Boom Boom Pow

Teddy loves music and loves to dance. I think he has some pretty slick moves for an 18 month old toddler! Here he is dancing to Boom Boom Pow by the Black Eyed Peas:

Dick, Jane, Mario and Luigi

I've mentioned before that Lourdes is starting to read and is doing a good job. She read another Dick and Jane book to me this evening that was much longer than the some of the previous ones. She only needed help with a couple of words and read the whole book in very short order. I'm very proud of her progress. She's also using little tricks to help her figure out words that she doesn't know like looking at the illustrations to get clues.

After she read to me, we played a little New Super Mario Brothers on the Wii. I mentioned earlier this week that Lourdes is a clever Mario Brothers player. She's also quite skilled in moving around, jumping and shooting. We played for almost an hour and got through several stages, but alas didn't get to a stage where we could save our progress. So we'll have to do it over again next time. Since we have a long weekend, I'm sure we'll make a lot of progress.

What's in store for the long weekend? I've already mentioned the Wii and yesterday I mentioned seeing a movie. I think I also mentioned going to a hockey game on Saturday. No other hard and fast plans at the moment.

Okay, time for bed!

Scoring and fighting

We went to an NHL game in St. Louis last October. It rained all the way there and all the way home. There were five of us cramped in a little car that is only meant for four. The seats we had for that game were really high up, not horrible seats but you could see the horrible seats nearby. The Blues played an uninspired game that night and lost quite handily.

Yesterday was a different story. The weather, while not warm, was mild. There were only four people in the four-person car. The seats were really, really good (well except when the action was down on the far end). The Blues were on fire, scoring three goals in the first period. There were also four fights in the first period. Exciting. The Blues went on to win 4-1. We thoroughly enjoyed it! Now I'm looking forward to a Rivermen game on Saturday night.

I'm also looking forward to catching a movie this weekend. The Book of Eli will probably be on the top of the list. I've really enjoyed the last three movies I've seen. I went to see Avatar in 3D when it came out. I must say 3D is the way to go. That movie was visually stunning and the plot wasn't bad. I also saw Sherlock Holmes which I thought was quite good as well. Rounding out the trio was The Blind Side and I found it to be the feel good story of the year. So I'm hoping that whatever movie I get to see continues my little streak of enjoying movies.

Got the Posting on the Road Blues

Driving while blogging or blogging while driving is tough. Plus it's illegal in Illinois. That's why I'm in the passenger seat, which frankly makes it difficult to drive. We're on our way to St. Louis to watch the Blues play Columbus. It's gonna be a late night. The last time we did this I got home late plus I had to make a late night run to WalMart for juice for Lourdes to take to school. I don't think I'll have to do that tonight, so I'll probably make it home at about 1 AM. Well that's all I'm writing tonight. I don't do well reading and riding.

Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease?

Lourdes woke up this morning complaining about her hands burning. She had some red splotches on her hands but we didn't know what they were. She kept complaining about her hands hurting but we thought she was just being a morning grouch. We sent her on to school and apparently her hands got worse. After a couple of visits to the school nurse, the nurse called us. I took Lourdes to the doctor and he said Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease - a viral infection. She doesn't have any signs of it on her feet and she doesn't have any sores in her mouth. The doctor did say her throat was a little raw looking. She didn't complain about her throat any. So she's out of school for two days.

So Lourdes and I spent the evening playing New Super Mario Brothers on the Wii. We busted in to World 4 and got to the first place you could save. Lourdes is a really good player. Sometimes I have to remember she's only 5, because sometimes she thinks better than me while playing the game. She's got some great hand-eye coordination and uses innovative strategies to get through the levels. In this variation of Super Mario Brothers, there can be up to 4 players playing at the same time. Lourdes and I have chosen to work together when we play. We call out "Bubble!" to each other when we think it's appropriate for the other player to activate a protective shield. If one player gets too far ahead of the other, the one that is too slow can get pushed off the screen and easily dies. But if the person "bubbles" then they are protected and can float towards the other player. We try to be apologetic when one of us causes the other to die. If you have a Wii and were contemplating a fun game for the family, I think the New Super Mario Brothers should fit the bill.

Side note, how do you get your kid to listen? For example, if your child is jumping on the bed and you tell them to stop and they don't what's your course of action?

