Look Alike?

So...we've been trying to decide...


does Madelyn look like Amanda...









...or does she look like Tom?






What do you think?

What makes me tick - part 1

We are going through a personality profiling at work with the intention of trying to identify what makes each of us tick. The theory goes that by knowing what makes each person tick the productivity of the office will increase and the satisfaction level of each person will increase.

Amanda laughs at me because I'm not very patient with "what makes Tom tick" questionnaires. She likes to point out that when we were newly married she tried to get me to take the Briggs - Meyer (or is it Meyer-Briggs) personality test to which I got frustrated with the questions halfway through and refused to complete it. I suspect that the test designers have a category for my type of person. In general I don't like questions that either a) don't account for context or b) are stupid.

Seemingly the questions are of the following nature

Which one of the following do you like
a) Puppies
b) Pizza
c) Winter
d) Football

Can't I just answer "Yes"?

The personality profiling that I'm involved with at my office takes the approach of "tell me ten stories about yourself" (within certain parameters) and then they'll tell me about myself based on themes within the stories I picked. The stories don't need to be very long, just a quarter of a page or so. I don't know how well this will work, we will see, I'm usually fairly skeptical.

Fun for you readers I'm planning on writing out the ten stories that I pick, maybe you all can tell me about myself based on the stories.

My first story is one that I don't actually remember. I have been told the story on enough occasions to have conjured up a "memory" but I suspect that this "memory" is not real.

The story takes place when I was young. I don't know how young but I was living in Arizona so I must have been less than 4 and it involves counting so I must have been old enough to count. Now that we know that I don't know how old I really was, and now that we know that I don't really remember this event happening though I do remember being told about the event, I will describe it to you in full conjured memory.

The story goes that when I was young I would take my collection of hotwheel cars, line them up along the fireplace hearth (which in my conjuring existed and was comprised of dark full size bricks, placed in the corner of the room with black wrought iron fireplace tools and paneling on the walls, in reality a fireplace in arizona?) and count them from first car through last car (with the total being in the 100's) and then I would take the first car put it at the end of the line and then count them over again. This activity would apparently keep me entertained for a long time.

Now that I've confessed that I really have no recollection of these events, perhaps one of my parents are reading and can give some clarity to this set of events.

p.s. no spell check or grammar check used. Why? Because I'm lazy!

Winter Wonderland

We have finally been introduced to old man winter. I was beginning to wonder if he had up and died. If that would have been the case you might have seen me deteriorate into a long funk. After talking a little it with old man winter I found out that he was just getting more forgetful and that he hadn't looked at his calender in a good three months, time had progressed quicker than he thought.

Now that old man winter is finally here I want to celebrate! Yesterday I celebrated by breaking in the snowshoes that I purchased at an REI event last spring. They sat lonely in the corner of the garage all summer long yearning for the day when they would touch the brilliant crystals of fresh snow. I strapped them on and walked the two miles to and from work. With the winter gear that I've been collecting over the past couple of years the jaunt to and from work was perfectly fine. In fact, with the gear and with the working out inherent to snowshoeing I was soaked in sweat both when I got to work and when I got home.

The only problem with snowshoeing to/from is that the snow wasn't deep enough in all of the places causing a little blunting of the teeth. If any of you want to play in the deeper snow let me know and we can set up a snowshoeing date!

Thanksgiving

Madelyn, Amanda and I went to Thanksgiving dinner with some friends of ours at their parents house. We ate and played and played and ate again until we got our quota of 3000-7000 calories (estimates vary). Madelyn did fairly well most of the day, had a few fussy times but also chatted with people a little bit. Towards the end of the day she started getting over stimulated and over tired. She slept all the way home, woke up for a minute when I accidentally hit the alarm button on the car remote (while the car was parked in the garage causing the sound to echo), transferred to her crib with no problem and is still sleeping now, 10 hours later (though she did scoot down to the opposite end of her crib).

I came to the realization the other day that in a decade I'll have a pre-teen girl, yikes! I came to the realization on the same other day that when the pre-teen emerges I'll have to start reading pre-teen girl books for research, to ensure that I have a slightly better clue where she's coming from. Whatever the new craze is then, like Twilight is now, I'll need to be up on. Yikes!

While watching ESPN I saw an example of the type of legacy I want to leave behind. The story involved John Wooden, the basketball coaching legend for UCLA. He was married to his first love Nell for 53 years (she died in 1985). In 2003 when UCLA wanted to honor him by naming the basketball court after him he declined unless they would also put Nell's name on the court. When UCLA accepted John declined again unless Nell's name came first on the court. So, now the court is named the "Nell & John Wooden" court.

Frustrations (repeated)?

To air one frustration and one analysis of people's illogical nature, perhaps one or both of these have been "aired" [via blog] before.

Subject 1 : Insurance

Amanda and I have been dealing with insurance on a dental exam for going on 14 months now. It's not a terribly large sum but large enough that I'd prefer to have insurance pay for it, particularly when I'm paying for the insurance. This time however it's not the fault of the insurance, it's the fault of the dental office who seemingly refuse to submit the claim to insurance. Both Amanda and I went in for a routine cleaning in September 2008 to the same dental practice. We submitted the co-payment and insurance cards and went on our merry way. The following day Amanda realized she gave the wrong information and went back to the dental office and provided updated info.

Fast forward to February/March 2009, I receive a bill stating that I have an outstanding balance so I logged on to my insurance provider and saw that they had paid the remaining balance promptly [prompt is relative when you're dealing with insurance] so I called my dentist back and told them what I found to which they responded that even though the balance outstanding was for "Thomas" it really was for Amanda. Amanda called up her insurance and sure enough they had no record of a bill by the practice. Amanda provided her insurance information to the dentist office again and went on her way.

Fast forward to August 2009, I receive a phone call stating that I have an outstanding balance. I explained that I've paid and they say "Oh yeah, Amanda has an outstanding balance". Amanda checked her insurance and sure enough nothing has ever been submitted. Fed up Amanda tried to submit on behalf of the dentist and the insurance says that they'll pay but they need the service codes. Armed with the document stating such Amanda went back in to the dental office and explained what they need to do (basically send this form in with a few numbers attached".

