Random Musings

It's been a while, so naturally I have a few things on my mind.

1. For one reason or another, we found ourselves in Florence (SC) the last two Saturdays. I really haven't been there in quite some time, perhaps since early January. Florence has the closest Target, Best Buy, big book stores, and so on. We go there anytime we need to get those (many) items that aren't available in Hartsville. I am pleased to announce that both the mall and other stores (Kohl's) appeared to be fairly busy. The mall actually looked busier than it did in late November, at the height of the Christmas shopping season. Even if it's people spending tax refunds, I'll take it. It's good to see people spending money again.

2. In an interesting profile of Billy Corgan in the latest issue of Rolling Stone magazine (links to the TOC, article isn't online yet), former Smashing Pumpkins drummer Jimmy Chamberlain talks about his departure from the band. Nothing earth shattering there, or that Corgan's ego is still firmly in place despite being a pop culture non-entity since 1996. Chamberlain had an excellent quote about the current state of music:

"Music is such a small part of people's lives now...People don't sit around like they did in the Nineties and stare at album covers and think about Kurt and Billy."

This got me thinking about popular music -- do kids today listen to music the same way we used to back in Nineties? Or is this a disgruntled rock star venting about his former boss?

3. Maybe the most interesting thing about using Facebook is having friends from disparate universes argue with each other. For instance, an elementary school friend that I haven't seen since the other Bush was the P.U.S.A. got into a debate with my brother-in-law. Wild!

4. I'm not surprised that Darlington County had one of the lowest rates of return for the 2000 Census. The level of ignorance around here is stunning. Filling out the form takes minutes and might have made a difference here.

5. In related news, my wife had a PTO meeting last week -- staying at work until 7 PM, making for a 12 hour day -- and only two of her kids' parents showed up. Baseball practice > School function, evidently.

6. Wyatt will soon be 18 months old and Owen will be four in May. Unbelievable how time flies! We've been trying some gluten with Owen, and we haven't seen any negative results. We actually spent the night with my parents and he didn't have an issue with the cat, either.

7. We've finally started seeing signs of Spring around Hartsville. It has been the longest, coldest winter that I've had since leaving Pittsburgh in 1990. It rarely made it out of the 40s from late December until the end of February. Several weeks during that time, the temperatures never made it out of the 30s. It snowed three or four times, twice with significant accumulation. We had an ice storm, knocking out power for six hours. So weird! But I've really appreciated upper 50s-low 60s the last ten days or so.

8. The Pacific miniseries has started on HBO. Not surprisingly, it is excellent and I really enjoyed the first episode. HBO is streaming the first episode, but will make you buy HBO or maybe pay for the streams after that. Great marketing move for them -- and I think a unique one at that. They control their programming pretty tightly, so this is a big step forward (from my standpoint).

Again into the Fray

I don't even know what the title means. I guess into the fray of blogging.

Anyway, another year has begun...2010. Sounds so futuristic. I remember being a little kid thinking 2000 was so far away, but here I am living in the future.

Wyatt got his ear tubes last month, so we've been antibiotic free for almost 40 days now! He is feeling a lot better now and seems to be talking a lot more...although it is his patented form of Ewok and Vietnamese. Although he has always had a pleasant disposition, he is just really happy right now. He must have had a lot of discomfort with his ears for quite some time -- constant pain for months.

Owen is Owen -- funny, stubborn and wickedly smart. He has a steel trap memory and recalls minute details of sights and conversations from months ago. He obviously gets the memory from his mother, because it is a good day if I remember what I had for breakfast this morning (oatmeal!)

Here are some things I hope to accomplish this year:

1. Lose 25 pounds. Yeah, original I know...
2. I would like to run a mile. Silly, but I haven't really done that yet. I always walked it in high school
3. Become a flexitarian. I'm not sure if I would miss meat or not, but I have already started to cut back on the meat intake.
4. I would really like to get up to Pittsburgh for one more Penguins game in the Mellon Arena, but it's probably cost prohibitive at this point. Everyone and their brother will be doing that this Spring, and there are only a handful (less than 20) games left.
5. Bake my own bread. I miss making bread and cookies -- why do I only do that during the holidays? I have a great whole wheat bread recipe, but it takes 12-24 hours to proof -- so I have to plan ahead

Five accomplishments is enough for now.

A Monkey Looks at One!