-12F

Driving to work this morning, the thermometer in my truck was showing the outside temperature to be -12F (-24C). That's freeze-the-snot-in-your-nose cold!! At work, there are public address announcements to let us know the current wind chill (or real feel temperature) and appropriate work/rest cycles for those who have to work outside. It seems that the work/rest cycle is always 40 minutes work / 20 minutes rest (warming) once the temp is below about 25. There have been a few times when I think it's too cold to walk from the parking lot to my office, let alone work outside for 40 minutes. I'm glad my primary duties don't take me outside for very long!!

The Rivermen lost this afternoon to Milwaukee. That's two losses in two days. Hopefully they'll get there act together. December was really good to the Rivermen (or rather the Rivermen were really good in December).

It's bedtime now, night night!

18.6 Stone

I weighed in today at work for our Biggest Loser contest. I rocked the scales at a whopping 18.6 stone! I've really let myself go and there's the proof. Our contest runs until the beginning of June so I hope to lose 2-3 stone in that time.

All right, I don't know the proper grammatical use of stone. What is the plural of stone? Stone or stones? I know one stone equals 14 pounds, so I weighed in at 260 lbs and hope to lose 28-42 lbs.

I'm going to lose the weight in a radical manner - I'm going to eat foods that are good for me in the appropriate amounts and exercise!! Novel idea, huh?

Rivermen

The Rivermen lost in Chicago tonight. They play here tomorrow against Milwaukee but I have to work and will miss the game. Next home game I can go to is next Saturday against Rockford. One of the actors from Disney's Wizards of Waverly Place is expected to be there to sign autographs.

Good night!

Quantity or Quality?

Okay, I know my posts have been lame, but at least I'm posting something!

We just got back from a Rivermen game and they won 5-1, woo hoo!! There weren't any fights but there were a couple of times when somebody on one side or the other was ready to go at it. The Rivs put the game out of reach with an empty netter with under 2 to play. Then the Marlies got a penalty and we capitalized on it in just a few seconds.

Lourdes generally plays her DS at the games while Teddy watches the game a little, dances to the music, and looks around for the team mascot. There's a game Sunday afternoon, but I have to work. Bummer!

Well I could probably just go on and on, but I need to get ready for bed. The important thing is that another day has gone by and the streak continues!

Hurry up Saturday!

This Saturday we will start our Biggest Loser competition at work and it can't get here quick enough. I feel so bloated and run down. If things get much worse, I'm going to have to hire someone to tie my shoes for me and take care of the nether region hygiene. Seriously, I'm at the point that if I drop money on the floor, it has to be at least a fiver before I consider bending over to pick it up lest I risk the ridicule of my coworkers. "Look at Sluggo! I bet if it were a twinkie he'd pick it up!!" Ironically, we weigh in on Saturday morning and then have a large holiday meal.

We did get quite a bit of snow and now we're supposed to get a lot of wind to blow it all over the place. At least it's supposed to warm up to the 20's. Hopefully our parking lots get cleaned well or we'll have the same old skating rink we always have.

This is the 7th day in a row that I've blogged. Take that you naysayers. Now if I can only liven up the entries, maybe I'll make it back on Dan's blogroll.

Posting from the crackberry

I'm sitting on the couch watching Man vs. Wild on Discovery Channel and updating my blog from my crackberry. I'm using Opera Mini as my browser and it is quite adequate. I don't think I can do the brackets to do HTML so this will all be one paragraph. But at least I'm feeding the blog. It's currently snowing and we could get up to 8 inches.

Two posts in one day, is the world ending?

Well, close. We just experienced a small fire in the kitchen. Everyone is fine, thanks for the concern. It seems that our little Teddy is so eager to be a big boy and do anything he sees the big people doing. So he has learned to climb up to the microwave and turn it on. And he's quick at it too! Turn your head for just a moment and in a flash he's up there turning it on. So tonight, he was playing with the cordless phone. Next thing you know, it's on fire in the microwave!!

Luckily it was caught in time and the fire was contained to pretty much the phone inside the microwave. I was able to grab the phone and throw it into the sink. Obviously it was a total loss and the microwave is no good either.