Fast forward to today, we received a letter from the dentist saying that we have an oustanding balance and they've exhausted all of their options with insurance and that we need to pay "or we're dead" [ok, they [probably] didn't say that but neither of us could read the writing and it could say that]. Amanda checked in with her insurance and guess what, the claim has never been submitted [except for the one that Amanda tried to do on their behalf]. The dentist did send a claim form but ut had Amanda's original [old] data, apparently the three times Amanda went in to tll them "that's old information, use this new information" hasn't quite sunk in.

The person was a decent dentist but all of this back and forth has prompted us to find a new one.

Subject 2 : Wheel of fortune [il]logic. Why is it that when someone knows the puzzle and they spin one more time they don't always call the letter that is represented more in the puzzle? If you know that there is 1 'N' and 3 'Cs' and you're going to solve after this spin ... pick C!!!

Rant is over - if you don't hear from us anymore after this, check with our former dentist...

Random Tidings of Today

To follow are my random tidings for today. Apparently this is more interesting for me to write about these than to write about events in my life. Note that that doesn't mean that these are more exciting than events in my life, just that they're more exciting to write about.

First random tiding is the sesquicentennial anniversary of the unsolved/unproven Reimann Hypothesis. If you are smart enough to figure out how to prove it you could earn a cool million. Good luck, your time starts ...... now!

Second random tiding is that it's sad to be a kid these days. Up until today I used to think that I wished I were a kid today instead of 20 years ago, primarily because toys are much cooler now than when I was a kid. Granted, kids can't have play time now that's not structured and coordinated but the toys are cooler. The final straw in determining now vs. then was laid when the post office decided to not pass letters to santa along to the north pole. We've been to the North Pole, it was 20 minutes from where we lived. Candy cane shaped light posts, etc. We're even going to take Madelyn there in a month when we visit, but poor Ralphie can longer write and ask Santa for an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle. What a sad day for kids everywhere.

Last random tiding is that the Levi Johnston kid makes me ill. Yuck. I'm not saying that in-laws (or almost in-laws) are a piece of cake but come'on kid.

All about the world

This posting is a representation of a variety of things that I've been thinking about or that have popped up that I want to comment about. No general continuity except that they've all passed through the filter that is Tom's brain. It's a scary filter indeed but if you're going to read this posting I thought you'd best know. In my line of work we have a lot of disclosures attached to documents so that clients can know what they're signing up for, well, now you know what you're signing up for.

I've decided to run a marathon (note that "run" doesn't mean "run" it means "get through") so today's tidbit in the Wall Street Journal regarding mega-marathoners piqued my interest. Apparently there's a whole sub-culture who collect marathon finishes. Some of these crazy people have logged more than 1000 marathons. To put that in perspective that's a marathon a week for twenty years. I'll be lucky to complete one!

On a sad note, flooding in Atlanta has caused a nationwide shortage of Eggo waffles. I don't actually remember the last time I had an eggo waffle but a shortage of them just makes me sad.

On a happy note, UAF has come up with a promotion to weed out the wimps and to embrace the cold. Answer a few questions and get a hat that says "&@*! Right it's Cold". Time to embrace the cold! It's the middle of November and we are still in the 50's here in Minnesota, we're not weeding out wimps here just yet. What happens if there's no snow and ice for ice fest in Sandstone in a few weeks? There are the type of things I have to think about.

On a Madelyn note, the last few days she has been fussing as soon as I pick her up and when she goes back to momma she calms down. I don't remember pinching her! I did learn yesterday that she had her first jealous fit. Amanda and Madelyn went out to a mall with a friend of hers who has a 6 month old boy. Apparently when they were in the elevator another person came in with an 8 month old (or so) girl and when the 6 month old boy started looking at the 8 month old girl Madelyn started bawling.

Festivities

This past weekend was full of festivities, as per our super packed life. We must be super cool people that people just love to chill with! I wonder if it's because of my red hair or if it's because I use words like 'posit' in regular speech?

Our first stop on Saturday morning was at the Mall of America, this was our third time going to the giant establishment, and even at ten-thirty in the morning it was packed with pre-teen and teen-aged girls. I have a few more years before Madelyn is one ... of ... those ....... Madelyn and I watched the roller coasters while Amanda did some christmas shopping. Madelyn also wanted to get her picture with Santa Claus but then she found out that not only did one picture cost $14.99 but Santa wasn't wearing his traditional red velvet outfit (instead he switched it up with some wierd patterned outfit). Bah Humbug! Madelyn will have to see the REAL Santa at his factory toy store in the North Pole where she'll visit right before Christmas time. I hope she doesn't cry like her momma did the first time her momma saw Santa. On a side note is it 'momma' or 'mama' ?

Our second stop was at Cossetta's in St. Paul. We were over in the area so we could swing by the Christian Community Fair (they had Llamas). I learned about Cossetta's when I was interviewing for my position and looking for some yummy pizza to take to my friends that were hosting me. Cossetta's fit the bill. This go around it was still yummy but a bit hectic. One thing we didn't account for while drawing up our weekend plans was that the Minnesota State High School Volleyball Tournaments were being held at the Xcel center just a few blocks away, hence our time in Cossetta's was filled with teenaged girls and their entourage. Maneuvering a carseat filled with Madelyn around in the chaos without bumping into anything was akin to dodging raindrops. The pizza was yummy though. On a sad note I did see someone throwing away their pizza crust, I almost cried.

Our third stop was at the aforementioned Christian Community Fair (again, they had Llamas). We didn't know what to expect but figured it would be a good opportunity to a) see what sort of locally-based missions work there is in the Twin Cities, b) purchase some Christmas presents and c) sign up for giveaways. We parked in the River Center parking lot but apparently we parked in the furtherst-away spot as we had to walk up eight flights of ramps to get to street-level. (It was either that or fight for elevator room). When we got to the fair we were greeted by a swimming-pool housing real fish that kids were catching and releasing (fishing poles and all). Strange. We walked around a bit, did some shopping and saw Larry the Cucumber and Bob the Tomato. It was disconcerting to watch pre-teen girl screaming in starstruck tones about people in plush vegetable (or fruit in the case of Bob) suits. Madelyn ... are you going to be a pre-teen girl some day? Lord give me strength!

On Sunday we got to chill with our good friends Matt & Becky and their brood of girls. Sorry Matt, we're outnumbered 6 to 2!

Choose one and only one

Every day we have a tough choice to make. A choice that is so tough that I don't recommend anyone having to make it, but we do. Tough tough tough.

