Is Something Burning...?

Moving to a new platform...

2010-11-19T12:01:00.000-06:00

...at least to try it out. I've decided that the limitations of blogger.com are a bit annoying, so I've set up a new blog on Tumblr. Check it: http://pantalonasenfuego.tumblr.com/

When I post to the new blog, it updates Facebook for me. Good stuff.

Halloween 2010

2010-11-02T13:30:00.002-05:00

Milestone

2010-11-01T12:14:00.000-05:00

Ran 10 miles yesterday. Around 6 miles, the "runner's high" kicked in, felt great. That turned south around mile 8.5, when I really just wanted to be done as soon as possible.

Average pace of 9:48, so good time overall. Cardio capacity was more than adequate. Some soreness in right hip, but otherwise ok.

Weight is fluctuating like mad now, from 175 up to 179, mostly depending on the amount of water I'm drinking.

Ah, scale....why do you tease me so?

2010-09-28T11:59:00.000-05:00

So after completing my longest run ever this Sunday (8.25 miles), and knocking out my fastest 10k split (59 min), I was hoping to see some good numbers on the scale. I broke a plateau and saw some numbers I hadn't seen in a loooong time...but in a good way. 179.8, which means only 9.8 pounds to go. However, the scale quickly rethought it's morning gift, and switched to 180.0. I don't know why this is such a sticking point for me, mentally-speaking. But it is.

Still, Nike+ is happy with my progress:

a runner am I?

2010-09-13T17:23:00.000-05:00

Flash back to six months ago, and (barring a short stint during my freshman year in high school) any time prior in my life. I have always hated running. It hurt, I wasn't particularly good at it, and my metabolism was such that I didn't need to burn big chunks of calories. Plus, I was pretty good at swimming, and that hurt a lot less.

Now flash to the present. I've been running for just over 3 months. When I started, I couldn't do a mile without significant pain and wheezing. After a short build up, I strained a quadricep and had to lay off for 3 weeks.

That all behind me, and a more sane training regiment in place (thanks, Nike+!), I ran the farthest this weekend I've ever run in my life: 10 k (6.2 mi). And it felt...good.

Now, I haven't actually lost much weight yet. My lower body has definitely started to change shape, but I think I'm doing more with muscle refinement than with fat burning at this point. I just started combining nutrition monitoring (via iPhone app Lose It!) with my Nike+ training tracker. We'll see how that goes. There is something addictive about knowing that 6.2 miles gives me an additional 800 calories of eating/drinking to play with ;)

Now, about the shoes. I am in love with my Nike Free Run shoes. $85. Light as a feather. They simulate barefoot running, so in theory my ankles, feet, calves and knees are getting stronger as the shoes do not provide much in the way of support. They are purely there for cushioning. I should cross the 100 mile mark early next week, so I will continue to update as I go along.

Emmie and Shrek ears

2010-08-28T16:14:00.000-05:00

Int'l festival at TGP

How to torment a toddler

2010-08-25T11:41:00.000-05:00

Emerson: More oatmeal, Daddy, peez!

Me: Peas?

Emerson: No, *peez*?

Me: Oh, *peez*

Emerson (giggling now): No, PEEZ!

It's called diction, young lady. In this house we do it right.

To be fair, at this point Marantha intervened, noting that Emerson was only 2 and I should stop...doing whatever it was that I was doing.

2010-08-24T12:58:00.001-05:00

Family pic in the backyard

2010-08-24T09:18:00.001-05:00

Break o' Day tomatoes!

2010-08-09T18:14:00.000-05:00

A sad tail...

2010-07-27T11:47:00.001-05:00

Clyde has been a part of our family since we moved to St. Louis. We picked him up from a Pyrenees rescue near Springfield, MO, and he kept Marantha company in a (somewhat scary) new neighborhood while we adjusted to urban life. He has kept squirrels at bay for six years now, patrolling our yard (to the point of wearing paths through the grass) and

Two years ago, Clyde started having seizures. This came out of the blue, and M and I both dug in and learned a lot about idiopathic epilepsy in dogs. We got very lucky in that Clyde responded beautifully to phenobarbital. Despite taking enough at a time for us to need a DEA waiver (seriously), he adjusted to the dosage within a couple of weeks and we witnessed no grand mal seizures in two years. About a week ago, he had a big one, so we took him to the vet. Blood work came back within normal bounds, so we increased his phenobarb slightly.

