been A's in my time). For the first time since he has been in school, I haven't had to go to a parent teacher conference. He is doing THAT well. There hasn't been a year since he was four years old where I didn't have to go in and talk to school staff about his very special challenges. Last year, after the first week, I was in a conference with 9 staff members that was VERY contentious. In the end we were able to work together to craft a plan that would put Brandon on a track to succeed, and he did, finishing the year on the Honor Roll.

The second nine weeks here have been a little more challenging and we had a rather large setback. His mom started talking to him about coming to live with her next year. She told him she works at a small christian school where he could be at school with her everyday, he would be with his friends there, her dogs, etc. She did not talk to me about it before hand, and she left it up to him to tell me (which took an awful lot of courage on his part).

The problem this creates is that now he is in the middle, a position NO CHILD should ever be in. Parents, or some other adult, should make those decisions. No child should ever be put in a position where they need to choose between one parent or another. A child, even a teenager, is not capable of making sound decisions in this regard.

I had to have a long talk with his mom. Brandon has been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome. Getting him to an emotionally stable point where he has the support, environment, and resources to succeed in a normal classroom has taken 8 solid years of work. His mom has not participated in the day to day struggles, the wrestling with mental health professionals, the battles with schools over his needs, or the financial burden that goes along with all the above. Now she sees a flourishing child, and is in a financially stable position for the first time ever, and she tells him how much better it will be there with her.

I work with many families that struggle with Asperger's children. Private schools, with the exception of those dedicated to Asperger's, don't have the resources to deal effectively with special needs children. Large school districts with huge tax bases like Virginia Beach struggle with it, but the resources are there. It isn't easy as they don't really want to part with the money or resources, but it is a battle that can be won. Someone that doesn't have the resolve to send money monthly to pay for half a piano lesson certainly doesn't have the fortitude to go to the mat and fight for her son, much less the resources to pay the tens of thousands of dollars and literally thousands of hours out of work to get the help her son needs. I have built networks of friends and professionals here that understand Brandon, and can channel me to the resources I need when I need them. He spends his long breaks with his mom, and spends the summer with her. I have worked long and hard to ensure he doesn't have to know why his mom and I divorced or why he stays with me. I only want him to have a great relationship with his mom because the other stuff really doesn't matter. He should never have to know, and just about everything he will eventually figure out as he gets older, but he certainly isn't ready to know it now or be the rope in some sort of ill conceived tug of war.

On to lighter subjects....

Brandon and I have been practicing for a Christmas piano recital at a local mall. We performed last Saturday in the food court at Pembroke Mall in Virginia Beach. He did fantastic. It was my first recital ever and I was overly nervous. I can easily get up and talk all day to security and network experts in a large auditorium for a televised presentation, but ask me to play a piano to a group of people eating lunch and I fall apart! Brandon played two pieces first, and then he and I played "French Carol" with him playing Secundo and me playing Primo. Then I went on to play three pieces by myself. So time I would normally be writing or doing other things has been spent playing the piano.

At the beginning of November Verizon released the Motorola Droid cell phone. While I love gadgets, I am rarely first in line to get any of them. Usually it is several months or even years behind. I have been hearing about iPhone users rave about their iPhones for some time, but didn't quite get what they were raving about. Now I do. I was first in line to get a Droid and I have not been disappointed. I love everything about this phone, but it is so much more than a phone. Like iPhone users already know, it is a mobile computing platform that makes so much more sense than a laptop most of the time. It can't replace a computer, but there are so many situations when a computer just isn't needed. I can talk to this thing, navigate, do geocaches, buy stuff, find movies, and SO much more. Text to speech, speech to text, barcode scanning, and on and on.

I have told my son that he should always smile when people take pictures and he should be careful what he does because he never knows when someone may post the picture, or write about an event. Yesterday was one of those moments.

We have the yard that collects the leaves of the whole neighborhood. We had to rake the leaves Thursday December 24. HAD TO. It has been one of the WETTEST years on record EVER here. It rains almost every day, and the days it doesn't rain, it makes up for on the days it does. We had about two dry days in a row and we had to move.

If I don't accomplish anything else with this child, he will be able to rake a yard without complaining by the time he is 18. He had a meltdown at first, then finally realized that the consequences weren't worth the tantrum. He certainly can complain a lot though. We were about halfway done when he was just about in tears, perceived pain wracked his face, eyes were rolling, head swiveling in imagined vertigo...he was obviously about to die. He cried out in collapse and succumbed to the cold, wailing that his hands were cold. It was a award winning performance. I told him to keep moving and his hands would be fine. He had gloves on, and a heavy coat. Like a banshee, he kept whining about how cold his hands were.

I finally asked him if his mouth was cold. He said "No." I said, "That's because it is moving. You should learn sign language, that way you can complain with your hands and they won't be so cold." It was so gratifying and funny to see the obvious confliction deep within his soul as he struggled to keep his suffering act going and not just bust up laughing. It was a struggle he lost by the way. It is actually my favorite way to break down his protests. I try to find some way to make him laugh. It instantly breaks the tension and then all of a sudden things don't seem so overwhelming. It works every time. After all, life just doesn't have to be that serious does it?

SGG and I have been keeping busy, trying to find date time without the children here and there, but also finding things they all enjoy. We have been planning something very special for just her and I, but more on that at a later time! It is so hard, but I feel like right now I have a good balance between the four corners of my little world. SGG, my son, my work, and myself. There are things that come up here and there that threaten to disrupt, but my whack-a-mole skills are improving.

We had a great Thanksgiving and a great Christmas. Below are some pictures from a few of the things we have been doing.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and will have a great New Year, A Bright Future, an Exception-al holiday, Seeking what warms you even with your Daily Plate of Crazy, with Different Kind of People, Creative-Types looking at each day, where ever your Depots are, in Gray or colorful Fortresses, Just on a Journey or a Mama bloggin, a Morgan or a Musing, Oh the Joys of the holidays and friends where ever they are, Ramblings from a Parent, Rants, Robin, Single Parenthoods, Summer Roses, Daily Gripes, Hygiene is SO IMPORTANT, Hot Tub Journey's, or even Texas Sized Quests, Sunnybrook Rants, or long lost Theaters. Thank you all for sharing your thoughts and experiences over the past year (and years).

Storm in November:

Geocache in SGG's neighborhood...we saw a Bald Eagle on this short hike too...

How my son sees me...one of the first things he did with his DSi last year:

SGG and I wandering through the Blue Ridge Mountains on our way to Blacksburg, VA for a rare weekend without children. This is a section of the Appalachian Trail in the mountains:
and another from the trail:
Hockey game, just me and all three boys (and a whole cub scout troop):

Muppets Bohemian Rhapsoday....

2009-11-24T17:11:00.001-05:00

Saw this at Geek Dad today at Wired.com...had to pass it on.

Just wondering...

2009-11-02T19:12:00.002-05:00

...if anyone out there has used the Shutterfly or Photoworks sites to create a Photobook or Calendar? I just created a calendar with Shutterfly and should have it by the end of the week. A friend just gave me the idea of doing a photobook, but I don't know what service she used. I was looking at these two because Picasa references both of them when you go to order prints and things. I really like the idea of having a hard cover printed book with captions and paragraphs talking about each set of pictures...sounds sort of like my blog really...so if anyone has any suggestions or advice I would appreciate it.

Well....I tried...

2009-11-01T20:13:00.003-05:00

To be an XKCD stick figure for Halloween...but it didn't turn out so well. I couldn't find the stuff I needed second hand (and frankly I started late because I didn't get the idea until this past week). So, buying new stuff and resorting to electrical tape instead of a Sharpie didn't get too far. You can see the amusing result below.

So Halloween was great fun for the kids and adults. The kids made out like bandits. My son now has enough candy to last until next year.

My brother came up for the weekend and I got to spend some time with him on Saturday in the morning and during the day. We went out to go surfing and skim boarding first thing. I brought my son along too. The waves were nice even if the water was cold. It was the first time I had worn a wet suit surfing. I only have my scuba wet suit and I quickly learned a few things.

First, you don't notice the water temperature when you are trying to paddle out through a nice set. You only notice that any headway you made is quickly erased.

Second, you can't paddle in a wet suit (3/5) like you do without one. It is a LOT harder. I was still inside the break and just couldn't paddle anymore. So surfing turned into something that was more like a prolonged drowning. I finally gave up and just went back in. Next time I'll wear the spring suit, or get something more designed for surfing.

As if that wasn't embarrasing enough, I decided to do some skim boarding too. Really it was my brother showing my son how to do, which he picked up incredibly quickly. I mostly watched. When they got tired, they would hand the board to me and get a few minutes of good laughs. Here is some necessary information to be successful at skim boarding. First, you can go too slow. You need a bit of speed, which requires a bit of coordination because you have to jump onto something that is moving and not quite stable. After you get some speed you throw the board down, flat, and a little ahead of you. On windy days this is challenging. For my brother and I, more so because when he and I get together near water, the winds are ALWAYS 25+ knots. My brother's wife went rollerblading on the board walk, but she made it back in time to get some good laughs at my expense. We all had a lot of fun.

After that we picked up my girlfriend and her children to go to my favorite sushi place. It is simply the best sushi anywhere ever.

More pictures from Halloween:
Picures

I practically stepped on this....

2009-10-24T15:18:00.004-04:00

Before I realized what it was. I was tracking three boys and SGG at the edge of the woods when my peripheral vision caught something unusual just below my foot and I extended my stride just a hair.

Cottonmouth, Water Moccasin, whatever you want to call them, it is a poisonous snake. There are more pictures, and a video below. It is near the end of October and these guys are normally near dormant this time of year, but it is a warm 80+ degree day here today. It wasn't very interested in me, and it wasn't able to move very fast. I got the boys and SGG over to have a look, from a safe distance, and we let the snake keep going on it's way. It seems like I see one every October.

We were out doing a geocache and moving a travel bug along. I've been wanting to get to this cache for a while. It is in a park I know very well, but a section I've never really been to before. SGG and I took my son and two of my neighbor's boys. It was fun, but we were under a time constraint....which we kind of busted. The cache was very cool, but fairly difficult to get to since there are no real "trails" leading there. There were a lot of thorns and my calves are scratched up pretty good.

It has been two years since the last big acorn harvest, but they are falling like rain drops here now. All day and all night...***SMACK***thud***thud***thud***roll***roll***swish. They hit the roof, bounce, roll, and sail into the grass or drive way. I park the car away from the house to keep the acorns from collecting under the windshield wipers.

:-)

EDITED to add:
SGG and I now believe this is a copperhead. It would be the biggest one I've seen up close if it is. The head shape, color, and body markings are closer to a copperhead than a water moccasin. If you look at pictures of both, you can begin to see why they are hard to tell apart.

Cool Snake and Cache Photos
Slideshow
And here are the pictures in a slide show below (just smaller):

Home runs and things

2009-10-22T21:05:00.004-04:00

Ok, home runs? Yes.

Home runs are things like a home cooked meal for cheap, that everyone loves, and only really need pan, maybe a pot.

I made the Cheatin' Chicken Cacciatore last Friday. If you haven't made the Chicken a la Popeye or this, you really don't know what you are missing. Quick, delicious, easy, inexpensive. It doesn't get better than that. A homerun, out of the park. How good was the chicken cacciatore? My son loved it, and SGG ate it even though it had mushrooms in it. She HATES mushrooms.

Things have been kind of busy lately. I've been working on some picture and video projects at home. My son had the flu three days last week. I had a 10' rule in effect. He couldn't get closer than 10' from me. Not a problem. I think he was in bed the whole time.

Brandon also had straight A's on his progress report. He really seems to be focused on doing well in school. Miracles never cease.

Work has been busy, but not stressful. Mostly I am back to doing what I love full time.

I play spring and fall softball. I bought a new bat in May, it lasted two nights. I sent it back. They sent me a warranty replacement bat. I used it two night, it broke, I sent it back. They weren't too keen on sending me another, but they did. I used it tonight for the first time. I hope it lasts longer than the others. I don't do anything hinky, I just hit softballs. I like the bat, and I hit a lot of home runs with it, but I don't think I'll buy another one of that brand.

Softball tonight had an interesting ending. Let me explain about a walk off home run. If you are the home team, in the last inning, and are either tied or losing when you get up to bat and you hit a home run, it is a walk off home run. It means you hit and walk off the field, the game is over, you win. :-) It doesn't happen too often, but it does happen. I haven't ever hit one, but I have wanted to.