The choice is:
a) Have Madelyn sleep through the night
b) Have Madelyn take a nice nap during the day

Apparently in the world of little girls these concepts are mutually exclusive. This weekend she took naps of 5 hours and 3 hours (after Amanda assured me that naps were not in Madelyn's repertoire) but then she got up in the middle of the night. Yesterday Madelyn wouldn't nap at all but here she is having slept since 7pm last night (and it's just past 6am as I write this).

Tough ... so tough

So long as we're talking about Madelyn and sleep I'll leave you with this somewhat random tiding. I think that she knows how to crawl but she doesn't want to show us. Every night we put her at one corner of her crib and by the time she wakes up she's at the opposite corner. Perhaps we should do a time-lapsed video?

Another random tiding : I wish for one day that I could be a senior in high school again (do you think I could pass for it?). Why? To participate in a Dodge Ball Tournament! At the risk of letting my secret out I was the type of dodge-baller (db'er for short) that would get you out by catching your throws. That's what happens when you're a white kid (remember, white guys, and by extension white kids, can't jump).

What does it mean?

I'm good at putting Madelyn to sleep, Amanda is good at getting Madelyn to smile. I wonder if [i.e. think] it is reflective of our personalities. I'm boring and sleep-inducing and Amanda is jovial and sweet!

Insurance?

Before we go any further, if you are affiliated with any sort of insurance company, if you have any conflicts of interests regarding laments about insurance, if you like insurance companies in any way, or if you hate winter, stop reading now!

Insurance is tricky and even though I'm an all-star at counting by 17's I don't quite understand insurance companies. The first instance was when I tore my ACL in school. Two insurances that were bickering about who pays first. It's like that cartoon scene with the vultures, "I don't know, whatchoo wanna do" to which the other replies "I don't know, whatchoo wanna do" but in this case it was "I'm not going to pay, you pay first" to which the other replied "I'm not going to pay, you pay first", all the while leaving poor (literally and figuratively) college student staring a medical bill equal to a year's worth of income. It only took about two dozen calls and 6 months to straighten up.

The current situation is no less silly even if it is quite a difference in scale. When Madelyn was born I called our insurance company to see if breast pumps would be covered, to which the agent assured me they would be. I then asked if it was something I had to submit through insurance while purchasing or if I could purchase and then submit to insurance and get directly recompensed, the agent assured me that either would work just fine (and if you're an astute reader I sense that you already are grasping what will be unfolding). So, we did just that, we purchased and then submitted to the insurance, merely wanting a check from the insurance company. Of course they sent the check to the hospital store selling the pump even though we showed that we paid for it already. The hospital store is confused about the whole situation. We'll see if we get the $200 or if the hospital gets paid twice.

The hate winter doesn't have any bearing on this post but I wanted to call you guys out because it's just a funny thing to hate.

Lock Down

Sorry about the sudden lock down, but we noticed a new follower that we don't know and we were unsure of his motives for following the blog. With so much personal information out there we decided it would be best to restrict access. Hopefully it's not too much trouble for you. Thanks for understanding.

On it and In it

Before traversing (and crying through) Grandma's 31 minus 4.8 I'm planning to traverse Lake Minnetonka's 7.9 minus 4.8 and maybe take a dip into the frigid waters so that Madelyn can see what a papasicle looks like.

The American Lung Association has a 5k and then polar bear plunge on new years day that I may have a partner for. They haven't yet opened up registration. Soon though.

Goal for the 7.9 minus 4.8 is 25 minutes, slow for you rock stars but plenty fast for me.

Changes

5 Days Old






1 Month Old






2 Months Old

2 Months Old

More pics can be found here

Today

Today Madelyn...


...got her first shot.

...weighed 12.03 lbs.

...went shopping.

...measured 21.5" long.

...met her new doctor.

...turned 2 months old.

31 minus 4.8

31 minus 4.8 ... what's that mean? Madelyn could tell you, she's a math prodigy, even if she doesn't know how to count yet. She's also a snow-angel making prodigy! Well, at least she's a cutie-pie, so she gets away with creating a lot of ruckus.

31 minus 4.8 ... roughly how much I love Amanda on a scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 being enormous amounts)

31 minus 4.8 ... how many gray hairs I gain on a daily basis

31 minus 4.8 ... well, if you really want to know you'll have to catch me at "Grandma's" in Duluth

Random Madelyn Pictures

The first snow of the season and Madelyn's first snow angel.









Cuddled up with her blanket from Heather









Our Little Pumpkin











She wasn't so sure about the whole costume thing.

Hiatus

I was called out yesterday by a good friend for not updating this puppy, which is true, but he rebels against Facebook, we must be even. So after a[nother] long hiatus here's a post for the ol' bloggy-blog-blog.

I don't know that this post will have any continuity, but that's pretty much how I think so I'm good with it.

I passed a sign on the way into work two days ago that pointed to "Tom's Party" at an office building a few down from mine. I wanted to go join them!

I saw an oppossum (or is it a possum, I'm confused) while biking in to work this morning. By the way, after 6 months of tinkering my bicycle might be fixed. By the by the way my replacement bike over these past 6 months (aka Amanda's bike) is now broken but she won't let me fix it up.

I discussed/debated/theorized about the difference between a newborn and an infant with a coworker this morning. Either way no chocolate for Madelyn.

I went to bed at 9:30 and got up at 5:00, which [not so] coincidentally is when Madelyn slept.

After an unsuccessful Challenge 2009 (I made my goals through June but not since) I'm starting to lay plans for a Challenge 2010.

She's here!!

Yesterday, in the wee hours of the morning, we welcomed Madelyn Elizabeth into the family.

Stats: 7 lbs 5 oz, 19 inches, arrived at 1:28am on 9/5/09

38 weeks and more

Today marks 38 weeks. Officially two more weeks to go. Unofficially anytime within the month of September. That's right, it looks like I'm going to share my birthday month with the little one. All of my birthday parties from here on out will be shared. Wait, who am I kidding, all of my birthday parties from here on out will be taken over by pink princesses and ponies and barbie dolls. Unless of course we can train her to love the outdoors and then all of my birthday parties from here on out will be taken over by camo-princesses and pack mules and ... well ... barbies.