I'm not too upset about the phone, it's been doomed for a while. The phone was originally a base station, a satellite station and two cordless handsets. Shortly after getting the phone, I had one of the handsets with me outside in the garage. I put the handset on the hood of the truck towards the base of the windshield (frontal glass to you Englatarians) and worked on whatever I was working on. After a while, I needed to go to the store for something and took off. On the way back home, I saw a phone laying in the street at the turn in to my alley. I laughed at the poor sucker who lost a phone as I ran over it pulling into my alley. Then about the time I heard the crunch I realized that it was my phone!!

The microwave has been on its last leg as well. The carousel made an awful noise, like the sound an accordion makes when it's thrown into a dumpster full of banjos (or ukuleles). I'm surprised it's lasted this long. Years ago, a pop tart on a plastic plate was meant to be heated for a few seconds, but some carelessness resulted in a completely melted plastic plate and a pop tart reduced to a charcoal briquette.

We already have a spare cordless phone to take over phone duties, but now I'm in the market for a microwave.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it....Nevermind!

We've got a few inches of snow on the ground and we've been in a deep freeze for a few days with lows in the minus single digits and highs around 10. For those of you in England, that is between 1 and 6 stone I think.

Tomorrow the forecast is calling for 3-5 more inches of snow to start falling. Again, for the non-american, that's like 7-11 deciliters or something. We'll see how it turns out.

Read with Dick and Jane

Lourdes is halfway through kindergarten and will be six years old in a couple of months. She had really great teachers in her pre-k and currently has a terrific teacher that really loves her students.

I have been reading to Lourdes for a while, but now the tables are turning. She started reading to me. She started with some books that focus on a particular letter or sound and then progressed to Dick and Jane books. As long as she stays focused, she can read really well and I thoroughly enjoy listening to her read. I'm proud of her.

As I type this, I'm eating Ben & Jerry's Cake Batter ice cream and it is yummy. I'm trying to pack on a few pounds before this weekend. We'll be kicking off a Biggest Loser competition this weekend. I absolutely plan on winning as well. I've really let myself go and need to use this competition to jump start a change in my eating habits and start working out again. I hit the gym for a couple months in 2008 right before we went to Paraguay and it worked wonders for me, but I've lapsed in to a steady stream of late night cookies and milk and little to no exercise. In the mean time, I've got to finish this ice cream and pass out.

Historic Antarctica plane remains 'found' by expedition

This is the title of a story on BBC News. The way I read this headline was more like "Historic Antarctica plane still  'found' by expedition". Kind of like Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead of SNL fame.

In general I'm a descent decent reader and righter writer, but sometimes I just reed read words wrong. So the story about the plane explains how some Australian conversationists have found the remains of a plane in Antarctica. I wondered what the heck were conversationists, only to find out the word was actually conservationsists.

Now get this, it just dawned on me that Antarctica is the continent around the South Pole. Again my attention to detail had me thinking of the North Pole and that these Australians sure are adventurous and were a long way from home.

Two days in a row, say it ain't so!!

I'm sure I have lots of interesting things to catch you up on but I just don't have time right now. It's late, the kids need to get to bed and I want to get to bed too.

I just needed to post something so that I don't break my streak.

Here's a tweet from the Rivermen Twitter page today: "Bishop makes a face save. The shot was hard enough to knock the strap loose. I'm sure his head is ringing a bit after that laser."

Maybe I'll post something original tomorrow, maybe not.

The Year Without A Blog

Happy New Year!

See, my blog isn't dead!

Pig shopping and ground breaking....

Time seems to be flying and crawling here in Paraguay. We´ve finally got a temporary 4x4 and treated it like a rented mule. It responded well and ate up all the rain and mud we could throw at it. Now we have a different 4x4 and so far it´s been a keeper as well. It has a little more clearance and that means a lot here. We´ve been taking lots of pictures and some video clips as well. Unfortunately we have to wait till we get home to post them as the internet is slow here. Besides I´ll have to edit them first (for size, not necessarily content).

Yesterday Raquel, her brother, and I went pig shopping. We bought one for about $70 and hauled back home. The plan is to slaughter it and cook it this weekend. Raquel plans to invite all the kids from Portrero Guazu to come over to eat. I´ve been around two pig preps here so far and it´s not a pretty sight and the sound is horrible. Reminds me of Silence of the Lambs. I prefer to go to the local supermarket in the US and buy the meat and poultry ready to go.

