More Weebling

So day two of being at home went even better than day one. More food was eaten, napping happened easier, we were busy having a good time when Mom came home, we weren't watching the clock. Pretty sweet! We went to the fancy library this morning, and read some books and pulled some books off the shelf, and tried to pull another kids hair. Pretty sweet! Only downer during the early part of the day was the Nannies at the fancy park. They work as a pack, when one of them gets her kids on the little kid swings they all hog them. She only takes her kids out when there is another nanny ready to jump right in. We waited and waited, but no little kid swing. So we went on a big kid swing together.

The other downer today has been the crazy weeble action. The girl will not lay down by herself. Even when I go in and help her lay down she pops right back up. Tonight she fell asleep after about an hour and a half of fussing and sitting in the corner of the crib. I was going in every 15 minutes to lay her down, but boing right back up. Finally she was in such a deep sleep that I was able to flop her down on her belly and she stayed there. It isn't like she doesn't know how to lay down. She can do it no problem. Mostly I just have to say "J, lie down" and she flops right over. If she is already on her belly and starts to get up I say "lie down" and she stays there, it is just as soon as I leave. I have never met such a stubborn 9 month old.

I love her a lot. We had a great day, both alone together and with Mom when she came home.

The summer is almost over now, and that means the teenager will soon be home. I cannot wait. Babies are nice and all, but they can't talk about things that interest them, and they don't have the attention span to watch a movie with you. Sure teenager roles her eyes when you suggest stuff to her, and gets insanely crabby for no discernable reason, but I love her just the same.

Did I mention I got a watch. Weird. Haven't had one for like at least 20 years.

some business

First off,

If I was reading this, it would really piss me off how I keep referring to my partner as Wife or N., and the kids as teenager and baby. It isn't because I am an arrogant prick - though that has been said about me - it has been requested that I keep names off here. So that is an easy way around it. I hope it doesn't offend anyone.

Secondly,

I don't know if anyone who is reading this read Lynn Truss' book "Eats, Shoots and Leaves", all about punctuation, but I did and I liked it. Well N. bought a kids version of it today called "Eats, Shoots and Leaves - Why, Commas really do make a difference" and I love it. I wish there had been a book like this for me in english class back when I was in school. It makes the comma very clear.

Finally,

Licorice Pizza has a great Xavier Cugat album up for your listening pleasure (amongst other things), so give it a listen.

First Day

Today was my first day off work and the first day of all alone with her imperial majesty. I feel so lame even commenting on it when her Mom hasn't been away from her for even 4 hours since she was born, but there it is, my first day alone with the kid.

It went really well, eating breakfast, napping, going to the library, lunching, napping, dropping by work to meet the new boss, napping, dinner, bath and bed. Pretty damn well actually.

It's not even as if I was alone with here for all that long N. was only at work for 4 hours today. Tomorrow 5 and so on until we work up to a full day next week.

It is all very exciting. I even got a watch so I could make sure not to be late for naps or story time or indoor play time or all the other exciting stuff that will now rule my life.

I really cannot wait.

My Daughter - The Weeble

OK, so the wife is back at work and we have decided that some changes have to be made if we are to survive. The most obvious and pressing change concerns sleeping. To whit, getting the baby to sleep more than 45 minutes at a time during the night. While Mom was off work, she could better deal with the exhaustion, but not now. So we have been talking about letting the baby cry it out.

Last night at about 8.30 she woke up and I went like usual to sit with her and pat her on the back until she fell asleep again. She wasn't having any of it, and after 45 minutes of sitting with her while she screamed I couldn't take it any more and decided it was time to let her cry it out. I told her I loved her, gave her a kiss and split. Now she must have been pretty exhausted by then because the crying only lasted for about ten minutes more, but she would NOT go back to sleep. F no! She sat in the crib, she crawled in the crib, she stood in the crib and she flailed in the crib, but she would NOT go back to sleep. Eventually after almost 3 hours we realised (we are watching all this on the video monitor a friend leant us for this very occasion) that she had fallen asleep while sitting up. The poor little weiner, she was wobbling almost half over and then pulling herself back up straight. Doing the head bob and the startled jerk. She is soooo stubborn. Anyhow, after 11 I relented and went in and laid her down on her belly. She didn't get up again until 3.45, and that is ok.