We're surprised that she waited for September (even if I am being presumptuous that she won't come in the next 16.5 hours). We're hoping that she stays in a few days longer to let Amanda recover from her sinus infection. At one point last week it looked like Amanda might go into labor while having the head cold and while having a tweaked back muscle. That would have made for a good time!

On another note I just fiished "Born to Run". Unless the running was part of a fast-paced game of hoops or ultimate frisbee I never felt that I was "Born to Run" myself. It's not my favorite thing in the world (neither are snow angels but they're near the top of the list), but it does keep me in [better] shape. I've been in a 10-week lull in my working out. My workout buddy is only 2 weeks away. The jogging stroller is all set. How soon can I bring her camping?

40 Days & 40 Nights

Today marks 40 days from the little one's due date. Of course she could be here in as little as 4 weeks, or she could take her sweet time and hold out another 8 weeks. We'll just have to wait and see.

I the meantime, I must declare that I have officially entered the umpa lumpa stage of pregnancy.

What does 1 cent buy?

Apparently 1 cent can purchase two blueberry or strawberry topped pancakes at Perkins./.

After we couldn't find the Monticello Corner Cafe on our drive up to farm country North Dakota we stopped at a Perkins where I noticed that they were offering a short-stack of pancakes for $3.99 and top them with either blueberry or strawberry stuff for an additional $1.99, grand total $5.98 for 3 pancakes. They additionally were offering a 5-stack of blueberry or strawberry stuff pancakes for $5.99 which led me to wonder whether it costs them less than one penny to make the extra two blueberry/strawberry pancakes.

26 Weeks

Amanda at 26 weeks





Tom at 26 weeks

Learning a new code

Yay for vacation days and for mini-vacations. With the economy in a downturn, the baby on the way and the house that's still ours in Chicago we're being a little more inventive with our time away. We've taken a few weekends to go visit state parks and get some camping in (and bonding with ticks, which is yucky) This weekend we're heading down to Springfield, Illinois to visit some friends of ours from Chicago who moved roughly the same time we did and still have their house on the market. Note : If any of you readers wants a house about an hour north of Chicago I know of two where you might get a good deal! We haven't seen them in a while and they have a new baby (sorry AK and BK, you know that Amanda is coming for JHK (aka the baby)).

Minneapolis to Springfield is about 8.5 hours or so, we decided to split it up into smaller chunks for the way down, why not, it's our mini-vacation! We are spending the night in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where they had a great big flood last year (we can commiserate). 400 blocks of downtown were under water and they're still recovering. While it's not New Orleans / Katrina we did see FEMA trailers on the way in and many of the doors in the first floor of the hotel we're in are still warped. Water is damaging.

As we were driving into downtown I caught a whiff of oatmeal. Oatmeal is super yummy in general and I figured they must mill oats here. Lo and behold the main Quaker Oats plant is located right down the street from the hotel! Maybe we'll head over there when we wake up tomorrow morning! (If we don't head over to a little bakery in the Czech village area)

Tomorrow we head the rest of the way, should be a fun weekend!

Bradley and Me

On Tuesday we went to our first of twelve Bradley classes. Bradley focuses on giving the mom the tools to go through with natural birth (no drugs, no caesarean) by teaching good nutrition, targeted exercise, and perhaps most importantly by training the dad in how to support both through the pregnancy and through the delivery. Twelve weeks of watching babies being born and getting prepped and ready to go. After our twelve weeks is up it's just about time for baby "Jill" to arrive!

We learned in this first class that babies, especially first babies, are typically late. Will the stork bring her on my birthday (4 days past due date)?

We also learned in this first class the beginnings of proper nutrition (more to come next week we're told). First and foremost 80-100 grams of protein a day. I'm in trouble if Amanda doesn't meet the goal. We were told of a website online that helps you track what you eat and you're recommended daily calorie consumption (based on age, height, weight, goals). Apparently I need about 3300 calories a day. When Amanda signed up she noticed that they didn't have a distinction between pregnant and not pregnant females so she wasn't sure how much she needed for the baby. I tricked the system though, I entered into the calculator an age of 0, height of 16 inches, weight of 1.5lbs with a goal of gaining 1 lb a week (which in reality should be about 0.5lbs a week but they didn't have that option. Tada, baby "Jill" needs 979 calories a day.

3D

I'm not very good about making a big deal about birthdays and anniversaries and the like (I don't forget them, I just don't usually make a big deal about them). This past Mother's Day was Amanda's first as a mom so I had to try and find something fun and exciting to give her. After hours of searching and searching I narrowed it down to two options: 1) Playing "Pin the carrot on the snowman" or 2) Getting a 3D ultrasound of baby "Jill".

I took the leap and gave her a gift certificate to the 3D ultrasound (sorry Amanda, hope you didn't have your heart set on the carrot/snowman game). Incidentally, Amanda and I don't actually give the gift certificates/cards to each other, we just free up that much $$ to spend, that way we can't lose the card, it doesn't expire, we can transfer it to a different store, etc.

Yesterday was the big day of the ultrasound. 25 weeks, 62.5% complete. 15 weeks, 37.5% to go. Little "Jill" is almost 2/3rds baked, which is 1/6th more than I'm baked!

In the last ultrasound we had "Jill" didn't want anything to do with showing us her face. She either would turn so we see the back of her head or put her hands over her face. She started this ultrasound in much the same way. I think she's camera shy. After about 15 minutes of prodding "Jill" did turn and look at the camera which caused both Amanda and the technician to giggle. Well worth the price of admission!

Ever since Amanda introduced me to the concept of 3D ultrasounds I've thought they made the baby look like aliens. Perhaps it's a guy thing as a coworker had the same lament. I think most girls just giggle at the pictures. After seeing my own munchkin in the 3D pictures I'll amend and now think that the 3D pictures make other peoples babies look like aliens. They make mine look like .... marshmallows? ...

Countdown is still going strong. Tonight we start the first of the "Bradley" classes. Fun times?

Where did those muscles come from?

This week has been a good week in terms of working out, have varied my routine a bit and am sore because of it. No pain no gain? I'm not sore because of anything being broken (except for a patch of skin on my elbow that was rubbed raw as I landed making a sweet catch in ultimate frisbee) but I am sore from using muscles that have been hiding for a long time.

