Over a month!

My longest time between posts, and for that I apologize.
What ever has been happening? I haven't had a car in almost two months, and it turns out I don't really need one. I have two colleagues that live close by that I can bum rides off of, and since Jennifer works from home, as it were, she can usually take me to work when I need it. I guess I won't go get a second car until either I can afford one, or it get too irritating to not have one.

Joseph is recovering nicely from having double pneumonia. He isn't healing a quickly as the doctors would like, but he is healing nonetheless. He's been a little dope, but other than that, he's in great spirits. If he hadn't had a fever, we wouldn't have known that anything was wrong.

That's about it. I guess I hadn't posted anything because I haven't been doing anything interesting.

-JP

The Human Torch was denied a bank loan.

Well, since the car fire, not too much has happened. It turns out that we don't really need a second car right now. I was car-pooling with my boss anyhow, and now that Jenn keeps his daughter during the day for a little extra cash, it is even easier to get around without a car.
The fire car was only driven once a week anyway, and was basically taking up space in the driveway and sucking money insuring it. So we're just gonna deal for a while.
...
We toured a private school last week that we decided to try to put Jackson into. As far as private schools go, it's pretty inexpensive because it is fairly new. Hopefully he'll get in. He's very smart if I do say so. I wonder where he got that from.... It wasn't me.
...
I have been doing a lot more Illustration for work, which is cool. They are even comfortable enough with my work to assign it even though they may not use it, which sounds bad but really isn't.
...
I entered a poster contest, but didn't win. :(
...
Did any of you watch the Will Farrell special this week. I think I peed my pants at one point.
...
I think that's it. Happy St. Patrick's day!

-JP

Car on Fire!

This is what is left of my car after it caught on fire this morning. I'm fine as it was a gradual thing and not an explosion.
What happened was: I was driving along and the car died. I couldn't get it started again, so had to push it into the center of the highway. I called Jen, and sat and waited. I noticed some smoke, but I had just had the car worked on twice for two separate fluid leaks, which were dripping onto the exhaust, and the mechanic said that it might take a few days for what was still on the exhaust to burn off. So I didn't think much of it. Then another motorist stopped and said that the grass had caught fire, and i noticed stat a lot more smoke was coming from under the hood. I then decided to call 911. While on the phone with them, a passing cop noticed and stopped. They called the fire department, and for a while until the FD showed up, we just sat there and watched it burn. It got worse and worse, and by the time the firemen showed up, there were 8-10 foot flames and a hell of a lot of smoke. They shut down both sides of the highway because my car was taking up one side, and all the smoke was blocking the other.
The fire moved into the cab, an they had to bust out a window to spray down the inside.
Eventually, they got it under control. A wrecker came and hauled it off, and my father in law, who lives about a mile away from where this all happened, gave me a ride to work.
So everything is fine. The wrecker is going to buy it off me to part out the back end, and I can probably get a new car with my tax return.

So there you have it.

-Jason.