A year ago, we were getting ready for Wyatt to join the family. After nine months of worry with various health scares - low amniotic fluid and the potential for genetic defects and damage while inside the womb -- Wyatt Davis was born a healthy, happy little baby.

Fortunately, he didn't have any of the severe allergy issues that his older brother had, only light cradle cap and the occasional eczema spot on his legs.

It's been a whirlwind year beginning with me staying home with him for November and December, the crazy daycare situation (water, lights and car repossessed etc), Wyatt staying with the Williamses until the end of the school year, and finally getting to go to "school" with Owen (yay!) this Fall.

Although developmentally he is a few weeks behind where he should be, he is a very strong and healthy baby. Only one ear infection and no other major illnesses, unlike his brother who was sick a lot his first year.

He is walking along furniture and can even climb some steps, but it will be a while before he is walking unassisted. Owen, on the other hand, began walking unassisted the day before his first birthday.

We probably shouldn't be comparing the Owen and Wyatt's development cycle, because each child is different. Second children, I am told, develop more slowly and Wyatt was two weeks premature, adding to the time frame.

My only wish is that he would start sleeping through the night on a regular basis. He will sleep through maybe 1-2 in a two week stretch. Last night, Lisa was up at 4am giving him a bottle. The night before that, I was up at 1:45am. Two nights before that, he slept through the night without a peep. It will come around, probably when we get him weaned off of formula.

But what a year it has been! Time flies when you are having fun...

Home and Another School Year Begins...

It's one of the last quiet weeks here at Coker, at least until the Christmas holiday. I'm wrapping up the last major project of the summer, accumulating the various statistics for the many electronic resources we have.

So far, the statistics are slightly higher than they were last year -- even though we had fewer number of students enrolled. Our book circulation numbers are pretty flat, unfortunately. It's difficult to get students to use and read books when the databases and open Internet available to them 24/7.

Next week, we'll have the traditional back to campus meetings and the students will begin filing in next weekend. It was yet another quick summer here at Coker!

As for home, all is well. Wyatt is beginning to pull up on furniture and move around. He still has the happy disposition, for the most part. Both boys have had mild fevers off and on this week, with Wyatt coming off of a pretty severe ear infection (requiring back to back doses of antibiotics).

Owen can be very difficult at times because he is very headstrong and stubborn. His personality has changed a lot in the last few months. I can't help but wonder if this has to do with the older kids at daycare over the summer or just a natural progression.

He still astounds me with his knowledge and intelligence almost daily. He will remember the most minute detail, like who gave him a t-shirt a year ago. Last night, he pieced together a pun in the story I read him: a mother comes home from work and calls her husband and son "dears" because they are pretending to wear antlers. Owen said "Reindeers have antlers, too!"

We may have the beginnings of sibling rivalry, too. Owen can't let Wyatt touch any of his toys without snatching it away from him. Wyatt adores Owen, too...following him around the house as quickly as possible.

Family Vacation Roadtrip

We had our first lengthy roadtrip vacation as a family of four last week. We had a blast, although it was exhausting at times. We're actually all still exhausted, and Owen has actually come down with some sort of fever.

Briefly, we drove from H-ville to Toronto and on the return trip, spent some time in Pittsburgh.

Here are some things I learned:

• The portable DVD player was the best $100 I've spent on Owen yet -- minus medical costs and food, of course. Even if he watched the 10 minutes of bonus features of Cars about 400 times in the 28 hours we spent in the van.
• The engineers who blasted the West Virginia Turnpike out of those mountains way back in the 1950s deserve some sort of commendation. What a long and winding road. People really overlook the importance of the highway system and Eisenhower's leadership in this area. Shame we got the idea from Adolf Hitler...
• We broke the drive up in two halves, staying in Morgantown, WV the first night. It was a perfect amount of time on the road -- around 8 hours or so, with frequent stops.
• Speaking of stops, Owen did an excellent job with potty stops -- only a couple more than what Lisa and I would have done if we were driving sans kids.
• Toronto is a wonderful city. Even with a city worker strike, the city was clean and most everyone was marginially friendly -- it doesn't help to have a cute baby with you either!
• Canadians are proud of their country. We were there during Canada Day, and most everyone wore flags or red shirts -- even the skate punks at the coffee shop in the Beaches. Much more patriotic than in the U.S., it seemed.
• One cool thing (and I wish I got a picture of it) is that the city of Toronto gives each household a larger recycling bin than garbage can! In fact, my sister-in-law informed me that the trash can has a false bottom, making it even smaller than it looks. How great is that? Darlington County is so far behind in recycling that it's pathetic. They don't even take office paper or junk mail unless it is shredded. Like public education here, it isn't a priority.
• Wyatt learned how to crawl during the trip, which was amazing considering how little floor space we had at our hotels and in-laws. I rarely put him on the ground for fear he would have been trampled by his brother and cousins. But he is moving around pretty well, and he has four teeth in with two more coming in.
• We tried to go see Niagara Falls. But traffic from Toronto to Niagara Falls was pretty heavy, and it was really crowded when we did get there. Owen saw the Falls, but wasn't impressed. On to Pittsburgh!
• Owen called Pittsburgh "Rothelisberger"
• We ate at a very loud and crowded Primanti Brothers Restaurant while waiting for the fireworks. It was excellent, but I don't think Lisa was impressed. Oh well. What's not to like with french fries and slaw IN your sandwich?
• Our hotel in Pittsburgh was expensive, but very close to PNC Park and the fireworks. What a show! And only a five minute walk from our hotel down to the Allegheny River. I realized that this was the first 4th of July fireworks I'd ever seen in Pittsburgh because we were always on the Outer Banks that week.
• We planned to go to the Zoo, but we were all out of steam by that point. A seventh night in a hotel room might have put us over the edge, so after a couple of stops (for food and formula), we decided to head back to Hartsville.
• We borrowed a GPS, which made the trip a little more interesting. We changed the voice to French and British English for fun. It was nice to have a list of close hotels when we got to Pittsburgh, and we could find a Wal-mart with ease. It definitely was good to have, and if we travelled more often, we would buy one ourselves.
• The GPS said it would take almost 11 hours to get home from Pittsburgh, but we made it home in under 10 with three stops.

New blog, school ending, kids

I've started up a new blog that will cover the activities of the Coker Library - Information Technology Center. Check it out at cokerlibrary.blogspot.com. Mostly library news and information, it probably will only be of interest to Coker students, faculty and staff. But maybe random people might find it interesting.

The semester ends early next week for the day students and the end of next week for our evening school students. Graduation is May 2, at 9 am. Seems like I was just helping the freshmen move in to their dorms back in August. Wyatt wasn't even born yet! Amazing how quickly time passes...

Speaking of Wyatt, he is now nearly seven months old. He is cutting some teeth and is getting close to sitting up on his own. He is an extremely laid-back baby, so we often "forget" about him. Now before you call social services, we don't really forget about him. But he often will just chill in his bouncy seat while we are busy in other parts of the house. He rarely cries when he is hungry or needs a diaper change -- only first thing in the morning most of the time. He adores watching Owen and has a smile for everyone. Fortunately, his allergies are very mild compared to Owen at this stage. A little bit of cradle cap and eczema, but no where near the level that Owen had.

Owen turns three in two weeks. What an amazing little boy! So smart, funny and getting bigger each day. Fortunately, he has his mother's amazing memory. He remembered that that Lisa's dad gave him a specific shirt a year and half ago.

Mr. Mom -- again

I'm officially on leave now until the end of the year. We decided to keep Wyatt out of daycare until the new year for a couple of reasons.

First, we both really hate the idea of dropping off a six week old to daycare. It always made me sad to see other parents do this at Owen's old daycare. Immune system, overall development, and sleep/eat routine are easier to create from home with his parents/relatives.

Secondly, the money issue. We're obviously saving several hundred dollars keeping him home for as long as possible. We have a daycare lined up which will cost $2 an hour. Say we drop him off at 8 am and pick him up at 4 pm (which would almost never happen) five days a week and you have another $80 departing our checking account. Most likely, it will be 8-5 making the daycare bill closer to $90. Ugh, it makes me irritable just thinking about it.

But things have been running pretty smoothly so far. He's sleeping well, which is always a good thing. He is much like Owen at this age, pretty agreeable and very portable. He must of had a growth spurt last week because he was irritable and didn't sleep much during the day. I wasn't on duty last week; that fell to my mother-in-law.

It has been bitterly cold (at least for SC) here so far this week -- barely getting out of the lower 40s for highs. My plan was to work in the yard and take him outside as much as possible (walks), but the wind a temperatures have made that a little difficult. Hopefully, it will warm up or the winds will drop so we can get out this afternoon.