I hit a walk off home run tonight. And we lost the game. Aweso...what? LOST? So, already, it doesn't really match the definition of a walk off home run...but I am going to claim it anyway. :-) What happened tonight was that we only had nine players. I was the ninth batter. We are supposed to have ten players, so after the ninth batter it is an automatic out. We had two outs already, so after me the game was over anyway. We were down by 4 runs. Only 1 runner was on. I hit a home run, and walked off, losing the game by two runs. :-)

Like the movie Tin Cup where "everyone will remember the 12", everyone tonight will remember the walk-off home run.....LOSS. :-)

Just thinking outside of the box a bit here about regulating...anything....

2009-10-13T15:47:00.002-04:00

Why regulate healthcare? Government involvement is already one of the reasons premiums and costs are so high.

I want to propose a different tact. There is an industry untouched by government regulation, and for one specific reason to follow is likely to remain untouched. Let's consider one of the reasons insurance is so high, health care is so expensive, and why we have so many interesting reminders on signs around us all the time. Lawsuits...and more specifically, Lawyers.

Just think about it. What if private law practices were limited to criminal defense? All other lawyers had to be government civilians, especially on civil suit cases. What if these attorney's were not allowed a cut of the final judgment or settlement?

Just think about it.

Now remember, most members of Congress, State Governments, and City Governments were at one time Lawyers...You think this will get anywhere?

Not until we get more involved.

Iris, Kajeet, and more Popeye....

2009-10-12T20:33:00.002-04:00

So, to catch up a bit. This weekend our neighbor's dog figured out how to will through the fence. While I was investigating the dog and the fence I saw this purple flower in a spot I didn't know there were flowers. My neighbor says it is a bearded iris.

I fixed the chicken a la popeye for SGG this weekend. How good was it? She asked if she could lick the plate. My son keeps asking for the chicken a la popeye now. Big Little Wolf said she has a pasta dish up there now too. One pan and one pot. :-)

Kajeet is a phone service for kids. I read about it here last week. I had been looking at phones and plans for my son, and I have come to HATE phone companies. Hidden fees, contracts, "features", etc. You could spend days trying to put all of it together to get to some bottom line price and still not get there. To me, Kajeet was simple. Parental controls on all phones, gps locator if you want it (and I do), and no contract. I can terminate my son's access at any moment, or add money and things to it. Compared to what I was looking at through Verizon and Sprint, this was easy and had all the right stuff. :-)

MMMMMMMMM.....

2009-09-30T20:45:00.004-04:00

Yesterday my son went on a field trip to the University of Richmond and then to the Virginia State Fair. What was the highlight of the trip? Bull riding at the State Fair. More specifically, he rode the mechanical bull. Twice even. He said that they were having some sort of contest, if you stayed on for 8 seconds you win $200. I mentioned that I couldn't see them allowing him to ride without a consenting adult. He said he had to sign a few forms. Seriously? I still haven't asked he teachers about it though. He said he was on both times for just over 7.9 seconds. That I do believe.

This morning he was complaining about his chest hurting. You think?

I was too tired to care. Something woke me up after about 3 hours of sleep and I couldn't go back. The only hour of sleep I got after that was the hour the alarm went off before I got up. I was so tired that I went running and everything was on inside out. I didn't notice until I took it off to get a shower. I bent over to smell something in a cup and then wandered about for five minutes trying to find where the smell was coming from before figuring out something from the cup was on my nose. I thought I pulled out my black suit today, but it was the navy blue one. Fortunately the shirt and tie almost matched because I wasn't changing it.

It wasn't shaping up to be a good day. It turned out fine though...at least at 9pm EDT it is fine.

I made this concoction tonight. It was AMAZINGLY delicious. Chicken ala popeye. My only begotten son went back for seconds. Many thanks go to Big Little Wolf for mentioning it in the comments. You really can do it all in one pan if you don't do the potatoes.

Edited to add:
You HAVE to do the potatoes though. It is worth cleaning the extra pan.

It's just dinner...

2009-09-28T17:54:00.003-04:00

And no it isn't a dating site...or a site at all...it's just my dinner tonight.

It was inspired by dinner last night at the Mexican place after the spider-tunnel-cache. I got a spinach enchilada and they made sure the spinach was thoroughly cooked. I am assuming to ensure the was no chance of any bacteria surviving...and I can tell you it did not. It wasn't bad at all, just really well done.

I got to thinking this morning that I could do that just a little bit better. I had refried beans and spinach tortillas in the house. I went to the store and got a couple of bags of spinach and a Mexican cheese combo bag (among a number of other items).

I heated up the refried beans in the microwave and heated a pan with some oil. I put in the spinach with a lot of garlic and some bits of an orange. My neighbor calls it kinky spinach, and it is really good. When the spinach was done I put it in a bowl and dumped a bunch of cheese on top. I spread out the beans on the tortilla, heaped the spinach/cheese on top, and rolled it up burrito style. It was delicious.

I knew Brandon wasn't going to eat it, so I got some catfish while I was at the store. I rolled it around in some corn meal, put in a little more oil in the pan, and fried the fish about five minutes on each side. I always add some salt on each side of the fish, but not pepper this time. It was marinated in some cajun seasoning already. I cooked some corn for him too.

Not too bad for dinner overall. We have lots of fish left over.

Another Sunday Geocache...hidden by a friend...

2009-09-27T22:02:00.002-04:00

Julie, the professional Geocacher, hid a cache out in Chesapeake not too long ago. Since I saw her Saturday at a little league game, she asked if we had gotten out to find her cache. We haven't, but we haven't been out that way. Sunday I had to pick up my son from his Grandparents and we were going right by there. No excuse, we had to go find it.

It was getting near sunset when I picked up my son. He was in his pajamas. Didn't matter, we were still going. I had brought my head lamps just in case we ran out of light, and it was a good thing because I needed them anyway. I have a good friend, Candace, that lives 2 minutes from there so I called to see if she would like to come out with us. She said yes and met us there.

There is a nice park just inside the neighborhood there and naturally I assumed the cache was there. Walking in, the first thing we noticed was the very large spiders making their webs for their evening of bug catching. I tried to get some pictures on my phone. They are below. There was a nice pond with a big waterfall. It is a very picturesque spot, even with the giant man eating spiders around. The cache was not here though. I looked at the cache description and it became apparent that we had to go out to the main road.

When we rounded the corner we saw a policeman investigating our vehicles. We were parked in front of some no trespassing signs, but we weren't trespassing. There were no "No Parking" signs. The policeman was very nice and knew about geocaching. We talked for a few minutes and he said we would be fine for now, but next time we should consider parking somewhere back up the road.

We walked over near the spot and we found a very cool tunnel that looked like it was used for flooding. It was dry and no chance of flash floods at that moment so we figured we were safe. It was there we saw the garden spider, and that was funny because I was just talking about one I nearly backed into in Oklahoma that was 3 times the size of the one we were looking at now. I investigated all round the tunnel opening, but the cache was not there. It was a sort of micro cache and only had a log in it. I was going to have to go in.

So I did. It was a really clean tunnel. While I was looking for clues to the spot I saw some sparkles here and there down the tunnel. I thought those might be from the cache. NOPE. Believe it or not. those things were spider eyes! I am not kidding. Like animals eyes at night, those things light up. That was crazy strange. I did find the cache quickly though, being arachnid-ly motivated.

This time and that time and that other time....

2009-09-25T19:50:00.002-04:00

I have a little bit of me time...my son is on his way to his mom's for the weekend. I am still getting over a cold I had this week and tonight I am feeding it Thai. Specifically Chicken Pad Thai, though I forget to tell them extra spicy. I am tired and confused and just realized I have practically eaten the whole thing with the wrong end of the chopsticks. The great thing about chopsticks is that it really doesn't matter.

Last week SGG's children were with their dad and she had to work most of Saturday. My son and I did a few things around the house, but we went out and did some geocaching too. I got him a kayak over the summer and he got to take it out for the first time on Sunday. We did some geocaches that you can only get to by boat. We got to see and watch some awesome Osprey's flying, fishing, and feeding. Sunday evening we recruited SGG for some more geocaches. We even met a man with an atomically hyperactive dog and crazy bird. One of the caches was really cool as it was suspended in the air versus hidden in the bushes.

Pictures are Here, slideshow below!

This week was basically spent succumbing to a head cold and trying to get through the week with it. I hope tonight is the last bit of NyQuil I need to take.

VT vs Miami annual party is tomorrow at Jim's place. Should be a lot of fun. That is the only football game I see during any season...and only because of the company. It usually gives me a chance to sharpen my wit as Jim, a hurricane fan, and myself try to trade barbs back and forth. It hasn't been as active the past few years as it was in the beginning. I have a great practical joke to play on him, been saving it for years, but I never do the planning to put it into action.

School and other things...

2009-09-13T01:00:00.003-04:00

My son's first week of school went really well. I feel like there was more homework for me than for him....Oh wait, there was! Lots of forms to fill out.

At the end of the week I went out to Lake Rawlings for some scuba diving. It was supposed to be different, but some last minute changes dictated that I go by myself and come back the next morning. The drive out was slow and I didn't get there until 9:30pm. I was hoping for a night dive, and what a night, but I couldn't find my group. I asked around to everyone that was still up, but no one knew who I was talking about. Hampton Roads Scuba at meetup.com was who I was supposed to find.

After scouring the campers for my dive group, and getting offers from some to join them Saturday, I setup my tent and had a few moments to just stare at the stars. I was in awe. One of my tweets "So I am laying next to my tent looking at an absolutely black sky where the Milky Way seems as brilliant as daylight. I am by myself." I was really wishing SGG would have been there to see it and share it with me. I almost brought my big camera and tripod for just this reason, but decided I had enough stuff.

The night was very cool and almost cold. However in my sleeping bag I was quite snug, and fell asleep watching Southpark on my iPod. :-) I can have a vice you know.

The morning was quite cool, but I quickly fixed some coffee and some grits. I finally found my group and I did get to go on one dive. I was a bit out of sorts during the dive because I haven't dove in over a year and I was trying to take pictures at the same time. It was great though!

I hurried back home after the dive because SGG had all three boys and was helping cater a company picnic that happened to be a company I used to work for. I walked around the picnic for a bit talking to people I used work with. It was a great time as well.

Sunday will be organizing and geocaching I think. I'm looking for another weekend to go diving and take the boys for some snorkel, snuba (snorkel scuba), and camping at Lake Rawlings.

The pictures below are not of me, but pictures I took of the people I was diving with. The camera was fogging up at points and not many pictures came out right. There is even a video mixed in there!

Pictures
Slideshow

From 2009.09.12 Lake Rawlings

Summer (Paradise) lost?

2009-09-07T23:26:00.003-04:00

Nope.

It has been a long summer for me. It seemed to crawl by. This is a great thing for the time I got to spend with SGG. Work was the negative side of that coin. About the time that summer was over, some changes finally came that have turned my job around. I just wish they would have come sooner.

My son is home now. He is re-acclimating to the rules and structure of my home, and that has gone well so far. We spent the afternoon today re-organizing the garage and taking unneeded items to a local thrift store. The return weekend wasn't all work though. Saturday we spent at Busch Gardens! :-) We rode all the roller coasters, much to my son's delight. Sunday we did some geocaches and there is one in particular that still eludes our capture. We are working on it and we have enlisted the aid of professional geocacher "tinglii". We should have that particular quarry in our grasp by the end of the week.

Overall the summer was a balance between rest, work, and play, all within reasonable limits.

I joined twitter tonight...because the Anti-Virus company I prefer is running an interesting contest. You can find me @crazycompdad...I think. It is new to me and I have been mainly ignoring twitter because I have far too much to do. Facebook is reconnecting me with some of my family in SC that I haven't seen in forever. Tonight several of them were having a southern fish fry with grits and tomatoes. If you haven't had it, you should at least try it.

I have been able to extend the streak of malaise that has seemed to plague me over the past couple of months. I have was diagnosed with Poison Ivy a couple of weeks ago. The doctor gave me a cream that has really helped. I also managed to get a bit of a raspberry on my leg while sliding in softball two weeks ago. I don't know which one itches more.

SGG is mildly fascinated and morbidly curious about what ailment, skin seems to be the theme, I will have fallen prey to by the next time she sees me. My new cologne seems to be bug spray.

I had one dive scheduled for this summer, the U-85 off of NC, but Hurricane Bill scratched that. I do plan to do some diving this weekend though...more on that later.

