CJ's Blah

Mary Had a Little Lamb

2008-10-03T21:21:00.003-07:00

RyanC has been potty trained for a while and we have been really pleased with his independence. Tonight he said he had to go poop and ran into the bathroom. So there he was sitting on the toilet and taking care of his business....

All of the sudden he started singing (to the tune of "Mary Had a Little Lamb"):

Ryan had a giant poopoo
giant poopoo~
giant poopoo~~
Ryan had a giant poopoo
filled up the toilet bowl~~~

Redemption

2008-08-17T16:04:00.004-07:00

I have been taking the kids fishing often in the past two weeks at City Park, which had been the preferred location when I take both RyanC and AidanC out.

Today I asked them "Who wants to go fishing with daddy today?"

... silence

RyanC then said: "but we never catch any fish."

OUCH!

It was a yet another blow to my confidence since I had gone walleye night fishing and had gotten skunked while a friend pulled in 6-8 walleyes. There was a near-catch but that's how most my fishing stories end up.

So today I decided to take the kids to the newly discovered secret spot where we are guaranteed to catch some bluegills. I had to bribe them with food to get them to go.

RyanC was reluctant to take the fishing rod initially so AidanC got the first shot. AidanC reeled in his first bluegill with and RyanC helped to pick it up~ We used plastic trout worm as lure.

RyanC liked it so much that he wanted more pictures taken:

I also caught my first bass using Zebco top-water lure that came with the kit. In fact, I caught two! Neither of them were able to throw the hook this time! It was a blast to see and hear the loud thrash as the lure disappears from view. They certainly fought harder than the bluegills.

RyanC and AidanC liked touching the bass.

We also saw a frog near the shore. It dives under the water and hide in the rocks when we get closer.

We caught 4 bluegills and 2 bass at the end of the day. That's good when considering we were using fake lures instead of night crawlers.

Interesting Fishing Day

2008-05-25T23:36:00.006-07:00

Today is fishing today for me and RyanC...

Late morning we went to North Lake Park @ Loveland to catch rainbow trout again. Wife took the kids to ride the train there and left me alone for a little while to catch the first trout. The fish started biting more when they got back. It seems that the fish were biting more at 1pm. Caught 2 rainbow trouts and one baby catfish with worms.

Tidbits #1: The Renegade hook remover purchased at Walmart were no help with these small-fish! It was hard to see how the hook was grabbed and even tougher to figure out how to remove the hook. I struggled with the baby catfish for a long time before giving up and cutting the line.

Tidbits #2: 2nd rainbow trout was "technically" hooked by someone somewhere around the lake. I saw a bobber being dragged across the lake towards my line as we were about to leave. It crossed my line/bobber got stuck so I naturally reeled that in. It's quite unusual.

In the evening I took RyanC to Sheridan Lake (City Park) and caught one baby bluegill and one adult size bluegill. The adult bluegill was caught with a spinner lure -- the first time I've ever caught a fish with a spinner! Of course then I lost the spinner to the bottom of the lake a few casts later. I don't like the obstacles on the bottom of this lake.

Wii Fit

2008-05-21T21:04:00.004-07:00

Today is the release date of the Wii Fit game. I got to Target an hour after it opened (~9am) wondering if it's already sold out. There were several news about stores selling out all their pre-orders so my hope wasn't too high. I figured I can check out their LED flash lights or their limited fishing stuff if the game is sold out.

It turns out I was able have my pick from 6+ units on the shelf. Lucky me! The cashier asked me whether I got the last one and commented on how he had sold many Wii Fit earlier.

This evening RyanC was eagerly awaiting my return home from work. It's not because he loves daddy the most. It was more because mommy had been telling him that daddy got a new game for him. AidanC is the only one that seems truly happy to see daddy home. At least he didn't know to ask about new game as he ran towards me to give me a hug.

RyanC was happy and kept on mentioning how he is a strong boy to be able to open the Nintendo Wii Fit box as he helped with the unpacking. Inside the box we found a set of 4 AA batteries, a white-board, a game DVD, and 4 extension stands for thicker carpet.

The two boys immediately fought for position on top of the white-board. Fortunately AidanC's short attention span won out so we did not have to arbitrate too much.

We let RyanC use his Mii characte to play the game. The Wii Fit game correctly rated him as underweight and off-balanced as he stood on the white-board. However, when we entered his height at 3'2". RyanC protested heavily about the visual shrinkage of his Mii character. He kept on yelling "daddy! make me tall!" That little sensitive boy. tsk tsk...

RyanC spent some time doing yoga with mommy's help. He didn't seem to have too much fun standing on one leg for 30 seconds. He then tried the balance games and he kept on getting hit by the shoes in the mini soccer-game. Wife did better.

He had a little fun with down-hill skiing game but missed most of the gates. He also liked ski-jumping as he fails to jump and rolls himself into a snow-ball.

Finally, we found the game he had the most fun with: "Running". It turns out that this game just requires him to old the Wii controller and run in-place. He had a blast running in-place. That game didn't require the white-board. Hmm...

RyanC also played the stepping game where he has to step on/off the white-board per graphics. It was funny to watch him totally ignore the screen and started doing his step ups/downs. At the end the tired boy complained "Daddy, is it done yet?" as the music continues on... Shortly after that he lost interest as he couldn't find any other fun game.

Wii Fit calculated that RyanC spent 27 minutes getting fit. RyanC said he likes running game and soccer game. We then let him out in the backyard to run around with AidanC -- until those two collided, fell over and started crying.

A colorful beginning

2008-05-17T21:44:00.005-07:00

Took the family fishing this morning at a new spot that a co-worker had recent success with. It was our first fishing trip this year and I reverted back to using the traditional bait: worms.

Last year it was too disappointing for the kids to see daddy catch no fish with the jig-head and other fake baits -- though they were never really asking why daddy didn't catch any fish last year. The only time I caught fish last year was when they weren't with me. "Fishing" was fun for them only because they got to go out and play.

I cast out the hooked worm for RyanC and had him hold fishing rod while I prepare my own fishing rod. Shortly afterwards, wife and AidanC wondered off to check out the playgrounds near-by -- I suspect wife didn't have any hope to see me catch any fish and AidanC didn't care much for the phantom fish-talk.

RyanC sat close to me with the rod in his hand for a while before he finally asked if he could crank the reel. I told him: "ok. just a little bit though." He obliged and I went back to struggling with hooking my worm. Five minutes later, I looked up and noticed the line had seemed to move to the right significantly. It wasn't obvious if the wind did that or if RyanC did it. RyanC then complained about the line being heavy at that point so I went over to check to see if we hooked a branch or something. It turns out a fish was at the other end of the line! RyanC was happy that he got to reel it to shore.

RyanC helped me reel in 4 rainbow trouts (~8-9 inches) in an hour: fist one escaped at the shore and the other 3 ended up as bird food eventually. A crane was near by and swooped up the released and yet struggling trouts...

I had trouble getting the hooks out since the fish swallowed the hooks deep -- I will need to get a better hook remover.

I am hungry!

2008-03-16T20:29:00.002-07:00

We were checking out after grocery shopping and RyanC saw McDonald store inside the Super Walmart.

RyanC: "I am hungry!"

Me: "Okay. We will eat more food when we get home soon."

RyanC was then quiet..

In the car, wife commented how we can eat more fruits or the new cereals we just bought. RyanC then declared that he is not hungry. I started telling him that if he is not hungry, then he should not say he is hungry if what he really wanted was the happy meal's toy.

After a moment of silence, the 3-year old protested from the back of the car:

"..but if I say I want a TOY then you will say NO!"

AidanC's adventure in big bed

2008-01-15T21:50:00.000-07:00

AidanC is ~1.5 now. He rarely woke up in the middle of the night so we have been blessed with the peaceful nights.

The other night he woke up crying hysterically. I took the poor little boy to our bedroom so he wouldn't wake up his brother next door. He was really happy to be with mommy and daddy. I left the light off hoping he will lie down and sleep since I was too tired to take him back to his room.

He then crawled toward mommy, found mommy's cheeks and gave mommy a big hug and kiss... "awww! nice boy" mommy said.

AidanC then started crawling toward me... I lay there expecting a hug and a kiss too - from the little boy.

Then I felt little chubby finger poking my cheeks a few times in the dark... and a little voice yelled "fat! fat!" as AidanC continued to poke my face with his finger...

Stop!

2007-08-11T19:50:00.000-07:00

I can stop normally again...

My 1996 Honda has been acting up recently with the brake system. The other day when I stopped at a red light, the car decided to move forward after a while despite brake pedal being firmly pushed to the floor. It had been a year since I encountered this brake pressure loss problem -- the last time the car did something like this, Brakes Plus couldn't figure out what was wrong since they couldn't reproduce it. The problem had gone away and then I had thought it was just a temporary issue... until it surfaced again recently. It seems to happen around the hottest days of the summer!

Fortunately the recurring issue did not result in anything other than scaring my lunch passengers. ;)

This morning we took the car in for repair at the local Honda dealer. Wife had scheduled appointment for Monday but we decided to take it in on Saturday morning to leave the car there anyways... Honda found time to identify and fix the problem by 4:30pm, 30 minutes before closing!

As some have suspected, Honda dealer confirmed the loss of brake pressure was caused by master cylinder leak. It costs ~$350 for the master cylinder replacement/labor.

Tid Bits

2007-08-05T20:47:00.000-07:00

I was looking at the Sunday's ads while RyanC was tearing up some ads with AidanC. I saw an ad for a tent and asked RyanC: "Do you want to go camping with daddy and Aidan?"

RyanC responded: "Yes! I want to go camping with daddy"

"...and Aidan."

then he paused, thinking really hard and then laughed...

"...and I want to go to fat camp too!"

The other day, I found a Hooters coupon in my wallet. It turns out that my considerate wife put it there in case I go there for lunch with my co-workers. Unfortunately, Hooters enthusiast isn't around so I doubt I'll get to use the coupon before its expiration on Monday.

Rain

2007-08-02T21:10:00.001-07:00

It rained a little more than usual tonight. I think it's flooding outside. The booming thunders had added to the thrill of not being able to see clearly through the rain.

I have finally recovered from the CA trip. RyanC hads the most fun in CA. He got to go to fairy land and pixie land and discovery museum in addition to daily trips to the playgrounds. Thanks to his older cousin's good example, he is now peeing into toilet more regularly though he is still far from being potty-trained. Wife hasn't been feeling well and AidanC's teething is causing extra difficulties.

Last evening when we went shopping and waited outside Safeway in the car, RyanC was telling me how I cannot fit in the shopping cart seats because I was too big. It all started when I asked him if he wanted to sit in a shopping cart at our next destination and whether I could sit with him.

All of the sudden RyanC looked outside of the window, pointed at these two heavy-set shoppers and said:

"daddy. that people cannot fit in their car. They are too big."

I rolled up the window...

Vacation sleep

2007-07-19T10:51:00.000-07:00

We have recently started our two weeks vacation in cool northern California. We had initially planned to stay with the younger sister-in-law's condo with her ~2 month old baby. However, when RyanC fell in love with the youngest sister-in-law's two kids' toys, we decided it would cool for us to stay with RyanC and AidanC's cousins.

The first night went well as all four boys (ages 1-3) staying in the same room. AidanC slept first in pack-n-play while the other kids ate snacks. Then the rest of the kids got to bed without any incident - no one cried and AidanC didn't wake up during that time! RyanC slept on this Thomas & Friends little portable bed thing and he was content.

Last night was a nightmare. AidanC has been teething and he cried his head off. That caused RyanC to start crying and wanting to come out. After about half an hour, the oldest 3-yeard old cousin Lucas yelled "Mommy! They are still crying!" We decided to take RyanC and AidanC out of the room so the other two kids can get some sleep. I then spent about an hour trying to calm AidanC down and failed. Well, I finally got him to fall asleep for a minute or two but then he woke up and started wailing. AidanC had never been this out of control as he is usually a great baby to take care of. As he was twisting his little body to escape from me, wife came to the rescue and held the baby and he was suddenly quiet. That was quite annoying as he didn't want mommy in the beginning either. Oh well... at least we all finally got to sleep because RyanC had fallen asleep in the middle of that struggle. The four of us slept on the floor peacefully for the remainder of the night.

In the morning, we found AidanC rolling to the tiles in front of the fire-place. I guess he liked the cool floor more than carpet. RyanC slept while the entire apartment full of people were eating breakfast. That little boy has a tough life with all that swimming, hot-tubbing, eating and playing with Lucas and Ethan.

signs

2007-07-09T22:24:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I took RyanC with me on a father-and-son car ride....

RyanC: "Daddy, I like going out with daddy"
Me: "Oh yeah? Daddy likes taking you out too."
little boy: "I want to go to fat camp with daddy!"
Me: "..."

Bang Bang Bang!

2007-07-01T01:01:00.001-07:00

I had planned on going to fishing again this weekend with the family. Then I got invited to go to an outdoor shooting range and wife gave me the OK to check it out. Yippie!

The Saturday morning ride to Weld County Fish & Wildlife range took longer than I had expected -- especially since I had no idea where we were going. We passed by a sheep farm and drove through the town of Ault, which added to the list of my firsts. Yep, I had never seen sheep farm before and I had never been to Ault.

Since I had never handled guns (not even BB guns), it was a little intimidating. My patient co-worker was great as he guided us through the safety rules and how to shoot with .22 pistol, 9mm pistol, .45 pistol and .22 rifles.

The first gun I tried was a Ruger .22 MK III pistol. When I held this new gun (co-worker just bought it) at the store, it felt too heavy -- all guns felt heavy to me. The weight of the gun disappeared quickly when I started shooting though. It was nerve-wrecking for me to be holding a loaded gun. The first shot hit the paper so it was somewhat a relief for me. However, I was still nervous as I aimed and shot for the rest of the rounds in the 10-round clip.

We had stapled target sheets 10 yards away and I kept the target sheets as souvenir. Here is my first target sheet: (yep! that's a bullseye! I was pretty excited about that one!)

Here is the 2nd sheet with 20 rounds fired. It looks decent on average but it started poorly. The first 10 rounds were clustered on the bottom left. It really showed how lucky I was to hit the bullseye in the first target sheet. My coworker then corrected my shooting stance before I shot the 2nd half of 10 rounds -- and that's how I got 5 bullseyes there. I still considered it to be beginner's luck though. Nevertheless, I was starting to feel less nervous with the .22 pistol.

We then did some rapid fire shooting for fun and I missed even more on those target sheets. I didn't really enjoy the rapid fire as much as I thought I would. I always paused a little -- afraid that I would lose control of the pistol if I fired too fast...

The next pistol we tried was a S&W 9mm pistol. The bullets are bigger than the .22 and I got even more nervous. It shows in the target sheet as I always aimed too low and several bullets missed the paper. The 9mm was louder and had more kick with fire. I was not comfortable with how much the gun moved since it felt like I didn't have much control. I tried to relax but I always hit lower than the aim.

We also tried the .45 (or .40 -- i can't remember) and that was just too much for me. I had thought about not trying it when I saw the bullets but thought I probably should see what it was like. It was probably more psychological but the kick-back and the loud pops (ear-protection was used) really bothered me. I did not like shooting it at all so I only shot 10 rounds and I missed the target sheet mostly...

Then we tried a scoped 10/22 rifle at 25 yards. The scoped rifle was steady and did not have any kickback at all. It also felt safer as the bullets hit the targets at 25 yards away. I started with the 10-round magazine and then had a blast when a 25-round magazine was inserted. It was so much fun to shoot non-stop with 25-round magazine! I was comfortable with the rifle -- more so than I ever felt with the pistols. In fact, I got so comfortable that I then rapid-fired 10 rounds of .22 at the 100-yard board for fun. Yeah!

At last, we tried a Winchester bolt-action .22 rifle and it was very accurate. It's not semi-automatic so the case needs to be unloaded manually each time. I was surprised at how well this antique gun fared accuracy-wise. The gun was heavy though -- so I had to use the sandbag thing to hold and aim. The firing action reminded me of the movie Enemy at the Gates.

I had a lot of fun at the shooting range with the borrowed guns. This does not mean I will be exercising the right to bear arms any time soon though -- especially when I didn't feel too comfortable with the higher caliber guns that are supposedly better for home-defense. I liked shooting with rifle more than pistol -- maybe because I felt more detached when shooting with the rifle through the scope?

This shooting experience was certainly memorable. When I got home, RyanC ran to me shouting: "Daddy Daddy!! Daddy, where did you go?" and then he hugged me. I replied, "Daddy went shooting."

"Oh... daddy went shooting... bang bang bang!"

Raibow Trout at Sheldon Lake

2007-06-17T22:16:00.000-07:00

I have found a new favorite fishing place!

I really did not have a problem with the recent favorite spot (Arapaho Bend). However, a teenager swam with friends there on Friday and didn't make it across the lake, which forbids swimming... The sad news showed up on Friday's local news. That caused a change to our plan of returning there to catch bass. I had to come up with a new place...

Colorado stocking report showed a local lake Sheldon Lake was stocked with trouts recently, which was a surprise because I had never heard of that lake before. I then found out that it is also known as City Park lake as it is in the Fort Collin's city park. There was no other fishing reports describing fishing experience there. I did find this one article specifically discussing that lake's toxic cyanobacterial and suggested people not to eat any fish caught there. That did not deter us from making a trip -- after all, the odds were in our favor.

Coincidentally, we had also received the newly ordered Red Flyer all-terrain wagon so we put the kids in them when we got to the city park on Saturday morning. RyanC likes to pull the wagon and he can keep himself busy until we get stressed out from worrying about the damage he might do. AidanC loves to sit in it whenever he has something to drink or something to munch on. In other words, it does not really free one of us from having to watch the kids but it does give us a more convenient location to place AidanC.

As we arrived shortly before 9am, we had feared the place would be packed. It turns out we were the only ones fishing at that time. There is also this water park area near the lake and it didn't open until later. RyanC and AidanC were initially content as they drank...

As I was starting to think there was no trout in the lake, we saw a duck catching a trout and swallowing it whole. It was disappointing to see the duck got to the fish before we did.

Now check out this pretty rainbow trout!

RyanC got to touch the rainbow trout and he was all happy.

Well, as my only reader may suspect, I did not catch that rainbow trout. It was caught by this 10-12 year old boy that arrived at the same place after we had been there for an hour or so. He reeled in 4 trouts in less than an hour while we watched in amazement. Obviously he knew what he was doing as he explained that he catches a lot of trouts there all the time. His secret was to use a heavy sinker to cast long distance and fish with worms off the bottom of the lake. It was good enough for us as RyanC was very happy to see so many fish finally. I guess a dead carp just was not that exciting compared with live rainbow trouts.