Working backwards from yesterday:

Went climbing at Vertical Endeavors, my second time climbing ever (unless you include the one stint ice climbing, which makes this my third go and unless you include a couple of bouldering attempts at my buddy Isaac's which makes this my fourth/fifth go). I climbed a 5.7 route, which is pretty much akin to walking up the stairs for actual climbers but for me was a good starting point. That was my first run and despite my efforts I only made it about half way up on other runs. I suppose a year of incessant running and biking hasn't done anything to strengthen my forearms. Interestingly my forearms are good to go today but my triceps ache, I didn't know I was using them that much!

On Wednesday I was finally able to make it out to play some Ultimate frisbee. The weather was perfect (about 60, overcast and a slight breeze). We had a good turnout, which is always nice, and it was a decently clean game. The game got more interesting when, about 15 minutes into it, the sprinklers went on all over the field. We played through the sprinklers and in some cases they seemed to act as additional defenders. We played for about an hour, which wasn't near enough, but according to my pedometer this hour provided 8,094 steps (which accounts to about 4 miles if the google search results indicating 2,000 steps to a mile is correct).

On Tuesday I stepped up my interval training. I did the "Extreme HR" routine on the treadmill which cycles you through levels of difficulty such that you peak at about 85% of your max HR (which is a function of age) for a length of time and valley at 55% of your max HR. I'm still tweaking this routine as it takes such a long time for me to reach the initial HR target (has me climbing at a 9.5% interval at 3.8 mph for 6 minutes or so before it switches me to the next zone). Once I'm at the point where my HR is good to go for the computer then the going gets fun. I put on some Pillar or POD or Thousand Foot Krutch and get rockin'.

On Monday I did my normal video game while walking 3 miles but then worked my abs on the "Ab Ripper X" routine, I just don't have the right muscles to do some of the moves, one day?

On Sunday I took off biking while Amanda took a nap, zigged and zagged on about 10 miles of pathway, not too far but enough to get a little pink!

That's it for now, still addicted to the natural endorphins, and to Amanda's home-made brownies.

Amanda's at almost 25 weeks (monday) which equates to 62.5%!

Maserati

I'm sitting here reading the Wall Street Journal to kick off my work day and what to my wondering eyes should appear but an add for a Maserati Quattroporte, available for you to lease for only $1999/month for 42 months with $8,894 due at lease signing. This qualifies you for 10,000 miles per year of driving.

Who's going to split the costs with me? (By split I mean I'll pay the $9/month if you'll cover the rest)

I would really only use it for those days when the sky is spitting down pellets of ice or flashes of lightning, on all of the other days I'm just pedal away on my bicycle (or on Amanda's while mine is waiting for some fixing), even if my pants cuffs get caught in the chain like they did this morning.

Endorphin Addict?

A friend from Church asked Amanda today why I was addicted to exercise and have I always been? This got me to thinking, ...I have gotten back on the bandwagon of actually exercising rather than just moving while watching the NBA playoffs or playing playstation. I've held at a steady weight since the beginning of the year but now it's time to get going and start "bringing it". This doesn't answer the "why" question though. I do have a few theories:

1) I'm addicted to the endorphins
2) I want to be in shape enough to be able to stick around for Amanda and our kids for as long as God will let me (which really it'll be in His timing anyways, so maybe I'm just trying to ensure the quality of life rather than the quantity of life)
3) I'm competitive and I want to be able to hold my own no matter what physical task/adventure I'm undertaking (I have a bit longer way on some tasks/adventures than on others)
4) I'm vain?

Anyways, yesterday I walked a few miles and went through most of the Ab Ripper X routine. Today I worked arms and did a half hour of interval training (though since I let my treadmill guide me I didn't get as ramped up as I intended to).

We'll see how all of this works out!

Update : Another half hour of interval training, this time set to "Extreme HR" instead of "Heart Rate Interval" -- Much better!

Metro Cool

Today Amanda and I were metro cool. Chic, suave, sophisticated, cool. We started off the day by going to the employee garage sale at Midwest Mountaineering (aka, another place where we may find outdoor junkie gear at a discount). Last year when we went to this sale they opened the back door first and of course we were waiting at the front door. We were wiser this time, right? Waited by the back door, were entertained by a guy practicing yoga amidst the other gear junkies, and wouldn't you know, they opened the front door first.

The garage sale was in the basement and it got very crowded. They set up a number of tables in an order that presumably encourages one specific traffic pattern ... doesn't work. People take their time looking at a particular item, people back up, people turn around and the area becomes like a traffic jam to the point where everyone is waiting for the next person to make a move before they can make their own move. Amanda quickly headed upstairs for fear of not being able to squeeze "Jill" through the paths. I think it was a wise move.

There were some Sorel Intrepid Expedition -100F boots that looked interesting, even in my size! $99, didn't seem to bad but they weren't crampon compatible, so they'd just be approach boots ... I ultimately didn't get them. Nothing else really piqued my interest except for a white water kayak but that was labeled at $400, or approximately $300 more than I was interested in spending today.

After the garage sale we headed to the Guthrie Theater for a dose of "Caroline, or Change". This past Christmas my work gave me a gift certificate for the theater (or is it theatre?) and today seemed to be a good day to use it up. The show started at 1:00 but we got to the area around 10:40. Thankfully there was entertainment in the form of the Mill City Market and of course lunch. We hung around at the market for a while where Amanda looked a little bit at cloth diapers and I looked around a little bit at Mango Lassi and Yak meat.

We ate at a Thai food restaurant, tasty enough, though I think i could make it just as tasty.

Baby "Jill" started grooving while we were watching the musical, apparently she really got into it when the baritone started singing. Is she already boy crazy? I hope not! We have 3 older brothers for her in our Church group, they can help me fend off the icky boys!

Tomorrow is Church and Monday is Yak burger. Tasty!

At the shooting range

We registered today for all things baby related by shooting all of the barcodes. All sorts of things without which the baby won't survive. It's a tough tough world out there don'tcha know? (Minnesota is taking over my speech) I'm actually pretty shocked that I made it to see 30 considering I didn't have most of the absolute necessities.

Now it's time to register for the fun things that are way too expensive for people to really give as presents (but there's always the chance, just like when you buy a lottery ticket).

Amanda will fill you all in (or at least the people she wants to fill in) on where we're registered. In the meantime happy hunting!

150

150 days down...116 to go

I'm back - For now at least

After another long hiatus we'll see if this turns into an "I'm back" moment or a random blip on the "I'm back" tour.