Stolen from Facebook

Here is my list of what I believe to be the 40 (or so) best and/or most important (to me) albums of all time (and sometimes why).
(I'll TRY to do this in chronological order, not the order that they were important to me. I don't know why.)
1977 The Sex Pistols - Never Mind the Bollocks
1979 Joy Divison - Unknown Pleasures
1984 Repo Man - Soundtrack (this movie/soundtrack pushed me into my fascination with punk)1985 Weird Al Yankovic - Dare to be Stupid (The first album I ever bought, and the first concert I ever went to.)
1986 The Beastie Boys - License to Ill
1986 Firehose - Ragin', Full On
1987 The Cure - Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me
1987 Love and Rockets - Earth Sun Moon (I was the only skater in my middle school with a L&R sticker on my board)
1987 The Pogues - If I Should Fall from Grace with God
1988 The Pixies - Surfer Rosa
1989 The Vandals - When in Rome/Peace Thru Vandalism
1989 Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine (I wore out a cassette and a CD of this album.)
1989 The Cure - Disintigration (I'm pretty sure this was playing when I lost my virginity :P)1988-1995 Everything Wax Trax/Nettwerk/TVT put out (All Ministry, Skinny Puppy, Pigface...*)
1988 Bauhaus - In the Flat Field (reissue)
1990 Peter Murphy - Deep
1990 MC 900 Foot Jesus - Hell with the Lid Off
1990 My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult - Confessions of a Knife
1992 Morphine - Good (I met Mark Sandman about 3 weeks before he died while working a festival.)
1992 Tom Waits - Bone Machine
1993 Beastie Boys - Ill Communication
1994 Portishead - Dummy (Memories of drawing comics in St. Marks with Tony Leonard and the crew.)
1994 Blur - Parklife
1994 Dead Can Dance - Toward the Within
1995 PJ Harvey - To Bring You My Love
1995 Radiohead - The Bends
1995 Pulp - Different Class
1996 Luna - Penthouse (Luna was one of the first things that Jennifer and I realized we had in common)
1996 16 Horsepower - Sackcloth and Ashes (Other than the Psychedelic Zombies and Foreskin 500, this was one of the few Denver bands I followed.)
1996 Belle & Sebastian - Tigermilk
1997 Radiohead - OK Computer1997 Stereolab - Dots and Loops
1997 Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - The Boatman's Call
1998 Belle And Sebastian - The Boy With The Arab Strap
1999 Built to Spill - Keep It Like a Secret(This album will always remind me of Heather O. and Pandora Jewelry)
1999 Rushmore - Soundtrack
2000 Modest Mouse - Building Nothing out of Something
2000 The Black Heart Procession - 3
2001 The White Stripes - White Blood Cells
2001 Gorillaz - Gorillaz (Where pop music and comics meet)
2002 Interpol - Turn On the Bright Lights(They picked up where Joy Division left off, albeit 20 years later.)
2002 Rilo Kiley - The Execution of All Things
2006 The Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not
2007 Kings of Loen - Because of the Times2007 LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
2008 The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing


*After Filth Pig came out, I totally lost interest with both Ministry and the Genre as a whole.

Overheard on the police scanner:

"Black male, mid twenties, wearing a red jersey. He's on crack, standing on the corner exposing his penis to the cars driving by. Apparently, his girlfriend didn't like that, and she's now chasing him down the street with a baseball bat."

Discuss.

A real post. Long overdue.

So I have been posting Internet memes and videos and crap like that for a while, and not telling you anything of substance. Sorry about that.
Well, 2009 is off to an odd start. Following the layoffs at work, I've been given extra duties to help carry the weight. Which is fine, I guess, but since right before the layoffs, they froze wages and raised our health insurance, I basically took a pay cut and am doing a lot more work. But I have a job, and a good one at that, so I can't really complain.* Also, some of my new duties are way better than the old ones. Like the Illustrations.

See Here and Here

So that's cool. Truthfully, since illustration is my actual background, if they want to steer me that way a little more, I'm just fine with that. People around here seem to like what I've been doing, so keeping me around in that capacity is definitely a possibility.
In other news:
Do you guys remember the argument clinic skit on Monty Python? That pretty much sums up our everyday dealings with Jackson these days. Three is definitely the new Two when it comes to pushing boundaries. Anything we say to Jackson is immediately met with contradiction. A friend suggested that we offer choices instead instead of just telling to do something, like do you want to wear this coat or that coat, so that it's hie decision, we get "I don't wanna wear a coat!"
Time outs and the like just make him laugh, and neither of us are willing to use physical punishment, because we both know from experience that it doesn't work. That doesn't mean we don't loose our tempers from time to time. I've wanted to throw him out the window on several occasions, and one night last week, we had to take him to his grandparent's house so we could get a break. He's still a total sweetie, and the awesomest, smartest kid I know, but I sure hope he grows out of this soon.
Jen may start watching a boy almost Jackson's exact age two day a week, so maybe that will distract him a little.
Joseph, on the other hand is being totally awesome. He started really walking in earnest this week, and I am getting a lot more exercise chasing him around the house. He friggin' fast!