My son starts school tomorrow and my strict schedule is back in place. Early risings, work, workout, dinner, and a little time with SGG in the evenings (usually on the phone), and a few minutes for me, then rewind and replay. We have some nice camping, hiking, and other plans for the fall. We'll see what pans out.

Sherando Lake

2009-08-16T23:40:00.003-04:00

SGG and I took a trip to Sherando Lake this weekend. It is a small lake nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Some say it is Virginia's best kept secret and I am inclined to agree. It is probably the cleanest and best kept campground I have ever been to.

Just driving through the mountains is a treat. Sherando Lake is not that far off the beaten path either. You can swim, bike, canoe, kayak, and hike around the lake and the surrounding mountains. The day time temperatures can still be hot, but there is not nearly as much humidity as there is in the lower part of the state. The temperature dropped to 60 degrees the night we were there. The stars were so clear you could see the Milky Way.

SGG and I went to camp and to hike. We did an extended hike around the lake when we got there and then did about a 10 mile loop through (and over) the mountains and crossing the Blue Ridge Parkway on Sunday.

We bought some hiking poles before we went. They really made an incredible difference for us. We could have made it without them, but the potential for injury would have been much greater and we definitely would have been a lot more sore. The poles offer so much more support and stress relief whether you are going up, down, or over flat terrain. We saw a lot of it all. :-)

At one point on Sunday we encountered some unexpected rain. We were about 3/4 of the way through our hike and the rain was a very welcome experience.

There are tons of short, day long, and multi-day excursions in the Blue Ridge Mountains...I highly recommend them!!

The pictures from the trip are below!

Pictures
Slideshow

At recess in the ring...

2009-08-10T22:37:00.004-04:00

It has been hot the last few days. Not unusual for August here. Tonight we won our beach volleyball playoff games and thus must play again next week. We actually have a chance at winning the tournament. :-)

SGG and her two boys were out there tonight, but I think they really wanted to be home rather than at the beach.

Two blocks away, I could hear a band playing. They were called "Mike Proffitt Band".

After volleyball, SGG took her boys home and I went up to 31st street to listen to a band called "Borderline Crazy". One of the few bands I have heard around here with a female singer.

I sat on the wall around the little grassy area. It was warm from being in the sun all day. The air was almost stifling, hot and humid. I was watching a few boys play with a soccer ball, and the occasional parent that would join them. I watched some people play Frisbee. Some people danced. Some kids did gymnastics...funny, I didn't see any parents give that a shot.

On their break in between sets they would play music from an ipod or something. One of the songs was Elton John's "Tiny Dancer". As this song played, there were were several little girls running about dancing, doing ballerina twirls and leaps. What popped into my head was this line from a poem we analyzed in 8th grade, "Because I could not stop for death" by Emily Dickinson. The line was "At recess in the ring". These children were just in the moment, blissfully unaware of future or stress, truly at recess in the ring or circle of life. For a moment I got to share that feeling...and then reality returned.

SGG couldn't be there, but I was texting her lines from the songs that they played. They played Paramore's "Misery Business" and that was my cue to leave.

If you are so busy that you cannot stop for anything...even death...try to take a moment, a recess, and dance with a child or a partner in your home, in the park, at a concert, or on a street corner (Like The Exception).

Google Voice...

2009-08-04T21:25:00.003-04:00

I really like to explore new things, figure out how they work, and figure out what can be done with them that maybe they were not meant to be used for. It is that weird curiosity that makes me good at my job.

I love to play with new operating systems, new tools, new gadgets, and basically anything shiny, especially if it has a lasers or LEDs built into it.

Amazon knows this about me. I think I finally bought enough stuff from them to really profile me. I was looking for a 4in1 pen/stylus/laser pointer/led light two weeks ago. I didn't find what I wanted initially, but when I went back the next day they had one waiting for me and at a price I couldn't say no to. Being every so evilly helpful, they said that people that bought the pen also bought two other 532nm green presentation lasers with visible beams suitable for astronomical presentations. REALLY? Again, at a price I couldn't say no to. So now I have some cool toys. Even SGG thinks they are cool...unless she was just being nice. At night, the green lasers will light up a whole room. It is like putting a green dot with a green spotlight where ever I want and how ever far away I want it. I LIKE IT.

However, the cool item this week is Google Voice. You have to politely ask for an invitation. You will need a google account. They may send you an invitation. They will ask you to pick a number in your area and a few other questions.

What does it do? Well, I can give this number out to schools, doctors, and other people that need to get a hold of me. When the number is called, Google will ring each and connect to whichever picks up first. If they do not pick up, Google will take a message, transcribe it, text it to my cell and my email address. I can listen to it, read it, etc. I can even forward phones to it so that people that need me can get me most anywhere.

Why is this important? It isn't so much. I really don't need to be more connected. However, I would be convenient for when I need people to reach me to be able to get a call and have them just dial one number. For instance, I cannot take my cell phone in to where I work. I can configure Google Voice to call my work number. Still not earth shaking but interesting and convenient. By getting the voice mail transcribed, I can then read the voice mail instead of having to listen to it.

I just got it and am going to work with it for a bit. I'll let you know if I come up with any other useful uses for it, but the combination right now is enough to keep me using it for a while.

I am not a big fan of letting Google control more of my information, but like Amazon, they know me. :-)

15 minutes of bliss...

2009-07-31T09:13:00.001-04:00

Now, this is a PG rated blog so those that are overly sensual are not going get what you think you are....

Work has been difficult lately, being out of action with a false case of chicken pox, and other summer activities I haven't been exercising (or eating) the way I really want to. Some activities make up for it, like surfing for 2 and half hours until my arms and legs are raw and nearly bleeding from rubbing against the board, but not fully.

This morning I woke up early, stretched (which hurts now that I'm over 40), did some ab and back exercises, and then went for a run. I put my shuffle on under my shirt, started up a network security podcast, and began a slow jog through the early morning heat and humidity of southeastern VA.

Bliss.

It just felt amazing. Just 15 minutes, about a mile and a half. I needed it. I had been craving it for a while. No aches or pains, just a slow comfortable jog sweating bullets early in the morning. I won't say it is the best way to start the day...PG remember...but it certainly is a great way to start.

--
"Until you forget what you think you know and what you think is possible, you will never know what is truly attainable."

In case you needed to cool off some....

2009-07-25T14:30:00.001-04:00

Maryland, February 2006

Not Chicken Pox

2009-07-19T14:51:00.003-04:00

But most likely chiggers. After a few days at home...which I needed...I still didn't have any other accompanying symptoms. I went back to the doctor and it appears chiggers is the most likely culprit. I have missed civilization! I am so happy to be able to go back out into public spaces!!!

My favorite cheese steak place, Philly Style Steak and Subs, has opened a new location just around the corner from me. It is called !GGLES though...so I didn't recognize it. Now I can go get one! :-)

SGG and I went on a hike at York River State Park Saturday. We figured it would be a good way to get out of the house and not really expose the public to what turned out not to be my illness. It is a really beautiful park on the York River. In addition to many miles of trails for hiking, they are supposed to be one of the top mountain bike destinations on the east coast. They also have trails for equestrian too. I saw a Bald Eagle fly past over the river, but SGG didn't believe me.

One of the beaches there is called Fossil Beach. They literally have thousands of fossils right on top of the sand there. They will let you take one. SGG found two predatory snail fossils so we took those. At one point we were sitting on a log just resting and the Bald Eagle I saw earlier dropped out of the tree it was in with a big WHOOSH, right over our heads. Every time the eagle flapped it's wings it made a loud whoosh sound. We don't see them very much around here and it was really cool to be so close to one in the wild. We saw some deer on the trail and a fawn on the way out of the park. No Chiggers this time.

York River offers canoeing and kayaking in the estuaries and on the river itself. Every two weeks they offer either a starlight kayak tour or a moonlight kayak tour. They also offer a guided fossil hike.

Explore your state parks, you may be amazed at what you find. Those of you that live close to national parks...I am envious!

Pictures
Slideshow

And....

2009-07-15T22:38:00.002-04:00

I have chicken pox.

My best guess on how I contracted it is the theater I saw Transformers 2 in.

So I am working from home, not scratching anything, and trying to get better fast. It doesn't appear to be too severe....and I REALLY hope that doesn't change.

Someone I would like you to meet....

2009-07-15T22:13:00.002-04:00

Percy is a 12 year old boy in Sixth Grade. He has some learning disabilities. ADHD and Dyslexia are chief amongst them. He has never known his father, and his mother has raised him since his birth. He lives in New York City. He has been kicked out of every school he has ever been in.

He doesn't sound like some kind of hero...

Percy is the main character in an amazing series of books that are called Percy Jackson and the Olympians. The first book is "The Lightning Thief" and the author is Rick Riordan.

Like many kids with issues, Percy isn't meaning to get into trouble, but for some reason he can't stay out of it. He really wants to do well, and he really wants to please his mom. Fortunately, she knows the source of his problems and loves him no matter what happens.

You see, Percy is the son of a Greek God, and what we interpret as impediments are really characteristics of his supernatural nature.

Rick Riordan has done an absolutely incredible job with this series. He has masterfully woven Greek Mythology into the modern world and created an amazing story. In the process he may be helping a lot of children regain some self esteem. Children with ADHD spend a lot of time in trouble. They really mean to do well, but often cannot control their impulses. Any child with ADHD will immediately identify very closely with Percy, the quandaries he finds himself in, and the expected punishment to follow. Percy gets bullied and punished a lot.

My son started reading the book to me out loud in the car and was cracking up saying things like "Who does that remind you of Dad?" And he is right, it did remind me of him.

Rick is able to then turn those traits from problems into assets as Percy realizes his true heritage and his destiny.

These books are great for any middle school child and I highly recommend all five. You may even be tempted to read them yourself, but I would warn you against it. You may find yourself drawn into the story and strangely unable to put the books down.

Summer stuff....

2009-07-09T23:34:00.004-04:00

Surfing.....
Sometimes it is the way the ocean looks. It is different in the morning, afternoon, and evening.
Sometimes it is the Dolphins.
Sometimes it is the big or little fish jumping. The minnows sometimes land on my board.
Sometimes it is the Pelicans flying high formations or skimming the water like bombers.
Sometimes it is the Ospreys.
Sometimes it is the taste of salt water, or the residue of it later on my lips.
Sometimes it is that crusty feeling of dried salt all over my body.
Sometimes it is the smell of ocean and sand.
Sometimes it is the feel of the warm grainy water all over my body and the way I float and move in it.
Sometimes it is the sense of euphoria when I am physically exhausted at the end, strange as it sounds.
Sometimes it is because I feel like a sea otter in the waves.
It is always because of the way I feel when I have paddled the board just enough to get caught in the awesome power of an ocean wave. The way the board picks up speed as though pushed by Poseidon himself. The way everything becomes a blur and the wind whips past. The balance of the board, leaning for a turn, crouching, trailing a hand in the wave, pumping for a little more speed, the sense of accomplishment if I make it long enough to ride the second break, and sometimes even the ability to walk back and forth on the board.

Evenings on the beach are always so tranquil. One night SGG and I danced in that space where it isn't quite ocean and not quite land. Truthfully, it was because I herded a crab straight at her. :-)

Chichos at 29th street has a band, $1 slices of pizza, and $5 pitchers of watered down beer on Monday evenings. It also has a couple of the volleyball teams when we finish playing on the beach. Chichos is 20 blocks from where we play volleyball. We had to walk 20 blocks back too. I'll bring some water next week....or drive. :-)

Piano lessons for me are back in full swing. I'm going to conquer the metronome and eighth notes. Had I been seriously playing and practicing the last six months it wouldn't be a problem...but I haven't. However, I have really missed it and I'm mad I let it drop for a bit.

Lots of changes happening at work. I think they will all be good changes, it will be a little difficult in the short term though.

I don't really get to go on week or longer vacations at points during the year, so I try to make a little vacation/fun time each day. Besides, you don't even know if you have a tomorrow until it becomes a yesterday so try to make the most of moments you have right now.

Speaker for the Dead...

2009-06-27T14:27:00.002-04:00

I first came across this concept from the book titled "Speaker for the Dead" by Orson Scott Card. The concept as I recall it (my memory is way corrupted these days) is that after someone dies, a person interviews people and compiles a more or less true portrait of that person, good and bad, and then presents the compilation publicly. I want to do something here that is similar for our Cockatiel, Choker, who died on May 19, 2009.