In the past six months, we had noticed an increase in balance problems, stumbling, and even a couple cases where he just fell down, unprovoked. I had chalked these up to a combination of arthritis and his seizure meds.

Night before last, he had another grand mal, and was extremely disoriented afterwards. I ended up sleeping downstairs with him, because otherwise he started howling and barking. This morning, he had a grand mal at 4:30, followed by a serious of cluster seizures. These weren't grand mals, but focal--just his head was seizing while he stood up. We counted 7 or 8 of them. After the grand mal, he was terribly disoriented, and I think blinded for a short while. He jerked away if I touched him, and was mostly unresponsive to sound or visual cues. He refused water as well as ice cream (I read yesterday that after a seizure, it was good to give a little vanilla ice cream to help stabilize the depleted blood sugars). This is a dog that used to eat bricks. He's always hungry, and always thirsty.

M helped me carry him downstairs--no mean feat, considering she is 5 1/2 months pregnant, Clyde weighs just south of a buck-twenty, and our stairs are original from the house built in 1897. He wasn't happy about the process, but we got him loaded into the car and I ran him out to Webster Groves Animal Hospital. He had two seizures in the car, another one in the parking lot, and another one in the ER. Vet techs muzzled him and helped me get him out of the car, but he freaked out and wouldn't stay on the stretcher. We ended up walk/dragging him into the exam room.

So now, he is doped up, and they are trying to stabilize him. The vet is concerned about the change in behavior over the past few months, and thinks it is possible that the balance issues coupled by the "breakthrough" seizing that there is possibly a slow-growth mass or tumor that is causing all of this. An MRI would be the next step, but that is approximately $2500. Where would that leave us? If positive for a tumor, we wouldn't elect to do brain surgery (if it was even operable) or chemo. If negative, we're back with idiopathic epilepsy that isn't managed well pharmacologically.

Best case scenario now is also pretty bleak. Upping the phenobarbital dosage is the next step, with a potential further step of adding potassium bromide. Those things (singly or jointly) might stabilize him, but for how long? Could be a day, or a week, or three years. What is certain is that we have a toddler now, and a baby on the way. Our ability to cope with this situation, should it recur, is rapidly decreasing. And of course, there is the horrific thought that Clyde might hurt himself or one of us accidentally.

I wasn't expecting this, and now that I'm facing it I can hardly believe how much it hurts. But I don't think this is a good quality of life for him, and it certainly isn't for us. I never wanted this decision to be about money, but of course that has to play into it, too...

Another funny

2010-07-19T13:10:00.002-05:00

I've been off of running the past few weeks due to some quadriceps pain, and Emmie has seen me with ice on my knee. Yesterday in the garden I misjudged the height of the fence when stepping over, and cut a gash across the same injured knee. Seeing the cut, Emmie exclaimed, "Daddy, you need to take a break from running!"

In rare form

2010-07-19T13:10:00.001-05:00

Emmie had her first baseball experience this weekend with the extended family at Busch stadium. She is still talking about the cheesy fries...

Beatty siblings and kids

2010-06-29T11:34:00.003-05:00

Emmie's second birthday

2010-06-29T11:34:00.001-05:00

Dora cake!

Garden is starting to produce...

2010-06-29T11:33:00.001-05:00

Emmie values her Easter eggs

2010-04-19T15:49:00.002-05:00

Yeah, I went to the Final Four

2010-04-19T15:28:00.000-05:00

Dr. Emmie says "Ahhhh"

2010-02-20T09:08:00.001-06:00

she can be a little demanding...

2010-02-10T15:47:00.001-06:00

Driving Emerson to daycare the other morning on my way to work. I was flipping through my iPod, trying to find something that was age-appropriate and suitable for my commute at the same time. Emmie was letting me know her opinion from the backseat. "No, no, no, no, no, NO, NO, NO, NONONONONONONO"

"Sweetie," I said, "what's wrong? What do you want?"

There was a brief pause while she considered this. Then she answered.

"Kid's music!"

Uhhh....I guess I need to update my playlists.

At this point (19 months), she can sing--mostly on-key, although sometimes over-enthusiastically--several songs, including her ABCs, Ring around the Rosie, Baa Baa Black Sheep, Pop Goes the Weasel, Twinkle Twinkle, etc. She also counts to 12 (why 12? She has a clock puzzle that has the numbers 1-12).