Later I tried adding more split sinkers to help with casting distance but I still could not cast as far as that kid. I also lost yet another kastmasters to the bottom of this lake while experimenting with lures. This fishing trip was rather unsuccessful for my fishing records but it was exciting to see live rainbow trouts.

We returned later in the evening for yet another short fishing stint -- yeah, got the fishing bugs. I still did not catch any fish but the view was really nice. There were quite a few people fishing in the evening though. We saw people catching small bluegills.

We enjoyed our fishing trips at Sheldon Lake (City Lake) at city park in Fort Collins. It was convenient as parking is right next to the lake with these big trees that can act as shades. The views were pleasant. It feels safe with the kids there. There are always people walking/running around the sidewalk next to the lake -- so it is not too peaceful for those that want to get away from people completely. Most importantly, it has fish and others are catching them!

Bugs & Fishing

2007-06-10T13:43:00.000-07:00

They are not always related...

Found these green bees nesting on the side of our house:

Here are some unidentified bugs on our plum tree. The curled leaves probably indicate we have aphids too.

Took the family to go fishing this morning at Arapaho bend. Wife was the primary fisherman today since it was my turn to watch the baby and the toddler so she can enjoy fishing. Something ate her worms off the hook though.

I casted jighead with bubber for Ryan or Aidan to reel in. Ryan got bored with that pretty quickly. I then found him a stick of branch on the ground so he can poke the sand/rocks. That kept him busy in the shade for a while until he declared "I am tired of playing daddy!". Baby Aidan was fussy on baby bjourn so I took the kids away from wife's fishing spot.

Wife reported seeing muskrat or beaver on the pond. It was relatively small so it is more likely to be a muskrat. I missed it since I was playing with the kids.

I saw this dead fish yesterday. It looks like the fish that I almost caught. There are some fish remains like this along the edge of the lake. I had thought some fisherman left these non-legal size catches on the shore.

As we were packing to leave after a short and unsuccessful fishing trip, a ranger biked by and we chatted a little... That's when I found out that this winter's abundant snow cover killed quite a few fish (that might explain the really old fish skeletons). He also said that most have been miss than hit with fishing experience there. Arapaho experience is not too great with the kids/wife due to the walking distance from parking lot -- we need to get a wagon or something to transport the kids and the equipment.

Fishing Tale

2007-06-09T22:29:00.000-07:00

Today my awesome wife let me go fishing by myself while she kept busy with the kids and garage-sell day at our neighborhood. I had planned to go scout this area for an hour or so but ended up staying for 4+ hours...

The place I had chosen is not Watson lake as I had planned earlier in the week. I ended up going to Arapaho Bend instead, which is a lot closer! The reason for the change of location is because a co-worker said someone caught a record bass there and I wanted to see if I could catch bass with lures. I managed to find information about this small place on-line and the type of fish available. It does not have trout though...

Equipment list:
rod - Ugly Stik Lite (Ultra lite 6'6")
reel - Daiwa Exceler 2000
line - 8lb tested Trilene XL clear/white
lures used - jighead, heddon baby torpedo, zebco minnow

I did not bring any live-bait because I used to fish with them and I want to try something different. Needless to say, my first attempt a week ago with gold kastmasters lure ended up with it getting stuck to a tree branch in the water. Hence, this time I bought a topwater lure (Heddon baby torpedo) to stay away from underwater branches.

After two+ hours of topwater lure and fake minnow lure, I gave up and switched to neon-green jighead instead...

That's when I caught a fish on the first cast!

Well, not exactly.. I pulled the fish (~10 inches) to within 3 feet of the shore and that's when I lost it. I think it looked like a bass but I can't be sure. I am pretty sure it is not a carp since I have the image of carp firmly imprinted in my head with CherkyB's catch.

Later I finally caught one for real at a different spot...

It was a sunfish (~5 inches)... and I let it go after spending 2-3 minutes getting the jighead hook out of his mouth. It's amazing how this little guy managed to devour the entire lure/hook with so little room for me to get the hook out.

I don't have proof of the catch as this is a fishing tale. I don't have any picture since I didn't have my camera with me -- yes, it does sound convenient doesn't it?

Overall, I would say I like Arapaho more since it's not as sloped as the edge of the lakes at Riverbend. There seems to be fewer fish jumping out of the water at Arapaho compared with Riverbend though. It will be interesting to see if I will ever catch a bass...

AidanC Speaks!

2007-05-05T23:25:00.000-07:00

AidanC suddenly said "no~~" while mommy was changing his diaper and RyanC & I were using the computers. RyanC was playing with web-based games on noggin and I was researching safes. RyanC loves to sit in front of the PC, stares intensely at the screen and clicks away on the mouse. He is just like a mini-me!

AidanC's unexpected sound then turned into an exciting session of everyone (including RyanC) trying to say "no!" to get him to repeat. AidanC did not disappoint. We were all pretty happy to hear him speak so early. RyanC didn't really do that until much later -- though he did manage to walk at similar stage.

At a little more than 10 months, AidanC has been pulling himself up in the past few days. He is not a picky eater yet so it's been pretty easy to take care of him. In fact, he is almost as big as RyanC! RyanC, on the other hand, has not been eating consistently. The only thing that he eats a lot of is candy & fried chicken. He got the chicken part from me...

Later in the day, wife and I were watching "Little Miss Sunshine". Well, wife fell asleep as she usually does with movies so technically speaking I was the only one watching. I had just checked on RyanC earlier and he was drawing in the living room (adjoining room from the family room). A few minutes later, I heard these exciting yet muffled sound coming from RyanC. It sounded like he was playing with grandpa in the front of the house or the basement so I didn't think too much about it. As time went on, I realized that he was yelling for me in a somewhat panic tone. I went to look for him and found him outside of the house, with the front-door closed. He had gotten outside and could not get back into the house because the door was closed (he could not reach the door knob from outside since the floor outside is at lower level). Grandpa was nowhere to be seen!

It was one of those moments where I felt really bad for not paying more attention to where he was. RyanC could have gotten lost and we would have had no clue! Later I found out that the father in-law had gone out and drove to the store. RyanC must have attempted to follow him (he can open door if it is unlocked already) and then end up locking himself out. It was nerve-wrecking thinking about how it could have gotten worse. We are lucky that everything turned out fine today.

Denver Zoo

2007-04-12T21:48:00.000-07:00

We went to the Denver Zoo a while ago. I finally got around to looking through the pictures. Here are some of my favorites:

lazy toddler

2007-02-18T11:10:00.000-07:00

Wife was telling RyanC that they need to clean up downstairs and solicited his help.

*suddenly clanking noises stop*
Wife: "Why did you stop Ryan?"
RyanC proudly claims: "I am too tired!"

Recovery

2007-02-17T22:20:00.000-07:00

As it turned out, everyone in the house became sick except cousin Lulu, who had supposedly gotten over a cold right before she came to the US. We all have gotten over the flu but I still have this dry cough that I can't seem to get rid off.

The house is quiet again. Two cousins left last week for CA with mother-in-law for 70F+ weather and a bit of Sea World and Disney. Father-in-law left this morning to travel to Buuurffalo to join the brother-in-law there. It's just me, wife and the two kids... until Tuesday when the mother-in-law returns from sunny CA. The two cousins will be returning to Taiwan this Sunday directly from LA. They will return to the same routine of school + after-school classes till 10pm where internet will not be readily available.

In some ways it is more tiring to have to handle the kids ourselves. In some ways it's more relaxing not to have to worry minding others in the house. RyanC had picked up some habits from the cousins and have been jumping around the house whenever he can. He looks like a short-legged dwarf as he hops around. RyanC is also speaking better in different languages while forming more complete sentences. He still wakes up in the middle of the night so I have to check on him. Last night he had an episode of bad nose bleed so that was rather tiring. AidanC is getting better at sleeping but he still wakes up a few times in the middle of the night. He likes to jump in the Jumperoo but he seems to jump back and forth more than up-and-down compared with RyanC at this stage.

With the kids behaving better, I finally opened the iPod nano (1GB) that mother-in-law had given me months ago when she received it as a present for opening some account at Keybank. It was disappointing to see the iTune software having problem syncing with the iPod on Windows XP system. It seems to sync fine when I first plug in the iPod to the USB but it does not seem to recognize the iPod if I attempt to manual sync the iPod with iTune after adding more files. I googled around and found out that people have issues with iPod/iTune syncing too -- hmm, prior to this I had heard all good things about Apple's iPod (except their proprietary encoding of the music files). The user interface of the iPod nano is definitely simple and straight forward though.

iPod Nano is a hit with RyanC. He loves to play with the click-wheels. He will even try to grab it from me if I don't let him have it right away. He even turned down the cell phone as a replacement for iPod once he has it in his hand. I think he just likes to watch my reaction or the display change as he pushes the button. It, however, isn't quite as popular with wife since the gadget prevents me from hearing her when I had it on. ;)

Today I took RyanC to BestBuy to purchase "The Curious George" DVD on sale for $9.99. He wanted to play with all the phones/music players/cameras there - yeah! that's my boy!

sick people

2007-02-02T23:00:00.000-07:00

We went to Denver on Sunday to stock up on groceries since my father-in-law was coming back to the US with wife's two 12-13 year old cousins on Monday.

Monday around noon, I started to have big headache and I couldn't tell if it was from dealing with the issues at work, lack of sleep, or being sick. . The top/back of my head hurt and I had difficulty moving by the end of the day. I could barely stay awake without being in pain so I couldn't really feel anything as I was driving home... Still, I was not coughing or sneezing so I thought I just needed more sleep.

Well, sleep didn't fix my headache. It was kind of difficult to tell from normal since I got up at 5:30am to get RyanC as he banged on the door crying for daddy. I was afraid he'd wake up his cousins so I took him downstairs to watch Moose on Noggin. I also started feeling a bit dry on my throat -- yet I couldn't tell if it was because the air was too dry or not (our humidifer does not always seem to keep the house humid enough). Since I had to make sure some important work got done to meet schedule, I couldn't just take time off so I went into work increasing the risk of causing others to get sick. By end of Tuesday I started coughing a little and that's when I heard about this flu that had been going around work... Hmmm.... I came home to find mother-in-law having sore throat and not feeling well... but she said she didn't have headache so it wasn't clear if we got sick with the same virus etc.

On Wed it became very obvious we both had flu. My phlegm started causing me to have problem sleeping that night - almost choked to death. My usually-happy mother-in-law seemed pretty out of it too.

AidanC got sick on Thursday. He coughed and sounded just like me and grandma. Poor little baby... He also had running nose too. I went to bed shortly after late dinner and AidanC was already asleep. He stayed in bed for more than 12 hours, which is a first!

As the weekend starts, we now have confirmed that grandpa is sick too. One of wife's cousins is also sick. I think they got sick from AidanC since they've been spending time with the baby.

RyanC, wife and cousin Lulu are the only ones remaining to compete for the healthiest body award. I get a feeling that they all will lose since they all love to hold the baby... It's going to be a long weekend!

Tamron 17-50mm lens

2007-01-14T09:38:00.000-07:00

My new Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 lens finally arrived from B&H at 5:01pm on Friday. UPS updated the on-line information within 15 minutes of delivery as I found out from work. I had been looking forward to this lens since all the reviews indicate it is very sharp and majority of the purchasers were very happy with their purchase.

Wife and RyanC helped to open the box and take out the lens. I immediately put it on the Rebel XT and snapped a few shots of the family. It was really disappointing to see the first few pictures taken turned out soft/blurry -- just like my Sigma 30mm f/1.4 before I sent it in for calibration. Of course the Sigma 30mm was notorious for focusing issues so I had been better prepared for disappoints then. Tamron is supposed to be good. I probably should not have expected my luck to be as good as others... then again, it is rather disturbing that lens manufactures have problem calibrating their lens properly in this day and age.

After performing several tests, I have confirmed that my copy of this Tamron lens front-focuses at 17mm (wide-angle) setting. At 50mm, the focus is pretty good so the pictures are fine there. I decided that I will exchange it for another copy. It was good to confirm that B&H has excellent service matching their reputation. The exchange-request went smoothly. They sent me a UPS label with email so I just have to use that on the return box and drop it off at UPS. (no need to pay return shipping)

At 50mm f/2.8, the focus is right on:

At 17mm f/2.8, focusing on the middle post result in the closer posts being in focus instead (front-focus):

Here is a picture of RyanC and AidanC at 50mm f/2.8:

The View In The Back

2007-01-07T21:03:00.000-07:00

I started playing with panoramic picture-stitching today. Here is the best composition using Canon Rebel XT and Sigma 30mm 1.4:

More Snow

2006-12-29T13:14:00.000-07:00

RyanC's fever only lasted 12 hours so he is back to normal. AidanC is no longer having running nose but he is still fussy with naps/sleep. We have been taking more day-time naps to make-up for baby's interruptions. It is going to be tough when I start working again.

Yesterday the 2nd snow blizzard started within a week of the previous one. This is unusual compared to the past when snow usually melt within a day. When wife heard about the blizzard, she had cheered:

"Yeah! More exercise!"

If she had said that after reading about CherkyB's recent purchas then I would have wondered if she was telling me that someone was nice enough to buy his wife a good exercise machine. However, I am left to think that she was subtly telling me that I need more exercise...

I shoveled the driveway this morning while brother-in-law was still sleeping and wife was just getting up from another long night of baby-harassment. Even though we were supposed to get 6-10 inches of snow, our driveway accumulated ~12 inches of snow due to the wind. Our friendly retired neighbor with snow blower helped to plow our sidewalk and the extended-driveway so we can get to the street if we need to. He must have taken care of 4-5 houses this morning with his snow-blower. It certainly saved another hour of shoveling for me since I only had to shovel our driveway.

We checked the attic and there was no snow accumulated this time - whew! However, it was interesting that snow blocked the satellite signal more quickly than previous snow blizzard. I had to use a broom to clean off the snow. It's a good thing that I placed our satellite next to bathroom window so I don't really have to get outside to do this.

Here is a morning shot of the peach tree in our backyard:

Sick Kids

2006-12-27T13:57:00.000-07:00

AidanC has been having running nose in the past few days. RyanC started having ~103F fever this morning. I first noticed that he wasn't well when I waved to him from upstairs and he just stared at me instead of his usual excited-to-see-daddy responses. RyanC's face has been fairly red and warm to the touch. He also has occasional shivers too.

When wife tried to measure his temperature, he became really afraid because he thought he was getting poked by needle. We had to hold the crying kid still while taking his temperature. He has been saying "hurt" a lot but we have yet to figure out where it's hurting... The doctor's office said to give him tylenol, warm bath and some chicken noodle soup. We did all that and he is taking his nap now...

Xmas Pics

2006-12-24T15:20:00.000-07:00

RyanC loves to open presents and AidanC loves to watch.

My mom made these cool kimono pajamas (reversible too!) for RyanC and AidanC to keep them warm in the winter. I am not sure how she measured the two boys during her last trip here but these pajamas are a bit too big.

More Pics

2006-12-23T15:19:00.000-07:00

I was browsing my favorite forum for lens review and found this amazing picture that someone took: cat & mouse. According to the person that took the picture, this was not staged and the mouse was rescued. link to forum thread here...

RyanC wanted brave the cold to go out and shovel snow with mommy and uncle yesterday. They cleared a path to enable our car(s) to get onto the street. Daddy had been spending most of the time reading a Chinese on-line novel about grave-diggers...

Snow Everywhere!

2006-12-21T20:59:00.000-07:00

Yesterday the highly anticipated blizzard started and it delivered ~2 feet of snow. My brother-in-law and I went to the post-office and then did some shopping early in the afternoon. We got home safely in my Accord but the car got stuck at the bottom of our steep driveway that required additional shoveling to get the car into the garage. It's a good thing that we got a better shovel while we were out so we were ready for some shoveling!

RyanC checked out the snow and declared "cold" when asked whether he wanted to go out and play. See how the snow got stuck on the door handle! There was a snow pocket forming against the wall too but it peeled off before I could take a picture of it.

The snow pile was almost at shoulder length when we got done shoveling. We were so tired that we didn't try to take RyanC outside to build snowman or snow-cave.

Later this evening, I walked upstairs and noticed this wet spot in the middle of the stairs. It didn't take me long to realize that we no longer have a dog and RyanC is not yet being holiday-potty-trained... As I looked up, I noticed that our two-story livingroom ceiling was showing signs that reminded me of CherkyB-leakage! I also heard the drip sound right at that moment too! It took me some time to find the ladder to climb up to peek into the attic. It is a good thing that I got these bright luxeon LED flashlights recently (more on these later). However, being the idiot I am, I did not see any wet spot in the roof when I looked in the attic. Wife asked for the flashlight and climbed up the stairs to inspect for herself. She immediately found two piles of snow inside the attic! Here is the bigger pile that is closest to the leak on the ceiling that dripped onto the stairs:

We got the biggest cooking pot we have and went into the attic to remove the snow. Actually brother-in-law beat me to it then so he ended up doing most of the digging while I dispose of the ice+insulation materials. We removed about 15+ buckets of snow... The water is still dripping... We will have to find someone to plug the hole(s) that we have yet to conclusively locate and fix the damages.

Anyways, about these Costo's Hawkeye Luxeon LED lights that I had been considering and finally purchased (through a coworker) lately... It comes in a package with 2 flashlights. Each light has blue & red filters. I put red on one and blue on another and demoed them for RyanC. RyanC was immediately fascinated by these lights. He held the flashlight(s) and pointed them on the floor and ceiling while going "wooooo!!" and "ahhhhh!". These are his favorite toy other than our older digital camera that he has been taking pictures with.

Last Sunday we went to Denver again for groceries and also stopped by the Denver Zoo. It is amazing how fast we can go through the zoo when most of the animals are not showing and when there were no more than 10 groups there.

Here is a lion checking us out as he walked really close to the glass. In the busy season the area around the glass would have been jam packed with people trying to see the lion so it was cool to take this picture. RyanC's reflected image is on the bottom right corner. It's probably difficult to see but he was a little intimidated by the lion.

This Rhino did not like to be confined in this little space. He banged against the door a few times and later pooped.

Still a little sick

2006-12-10T21:09:00.000-07:00

Wife is sick, AidanC is sick, and I am a little sick. Wife started this thing soon after my family left after the thanksgiving break... she probably got sick from grocery shipping or something. The good news is that we are all finally getting better. The bad news is that even if I could go to fat camp, I couldn't have gone because I wouldn't want to pass it along the happy campers.