In 1991, a Cockatiel was hatched to a breeder in Tampa, FL. This Cockatiel was hand-fed. A short time later, my brother Brian and his girlfriend Rocquel went to this breeder to purchase a Cockatiel. They chose this particular Cockatiel.

A short time after they brought the bird home, Rocquel was very concerned when she saw the bird was opening it's beak wide repetitively. She called to get Brian out of class because she thought the bird was choking. Thereafter, they called the bird Choker.

Living with a couple of college students can be dangerous. Choker's middle name must have been Danger though. Choker lived through a small fire and various other potentially life threatening events.

It was during this time period that I first made my acquaintance with Choker. I was in the Navy and visiting my brother while my submarine was temporarily in Port Canaveral. Choker and I got along pretty well at our first meeting.

I met Choker again when I attended my brother's graduation from the University of Southern Florida in 1993. Soon after Brian and Rocquel moved to North Carolina so that Brian could pursue his Master's degree at UNC (He never said, but I guess he couldn't get into Duke...just kidding!).

Brian, Rocquel, Choker, and their dog Zaney lived in NC up until December 2006. During that time Brian and Rocquel got married, moved within NC, went on many adventures, and eventually had two children. When I would visit, I would always take some time to whistle with Choker, hold him, and scratch his neck. Rocquel would make the comment that the bird really loved me as he really didn't take to many people. Brian would say that they sometimes forget they have a bird until I come over.

Choker was very well taken care of. He still had some mishaps though. Once or twice his cage was left outside when it got a bit colder than anyone expected it to get. I was there one time when we had to pull the cage out of the bushes where it either fell or was pushed by a cat.

Choker learned to whistle the Adam's Family theme song, the "Charge" tune, and various other things. Sometimes he could immediately imitate something, and sometimes it took repetition. Choker really liked to greet the morning with a series of shrill whistles. :-) The reality is that he was probably looking for Brian. Cockatiels tend to bond with an owner and often shrilly whistle when they cannot see that person.

In December 2006, after the birth of their second child, they asked if I wanted to keep Choker. Trying to take care of two pets and two children was a little much for them. I instantly agreed. My son was ecstatic.

So, for two and a half years Choker lived with us in Virginia Beach. Every day I would come home and Choker would start squawking as soon as my key went in the door. As I ambled about the house, I would whistle and Choker would answer. Occasionally the bird would break out into song. One night when I was up fairly late, a car alarm was set off in the neighborhood. Choker immediately started mimicking it and I couldn't stop laughing.

In December 2007, Brandon and I got a much bigger cage for Choker, and then he really started singing. I was teaching myself how to play piano and Choker learned The Entertainer from that. Often, Brandon would be sitting quietly after school doing his homework and I would be in another room working on something else. Choker would just start belting out The Entertainer and both Brandon and I would start laughing. When I would leave the room, Choker would start chirping, I would answer, and it was like our own version of Marco Polo.

One time I set him out on our patio, with the umbrella up to cover him. He would squawk every time I walked away. Then he started squawking and wouldn't stop. I looked over to see what was wrong and realized that there was a wasp nest under the umbrella. A big one. The wasps weren't bothering him, but I rushed over to grab the cage and take him back inside.

Choker loved to have his neck scratched. I would pick him up, and scratch his neck, picking off the sheaths over his feathers until I was covered in that and dander. He would perch on my shoulder pulling at the hairs on my neck. He would submit to having other people pick him up and scratch his neck, but only if I wasn't in the room. If I were there, he pretty much wouldn't have anyone else pick him up, and he would flap, claw, nibble, and climb to get to me.

On the afternoon of May 19th, 2009, we found Choker dead in his cage. He was about 18 years old. He had been through a lot with our two families. Even now I still whistle out, expecting a reply, but one doesn't come.

Writing....last hurrahs...etc

2009-06-20T09:17:00.005-04:00

My favorite museum in DC is the National Archives. One of the first times I went in there when I had moved to Maryland in 2004 I was completely overcome. There is something about seeing a memo penned by a Senator from the early 1800's. There is something about being so close to history, about being near a piece of paper and ink that was written by a person that has helped shape the course of history. I'm not even talking about the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, or the Magna Carta that were on display. It is the little things, the memos, the letters, and other bits. The grandiose pieces mentioned are amazing, but I feel more connected to the smaller things...the things that the people that wrote them probably never thought may be on display somewhere. It almost feels as if you could get to know these people that are long gone.

Can you imagine what it would be like to find personal writing from your grandparents, great grandparents, or beyond? I love talking to elderly people because they are so rich with the experience of living through history. There is so much about their past that will never be in a history book, but it is so pertinent to the times if you really want to understand them. Art can help to convey feelings and emotions, but to live their lives you really need to do it through reading their writing. That is how people live on, through their writing.

I had a surprise Friday morning in a blog I read. Oh the Joys put up a post Friday that was a memoir from her father, and thusly spawned this part of this post.

I had another surprise Friday as Rachel and Dr. Leah chose to feature me and several other single dads in their week long tribute to single fathers for Father's Day.

You should check out all these dads here, here, here, and here.

Also, the two blogs/forums Single Mom Seeking and Singlemommyhood.com are fantastic places for conversation, ideas, and help. If you are looking for inspiration, frank and open discussions about all kinds of things related to parenting and relationships, or you just need to know that you aren't the only one out there going through this these are two great places to go to. Rachel Sarah writes Single Mom Seeking and Rachel and Dr. Leah collaborate on singlemommyhood.com. While both of these women are amazing by themselves, each of the blogs are wonderfully enhanced by the comments of those that read. So go read and participate! You will not be sorry.

I'll also have to make some time today or this week to add the other single dad blogs they mention to my reader and my blog roll!

Friday my son and I went to Busch Gardens in Williamsburg. I was all set in my BUS ZEN mindset, expecting traffic, big crowds, long hot lines...but was going to enjoy every minutiae of every minute just because I was there with just my son. We were going to have fun no matter what. While there were two accidents on the way there and lots of traffic, when we got in the park we received a gift. It was essentially EMPTY. The first roller coaster we went to, Loch Ness Monster, we walked right up to a car and sat down, no line at all. The Griffon, the best roller coaster I have ever ridden, had the shortest line I had seen there to date. About 5-10 minute wait. Apollo's chariot was another we just walked up to and sat down. In two hours we had ridden all the rides and eaten lunch. :-) We left not too long after that to get back home so he could spend some time with his friends in the neighborhood before he left for the summer Saturday.

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Saturday we went to SGG's house for breakfast. I took my son and SGG's boys to see "Race to Witch Mountain" at Cinema Cafe. We ordered pizza, chicken fingers, sodas, and sundaes. They loved the moved and had a great time. Soon after I took Brandon to his mom and bid farewell for the summer. I will talk to him and email every couple of days to see how things are going. He is going to have a great summer!

SGG took her children to the airport where they flew to New York for six weeks with their dad. We are kid-free!!!

SGG hosted a dinner for her family for her mother's 75th birthday. Afterward we went to see world famous fiddle player Charlie Austin and a band he is currently playing with called Rock Star Parking. Unfortunately, the early twenty somethings in the club didn't really appreciate the band. :-) We did though.

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there. Hope yours is a fantastic one!!

(GRRRRRR, thanks to a horrid MS Word 2007, it has taken me over an hour just get the formatting for this post correct. I often will cut and paste things in Word when blogger isn't exactly acting properly. I sometimes compose in Word and then paste into blogger. Now in 2007 and Vista, MS has made the piss-poor and unalterable assumption that I want all the formatting in HTML pasted with the text. Blogger chokes on this makes wild changes to font sizes and spacing...which would take me hours to sift through the HTML to weed out all the un-needed MS crud. I just need a simple word processor MS, not a wonderful wasteful way to wreck words. Sometimes more is less and it is obvious you haven't been listening to consumers or to governments around the world.)

Father's Day Poem....

2009-06-19T07:06:00.003-04:00

It's the way you hold my hand when we are out,
It's the way we run, laugh, sing, and shout,
It's the day to day memories we make and do,
That I want for Father's day from you.

There is no gift or other token,
There is no nifty phrase that's spoken,
There is no tool or toy that I could use,
That's any better than the time I spend with you.

Day to day I get to see you grow,
Increasing all the things you know,
I pick you up when you fall out,
That's what fathers are all about.

And if I love and raise you well,
You'll have your own kids this to tell,
And I'm sure you will certainly agree,
That every day is Father's Day to me.

I wrote this poem for Father's Day last year and figured I would just post it again! :-)
It has been another eventful school year. My son has matured a lot the past nine months. He is now a seventh grader and 12 years old. I see so many differences in him. I'm working on trying to make him a bit more independent. Giving him more freedom, exposing him to more of the world. It isn't always very easy. Sometimes he doesn't want to let go of me, then sometimes he doesn't want to be near me. That is ok as I sort of feel the same way. In four more years he'll be driving. 48 months. 72 months he'll be 18. What once seemed like it was a long ways off now seems like just around the corner.

Summer....

2009-06-18T13:00:00.003-04:00

The Winds have changed, so has the tide,
I feel this draw, to be outside,
The Sun's energy warms my skin,
Emotions stir from deep within,
The air is hot, the sand is too,
The local bands play just for you,
Beach is nice, but friends are better,
Memories made last forever,
The cars are filling up with sand,
Lovers kiss and walk hand in hand,
As Summer dawns upon the land.

Edited to add:
Summer is here. My son leaves to go spend it with his mom on Saturday. The transition is hard for me. Each year I'm the only care giver for him from the end of August until the middle of June. Along the way we get a bit tired of each other. So, it isn't so much that I'm sad to see him go. I'm actually pretty happy that he gets a little adventure and gets to spend some quality time with his mom. It is a different home, different rules, etc.

What is hard is me making the transition from care giver dad to soloist. I'm ready for it, but it takes a while to break my parenting routines....and by then it is nearly time to implement them again! :-) SGG is kind of the same way...and she will be without her kids for about six weeks, the longest she has ever gone without seeing them.

Today was the last day of school, finally. I'm not sure why Virginia Beach seems to keep adding days to the calendar. There really is no need and they don't really do anything in class the last week or two of school anyway.

I took off from work today to deal with my son's abbreviated schedule and early dismissal. While he was in school this morning I went surfing. I'm finally actually up and riding waves. Today was pretty rough. The waves were bigger than normal and there were more of them. I got a couple of rides in, but my arms soon gave out. Paddling out into the non-stop barrage of waves can tire you out quickly. It can be hard getting through the break and into position.

Regardless, I had a great time.

I'm playing volleyball again on Monday nights. A great sport, on the beach, with great friends. Softball has been in swing again since the beginning of May. I might pickup soccer again in July, we'll see. No dodgeball this year...it kills my arm.

It's SUMMER!!! So get outside, enjoy the weather! More to come!

ugggghhhhhh.....A Month!

2009-06-16T21:51:00.004-04:00

Hmmmmm....I've been busy. We have been busy. All of us have been busy.

Here we go...the recap....in Reverse.....

Tonight, 6/16/09, my son had his piano recital. He did fantastic! The pictures, and video, are here. Since he leaves to go to his mom's on Saturday, I will pick up his lessons like I did last year. All the students tonight did a great job, and since the piano is my favorite instrument, I could have sat there all day to listen to the children play.

This past weekend was not great. It would be a stretch to say it was even fun, but some parts of it were. Friday afternoon was very interesting for the SGG and I. SGG is my girlfriend. Her name is Chris. I would bet that in a million years you could not guess what SGG stood for! :-) So, on Friday SGG was hosting a gaggle of cub scouts for a backyard tent bonanza. I went to do my upper body workout and then went on to surf for about 2 hours. My goal this summer is to get up and surfing and I put in a honest effort Friday. After surfing I took my son out for sushi and then we went to keep SGG company for a bit. Saturday morning I got up and did another hour and half of surfing. I actually got up and road about six waves for more than 5 seconds. It is actually sort of like a rodeo. It wasn't a great idea because I was still physically recovering from Friday evening. SGG also got up early and took the cub scouts out for a hike at Seashore State Park here in VA Beach. I think she deserves a medal for what she did Friday night and Saturday.

About 2pm Saturday we finish packing for an overnight camp at Kiptopeke State Park on Virginia's eastern shore. We have four kids (still trying to figure out where the fourth came from), a canoe, three tents, fishing poles, crab nets, boogie boards, skim boards, sleeping bags, bug spray, sun block, and much more. SGG and I started setting up the tents. By some freakishly strange alignment of the planets, I managed to trap a bee between my sandal and my middle left toe. That bee stung the snot out of me. I haven't been stung by a bee since I was 9. GRRRRRRR. Now my foot was hurting and swollen. We finished the tents and then I went to the store to get some Benadryl, compresses, band aids, baking soda, and some Coke for the Rum I was going to buy at Liquor store next door. As it turns out, I got Children's Benadryl by mistake, so I chewed up four of those things right away.