What we've found most impressive, however, is her ability to use descriptors for concepts. Walking to the garage the other morning, we passed a decrepit, rotting pumpkin that had been a decoration around Thanksgiving and never made it to the compost heap. She pointed at it and told me, "Old pumpkin."

I picked her up the other morning and said, "You're getting to be such a big girl." To this she nodded, lower lip stuck out thoughtfully, and said, "Uh huh. Heavy."

Unexpected snow

2010-01-27T15:45:00.000-06:00

View from my office towards the Arch

She would rather eat broccoli

2010-01-03T18:09:00.000-06:00

One bit of hamburger. 20 bites of broccoli.

The importance of a good backup strategy...

2009-12-30T16:36:00.002-06:00

The day after uploading our Christmas pictures (and deleting them from the camera), M called me at work.

"The Mac is frozen up," she said. "The cursor moves, but nothing else is working."

"Go ahead and power it off," I said, "and then power it back on."

Fifteen minutes later, she called again. "It is showing a gray screen with a spinning icon."

"That just means it is checking the disk for errors. Let it finish and it will be fine."

Two hours later, when I got home, it was still "checking" itself. Not good. Some command-line trickery later, it had fsck'ed itself multiple times and declared that all was well, yet it still would not boot. Apple hardware diagnostics showed no problems, and then, mysteriously, the drive failed to show up at all. MicroCenter to the rescue!

Using step-by-step disassembly directions from www.ifixit.com, I put in a new 500 GB caviar blue drive, installed Tiger, then upgraded to Snow Leopard. In the meantime, I put the ailing drive in a SATA dock and ran DiskWarrior on it, which rebuilt the directory (and DiskWarrior warned, "Recovery slowed due to drive malfunction"). Tonight, I will see how effective my backup via Time Machine/Time Capsule has been.

Having all your music, video and pictures in a digital format is awesome, but it carries with it certain risks. What if our house burned? Our backups are in our house. You could try backing up "to the cloud," but who is going to push 50+ gigs of data and pay a monthly fee to house it?

Another option--hang an eSATA/USB 2.0 dock off of the Time Capsule, and archive backups to a standard SATA drive quarterly. Put that drive somewhere safe and offsite, like a safety deposit box, or in a car trunk.

She's fancy

2009-11-19T20:20:00.001-06:00

Words Emmie can say

2009-10-23T19:50:00.002-05:00

At 16+ months, she just learned her name. In addition:
Yes, no, please, up, down, more, bath, shoes, socks, walk, ball, Mama, Dada, hi, bye, one, two, duck, elbow, back, toes, teeth, blue, horse, turtle, poopoo, me, tutu, thank you (sorta), baby

Hackintosh

2009-10-16T15:37:00.000-05:00

Yes, that is a Dell Mini 9. Yes, it is running OS X 10.5.8

No, sleep doesn't work. Everything else does. It weighs 2.2 lbs.

I am Darticus!

2009-10-15T20:28:00.001-05:00

And so is my wife (name that cinematic joke for bonus geek cred). Not
me in the pic, that is team captain, Larrold

All I had to do was post....

2009-10-01T16:43:00.001-05:00

and the doctor's office called. ALL of Emerson's tests came back negative. She is, in our pediatrician's own words, just a "skinny little girl. Like her parents." I didn't make that second part up, either.

Clearly our pediatrician has not seen me in my Speedo.

The waiting game

2009-10-01T12:06:00.000-05:00

For those of you who have come along with us on the Day-carousel of Infectious Diseases, we had a little bit of a scare when Emerson was in for her 15th month checkup. Her weight had actually dropped since her 1 year checkup, which dropped her off the growth charts for weight (but she was still at the 40th percentile for height). This triggered a fair amount of medical paranoia and ass-covering, so the doctor ordered several batteries of tests to be carried out. These were to rule out some pretty scary things, including Cystic Fibrosis, celiac disease (gluten allergy), thyroid dysfunction, etc.

We took Emmie to Children's Hospital where they put electrodes on her and took blood. We are still waiting for results, but hopefully will have them soon. In the meantime, she has been eating like a champ and gaining weight. Our scale puts her a bit over 19 lbs now. That's on the charts, barely.

I'm an uncle (again)!