Um... That's it.

-JP









*The old punker Jason is screaming inside right now.

Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn't seen it)

Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn't seen it) from Joe Nicolosi on Vimeo.

RIP #6

Patrick McGoohan has died

Jan 14, 2009, 01:29 PM by Ken Tucker
Categories: '60s mind-blowing, Television
Patrick McGoohan, the man who embodied hope over despair in the coolest way imaginable in the 1960s cult TV classic The Prisoner, has died--he was 80 years old.

The Prisoner was a British TV series that aired in America starting in 1967. Only 17 episodes long, The Prisoner was a strikingly original show about a former British spy who wakes one morning to find himself in a psychedelic fantasy-land that's not all candy and sunshine--it's a combination British village/futuristic prison, and McGoohan's character was stripped of his identity and known only as "Number Six." McGoohan (who'd starred in an earlier spy show, Danger Man, which was titled Secret Agent in the U.S.) had the rugged good looks and clipped accent that leant The Prisoner a gravity its giddy alternate-worldliness might otherwise have lacked. Number Six's famous cry, "I am not a number, I am a free man!" became both a counterculture catchphrase as well as an anguished plea for freedom. The Prisoner was James Bond for acid-heads, and McGoohan's straitlaced image made his small-screen version of a hip spy all the more appealing.
McGoohan also appeared in many films, from Ice Station Zebra to Braveheart, but for TV fans, he'll always be The Prisoner.

I lost 7 lbs in 3 days! Ask me how!

It's called: Debilitating Stomach Virus! Horay!

I woke up Saturday night, I guess actually early Sunday, around 2:00am and started throwing up. Around 4:00 it started coming out of the other end, and this went on until yesterday. I had some pizza last night and that was the first solid food I'd had since dinner Saturday, which I threw up, so it doesn't count. ugh.

Don't worry, I'm fine

Tulsa World announces layoffs of 28 employees

It was a hard day yesterday. Some really awesome people were let go.

-JP

Year in Review 2008

And what a year it has been.

In 2008:

-I turned 33
-Saw a lot of good movies based on comics, and a few not so good ones.
-I obsessively followed the Election, which not only made history several times over, but both renewed my faith in humanity while simoultaniously destroying it.
-I finally got on board with LOST. A friend lent me a copy of season 1, and Jennifer and I couldn't stop watching until the end, to the point where we would cancel plans to watch LOST.
-I put my kids back in daycare, only to take them out again after only 2 months.
-I realized that daycare sucks eggrolls.
-I helped Jennifer nanny for a sweet little girl who later ended up dead under mysterious circumstances. (not because of us)
-I had to deal with an ex-stepfather's death.
-I did not attend his funeral. I sort of... dealt from afar.
-I had to put my cat of 7 years down.
-I only went to Denver once. Sorry, guys.
-I did, however, host many more people in Tulsa than ever before. Thanks, guys.
-I was severely dissapointed by Stephen Spielberg and George Lucas. Again.
-I helped Cody and Grace (seperately) move to Tulsa. YAY!
-I watched a shit ton of weird drama develop around Jennifer's step-brother.
-I watched Jackson Turn 3, and Joseph turn 1.
-I watched Jackson come to terms with actually having a little brother. Well, start to come to terms with it.
-I got really pumped about the 2009 movie schedual, especailly for Watchmen and Star Trek.
-I doodled a lot at work on my desk calendar:

Happy new year, everybody!

-JP

A letter to my second son on the day after his first birthday.

