Random Traffic Through Nick's Brain

7 foot bookshelf? No problem. Fits with the trunk closed.

The Question

A question I’m frequently asked is, “What do you do with your day.”

It’s hard to explain my day in a way that satisfies the questioner. It’s hard to communicate how much time is just spent ‘playing’ with Alex, feeding him, changing him, and keeping him fed, clean, happy, and stimulated. It’s also hard to explain how much he slows most tasks down. I’ve been thinking about how to describe my day… but I think the better thing to do is to describe my week. I’ll get around to that sometime… or not.

Writing

Things are both good and bad here. I actually have enough time to write… I’m just not in the right frame of mind. Part of it is that taking care of Alex seems boring to everyone except Dina, Alex, and I… and sometimes even we get bored of it. Part of it is that I’m in a quieter mood.

Sexism

Encountering a lot of subtle and not-so-subtle sexism as a stay-at-home dad, and quite frankly, as a dad period. I should be blogging more about this since it drives me nuts.

The one that’s currently stuck in my craw? A ‘friend’ of mine said “You’re rich. You can afford to take a year off to take care of Alex.” Would that person have said the same thing if Dina took the year off? I seriously doubt it.

Tell them you’re contemplating suicide and then tell them you’re not in the mood to talk.

Yeah, I’m a selfish bastard.

Who says you don’t get to stay up late and party when you’re a parent? Kid woke me up at 03:00 to do just that. 04:50 and still going strong.

Got rid of my dedicated / anonymous parenting blog and moved most of the content over to here. Too much effort to maintain multiple blogs.

Sitting him in front of iTunes visualizations while I warm his milk seems to work quite well.

We’ve decided to name our new car (well… our recently purchased used car) Dozer.

We had our first group gathering at our house on Sunday. It went well. I’m a bit bummed that we still haven’t organized gaming… but watching football was a good way to break us back into being social.

It also served as a good test for the contraptions I’d built to keep the sofa sections from moving. They worked. A piece of wood between each pair of sections with holes cut out for the feet. Since the feet are the only non-movable parts on the recliners, this seemed like the best way.

Speaking of being handy, I’ve also jury rigged a way to support a lot of the car seat weight on my waist (via my belt) when I’m carrying it. Jim suggested a neck strap for additional support and safety. I think I can accomplish that with an old camera bag strap. I also thought (and was backed up by Jim’s suggestion) that it’d be better to put small holes in the car seat so the hooks could hold better. I’ll ask the owners of the car seat when they next visit.

A B C

Ay, bee, see, dee
eee, eff, gee
aich, eye, jay, kay
ell-em-en-oh-pee
queue, arr, ess
tee, you, vee
double-you, ecks
why and zed
Now I know my ay, bee, sees…
Next time won’t you sing with me.

12 Ladybugs

Zero one two three
Four five six
Seven eight nine
Ten eleven twelve
Ladybugs came
To the ladybugs’ picnic
 
Zero one two three
Four five six
Seven eight nine
Ten eleven twelve
And they all played games
At the ladybugs’ picnic
 
They had twelve sacks so they ran sack races
They fell on their backs and they fell on their faces
The ladybugs 12
At the ladybugs’ picnic
 
They played jump rope but the rope it broke
So they just sat around telling knock-knock jokes
The ladybugs 12
At the ladybugs’ picnic
 
Zero one two three
Four five six
Seven eight nine
Ten eleven twelve
And they chatted away
At the ladybugs’ picnic
 
They talked about the high price of furniture and rugs
And fire insurance for ladybugs
The ladybugs 12
At the ladybugs’ picnic

Some BP employee predicted the BP catastrophe. Some operative predicted the September 11^th attacks. In hindsight, what were the higher ups thinking?

The problem is, many such predictions were made by many different people. Some have come to pass, some have not, some never will. How does one separate the wheat from the chaff without benefit of hindsight? With great difficulty. Think about the simple case of every day life. Do you see every Tom, Dick, and Harry making perfect decisions based on incomplete information?

The Verizon guy is getting chubby. Lame that I watch enough TV to notice.