2009-09-16T13:39:00.001-05:00

Congratulations to Zach and Kathleen, who brought Roguen Wallace Brown into the world around 11pm on 9-15-09.

By all accounts, mom and baby are happy and healthy. We are *thrilled* for them and anxious to meet our new nephew!

Emmie is grateful

2009-09-10T08:53:00.001-05:00

I am a punctual person

2009-08-28T19:10:00.001-05:00

It pains me to be late. I view it as the height of arrogance, the
assumption that my time is somehow more valuable than that of the
people with whom I am supposed to meet.

I just misse the first flight connection of my life. I was ON the
plane already. We deplaned, against my will, because of a desire to
stretch legs, use a regular bathroom, and feed the baby. Marantha was
convinced the fligt reboarded at 6:42. I was convinced that it left at
6:42. She was more convinced than me.

So we are dinner and changed the baby. And got back to the gate at
6:45. Flight was still there. But they wouldn't let us on, because
they started boarding 20 minutes earlier.

Our bags--including baby paraphenalia--were in our seats. This is
going to be a long night. We were able to get onto the 8:40 flight.

My screenplay

2009-08-25T09:47:00.003-05:00

I'm working on a screenplay. It is tentatively titled, "What OSHA has to say about Birkenstocks" with a subtitle of, "Why hippies don't work in machine shops."

The plot centers around a guy who is finishing up a woodworking project for a buddy, and thoughtlessly goes down to his shop wearing shorts, a T-shirt, and sandals. While in the shop, he accidentally drops a 4 1/2" steel C-clamp on his little toe.

I'm shooting for an NC-17 language based on violence and adult language.

I've got one thing to say to you...

2009-08-21T08:47:00.001-05:00

Emerson has started saying things. The trouble is, she says them once--
enough to get whomever is in earshot good and excited--then
steadfastly refuses to say them again. In the last 24 hours, she has
said "Teddy" while pointing at her stuffed bear, and "juice" when I
packed up her juice for daycare. I guess she has decided that it is
easier to point at things.

Baby signing time

2009-08-02T15:17:00.000-05:00

Her vocabulary of signs now includes more, all done, milk, dog, hungry/
food, and cracker.

I have tried, in vain so far, to get her to sign "crazy cracker"

This is the reward--Saltines--for her request of "more cracker". In
retrospect, maybe she just wanted to server to come back.

It's been a tough few days

2009-07-29T21:17:00.002-05:00

For those of you that follow me on Twitter (@philgrad) or Facebook, you've seen the status updates and tweets (grr) coming in about Emerson. We've been riding the wave of illness in this house since last Friday. Short story: everyone is fine. It all takes place against the backdrop of my first attempt at a "staycation", taking a Friday/Monday combo off so I'd have a nice, long weekend.

It initially appeared to be a low grade fever, just under 100. This, we thought, could be due to the three molars she is working on simultaneously. Friday morning she woke up and was much more feverish, around 101.5. Marantha, too, was sick, sporting a nasty cold and pink eye (for the third time). Good times.

The fever got worse, although Emmie was a trooper. She hit mid-103s a few times on Friday, so we got her in to the pediatrician on Saturday as soon as we could (although we couldn't get in to see our regular doc). After a negative strep test, they surmised that it was a viral infection, so the typical 72 hours should suffice for fever, and we should just keep an eye. Any fever under 103, Emmie was acting almost normal. She was eating, drinking, and playing. Then things got worse. We saw the fever hit 104.8 on Saturday and Sunday, and she started to not want to eat. She got listless. Sunday was pretty bad.

On Monday we took her back to the pediatrician--our own this time--who did a urine culture (negative) to rule out a UTI, then sent us to Children's Hospital. There they did a CBC and chest X-Rays. Both were negative, so no pneumonia, and no bacterial infection. So we were back at the viral diagnosis, although now we'd had 5 days of fevers, most of which were 103+. Scary stuff. The best guess was roseola, which presents with high fevers and few if any other symptoms. After the fever breaks, you get a nice red rash (non-itchy, thankfully). Now we have no fever, and no rash.

It's good to see her smile again.

Mexican night!

2009-07-09T18:53:00.001-05:00

Emmie likes the pool

2009-06-26T11:02:00.000-05:00

G'pa and Emmie

2009-06-25T08:18:00.001-05:00

Buying a car

2009-06-22T10:49:00.001-05:00

Emmie is helping. Really!