Joseph,
Holy crap you are one year old already. What a year it has been. When I first met you, your mom was having a scheduled C-section. I was a little less worried and strung out than before, but only a little bit. Your C-section went a lot more smooth that your brother's did. The weird thing is that even though you two look very different to me now, when they pulled you out and handed you to me, I got a weird look on my face, like that dog looking into the gramophone tube in the old RCA ads because you looked EXACTLY like your brother did when he came out. The first words you heard me say were to the doctor: "Hey, didn't we already had this baby?"
Then we spent a few days in the hospital, which also went smoother due to the absence of a really bitchy nurse, and the fact that at that time you were so like your brother that we knew what was in store. Jen was a much more confident mother because she wasn't new to it any more, and during the last few years, the "mom" part of her personality has come front and center, and isn't likely to go anywhere. We spent our time in the hospital watching movies on the laptop rather than endlessly worrying that we were going to make horrible parents. At Your mom, being the tough girl that she is, wanted to go home long before they let us.
In this last year, you have made it very clear that those early similarities were to end very quickly. You are more daring that your brother, more hands on, and oh, so much louder. You sleep better. Not great, but nothing like Jackson's first year. You became very mobile very quickly. In short, you became your own person so fast that the constant comparisons to your brother that we all initially made soon became moot. You have a different fire in your eyes, and I can tell that you will be the devious one. You will also be the funny one. Children will get in trouble around you due to your actions, but you will be safely to the side, watching.
Because you came out looking just like your brother, we assumed you'd look a lot like him, and you do, but you also have green eyes and curly reddish hair. Where did that come from?

I love that you try to bulldoze all of your brother's belongings in that Joezilla way you have, and how patient Jackson is with you, saying: "He's just little, and still learning," when he sees that his train set in now in pieces on the floor.
I love that every time I pick you up, you go straight for my glasses, and usually succeed, which is why my glasses are hopelessly disfigured and scratched up now.
I love that look you get when you are trying not to laugh. Like you could hide anything from me.
I love that you crawl so fast, and with such determination that you sometimes run right into the wall.
I love how you always want to get into boxes, drawers, and buckets. And then just sit there.
I love that you look so much like your mom.

You are a good boy, Joseph, and I love you. Happy birthday.

-Dad.

Christmas is coming.

And there is nothing you can do about it.
We, like everybody else in the free world, are taking it easy this holiday season. No trips, few gifts, and only taking the time off that work will take away if we don't.
Jackson is getting an expansion for his train set, and a few odds and ends, but nothing outrageous. Joseph would be happy with a ball of tinfoil, so we got him a ball of tinfoil. Kidding.
He's getting some lovely age-appropriate stuff. We promised to make a bigger deal about his birthday than Christmas, but it's hard with all the lights and whatnot.
Speaking of: Holy shit, Joseph is almost a year old! Time really flies. He's an awesome kid, so very like his brother in appearance, but unlike him in personality. Joseph is way more loud, and tends to destroy more than he creates. He is happy way more than he is sad. He is also huge. He can fit into 12 month stuff, and freely swaps clothes with his cousin Zane, who is 17 mo. He is in the 98th percentile for height, but 50th for weight, so he is not fat at all. He's just awesome:
My mom will be coming here for Christmas. She wanted us to go down there since we stayed here for Thanksgiving, but we chose not to do that, and here is why: Jennifer and Myself are both latch-key kids, meaning that holidays were more about travelling from this house to that in bad weather than anything else. As we got older and started dating, it just got worse, because then you had to go to all of those houses too. So I put my foot down. I did so much travelling throughout mu life for all of my relatives that now it is there turn. My kids will open their presents in their own house Christmas morning. If you want to be there, that's great. We'll work out Thanksgiving, but Christmas is ours.
So there.