I guess the big news is the ground breaking on a little house here for us. Yep, a house. My father-in-law gave us his property and house to do as we see fit. The current house is old and a little disheveled. We contracted a guy to come and build next to the house the beginnings of a house. To start it will be one bedroom with private bath and a small all-purpose room. As money becomes available, we´ll add on to it. Anyway, this will be our comfortable place to stay instead of getting a hotel. Also we probably won´t need a rental vehicle anymore on the next visits.

Well, I´ve got to go for now. More soon.

I´m a bit behind....

Somehow I´ve let the days, weeks, and months slip speedily by without an update. Well, I did post a few photos on the flickr thingy.

I knew some might suspect something might have been wrong because my last post was in June and we were expecting our baby in late June or early July. I apologize for not posting - I just kept thinking I´d get to it sooner or later.

Anyhoo, we were blessed with a wonderful, healthy baby boy on June 26th. Everything went pretty smooth over all. Richard Theodore was born in the early afternoon and has been growing rapidly ever since.

Lots of things have happened since, but just a couple really stand out right now. First, Lourdes started her Bright Futures (pre-school) and seems to be enjoying it.
Second, a friend´s mom died recently, but it was really great to have some friends get together to celebrate life.
Third, we lost two of our three dogs. The dachshunds escaped and one was hit and killed and the other just disappeared.
Finally, we´re in Paraguay on vacation.

We´ve been here for just over a week and it´s been great over all. The family all seems to be doing well. We wanted to rent a four wheel drive vehicle, but one wasn´t available from our agency when we arrived. We´ve been getting around in a nice little sedan that was doing really well over all. Then it rained. We were out in the country visiting my wife´s parents at the time. It rained really hard. We waited for it stop raining and hoped the road wasn´t a disaster. Our trip back to the city started off a little squirrelly with some difficulty getting up a slight hill. But I made it up that hill and thought about turning around. Against my better judgement, we went for it. I drove like a champion rally racer for a long while, sometimes suprising myself with my skills. The Corsa was eating up the mud for the longest time and then we finally hit a really bad spot. I think that if I had stayed out of the ruts caused by a previous vehicle (a truck no doubt) I might have made it (probably not). We sunk up to the frame and couldn´t go forwards or backwards. Luckily we were very near a house and Raquel went to ask for help. She ended up getting a man to come with a tractor and pull us quite a distance to where we knew we were safe. Lots of things go through your mind when you´re stuck in the mud in the middle of nowhere. Oh well, we made it out and it´s just another sidenote in our Paragauyan adventure. By the way, we should be getting that four-wheel drive rental tomorrow. The roads should be dried out enough to make it out to the in-laws for a visit.

More some other time.

"verbosity - it's common sense" but I beg to differ...

In my last post I mentioned Games With A Purpose. It's a website where you can play a few different games that have a purpose. For example, one of the games is basically designed to tag pictures. You and your partner are shown the same picture and you have to use "ESP" to determine what your partner types based on the picture. For example, if the picture is of a yellow puppy with a red collar sitting in the green grass, you might type "dog" and your partner might type "green". You keep describing the picture until you and your partner have at some point used the same word. Oh yeah, you play for about four minutes and earn points for every match.

Another game is called "verbosity - it's common sense." In this game, you and your random partner take turns giving clues for the other to guess a "secret word". There are preformatted phrases that the clue giver has to use to plug in up to two words to form the clue. There are about six of these phrases, like "it is the opposite of" or "it is related to" or "it has" or "it is". For example, if the secret word is NEST, as the clue giver I might use the "it is" and fill in BIRD HOME. Hopefully my partner will understand and guess NEST.

"Verbosity - it's common sense" is kind of a bold statement. I've played this game a lot over the past week and sometimes I've been frustrated by the lack of common sense that I've encountered. Let me give you an example.