Cap'n Ron?

2009-06-22T10:48:00.000-05:00

With friends at Osage Beach

Birthday cake!

2009-06-22T10:47:00.000-05:00

Mmmm...chocolate

First birthday presents

2009-06-22T10:46:00.000-05:00

She likes success, and will sort the red block over and over.

Emmie's first camping trip

2009-06-01T22:24:00.001-05:00

We took Emerson--just days shy of her first birthday--to Hawn State Park for an overnight camping trip. We improvised a 'baby containment system' that consisted of a moderately sized inflatable kids pool.

Once escape was thwarted repeatedly, Emerson grew frustrated with this arrangement.

Clyde took it all in stride. However, he is a little bit on the "short bus" end of the intelligence spectrum when it comes to exploring by himself while on a long tether.

Swinging helped calm Emerson down. It was all we could do to keep Marantha off the swings herself.

Wheee!

She's extra fancy

2009-05-25T17:27:00.002-05:00

Emerson's pre-birthday

2009-05-25T17:09:00.003-05:00

We had the good fortune to spend this weekend in KC with my sister-in-law, and with the assembly of multiple Beattys we decided to have a birthday party for Emerson (OK, it was a week early, but still...)

She got nice loot, and enjoyed a delicious vanilla cupcake from our neighborhood bakery, SweetArt (who also supplied my delicious birthday cake this year).

Swimming

2009-05-24T20:07:00.001-05:00

Emerson's first time swimming. Dig the Garbo shades.

Our Japanese garden

2009-05-09T15:34:00.001-05:00

Because nothing says "Japanese" like vinyl garage siding.

Grillin and chillin

2009-05-09T15:29:00.000-05:00

Enjoying some perfect weather in the 'Lou. Clyde agrees.

It's Official...an SVP is me!

2009-05-08T11:09:00.002-05:00

This year marks my fifth year in the 'Lou, and my fifth year with Fleishman-Hillard. To commemorate the occasion, they promoted me to Senior Vice President (that's 3 promos in 5 years if anyone is keeping score).

A friend helpfully pointed out that "SVP" doesn't mean the same thing everywhere...like in California, which *might* mistake that acronym for Sexually Violent Predator (yikes!!)

Great picture of G'pa with Emerson

2009-05-04T11:57:00.000-05:00

A great picture this weekend of Emerson with G'pa!

Posting from e-mail and from SMS

2009-05-04T11:33:00.001-05:00

To help keep me more active with posting, I'm going to try microposts from my iPhone and from e-mail. We'll see how this goes. Also, insert random picture of Emerson here.

OK, I'm properly chastised

2009-05-03T18:50:00.007-05:00

One of my longtime friends contacted me a couple of days ago. Tone can be hard to determine in e-mail, but it *looked* concerned...and he asked me what was wrong, alluding to my blogs. Not posting anything in several months, especially when most previou
s posts had been about Emerson, was probably a little jarring.

In truth, we've just been incredibly busy. So what's been the deal?

Probably the same things that most 2-wage-earner-with-first-baby families go through. And now that Emerson is mobile, it's even crazier. But I apologize to all three of the people who use this blog to keep up with me. ;) I have footage of this on the day it began:

We just got back from a whirlwind 36-hour trip to Springfield to see my parents. We decided to take my car (a sedan), but we also decided not to board Clyde (the kennel has raised its prices so it would have been $100 for this trip....I could have driven Clyde to Branson and gotten him his own hotel room for less). This meant fitting the two of us, plus baby, plus all the baby stuff you travel with, plus 120# of dog in a 4 door sedan. Good times. That said, Clyde is the laziest dog ever, so that helped.

I've been spending some time making inventory for my latest hobby/obsession--wood turning--and also working on a new website that will feature my stuff, potentially with the ability to sell some of it online. Probably a pipe dream, but it's fun to work on. A couple of examples were some darts I did on commission, and a pen made with spalted maple from trees in our old family resort (now buried under 22' of rock so they could build a strip mall), and a unique-shaped gold rollerball made from black palm:

And at work, the slimmer MIS department has been collectively pulling Yeomen work levels, as the number and complexity of projects seems to have jumped lately. Still, I must be doing something right, because I made SVP this go-around. Good stuff.