Multiple choice question for why I haven't written much lately:
a) I haven't felt that my life has been blog worthy lately
b) I have become less narcissistic over the last few months
c) I'm lazy
d) I have more interesting things going on
e) The dog ate the blog posts


We're just about at 24 weeks along and things are going well so far. Amanda is enjoying the soccer games that break out in her tummy. Every once in a while she jumps, I think baby "Jill" must have just scored a goal. Every once in a while I even get to feel.

Parting thought : My daughter is going to be so embarassed when she grows up and realizes how much of a kid I am. Thankfully she has a few years before she's aware enough to really understand.

Nesting Project #3

Baby Quilt

I actually drug Tom along to Jo-Ann Fabrics the day we found out we were having a girl (I need a second opinion when picking out fabrics). I had designed the quilt a while back (during a particularly boring class session). But it took a backseat to the two previous projects. I started on it last weekend, and yesterday I finished the quilt top.



I still need to put the layers together, quilt it and bind it, but my mind has already moved on to the next project...time to get a scrapbook started, because if I don't start it now, chances are it won't happen until she's four.

Nesting Project #2

Reupholstering the ugly red chair.

I obtained this gliding rocker chair and ottoman from a previous place of employment. When I accepted ownership the chair I was not aware of the ugly red fabric that adorned it, but that was because it was new in the box, and who would pass up a brand new, completely free glider?




Well, I drug it all the way home and from the moment I opened the box I swore I would reupholster it...that was four years ago. For the most part it has been used by the cat as a place to sleep, so I wasn't in any hurry. But with the baby on the way I finally decided I should do something about it, since I would likely be using it regularly in the near future. So, with my recently cleaned and organized downstairs craft room (formerly known as the man cave)I started (almost giddily) tearing the hideous, stuck-in-the-seventies, red fabric off the chair and replacing it with a nice, soft, neutral microfiber. The fabric wasn't cheap and I needed a few tools I didn't have (hot glue gun and staple gun), but I think, in the end $75 for a new, custom upholstered, microfiber glider isn't too bad.

Nesting Project #1

Organizing the downstairs man cave/office/storage area.

Mid-April I finally got my second trimester energy boost and apparently started nesting. The first thing I felt the need to tackle was the downstairs. It dawned on me one day (when our landlord called to ask if we would be renewing our lease)that we'd been living in our current place for almost a year and there were still boxes sitting around downstairs that had yet to be unpacked. So, I went on a shopping binge and bought every Rubbermaid tote our local Walmart had to offer.

Two weeks, two car loads of donations and a few trash bags later, the man cave is much less cave-like. Now I feel like I can actually spend time down there without being stressed out about how untidy it is. I think some craftiness is in my future.

It's a girl!

We finally had our 'big' ultrasound yesterday and discovered that I'm incubating a little girl.

She had no problem showing us her girl parts, but refused to show us her face. At first she had her back to the ultrasound transducer and refused to turn over (despite half an hour of prodding from the tech) and when she finally did roll over she put her hands in front of her face. Apparently she's stubborn and camera shy...taking after her mom already.

Everything looked good on the ultrasound, but the tech was especially excited about her 'healthy' diaphragm...meaning she'll be good at screaming, I guess we better start stocking up on ear plugs now.

19 1/2 weeks down about 20 to go

18 Weeks

Something's growing in there...

100 Days

100 days down 166 to go.

12 Weeks 2 Days

12 Weeks

Well, we made it through the magic week 12 and this afternoon we heard the baby's heartbeat (and some kicks) via the doppler I've had since 8 weeks. We've tried half a dozen times to find him in the last two weeks, but this was the first time we succeeded. Hopefully he'll remember this early lesson that his parents are more stubborn then he is, so he might as well just do what we want him to.



...just a little bit of a belly, it certainly feels a lot bigger than it looks

Paparazzi

"Wait, Wait" came the cry from the balcony window.

I looked up and saw a woman in a sundress waiving at me. What's going on? It's February in Minneapolis, even though the sun was shining it was still only 15 degrees outside. I don't know if she even had shoes on.

"I almost caught you this morning" she said, "can I take your picture?"

Never one to be shy in front of the camera I obliged.

"My friends in Ohio are going to freak, I told them that people in Minnesota don't care about the cold."

Aha, so this is what it's about. She wanted to take my picture to prove to her buddies in Ohio that there are crazy people here in the Twin Cities that ride their bike during the winter.

"Now, can I get one of you riding away?"

"Sure, why not"

"Thanks"

"No problem, have a nice day"

----

Thus, my days being hounded by the paparazzi begin!

How low can you go oh coefficient of friction?

If you've been reading, or if you've been listening to my tales you'll know that I've been one of those "ice bikers" this winter. I ride to work day in and day out (though it's only a 5 mile round trip, so I'm not too hard core), except for when Amanda declares it's too dangerous. Thankfully I'm only on the road for a total of 1 mile (trails make up the other 4), so if I do slip and fall I don't have to worry about being run over by a car. I enjoy that I don't have to play a version of frogger while getting to work.

Riding through snow really isn't that difficult, even without studded tires. Riding on ice is a different story. We had a few days of 45 degrees which melted everything and then it quickly turned to 0 degrees which flash-froze all of the water. Now there's a couple of spots on the ride that a tricky at best. After not having fallen all winter long I've taken the tumble three times in the last week, twice yesterday. My pretty little chin and my pretty little knee took the brunt of the force. Thankfully I wasn't going too fast and I was prepared for the fall but it doesn't make Amanda's worry of my biking any less pronounced. That being said she let me ride in again this morning! She's good to and for me!

The Mille Lacs band of Ojibwe welcomed ME!

Well well well, here we are again. This past week was a busy week, full of parties and fun activities. It reminds me of when I was the cool kid in school, never had a night free 'cause I was too busy livin' it up. Wait ... that was just in my dream. I've always been a home body that tends to get overbooked with Church groups and life. Still livin' it up in my own way!

To recount the events that transpired since last Wednesday.

