Friday, 01 April 2011
So here we are one-quarter of the way through the year.
I am happy to announce that I have a new job. Same company, same location (well, same building, different department). I’m not sure on my start date yet, but it will be sometime around Monday the 11th.
This is great news and great timing because, as I’ve alluded to at this blog, lay-offs are coming in a major way to the department I currently work in. Specifically, about one-third of my department will be axed on the 12th, and the rumor is that the department itself is to be phased out of existence throughout the summer.
It’s strange to think that I am the only one of my co-workers who is guaranteed employment past the middle of the month…but that’s how it’s looking at the moment. It’s really weird to see all my co-workers fixing up their resumes, looking on line for jobs, and showing up at work dressed all classy because they’re going on interviews. I suppose I’ve had co-workers that have done this all the time (i.e., everyone who’s ever quit), but this is the first time so many people are being so open about it. Very odd.

Saturday, 02 April 2011
Today we went for our first walk outside the house this year. That’s not to say we haven’t done any exercising; both Jennifer and I have paid visits to the workout room. But today we ventured out into the great outdoors. I had Isla in our ergo and Owen collected sticks as we went. We walked first to the local co-op but then, deciding we hadn’t done enough walking, we walked around the neighborhood a little more. We then went into the co-op, picked up some stuff for dinner, then walked back home.
While Isla continued to sleep in the ergo, we looked up a nearby geocache and headed back out to find it. No luck. This marks the second time I’ve gone looking for a cache and turned up empty handed. In our defense, there were lots of muddy leaves, trash, and ice in the area where we were looking. We’ll check back again for this geocache soon (it’s less than a thousand feet from our front door).
Also, my wife made this page on our website of Isla’s month-to-month growth. Check it out: CLICK HERE.

Sunday, 03 April 2011
Today is my wife’s birthday, which we celebrated by dining at Buca. This was our third consecutive occasion feasting at Buca for my wife’s birthday, but I think this might have been the most disappointing one.
For one thing, the apple Gorgonzola salad – normally one of our most favorite dishes – tasted as if the lettuce was a couple days past expiration date. For another thing, my wife picked out the fettuccine pasta, and it was quite bland. I doused my serving with liberal amounts of pepper, and I kept spicing things up by filling up on the bread instead.
The dessert was delicious, however, as we were eating it, the waitress asked us if we had any coupons. Here’s something she – and every waitstaff member should know – Don’t ask people if they have a coupon! If they do have a coupon, they’ll remember to use it, and if they don’t have a coupon (we didn’t), then they’ll feel like they’ve been cheated out of something (I did). The waitress said it was too bad we didn’t have a coupon, ’cause then we could’ve gotten our dessert for free. Thanks, lady. Thanks a ton.
Anyway, I guess we’ll try again next year.

Wednesday, 30 March 2011

A few days ago, my wife and I finished editing and uploading some recent home videos of Isla and I keep forgetting to post them here. So, here they are:

This one was filmed earlier this month. Something just tickled Isla about her brother’s yelling. She thought it was hilarious and even waved her hand in imitation of him (presumably to get him to keep doing it). We finally pulled out the camera and caught some of her laughing:

Here’s another video of her laughing. Jennifer recorded this with her iPhone, so the image quality isn’t as good, but it’s good enough:

And here she is clapping. This video was recorded over a month ago – she’s much more vigorous about it now:

Thursday, 31 March 2011

Today I attended a “How to be a straight ally” meeting and luncheon put on by PFLAG (a really terrible acronym that stands for “Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians And Gays”). I figured that I should attend since I am such a strong supporter of free lunches.

The main point of the meeting was that, even if you’re straight, you can still be an ally of the gay-rights movement. She noted that people often don’t like to defend GLBTs because then their co-workers might think that they are GLB or T, too. It’s like this: Let’s say that I say to my co-workers, “Hey, I don’t like that joke, it’s demeaning to women.” Well, no one’s going to think that I’m a woman. And if I say, “Woe, that joke’s kind of racist,” no one is going to think that I am black (or whatever race is being ridiculed at the moment). But if I say, “Um, I don’t really like jokes against gays,” then people might start thinking…”hey, is he gay?”

The speaker noted that in some states it is still legal to fire people for being gay or lesbian. In some states, it’s even legal to fire employees simply for expressing their sexuality in a non-traditional manner (e.g., A woman who wears men’s shirts, or a guy who uses a ‘man bag‘).