We spent the rest of the afternoon playing and swimming at the beach...though I really mostly slept. SGG has some friends there and we hung out with them for dinner and conversation until 10pm. I can tell SGG needs some time away from her children...every time she left camp for something she was gone for an hour and a half! :-)

While Rachel and Dr. Leah of singlemommyhood.com would espouse the benefits of dating people without kids....if you are not a parent you might not fully appreciate the next part of this story....

SGG and I get the kids in their tents and threaten them with eternal restriction from all electronics if they make a peep. We lay down in our tent, on an air mattress, and start watching a South Park episode on my ipod. We are both more or less instantly asleep. Deeply asleep. At some point in the night a shivering twelve year old boy is saying "Dad. Dad. Dad" in his most hurt and pained "i need help and sympathy right now" voice. He is on the verge of tears. He is very cold. His ear is killing him. His nose is stuffed up. SGG and I are now both out of the tent. I am not so patiently telling my son five time in a row to put his shirt on first. Then we walk down to the bathroom. Then SGG gives him Ibuprofen for his pain. I happen to have a fresh supply of children's benadryl, through my own unfortunate providence, and I give him some to help his allergies that were exacerbating the ear situation. It has the added bonus of helping him sleep. I also ask him if he would now like the sleeping bag he so adamantly stated he didn't need earlier. He does, is grateful, and soon warm and asleep.

Not too long after that, another child awakens our now not so restful slumber. This one is ten and his stomach hurts. The two adults are slow to respond, addled really, until the ten begins to vomit at the opening of our tent. SGG is barely not screaming at the ten to move away from the tent and to direct the unpleasant upheaval somewhere else. It takes the ten at least two heaves to comprehend and act on the instruction. Having lost my sanity, I lay back and just start laughing inside, because if I laugh out loud I was going to get hit. I am also thankful that the wind was blowing west to east and carrying the smell away from the tent. SGG gets the ten settled and we get situated again.

In the morning, SGG goes out for breakfast for everyone....and is gone for an hour and half. :-) We get our act together finally and get the crab nets and fishing poles situated for the boys. One of them, mine, has wandered off as he want to do, and SGG has gone to pay for the pier pass...and is gone for an hour and half. I finally find my son...who has been swimming at the beach, and he and I go to the beach to swim some more and then I lay down again. My foot is throbbing and swollen and I am really tired from all the joyful parental experiences I got to participate in during the night. About 1pm I figure I've had enough fun for the weekend and we pack up everything to head home.

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Ok so that was kind of painful...but maybe it was needed to balance out the weekend of 6/5/09. On this weekend we were planning to drive to Charlottesville, VA for SGG's 20th college reunion at UVA. Friday night was a bust as we had intense thunderstorms come through and a tornado. We decided to leave in the morning. Leaving in the morning was the right choice. We made it into Charlottesville just in time to start meeting up with SGG's friends. We went through her old hangouts, had some drinks, and then attended the ROTC cocktail party. While I didn't know anyone there, turns out we knew some of the same people and I got to have a lot of interesting conversations. One of the people had a room on the UVA Lawn by the Rotunda so we went back there to have some more drinks and look out over the lawn. The evening was amazing. The weather was perfect, the company was great, and the band was The English Beat. We spent the night in Afton at a friend of SGG's. Some of the pictures below are from her friends house, and some are from out hike up Humpback Rock. Humpback rock is a truly remarkable hike and vista.

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The weekend of May 29th was spent playing at the beach, surfing, and playing volleyball. :-)

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Memorial day weekend was spent resting. Believe it or not.
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The weekend of the 15th started off in an interesting way.

We were going to camp at Northwest River park for the monthly Astronomy Association demo night. We had a group of cub scouts with us. I was going to be late because I do my workouts in the afternoons after work. Brandon and I got packed up and were getting ready to head out when SGG calls and says she needs a favor. She wasn't expecting to 'Start', but did, and needed some 'supplies'. I say no problem and we detour for Target.

In the parking lot, Brandon is anxious to get to the campsite so he wants to know why we are going to Target.

I take a deep breath. We just had the 'Talk' a few weeks prior to this. He is actually mostly mortified about the whole thing and gets dreadfully embarrassed when I bring it up. But, he did ask why we were going to Target. He regrets it now. I begin asking him if he remembers our talk, and how we talked about women and menstruation. My son is at this point red from head to toe, and can't seem to look up from his feet. We are surrounded by women in the parking lot and it really isn't all that easy for me either. I tell him SGG needs some tampons and we are going to get them. We were also looking for a coffee press, but we never found that.

After giving up on the coffee press we headed to the tampons. This is where I become intrigued. What a variety. The specific request was a small box of regular tampons. If you have looked closely lately, that product line was obviously phased out some time ago. There are generic and name brand versions. Quantities start at "a lot" and go up to "a hell of a lot". There are a wide variety of different absorbency levels too. Some even have flushable applicators. They are stacked in Target over 6' high and extend down the row about 8'. 48' square feet of menstrual mecca. I'm not actually counting the pads either. My son is sulking and lurking about a few aisles over while I diligently read EVERYTHING in search of the specifics that SGG gave me. I had a few women come by to offer condolences and support...sort of. So, I settled on a variety pack that seemed to embody the quantity request while offering an assortment of absorbency capabilities for which I'm sure SGG could find a 'regular' in.

At the checkout counter, the woman clerk said "Awwww, you are a good guy aren't you?"

And then we were on our way to camping, geocaching, fishing, and tick pulling fun. :-)

OBX ...

2009-05-12T17:47:00.003-04:00

Ok, the last post was written lying down at Oregon Inlet, part of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. It was a windy, clear, beautiful night with a full moon that lit up the entire landscape with its familiar yet eerie milky white glow. As excited as I was just to be there, I was very tired.

Sleeping wasn't great, but when we woke we did feel rested.

We went down to New Inlet in the morning to do some canoeing. It was the suggestion of the Park Ranger and it was an excellent suggestion. While there was some wind, it was not too bad. The water was shallow and at its deepest it was about 3ft. We saw some skate rays while we were paddling about. We found a small island where we could beach the canoe and walk about for a bit. The very astute Chris found some of these little guys. What a strange little creature...looked like a small bunch of seaweed, only with some well blended legs and it was moving.

A skate swam in between Chris and I while we were walking around too. On the way back to the ramp we went by an Osprey nest. It looked like there were two adults and some smaller chicks. We didn't get too close.

When we got back to the truck, it looked like someone had purposely killed a small water snake. It wasn't poisonous and only its head had been smashed. Snakes are an important part of our environment, even poisonous ones, and killing for the sake of fear angers me. Unless a snake is startled, cornered, or attacked it is almost always going to flee the presence of a human. There is no real need to kill them.

Overall we had a fantastic weekend. We headed back home to a Mother's day dinner with Chris's sister and her mom. Glucklich Muttertag (Chris's mom is German).

The horse pictures aren't the greatest as they were taken with my phone....

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OBX ADVENTURE - onsite blogging

2009-05-09T22:59:00.002-04:00

Brought to you live...via cell phone.

today has been very interesting. my girlfriend and i were going to the outer baks (obx). we were slow moving in the beginning. we took our time packing and deciding what we would do. we loaded the truck with the canoe and camping gear and headed south. we knew we wanted to go to corolla and drive on the beach. we didnt know if we could camp there...turns out you cannot. we saw a LOT of wild horses. pictures will be up sunday. we could not sit on the beach because it was too windy. we did some hiking and then headed out to find a campground. roanoke island does not have any anymore. we did find one at oregon inlet. right now it is nearly midnight and im too tired to type anymore. good night and happy mothers day!!!

Open letter to Verizon

2009-05-08T16:27:00.004-04:00

Verizon,
I have been a happy customer of your FIOS Internet service for almost three years. I used your FIOS TV service for nearly two years, but since I do not really watch TV I recently had that disconnected. I recently put in an order to get a basic copper line telephone, with only local service, and that was supposed to be put in today. The reason for this is that my VoIP provider is shutting down their service.

Two years ago I tried to switch from my VoIP provider back to a basic Verizon land line at the same time I got the TV service. When the technicians got here, they did not know about the phone install, just the TV. Towards the end of the day, I still had not seen a phone technician. When I called I found out that some how they had lost the phone part of the order, were very sorry, and asked if I could take another day off from work to wait around for a phone technician to possibly show up at some point to install my order. I told them no and then asked them to cancel the order. In 10 minutes, I had phone service back through my VoIP provider, and all of the control I wanted over the line as well.

Today I had to be at work first thing, but quickly came home to wait for the phone technician. The order did not specify I needed to be here, and really the circuit just needs to be turned on at the local central office. You see, phone service has been here for a long time. I did not need to pay $40 a month for special FIOS service, I just need dial tone and local service. Specifically 911.

I called to make sure I needed to be here. I was transferred around, went from IVR to human to IVR to human to disconnect to redial to IVR to human, etc. The second time I talked to a dispatcher they said I did not need to be there. Being in short supply of time to get things done at all times, I left to go do something I was going to have to put off until next week. They called in that two hour time span and left a voice mail to tell me that the technician was there, could not get in, and would need to be rescheduled. I am a very unhappy Verizon customer at this point.

I called back, bounced from IVR to human to IVR to human to human to IVR to a human that was still unable to help me but offered to transfer me again and then I went to another IVR and was disconnected yet again.

At this point I have wasted over 90 minutes of my cell phone time, on Verizon Wireless, and I am sure they will not credit me back because they are different companies. You see, I worked for Verizon for a short period of time, and divisions or sub companies might at as well be speaking different languages, in different countries, and at war with each other. It is not going to happen.

I hooked my VoIP provider back into the house wiring, I called them back, went through the whole process all over again bouncing from IVR to human and so forth until I get to someone that tells me I have to reschedule and the earliest time is next Friday, and I MUST WAIT FROM 8am UNTIL 5pm so that a technician can get access to the premises.

I will not take another day off from work. I once again asked Verizon to cancel my order. I will choose from a variety of other VoIP providers and move my serivce to them if I even get another line at all.

Yes, Verizon is getting my money for FIOS Internet. FIOS Internet has been the best Internet service I have ever had. Installation was not too bad for me, but I have talked to many other people where they have had the same experience above getting even the Internet service installed. The Verizon FIOS TV service is too expensive and not nearly flexible enough. They riddle you with extras to boot (i.e. renting the set top box, other hookups, etc). A cafeteria type plan would suit me better, just the basics and a few other extras I choose. I also don't want to rent a set top box.

Verizon is also getting my money for Cell Phone service. Again, it is an overpriced service, but the coverage is better and it is worth a little more money to know that I'll have service where other providers do not.

Verizon is an institution and I am insignificant to it, therefore they can afford to just bounce me around like a ragdoll and it does not make one bit of difference to their bottom line whether I am a satisfied customer or not. Everyone I talked to was pleasant but unable to help me and unable to offer restitution or an explanation as to why I was told I could leave or why someone needed to be there in the first place. Other companies can make after hours appointments. Other companies can schedule specific times. Verizon has no reason to do so. The Virginia SCC will not revoke their license to operate or penalize them for this ineptitude, they are too big to fail as the current presidential administration would say.

hmmmm....just randomness....

2009-05-06T21:46:00.004-04:00

Sometime soon I will try to do a post or a series of posts on recommendations for your home computer security. None of what I will say will totally protect you, but it can help keep you reasonably safe provided you practice reasonable web surfing. I deal with malware on a daily basis that, even on thoroughly locked down systems, is still able to bypass all security measures. I will only cover windows though. Some of the concepts also apply to other Operating Systems such as Linux or the MAC OS, but you'll have to find your own software for them. :-)

I always have a good chuckle when people ask me if I've seen this show or that commercial. Today at my son's IEP they suggested taking away TV as a punishment. :-) I don't watch TV. I have one, but it is basically a large computer monitor that I watch an occasional movie on, a downloaded show from iTunes, Hulu, or some other alternate media. One reason is that I cannot stand the advertising. My mind is cluttered enough as it is. Another reason is that I abhor having TV networks tell me when I'm going to be home and sitting on the couch to watch something that in my mind is drivel and keeps me (and the rest of the world) from getting out and doing things that really matter and can make a difference. All so that we can be entertained.

and I had more, but it is getting late and I realized that I'm just ranting on about things that will get me into trouble anyway. :-)

Have a good night.