-JP

A dead cat and The Christmas Train

So for those of you who didn't know, Audrey the cat died. She had stomach cancer. She is sorely missed.
Now that we have that out of the way, on to The Christmas Train.
The Christmas Train sounds like a great idea in theory. Some movie company made a wild west town outside of Pryor, OK some time in the '80s. When shooting was done, a church bought the land and turned it into a western themed summer camp. During the holiday season, they decorate the place with lights and all that and turn it into a Victorian/Cowboy Christmas theme park, complete with a vintage train that actually still runs on steam. Fair enough. The kids should like it.
One of the things they keep talking about in all of the Literature is the true meaning of Christmas, and how one might learn of such during the train ride. In my mind, the "true meaning of Christmas" conjors up all sorts of imagery that mostly involves Charlie Brown and his sad little tree. This was not the case.
All seemed well and good after the hour and a half car ride. Grace and Zane were there to keep us company. Everything was quaint and charming. The main problem we had was that the tix we had, (which aren't for the train itself, only for entry into the complex) were for 6:00 and the boys hadn't eaten yet. We thought about eating first, but Jackson was so gung-ho about riding the train that his exuberance superseded hunger. The night was terribly cold, and we spent a long time getting everybody bundled up. We make it into the complex, and it is very cute. We see the boarding area for the train, having to first check the strollers. The line moved slowly and the kids were getting cranky. Finally we board the train. It's a snug fit. Everybody is wearing extra clothes due to the cold. Jackson is as excited as can be for the train ride. The conductor even yelled "ALL ABOARD!!" like he was in it to win it. The train gets rolling. There is steam and a whistle and everything seems perfect.
A few minutes into the ride, as we were riding through a tunnel decorated with hanging Styrofoam planets and stars and a lovely space mural, a gigantic, loud, booming, Darth Vader voice comes over the PA system....
"IN THE BEGINNING, GOD CREATED THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH!!!"
Almost every kid on the train lost their shit. The crying was loud, but not as loud as the magic voice. The rest of the twenty minute train ride, we chugged past painted murals of the story of Jesus, and in a few thematically important areas actors portrayed the events live. Joseph and Zane were calmed my hand-feeding them kix cereal, but Jackson just sort of stared out the window. Until I hear him say: "Daddy, what are they doing?", and I look out the window to see a bunch of guys dressed as Romans nailing a guy to a cross in a pretty graphic way. Um... our kids are all 3 or under. We don't really need blood and scary voices and violence with our theme parks, thank you. We got back to the station and they lead us all into a theater where they wanted us to watch a movie. After a collective "fuck that", we left and went to get some food. Jack played on their playground while the girls want to get the strollers, and on to some really expensive and extremely mediocre food. As the boys' blood sugar raised, attitudes were improved. We had as semi-lovely a meal as we could in a cafeteria setting. Then Disaster #2 struck. As we were getting read to venture back out into toon town, Jackson got so excited at the prospect of seeing Santa, he peed himself. Boys will be boys, but we did not have an extra outfit on hand as we usually do. So much for sitting in Santa's lap. Time to go home. All I could find in the car to put Jackson in, were a pair of his brother's pajama pants, which looked like bicycle shorts once I got them on him, and a pair of my socks. Lookin' sharp, Mr. Powers. Joseph cried the whole way home, and Grace had to feed him raisins and jingle her keys for over an hour.
So....the verdict: If it had been warmer, and if we had eaten beforehand, the old west town would have been pretty cool for the kiddos. There were pony rides and a merry-go-round and and arcade and Santa, so they would have enjoyed that. The Propaganda Train, however, we would not do again. I'm all for the Story of Jesus and all that, but for goodness sake, ease the kids into Romans and nails and raising from the dead Zombie style. That shit can wait until they don't believe in Santa anymore. Which I also thought was odd. They make a big deal about the true meaning of Christmas, but then want you to spend $15.00 on a picture of your kid with Santa. Hmmm....

-JP

Fighting kids, a job gained and then given back, a sick cat, and another death.