Wednesday : Went to our monthly Bible Study and bouldering event at Climbing for Christ. This group is one that takes the Gospel to villages that are tucked away in mountains in various countries (including the Philippines, one of these years I'll go?) and also takes the Gospel to mountaineering hotspots (including Denali, one of these years I'll go?). Mountaineering isn't such a hot prospect here in Minnesota but winter camping, hiking, and ice climbing are. I haven't gone as much as I'd like but that's ok, Amanda is working on building a life and I don't want to drag her all across the state while she's baking away! At the study we talked about having a missions mindset and talked about how to handle hard times and how to help others handle hard times. As a nation we're going through some tough times right now. It's hitting close to home as well, we've had a few friends who have been laid off and now are unsure what the next steps are, even to the point of being able to keep their house, etc. How do we help them? The night was punctuated by the leaders 2.5 year old daughter looking at me twice and declaring "cutie pie". It was funny. We skipped the bouldering due to the prospect of late nights all week. Got home at a reasonable hour, around 9:30.

Thursday : For Christmas I gave Amanda tickets for two to a cooking class. She signed up for a hands on pasta making course. This course took place in the "Uptown" area of Minneapolis. Uptown is the fancy metro chic area, we're not fancy metro chic but every once in a while we like to pretend that we are. One downfall of fancy metro chic areas is that they tend to not have room to park, we ended up parking about 10 minutes away and made it to the class just in time to claim the first back row seats (which in hindsight weren't too bad). Central casting picked out an old italian grandpa guy to teach the course. It turns out that pasta is fairly easy to make. It also turns out that I'm curious if pasta making is like rice making, anyone can make it but it takes years to become a master? We whipped up a few ravioli's, some fettucini, some angle hair, and some tortellini's. Tasty stuff. We got home at around 10:00.

Friday : Party party party. After searching for a half hour for Godfathers Pizza we hung out with our Church home group. All four girls in the group are growing babies (thanks to a certain someone's water supply?). We watched a movie regarding babies (traditional party fare I assure you) and then watched a Christian comedian DVD. Good time and it hit home to some of the peops that the babies are coming, the babies are coming, we're under attack! We got home around midnight.

Saturday : We don't traditionally do our Valentine's day on February 14th. We're not too crazy about large crowds and don't believe expressions of love need to be tied solely to one day. We generally do something around V-Day, such as pasta making a couple of days ago. So, we didn't have explicit plans for Saturday. This doesn't mean we didn't fill it up with lots of running around though! First stop was at Turtle Bread to get some bread to go with our left-over fresh pasta. Second stop was at Al's Breakfast in Dinkytown. This is where things turned interesting. First : Dinkytown is a funny name, it's right next to the University of Minnesota, though I'll let you draw your own conclusion about why a section of Minneapolis that basically supports (and is supported by) the U is named "Dinkytown". Second : Al's Breakfast embodies dinkytown both in spirit and in stature. This little hot spot of breakfast food is literally a converted alleyway. We saw a few people standing outside waiting for their spot and figured the wait couldn't be that bad. Baby "Jack" (our nickname for our baby until we decide otherwise) could wait a little bit for food, right? Well, two hours later, with baby Jack arguing more and more, we finally got to one of the 14 stools. It was tasty enough. I can't really do it justice with my words, if you make it to Minneapolis and have time for breakfast we'll take you there, just so long as it's before the college kids wake up (so, anytime before about 10:00 am).

Saturday Part 2 : This is only part 2 because I don't want to use paragraphs correctly and I don't want all of Saturday to run into one giant sized "paragraph". We went from Al's to Midwest Mountaineering which is essentially a home-town REI. They are running their end of winter clearance. Side note - If this is the end of winter this means that Minneapolis winters are a piece of cake - End side note. I picked up some boots (rated to -25F) and a coat, both at half price. My closet is looking more and more like I'm a gear junkie (though I have a long way to go to be officially accepted to any true gear junkie meets). I now have summer hiking boats, winter hiking boots, ice climbing boots, two pairs of running shoes, works shoes, tennis shoes, beach shoes. That's more shoes than any one guy needs.

Saturday Part 3 : Booked it to Circuit City to see if I could find mega deals. None found. The end.
Sunday : Watched over kiddos at Church (we had nursery duty). Amanda has made it her mission this week to not get sick. For the last 5 months she's had a cold develop starting about wednesday after watching kids in the nursery. If what they say is true that you can only catch one strain of a cold virus once, she should be building up a number of free and clear years! We then headed north to the Grand Casino in Hinckley and were welcomed by the Mille Lacs band of Ojibwe. Gambling is not our forte, we only went there because when we were at the Ice Fest in November we won a free night stay in a jacuzzi room and a free dinner. They were also giving out free $5 gaming coupons at the Ice Fest. So, we hightailed it up to Hinckley with our coupons in tow. Got settled into our room, which was actually off-site from the casino, and then headed over to see if we could parlay the free $5 credit into some real hard cash money. We stepped into the casino and were greeted by smoke and old ladies. Yum. We hadn't counted on smoking at a casino, are we naive? Yuck Yuck Yuck. We got our cards, apparently with $10 just for signing up, another $5 from coupon meant that we each had $15 in house money (so long as we put in $1 of our own, aha, there's the catch!). The wait for the dinner was about an hour, so we found the tiny corner that was non-smoking and gambled for the second time in our lives (the first time being in Lake Tahoe on our honeymoon where we each put in a nickel, though we did spend $20 at the arcade on that trip). One dollar each of our money, $15 each of house money (not able to be cashed out until we actually "won" something). We translated that into $34 that we could cash out. Yippee, a 1600% return in 20 minutes (if you don't count the house money into the equation)! Final thought on the casino, I think we felt as culturally out of our comfort zone there as we did on our trip to Manila.

Monday : Relatively uneventful, drove by Taylors Falls on our way back home. I have this habit of doing one surprise addendum to our well-laid plans and this time it was a brief trek to Taylors Falls. We just went to the town, which is on the St. Croix river and I had been hoping to go to the "Rocky River Bakery". Unfortunately it seems that there is some unwritten rule about bakeries not being open for business on Monday. We had this problem at the "Moose is Loose" in Soldotna and we now have this problem at RRB in Taylors Falls. Next time.

Tuesday : No, just because we're back at work and back at home don't think that we're back to lounging. We have an outreach meeting tonight at Church. Tomorrow is rest day ... for now.

50 Days

Our little person is 50 days old today.
(though the pic is from a few weeks back)

1 Month of silence

Yay, I did it! I ignored blogger for one whole month. Victory is mine!