AidanC has a blocked tear duct on his right eye. It supposedly started more than a month ago but I only noticed it two weeks ago -- not sure how I missed it . Being the more paranoid one, I asked wife to arrange for AidanC to go with RyanC to his 2-year checkout. AidanC got some eye-drop med and it may take some time before the swelling goes down. We were told to put warm towel on his eye and AidanC likes it as much as his brother's hugs, which means he responds with screams and disgruntled twists and turns...

RyanC has been doing great despite being surrounded by sick people. He seems to eat well and sleep well lately. Today he sat through most of the movie "Curious George", giggling and laughing at the little trouble-maker monkey. I saw part of the movie and thought RyanC behaves a lot like the monkey. Though the monkey doesn't seem to scream as loudly as RyanC does...

RyanC also peed into the toilet today. We are still in the early stages of our less-than-rigorous potty training attempts. He doesn't really tell us when he has to go. In the rare occasions when we ask him if he has to go peepee and he responds "yes", he would often say "i do it!" as he attempts to take off the diapers. We have to take care of the outer layers since it's winter and we usually leave him in 2-4 layers of clothing. So the little monkey was sitting on top of the toilet seat (special kid-size one that fits over regular one) while daddy sat next to him waiting for him to do his business... All of the sudden RyanC pointed to the door and said "go away!" repeatedly. I don't know who taught him that. I certainly don't recall telling him to go away...

So I went outside of the bathroom and waited for him to finish peeing... I then asked wife to watch him as I went downstairs to fetch some water for the boy's bed-side bottle. RyanC ran out of the bathroom into his room as I got to the bottom of stairs and as wife walked towards him. When I got back upstairs later, I found RyanC standing on top of the little step hovering over the toilet - wife was next to him. Wife informed me that he still had to pee some more and said to me "you need to teach him to pee standing up like men do" and then left the bathroom...

I am not ready to let the boy pee wherever his aim takes it...

Luckily, the little monkey wanted off the steps soon after mommy walked out of the bathroom. We will resume the men's P-training in the future.

RyanC's favorite saying lately: "NO!" and "i do it".

mountain vs malls

2006-11-26T00:56:00.000-07:00

We had planned on going to the Rocky Mountain park on Saturday...

As we got closer to having to make a decision, it became apparent that mom and sister were not too interested in going up to the mountains. Sister wanted to take a look but did not seem to want to deal with the cold weather. Mom had been there in the spring/summer so she was not too eager to go again. RyanC did not express any preference though he did have a terrifying encounter with the chipmunks when they sniffed his hand unexpectedly in the last trip with grandma.

Hence we did what most people reportedly do on the weekend after thanksgiving -- we went shopping instead. We chose Colorado Mills since none of us had been there before. It's not Malls of America but it's supposedly a big place.

It took us more than an hour to get to the mall west of Denver. I had assumed that we would end up circling the mall for half an hour or more before finding a parking spot. I was partially right. We circled the outside of the big mall once or twice before I finally declared that I have a headache and we should just go in. See, the parking not was not full and we could have parked right away. However, we were looking for signs to a particular store so we could park closer to where we wanted to be. It turns out that Colorado Mills only have signs for some stores and we had to go inside to find the rest. BLAH!

Mom and sis soon went their separate ways to shop while wife and I walked around with the two kids. AidanC had the stroller so we had to take turns carrying RyanC. RyanC had a blast running around the mall after we took off his jacket and the 2nd layer of clothing. He was really excited to see the marry-go-round too - he pointed to the spinning horses/people and laughed. Funny thing is that he did not demand to go ride there. I was too afraid to offer out of fear that he would want to ride non-stop and we are too cheap to do that.

As luck would have it, we found him some steps he could climb up and down so he had fun with that. He was also very happy with this free play area in the mall - we spent almost an hour there before we finally were able to wrestle him away. He had fun pointing at the bugs/butterflies hanging from the ceiling and climbing and running around with other kids. He seems to prefer hanging out with kids smaller than him though.. maybe because smaller kids don't jump on him or his hand by accident...

As we started leaving the playground, wife pointed to a brown teddy bear at this store's display and said "look! It's a big teddy bear!" RyanC happily ran inside the store, hugged the bear and started carrying the big bear outside. I stopped the little robber just in time and was able to get him to say goodbye to the dear without incident.

Dear

2006-11-23T21:56:00.000-07:00

Daddy to RyanC: "Can you say bear?"
RyanC: "dear!"
Daddy: "no. let's try this... bee"
RyanC: "bee"
Daddy: "behh"
RyanC: "behh"
Daddy: "Behhhr"
RyanC: "Behhhr"
Daddy: "Good boy! Bear!."
RyanC (proudly) says: "Dear!"

Rooms Are Full

2006-11-23T00:00:00.000-07:00

My sister arrived in CO today and we took a trip to Denver for more duck (Empress has great roast duck!) and groceries. We also stopped by Costco to see what they have. (Mom has membership and I had never been to Costo in CO since we prefer Sam's due to its close proximity to our house.) Costco seems to have a lot more goodies than the local Sam's club. I checked out the toys at Costco but did not buy any.... It was a bit unusual to see > $100 wines at Costco's liquor store though. I don't recall seeing that at Sam's liquor store...

Wife called and told me that RyanC got a Lightning McQueen car for his birthday. He was busy playing with it in the background despite it not being his birthday yet. When we got home, he showed me how to push all the buttons on the car to make different noises and he was so happy. Darn, I was going to get him that car for xmas and now I have to find myself another toy to play with...

We probably will stick around town in the next few days and maybe go to Rocky Mountain park on Saturday. Usually we wait for our guest(s) to adjust to the altitude before taking them to higher grounds.

We had a very interesting sunset a few days ago. Here is an image taken by wife:

Warm!

2006-11-21T21:32:00.000-07:00

We survived one night without heater. The house temp dropped to ~50F overnight. We all wore layers of clothing and felt pretty warm. I ended up sleeping in RyanC's room since I was not sure how cold it would end up at night in his room, which is usually colder than other rooms. It turned that he was too warm so he kept on kicking/twisting to get away from the blankets that I piled on him. Mom had the portable little heater in the guest room and it was comfortable in there.

Heater is now fixed. The service guy opened the upper half of the furnace that I had not opened previously, spun the motor fan by hand and it started. Not wanting to deal with another cold night possibility, we decided to get it replaced. We were charged $320 (draft motor and assembly) plus $59 (system diagnostic fee)...

Today RyanC successfully used chopsticks to pick up some vegetable stems from a plate to put them in his mouth! He was so happy and proud of himself. He is still a bit clumsy but it's a great first step. Next we will teach him to catch flies with chopsticks... gotta start them young! Oh wait, the flies are gone for the winter so we will have to wait till the summer.

Cold!!!

2006-11-20T19:59:00.000-07:00

This evening I came home and found RyanC running around with his socks on. I commented to wife "Was it cold today? Why is he wearing socks?" Then wife checked the temperature and noticed that we are at 65F instead of programmed setting. ARGH! The heater had stopped working and no one noticed!

We went downstairs to check on the heater and I couldn't find the pilot light, which was not too surprising since I am not much of a handyman. I did find a comment on the panel saying not to light the pilot light by hand so I probably couldn't do anything anyways. After fooling around with the on/off electrical switch for a while, I gave up when all the machine did was making a humming sound...

It's going to be a cold night since we are too cheap to pay the evening rate.... burrr~~

Mom's here!

2006-11-19T21:03:00.000-07:00

This morning our entire family all got into the minivan for a ride to Denver to pick up my mom. Since wife's mom and my mom are both "grandma", I wondered if RyanC would get confused. I tried to prep the boy on the ride there but he was more interested in looking for hot air balloons (there were none today) and airplanes.

It took some time to find grandma's luggage. It turns out that she waited at the wrong luggage area. Hmm... maybe it's no coincidence that I cannot find my car in the parking lot whenever I don't park in the usual spot. Good thing wife went in with RyanC to look for grandma and help her find her luggages. RyanC was shy around the "new" grandma. He kept on staring at her like he always do when he meets strangers. He did let grandma hold her though. He was just really quiet.. until we got into the minivan and grandma gave him some crackers. That broke the ice and then little boy started calling "ah ma".

Once RyanC warmed up to grandma, he only wanted grandma's attention. When we had lunch at a dimsum place south of Denver, he wanted grandma to sit next to him. Though he did reserve a closer spot for daddy then -- a small vanity victory for me. It was obvious that he preferred grandma when he only wanted the new grandma to feed him. We then went grocery shopping and he glued himself to grandma for most of the trips. By the end of the day when we got home for dinner, all he cared for was grandma! He wanted to hang out with grandma all the time. He also love the preserved radish pickles that grandma made -- it's from a secret recipe a relative learned by chance (it was pretty good I thought!). I had to pull RyanC away from grandma to get him prepped for bedtime! Maybe we should get her to read him stories so she can also put him to bed while she is here...

The last two weeks

2006-11-18T21:57:00.000-07:00

Last week I was out in the west coast for a few days on business trip. I had awesome Thai & Malayasian food there. It was also the second time I had to be away from AidanC and RyanC so it was a perfect opportunity to get more sleep -- and it would have been much better if I had not needed to get up early for the meetings, or if I could have found the curtain to block the morning sun that first morning. I was so convinced the hotel did not have blackout curtains until the 2nd night when I found them tugged away conveniently in my blind spots, which appear to grow exponentially.

I bought RyanC "Cars" DVD after getting back from the business trip. RyanC had seen a poster promoting it at Target the week before and pointed to the posted and yelled "Cars!" I had made a mental note to get the movie for him to see if it can replace Ice Age as his favorite movie. The next morning the little guy woke up at 6am and I got to him before grandma since I had felt bad for been away from the family. We went downstairs and instead of mumbling something resembling "Ice Age" like he always did, he pointed to the area where we put the DVDs and said "Cars!". Well, his routine certainly has changed since we bought that DVD. He wants to watch Cars all the time. However, he gets bored with the slower scenes so sometimes I have to fast forward for him. His favorite part is the tractor-tipping scene. He also tried to copy the "vroom vroom!" sound. I am now thinking about getting him toy cars for his birthday or for xmas... speaking of which, we already setup the plastic xmas tree since we wanted to take some pics of RyanC and AidanC with grandma before she left.

Mother-in-law left on last weekend for east coast and she is scheduled to return after New Year. We all miss her. AidanC misses being held most of the time. RyanC misses a playmate that rarely says no to him. Wife misses the help. I miss having someone else to help with RyanC in the middle of the night... and I miss not having to do dishes. My poor wife has been left with the two spoiled brats alone last week so I am extra tired. It's a good thing that my mom is coming tomorrow to enjoy her grand children for a little more than a week.

Wife suggested KFC for lunch today and I almost had a heart-attack hearing that. We got 8-piece bucket of extra-crispy chicken. Now I am ready for heaven. :)

RyanC pics

2006-11-04T23:08:00.000-07:00

We think grandma taught RyanC to put his hands in his pockets to keep hands warm in their morning walks... Now he poses like this whenever he wears anything with pockets:

Halloween was a blast for RyanC since it's the first time he got to take any candy he wanted. Last year he wore the same costume (it was too big for him then) and but did not care enough to take any candies. This year he gradually learned from all the other kids that all he had to do was to walk around work, pick up candy and put it in a container. He doesn't say trick-or-treat so I got him say hello and thank you to people instead. He made really quick decisions early on as he rarely hesitated in picking which candy he wanted from the various piles of goodies. That made sense since we hadn't given him much candy so he couldn't have a favorite yet. However, as he got more candies, he started to take more time for some reason. I was really puzzled when he took forever to pick one from a pile of fruity candies with the same color/pattern. Good thing he didn't get in between CherkyB's MaxC and candies when they met -- eeyore is no match for buzz light year!

Today we went to the local grocery store and RyanC gave us this sheepish look as he put his hands in his pockets and eagerly walked towards the candy container area. It soon became obvious that he thought the store was like the trick-or-treat trip at work where he could take any candy he wanted. Since reasoning does not yet work well with the boy, we had to give him the emergency reserve candies to bribe him to move on.

RyanC has been having night terrors lately. It's kept me and grandma restless as we took turn taking care of him. Yet I had forgotten about that when I put in Monsters Inc for the first time this morning -- was trying to find a movie that he would enjoy other than Ice Age. He doesn't seem to like Toy Story or Finding Nemo much and Noggin shows were starting to bore him too. I realized what I might have done when he hid behind me as the monster was practicing scaring a dummy kid. Despite that scare, he still finished the movie without too much fuss though! It's going to be an interesting night.

Dat Boring Work Stuff

2006-10-21T00:52:00.000-07:00

I have been busy with work so I have not had much time to update blog. RyanC must have felt my busy absence so he started waking up in the middle of the night... or maybe he wakes up because his room becomes super dry due to recent near-freezing weather in Fort Collins. We have a humidifier in his room but it is still dry in there sometimes.

Recently RyanC and I have been playing the following games whenever I am home:
1) catch - i throw RyanC the ball and he lets it fall in between his hands most of the time
2) ride the pig - RyanC sits on my back with his teddy bear while I crawl around the floor
3) balance - RyanC stands on my back and I try to wiggle him off
4) fetch - RyanC pulls me to the fridge, points at the freezer and then wait for me to open it to grab the Vanilla Swiss Almond ice-cream for him.

AidanC seems to recognize me more and more quickly nowadays -- despite my time away from home. He smiles and laughs whenever he sees me. I'm a happy daddy :)

Japango!

2006-10-11T21:35:00.000-07:00

Tuesday night is all-you-can eat sushi buffet night at Japango in Boulder. I had never been there myself but I had heard good things. Since I hadn't eaten volume sushi in a while so I organized a trip with others to go stuff ourselves silly. We had a total of 5 people car-pooling to Boulder from Fort Collins in one 4 Runner. It took about an hour to get to Denver and we got there at ~6:45pm..

Japango does not take reservations but they will take your info down if you call ahead. I am not sure how it really works but we called ahead anyways. After arriving at the restaurant, we were initially told that there would be a 20 minute wait. However, that 20 minute turned into 30-40 minutes when the table that was supposed to be cleared ordered more food. We didn't get to eat until after 7:30pm...

Here is a link that shows a very detailed menu. I like its format better than the official link here. The all-you-can-eat meal is ~$28 and you can pick anything from the menu with the exception of sashimi and maybe some entrees. They have been raising price each year recently since it was ~$24 a few years back -- or so I was told by someone that had been there.

The restaurant is not too big but it was cozy. We read the rules page that essentially said we will be charged $0.50/roll for food ordered but not eaten. That meant we couldn't just pick every item in the menu. See, they don't have a buffet setting where you have to go up to pick whatever food you like. We had to fill out these order forms , which were pretty easy except for the different choices that required time to consider. So we orderd most of the rolls and some appetizers in the first round.

I had ordered myself a seared tuna salad while others got seaweed salad. The seared tuna salad was very fresh and flavorful -- though I was starving so my taste buds might be biased. Then the tempuras, rolls, dynamite, and other dishes showed up... filling the little table we shared. It seemed so daunting that I wondered if we will have left-overs. However, we devoured the food in record time. Our waitress commented that we were like professionals -- i think she meant like those that compete in food eating contest. I really liked the dynamite (mix of seafood/mushroom in a shallow plate that had a tingy spicy flavor), unagi (fresh water eel), spider rolls (called Washington DC roll here), and seared tuna with tempura. The raw sushi rolls were okay too -- but I ate too quickly to taste them. Some liked the waitress but she was not part of the buffet.

Our 2nd order consisted of the better tasting choices from the first round except I added grilled squid dish to the mix. That grilled squid was pretty good. I haven't had grilled squid in years! I had wanted to try more different dishes but somehow the order form was quickly returned to the waitress...

At this time, we were starting to be full... yet there were so many dishes we hadn't tried. We started looking at the "steak" section and wondering how it was prepared. Our fine waitress explained that she thinks the beef steaks were the best deal since they were $24 each -- great, she tells us this when we were almost done! So we tried the beef steak, tuna steak, and some spicy squid for the final round. They were delicious! The beef was really tender and the tuna did not come with rice (pretty much like sashimi!). I wish we had gotten them earlier... maybe next time!

Overall, I would say it was a worthwhile all-you-can-eat buffet. I did not eat as much raw fish as I had originally planned but it was still enjoyable. It did take us a total of ~5 hours counting the traveling time though. We need one of these in Fort Collins!

Bounce vs Macy's

2006-10-08T21:06:00.000-07:00

Took RyanC to Bounce! while wife, AidanC and mother-in-law went to Macy's. RyanC is still under 2 so it costs $3 to play on these inflatable playgrounds.

There were a lot of kids at Bounce! RyanC was intimidated by other bigger kids running and bouncing all over the place. I had to keep an eye on the little boy since others can easily jump on him while he struggles to climb over the barriars. RyanC only spent spent an hour there playing with 3-4 playgrounds before wanting to head outside. That certainly was not part of my plan since I had planned on staying there for 2-3 hours while the rest of the family shopped.

I then took RyanC to meet up with da family at Macy's. RyanC pointed to the escalator as soon as he saw it and wanted me to let him down. I had heard wife talk about his fascination with escalator in the last visit so I held his hand and went up and down the escalators. He was so happy! He climbed up and down with seemingly unlimited energy. It was good that the escalators were positioned in such a way that one has to walk to the other side to go up/down -- so we took a slightly different route each time. While we were on these little detours, RyanC showed interests in these stuffed labpoodles, cooking equipments, Godiva chocolates and wallets/bags. He also wanted these $.25 white mint-like candy balls filled in this candy machine. Cheap daddy didn't buy him anything.

I was tired after another 90 minutes of escalator climbing. I tried resting on the escalators but the boy wanted to move on the escalators. As soon as we get off the escalators, he'd turn to me and want me to hold/carry him to the other side before slipping to the ground as we near the escalator again. Oh, almost forgot, RyanC also tried every little chair we came across. It was funny seeing him sitting on these chairs like a little king. I think I had more fun walking around Macy's with him than trying to watch him among the other kids.

Next time we will just take him to the escalators instead of Bounce!

Full Moon

2006-10-07T21:42:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was the mid-autumn full moon according to Chinese calendar. When I was a kid, I used to look forward to full-moon festival for the moon-cakes and the fireworks. Now I barely pay attention to it other than noticing the moon is full.