Poison...

2009-05-04T18:18:00.003-04:00

It's everywhere. All over my back yard.

I didn't know.

Poison Ivy. It also happens to be all over the neighborhood too. My girlfriend had to tell me what it was. I either don't react to it, or I have just been wildly fortunate.

Saturday afternoon was spent raking part of the back yard and butchering the bushes back into submission. It really is amazing I don't have some sort of exotic deadly respiratory ailment right now. I inhaled massive amounts of dust, pollen, and vegetative matter.

All that work and the yard is only partially finished. I have more to do in the back, and then I have to weed the front. Grrrrr. I'm neither a gardener nor a landscaper.

I also believe that Virginia Beach is the mega-epicenter of all pollen on the planet. I'm tired of having to constantly wash the cars.

The weather has been nearly non-stop awesome though. I am very thankful for that.

More conversations...

2009-05-01T16:30:00.002-04:00

This morning was a funny one....

[B] "Dad, have you ever broken any bones?"

[D] "No. You?"

[B] "No."

[D] "What about when you flipped backward off the swing and smashed your face on the railroad tie?"

[B] "I didn't break anything!"

[D] "Are you sure? Have you seen your face?"

:-)

I got the squinty eye scrunched up glaring face for that one.

Teachable Moments?

2009-04-30T12:39:00.001-04:00

Riding in the car to daycare a few days ago, the following conversation ensued:

[B] "Dad, Look at that big crane!"

[D] "That isn't a crane."

[B] "What is it?"

[D] "It is a concrete dispensing arm."

[B] "What is that?"

[D] "Concrete trucks can't fit into buildings and you can't always get it to where you need it from the truck. Somebody found a way to pump it via those crane like arms and tubes into virtually anywhere you need it."

[B] "Cool."

[B] "Dad, I'm like the smartest kid in class, and over half of what I know I learn from you."

The future is going to be a scary scary place. I'm so sorry for all of you and apologize profusely in advance.

--
"Until you forget what you think you know and what you think is possible, you will never know what is truly attainable."

OBX (The Outer Banks of NC)

2009-04-26T20:38:00.000-04:00

So, what's a crazy single (but in a serious relationship) dad supposed to do to follow up after a spring break like the one I just had?

Well, grab his son, The Neighbor's eldest son, strap a canoe to the top of the car, and head to Frisco in the OBX for a Lord of the Flies type weekend with his brother and some of his friends.

Before we left Friday night we stopped in to see Chris's eldest son perform in his Tae Kwon Do belt advancement test. He did awesome and I got some great pictures of him.

After that we sprinted to the outer banks. We got to the campground about 11:30pm. I set up the tent for the boys and I slept in my brother's tent (really it is the size of a medium sized house, but with the flimsy walls we'll call it a tent). The stars that night were the most magnificent I've seen since being in the desert in Nevada in 2002. I saw four shooting stars while talking to my brother before we finally went to sleep.

The boys were really extra excited.

We got up the next morning, had coffee, and had our own little version of Brad's Bacon Day (maybe I'll say more about this later, for now it is an inside joke). We had some healthy food, like Dr. Woo's All Bran (which really looked like he picked up a bunch of twigs off the ground). Mostly we had three to four different types of pork. Pop tarts too. There was a discussion I started about nut milk (Almond milk) for Dr. Woo, but that didn't get to far with that group. The Neighbor's eldest son (13, nearly 14) stepped on a piece of glass while fetching a football. We got him bandaged up and he was fine the rest of the trip.

We took our time getting ready in the morning, and about 10:30 am we were on the water in kayaks and my canoe. We decided to head into the wind going out to make it easier going back. If you think having one teen and one tween there to help paddle was an advantage then you've never taken a child canoeing before. That is ok, it is a common mistake. We'll call it a handicap and a team building exercise...leave it at that.

When the group finally picked a destination, a beach, we were the last to arrive. Upon arrival though, my brother was chasing down a water snake. It was a very feisty water snake. I hope to have pictures of it soon as Dr. Woo was taking some.

Once that excitement was over the boys proceeded to investigate and dissect anything and everything they found. They couldn't catch any fish, though they really really tried hard. We did catch a crab. There is also some kind of jelly/plant they had fun with. They found a ton of scallops too. The scallops are really quite active, almost aggressive. They would open and close their shells pretty rapidly. Maybe because they pulled them out of the water...sort of like airboarding (waterboarding for aquatic life?).

Around noon we pulled up anchor and set out to the next beach down before eating lunch. Once we started heading back, the boys really pulled together to paddle hard. We were the first ones back to camp. We spent the rest of the afternoon in the sound with a football, a frisbee, and an Aerobie.

This wasn't extreme camping, so we went to a local restaurant for dinner. We also went to the store for S'mores supplies. :-) The S'mores were excellent!

The next morning was more pork...and some fantastic coffee thanks to Jamie. The boys and I got packed up and headed back home by 10am.

We had a fantastic time. I really need to spend more time in the OBX.

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Spring Break Part 6 - The Journey Home (and some plugs for equipment)

2009-04-17T21:55:00.002-04:00

Getting up the next morning was no problem.

We boiled some water for some HORRIBLE coffee, then boiled more for some delicious rice and black beans. Everyone left camp. The through hikers left at staggered intervals to head north, and Mark went south. I watched everyone pack up to try and get some pointers. Chris and I took our time.

After we ate we gathered our things and re-packed it all. We then filtered some more water for the trip back. 3-4 miles all up hill. I'm not kidding. It was worth it and felt about just right for our first outing like that.

We got back to the car, unloaded, and headed to Wendy's! :-)

When we got back to Wilson's we showered, looked at pictures, played with the kids when they got home, and then headed out to a Mexican Restaurant for dinner. Dinner was delicious!

After dinner we headed home, about a 5 hour drive from Blacksburg. We arrived safe and sound. The weekend was spent unpacking, cleaning, and sleeping!!

Some terms we learned hike:

AYCE: All You Can Eat
nobo, sobo: NOrthBOund, SOuthBOund
Zeroing, Neroing: A zero mile day, presumably to stay at an AYCE, or a NEARLY zero mile day to get to and stay at an AYCE. :-)
Trailname: Like mi the name I call myself, fa a long long way to walk. Basically what you call yourself on the trail.
There may be more, I can't remember now...I'll add later if I do.

Equipment:
About some of the equipment we used....

Me:
Kelty Redcloud 6650 Backpack - HUGE. 109L of storage capacity. Honestly, I don't need all that room. The pack has adjustable torso capability, and lots of ways to adjust the loading. I was carrying a lot of weight because most of my other gear is not really backpacking quality. The pack fit great and really helped me get the weight off my shoulders. It was comfortable the whole time. This was the first time I've taken it anywhere and I don't really have any complaints other than I have recently learned it is probably too big for the hiking I do. I don't mind that though.

Pinnacle Dualist Cook system - I haven't had much luck with cooking sets in the past so for this trip I went to the local Blue Ridge Mountain Sports to ask about a decent one. They recommended this one. Having used it, all I can say is AWESOME. It was very easy to clean, nothing stuck to it. It is highly versatile having the utensiles, bowls, cups, fuel, stove, and pot all combine together. It really made cooking an enjoyable experience. It pours easy, no spillage, and did I mention it wasy easy to clean?!?!?!

MSR Pocket Rocket - The fuel and the stove for this set all fits into the cook system above for easy and protective packing. It is light, efficient, and very easy to use.

MSR WaterWorks Ex - A water filtration system. This was also very easy to use and we didn't get sick!

Blue Ridge Mountain Sports - The people at Blue Ridge have been fantastic. They are experienced hikers, climbers, and paddlers and they are extremely helpful. They also just started a class on Tuesday evenings at 7pm for backpacking and hiking. I am on my way there right now for my second class (On Sleeping Bags and Pads, last week was backpacks).

Spring Break Part 5 - Cascades and Mountain Lake Wilderness

2009-04-16T21:58:00.000-04:00

So did we get out and going early?

Are you kidding me?

Instead of lashing the heavy packs to our backs right away, we thought we would do a warm up hike...about halfway through the Cascades trail in Pembroke, VA. There was still a chill in the air as the sun was just peeking it's head into the gorge there. The Cascades Trail is a nice easy trail that is just beautiful. We thought about doing the whole thing (about 4 miles) but decided to just do 2 miles and get over to the Mountain Lake Wilderness.

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Slideshow

Mountain Lake Wilderness

It took us about 30 minutes to get to the trail head for the overnight hike in Mountain Lake Wilderness. We tried to make sure we didn't have anything that we didn't need, but our packs were still quite heavy. Mine is HUGE, 109 Liters. Chris's is about 50 Liters. Why is mine so big? I bought it on sale at REI about 2 years ago. I knew I wanted a nice pack, and a large volume pack. Until recently (more on this shortly) I didn't know that it was probably too big. Now I know. However it was fine for the trip.

You can see both of us in the pictures above.

One thing before we get going...We passed Mountain Lake Resort on the way to the trail head. Mountain Lake Resort is where Dirty Dancing was filmed. As we were going by we wondered where the lake went to. It's gone. I guess the lake sprung a leak and now there is just a small portion of it left. Should be called Mountain Meadow Resort now because that is what it looks like.

So back to the trail...

Once we were completely laden, we locked the truck and set off down the trail. We saw a splendid little wood pecker, but not much else. We took pictures at the War Spur overlook. The view is interesting because you will not see a power line, a home, a road, or any other sign of human habitation.

The trail heads down to the War Spur Creek from there and then up to the AT. We stopped for a bit at the AT intersection and then headed east/north on the AT from there. We saw a lizard, some twisted trees, a lot of moss, and some cool fungal patterns on some rocks. We were going downhill the whole time and it was really killing our knees. We were very happy when we reached our destination, the War Spur Hut.

We set down our packs, took off our hiking shoes, and rubbed our feet. Chris started reading through the log book in the hut. I started getting stuff out and figuring out where we would put the tent. There was a fire ring there, so we could have a fire if we wanted. It was around 4pm.

Just after we got the tent up and were really starting to relax, another hiker came up. Mark looked to be in his early 50's or so and he is a boy scout leader. He is doing sections of the AT and hopes to complete all of VA this year. That is no easy feat as VA has the longest stretch of the AT.

We cooked some chicken and pasta that came in a pouch from Wal-mart. It was ok. We drank the rest of our water too. We went down to War Spur Creek to wash our mess kit and refill our water. Soon after we were joined by three more hikers. These three didn't come in all at once. Padre was first, Blue was second, and Evergreen was third. Those are their trail names and it is all they gave us. Chris and I started brainstorming some names of our own. We came up with Ford Prefect and Trillian, Crazy Computer Dad (CCD), Hiker Mom, etc. We're still working on it.

Padre was a Religion/Philosophy major in college. Blue had red hair and wore blue. Evergreen died her hair partially green and wore green. I'm going to call them kids, even though they were in their early to mid twenties. So, these kids were amazing to talk to. They were through hikers on the AT and had started in Georgia in early March. They had a lot of stories about the trail thus far, and even more interesting stories about why they were doing it. It was inspiring really. :-) Now I'm thinking I will hike the AT through VA....or maybe WV first. I think the AT only goes through 13 miles of WV. I could do that in a day. :-) Then I could say, "I hiked the AT ALL the way through WV!"

Chris taught me how to play Rummy....and then she even let me win!

Mark got a fire going, and Blue kept it up. We expected the temperatures to drop...but didn't expect it get down to 34 degrees, but it did.

The stars were awesome to look at, and my gaze was constantly drawn upwards. I even spotted a few satellites.

We told stories into the night. I was reluctant to go to sleep because I was worried about keeping warm at this point. We did eventually retire.

We bought some light sleeping bags just before we left on the trip. They were rated for 30 degrees. Mine wasn't quite big enough. Chris had to really work to zip me up. Fortunately I had a few layers on and was fairly comfortable temperature-wise through the night.