Wireless Security Class in St. Louis

2009-02-06T10:44:00.004-06:00

I'm going to be mentoring a class for the SANS Institute in St. Louis in March. The course is an advanced take on wireless security, titled "Wireless Ethical Hacking, Penetration Testing, and Defenses." If your company does anything with wireless--including having a "no wireless" policy--then you should seriously consider taking this class.

More info on the course content here.

I know that a lot of companies are nixing their training budgets right now. The economy is in dire straights, so this is often the first place they cut. Still, this class is a bargain compared to the "on site" SANS conventions, and I can arrange discounts if there are further budgetary concerns. Please contact me if you are interested. If I don't get more registrations, the class will be cancelled.

UPDATE: this class was cancelled. Stupid economy.

She's fun when she isn't sick

2009-01-10T19:07:00.002-06:00

The camera does make a difference...

2009-01-09T09:31:00.005-06:00

OK, so the subject is pretty darn cute. And if the camera adds 10 pounds, she is no longer at the 20th percentile for weight at 7 months. You judge for yourselves...

I decided to pick up the Canon EOS Rebel XS, rather than the XSi. The differences? Mainly 10 megapixel resolution rather than 12 (not a big deal at all unless you are going to blow up the pics to be ginormous...), and a lack of spot-metering. Oh, also *significantly* cheaper. Apparently, the internal buffer is smaller, so if you are doing a lot of servo-driven shooting in RAW mode, you can overrun the buffer and you'll drop from 3 fps down to 1.5 or so. The XSi shoots 3.5 fps continuously.

One of the greatest technological advances since I have used an SLR (which was back in college) is the advent of image stabilization in the lens (Canon puts the tech in the lens, but I think Nikon puts it in the camera body...not sure, they call it "VR"). Anyway, it's pretty amazing--last night I shot a 3 second exposure without using a tripod, and it came out crystal clear. This will let you take shots of things in relatively dark conditions without using a flash, and without getting grainy images. Good stuff.

Aside from the camera, Emerson is doing great--she is over her third ear infection in two months, and also got over a nasty virus that made blisters in her mouth and throat. It was so sore than she didn't want to swallow anything, and then she made an association between the pain of swallowing and the sight of a bottle...so anytime we'd come in with a bottle, she'd start crying. Ugly.

She really is a chill baby, though, especially when she's well. I think we're very, very lucky.

On the Outside, Looking In...

2008-12-31T18:18:00.003-06:00

Time for a Purge

2008-12-31T17:52:00.003-06:00

Out with the old, in with the new. Just finished boxing up 10 place settings of China, used fewer than 10 times in an 11 year period. Will be sending to my brother, who just happened to be in the market for China. Good times, and a free corner cabinet in my kitchen. I think tomorrow is the day of reckoning, where all unused/underused items will briefly see the light of day, then will be boxed up and prepared for donation or future yard sales.

I have tried over the past few days to find a place to sell my aged, but mint condition Canon EOS Rebel S camera. An SLR from the days of film, I've had this camera since the early '90s. It has served me well. However, everything is digital now. Out of four places that I requested quotes for the camera body, 2 lenses, and a flash, only two were "interested", and by "interested" I mean "not really interested." The offers were $45 and $65 for the whole kit. For that price, I'd prefer to keep it and/or donate it to a school or something.

As for what I'd like to purchase to replace it, well, I have my eye on a Canon EOS XSi: see the hotness here. I have spoken with other shutterbug friends who report, with some unease, the relative heft of DSLRs once you also have to contend with carting a lot of baby stuff around. I get this point. After all, for a weekend getaway to my parent's place we managed to completely fill my car with Emerson and her retinue of stuffed/plush accoutrement. I believe I managed to cram a pair of jeans, clean undies, and one sock where the spare tire should go.

Happy Holidays?

2008-12-23T22:16:00.003-06:00

Is it Festivus already? No? Well, we can hold off on the Feats of Strength, then.

It is the time of year to think of all the things for which we are thankful. Marantha and I welcomed the biggest one into our lives this year.

For those friends and family that we will not get to see this holiday season, we send you our love and thanks.

PS--in about 4 weeks we get the *second* biggest gift in our lives: Obama in the White House!

How do you feed a cold and starve a fever...

2008-12-20T16:36:00.002-06:00

at the same time? Emerson now has the three horsemen of the apocalypse residing somewhere between her lungs and her mouth. We have a nasty ear infection, teething, and an upper respiratory infection. If she could talk, it would sound a lot like Jack Palance. All these things combined have pushed her to a 103.2 fever. Solid!