Tonight I tried to take some pictures of the moon and ended up confirming I am not yet proficient enough to take night photos. I think this is mostly because I have not learned how to use manual exposure (among other things) so most of the picture showed overly exposed moon. Here is the only shot that looked more like a moon (cropped and post-processed since my 30mm lens does not zoom):

A car drove by and stopped in front of our house for a minute -- probably wondering what I was doing with a tripod and camera in the middle of the night.

Know the rules

2006-10-05T21:29:00.000-07:00

I got home late tonight. It's starting to get hectic at work again...

RyanC was done with dinner and was already eating grapes. He had pushed the chair to the kitchen sink area and climbed on top of the chair to help grandma wash grapes and eats them right there. He gave me this big smile as he quickly stuffed another grape into his mouth. Usually he comes running towards me to give me a hug as I get home. No hug for daddy until he got done with the grapes. AidanC was in the swing and giggled/smiled as I played with him a little. It's always nice to see da boys in a happy mood.

I told wife that JAM , who lives near by, needs my help with installing his new computer tonight so I have to go over after dinner.

Wife asked "Don't you have fat camp tonight?"
I said "Yeah, but I am not going."
She responded "That's right."

I know the rules. I can go to fat camp but just not every week. :)

Then wife asked "Why doesn't JAM know how to put together a computer?"
I clarified "He has never done it before and he also bought a different memory than what he was suppsoed to get to save money so I need to bring mine over just in case."
She commented "I thought engineers would know how to buy the right components."

I thought back to the time when wife bought the right potable water expansion tank without matching the detailed spec and decided to ask wife about dinner instead.

After dinner I headed over to JAM's to help setup his system. It turns out that he already had most of the connections done. We double-checked the work and decided to plug the power. The first push on power button resulted in nothing. Dead silence. Well, maybe not dead silence since we hear a light squeak. I was starting to think maybe he has a bad power supply since they usually fail more often than other components. Yet I noticed the motherboard's green light was on so that seemed unlikely.

After spending 15 minutes checking more connections and unplugging some other components, we dicussed moving the supply to another machine to make sure it's really working right but thought we would measure the voltage output first. While JAM went to get his digital volt meter (I don't even have one yet), I decided to try a few more things and check a few cables. That's when I noticed the 4-pin power connector had two branches on this power supply and the 2nd branch was hiding behind the CPU fan that I couldn't see from where I had been sitting. Hmm... that's weird. I pulled it out to exam them and found one had label and one didn't. The one without label was plugged in. The one that said "P2" (I assume that meant power-supply connection #2) was not. I plugged in the P2 connection, turned on the power and tada! The fans came on and the machine started booting. I felt like an idiot for not catching this sooner. Well, I am used to this since I do this a lot at work and still get paid for it...

It turns out that JAM got lucky and his memory works fine on this motherboard. He saved $80-100 by buying this out-of-spec memory. Well, if he had listened to my warning about recent memory price hikes a few weeks back then he could have paid the same amount for faster memory -- just like mine. Timing is important... just like knowing when to ask about going to fat camp.

As I left for home, I looked at the time (30 minutes after fat camp starts) and wondered how the guys were doing. Maybe next week...

Free Peanuts!

2006-09-29T21:44:00.000-07:00

Last night was MHFC fat camp. I called up El Torito about car-pooling and he said "oh, i didn't think you would be able to make it." and I replied "i didn't know either". He offerred to drive this time and took the faster and longer route. We got there and everybody was there already.

Fat camp has been an educational experience. I learned the following things through fellow campers:
1) Margaritas containsTequila
2) I prefer "girly" drinks
3) what happens in Vegas doesn't really stay there
4) it is difficult to remember the details after two margaritas
5) CherkyB does not like peanuts... in his beer

I recall walking with the guys through small crowds at Rio's looking for somebody's girlfriend that we had never met but found him with another guy from work as we were leaving. I had my 2nd Margaritas there and it was better than the first time. I could see why people say Rio's has good Margaritas. I think I felt numbness in my left foot afterwards.

We then went to this other place that charges $ to get in. I had never been to da "Wash Bar" before so it was like paying $3 for a tour of a bar. I don't know what's really special about place but we really like the air hockey table - and we weren't the only ones...

We then went to LJ's to have peanuts since Mr 10th anniversary + 1 week missed having peanuts. I did not stay there long enough in the first fat camp so it was refreshing to see nut shells all over the floor. I had never seen a big tub full of peanuts up for grabs. It had been years since I've eaten peanuts non-stop. I used to love eating them -- and I found out that I still did as we sat around peeling and eating peanuts. We sat at this table next to the brickwall, close the front so we get blasted by the music and not-so-great singing. I had a hard time hearing -- and I could not tell if it was the Margaritas , the loud music... or both.

Soon El Torito started tossing peanut shells backward. I looked back to make sure there were no one behind me and started doing the same. I was in a zone, eating peanuts and tossing the shells behind me -- happy that I don't have to clean up the mess. It was blissful. I was starting to enjoy fat camp. Later some people came in and sat not too far behind me and it ruined my happy tosses... Well, my depression didn't last long when I realized that I could just throw the shells against the brick wall in front of me... so I threw the shells against the wall and noticed that they don't really bounce with my casual tosses. I then flicked the shells and found them to bounce back further. It brought good old memories of the younger days when I would copy this kung-fu shows' main character's flicking little rocks/pebbles to see how accurate I could be... the guys didn't seem to mind as they drank/chatted so I continued to relive my childhood... eating peanuts and flicking peanut shells against the wall. I was happy.

All of the sudden, Mr Beer seemed to turn red and started trying to tell me something with animated expression. I had a difficult time hearing him with the loud music. I strained to try to hear why he appeared so upset but it sounded like "blah blah blah" most of the time. I soon realized he was upset about his drink through hand gestures and I looked inside his beer glass and found some peanut skins on the surface. I figured out that he wanted me to stop tossing because the crumbs were falling into his drinks. I thought it was odd since I did not try to bounce the shells into that beer glass... Then again, since I was obviously not paying attention, maybe I got some crumbs in by accident. So I stopped reliving my childhood.... and simply ate the peanuts... while tossing the shells onto the floor.

Five minutes later, Mr Beer got really upset with his beer and then me or vice versa. He fished out these big peanut shell pieces from his beer glass. I found it funny that he thought my peanut shells would bounce against the floor and into that beer glass a few feet above... so I laughed.

Soon El Torito noticed that it was close Cinderella time and we needed to head back before getting turned into mashed potatoes. That was the end of the night for us.

KFC

2006-09-23T22:45:00.000-07:00

I ate at KFC on Friday! Wife said okay and that made my day. :)

I ordered the 3-piece extra crispy chicken combo not on the menu. Yep, when you really know your KFC, you get to order like a celebrity and order off the menu. It's just like how I used to get 8-piece buckets with dark meat only in the good old days before I was banned there for concers regarding my health... but let's focus on the positives here. I got to eat at KFC!

Happy thoughts brings happy images...

RyanC loves looking at horses from our backyard. There were some white horses to the right but they were blocked by the fence. These horses used to reach over to eat our grass in the earlier years when I didn't have in-laws to help mow the lawn.

Today we dressed up the kids to get ready to go to our favorite Japanese restaurant for lunch. RyanC is smiling at AidanC, AidanC is smiling at daddy, daddy is smiling at AidanC to trying to get him to smile more... We are a happy family!

RyanC also loves to kiss AidanC. Here is one of the many pictures snapped by wife in today's photo session:

About Last Night

2006-09-15T17:41:00.000-07:00

This morning I told wife what I drank night at fat camp and then she asked "So... how often are you going to have fat camp? Once a month?" I started going "ehhh...." and she asked "you are not going every week, are you?" I went to work early then...

Mile High Fat Camp started about ~5 minutes after planned schedule since I could not find a parking spot right outside the pub. El Torito and I walked into the pub and did not see anyone at street-level. We then went to the basement level and again did not see anyone we recognize. The candle lights in basement created an atmosphere that did not seem suitable for a bunch of guys sitting together. So we headed back upstairs to wait...

I called MoodyT to confirm he was still coming and he said he just parked on the perfect parking spot. I hung up when I noticed him and Rico walking towards the bar. The next call was for CherkyB since I was not sure if he would be grounded or not. Having kids does not always provide the most flexibility when it comes to gatherings...

CherkyB said he was close by and I gave him direction to parking garage in case he had problem finding a spot. I neglected to mention that they charge $0.50/hour and later he was not too thrilled about that -- so I gave him $1 to pay for the parking. Though he probably ended up paying $1.50 since he stayed longer... but I digress...

So we were just chatting and at last CherkB happily walked into the pub finding us with drinks in hand. Waitress appeared quickly and then SmurkyB ordered Jack & Coke. What happened next surprised the rest of us.

The waitress asked to see SmurkyB's ID!

We were not carded when we ordered our drinks so obviously either SmurkyB looked younger than us or his smurk just makes the waitress want to get to know him better.. or both. She stared at his ID for a long time and then declared him to be 23... Hmm...

Later in the night we went to this small and cozy bar , yet another place I had never been to, to have shots. I had this thing called kamikaze and it tasted like lemonade. Supposedly it was lime and voda according to the experts. Later we headed to the roof-top party place, which was called Tailgate Tommy's or so I remembered... Interestingly only card lady was hanging out downstairs in this two-story place and all the noises came from roof-top. I had to go to the restroom so I got lost while the rest of the gang headed upstairs towards the music and happy voices.

Their bathroom was stinkier than the small cozy bar's tiny bathroom!

It was a sea of yellow... t-shirts upstairs. A lot of young people were celebrating and having fun. Their t-shirts said "CSU Vet Med" and "pub crawl party" or something like that. I found MoodyT first and then we waded through the crowds to get to the bar area. FriendlyT then chatted with a girl (wearing yellow t-shirt) from Pennsylvania while waiting at the bar and then we found out out they just got done with their first anatomy exam. I couldn't hear her answer when he asked what kind of anatomy exam it was... I looked at the happy yellow t-shirts surrounding us, reflected back on my first geeky exam and became depressed...

CherkyB and Rico already got drinks at that time and chatted near the bar area. El Torito ordered light beer while us designated drivers got Coke. I told CherkyB I got triple-shots when he bragged about his double-shot drink... Apparently he wasn't drunk enough so he didn't believe me.

As we were standing around taking up space in the crowded roof-top, this animal lover, who also wore the same yellow t-shirt as everyone but us, asked if she could cut through us to get to her friends. I stood aside to let her through and then the guys chatted with her a little bit before she walked/rushed off. I stood furthest away so I didn't hear what it was about. I confirmed that I don't hear very well -- though my wife already knows about my hearing problem.

So as the night went on, both El Torito and I were looking at our cell phones to check for time and possible messages. We decided that we should get back before midnight. Ten minutes later we said goodbye to the three Amigos and left the Tailgate party.

I dropped El Torito senior off and got home by midnight... only to find out that everyone was sleeping already! I looked at baby AidanC's sleeping pose and wondered when he'd wake us up. I never got to found out as I slept until wife brought RyanC to wake me up a little after 7am.

Fat Camp Site #2

2006-09-14T18:17:00.000-07:00

Tonight is the official beginning of the Mile High Fat Camp -- mind you, this is not associated with the little fat camp in SC except we have have their ex-member that occasionally wears a "i make stuff up" t-shirt.

I am officially the puppet head that is organizing the event but I don't have any real power. I get the invite list from the selective voting powers since my judgement is impaired by my lack of understanding about "fat camp". I always misunderstood it to be similar to "happy hour" here but after the IM lecture from Dr. CherkyB, I won't be making that mistake anytime soon.

CherkyB is really directing the action behind the scenes and exists to undermine my authority -- or so he said... though he will probably correct me on the details soon since I always seem to miss the details.

El Torito is the oldest among The Depressives. He will be the default elderly in the tribe so we can make fun of the old folks. Then again, I am the one that parks in the same spot so I wouldn't forget where I parked.

Unfortunately MoustachioP prefer spending time with the in-laws this week and declined the invitation to be part of history.

MoodyT is join us tonight too. He ditched us for poker night when CherkyB was in town with short notice before his final move. When I called to invite him, he asked "why is this at 9pm?" I answered "because of CherkyB" and then he understood without further questions.

I better go get ready and put RyanC to bed. He has been sitting next to me watching MTVs.

Violent kid?

2006-09-13T22:21:00.000-07:00

RyanC was hugging and kissing baby AidanC while I held AidanC and sat on the sofa. All of the sudden RyanC stopped, looked me, and he started hitting my arm a few times! He then attempted to hit baby -- but missed. WHOA!

He has been doing this in the past 2 days but not often. We have no idea how he learned to hit people. We speculate he might be getting jealous of us holding AidanC all the time. I am not sure how to get him to stop though...

Tonight I handed baby to wife and then gave RyanC big hugs. He didn't try to hit us after that but he twisted to get away from me hugging him. We then spent the next 10-15 minutes chasing each other around the house. Maybe I need to play with RyanC more often....

All quiet again?

2006-09-12T20:24:00.000-07:00

Last night after dinner RyanC hugged uncle for more than 2 minutes all of the sudden. It's unusual to see him holding onto uncle (or anyone) and keeping still -- he was definitely not tired at that time. Usually the little guy would give us a hug and then move on. He must have sensed that uncle was leaving soon...

My father in-law and brother in-law left for Taiwan today. This means RyanC lost two playmates so he was pretty happy to see my when I came home.

With the sudden realization that I may soon needing to mow my lawn, I am starting to wish I had a bigger yard where I can get a riding lawn mower to achieve marital bliss like CherkB. Except in my situation my wife will probably get to ride the lawn mower with RyanC and I get to watch the baby.

Baby AidanC has been cooing more and more. Everyone says he looks more like mommy. It was fun when everyone says RyanC looks more like me -- but it's a bit weird when hearing that AidanC looks more like mommy.

Hmm.. I have been getting hungry more easily lately... I wonder why...

Ryan's New Playground

2006-09-09T22:49:00.000-07:00

In the past 2 days, RyanC has been pulling us to go with him to play in his new playground. He does this ~3 times a day. He would start fussing if we refuse to take him. Once there, he does not want to leave!

Well, the playground was supposed to be a new mini-van (Toyota Sienna LE) to replace wife's older sedan but our little boy found it more suitable for his enjoyment -- even though this minivan does not have any bell and whistles like DVD player or navigation system. Wife decided on the basic model with power-sliding doors.

We inspected the playground in garage -- I was really looking for spots to drill if I ever get around to purchasing/installing backup sensors. RyanC was looking for buttons to push and he has also been imitating everything we do lately.

RyanC enjoys climbing all over the car to sit in all the seats. He would push all the buttons and then opens/closes all the compartments he can find. I think he is having more fun in this minivan than in a bathtub. Here he is pretending to be driving.

When we turn on the music, RyanC would start dancing no matter which row he is checking out at that time. He walks and climbs through the three rows of seats happily -- always on the lookout for more buttons and compartments.

The little tank that leaked

2006-09-05T21:24:00.000-07:00

We were having leakage problem with our potable water expansion tank in the past few weeks. We noticed it when the basement was cleaned up and then there was this wet spot on the floor. It turned out that rust-colored water was dripping from the ridge in the middle of the tank. It was a slow leak so I was never in a hurry to deal with it -- especially when I am not as handy as CherkyB.

So... the other day (last Thursday) I asked wife to call plumbers to find out how much it would cost to get a new tank installed. The next thing I know, I got a phone call from her in the middle of the day asking me what pressure range to buy for the tank. The conservation went something like this:

Wife: "What is the size of the tank we have?"
Me: "Huh? What tank?"
Wife: "Water expansion tank. The one that is leaking."
Me: "Oh. I don't remember. Can I get back to you later in the day?"
Wife: "I am at Home Depot already."
Me: "I thought you were supposed to call plumbers for installation pricing?"
Wife: "Yeah, but I am at Home Depot already so I will just buy one and we can return it if it doesn't work"
Me: "Okay... you need to make sure you get a tank with max pressure of 150"
Wife: "I see two tanks here and they are blah blah blah mdoel #s.... not sure about pressure"
Me: "Maybe I can go buy it later after work?"
Wife: "Nah, it's okay. I will just get one that looks like the size of ours."
Me: "I don't know. We are supposed to match the pressure."
Wife: "You can always return it. I will just get it."
Me: "ok..."

Half an hour later I got another phone call:
Wife: "I just opened the box. The pressure is between 40-150"
Me: "Okay. I don't know how to install it though."
Wife: "Why don't you ask your co-workers?"
Me: "I will double check. EDF said to drain the pipe, unscrew the old one and screw in the new one"
Wife: "Ok"

Later I got home to find a new water expansion tank with 2x the capacity of the old one. Hmm... this does not look like the same size as the old one...

I then read the installation warnings and how we are supposed to match the pressure of the tank to the pressure of the pipe... along with several warnings about how it should really be installed by professionals who know what they are doing to follow local code. That is when I went back upstairs to tell wife that we may still need to call plumbers to install the tank.

This morning wife asked whether she should call plumbers and I said to give me a day to find out whether someone had installed this at work. Well, I did not find anyone who had actually installed one. Some asked why I have a potable water expansion tank and all I could say was that it was for the water heater and it was there when we bought the house.

I went by EDF's cube for further consulation. He was sitting in his cube but he had a "DO NOT DISTURB" sign posted with notes saying "you are NOT an exception. Come back at the following times..." Figuring that note was not for me, I popped my head over the wall and asked whether I really need to pressurize the new tank or whether I should come back in half an hour. He created an exception and answered my questions... At the end of the day I ran into him in the parking lot and found out that everyone figured they were exceptions. Hmm... I guess that was not too surprising.

After dinner tonight, I went downstairs to look at the leaky tank some more. It had two drips of water on it. I asked my brother-in-law what he thought and he said the installation seems to indicate the need to match pressure but he also could not find the pressure meter. Since no one has yet to say "Don't do this! It is highly dangerous", I figured I'll give it a shot after everyone has used the water and was made aware that we might be out of water for a while.

The first step was to turn off the water heater since installation guide said to turn everything off. We then turned off the main pipe and then drained the pipe using the tube and drain mechanism in my first DIY project. It took about 5-10 minutes to drain the water and during that time we realized that we probably did not need to turn off the water heater since we had turned off this valve to prevent water from going in/out of the water heater.

The next step was to unscrew the old tank. When I climbed on the ladder, I noticed that the old tank had no supporting mechanism to allow one to apply a wrench to screw it on/off. Wife said "Just use your hands and twist the tank". I twisted the tank and it came off easily.

Then came the easiest part - screwing the new tank. This new tank had a supporting mechanism to allow a wrench to be applied so it was relatively trivial to screw it on tightly.