As I type this now she has been awake for about 15 minutes. Crying off and on and sitting in the middle of her crib. I went in when she first sat up and laid her down and told her I loved her, and will go back in and lay her down again at the half hour mark. It breaks my heart, but I know from my experience when the teenager was wee that this will work.

Thursday instead of Sunday

OK, I was supposed to post Sunday night, or Monday morning. I had the whole thing written in my head. What a great day it was, how I loved everything, I went to the park (see the picture to the side for photographic evidence), I made dal, I was listening to great music. Then the baby didn't want to go to sleep, then work was really busy the next day, then I had to go to the orthodontist with the teenager, then I spent an entire day retouching a pretend comic book cover, and don't even get me started on how many packages of fake cat food I have created. I made two brand new ones from scratch this afternoon on top of editing 36 others. So needless to say, this post is happening Thursday instead of Sunday, and the CDs from Sunday that I was going to upload are in the next room, and I can't go in there because the baby is barely asleep in there, and I really don't want her waking up again.

Baby, Wife and Teenager are all back from cottage. That is nice. I miss them when they are gone. Teenager has finished her summer job, but is headed back up north on Sunday. Baby is teething again, and would rather wake up every 15 minutes than sleep and as her mother has been responsible for all baby-work for the last 4 days I am totally in-charge of sleeping right now.

Went to a friends b-day party tonight, couldn't stay long, but had delicious Sushi, and many laughs. Baby ate jumbo olive much to everyone else's surprise. Teenager was charming.

Just finished half a tub of Caramel Cone explosion.

Best thing of all right now is that tomorrow is my last day of work for 3 whole months. Going to be at home with the baby full time. Sweet. A little nervous about how we will get along in the nap department, and fretting a touch about not having Mom around for nursing whenever we want, but know all will be well.

Teenager just complained that there are not enough pictures of her on here. Will rectify that in the coming days.

Olympics Pics

I was gonna post a bunch of pics from the olympics, but the whole issue of privacy etc. came up and I will only be posting pictures of myself or the kids. That way no crazed internet stalker will be tracking down my friends and family from my blog. If anyone who happens to be friend or family sees these and wants more pics drop me a line in the comments and I will post some pics online for you via rapidshare or something. Does that make sense. Anyhow, you can tell from them that the baby and I were on the Blue team, and the teenager was on the green team - for that matter so was N. Strangely enough, the green and blue team tied again this year. Go figure. Ok, I lied i have posted a pic of someone else, there is one of my sister and the baby, cause i thought it was so great, and if my sister has a problem with it I will call her a spoilsport.

My iPod

just a quick update,

tried whacking the ipod on the desk, several times, but to no avail. When i put it up to my ear i could hear the harddrive having a seizure, i am going to try and re-plug the drive, but I think the machine is toast. Toast Toast Toast. swearwords. I have done some checking and it looks like the drive will cost at least $89 to replace - so it will be cheaper than a new one, but I could totally trash the machine if I do it myself. There is a place a college and bathurst that will do it though, so mayge I will go with them. I don't know.

Sad and Sorry

My friend and co-worker Rye just lost his wife June to cancer last week. It was a long time coming and completely expected but it still completely sucks. She was great, and the love of his life. I know everyone here at work will try to help him as much as possible, and I know they both come from large families who will totally be there for Rye and his daughter, but it still totally sucks. I am not sure who will be reading this, and I am not sure if anyone will know June, but I am going to include a link to her obituary and a condolences book.

June

Baby spiders make my lawn unkempt!