Where oh where to begin?
Okay. About a month and a half ago, Jennifer was offered a job managing a foundation started by the church we attend which is also where Jackson used to go to school. They couldn't pay much, but it was only part-time and the boys could be looked after on-site and for half price. Sounded awesome, and in a lot of way it really was. Jennifer wouldn't have a massive gap in her resume, we would get some extra cash, and the boys would be going to a pretty decent school. This is not exactly how it turned out.
The job part was fine, except that the retired pastor who ran it, and is getting on in years a little, turned out to be a bit of a Flibbertygibbet. A good man, and an excellent pastor, but a bit unorganized and scatterbrained. Jennifer is very left-brained. Disorganization in something she's being paid to maintain makes her want to beat up bags of cats. This, however can be dealt with.
What happened in the school turned out to be more trouble than it was worth. First off, Joseph has been sick every single day since he started going to school. First a cold then a crazy eye infection that looked like that disease coal miners get, then another cold, and a chronic cough that he still has.
Second off, Jackson started acting out. A lot. It started slowly, with a little more defiance than usual, but escalated into hitting and fits which is so not like him, and regression in his potty-training. I won't get into that. During all of this, he started saying some weird things about his class, like how he doesn't like being choked*, and saying that he didn't want to go there anymore. When Jennifer looked into this, it turned out that Jackson was being terrorized by another little boy in his class. This other kid's mom was getting a divorce from the kid's step-father (he's only three, and already has a step-father) who was pretty abusive, if you take that time he punched her in the parking lot as ant indication. So that kid was taking it out on Jackson I guess. They talked to the mom about the whole thing, and she was completely unaware of the situation, and was very upset about it, and agreed to go to some family counseling. Which is all fine and good on one hand. It's not really that kid's fault his parents are messed-up, and he'll probably settle down after the divorce and all that. On the other hand, fuck that kid. He's beating up Jackson, and that can't happen. So we gave it a couple weeks. On Tuesday, Jackson and the other kid got into a fight over a match-box car. When the teacher finally got there, Jackson was choking the other kid, who had just bit Jackson on the chin pretty good. That was kind of the last draw. We decided that this would be their last week there.
When Jennifer went in to quit her job, she explained that the good was not outweighing the bad any longer, and that she would be happy to work from home until they found a replacement, and suggested that she could work from home permanently if they would go for that. Well the good news is that the board members were all for it, saying that there was nothing preventing this, but the pastor was decidedly against it, saying he wanted someone on site as much as possible. So we will see how that shakes out. Hopefully the board will get there way and Jennifer can work from home, which seems likely because it will be a very difficult position to fill. Cross your fingers. Next week, everybody is home, so things should settle down.
On to the sick cat. I realize that this will may cast me in a bad light, but because of the boys, pet ownership has become less practical. Having two rambunctious boys, a cat and two small. obnoxious dogs was becoming way too much. Over the summer, My aunt's cat Lady, whom she'd had for years and years died. She was wanting a new cat, but didn't want a kitten, and wanted a cat that could get along with her son's two dogs. My cat Audrey fit the bill pretty good. So after a little discussion and a but of a cry, I gave her my cat. About a week ago, I get a call that Audrey wasn't eating and had dropped to 7lbs from her usual 12. My aunt has had numerous trips to the vet, and after an ultrasound, there seems to be a blockage of some sort in her small intestine. The pulled out a chunk to send to the lab so they can see if it is a virus, and infection or cancer or what. Those results will be here in a few days. I feel really bad about it. I gave my aunt a sick cat, and she just went through loosing a cat and now she may have to do it again. And she's paying all of the vet costs. And I miss my cat. I had her for almost 9 years. Bummer!
Now for the really freaky story. Remember the little girl Jenn used to nanny for? The one who's mom worked at the massage parlor? That little girl died last week. She was just about to turn 2. On Friday, Jennifer saw an odd message on the girl's sister's mySpace saying "RIP my baby sister" and a pic of the girl. Jennifer and I started investigating, and we found a death notice in the paper from the Sunday before. Jennifer called around to no avail, but ended up going to the funeral, which happened to be that day**. Once there, more questions were raised than answered. The "official"story Jenn got from the mom is that while at their current nanny's place, the girl started coughing up blood. They got her to the hospital where they thought she had a tear in her esophagus. When they operated, the girl had some kind of heart failure and died.
Everyone thinks this is bullshit. There were all these bruises and scratches all over her face that the mom said were from the tubes they put in, which is bunk. I guess the story has changed a few times. I had one of our reporters call the medical examiner, and they said that they had to do a more involved autopsy because they couldn't figure it out. That report takes a few months. The cops were equally confused. The whole thing was sketchy and weird.
It sucks because we really liked that girl, and Jackson still asks about her. We still find some of her toys around from time to time. She was messed up, but curious about everything and very sweet. And this whole thing could have probably been avoided by removing the kid from the circumstances. The mom had already had two kids taken away from her. Just before Jenn stopped watching the girl, she and the girl's weekend nanny were concerned enough about the girl that they called DHS. DHS said that nothing life-threatening had happened to the girl yet and unfortunately, there is no law against being a shitty mother.
There sure as hell should be.