We turned the water back on and nothing exploded... so that was a good sign.

Then we read the instructions on how to turn on the water heater and found out that we needed to light it manually. It took some time but we eventually got it to work. It reminded me of the early days in my childhood when I used to be so scared of lighting the gas-powered water heater. The fire went out often in those days and I always thought it was going to explode when I lit the matches -- not to mention the tank was out in the dark backyard. I will probably check the water heater tank often in the next few days out of paranoia.

We do have a CO detector in the house so hopefully it will detect gas. Though I have never seen it register an alarm after installing it -- it is either working really well or it is not working at all.

The important lessons learned are:
1) wife is always right. she bought the right tank (it fits).
2) wife is always right. she told me to unscrew the old tank by hand and she was right.

I am such a lucky man... hopefully the new tank will hold when the sprinkler turns on...

Bounce!

2006-09-03T21:43:00.000-07:00

RyanC was invited to a co-worker's daughter's two-year birthday party at Bounce , which is a place with giant inflatable playgrounds for kids. This is RyanC's first birthday party invitation so I took the Rebel XT dSLR along.

Here is the birthday cake with a little pony on it:

Ryan stuffed himself full with pepproni pizza before enjoying the wonderful cake:

Initially RyanC hesitated with these giant inflatable playgrounds. It took him some time before making a step after I plopped him into the toddler one. He stood still, afraid to move, for a few minutes while observing all these other big kids crash around. Suddenly an employee showed up and told those big kids to go to other playgrounds instead. It became less intimadating when only the toddlers are left. RyanC eventually became comfortable enough to enter the castle in this mario-like land with mushrooms & castle.

RyanC even warmed up to this little toddler girl who was there for the same party. He followed her around for a little bit and imitated her as she hopped and fell onto the floor intentionally. Later he saw her around an obstacle so he pointed at her and screeched, which is his way of saying "I see you!" but he scared the little girl instead.

RyanC also hugged this dwarf when I told him to go push the little blue guy. He also pushed the mushroom shown in the background but that one bounced back and smacked his face. The brave little guy didn't cry though. He hopped on the mushroom and pushed it onto the floor later.

After a while in the toddler playground, RyanC didn't want to play there anymore so I took him to this other obstacle course that was once filled with bigger kids earlier. They had just left for the giant slide. I took the opportunity to encourage RyanC to go inside by himself. Here is RyanC looking back at me after crawling through the tunnel to get inside this obstacle course with medium slides:

Once inside, RyanC was attempting to jump but can't really balance himself so he fell down and then got stuck in between the obstacles. I had to pull him up from the edge since he wedged himself pretty good in there. RyanC had a lot of fun bouncing himself against the obstacles and climbing over the stair-like 3 ft tubes. It took ~10 minutes before he reached the climbing wall area. After watching him bounce around having a blast, I jokingly told him to try go up since he seemed to enjoy falling more so than bouncing. The little monkey headed to the 4-5 ft climbing wall and climbed and climbed... When he got near the top without falling, that's when I belatedly realized he could still get hurt if he fell from the top. I held my breath as he climbed up and eventually disappeared from my view.

I had to run around to the other side of the playground to see where he went. It turns out that he was sitting on the other side looking down at the slide. I tried to get him to slide down but he was really hesitant. He attempted to get down with his back turned and then changed his mind after realizing his feet was not touching the ground. He disappeared from view again after crawling to the other side, which has another slide waiting for him. I rushed over to find him sitting at the top smiling at me. I got closer to the slide and told him I'd catch him. That's when he slid down and laughed the whole way. RyanC repeated this obstacle/slide 2-3 times and then didn't want to play anymore.

It was around closing time so I asked RyanC if he wanted to go home and got the surprising nod from him. However, I wasn't too tired so I took him to BestBuy next door for additional father-and-son bonding. RyanC was definitely attracted to the plasma HDTVs since he'd stand in front of them and stare. He also danced whenever music played so that was pretty funny. We goofed around a little bit before heading home...

Home Again

2006-08-31T22:56:00.000-07:00

Just got back home from a conference in CA. Everyone but the in-laws are asleep already. No welcome party at home! Too bad, RyanC will have to wait for the Japanese chocolate I received as present... It was weird not seeing RyanC and AidanC for a few days. AidanC seems bigger while sleeping quietly in the crib. I am afraid to open RyanC's door since that'll wake him up for sure - need to fix that door so it doesn't make s0 much noise when opening/closing.

Since I was away for a few days, I had thought I would get plenty of sleep at the conference but that didn't work out. It wasn't because I tried Long Island iced-tea at this bar inside Mariott that costed $10.87, which caused me to feel the effect for a day or two...

Anyways, on the first day of the conference, I sprained my back muscle while carrying my super cool backpack that was supposed to provide excellent support. I should not have kept it on one shoulder to balance between the backpack, a plate full of not-so-great food (sandwiches), and a glass of coke.

It also didn't help that I sat in front of little kids in both out-bound and in-bound trips so I couldn't nap. They seemed to enjoy kicking chair non-stop. I missed my boys...

This trip I didn't go to eat my usual stinky-tofu. Instead the best food I had were outside of the conference:

peking duck
pearl milk tea
steamed fish

Rain rain rain!

2006-08-25T17:40:00.000-07:00

It started raining this evening after yet-another team-celebration where we had free drinks and snacks. No we don't always have so many celebrations -- it's just that the celebrations piled up this year when things finally got done. It will probably be another year before I get invited to another one of these....

It's raining cats and dogs. We have lost our satellite signal so there is no TV. I guess it's one of those rare occasions where we wish we had cable. It's a good thing that in-law already mowed the lawn. :)

Eggs!

2006-08-17T21:01:00.000-07:00

I love eggs.

The other day in-laws bought 12 dozens of eggs because they were on sale. That's 144 eggs and we have been eating eggs daily. With 5 adults in the house, that means it will take us ~14 days to finish these eggs if we each eat 2/day. RyanC usually eats a little of the egg-white area and spits out the egg yolk, which is the best tasting part for me but wife strongly discourages me from eating too much for health reasons.

I probably will have egg-phobia by the end of this week.

Last Sunday in-laws drove to Denver (1-1.5 hrs drive) to get fresh vegies & fish -- I think they just needed a break from us. Wife and I stayed home with RyanC and AidanC most of the afternoon until RyanC started getting restless. I took RyanC to CircuitCity for some father-n-son bonding experience. He had fun re-arranging items on shelves.

I had bought this notebook backpack on-line since I have been worried about using non-padded backpack for the laptop daily. However, CircuitCity didn't have it in store despite pomising it will be available within 24 minutes of ordering on-line. It was annoying to see them cancel my order without making any attempt to get the item in-store. That's when I looked at the order form more closely and noticed that they owe me $24 giftcard if the order is not ready in 24 minutes. They honored that promise only after I pointed that out. So I took RyanC to BestBuy to see if they have the same backpack in stock. Score! BestBuy had two in stock and I got them to price-match CircuitCity's web-special. This Synergy backpack has so many pockets that I don't know what to do with them all! I really like the padding it provides even though the bag itself weighs ~3.5 lbs.

New finding: RyanC loves XBOX 360 -- or he just loves anything with buttons. He saw the XBOX 360 and immediately reached for the controller. He didn't care much for the giant HDTVs though... we will have to work on that.

On a different note, CherkyB and the family has finally moved to Colorado! Welcome!

Kiddie Pool

2006-08-11T20:27:00.000-07:00

RyanC went swimming at the community pool on Sunday evening. It was the first time he went this year. He had an entourage consisting of grandpa, grandma, uncle and mommy. I stayed home to watch baby AidanC since I was too exhausted...

Then the other night I watched the video captured by RyanC's uncle...

RyanC was giggling and laughing in the kiddie pool with grandma standing in the water with him. Mommy was standing to the side of the pool taking pictures. RyanC was having a ball.. and he was also grabbing onto this big and colorful beach ball and moving it around in the pool. Grandpa called out to RyanC to ask for the beach ball. The little boy then walked across the shallow water to give the beach ball to grandpa, who was sitting a few feet from the pool, a few feet from uncle who was filming the happy boy. Then little RyanC walked back into the kiddie pool. Here is mommy's view of this:

Well, what follows was rather surreal...

RyanC stepped into the pool, lost his balance, and then fell face down into the water. On the video, I heard wife saying "hurry!" while RyanC was struggling unsuccessfully to come to surface. In the background, grandma was standing there in shock, not knowing what to do... even though she was standing in the water and a few feet away from RyanC. It seemed pretty scary to watch RyanC's submerging body with little hands/legs not finding a place to push up. Soon, super mommy showed up in the view, handed the camera to grandpa (who just stood up) urgently, and then went into the water to pick up the not-so-thirsty boy.

I counted the time silently as the disturbing images played on... it took about 5-6 seconds for da boy to be rescued.

RyanC wimpered with a few weak cries. Wife pushed on RyanC's tummy and that forced some water out of his mouth... A few minutes later, RyanC was back into the pool as if nothing had happened. Everyone kept a close eye on him but no one stood next to him in the water.

This was caught on tape by the dedicated video-capturing uncle, whose calm hands enabled us to have these unforgettable images/sounds. The video was as nerve-wrecking as wife's story afterwards. We are all relieved that RyanC is okay. Grandma was too traumatized by this -- she does not want to take RyanC to the kiddie pool again.

Coincidentally, recently RyanC also started having nightmares and would go hysterical around 3:30am-4:30am, requiring someone to hold him and calm him down afterwards. We have no idea if it has anything to do with the kiddie pool incident since he does not yet tell us about his nightmares. However, based on some sleep-toddler-talk heard by grandpa, it might be related to the flying bird incident, where a bird flew into him and scared him so much that he is now afraid of anything (fly, moth, butterfly, bee) that flies near-by.

Today RyanC said "ba ba" and "ma ma" several times to me on the phone while wife coached him on the side. It was the first time he actually "talked" to me on the phone with more than coincidental mumbling. It made my day. :)

Another Celebration

2006-08-04T17:46:00.000-07:00

We had yet another celebration last night for project completition. Wife changed her mind about going and the official line is that "She is too tired from taking care of the kids" but everyone thinks it's really because most spouses/SO cannot stand geeks talking to geeks about work at such celebrations.

Each RSVP'ed individual got 2 tickets for the drinks of our choice and I had 4 to spend since wife was no show. Hence, I took advantage of the situation and tried 3 new drinks. (gave one ticket away to Mr F.A.)

White Russian - this was recommended to me at the last wedding I had been to but I never got a chance to try it since I had Long Island Iced Tea then. It tasted a bit too sweet though.

Vodka Tonic - CherkyB had recommended this one earlier after hearing about me drinking sissy drinks. It was not too bad (since I finished it) but I really can't remember how it tasted.

Seven & Seven - Quite a few people at the celebration was drinking this and I seem to think I liked this one the most -- though I can't tell if I had been drunk by this time.

Wide-Angle Lens

2006-07-23T22:54:00.000-07:00

Borrowed friend's Canon 10-22mm lens to play with and here are the pics that I can post without near-term retribution:

AidanC @ 1 month (taken with Sigma 30mm):

All Quiet Again

2006-07-22T23:04:00.000-07:00

Mother-in-law is the only one remaining with us. Sister-in-law left today and the others left on Thursday. This house feels a bit empty without people occupying the sofas -- either for sleep or for TV. I probably will be stressed out soon since this means I have to watch the children more.

RyanC was super attached to me this afternoon. Yep, that's right, he wanted me and not mommy or grandma! (The fruity bars finally worked!) It is not clear if that was caused by the sudden drop of his playmates (grandpa, uncle and aunt) in the past few days. For some reason he didn't want to play with grandma for much of the afternoon and instead wanted me to keep him company. He did eventually warm up to grandma gain in the late evening and went to bed without a fight though...

In the past few weeks RyanC has learned to call "ma ma" and "ba ba" clearly. He will call the right names when we look at the pictures taken. Heck, he will even call "gong" and "gu" for grandpa and uncle. He doesn't know how to call auntie and grandma yet. gotta work on that.

So... on Friday at lunch I mentioned that I was brought up in Taiwan and then SV immediately started the sentence "Oh! Do you know...." and was interrupted by TG "Come on! This is where you ask about someone you know from Taiwan and I will bet you lunch that he does not know of so-and-so since Taiwan is not a small country!"

So SV took the bet and continued "Emil, also goes by the stage name Wakim"... and at this time I blurted out "Emil Chou the singer?! I used to listen to his albums all the time! He is one of my favorite singers!" I was then thinking SV was just mentioning a famous person to see if I know of him -- kind of like how 10 years back people betted on whether I would know what Hootie and the Blowfish was...

However, SV then proceeded to tell how her high school girl friend is married to Emil and that they come to Fort Collins to visit her folks yearly! WHOA! I had read that Emil was married to an American but I did not know she's from Fort Collins! Anyways, TG lost the bet and I learned more about an idol. By the way, Emil made cameo appearances in Jacky Chan movies. For example, he was the ice-cream vendor in Rumble in the Bronx and Mr Nice Guy.

While I am commenting about famous people in real life, I should mention that da funny blogger CherkyB (who may not have as large of a following as Emil) was in town for house-hunting and we went out for lunch on Thursday with other co-workers. I learned that he was not kidding when he had previously told stories of himself looking at the ringing cell phone and then decides not to answer because it's The Mrs... but then he called the voicemail to check the message soon after that...

Relatives @ Home

2006-07-16T20:51:00.000-07:00

Last weekend sister-in-law arrived for a 2-week stay to visit baby AidanC and RyanC. This weekend mother-in-law arrived to help take care of baby AidanC for a while. With the wife's family mostly here (brother & dad came earlier), we are only missing the youngest sister-in-law in this house! Supposedly she thought about coming but can't seem to find an economical way to also bring her two younger ones from east coast. :)

Needless to say, it's been pretty exciting to have so many people in the house. Fridge usually starts totally full from weekend grocery shopping and becomes empty around mid-week. Our partial-basement is now more spacious thanks to the team effort by everyone but me. I think I was busy doing something with work but I might have been just thinking that to avoid manual labor.

RyanC has been having a blast since everyone takes turns to play with him due to his incredible ability to wear us out. The only time the relatives seem to ignore him is when they are watching Taianese TV shows. RyanC would then entertain himself by sneaking upstairs to find colorful markers to draw on the walls, which took grandpa some time to clean up. It is a good thing that he is not tall enough to reach for the permanent markers.

AidanC has been growing pretty quickly and is more alert and sensitive about whether someone is holding him. AidanC's aunt seems to enjoy holding AidanC so she is usually the first one to pick him up if he fusses -- somehow she can hear AidanC so much better than me and wife. I have been able to get reasonable sleep most of the nights thanks to wife's late-night feedings. I meant she feeds AidanC so his crying won't wake me up. Here is a picture of AidanC doing daddy impersonation:

Beer Chicken

2006-07-03T22:10:00.000-07:00

Today we finally tried grilling beer chicken for the first time. BobG had highly recommended it but I just never got around to trying it. It's a pretty simple recipe where one places rubs on the chicken and then sticks half-can of beer into the chicken's behind to stand it on the grill. Here is what the chicken looked like before we closed the lid on it:

Ryan had a lot of fun poking the cooked chicken with his fork but Aidan did not enjoy being compared with another 6 pounder.

The chicken was pretty tender and juicy as advertised! Unfortunately we couldn't finish the 6 lb chicken so we will probably get a 3-4 lb chicken next time.

Busy?

2006-07-01T22:16:00.000-07:00

I have been slacking off on updating this blog. Some may think that I haven't updated because I am busy with the children but that is not entirely true -- it's deceiving just like my often "busy" status on IM @ work.

The truth is...

AidanC has been a dream baby as he sleeps/eats every 3-4 hours. RyanC has been having a great time with grandpa as they go to parks daily. Wife has been able to get everything done without needing me to help a whole lot. I occasionally help with diaper change or taking care of RyanC when grandpa is too tired to deal with him -- but that's really not "busy" work.

So I went back to work on Monday without taking time off... but then there was no crisis this week at work so I started focusing on the next project instead. I thought about blogging in the evenings but then I didn't have much to write about...

Since there has not been any pressing needs for me to accomplish anything, I started taking more pictures with my calibrated Sigma lens to practice photography.

AidanC sleeping as usual:

Here is RyanC in the morning ( you can tell it's morning from his hair), looking through my wallet for goodies already:

RyanC staring at uncle's LCD display:

RyanC learning about the daunting work involved with eating crabs: (wife took this one)

RyanC doing what grandpa taught him about squeezing nose:

Kids

2006-06-25T07:37:00.000-07:00

Now that there are two, I have to refer to them "kidS". It feels a bit weird but I guess we will have to get used to that.

Here are some pictures taken on Friday when RyanC met AidanC for the first time. RyanC was pointing at AidanC initially and then eventually he warmed up to the little baby.

On Saturday mommy and baby came home! RyanC wanted to see baby in the crib initially.
Later he seemed annoyed when we held the baby instead of him. Maybe he was jealous but he was a little fussy for the rest of the day. Grandpa calmed him down by giving him candies.

Last night baby AidanC woke up every hour. He was a hungry little baby! RyanC woke up in a good mood since he was happily playing with grandpa and uncle, who returned from his military duty in Korea yesterday afternoon. It will be interesting to see how we all cope when aunty and grandma comes over in July to visit.

Baby AidanC

2006-06-23T21:28:00.000-07:00

Baby AidanC finally arrived after a long wait for the labor process to start! We are all tired so I'm going to continue to slack off on blog update...

Team Celebration

2006-06-17T13:52:00.000-07:00

I was telling CherkyB via IM about our informal team celebration and he said "you should blog about that"... Since I usually take da blog meister's advice, I immediately started this post. Please note that even though this title might be awfully similar to JohnnyB's "Team Building vs. Beer" first post, it is not from the same event. (Greetings to JohnnyB in case he stumbles into this dreck!)

Yesterday we had an impromptu team celebration at this restaurant/bar to take a break from being done with our committed milestone. It seems kind of silly to take a break from being done but oh well.. free food & drinks are always welcome! Hence, even though I was supposed to be alert and on-call in case wife calls about labor, I attempted to round up some people to go for the freebies.

Normally you would think that people would be jumping at the opportunity to be DONE and celebrate. However, I encountered quite a few indifferent people that needed some prodding encouragement to join us. A group of people were standing around and chatting about "going home early!" until I reminded them of the free drinks/food. TG even lamented about feeling bad for taking a break from working on a project that isn't even approved. ARGH! What happened to these people's natural attraction for free food/drinks?! Something must be wrong with us... but let's not dwell on that since free food/drinks were waiting at a restaurant/bar a few miles away...

