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I am now off on "vacation," which involves being in charge of Rex from noon today until Sunday night as Ben and Lynn head to Oregon to visit her brother, and then taking all next week off as well as Labor Day. I've planned for months to not have work piled, and have mostly succeeded. There's a fair pile awaiting my return to full-time on Sept. 2, but I'm staying put and having fun. Happy new work year?
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Ben: The dung is on the plane! [after reading about dung beetles in a book]
Me: I don't think dung really needs to be on a plane.
Ben: The dung is flying the plane.
Me: But dung is an inanimate object. Like a rock. Can a rock fly a plane?
Ben: Yes! A rock can fly a plane!
Me: I would prefer not to fly that airline.
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Rex has a new word: ding! I put a bell on my bike recently, something I've long resisted for its sheer nerd-a-liciousness. But the bike trails and streets are more crowded as folks shed cars for cycles, and I find myself calling out "passing" or "on your left/right" very often. Since everyone is obligated by a dictate from Apple to be wearing headsets while walking or running (and very ill-advisedly while biking), my voice doesn't carry far. The bell works nicely, and I think it's less irritating to people. They also seem to obey it more quickly than a voice alert. Ben and I take the bus to his childcare most mornings these days. I load my bike on...
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I haven't posted anything since Rex's hand-foot-mouth disease experience, so I merely note that the boys are healthy and well. Ben got twin blisters on his feet from new sandals; he will be wearing flip flops soon. Ben is now in the oldest age group classroom (Jungle) at his child care, and enjoying it, although it's clearly a little stressful. This is the pre-school room, and Ben, at nearly 4, is just 15 months away from kindergarten, unbelievably to Lynn and I. Several kids left the room at the start of summer, since they'll start KG in the fall; several more will leave then. The room will mostly then be full of kids he knows, although many of...
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Rex has hand-foot-mouth disease, which produces sores in the mouth and throat, and on the soles of the feet and palms, plus fever, and he's pretty miserable. But we got through what we think are the worst couple days, and he's sleeping well now. The boys' merger at night has gone beautifully, with two full weeks under our belt until last night, when Rex woke miserable at 8-something. Ben slept through it. Rex spent the night with us, and did sleep a 6-hour stretch (as did we). H-F-M passes in under 7 days, and based on the symptoms tomorrow might be day 4 or 5, even. Poor guy. Jello and pudding is in his future--tomorrow! I...
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So...Lynn and I decided Rex was old enough to not freaking sleep in our room any more at night. Don't get us wrong: He needed to be nearer to us during his months of ear infections. But we'd hit a stride with him. He was getting himself well back to sleep on the rare occasions that he was waking up. Ear infections seem to be past with ear tubes and better weather. He's sleeping til about 6.15 am, which is late morning in babyworld. We'd tried to merge the boys in Ben's room (now redubbed Ben and Rex's room) several months ago. We had a couple decent nights and then two that just didn't work. We gave up...
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My alma mater, Yale, tired of turning away qualified applicants, is boosting storage space, er, dormitories, um, residential colleges! They're building 2 more for a total of 14. Yale's colleges, each of which houses about 400 to 500 students, date back mostly to the 1930s, with the last two built in the 1960s. Old Campus houses about 80% of freshmen, in historic buildings, renovated every once in a while to put in central heating or insulation. The new colleges will be ready by 2013, and increase enrollment by about 15 percent (from roughly 5,200 today). The alumni interviewing committee just sent out a flyer that said only about 8 percent of applicants were accepted in this year's...
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Rex walks! Several steps at a time now. Pretty confident about it. Rex talks! Down, shoes, jay (as in blue jay), and a host of b words, sometimes indistinguishable: banana, book, ball, block, Ben, bottle, and so on. When Rex doesn't know what something's called, he points at it and says, "Bah!"
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I wrote a short, but I think interesting article about IPv6, the next-generation Internet address scheme, and why it's both critical but not urgent to transition to it. We're watching a very slow-moving accident as a train approaches a bunch of cars parked on a road, and everyone is mosying slowly to their cars, jangling their keys, to drive them off the tracks. IPv6 replaces the current IPv4 addressing systems--numbers like 192.168.1.2--with a much larger set of possible numbers. 4 billion to the fourth power numbers, in fact. This isn't because we need untold sextillions of numbers. Rather, it's because it's easier to divvy the network up into large pieces...
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Ben and I took a very brief trip to Port Townsend to visit the 'rents and my aunt and uncle on Thursday and Friday. This was kind of a dry run, since we have traveled about 5% as much as most of our friends with one or two kids. Ben has gone to Connecticut by plane three times (Lynn's parents), and I think to Eugene by car three times (my folks). Rex has never slept away from home, unbelievably. But we're planning a modest trip in the fall to Maine, and we're thinking about traveling a bit more this summer, so we're trying to figure...
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It just struck me why politicians are required to kiss babies. Because to hold a baby and interact with it requires some measure of empathy. Parents recognize real empathy. A politician with children (or even without) that can't fake that--yes, I'm trying to be funny--can't connect. The Bush photo is him hamming it up, obviously, but look at the genuine delight on Hillary's face at right. One could argue that by mirroring the baby's expression, Bush is showing true empathy, too, just not of the appealing kind.
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I was given the pleasure of babysitting this fine child last night. My first time being asked to babysit, though perhaps nearly three years of caring for one child and one year of caring for two may qualify me. She's a sweetheart.
Ellie Smile
Originally uploaded by GlennFleishman
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Rex has been gaining words apace. He has "car," "buh-bye," and a few others. Last night was the capper at dinner, though. "Are you all done, Rex?" "Ah duh." Whoa. "All done?" He does it again: "Ah duh." Pretty cool. Two words!
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I was about to leave my house to drive to Tacoma to a bar (crazy thing for a parent to actually a. leave the house at night and b. go to a bar) on Wednesday, and while I was putting the baby down for the night, I heard this loud humming I couldn't identify. At first, I thought our newish furnace was acting up again, but then realized the sound was coming from outside. I walked out front to the car, looked up, and saw three freaking news helicopters hovering over the bus accident in the Arboretum. A genius bus driver, following his GPS and ignoring four signs (including flashing lights) about overheight vehicles shaved nearly two...
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Rex is nearly 1! Lynn is nearly __! (Never reveal a woman's age.) We are a bit tired. My parents just passed through on a visit; Lynn's mom is here now, and her dad arrives shortly. Rex is sleeping generally well, but 6 am is the latest he's getting up. Some mornings it's 5. He's waking at night every few nights. The ear infections are over, and we're trying to get into a new rhythm. Lynn and I are (knock wood) going to the nicest restaurant in Seattle Tuesday night to celebrate our 5th wedding anniversary...which was last September.
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