Luckily, we have another 36 hours before we need to travel with her.

Happy holidays!

JB

great sushi

2008-12-15T16:25:00.002-06:00

There are few things I enjoy more than really good sushi. I had feared this would be a thing we left behind when we moved from DC to St. Louis, but (aside from a couple of really bad experiences) the sushi in the 'Lou has ranged from passable to good. This weekend, however, we returned to one of my favorite places: Wasabi (on Washington Ave. downtown). The sushi was *sublime*, especially the bluefin tuna...which is pretty guilt-inducing at this point, since it is being harvested to the point of extinction.

My favorite roll at this point is the spider roll, with softshell crab deep-fried inside it. Mmm.

There is money to be made

2008-12-09T20:27:00.000-06:00

New parents, you will recognize the subject of which I speak. The market is saturated with all manner of baby equipment. While we have striven to not let our house be overtaken with brightly colored plastic crap, it still sneaks in, then proliferates under the cover of darkness. We awaken with baby stuff everywhere.

Yet none of this stuff prepared us for the horror of teething. No frozen washclothes, chilled pacifiers, or bottles of Baby Tylenol could abate the regularity of Emerson awaking throughout the night to howl at us. Night after night.

So here is the gauntlet I throw down to medical manufacturers--you have two options. Either design a soundproof, non-toxic acrylic shell into which we can place our beloved infants (they must not be able to injure themselves in these confines); or produce Baby Ambien. I'm voting for the latter.

Just think about it. You don't have to worry about the baby taking Ambien, then driving to the store or operating a forklift later. Just a good, sound night's sleep.

The dog has the shakes...

2008-12-03T20:20:00.000-06:00

Clyde, our Great Pyrenees mix, developed "idiopathic epilepsy," which we had thought would be rare in mixed breeds and dogs of a relatively young age. Turns out, neither was correct. So after a battery of tests, and going from having no seizures to having a ton in 36 hours, Clyde became the recipient of a healthy prescription of phenobarbitol. For the first two weeks, he staggered, drooled, slept all the time (OK, no big change in behavior there) and didn't wag. He couldn't get up and down the steps by himself. But gradually, his body adjusted to the depressant. He got back to normal. Since going on the meds, he hadn't had a single seizure that we had witnessed, although I suppose it was possible he had them while outside alone.

Tonight, we heard him gasping. He was laying on the floor and his breathing came in jerks. He wasn't twitching violently like we had witnessed pre-phenobarb, but it was still unmistakeable. He was having another seizure.

That pretty much shatters all hopes we had of being able to eventually wean him off the drugs. They vet told us if he had no seizures (as in literally none) for 2 years, we could try weaning him. The up side is that he is on the lowest possible dosage (which, due to his size, is still a ton of pills), so the epilepsy is very well controlled. It's just so *sad*.

I'm not a smoker...but

2008-11-30T21:44:00.000-06:00

I do love a good smoked turkey. Thus was my charge this Thanksgiving, and I think I carried it off rather nicely. Of course, the 16 pounder from Trader Joes--organic, never frozen, no antibiotics, and pre-brined--probably helped matters, but after 7 hours in the smoker over hickory chunks, we had a nice, smoky brown bird.

We finished most of the leftovers tonight, after eating on them for 3 days straight. Had to sneak a pizza in there for a little culinary break, and (I can't believe I'm saying this) I'm really glad that there is no more pumpkin pie left for breakfast tomorrow.

And now, back to the grind tomorrow...although this month always seems like a wash.

Getting back into teaching

2008-11-25T15:55:00.000-06:00

So it is official--I will be teaching an evening class on wireless security and "ethical hacking". I did well enough on the two certification exams after taking the SANS course (descriptively titled "SEC-617") that they invited me to participate in their mentor program. This is a gateway to becoming a fully-fledged faculty member of the SANS Institute. In any case, the course starts March 10 and will meet on Tuesday nights from 6:30-8:30 at the Ballpark Hilton in St. Louis. There will be 10 sessions covering theory and practice.

Info on the class is available here and while this is a very advanced class (SANS says it is graduate level) I think I can do a good job at making the material approachable to people with an understanding of networking and basic cryptographic concepts.