As TG, SS, and I walked into the 2nd level of the bar where we had reserved most of the space for our celebration, one customer (sitting right in front of the bartender) blurted "What is this? Geeks are us?!" and the other customer replied "Yepp!". That was our "three engineers walked into the bar" story and the beginning of our celebration... (and I didn't even hear them first hand as TG was the one that heard them clearly).

One good thing about impromptu team celebration is that there is not much time to plan for anything but food and drinks by the organizers. We did not have to listen to speeches and we did not have to have team building events where we compete with each other for the sake of making it a great place to work. All we did was to chat, eat and drink about the past 2 years of down-and-upside-down excitements. Oh, and there were a lot of drinks. The waitresses were friendly and helpful as they walked among the geeks. When one asks for a beer, they bring a filled-up glass AND a full pitcher too -- what service! When one declines for beer, they ask if we want shots instead! What a celebration!

False Alarm?

2006-06-17T10:10:00.000-07:00

It is starting to look like we had a false alarm earlier regarding imminent delivery -- maybe saying this will cause it to really happen. We have everything packed and ready to go. Hmm.. I better make sure to get the infant child-seat.

This delay did cause some inconvenience as people at work attempted to send me home on Friday - they did not believe me when I said said my wife told me to go back to work and that she will call me when she is ready.

The upside of this slight delay is that I have had time to write-up the credit dispute letter (for credit card company) with Dell's surprising charges that were added after order confirmation. I am still thinking about submitting a complaint against FTC -- especially since I found the following line in the order confirmation:

If you paid by Dell Preferred Account or credit card, a charge for the amount above was submitted to your card issuer and will be charged when your system or item ships.

The Waiting Game

2006-06-15T21:12:00.000-07:00

I woke up from my nap not hearing any sound. I started thinking that maybe wife went to deliver the baby without me - hmm, that would be something. Then I heard door close and RyanC's piercing cry echoed through the house. Ahhh, she was putting RyanC to bed...

It appears that wife's labor is progressing slowly. In some ways, it's probably good that we are at home. Yet I am too paranoid to think that the baby's gonna pop out before we can get to the hospital... I will go read a book or something...

Too exhausted

2006-06-15T17:23:00.000-07:00

Last night I got home past midnight after a long day of work. As I was trying to sleep at 2am, wife said "I am having painful contractions". My response was:

Honey, can you please go drink more water and relax? I am really exhausted now...

She was nice and considerate and left the bedroom to drink water and relax -- while measuring the contractions... I slept through the night...

Just when everything was fine and dandy today at work, I see this from email from wife declaring to our relatives that the doctor said to get ready to have baby tonight... Hmm... is the baby really going to come out two weeks earlier than expected? I am now waiting at home to find out...

Fortunately my checklist is short:
Camera Batteries - charged.
VideoCam Battery - charging...
Wife - seems okay at this time
RyanC - happy still

*YAWN* I am tired. Maybe I will go take a nap now....

Lightning Strikes

2006-06-11T17:50:00.000-07:00

Found out today from our next-door neighbor that the neighbor 3 houses down was hit by lightning the other day when we all heard a loud boom associated with lightning. Our neighbor saw the blinding white flash since he happened to be looking out the window at that time.

That house lost 3 TVs with that lightning hit but the PC was okay.... one was a big screen... OUCH.

We got lucky since our house is the highest house (due to its position on the sloped hill and the fact that our immediate neighbors have one-story houses instead of two) near where lightning striked. We could have lost our 50" TV, 3 PCs and 1 notebook...

Car Window

2006-06-10T13:36:00.000-07:00

We got lucky and fixed wife's car window after it's been stuck in wide-open position in the past few years. It turns out that the window was jammed and pushing it out of the wide-open setting (requiring opening the side-panel etc) caused it to work again. We didn't put the side panel back in tightly afterwards though... oh well... this saves some moneyfor now...

You betcha

2006-06-09T22:23:00.000-07:00

My horoscope from excite.com (quoted without permission):

"There's no need to work toward a goal every day. Some days, it's okay to just enjoy the beauty and wonder that's all around you. Work and relationship concerns can wait for tomorrow. Today you deserve to take it easy and look for the flatter land -- you can climb that mountain some other day! Remember, you're in control. Don't let your life get taken over by goals and deadlines. Avoid controversy and answer every appealing invitation with a 'you betcha!' and a smile."

Interesting enough, work deadlines have been consuming my time everyday recently. So I looked around to enjoy the beauty and wonder around me -- they are all sleeping, exhausted from full-day of chores/play. I am in control.... you bethca!

06/06/06

2006-06-06T22:29:00.000-07:00

RyanC was really happy today when he woke up. He giggled and laughed with mommy, daddy and grandpa. We don't know why. He behaved so well that grandpa declared "He was so good that he did not even cry today!" - 06/06/06.

Picture Day

2006-06-04T21:21:00.000-07:00

Went to car-show but got turned away at the gate since my friend and I were too cheap to pay $15/person for the last-hour of the car-show. So we headed to CSU's outdoor flower garden to take some pictures.

These flowers look like faces staring back....

Hungry butterfly... it was busy feeding all over the garden.

For dinner, my father in-law cooked fatty pork & pig-feet for dinner. Yumm~~~

Fresh oranges.. pre-juice form...

RyanC practicing Kung-Fu...

The training continues....

DIY Project

2006-06-03T22:37:00.000-07:00

A few days ago my wife called me at work to tell me that the top of oven-top Kenmore microwave melted. I was confused until I got home and saw the white circular plastic piece (center-top of microwave) with plasticle -- oil was dripping from the melted plastic. WOW! I didn't know microwave could melt its own plastic parts.

I pulled the plastic piece off and found out that oil had somehow accumulated on top and the microwave must have heated up the oil and then eventually melted the plastic. That oil looks and smells like cooking grease so it probably accumulated in the past 5 years. We briefly discussed buying a new microwave or calling in a repairman but then the cheap side of me thought that it would be economical for me to fix it myself... after all, it shouldn't cost more than $10 to buy that piece of circular plastic... so I naively thought.

Well, it turns out that this piece is called a Microwave inlet-cover and the cheapest I could find on-line was $41.05 + shipping from AppliancePartsPros! Yikes! It even has a yellow piece that doesn't seem to exist in our Kenmore microwave. I called up the customer support to see if it comes installation instruction -- and I was told that due to the high-wattage danger of working with microwave, they recommend having professionals perform fixes so they do not provide installation instructions with parts! HUH? I then decided to take a risk and ordered the part anyways -- figuring that I should be able to stick 4 plastic screws to secure a circular plastic piece in place.

The partquickly arrived (much faster than the Dell camera/lens and the credit card charge did not include surprising tax charges) within 2 days. In fact, it came in on the same day when the camera lens arrived (ordered more than a month earlier). I had to put off the installation since it was more important to check out the much-awaited lens to whine/complain about how out-of-focus it was and how Dell overcharged my credit card.

Tonight I finally got around to installing the plastic cover after cleaning microwave and wiping off some of the grease accumulated in the inet. The first thing I noticed was that I had to choose either the yellow cover or the white cover -- but not both (screws aren't long enough). I picked the white one. However, that's when real work started. I found out that the plastic push-in screws would drop off due to gravity working on the cover. This meant I had to scrap off the sealant left-over and re-apply new ones to cause the cover to stick to the top! Not being the most handyman around, I found a flat-head screw-driver and started scraping/digging. It took me 30 minutes to get that gunk off the top of the microwave. It took me another 15 minutes to squeeze enough of the sealant onto the plastic cover. It was pretty much a done deal after that... I felt like a pro.

I was too chicken to turn on the microwave tonight. We will find out if it still works tomorrow.

Lens & SurpriseTax & BYOB

2006-06-02T23:15:00.000-07:00

Finally got my Sigma 30mm 1.4 lens on Thursday. I got home early to check out the lens and the pictures were fuzzy in most cases. What a major disappointment! After performing a more thorough focus tests, it turns out that the lens front-focuses (known problem) so I will either have to send it in to Sigma service for calibration or I will have to get a different lens. My decision is somewhat complicated by Dell's recent charges to my credit card.

Dell is starting to really piss me off. I used to favor Dell but I am no longer sure. More than one month after I placed orders for the lens and camera, Dell just charged my credit card for the purchase and additional $$ for state tax. This means I could have gotten the camera for cheaper and had shorter wait from another vendor instead. The annoying part is that my order confirmations clearly indicates there's no state tax and I only found out about the additional charge by checking my credit-card statements. When I contacted Dell about this surprising tax charge, the customer service rep was telling me that the Terms of Service says customer is responsible for paying taxes and that I can contact IVR department about this issue. Of course I am responsible for paying taxes but I don't see why I have to pay taxes whey the order confirmation clearly indicated no taxes are due. I am still debating whether I should continue to deal with Dell. I am thinking about just disputing these additional charges with credit card company and let them handle this mess instead... what a pain!

Tonight I went to a co-worker's unwarming party after dinner. It's a party to celebrate him moving out of rental house. Interesting enough, the party is not held at the new house he bought but it's held at another co-worker's place...

The invitation said BYOB so I brought my own baby.

RyanC was shy at first so he clung to me closely. He then warmed up to the place and started playing with XBOX controllers & plastic cups near the keg. RyanC also stuffed his mouth with little cheese crackers -- as if he's been starving at home!

Well, tomorrow we are supposed to go to Denver early so here is the end of today's dreck.

Work, in-law, Wedding and "NO!"

2006-05-29T21:09:00.000-07:00

So many things have happened... However, unlike CherkyB, who succinctly remembers all the details in the funny aspect of life, I only can vaguely summarize the main events in the past few days:

1) work is taking over again...

2) My in-law arrived last Wed night from Taiwan! He had been living in Korea in the past 2 years with my brother-in-law. My brother-in-law will return next month.

3) I went to a Jewish wedding on Sunday.

4) RyanC started saying "NO!"

In the short time my in-law has been here, he has relocated and rearranged all the plants in the front-yard (by moving some to the backyard), per wife's instructions. He has also sanded the fence (did a great job there with the the smooth fence surface!) and will probably start and finish painting before I stop coughing. I think he will get bored in a few days when he finishes all the house chores that I had planned for the rest of the year. Well, it's okay. RyanC continues to be fond of grandpa so he's been attaching himself to grandpa more and more. I suspect in-law also enjoys RyanC's company because little boy reached for grandma as soon as they met at ~2am that night when we got back from Denver International Airport. Wife said he already changed RyanC's diapers a few times while I was away at the wedding. The only thing that he hasn't done is to take care of RyanC as he randomly wakes up at midnight, 3am or 5am -- that's still my speciality since "NO"-boy is somehow more attached to me at those times.

Since my in-law was here, I didn't feel too bad about leaving wife and kid at home to go to a co-worker's wedding on Sunday. Wife and kid was invited but wife didn't want to go (being 8+ month pregnant) and then I didn't really want to take the chance with RyanC ruining the wedding experience. The wedding was at Stanley Hotel at Estes Park, CO. I had not realized that is where "The Shining" was based on until I saw the posters at the basement of the main hotel. It was the first Jewish wedding I've ever been to, which was pretty exciting to see different customs. It was also the first time I heard a concert with classical music, which was part of the 45-minute music portion of the ceremony. I liked the music though I would have preferred more comfortable chair. I believe it was also the first time long island ice-tea made me feel nothing so I don't really remember too much. Good thing I got a ride so I didn't have to drive. Okay, I didn't really forget that much.. It was a great wedding and I just can't seem to describe the details with words...

RyanC has been getting better at communicating with us. He points to his mouth when he wants food/water. He points to items that he wants to have and sometimes whines/cries when he doesn't get it. He laughs and giggles when making a mess. And he says "NO!" whenever we ask/tell him to do something. e.g. "Ryan, is it bed-time?" "NO!" He is practically a teenager! He just doesn't ask for money yet -- though he enjoys taking my wallet and emptying all the contents all over the floor. I had thought he started saying "mama" or "dada" but he seems to make those sounds without really knowing what they meant... but he sure knows "uh oh" and "NO!" well. I think he is ready to start blogging and do a better job than daddy.

PS. Dell still has not shipped my Sigma 30mm 1.4 lens.

Open Sesame!

2006-05-23T20:55:00.000-07:00

RyanC knows how to open doors!

When I first heard about it from my wife yesterday, I was a bit skeptical because I thought he was still super shorty -- and it seemed too coincidental that he'd open the unlocked front-door around the time when the ice-cream truck comes by and then start dancing to tune of the music.

When I got home yesterday, I put the little guy to the test and asked him to open the bathroom door. He struggled a little bit to tip-toe and reach for the handle but he got it! Repeatedly! ARGH! This meant we could no longer count on containing him in his bedroom when it comes to bed time! Hence, I stayed with him until he fell asleep when it came to sleep time...

Later in the night, hours after we put RyanC to bed, I noticed that his door was ajar. I walked inside and did not find the little boy anywhere on bed. Fearing the worst, I turned on the light and found my boy lying face down on the carpet -- not too far away from the mattress. He was sleeping soundly. Apparently he figured out how to open the door but did not come out for some reason. Lucky us...

I borrowed a Canon 50mm 1.8 lens today to see how well this cheaper lens (~$80) works compared with the pricier 50mm 1.4 ($300+). Initial impression is that this lens does not seem as sharp as the 50mm 1.4. The autofocus felt almost just as fast for regular snap shots. It's not too bad for the price though! On another note, Dell still has not shipped my sigma 30mm 1.4 lens. I have stopped checking every few hours....

Horses

2006-05-20T23:28:00.000-07:00

Weather changed from cloudy in the morning to hot sun for the rest of the day, with some drizzle in between... typical CO weather. It was hot in our hose as temperature reached 84F in the afternoon -- didn't turn on AC because we kept on thinking it'll get cooler and it just got hotter and hotter.

We ended up staying at home today since I was too exhausted to drive to Denver after the bloody morning. RyanC had another nose bleed episode during morning nap and this time he got blood all over the carpet and door. It was messy but the boy was okay. When we did laundry to wash his bloody sheets, we were lucky to find out that the 4 layers of sheets used were all bloddy and they were just enough to protect the mattress from getting bloddy. Why do we use 4 layers? It's really because we were too cheap to buy a water-proof mattress cover for RyanC's mattress -- so we just added more sheets to protect against overflowing diaper conditions. It was amazing to see that detergent and oxy cleaned up all the various bloody spots.

I finally got something done for our own yardwork though. I mowed the lawn and trimmed the edges when the weather cooled in the evening. This was the first lawn mowing for our yard this year - sure dragged it out long enough!

Also got some more shooting done when horses showed up in the farm behind our backyard earlier in the day. One of the perks of our house's location is that we get to see rabbits, horses, dogs, and cows occasionally. In the early days when our grass was severely overgrown, the horses would reach over the wired fence and eat our grass. The following pictures were taken at with the Tamron 28-300mm zoom lens at 300mm. The first picture shows the view of the horse where we had trouble telling head or tail initially.

.

If all goes well, tomorrow we will head to Denver for some food and groceries!

Bloody Morning

2006-05-20T07:37:00.000-07:00

Snapped a few more pictures of RyanC this morning in the cloudy day and this is one of the very few focused ones. In the good old P&S Digital camera days, I used to have trouble capturing "the moment" and blamed it all on the camera not being able to keep up with RyanC's active movement. dSLR was going to be the key -- as I often explained to my wife. The great thing about dSLR is that the moment can be captured with its faster operations. The harsh reality is that I now have difficulty attributing my problem to the equipment - it really might just be me! I have been taking a lot (~25-50%) out-of-focus pictures since my hand shakes at the last minute or I recomposed the frame after focusing.

I am only counting the pictures where the key subject is out-of-focus and not the ones where the background seems blurry (that's intentional with the aperature settings). Maybe I need one of those $1k+ lenses with IS (Image Stabilization) where it helps with hand-shake! The thing is... if I buy the really nice lens, then I might really prove that it's just me and not the equipment. I am not yet ready for such confirmation in my life.

My inquisitive readers may wonder, how come only show one picture from this morning? Well, the other focused ones show too clearly of RyanC's running nose and drooling and I am saving those for when he grows up and brings a date home or something...

RyanC is still sick from the daycare so he has been fussier than usual - in fact, even daycare people noticed he was fussier on Friday. Maybe they had been polite in not telling us until it's RyanC's last day at this temporary daycare arrangement. At last, wife is finally done with the 2 week jury-duty! This means she will be tired from taking care of fussy baby instead of sitting in court-room. It doesn't sound like they are going to get together to write a book about their case like Scott Peterson's jurors did -- that may change if some national media starts getting interested in case involving someone suing a company for their car causing car-accident.

RyanC woke me up this morning at 2am and then 5:30am. At 2am, he apparently only wanted some water before he fell back to sleep in my arms -- he even refused grapes. But there was a bigger surprise at 5:30am. I found RyanC with major bloody face and that the bed sheet had bloody spots as well. ARGH! The blood was mostly dry so it must have happened earlier. This is the 2nd time it's happened to him -- I better turn the humidifier back on again. I tried to wash his face clean and it took multiple attempts as he violently pushed my hand away or cried his head off. Usually I'd just hand him to mommy since she knows best (i.e. best to clean him up and not let his crying interfere with the cleaning)... but she was still sleeping. So I fed RyanC some grapes and he calmed down eventually.

Hmm.. I am supposed to take a nap so I can drive the family to Denver for lunch and grocery shopping...

Photos

2006-05-18T21:02:00.000-07:00

Sick

2006-05-17T22:26:00.000-07:00

I got sick last weekend from something RyanC caught at daycare. My symptoms are running nose and sore throat. Poor little RyanC has been having problem sleeping so it's extra tiring for me -- especially since my arms and back are still sore from the yardwork.

I've turned into a browser-reload maniac in the past few days. It all started when I found out about the surprise shipment of my dSLR (Canon Rebel XT) last Friday, which is 3 weeks earlier than Dell had estimated. I was so excited that I've been clicking reload on the DHL status page every hour -- even though DHL says expected delivery is May 17th... There is something about being able to track a package constantly that makes it irresistable...

On May 12th (Friday), package went through sort at Atlanta, GA
On May 13th (Saturday), package went through sort at Columbia, MO

I then googled the driving distance between Atlanta, GA and Loveland, CO to see how it compares with Atlanta, GA to Columbia, MO. ~12 hours so that meant the package could arrive on Tuesday - one day earlier than "projected". I clicked on reload furiously on Monday but there was no update. I then repeated these inquiries on late Tuesday (or rather, early Wed AM) and still did not see an update. Darn DHL should have provided information on when the package LEFT their facility!