She continued by offering some ways in which straight people can be an ally and gave everyone resources for continuing support. I got a rainbow-colored magnet to put up in my cube that says “I support Equality at [name of employer].”

After the PLFAG representative completed her talk, the employee who had set up the event got up and gave some closing remarks. After telling us to take the papers on the table and to visit the website, she announced – whilst getting choked up – that she was bisexual. Wow. I’ve never actually been there before when someone ‘came out.’

Monday, 28 March 2011

So, last night’s episode of The Amazing Race turned out to be one big commercial for Snapple (just click on that Amazing Race link and you’ll see what I mean). This happens every once in a while – Suvivor does it, too – there will be an episode that features a name brand; sometimes the players are playing to win a box of tools from Home Depot, or maybe they have to assemble a piece of furniture from IKEA. It doesn’t usually bother me.

In last night’s Snapple-fest, teams first had to stop at a tea store and sample some tea (nothing Snapple about that). Then, after arriving in India, they had to taste from 1,000 cups of tea and pick out the one that matched the flavor they had tasted prior to their flight. The clue they received after finishing that task was an unlabeled bottle of Snapple (the clue was printed on the underside of the cap). Anyway, when the first team checked in, Phil (the host) asked the team if they’d noticed the tea-influenced tasks of the leg. He also announced that Snapple was coming out with two new flavors and – as the winners of that leg of the race – they’d be the first to sample these new flavors. He presented two bottles to the team (holy shitty reward, Batman!). Actually, there was more to the reward than that (i.e., $20,000), but it’s funny how prominent Snapple was featured, especially considering that there were about four Snapple commercials during the show.

And that brings me to today: the three of us (I’m excluding Isla because she’s still crawling around the house and babbling like a drunkard) thought the new flavors sounded pretty enticing. I had an item to return to Target, so I stopped there on my way home, returned my item, received store credit, then ventured over to the grocery section. Lots of Snapple…no new flavors. Epic loss for Snapple – instead of extolling the wonders of the flavors, I am bemoaning the fact that, for probably the first time ever, product placement consciously caused me to attempt to buy said product, only to be unable to find it for sale.

Next:
Check out this graphic of Japan’s aftershocks. You just kind of have to watch it, you can’t manipulate as much as you’d like (or maybe I should say I can’t manipulate it as much as I’d like).

And if that’s too depressing, check this out (I laughed ’til I cried):

Tuesday, 29 March 2011

I arrived at Hamline University this morning for the first time in 12 days. I parked, as usual, four blocks away from class. When I was about a block away, I crossed over Hewitt Avenue, then began walking west towards my classroom. I noticed that, for some reason I couldn’t quite determine, a fifty foot stretch of Hewitt was thick with ice. There was no obvious runoff from the buildings, and the land around is pretty flat, so I couldn’t attribute the ice to snow coming down any hill. I thought to myself, “Wow, drivers are gonna have some trouble here.”

Moments later, a line of five cars came passing by (heading east). The first one slid a little bit, but no problem. The second car, seeing the ice, slowed down ever so slightly. The next two cars proceeded in a similar fashion. I think the patch of ice was a real shock because no where else was there any ice (indeed, I never came across any at all on my to school or work today). If it was a snowy or icy day, the drivers probably would’ve been preparing for such icy patches, but this was completely unexpected.

The fifth driver hit the patch and began fish-tailing a little bit. Since there were no other cars around, he should’ve just kept driving and, though he may have slid into the other lane, he wouldn’t have faced any issues. But he didn’t “just keep driving.” Instead, he decided to slam on his brakes. This caused his car’s back end to slide uncontrollably to the left and then, sliding forward, he crashed into a snowbank and surely would’ve landed onto the very sidewalk I was traversing had he not been stopped by a tree. He hit the tree dead-center, so that it buckled in the front of his car pretty bad. The tree made a snapping sound, though it appeared to weather the punch. Once the momentum ceased, gravity took over and the car, now 6 inches shorter than it had been, slid back down onto the road. A sixth car, approaching slowly, drove into the opposing lane to get around the wreckage.

I walked about another fifty feet before turning and going inside a building (from where I could no longer see the car). When I left (about 90 minutes later), the car was gone. A big chunk of tree bark was gone from the tree, and there were enough pieces of the car on the snowbank to build a scale-model replica of the original car.

As I passed by the tree, another car slid on the ice patch (no incidents). About five minutes later, I made the treacherous trek verrrry sloooowly.