I was really worried about Chris though. I would occassionally ask her how she was or put my arm over her to make sure she was ok. She kept responding with "I'm alive!" "I'm not frozen yet!" She said she wasn't getting any sleep...but less than three seconds after each check she was fast asleep again. Overall the night wasn't too bad and we didn't end up in the news for hypothermia. :-)

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Slideshow

Spring Break Part 4 - The Journey to Blacksburg

2009-04-15T20:12:00.001-04:00

Well, Wednesday started like all the other days. We took our time getting up and out. Middleton Place? Will have to wait for another time. The rest of Charleston too. Around noon we were finally packed up and eating lunch at an IHOP. We talked about trying to squeeze something else in, but decided it would be best to get on the road. We pulled into Blacksburg/Christiansburg around 7pm that evening at my friend's house. They had made reservations for a Japanese Steak House called Kabuki.

They eat there often and are very familiar and friendly with the staff. Our chef was fantastic and quite interesting. He told us he was from Nepal, and had climbed Mt Everest as a Sherpa twice.

We had a great time and were well rested for the beginning of our backpack adventure the next day.

Spring Break Part 3 - Bridges, Carriages, Markets, and Ghosts

2009-04-14T23:25:00.000-04:00

So, day three began much like day two, leisurely waking up and enjoying the morning.

While we wanted to do a Carriage Tour of Charleston, we (well at least I did) wanted to walk the Cooper River Bridge. We parked at Patriot's Point and headed across the bridge. We took a lot of pictures along the way.

It was quite a windy day up on the bridge!

From the bridge you can see Patriot's Point in Mt. Pleasant with the USS Yorktown, the USS Lafey, a Coast Guard Cutter, and a WWII Diesel Submarine. Off in the distance you can see Shem Creek, Ft Sumter, Castle Pickney, James Island, The Battery, most of Charleston, the Carolina Aquarium, and more. You can almost see all the way to Goose Creek to the north.

It is quite a high point considering Charleston is part of the "Low Country" of South Carolina. Some parts of Charleston are at or below sea level. When it rains, parts of Charleston can flood quite dramatically.

The walk over the bridge was just awesome. The pictures say more about it really.

After the bridge we went into to Charleston to claim our Carriage Tour. We had a nice draft horse named Marty to take us around, and a great guide named Fred. The city actually licenses tour guides and you have to pass a test to be one. There are three routes and they are randomly assigned by the City to control the horse (or mule) traffic. In other words you don't know what you are going to get until after you get going.

There is so much to learn that it is exciting every time I go.

After the tour we wandered around the market looking for souvenirs for the boys. Chris got her boys some agate book ends while I got Brandon a carved dragon. The boys loved their gifts.

There is no shortage of good food in Charleston, but somehow we managed to get away with only a bowl of ice cream!

We booked the ghost tour for that evening and then headed back to the cabin for a spell.

On the way back into Charleston that night (because ghost tours have to happen at night...and after 9:30pm) I ducked in to get another Falafel. Delicious.

The ghost tours are walking tours that talk more about the history of the city, its graveyards and cemeteries, and the people that lived and died there. They are always fun and exciting. It was nice that they covered stories I hadn't already told Chris. :-)

We finished up about 11pm and headed back to the cabin.

We thought about getting up to head over to Middleton Place early in the morning...

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Spring Break Part 2 - Who's in a rush?

2009-04-13T21:18:00.000-04:00

Not us.

Already I'm forgetting things we have done.

The first night we were there (Part 1), we also went into downtown Charleston to walk around. I told Chris about the things I knew about Charleston, walked all the way down the Battery, and then up Church St. We were amazed at how old some of the buildings were. 100-200 years old. Most of them were homes people own and live in. I also gave Chris my version of the ghost tours of Charleston. Since it was dark and deserted, she was a little creeped out.

Coffee with a granola bar was breakfast next to the lake. The time was sometime before noon, but definitely not before 9am. :-)

We just watched the birds and squirrels and talked.

When we got motivated, we left. Today we weren't sure about everything on the agenda, but two things were certain, Ft. Sumter and BBQ. We improvised everything else along the way.

We found a very cool Mediterranean restaurant called Ali-Baba's. I got the Falafel. Hands down it was the best ever. They just off 17 in Mt. Pleasant, just after the bridge.

After our quick lunch we were ready for Ft. Sumter, where the Civil War began. We decided to purchase a combo ticket, one for Fort Sumter and one for a carriage tour of Charleston. It saved us a little money and we were going to do both anyway.

On the way out to Fort Sumter, they play a lot of history sound bites. Charleston is getting close to being 400 years old you know. It has a lot of History, and it has played some major roles in History. It doesn't seem like it today, but South Carolina was one of the wealthiest colonies and states up until just after the Civil War.

One of the highlights of the trip was the soon to be Ranger that gave us a great History lesson about the part the Fort played before and during the Civil War. It was both educational and entertaining. It is always amazing to me how much History we miss in school.

After the short History refresher, we wandered around the Fort taking pictures. We found three unexploded mortar shells in the north wall of the Fort. The Ranger said these were duds shot at the Fort during the Civil war from the south.

Fort Sumter sits right in the middle of Charleston Harbor. Charleston Harbor, even before Fort Sumter was built, has always been very well defended, and has never been taken by sea.

After Fort Sumter we went to a place that in my opinion serves the best BBQ of any place on the planet. Bessinger's BBQ. They cook their BBQ with a thick hickory flavor and a mustard based sauce. Everytime I go through Charleston or Columbia SC I get some of their BBQ. Chris has never had it before, and she has never had hash either. She got a little of both. :-) She asked what hash is. I honestly don't know, but I know it is good, and I know I probably shouldn't ask.

She also got what I call Grandma sweet tea. My Grandmother in SC used to make the sweetest tea on the planet. If you run out of syrup, you can pour the tea on your pancakes.

We thought about doing a ghost tour that night, but we just went back to the cabin instead.

I hope you enjoy the pictures. We sure enjoyed taking them. :-) Charleston is a beautiful place!

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Spring Break....Part 1 - The Journey South

2009-04-12T22:57:00.002-04:00

While we were thinking of making big plans for Saturday...we packed instead. Backpacks for hiking and camping, other bags for our three days in Charleston, SC.

Why Charleston, SC?

It is warmer than Virginia Beach. Easy to get to. I know it VERY well. There is so much to do. There is a ton of History wrapped up in Charleston. There is a lot of Art in Charleston. And it is a great place to take pictures.

There is also some incredible food in Charleston.

We had some ideas about leaving early Sunday morning, but since we were on vacation we took our time. Being Easter Sunday, the traffic was actually very light.

We stayed at a KOA in Mt. Pleasant, SC. It was very clean, easy to get to, and very comfortable. After we got unpacked and settled in (see the pictures), we set off for Shem Creek.

Shem Creek is where the fishing trawlers come back into and dump their loads. There have been several restaurants built there on the water that serve very fresh seafood. We sat by the window in Waters Edge and enjoyed the Dolphins and Pelicans that had made their way up the creek. We laughed with the little girls behind us and ate a huge and impossibly delicious meal. If you get a chance, stone ground grits goes well with just about any seafood. You should try it. We drove around Patriot's Point too.

After dinner we headed back to the cabin to plan the next day's adventure!

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This time with the kids....Back Bay Bike Bonanza

2009-04-05T21:59:00.000-04:00

It was a little windy. Not like a hurricane, but not exactly unlike it either. The winds were coming out of the South....Exactly where we were headed.

The idea was to park at the city parking lot in Sandbridge and then bike to False Cape. This would add about 2 miles on to the total bike ride each direction. It would not have been all that much of a problem if the wind had cooperated.

We did a quick cache across the street from the parking lot and then headed south.

We stopped at visitor's center for a little while and then headed south again.

About a mile before the cache we lost two of the party to the wind. Brandon, John, and I forged on. It really was a beautiful day, just windy. The spot very close to the cache we were going for was really nice as you can see by the pictures.

We hope to camp with the boys soon down in False Cape. It is right on the ocean, there is lots of wildlife (otters, boars, deers, horses, snakes, and more), and a lot of geocaches.

Total round trip was 9 miles. It was a lot easier going back. :-)

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The next post is about spring break, spending some time in Charleston, SC, and hiking on part of the Appalachian Trail (AT). :-) It is going to take a little longer to write and I may have a guest author for parts of it. :-)

"Along the edge where the ocean meets the land..." and No kids!!!

2009-03-28T21:37:00.000-04:00

So, the weekend of March 27 found us without children. My son went to his mom's for her birthday, and Chris's children's father came down to see them.

So what did we do with our free time? SLEPT.

No, not really. We like to get out to hear live bands and things, but we also get out to do some crazy adventures.

This particular weekend we decided to go for a bike ride and do some geocaches in Back Bay / False Cape State park.

When we got going the weather seemed like it would be fine, but it turned very quickly. The temperature dropped pretty drastically, and a cool dense fog set it.

We thought we would be able to ride on the gravel paths down through the park, but they were closed off due to migrating birds.

We were forced to ride on the beach. This turned out to be a very fortuitous turn of events. We saw our first snake of the year. We found a lot of very cool shells. We had a close encounter with a turkey vulture eating a sting ray (there were several sting rays washed up), and the beach was basically deserted.

By the time we reached False Cape (3-4 miles) we had stopped collecting shells. We just had too many nice ones. Anything inhabited we left were it was though.

Riding "along the edge where the ocean meets the land" is where the sand is firmest. It is still difficult, but doable. When we could finally turn inland the sand was too soft to ride in and we had to ditch the bikes.

We found the spot where the geocache should be, but we could not find the cache. We did find a nice family of boar though. I think there were three adults, three children, and they were all rooting through the mud like mad.

The ride back wasn't too bad and we stopped to eat some great food at Margie & Rays. Thank God they haven't closed too.

Pictures

Rockets....

2009-03-22T21:18:00.000-04:00

Hmmm, where was I? Oh yeah, March 22, 2009. So...I'm behind but I'm going to try and catch up quickly.

One thing I will be doing is creating links for pictures. It is just too much work to inject pictures in between what I want to write here. I think that will help speed things up a bit.

:-)

So....back to March 22...we left Mt Trashmore to go play with rockets....

This was a Cub Scout effort that Chris's boys are involved with. One of the Dads, Brian, was there to show them how to build and light off the rockets. We had a couple of different types.

One was a neat contraption that would mix vinegar and baking soda to give off CO2 gas to propel the rocket up. Brian had the idea to shake it up to really mix it...and then it shot off over the trees into the neighbor's yard.

They also built a model rocket with a chemical engine that went quite a bit higher. All the boys had a great time!

If you look at the pictures below, you'll see that their minds weren't on rockets the whole time...but I guess that is to be expected.

We also had an Osprey come by with it's latest catch.

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Slideshow
and the slide show embedded below...bear with me while I work this out....

Weekends....

2009-03-22T20:46:00.000-04:00

Work is work. Week days are all work.

Evening time is homework, house work, cooking, eating, sometimes cleaning, then finding some relaxation after my son goes to bed.

Weekends are where the wild things are. Wild days, wild kids, wild nights, wild adventures, wild relaxation, and wild exhaustion.

Last weekend was a wild Sunday. My Girlfriend and I took the boys and a friend of hers to Mt. Trashmore. Mt. Trashmore is a dump that was converted into a huge park back in the early 70's I think. The boys ride ripstiks, bikes, play games, sports, run up the hill, down the hill, roll down the hill, and more there.

While the kids were playing, the parents were really hard at work keeping track of everyone....
After lunch we grabbed the GPS to find some geocaches!!

We found two caches, but the third eluded us. We had to race back to the house. Chris's boys are in scouts and they had a meeting at 4pm. They were learning about rockets! Meaning, they were going to shoot some off.

More on this later!

Disgusting doesn't even begin to describe it....

2009-03-16T19:04:00.002-04:00

I really don't know what the deal is, but my son has been gorging himself lately...when he is not under my supervision. I'm all for him eating more. The problem is that he is eating junk food, candy, etc.

The end result of which is he throws it up the next morning.

Again, not too big of a deal. I figure he'll learn or just get sick of the crud he is consuming, except, this past Saturday morning he vomited something way beyond foul into his BED. I'm already not pleased with having to address the issue at 5am on Saturday. I do not do to well around puke in general. This however was at a whole new level for me. Three times I tried to enter the room, and three times I was half a second away from becoming a secondary contributor. I'm not even sure I had anything to contribute, but I was certainly in danger of trying.

I had to knock the smell down somehow. Here is what I did. I went looking for an odor neutralizer, but found the Lysol. It did the trick. I sprayed it into the doorway of his room and took tentative steps in. So far so good. I kept up the tactic and doused whatever foul mixture exploded from my son's stomach. I then wrapped the whole thing up in the sheet and sped off to the washing machine. I'm not even going to try to bring his pillow back. Toxic Waste at this point.