-JP




*Yeah, WTF?
*8Ask Jenn to fill you in on the Funeral. It was a spectacle in itself.

Color me excited!

woo hoo!!

This is about how I feel...

Silly onion...


Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters To Realize How Empty Their Lives Are

Some thoughts on the election.

First off, congrats to Obama and Biden. You guys deserve it.

Finally people are engaged in the political process again. People are excited about performing their civic duty again. Gone, or at least lessened are the days of apathy. The feelings of why bother, my vote won't count, or politics has nothing to do with my day to day life.

Finally people other than aging baby boomers and values voters showed up at the polls.

It is very telling that when John McCain mentioned Omaba's name during his concession speech, the crowd booed, but when Obama mentioned McCain's name during his victory speech, the crowd cheered. It tells me that closed-minded arrogance has run it's course, and the American people are ready for real solutions that go beyond finger pointing.

I fear for Obama's safety and for that of his family. All the good ones get killed.

I can't wait to hear the political back-pedaling from the pendants.

It's a good day. Were it not overcast, I'm sure the sun would be a little brighter today.

I am sad that the State I live in is always way behind the curve.

More as I think of them.

The perfect quote about how I feel:

The always awesome Jeffrey Rowland puts it thus:



"It's almost over, I swear. Four years ago I would've been totally okay with John McCain, but things are different now. He's irresponsible. And don't think just because all the polls say Obama is definitely gonna win that you don't need to vote. If you failed to register, shame on you. And I'm not saying there's a possiblity we might not end up regretting Obama. But that's a lot better than the 100% certainty I have of regretting Vice President Palin. "



That about sums it up. I am sorry for not posting more often lateley, but between obsessively following the election, work, my newfound obsession with Lost*, and kids, it hasn't been on the top of my radar. Here is some cuteness to make up for it:







We had Joseph baptized last weekend, or was that the weekend before? Anyway. I had a heap of family in, and we all had a great time. Other than Jackson being a rambunchious 3-year-old, everything went off with out a hitch.



Last weekend we celebrated Papa Norm's birthday, with massive amounts of red meat and cake. He's all American, you know. We also went to the Boo-ha-ha thing on Peoria. Crowded, but fun, I guess. Zane and Jack started getting speepy/hungry/grumpy early on, so we skipped the parade in lew of naps in the car. Last night was Hallow-zoo-een, tonight is the fall festival at the church**, and then begging for treats Friday night. Then back to normal, whatever that is.

So, um... that's it.

-Powers out.








*I'm late to the game, I know, but a buddy lent me season 1, and Jen and I have spent all week staying up way too late watching episodes.
**As well as Obama's infomercial. Everyone should watch.

A-ha the literal version

Keep watching.