For the secret word in question, my partner's clue was "it is a kind of" SHEEP FUR.
I guessed FLEECE, which wasn't right immediately followed by WOOL which also wasn't correct.
My partner said "it is a type of" SWEATER MATERIAL
I guessed CASHMERE which wasn't correct, then YARN which also wasn't correct.
My partner said "it looks like" FOOL
I guessed WOOL again thinking that maybe I misspelled it or it didn't transmit (this is an internet game after all). What more could I guess?
My partner passed and we finished playing. After you play a four minute round you can review the game. It shows the clues given and the guesses and the secret word.
Guess what the secret word was that dealt with SHEEP FUR, SWEATER MATERIAL and looks like FOOL?
It was WOOD.
It's common sense but I beg to differ.

Assault with a deadly confectionery

Article in the Peoria Journal Star: "Galesburg man, 84, assaulted with Moon Pies." Dan, are there Moon Pies in England? I'm sure the industrious crooks, thieves and nardowells of the UK are always on the watch for a new weapon since they can't have guns there.

I posted a few (okay, I think there were 10) pictures from the last few months. The next time I post any more pics will probably be when our son is born.

I read an email from H.O.G. (Harley Owners Group) about the 1,000,000 Mile Monday. They want Harley owners to get out on Monday for a ride on their Harleys and then log on to the H.O.G. webpage to log their miles. They're hoping to get 1,000,000 miles. So I dutifully got onto the beast and rode her for just over 100 miles despite the threat of rain. At one point the skies darkened and I just knew it was going to pour. I pulled in to a parking lot and donned my rain gear and continued on. It seems that as soon as I hit the road again, the skies pretty much cleared up and we had one of the warmest days of the year. But, I pressed on in my gear. I figured if I continued, I would act like a rain preventer and everyone else could enjoy the weather while I semi-roasted in my suit. Doesn't matter, it was a good ride. So when I got home, I logged on to post my miles. Don't you know the devil is in the fine print: the H.O.G. Million Miles Monday is 30 June. Like I said, it was a good ride. One of my objectives was to find a german restaurant (The Alpine Village Restaurant) in the small town of Minier. I met that objective, so now I just need to get a handful of us together to head over there and eat sometime.

This was a long weekend for me. Friday we goofed off most of the morning, then dropped Lourdes off with a sitter so we could enjoy the latest Indiana Jones movie, something about crystal skulls. It was as good or bad as any of the other 3 Indy movies, but it was funny (in a sad way) to see Indy kind of hobble around like he needed hip or knee replacement surgery. I watched parts of a couple of the old movies and they weren't as good as they were when they first came out. This new one was a mixed bag of rubbish and classic entertainment. But I must agree that the CGI gophers were unnecessary.

Saturday, I went for a 160 mile ride with my friend Greg (not Wisconsin Greg). He recently got a newer motorcyle (03 Dyna) and he was itching to get some saddle time in. I guess I should specify that I went on my Sportster and he went on his Dyna. Good times. After I got home Raquel, Lourdes and I went to the Legion with Adam and his family. We ended up at his house for the first game of the Stanley Cup Finals.

Sunday was a lazy day until we went to a cookout that evening.

Greg (Wisconsin Greg) has read WIRED magazine for a long time, but I never got into for some reason. Then I got a free subscription to it last year and I've been hooked ever since. I read a few months ago about a website that had the intent of letting people play games with each other over the internet while collecting the data of your play to catalog words and pictures. The website was not working when I read the article and I checked back every so often to see it still not working. It looks like it finally launched and it's kind of addicting. There are a few different games to play. Check it out, but don't blame me if you stay on it for hours: Games With A Purpose. I'm looking at you Greg and Dan.

On the family front, we had a sonogram on Thursday. It was supposed to be the last one, but baby is breach at the moment. We'll get another sonogram in 2 weeks and see what's happening with him. If he's still breach, the doctor is going to ask us what option we want to take: schedule a c-section or schedule a manual inversion. The manual inversion could lead to a normal delivery or an emergency c-section. We'll see what happens.

Lourdes was screened for Bright Futures on Wednesday. I was suprised that the tester classified her as "English As A Second Language". We've been trying to get her to understand that there are Spanish words and there are English words and that she shouldn't mix them. She really understands the concept, but I guess there are some words that flow easier for her in Spanish. What is really funny is that Lourdes used ONE Spanish word during the screening and a couple of made-up words. Oh well, if it puts her higher on the priority list to get in a class, I'll take it.