I get compensated based on the number of people that take the class (double the compensation if I refer the students myself)...so if you know anyone who would be interested, send them my way and I will refer them ;)

When is an ear infection art?

2008-11-24T19:34:00.000-06:00

When it is a performance, not an actual malady. Yes, Emerson qualified for diva status. Yes, a 5 month-old can (apparently) be manipulative. After months of sleeping nearly through the night, getting up once or twice to eat, she decided to catch up on missed opportunities last night. She went down--after a full day of playing, being her typical happy self--at 9 pm and was up at 10:40, 11:40, 3:45, 4:30, and 6am. Each of these times, she wasn't just fussing. She was *screaming* at the top of her tiny lungs. For the most part, each time you could pick her up and she would go right back to sleep.

Since we've been fighting an ear infection with her, we assumed this was classic ear infection behavior and maybe we should go get things checked out. Turns out, it was a fraud. A sham. An early audition for the Thespian Society. Now, of course, she is still sitting in her car seat, snoring softly.

She has picked up another behavior, too--wheezing loudly, like a stereotypical hillbilly laughing. She demonstrated this for the pediatrician, who decided it was designed to garner her attention. Emerson finds the whole thing very funny.

Timberrrrrr........

2008-11-22T15:01:00.000-06:00

We had tried for the past 5 years to save this old silver maple. The rehab work they did on our property (and the adjacent house, which was bulldozed into the ground) had stressed the root system, and ultimately led to the downfall of the tree. When having some trimming work done this winter, the trimmer discovered rot that went all the way into the trunk.

Because they couldn't fit a crane into our alley, they did all the work with a climber and ropes.

If anyone needs tree work done, I highly recommend Tidy Tree Service (Frank Cagle). Their quote was half what we got from their competitors, and they did a great job.

The XBox Live Experience

2008-11-22T14:53:00.000-06:00

So the new XBox Live Experience is out. Interestingly, it feels a lot like the Wii Experience... avatars running around, layers intead of the old "blades" layout. The customization options are fairly limited at this point, but I think I like it. At least, I'll like it until everyone decides to make their avatar a Japanese schoolgirl with tartan skirt and Princess Leia hairdo.

The best feature, though, is the ability to stream content from NetFlix. NetFlix is already awesome. I can't believe we actually used to *drive* to movie stores. Crazy madness, that. But this is actually making me consider getting a second XBox 360 to put in our main TV room. My existing XBox has been relegated to our basement bar, since that is where we apparently keep the collection of plastic instruments for Rock Band/Guitar Hero. (Note: these plastic toys should NOT be confused with the other huge assortment of plastic toys that are strewn throughout the house for Emerson).

Swift kick in the pants...old school

2008-11-22T14:44:00.000-06:00

Welcome, all.
After unsuccessfully starting multiple blogs, on multiple platforms, I think I'm going to give Blogger a try.

I was hoping for the magic convergence out of Apple's iWeb...like so other aspects of my digital life that live on my Mac, I had hoped that an iWeb blog would synergize those elements and provide a cool fusion of pictures, video clips, and rambling thoughts. Instead, it sits there, dormant, mocking me. So what's the problem with iWeb?

Well, unlike other Apple products--iPhoto, iMovie--it isn't easy or intuitive to use. I spent nearly an hour one night trying to get a damn button set up to link to another page in the blog where I had a photo album. I could get a link, but couldn't get the button to sit where I wanted it. Fighting against the app is very un-Apple, and I think that's why I got unusually frustrated. And I *know* what I'm doing, at least compared to a lot of people out there. Then, there is the inability to update your iWeb page from anywhere except in front of a Mac running iWeb. Since I don't have a MacBook, that means I can only update from home. LAME.

The other issue is not Apple fault; I have a 5 month-old daughter, and she consumes the lion's share of my free time these days. I had been toying with the notion of (finally) learning how to play guitar. Then I made a list of all the things I already love to do but do not have the time to do anymore...and the list was shamefully long. Don't get my wrong--I have NO REGRETS, I love Emerson and what she has done to my life. I just realized that I need to prioritize and focus on existing commitments: family, friends, career. And if there is a little time here and there for Rock Band, well, that will be great, too.

So I hope I keep this more updated than my old blog (which lives at http://web.mac.com/philgrad). It will still be a place that we'll stick photos and stuff, and Marantha has a blog there too.

For now, it's back to pre-Thanksgiving house cleaning.