I was about to mow the lawn the other night but something came up and I couldn't. Here is the thing, the damn racoons are tipping over and trashing our green bins every night, so we bought these beautiful pine and cedar boxes to store them in that are racoon proof, but we have to stain the boxes before we can put the bins in them, so now the bins are in the garage, and because they are in the garage i can't get the lawnmower out - so - my plan was to mow the lawn (there is only a little lawn) with the whipper snipper. Follow so far? I picked up the whipper snipper and turned it over to make sure there was string in it and i noticed a beautiful chocolate brown orb weaver spider with ivory lace pattern markings. I reach in to take her out so she won't get shredded when I notice she has two egg sacs with her. "OK I will take those out too", but closer inspection reveals that one of the sacs has just hatched and is crawling with hundred and hundreds of little baby spiders. They were so tiny i could hardly see them. I couldn't get all of them out without crushing a bunch, so the whipper snipper went back in the garage to wait and my lawn is still looking a fright. I did clip the hedge though.

what's that bug?

spiders rule

Sad Sad iPod

So my iPod really seems to be tres mort.

I tried all the fixes listed on the apple site, and that I got through my first google for the problem, but to no avail.

So I googled a little more thoroughly this morning and came up with some other ideas.

I could have a seized arm on my hardrive heads. To fix this one has to (believe it or not) whack the iPod against a hard surface. Supposedly it works.

Or I could have a loose connection to my hardrive. To fix this I have to open up the iPod and unplug and replug both cables to the drive.

Or I could have a dead hardrive. In which case I can get a new one off ebay.

Or I could just break down and get a new iPod.

I will try at least the first two options before i buy new (and I will price the drives). I know that Apple didn't build the things to last, and I know I got a year and a half out of it, but having to replace it sucks. Maybe it is time to give up on apple and get my number of the beast tattoo.

Do I really need an iPod if I am going to be at home with the baby for 3 months? I am pondering that major, but I think I would be sad without one. Perhaps I can just go back to my MP3 Discman.

I will report on my progress, and meanwhile you can check out these links to see what I have been talking about.

macgeekery

digg.com

askpang

Olympic photos coming soon.

My iPod Just Died

Boo hoo hoo.

My mini just started giving me the very sad iPod face, and it won't show up on my desktop or in iTunes. As a matter of fact it won't even let my computer boot if it is plugged in. I am at work right now so I can't even install any software to wipe the drive or anything.

Boo hoo hoo.

I wiped out good and hard on the bike a week ago, and my iPod skittered off down the road, I hope this isn't a result of that.

I have no new pictures to post, though I will soon.

The "olympics" went swimmingly. Though the swimming itself was very careful due to the strength of the current. The current being strong due to the amount of rain.

Here are a couple of links with lots of tunes.

serialslingshot

moogpower

Not all of the links work at these two sites, but most of them do.

check out both of the links to the side as well.

greg

At the library

Here I am at the library in BF, posting to the blog. Cool. I am here waiting for my dad to get finished grocery shopping. We just bought him a used laptop at The Source. It was weird to be encouraging someone to buy a PC. It is a pretty good deal, and once he installs some software on it, he can use it at the cottage, and at home. I am in the library where the teenager works. She looks so grownup right now using a tape dispenser and dealing with a bunch of giggling nine year old girls. The kid beside me is playing some online dungeons and dragons game and the guy on the other side is surfing for computer parts at tiger direct. I am hung-over, sweaty and more than a bit tired. I woke up the baby with my snoring this morning and N is a little annoyed with me. She is also freaking out about the last week of August and going back to work and when my leave starts, and this afternoon everybody starts showing up for the "olympics". It is going to be a tense day. Who am I writing to right now? I haven't given this link out to anyone. bye.

Wednesday at work

I am still a little flummoxed by this whole thing. Not sure if it is a question of not knowing what I am doing (most likely) or that I am expecting too much of blogger (like seeing changes when I make them.) Anyhow, I am going to put some more pictures on here today, and then I am off to the cottage. Yes the sweet sweet cottage for 5 whole days.

These are from the house (note the sister in this photo - didn't ask for permission to do this and hope it is ok), the cottage and the park.

Jemima can really crawl now, and is busy experimenting with bad moods. Scowling and angry crying are the the preffered methods of letting us know that we are cramping her style. She can stand up in her crib, and loved the Banana and Rice Milk smoothie she had for breakfast. She also loves raw green beans and cheerios.

Now, lets see if this works.