That weird smile on my dog is permanent- something's up with her lip. We've been doing some long-intended work on River's room, and Elizabeth took a break from painting a mural on River's wall to snap this picture.
Posted 9:14 pm | Add a commentI probably haven't spent a lot of time on this little corner of the internet discussing my love of all things Pixar, but trust me it's significant. Which makes this my one complaint all the more significant. It has been much discussed in my household, and I've finally decided to start my own little grassroots internet campain. It's a very simple idea:
For those of you who don't know these little details, Luxo is the cute little light that bounces out and squashes the "I" in Pixar at the beginning of their movies. And isn't it really about time that Luxo's lightbulb was reblaced with a Compact Flourescent Lamp (CFL) light bulb?
Pixar even made a short promotional commercial encouraging the use of CFL bulbs, but Luxo still has a plain old round bulb. When I saw the first teaser for WALL.E (where WALL.E changes Luxo's bulb) I had big hopes that WALL.E would do the right thing, but sadly, he replaces Luxo's bulb with a regular round bulb. Very sad.
But surely, if enough people suggest it, Pixar will do the right thing.
So, pick up the call, internets:
Posted 8:31 pm | Add a commentHey Quinn-
Sometime over the last year (and it's not entirely clear to me when this happened) you stopped being a little kid and started being a slightly less little kid. First, you started reading and writing like a machine- 31 Magic Treehouse books- read. 10 Weird School books- done. 3 My Weird Treehouse books- written and illustrated. Remember when I'd make you read Ten Apples up on Top again and again? And you didn't like it? That's gone. You like everything you read. Last night you stayed up reading till midnight to finish a book so you could start the new Magic Treehouse book
Also, you stopped being scared of things the way you used to. Sometimes now you can even watch a slightly scary movie right before bed without waking up 40 times. You don't even mind if your closet is open a few milimeters any more.
I think it hit me how much you grew up this year when we were playing catch in the front yard earlier this summer. After reading some books about baseball, you have decided you are a jock (you didn't get that from me, kid) so I was out in the front yard with you pretending that I know how to throw a baseball better than I do. You were doing pretty well catching, but then suddenly you missed one, and it hit you square in the chest. I could feel the thud from 15 feet away. But amazingly, you shook it off.
Two months earlier that hit would have been worth at least 30 minutes of screaming and crying and blaming me for throwing the ball right to you instead of over to some remote corner of the yard. But you just shook it off, and kept playing through the tears welling up in your eyes.
Another thing that freaked your mom and I out is how well you handled the swim team. We decided that this year you and Tuesday were going to learn to swim, damnit, and we were going to make this happen. We decided to sign you up for the swim team, which has practice every day.
For two hours.
We figured you'd last a week or so.
But you slugged it out.
You lasted that whole season, even though you still weren't managing much more than a dog paddle. At the end of two months of meets, you still couldn't even pass your band test to get run of the pool. Then when the regular practices ended, you asked the coach if you were allowed to go to the practices for the kids who qualifed for the post season meets, and you went to those even when Tuesday didn't. I guess something suddenly kicked in during those practices, becase that Friday, you decided to take your band test. While you were waiting in line, someone came up and started talking to mom and I, and by the time they left, you weren't standing there anymore. We couldn't find you until we realized that the kid swimming in the pool and lifting his arms all the way out of the water was you. All of a sudden I guess everything just clicked for you.
When you finished the test you ran all the way from the far end of the pool to the front desk with your arms up high in the air and your chest stuck out like you had just won a marathon. I don't need a picture of that moment to remember it clearly for the rest of my life. I don't think I've ever seen you so proud of yourself, and you earned every bit of that pride.
Happy summer, Quinn. Can't wait to see what second grade does for you.
-Dad
Posted 7:05 am | Add a commentSo I've got some pictures from a 4D ultrasound we had done last night up for you to check out in the gallery
Okay, I got some video up on the YouTube (seems like that's what all the kids are doing these days). I'll probably be adding more soon, so keep checking back if you're interested.
Posted 7:40 am | Add a commentWhen I become a record studio executive (right after I become an animal cracker designer), I'm going to put together a colloction of sardonic covers of insipid pop songs. It's going to have Cat Power doing Wonderwall, Ted Leo doing since you Been Gone, and this:
Posted 12:21 pm | Add a commentSomeone posted this note on the refrigerator in our lunch room (for the record, I did not steal the lunch, nor did I post the note).
Posted 10:24 am | Add a commentI've been working on a recipe for ultimate bike ride banana bread for a while now. The idea is a very healthy banana bread loaded up with lots of good stuff for recovering after a long ride- lots of good complex carbohydrates, a little bit of protein, some omega 3 fatty acids, antioxidants, and a few good old fashioned simple carbs. It's pretty damned good so far, and I thought I'd share the recipe. Here's what you'll need.
Stir the whey, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together in a small bowl, and set aside. In another small bowl, mash the bananas up, and set that aside too.
Use a mixer to mix the yogurt and sugar, then add the eggs one at a time, then the milk. Alternate adding the whey mixture and the bananas until everything is all mixed up, then stir in the walnuts, wheat germ, oats and chocolate chips.
I don't have the cooking time quite down yet, but try 45 minutes, and test it by sticking a toothpick into the middle and see if it comes out clean.
Next time I make a batch, I'm going to try substituting the flour with more whey protein, if it works out I'll post the revision here.
Posted 9:23 am | Add a commentThis weekend my Treo bit the dust. At first it was a given that I would repair it, but as I've been thinking about it more and more, I think I may go with a cheaper phone and ditch the PalmOS and all the code I've written for it. PalmSource has simply not shown me any indication that the platform is alive, and the last time I sat down to write some code for it, I realized that I can't even do HTTP calls without paying for a 3rd party library. I could do better than that on my 3 year old Nokia.
I haven't made a final decision yet, but I am leaning towards ditching the Palm platform for the first time since I used my original US Robotics Palm.
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Posted 10:22 am | Add a comment