Somebody should do something about that.

Saturday, 26 March 2011

Today I attended my niece’s five-year birthday party. I’ve actually been to all five of her birthday parties. I don’t think I have a perfect attendance record for anyone else like that.

The other day, I made some off-hand comment that Owen had been to more birthday parties in his life that I’ve been to in my life. Owen didn’t believe me, but then we started counting–

We’ve both been to all the parties each member of our immediate family has had, and we’ve been been to my niece’s (his cousin’s) five birthday parties. But while I’ve been to four birthday parties for friends, he’s been to at least seven. And just about a month ago, he attended the party of someone he hardly knew.

Maybe I should start a list for him.

Sunday, 27 March 2011

So, by popular demand (including a phone call from my brother-in-law at a quarter to ten last night), I have decided to upload the footage of my time spent on the Oprah Winfrey Show stage. Here it is:

I am quick to note here that I do not have the copyrights for this footage. However, in an agreement I signed, I only agreed to not benefit financially off of my interview. So I just want to make that clear: I’m not posting this with the intent of making any money, and if any of the proper copyright holders do have an issue with my uploading it onto the WWW, please let me know and I will remove it.

Did I ever mention that my appearance on the show came with multiple limo rides, two free nights in fancy-schmancy hotel and a $160 room service credit? Yeah, I ordered four orange juices with my breakfast on the first morning. And five on the second.

Wednesday, 23 March 2011

I love when I wonder about something, and then an answer just comes at me from an unexpected source. Check out this blog entry from one of my friends:

Proper Noun Blog: Savor

There, my friend talks about a book she recently read in which being a “mindful eater” is said to include all six senses. I commented that I couldn’t really think of a way in which to engage hearing in meal time. Put another way, if I was completely deaf, would my meals be diminished in any way?

Then…

This afternoon I was at a Toastmasters meeting (I gave a speech about the Hinckley Firestorm, but that’s not relevant right now). One member gave a speech titled “A Beginner’s Guide to Enjoying Wine.” In his speech, he noted that partaking of wine should involve all the senses, and this is why people clink their glasses at the start or end of a glass of wine: it’s the best way to engage the sense of hearing.

Pretty cool, huh?

Oh – he also recommended the documentary Mondovino, which I have subsequently placed high on my Netflix queueueue.

Thursday, 24 March 2011

Today I took part in a group outing (yes, yes, I know “group” is a silly word, but I honestly think that’s the next level up from my department at work) at Pinstripes.

Pinstripes appears to exist solely for the purpose of catering to events; i.e., you wouldn’t go there just for dinner, but you would go there for, say, a groomsmen dinner (where you can hope to Thor that they don’t serve Pastira).

First, there was an eleven-course meal. I tried to abstain from gluttony and only partook of nine courses. Then there was bowling, then indoor bocce ball, which was a new experience for me. The only other two times I’ve played bocce ball have been outside on sand. The flooring for the indoor variety was akin to a pool table’s felt top: a little power and the balls went a loooong way.

There was so much food leftover that the staff packaged the pasta into containers 9x4x3 inches in size. I took one home and it should provide an additional three meals. They might be that last meals I have on the company tab – as my co-worker said on the way home, perhaps today was our Last Supper.

Friday, 25 March 2011

Back on Wednesday, I went out to my car, and it didn’t start. This wasn’t too much of a problem since I just took my wife’s car to work. Owen is on spring break this week, so he didn’t need to go to school and, though my wife had an appointment that morning, it was postponed due to the weather.

Anyways…

My car chooses not to start whenever the air is really wet. The heavy precipitation of Tuesday, coupled with the melting of snow, likely conspired to keep my engine from “turning over” (whatever that means) on Wednesday morning.

Wednesday and today, I used my wife’s car. (Okay, technically, I really hate the term “wife’s car,” as if she is in sole possession of that Saturn. That’s silly. The car belongs to both of us equally. It just turns out that my wife uses the Saturn more often than I do and, as a routine, I drive the Cavalier to work.) On Thursday, I got a ride to work from a co-worker.

I knew my car must be okay, because my father-in-law stated that I “should be able to get another 50 thousand miles out of that thing,” and that was only 8,000 miles ago. So today, with the sun shining and the air heating up, I decided to give my Cavalier another try. It worked, and I took it around the block to fill the tank up with fossil fuels. When I returned home, I wisely decided to back into the parking space…just in case.