Ok, so I really had no intention of ignoring the blog for so long, I just didn't really care to take the time to update all of you avid readers on the very tremendously exciting happenings in our lives. I didn't even take the time to make up some random event or comment on some random happening. I trust that you'll forgive me. Perhaps I'll be better this next month? Perhaps not. We'll see!

Blogger seems to be a glorified show and tell, like they had in elementary school, without the forced commitment. This style works for me. I can't promise that I'll make up lost ground by writing boat loads of information or writing something so insightful that you all will stop dead in your tracks in awe and wonder. I can promise that I'll finish this post and then think some day about writing another one. I can promise to enjoy God's creations and possibly tell you about them and maybe show pictures. Stay tuned?

Homer - Amanda through the years

The only plan we had for the day was to try the “Sourdough Express” cafe. No one in our crew had ever been there but it had good reviews on the internet, which incidentally is the way we find a lot of the restaurants we try. We pulled up right around 9:00 to a dark restaurant. Amanda went to check the hours and is greeted by a “see you in April” sign. Mark another one on the list of winter casualties! Tomorrow we head for the Samover Café in Nikolaevsk. Whether we are rewarded with a meal or with a “closed until no more snow” sign is yet to be determined. I’ll write about that tomorrow. This sort of reminds me of our honeymoon in Lake Tahoe. We went in the middle of May but found out that we arrived in the 4 week stretch between winter closing and summer opening, consequently we couldn’t do either winter or summer activities and a lot of the shops were closed. It was fun still, just like this trip is. We somewhat expected to be greeted by a lot of “closed for the winter” signs but it’s still a little disappointing when you travel 3,000 miles for sourdough pancakes and fried halibut and the aces of those foods are closed! In fact, we traveled 3,000 miles to see some funny looking creatures known as Moose and have yet to see any of those. Maybe the Moose went south for the winter just like the restaurateurs. There’s always next time. Instead of eating at the “Sourdough Express” we ate at a little diner where no sourdough pancakes were to be found. Oh well.

Today really was about eating and fighting off a packrat. When we got tired of fighting off the packrat we’d take a break and go eat. Good thing Challenge 2009 hasn’t started yet! I will most assuredly have a higher starting point to work from, which only means that I’ll be even more productive in my endeavor! I think I mentioned before that Amanda’s mom is a packrat. It’s funny, she doesn’t know what half the stuff is that she has and doesn’t know what she’ll use it for, but she wants it just in case. Things like she has three watering cans for plants. She can’t have just one in case it breaks. She can’t have just two in case they both break. A lot of the stuff she has in duplicate/triplicate because she doesn’t want to have to buy something if the break. But she’s more than willing to pay $37/month for her second storage unit (I’m not even sure what the first storage unit costs). From an analytical viewpoint she’d need to have more than $37 in stuff broken or need to be replaced per month to just break even. It’s even funnier to me some of the excuses that she makes up to keep things. Here’s an example. She keeps the containers the Ferrero Rocher chocolates come in, complete with the settings for the chocolates themselves. She keeps multitudes of these. We threw some out without asking her (she did invite is over to kick-start her cleaning up), if we had asked her we probably would have found out that she needed to keep them just in case someone dropped off 50 golf balls, she’d need some place to store them. All in all we’ve straightened up quite a bit of her place, she can now walk around without having to take goods from one place and set them in another. More importantly we removed the instances of electricity outlet splitters being plugged into splitters down to the third and fourth generation (can you say "fire hazard") and hooked her up with power strips. We’ve even managed to get rid of her second stereo that doesn’t turn on. Our battles (mostly Amanda’s battles) go decent for an hour or so and then it gets overwhelming, then we go eat.

We’ve already reported on our lack of food options. For lunch, instead of seeking out new (sure to be closed) restaurants we went to the “Starvin’ Marvin” pizza joint. We didn’t see it yesterday but they have a 2 pizza for $30 deal. Considering one pizza is $26 this is a decent deal. We opted for one Hawaiian pizza and one mushroom/onion pizza. Really, $4 for pizza for breakfast, I can handle that!

Another staple of an Alaskan winter is ice racing. Let a lake freeze over, remove accumulated snow in roughly an oval shape, polish the snowless ice-oval to a glassy perfection, race around and around in various classes of cars. I reckon there’s also beer and cash somewhere in the equation. We did not partake. We only watched from the safe confines of solid ground. Amanda’s mom wanted me to take our rental F-150 onto the ice, if it were my personal car I might consider, but I don’t particularly want to be calling up Enterprise and having them pick me up lakeside.

After watching a few minutes of ice racing, and after going back to “Starvin’ Marvin’s” to retrieve Amanda’s mom’s purse, we headed to “Alaska Wildberry Products” which has turned into quite a commercial operation. We played tourist and purchased tourist items such as baby clothes (seems to be our collector’s item de jour these past couple of years, our kids will be stocked for the first 6 months of their lives) and of course purchased some chocolate. I got one piece filled with salmonberry jelly. What is salmonberry? It’s like a raspberry but much tastier. It’s a plant native to the Aleutian Islands where I grew up. One little known fact about salmonberries is that there are two types of plants, one that’s low to the ground and one that’s thicket like where a grown man can stand and reach his arm up straight and not have it protrude through the tangle. For the first 4 or 5 years or our marriage, before we knew that they came on these different types of bushes, Amanda and I argued about the bushes they came on.

One very exciting part of this trip, and admittedly one good side effect of having a packrat as a mother-in-law, is that I got to dig through Amanda’s family annals! I got to see art projects from when she was little and pictures of various stages of her life. I’d seen bit and pieces here and there but this was the first time to really dig in. A few years ago my grandmother gave me a photo album that she made and compiled of me growing up, now we have the resources to gather one of Amanda! I think I need to carefully weigh the pro’s and con’s of posting any pictures online!

The last little bit of exciting day #3 was making bags for the lenses of Amanda’s fancy new camera. Amanda and her mom whipped up 3 lens bags out of spare material and drawstrings. These have come in handy already!

Challenge 2009

After successfully completing Challenge 2008, final numbers available soon, it's time to introduce Challenge 2009. So, without further ado, here we go!

Each Month :
100 miles of treadmilling
100 miles of biking

This will be trickier in the winter months when biking is at a premium, and will be trickier than last year as we've gotten the weights set up and now have a bunch of fancy new balance/core training equipment so I have more activities to spread my time between.