At this time I was depressed so I started googling for DHL missing packages. Some of the negative postings freaked me out and I started thinking maybe I should have ordered from another place that uses FedEx. I went to bed thinking that I may never get my dSLR. It doesn't really make sense how I was preparing to wait for 6+ weeks to save 3 buckets of KFCs and yet I got extra nervous with the package not getting to me ASAP. It might be because I had already borrowed some lens to get ready to test my new camera body! (My Sigma 30mm 1.4 lens is still not yet shipped according to Dell)

Woke up early Wed morning and checked DHL tracking site and there was still no update! I then went to work and clicked reload every few minutes -- hoping that my eagerness can speed up the delivery. It worked - or so I would like to think! At 9:30am I found out that my package reached Loveland and is out for delivery! This is when I started hitting reload more frequently... I would have stayed home if I didn't have all these meetings scheduled where I was a required attendee -- not because I say much but because they want someone to do work...

At 11:15am the package was delivered according to the tracking indicator so I rushed home to pick up the camrea. I didn't want to take a chance with losing the package as it sits in the front door. Normally I wouldn't worry this much but I really got tired from clicking reload - and my wife is still on that never ending jury-duty stuff! Luckily, my precious dSLR was patiently waiting for me when I got home. Yippie! Oh wait, except now I keep on checking on the order status of my lens to see whether Dell has shipped it yet...

It didn't take me long to snap 100+ pictures after getting home from work earlier than usual. RyanC was having running nose and was also drooling all over himself as he ate the California Kitchen Pizza (white cheese, thin crust), which is our favorite easy-to-make food lately. I took pics of RyanC until he cried from wanting to grab my new camera. He should have been thankful that I didn't use flash to make him look totally dazed.

Anyways, here are some non-flash pictures that didn't go completely out of focus when using Canon 50mm 1.4 lens, which should be similar to the lens I purchased. I still have a lot to learn about photography -- just like everything else.

Return of the Blah

2006-05-13T19:53:00.000-07:00

I am exhausted. My arms and back are sore...

It's been 8 days since my last update. I was aiming to match CherkyB's record of non-posting but instead I shatterd it. Why was I aiming to match the non-posting record? Well, it started with the Friday following my post when I realized that my body was still feeling the effect of that pint of Easy Street and I didn't feel like doing anything. I thought to myself that I'll wait for da funny blog update of the dedicated (well, not so-dedicated with recent trend) fat camper for further inspiration -- I waited and waited and then hectic life took over. Hence, this long absence did not make me a better story teller/writer so my bored readers may continue to be disappointed.

A few things did happen during this time...

The first involves the beginning of RyanC's stay at day care on May 9th. Our 17-month old kid had never been away from us until this point. Naturally it was really stressful for us as we dropped him off before wife headed to court. Oh yeah. What started this was a jury-duty summon that arrived for my 8-month wife. As obvious it seems, we were amazed with her luck as she got picked as final juror (7 out of 70 ppl that showed up) despite her pregnant state. (Who would want a potentially cranky house-wife deciding the fate of their case while a baby is kicking/flipping around inside her tummy as she listens to others yack?) In fact, not only did she get selected, she got a case that is projected to take 10 business days to finish -- not the nominal 1-3 day jury service. We thought it was so unlikely that we went out and bought a lottery ticket to see if the trend woud continue -- but her luck ended there.

Anyways, back to us scrambling to find a day-care and then dropping RyanC off on the morning of May 9th. We had planned on staying for up to half an hour to get him used to the new environment so we sat on the carpet with him watching a few kids playing with toys. I was looking at this little kid that had a dry-cough and wondered if RyanC will get sick from hanging out at daycare. That's when RyanC found this button-pushing toy interesting and walked towards it. He got so involved with that toy that he wouldn't have noticed us leaving if we hadn't pulled him to us to give him a goodbye hug. We were still concerned about how well he would adopt so we called in two hours to hear him doing "really well" according to the supervising adults. In fact, RyanC did so well that when we went to pick him up, he wanted to go back inside!!! Mommy had to take him to the day-care playground outside to keep him from fussing too much. He had a lot of fun playing with the sand and then dumped sand over his head with this little plastic shovel. That was a somewhat disappointing day when we realized this little brat didn't really care of us as much as we thought he might be.

The second event involves mini-crisis at work but that's normal so I don't really feel like writing too much about it despite it taking up most of my time recently.

The most recent even occurred today. I moved 4000-6000 lbs of grass rolls while helping a friend with yard work, which is something that I am terrible at. This is the most weight I have ever handled in one day! The trailer had 3 piles with each having 50 rolls weighing at ~40lbs each. Some of them must have weighed more than 60 lbs because they were wet and dense. Of course I didn't do all the work myself (friend's kids and neighbor's kids were helping) but that was still pretty amazing for me. I normally don't lift heavy stuff after my back got injured from bike-hiking in Moab 8 years ago... Yes, I used to be "active" in mountain-biking when I only stayed on the bike for downhill and hiked the bike when facing uphill. I refer to these trips as my "bike-hiking" trips since I don't really ride as much as others do. Anyhoo, I must have pushed the bike uphill in a bad way or something -- my back had never been the same since that trip. Surprisingly my back held up pretty well today while carrying these rolls so I only got sore back. Other than the scratches on my lower arms, my arms are super weak and I am not sure I can keep on typing in pain. I am going to stop for now...

Easy Street

2006-05-04T19:17:00.000-07:00

I actually had an outspoken moment today.

We were sitting around eating pizza (NY-style thin crust) at our favorite pizza place, which has good pizza and is close to work (perfect combo). It was one of those normal days when I was enjoying my slices of four-cheese and white pizza, which aren't as greasy as the pepproni or other types that drowns in oil. A few people were talking about this SS coworker and how he was telling them about him being a navy seal and his encounter with this celebrity news person etc. So they asked one of the guys that knew SS from the old days whether he was really a Navy Seal... Before the guy had a chance to answer, I blurted out:

SS was a Navy Seal? But he is Canadian!

That was funny to some people. I still don't understand how a Canadian can become US Navy Seal. Oh well... must be my ignorance.

This afternoon some of us scheduled a happy-hour get-together with an ex-coworker that had left for our main competitor. It was a loss for our company since the guy was really nice and he's always professional despite owning a nearly impossible job. I enjoyed working with the guy so I invited myself to the list when I first heard about it, which was a month or two ago.

It took several reschedules to arrange this happy-hour. The most recent reschedule occurred on Tuesday, when the organizer sent out an email that morning saying he has an obligation to play golf on the evening that he had scheduled and asked if our new competitor can reschedule to Thursday. While there were some grumbling etc, everyone finally agreed this would work. I spent most of today waiting for another email to reschedule but it never came... so the happy-hour was really on!

It should be noted that happy-hour gatherings for coworkers is usually a time to vent and complain about on-going work so it's really like not-so-happy hour.. That is also one of the reasons why spouses usually don't like big gatherings with coworkers. "All you guys do is talk about work and complain" is the most often heard statement from spouses/significant others. Hence it was no surprise that there are no spouses or significant hours at today's happy-hour. I can picture someone explaining to me "it's called happy-hour because our spouses aren't present" but that guy is at some loosely attended fat camp so I can't confirm that's what he would really say -- fat camp biker will probably say something witty about this later.

Anyways, the nice thing about having happy-hour with a competitor is that we cannot talk about work -- especially since we are trained to protect our well-known secrets. Because of this mutual-understanding, this was the least whiney happy-hour I have been too! We were talking about everything but current work-work! At least that's what I seem to remember after downing a pint of Easy Street Wheat Beer and gobbling various wings, artichoke dips and nachos. I was told this wheat beer for those people that don't really like beer so I tried it. Unfortunately, a pint may have been too much since I can't remember if I really liked it or not. ARGH!

After two hours of easy happiness, I returned home to my happy family. Recently RyanC has not been running to me like he used to when I first get home. Instead he runs in opposite direction when he hears mommy informing him that daddy is home. See, we have been playing this game where I say "Where is my boy?" and he would giggle and laugh and wobble away from me as I hunt him down all over the house. It's really funny to watch him kick his legs in high gear and runs to hide. It started as one way to get him to exercise a little so he doesn't just eat all day. However, it has the unintended side-effect of seeing him happily running away from me most of the time - I might as well get ready for the future though.

Easy Street Wheat.. hmm...

Exit Plan

2006-05-02T20:01:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time in a dungeon far away in the west coast, a wise man (who wasn't drunk at the time -- at least not to my knowledge) told me:

You should always have an exit plan.

I have always followed that advice by making sure I can always get out of the work I'm doing now. This same wise man also told me to get a kingsize bed upon hearing about my marriage -- yet that's the one advice that I took too late. Our recent king-size bed purchase has made it clear that some people simply see "the truth" earlier than others. I am slow but I'm trying to catch up.

So.. today I started working on my most recent exit plan since it's about time. Now, don't get me wrong. I love my current job. I enjoy working on nearly impossible situations where some geniuses will recognize the low ROI (Return On Investment) and refuse to work on them. It's not because I am smarter since I'm obviously not getting paid as much as those geniuses -- in fact, I get way less $/hour than these smart people. Sometimes I don't know why I continue to spend so much time at work -- though CherkyB will probably say that I'm spending that time at work to avoid family so I can make preserve my happiness in marriage... but I digress...

In any case, there are multiple options to choose from (or so I would like to tell myself). My exit-plan involves moving onto the next project or going onto the "future" project. The next project is going to be another fire-fighting experience since the smart people are already planning to move onto the "future" project. The future project is just starting so I have a chance to work on stuff that may not materialize, which ought to be good for bragging rights before it eventually gets canceled/redirected. Recent history at work shows that the path to promotion is to work on "future" stuff and not the #1 immediate priority that everyone seems to talk about but so few people actually do significant work for. Hence, knowing that I probably should move to the future project, I started investigating the slightly less glamorous option. Some people eat their favorite food first. I tend to save the best for last.

I scheduled an appointment with the manager that I'd like to work with if I should choose to move to the next project. We discussed several possibilities and they all sounded like viable options - for getting out of the current work. The scary thing about the possibilities is that the next project sounds even more "exciting" than the existing one! Like moth flying into fire, I was naturally drawn to the hot opportunities presented... wooo!

But I must resist... I still need to evaluate the other exit-plan options -- just in case I need an exit-plan to get out of the immediate exit-plan. Unfortunately most of those "future" folks are out of down discussing future possibilities so I will need to wait till next week. Patience is a virtue in the strategy of exit-plans.

So... back to my current job... today I also got updated on another possibility of getting sent out of the country to work on something important. We always seem to have important issues. It's almost as if we didn't have important issues, then we wouldn't be important anymore. Well, this email thread included a bunch of names I didn't recognize so it must be pretty important. If it turns out that I am really needed there, then we are going to need some help with RyanC or I can't go.

Drink & Blog

2006-05-01T19:33:00.000-07:00

How come I didn't post on Saturday and Sunday? To put it simply, it was my failure to imitate CherkyB's inspiration for blog.

Here is the longer version of what happened:

I was getting ready to post Saturday afternoon about the yummy garlic grilled corn when I remembered da funny blog master's inspirational words from a few days ago: "I write blog as if I were at happy hour drinking and telling stories". At that time, I had replied that "I am usually focused on munching the appetizers at happy-hour so I don't get a lot of practice telling stories". Later my slow thought told me that maybe da man was telling me to drink and then blog so I added 6-pack beer to our grocery list earlier in the day. Realizing that I had not consumed the beverage before blogging, I left the computer room to go downstairs to place a mug in the freezer to chill.

Now, normally I don't drink but I've learned a lot from watching foodtv so I felt like an expert as I poured the beverage into the chilled glass 15 minutes later. I carried the mug around the kitchen like a thief walking through minefield - one reason was because RyanC had left a mess on the kitchen floor and we hadn't cleaned it up and the other reason was because I realized that if I make noises then the little guy might start investigating daddy's drink and decides that he should have some. I must have been pretty successful at keeping quiet. I can't remember what happened next..

The next memory I have was of me sitting on the sofa watching tv with an empty mug on the table. It should be noted that I usually do not watch tv as part of my daily routine - internet has made tv less interesting unless a good show is on foodtv. I didn't feel like going upstairs to write blog. I didn't feel like moving much. All I wanted to do was to sit on the sofa and stare at the tv. I don't remember what show was on. I don't remember what wife and RyanC did. All I remember was that I liked sitting on the sofa...

That pretty much ended Saturday as I continued to spend most of the time on the sofa. I think I may have even watched tivo'ed One Tree Hill or Oprah. I also finished "Forever Odd" book and I can vaguely remember what it was about - but that's not unusual. It was a peaceful day. Everything was normal -- except that I totally forgot about blog...

When I finally woke up for good on Sunday, I felt guilty about not posting blog. I got on-line and noticed that the master has not updated his blog either -- so I felt better about my non-update. I started creating my post and that's when I heard the familiar shout:

Your turn!

I walked out of the computer room to look for the little poopoo boy to change his diaper.

It turns out that we were supposed to go to JC Penny to spend our $10 coupon and we also had to go to the library to pick up reserved DVD "Proof" and book "5th Horseman". We planned to be out for a few hours since we also wanted to go to ToysRUs, Target and Walmart -- and of course the plan changed due to the little boy. RyanC fell asleep in the car and we didn't want to wake him up since it was around his nap time anyways. We had hoped that he'd nap later as he did the day before but apparently the car ride was too comfortable for him.

So we sped up our trips, skipped Walmart, and came home earlier than expected. I volunteered to stay in the car with RyanC as we parked in the garage. He has been super fussy due to teething so it was good to see him rest comfortably. I then started reading James Patterson's "5th Horseman" page-turner while sitting in the parked car.

An hour later, the boy woke up from the nap and pointed to his mouth, demanding some food. It was pretty exciting when he first pointed to his mouth indicating he wants food -- but recently it's been non-stop as he seems to want to eat all the time. Looking at his chubby face, I thought maybe we have been spoiling him too much recently. But he seems so eager to have us feed him!

At this time you probably think that I forgot about the blog but I didn't. I simply had to wait the next opportunity, which would be when RyanC goes to bed. However, I also remembered something about drinks and blog and got another drink ready after putting RyanC to bed that night. This time I didn't end up on the sofa most of the night.

I ended up browsing the web aimlessly and then did some work. I think I may even have IM'ed da blog master when he showed up -- how I managed to forget about my own blog evades me...

It is obvious that I need to stay sober for blog or I'll never remember to post. It was unfortunate that I cannot follow da funny blogger's inspirational methods. This means I will need to find alternative means to improve my blog delivery and content.

PS. Our garbage was picked up today as scheduled despite the immigrant protests.

Boring Postings

2006-04-28T20:46:00.000-07:00

+SPICE

Mr Funny CherkyB observed that he can write a Perl script to generate my blog postings by randomizing/combining the following elements:

randomize RyanC wake-up time
randomize daily grape feeding time
randomize basic food groups for grilling
randomize pics of food grilled
randomize books read

It was pretty obvious and I couldn't even pretend that I have something profound or funny to post - afterall, I am NOT that funny and I'm sure ya all figured that out. In fact, my recollection of the only times coworkers laugh at my comments is when I get pissed off -- either because they don't see me pissed off too often (but then some say I need to be respectful to those that won't do simple work in my opinion) or because they were laughing at me. So, I must apologize to my disappointed readers that may have expected "entertaining" or "readable" postings.

Here is what my slow wit said to myself when I thought about the script posting idea: "If I could control daily routines, then I'd be able to eliminate the random parts and my postings will say 'see previous day'! That would be a simpler script to write!" I forgot to let the master blogger know that his Perl script will probably post more interesting stories than mine -- but he should know that already. Despite my limitations, I will keep his helpful encouragement in mind about spicing up this blog before losing all my readers. Hmm.. I think he meant to make funny insight or improve on my delivery -- though I did think maybe he might have wanted to hear about the spices we use for grilling, which would be cayen pepper for burgers.

+ SPICE^2

I can't think of anything funny to write about! Maybe instead of focusing on listening and eating during lunch/dinner, I need to start practicing my story-telling techniques. Another slightly more attractive alternative is to wait for RyanC to grow up and have him post here since he is definitely a lot funnier than me - especially since that little boy is the one that gets all the women to laugh and smile when we go out.

+ SPICE

Okay... so back to regular postings with (hopefully) less predictable content:

Yesterday I saw a road-kill. It looked like a rabbit but I couldn't be sure since I was focusing on not running over the already-dead animal with wheels. With the master's words lingering in my head "find and write about the funny stuff in regular life" (or something like that), I thought: "I wonder how this can be funny?" That funny thought quickly turned into another type of curiousity: "I wonder who takes care of the road kills? how come they just seem to magically disappear on the road after a few days? do coyotes eat them?"

I was too tired last night so I fell asleep without following up on the road-kill idea, only to wake up at 1am finding myself alone on the sofa downstairs. Alone and hungry, I figured it was better if I slept instead of looking into road kills...

So, after eating dinner and digesting most of it, I did some googling tonight and found this article describing someone that gets paid to remove road kills.

He's paid $40 per deer. The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation says Brannon averages about 1,800 of them a year. That's $72,000 annually."

Whoa! That's not bad even though the guy has to pay some expenses out of pocket. Maybe I do have a backup plan in case I lose my job or I can do this on the side! Though I also wondered if this guy's family would drive around running over animals to increase his take home pay. That'd be like having internet ads to generate revenue and then clicking on them! Hmm.. maybe this road-kill contract job isn't for me.

I will need to find another way to pay for the new gadget purchased tonight...

BIG NEWS! I finally caught Dell with non-expired deal on the Digital Rebel XT dSLR camera and placed an order. They didn't have black colored camera on sale so I had to get silver instead, which isn't my top choice but figured I can always re-order if the black one goes on sale. It was a tradeoff between getting it quickly from another on-line vendor or save $30 (3 buckets of KFC!!!) and wait 6+ weeks for delivery from Dell. Now, 6+ weeks may seem like a lot of time to some folks but not to a married guy that stayed home for 6+ weeks during sabbatical. This delivery estimate is also the estimate for when my lens (ordered a few days earlier) will arrive. Maybe the grilled food postings will look better then!

PS. Had grilled corn tonight with Yoshida sauce. It was just okay. I'd like to try garlic butter grilled corn next time...

+ SPICE + SPICE + SPICE...