So if you find yourself in this spot, and I sincerely hope you don't, Lysol or some strong odor neutralizer should get you to where you can take care of the problem without becoming part of the problem.

Fun, Sun, and more....

2009-03-08T20:23:00.009-04:00

Saturday was awesome. Saturday was warm. Saturday was sunny. Saturday we went to Richmond :-)

This story is mostly in pictures....and it is lengthy.

Our first stop was here:
The Virginia Aviation Museum
The museum has the COOLEST dioramas.

There are some fun interactive features too...like this Piper Brandon is in...
Or the flight simulator Brandon and John are playing (there are actually 3-4 of these there).

And Michael is exploring the planes on display inside.There is much more inside, engines, planes, a helicopter, models, etc. You have to go and see it!
Outside there is a F-14 Tomcat and a SR-71 Blackbird.

Chris and Michael in front of the SR-71. Worlds fastest jet. There are too many cool facts about this plane to tell here.After the museum we meandered over to Belle Isle in downtown Richmond, on the James River. You get to the island by suspended bridge, but the island was closed. With the snow this week we think there was a chance of flooding. However, there were plenty of geocaches to find on the north bank of the river. Plus there is a Civil War museum.

There were all kinds of things to climb on, rocks to jump about on, and we found three geocaches. Two micros and one ghost cache. If the trees had been in bloom it would have been prettier, but it was a fantastic day overall. The boy LOVED it. There was so much to see, do, and explore.

This was our ghost cache. A ghost cache is one where you just log that you were at the spot. This one was titled 'To bind up the Nations wounds". Abraham Lincoln came to Richmond just after the Confederate Army surrendered, to see the devastation of Richmond. Three days later he was assassinated.
The museum at this spot is fantastic. They have a cool spot with post it notes where you can write something and leave it there. :-)

We took so many more cool pictures, but I'm not going to show them all here. If you get a chance, Richmond is well worth a visit!

I have some friends in Richmond, but couldn't get any to come out and play with us! Maybe next time. Sunday was recovery from Saturday and the daylight savings time change. Nice to have another hour of daylight in the afternoon.

-Mike

Research and Diorama project....and Math

2009-02-26T00:17:00.002-05:00

So, after all the fighting my son did with me over the diorama research, he did write it out in his own words...and he got a 100 on the project.

He argues with me about math too. Today he tried again. I asked him who has been right and who has been wrong every time he tries to contest a math problem...he said "You've been right and I've been wrong". So he sat and listened to what I had to say.

How to be a Geek Goddess....

2009-02-25T23:48:00.002-05:00

I found this site today on Slashdot.

Geek Girlfriends.com

The site looks like it has a lot of great ideas for using technology to save money. Who can't use that?

I recommend you take a look!

The site is authored by Christina Tynan-Wood who also Authored the book: How to Be a Geek Goddess: Practical Advice for Using Computers with Smarts and Style
ISBN-13: 978-1593271879

Amazon had this to say about it:
Product Description

When it comes to technology (or anything, really), men and women rarely think alike. Men are obsessed with acronyms and the size of their hard drives. Women just want to get things done. And if they can get it done while shopping for a cute pair of shoes, even better.

How to Be a Geek Goddess shows you how to sort out technology decisions (and find those cute shoes online) without ever having to ask a man. Whether you're buying a computer, shopping for a cell phone, trapped in the electronics aisle, or simply lost on the Internet, author Christina Tynan-Wood explains it all with wit, intelligence, and a minimum of geeky acronyms.

You'll learn how to:

Buy the right computer for your needs, your decor, and your budget
Surf the Web with confidence, organize your life, and manage your finances
Master your email inbox, cell phone, and instant messaging
Keep yourself and your kids safe from spyware, viruses, and online scam artists
Reconnect with friends, grow your professional network, or find that special someone online

How to Be a Geek Goddess will show you how to join the Web conversation, start your own blog, and maybe even teach your friends a thing or two. Think of it as the tech-savvy girlfriend you wish you had on speed dial.

Research?? Who needs to do research?

2009-02-24T07:05:00.003-05:00

My son has diorama due today. He worked on it last week. He is depicting the signing of the Declaration of Independence....in legos.

His research consisted of printing out the wikipedia entry on the event.

He wanted to post that on his project. I told him that research means looking up the information and then writing about what you want to say in your own words. Printing out the article and stapling it to your project is taking credit for another person's work. I told him he cannot plagiarize. He was quite mad for a while, but when faced with the prospect of a indefinite restriction he relented and wrote his own version. :-)

It makes me feel like a drug pusher in a way. I give him some freedom. He takes it, does lots of things with his friends, he wants more, gets hooked...and then when he is out of line I take it away. He gets mad, goes into withdrawal, gets desperate, then does anything to get it back....

....and the 80's

2009-02-17T20:42:00.002-05:00

just a bit of nothingness really. For some reason I've been on an 80's kick the last few days. It started with really wanting to hear the Talking Heads, especially Pscho Killer. My iPod has an 80's auto-populated playlist. In the car I just hit that and hit random on the radio. It's been fun. I quiz my son, "Who's this?" "Who's that?". He can pick out Rush, The Cure, and the Talking Heads just about every time now. :-) poor kid.

Was watching the news this morning...

2009-02-17T20:09:00.002-05:00

While I was running at the gym. I was listening to Paramore, but reading the subtitles for the news. On one screen they were talking about Bristol Palin. I got to thinking about how people lived in the past and how they live today. There really isn't too much new under the sun, and human societies cope with life in a huge variety of ways.

There are so many definitions of success, hapiness, and love. You have to find the one that is right for you. There are also many different paths to get there, and no tried and true guaranteed formula for attaining what you want. Most of us have to face failure and difficult times. I have learned that once you go through some things then you can pretty much weather anything.

So what do you do when things don't go as planned? What do you do when the unexpected comes up? You make the best of what you have. Luck favors the prepared so you take your lessons as they come and try to be ready for the next thing. Bristol and her parents may not have planned this, but it happened and you do what you can from there. All is certainly not lost, not by a long shot. The economy isn't what we had hoped for at this point, but it certainly isn't the end of the world, and there is opportunity if you have the vision for it.

Life, the Universe, and Everything...

2009-02-15T08:23:00.004-05:00

or The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

I was going to write this Saturday. I was home sick (feels like Bronchitis). I was sitting on my couch with tea and a monster container of the most delicious chicken noodle soup I have ever had. I had just taken a smidgen of nyquil. My girlfriend had just picked up my son to take him skating for the afternoon and she was the one that brought me the nyquil, the soup, and a few other cold remedies (Thank you Chris!!).

I could either write some things in my blog that I had been wanting to write for a while, or I could watch "A Threevening with Kevin Smith". I chose the latter. I was saving Zack and Miri for Chris and I to watch together. Needless to say, Kevin Smith doesn't have any material that is really appropriate for children.

Brandon's school year got off to a very rough start. He wasn't on any medication and he didn't want to be. Middle school is a huge change. 30+ kids in each class, changing classes and teachers every hour. I expected big problems and I wasn't disappointed there. Mostly there was just a lot of inappropriate behavior and he wasn't turning in work. I had several meetings with the teachers from September through October. By the end of October he was failing two classes and doing just marginally better in the others. The teachers were frustrated and I was angry. They wanted to take him out of the AVID program and they said he would have to go back to leave the out of district school he was in.

We were working with the counselor every week. He was doing homework, but not really his classwork. He couldn't go on field trips unless I was there. They couldn't get the class part worked out, and because each teacher only had him for an hour they didn't know what to do.

I started him back on Vyvanse at the beginning of November. It is an ADHD medication. What Brandon says is "Dad, when I'm not taking Vyvanse it is like I can't tune anything out. I can't ignore anything. When I am, I can ignore the sounds and other things going on in the class." The teachers have been frankly amazed at the difference. The last report card just a few weeks ago he had all B's and one C. I'm pretty sure he'll have an A in his Advanced English by the end of the year, and probably an A in Advanced Math. His teachers have said the kids aren't shunning him anymore and he is making some real friends. I have been trying to get him out during the afternoons and the weekends to get into some sunshine, etc. We've been doing a lot of geocaches lately, exploring some cool trails, and talking about doing some camping in the spring. We have also been bringing some of the neighbors out on our adventures.

Brandon expressed an interest in going to a dance last week at school. He said he wanted to ask a girl to go. Hmmmm. It is the first time he has said anything about having an interest in a girl. So we talked about it. I gave him what very little advice I have about talking to girls and going to dances. I told him most people are nervous about asking someone out, and usually the person being asked can be just as nervous about answering. I said it gets easier the more you do it, so never miss an opportunity to do so. I told him that girls like it when you show an interest in them and when you are talking them you should ask them questions about their likes, dislikes, things they do, etc. When you are at a dance, girls like to dance and you should ALWAYS dance with them, whether you know how or not. It is all about having fun.

So what else has been going on? I've been dating some and now one person exclusively. Mostly I was trying to get out and meet people. You could call it "Coffee Encounters of the Third Kind". It really wasn't bad, I met some great people, and so far it has a really happy ending. On December 7th, I wrote this in my blog. Four hours later that woman wrote to me on Match. I didn't know it at the time though. We met a Panera Bread one afternoon just to talk. She said she wasn't really looking for a relationship, just looking to be friends and get out to do things like hiking, biking, etc. She didn't really want to do coffee or dinner, but suggested maybe do a hike or bike or something. There was a trail that was new to me that I wanted to bike on so I suggested maybe we do that sometime and we set that up. That story is here. Still just going out to do things as FRIENDS. She said she wanted to take things SLOW. Because of issues with Brandon, and work (more on work in a bit) I'm totally fine with that. However, things did progress a bit more rapidly than we expected or wanted. Friends quickly changed into exclusively dating, etc.

So for Valentine's Day, I am sick. The restaurant I wanted go to for dinner, my favorite in the area, is closed due to economic conditions. GRRRR. Others are booked, etc, but I found one that I really like and is accommodating. We were planning on sharing a babysitter as she has two children one and two years younger than Brandon. However, I am sick. She came and picked up Brandon to take him skating with a few other kids. They had a great time. I slept and laughed and took cold remedies. Dinner was fantastic. Afterward we just went to back to my empty house and watched Zack and Miri make a Porno, by Kevin Smith. Which is actually quite a fantastic Valentine's Day movie. You'll have to trust me and see it. It is very funny, crass as Kevin Smith normally is, and very well done.

So what has been keeping me from writing? Work. I'm not going to say too much about it, but it has been excruciatingly and increasingly difficult. I find myself having to work more and more from home in the evenings. I am very much aware that they would rather see me in the building until 7pm or later at night. I am not at all happy working for a group that brags about how much overtime they put in during the year. 400+ hours. I cannot do that with my son. It also cuts into the little time I have to myself.

So, the pendulum ever swings, and of the four main areas of my life, two seem to be doing well and one seems to be doing poorly, and one seems about neutral. It is the closest thing to balance I ever get, and I would rather have it this way than the alternatives. Brandon is doing so well right now.

Back to lighter and more fun things....
I got mentioned at Single Mommyhood for Valentine's Day. I want to return that sentiment. I also want to thank both Rachel and Dr. Leah for always being so open and inviting in all of their discussions. It is pretty fantastic to have a forum where topics can be discussed openly, honestly, and truthfully without fear of reprisal and where people seem to be rather open minded. I really enjoy the blogs of everyone on my blog roll and I have several I need to add. I'll get to it very soon.

I hope everyone had a great Valentine's Day and hope you are able to enjoy the weekend!

Goals

2009-02-02T21:12:00.003-05:00

Kind of like new years resolutions, but not....

Learn a little about backpacking and Virginia Trails and get out to do some hikes and camping with my son this spring. What I mean by learn a little is learn what the hell I am doing. I learned from Yosemite and other various adventures with my brother that just winging it can be deadly. I would like to make it a little less stressful and a lot more fun.

Find some nice calm kayak/canoe trails and do some of those. Do some dolphin watching from the kayak/canoe like I was able to get out and do once last summer.

Eat better. Hmmmm. I keep forgetting I don't mean better chocolate, ice cream, or pizza.

Find good fiber sources like FiberOne bars that don't make me so gastro-musical.

Exercise a little more consistently. I would like to not wake up on Monday morning feeling like road kill. Weekends like this past one are SO much fun, but I need day to recuperate.

At work my current motto is: "Lets work on solutions that are not new ways to be incompetent." We are making progress a little at a time.