First Day Back

2006-04-26T22:42:00.000-07:00

I forgot to talk about my first day back to work.

Everyone I ran into asked about my wonderful sabbatical experience and yet their interest dimished as I quickly explained that I didn't go anywhere exciting. I didn't go to Africa, Amsterdam, New Zealand or Europe like most people. I didn't drive out of state and, when we flew to CA, I didn't do much other than eat, sleep and babysit. I merely lived the simple life of a babysitter. NOTE: I am not sure that I did a lot of "parenting" since my attempt to teach RyanC to call daddy failed...

I guess no one lives vicariously through me so I didn't feel too bad.

As expected, someone already has work lined up for me so I was sent by my manager to another building to work on this "high priority" business. (NOTE: I am not sure it's that high priority but I was told to treat it with high priority) It was explained that 3 other experts looked at the problem and decided they don't know the answer so they weren't working on it. Someone is needed to resolve this -- and I was the chosen one despite my equal ignorance of the "answer". It took me some time to talk to three other people to realize that this "issue" looks different to each of them. Worst of all, it will take days to confirm any hypothesis on the possible causes. So there goes my original thinking of using one week of "catch-up" time to browse the web and continue my dSLR deal research or read blogs.

Hmmm... I shouldn't talk about boring work stuff that even my co-workers didn't care to work on. Anyways, I can't figure out if I was really rejuvenated with this sabbatical with the first day back. I did find myself not getting too upset about others not wanting to do work that needs to be done... it's almost as if I was indifferent.

It was a little disappointing that RyanC didn't run to me when I got home from work though -- he was having his late nap.

Juggling

2006-04-26T22:01:00.000-07:00

The older I get, the slower I have become. I can't run as fast and I can't remember where I park. I miss tennis balls as they bounce pass me. Some would say that I was too slow to begin with so the additional slowness isn't too obvious - but I surprised myself today.

RyanC was happily munching on shrimp crackers tonight after he had devoured a lot of BBQ chicken... Yes, shrimp crackers is part of his "healthy" diet. The shrimp crackers were placed on top of a big ceramic plate on top of the high chair while our little trouble maker was standing on the edge of high-chair. RyanC has been standing while eating most of the time recently. We used to worry about him tipping over and hit the hard kitchen floor but gradually we let our guard down as he seems to have mastered good balance.

Well, he showed his balance when he decided to perform acrobatics both his leg and head.

It happened without warning. RyanC somehow picked up one of his leg and kicked the plate toward the edge of the high chair so I instinctively reached to grab the plate with my right hand. Then, almost simultaneously, he tipped over the edge of the chair and aimed for the hard kitchen floor with his head. I thought "uh oh" and tried to catch him with my left arm and managed to clamp his big tummy with my elbow before his head hammered the floor. It was a kodak moment with one hand grabbing onto the big plate and one elbow clamping onto the upside-down boy.

I felt like I was part of a circus act. This was too much excitement for my weak heart so I banned the boy from the high-chair for the rest of the night.

The End

2006-04-25T21:00:00.000-07:00

of sabbatical... tomorrow I have to go to work and not pretend that I'm not checking email there...

Today is the last day of my 8-week sabbatical. I don't think much got accomplished during this time other than spending a lot of time with wife and RyanC. Unfortunately I failed at my attempt to get RyanC to call me daddy during this time -- was aiming to get him to call daddy before mommy. "uh oh" is still the only words he says properly in connection with his actions. He seems to recognize words like "grape", "mommy", "daddy", "tv", "car", or "book" and shakes his head violently whenever he hears "bed time".

Last week I did finally annoy my wife enough with my presence to cause her to tell me to go back to work so she wouldn't have to hear how I "nag" about what we need to do with RyanC... so I guess it's about time I head back anyways.

RyanC fell down stairs under my watch today. He hadn't fallen off the stairs for a while so that was a surprise. This time he tumbled twice (according to the thud-thud sounds since I wasn't really watching him closely like I should have) and was lying on the bottom of the stairs when I ran to him. He stopped crying as soon as I picked him up and was immediately consumed with eating the toast he held in his hand. Of course the sound woke up napping mommy and upset mommy greatly. I was lucky that RyanC didn't get hurt... WHEW! For the record, I thought he rounded the corner with the toast in hand to find a toy to bring back to family room -- usually he comes back with a "i'm so proud of myself" face and a toy in his hand. Gravity got him this time as he took a little climb.

Finally ordered dSLR lens and memory card today after much research. It will take 6+ weeks to get the lens according to Dell's web-site so maybe it'll get here before my retirement. However, I'm still waiting for better deal to get dSLR camera -- so I can save ~3 buckets of KFC chicken...

Too Dry

2006-04-24T14:30:00.000-07:00

RyanC had a nose-bleed last night. It was scary to see dried blood on his face as he cried and stumbled out of his room at midnight. Since the blood was already dry, we figured he probably had the nose bleed much earlier and didn't know to make a bigger fuss. We wiped his face clean and then took him back to our room so he can sleep with us for the night - it just didn't seem right to have him sleep in a bloody room. Little boy crawled to mommy and daddy to cuddle a few times and finally fell asleep.

It was 5am when sleep left RyanC and then abandoned me so we went downstairs to play our breakfast game. I tried to get him to drink milk or water but he wouldn't. I pointed to oatmeal and he nodded approvingly, which was a good sign since we have been trying to teach him to nod for yes and shake for no. We can't stand the non-flavored oatmeal so I always add some apple sauce. RyanC turned his head away and shook his head when I placed the bowl right in front of him. He then pointed to the peanut flavored puffs sitting on top of the counter. I was dreading that I had to finish the oatmeal myself as RyanC happily picked up the puffs. The next I know, he threw the puffs into the oatmeal bowl and started giggling. Uh Oh...

So, I scooped up some oatmeal and one puff to see if he'd eat it. He then devoured it like a hungry pig. It turns out that "apple sauce oatmeal with puffs" is the way to get him to eat half a bowl of oatmeal so I don't have to eat it. I then tried the same thing with whole milk and he ate that too. Looks like he'll eat anything with these puffs!

After the big breakfast, RyanC watched some little einstein show on disney channel where the kids were looking for a baton grabbed by an eagle that had mistook it to be a stick. He was surprisingly quiet so I held him and tried to doze off on the sofa. That didn't last long. He then wanted off the sofa and walked to the kitchen wanting to open the fridge - typical sign for wanting grapes. I gave him a bowl of mixed black and red grapes in the high chair and changed the channel to History channel where Sherman M4 tanks were shown to be ineffective against German tanks in World War II. It was pretty sad...

RyanC finished eating most of the grapes and wanted out of the high chair. Soon afterwards he crawled upstairs to look for mommy while I cleaned up the mess he left behind. I caught him as he wandered out of our bedroom, holding onto the stereo remote and pushing the buttons furiously. I had to take him downstairs again since that was only 7am and little boy's mommy was sleeping still. It seemed like ages before 8am arrived and I decided to get back to bed and took the little one with me. That's when mommy woke up and took little boy out of the room. I then napped for 4+ hours while RyanC supposedly napped for 3.5 hrs in his room.

It's cloudy and raining outside - perfect for naps. RyanC and mommy are smart to be napping again. I can use some more nap... *yawn*

Here is an old picture of the grilled chicken wings:

Uh oh... RyanC just woke up from his nap.

No Meat Tonight!

2006-04-23T19:57:00.000-07:00

Since we have been eating a lot of grilled meat (had small BBQ party yesterday), tonight we had boiled green beans, garlic green sprouts, and toast with peanut-butter. RyanC took a few tiny bites of my toast and decided that he doesn't like it much. He then ate the sprouts and green beans, which was surprising since he doesn't usually eat green food.

I am counting on our excellent lunch (dimsum in Denver) to keep me from getting hungry tonight. If not, we have left-over ice-cream cake in the freezer... It's always nice to have options when it comes to food.

Hmm.. weather forecast says it'll rain/snow tomorrow!

Peaceful Morning

2006-04-22T09:46:00.000-07:00

I woke up today not hearing anything but birds chirping outside. There was no whining, no laughing/giggling, no toys getting dropped on the floor, no loud noises from electronic toys, and no tv. Hmm.. was I left behind? Oh yeah, wife probably took the little one to the yard-sale thingie - either that or they decided that they can't deal with stay-at-home daddy anymore.

That's when I went back to sleep...

And then they came back! RyanC and mommy showed off the books and small toy cars purchased from there. I played with the toy cars before the little one grabbed them from me. I got to play with the less interesting ones since anytime I found something interesting (i.e. something to push or pull), then little bully would take it from me.

Just wait till he has a little brother that would fight him for the toys!

Hmm.. Sony PSP Portable Core system can be purchased for $159 @ Dell with 2 $20 off coupons... Nah, I need to save money for that elusive dSLR - Canon Rebel XT.

1776

2006-04-21T17:38:00.000-07:00

We did not use the grill today despite it being a great day outside. It was "refreshing" to have instant noodle for lunch and then shrimp + halibut for dinner. RyanC tired me out last night by waking up at 2am and not wanting to go to sleep for another hour or two. In addition to his usual grape addition, he seems to have discovered trader joe's chocolate and added pantry door (in addition to refridgerator door) to must-point/must-open list.

Finished reading David McCullough's book 1776, which is about the drama taking place in the year of the Declaration of Independence. This book contains 300 pages of narratives + 70 pages of source notes. It was not surprising that the United States won at the end but it was still interesting to read more about what happened...

Uh Oh!

2006-04-20T09:19:00.000-07:00

At 9AM, RyanC stormed into our bedroom whining about something when i was sleeping. I was too exhausted so I had to slowly recall what happened last night...

I had brought the boy to our bed after he woke up and cried for a long time, which is defined by my tolerance of his crying and how tired I was. He then hugged mommy and daddy a lot before falling asleep - so cute! An hour or two later, he proceeded to bug the crap out of us with his 360 kicks and constant flip-flopping. I then took him downstairs at 3AM to see what he wanted. Of course he wanted some grapes since he violently shook head at everything else and pointed to his mouth as soon as he saw grapes.

I don't know if it's because we don't feed him enough for dinner or what. Some nights he just wakes up and not want to go back to sleep until he's fed. Well, this time I also fed him a little oatmeal with apple sauce. Soon after that I took him back to his own bedroom so he won't bother mommy and daddy. Poor little guy cried for a few mintues (this is usually when my mom calls me "heartless") and then fell asleep.

When the little whining grew louder and louder, I opened my eyes to see him standing next to my bed wanting to grab something on the night stand.

Where is mommy? What do you want Ryan?

He pointed his little finger at my glasses sitting on the night stand and then grabbed it, which woke me up. He then started bending/folding the glass frames as if it's the most interesting toy in the whole world. I took the glasses from him and gave him the cordless phone, which caused some whining and fake crying.

So I pushed the intercom button to cause the base to ring the cordless phone. The beeping got his attention so he stopped crying and said "uh oh!" He then played with the buttons on the phone to turn on speaker and intercom for the next few minutes.

I was too tired to move much but the little devil wanted my glasses again! He also started pulling my finger to follow him, which is something he started doing recently to tell us he wants something.

So I followed him to the hallway to see my wife on the computer busy typing away - probably emailing I thought. She had said she has a headache when I inquired about why Ryan is in the master bedroom so I took the little trouble maker downstairs. He pointed to the tv where Rachel Ray was eating some food somewhere for $40 or less. I put him on the sofa and then he pulled me away to the little tykes car (still on loan from nice neighbor). Apparently he wants me to hold him so he can push the high-handle bar! I got lazy and placed him on another sofa and placed the car right in front of him.

So I watched him struggle to push the car via handle while standing on the sofa. That lasted a few minutes and then he tried to get me to hold him to push the car handle again. ARGH! I placed him in the car instead but he climbed out right away. So... I took him to the livingroom to play with his toys. Tried to read him a story about Baby Bop playing with other kids and then he took the Barney book away.

He then played with some puzzle cards and hugged Ralph the stuffed animal dog. I noticed that he started yawning so I picked him up -- but then he sensed i wanted to put him to bed so he fussed some more. I decided to put him back in the car to push him around. He didn't object this time. Whew!

So.. I made a few loops and bumped into the high-chair (was still tired) and RyanC said "uh oh". I figured the little one has calmed down enough so I picked him up again. This time he didn't object much and rested on my shoulder before I put him back to his bed for the morning nap.

I then sat down next to my wife , who was still busy typing and clicking away and asked what she was up to... That's when she happily told me to check out her "Cindy's Blah" blog and demanded that I link her.

UH OH...

BBQ Chicken

2006-04-19T20:48:00.000-07:00

Little RyanC also loves BBQ chicken and can't get enough of it. He quickly devoured most of the chicken legs (my share!) marinated in Yoshida sauce. When he is happy, we are happy. It also helps that he slept in his room for the 2nd night in a row. He woke up twice but went back to bed eventually. It was refreshing to see him wake up at 8:30am.

This evening I gave wife a much deserved break by getting out of the house to go to happy hour with co-workers, while she gets quality time with RyanC. We had pretty much every item on the appetizer menu: oysters, fried calamari, coconut shrimp, potato skin, crab artichoke dip, and fried mushrooms. One news I heard is that some people think I'm going back next Monday and that they already have work lined up for me -- HA! I am really scheduled to go back on Wed and I can always use the commonly-used justification "It will take me a few days to catch up with email and get back to the normal flow".

Finished John Grisham's "The Broker" today. It was an intriguing page turner though it didn't really have that "WOW" factor...

Spanish Mackerel

2006-04-18T17:50:00.000-07:00

Grilled Spanish mackerel. Yes, that is fish head on the left. It tastes better than it looks! We had grilled filet version of this fish and overcooked it previously. This time we cooked the whole fish and it's much juicier. RyanC usually doesn't eat fish but he ate some today - though we cannot tell if it's because all of the sudden he starts eating everything in sight. Speaking of the little devil, he slept in his room last night by himself!

It's yet another windy day (supposed to rain but didn't). Our plum tree is doing really well this year. In fact, it is the only tree/plant in our backyard with flowers at this time. I took this picture at a different angle to avoid direct sun-light and the flowers don't look as bright as they appear in person:

Here is a close-up taken by Mr A with zoom lens from Sunday:

More Chicken Wings

2006-04-17T19:33:00.000-07:00

We just can't get enough of the chicken wings so we bought more and grilled them for dinner. Again, we forgot to take a picture. RyanC ate about 2-3 chicken wings' worth of meat and then some crackers and ice-cream cake.

I finally got to use the new Nike Max Breath III tennis shoes earlier in the day though. Played at the park near-by for an hour with CJW. The weather was perfect since the wind hadn't picked up yet. This is the first time I've played tennis in the past 2-3 years so it took some getting used to -- had to get used to chasing after the balls after misfires causing the ball to bounce away. I also sprained my left ankle lightly as I got tired. It is probably too early for me to think about coming out of retirement to play in US Open.

Finished The Last Templar by Raymond Khoury today. It's another Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown) wannabe and the ending was kinda weak.

Chicken Wings

2006-04-16T22:15:00.000-07:00

Lunch menu: BBQ sauce marinated chicken wings + garlic & soy sauce marinated chicken wings + Asparagus + Cold Stone ice-cream cake (strawberry + chocolate ice-cream layers).

We were too hungry so we ate the grilled chicken wings before realizing that we forgot to take a picture. RyanC ate some of the chicken and we were pleasantly surprised since he had stopped eating meat for a while. Maybe he will finally grow bigger than the bottom 10%!

Our friends also brought over their Canon Rebel 300D dSLR and a few lenses so we could experiment with how they perform compared with our Canon A95. I have been researching dSLR/lens for ages but haven't taken the plunge yet. The first thing we noticed were the fast focus and how it could take several consecutive pics. We took several pictures of RyanC in-doors and found out that he sometimes moves too fast for the lenses at our disposal. It was cool to play with wide-angle lens: Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM. Here is RyanC taking a little break on the sofa:

Ribeye

2006-04-15T21:05:00.000-07:00

Today's grill special was ribeye steak, which I prefer more than t-bone. It was a bit too windy to BBQ but hunger won out. Fort Collins was supposed to get some shower today and the rain never really came. At 5:30am I saw a few rain droplets while feeding the little grape boy though.

RyanC was happy today when he sat in this car (on loan from nice neighbor):

The ugly side with having a happy kid is that he becomes really unhappy when he no longer gets what he wants. In this case, the little boss wants to be pushed around the house in the car. I then pushed him around the house, going from family room -> kitchen -> living room -> hallway and then back to family room... I lost track of the loops after 5 and I was getting dizzy and tired but the happy boy wanted to continue. So I did what most dads would do and tried to send the little one to mommy. Unfortunately that didn't work so well this time since mommy was already exhausted. It's good that the little man is addicted to grapes so we fed him some more grapes and then he temporarily forgets about wanting to be pushed in the car.

Oh yeah. The ribeye was excellent!

Addiction

2006-04-14T21:33:00.000-07:00

We cooked green beans and babyback ribs today on the Weber grill today. That was the highlight of the day since RyanC woke up crying/fussing last night and caused us to be tired as usual. When the little boy fusses during sleep time, I'd take him downstairs to calm him down so mommy can get some rest -- i.e. usually when I don't have to go to work in the morning...

Early this morening, when I took the little boy downstairs to figure out why he wouldn't stop fussing, he gestured putting food in his mouth repeatedly (first time he did this), indicating he wanted something to eat. It turns out that he really wanted grapes after rejecting soy milk, toast and cookie. He then repeated the sleep->wake up crying->want grapes cycle 2 more times before sun-rise.

Our son has turned into a grape addict!

Well, at least he has not shown any sign of diarrhea issues from over-eating grapes, which wasn't the case with his prior addictions with strawberries, peaches, or oranges.

Leisure afternoon

2006-04-13T19:52:00.000-07:00

RyanC went out toy shopping with mommy and friend. I had time to finish reading Turning Angel by Greg Isles. I tend to forget pretty much everything about a book after reading it and this one is no exception. Maybe I read just so I can have more excuse to forget about the other things that I am supposed to remember.

Now, I remember the toy they brought back... It's this super noisy car-driving toy with no volume control. Most kid toys don't seem to have volume control just to torture exhausted parents. Either that or the noise is there to let parents know where the child might be "playing" in the house. Apparently RyanC played with this one at Toys R Us for a while so he doesn't seem as intrigued by it at home. Oh well, we can always give him our cell phone or a shoe-box if he gets fussy.

On another note, grilled much better t-bone steak today using higher heat at 5 minutes/side!