Odds and ends....

Okay. First off, if anybody believes that a monkey suit with somebody's lunch dumped on it is a real-life bigfoot, you are no longer my friend. Also, since when is bigfoot in Gerogia? He's strictly a north-west dude. Or if it were "found" in the other Georgia that suddenly everyone cares about, I'd tell you that Yetis are strictly north-east Asia dudes.

A note on Sweded films:

I know I am way behind the curve here. Most of them suck. They have no heart. Even the Star Wars one that Internet is raving about is kinda sucky. The main exception being the one for the bike scene in Tron:

Also, and I love this one just because everybody has been doing re-makes, and these guys broke that rule, but the Spoof of Boston Dynamics Big Dog is just plain awesome. Watch at least a little of the original before you watch this:

In Other News:

This has been the most temperate August ever. Today's high is only 80°!! This makes up for the one two years ago when it was over 110° for 3 weeks straight and the foundation of our house cracked and I almost moved to the Yukon.

-JP

Jackson loves the ladies.

That is the electronic Truck Jackson got from his Papa B for his birthday. He had it 5 seconds before it was full of girls. He's going to break some hearts, that one is.
So other that it being the hottest day of the year, Jackson's birthday party was awesome. He had a great turn out, and everybody seemed to dig that it was in a park(the kids, anyway). The kids played and ate cup-cakes(which completely melted) and played with his new toys, and then were whisked off before they passed out. The whole thing was maybe 2½ hours. Having a kids party at 10:30 in the morning is awesome. Everybody is energetic, they eat everything you bring, and the crash out when it's done. No more afternoon parties for us anymore.


In other news, if anybody in the Tulsa area wants to house a foriegn exchange student, please contact my wife. She has been tasked with finding homes for 20 kids 15-18 from arounnd the world for between 4 and 12 weeks by August 14, when they may land in Tulsa and have no where to go. She cound really use your help.


Also, my other kid is a vampire.




Powers out.

Cute kids and Summer Movies

Man, my wife makes cute kids.
Thanks to the mighty Bucaroo for the pic.


it is now one of my favs of all time.


Laura took thins pic while here last month. We had a grand time.


My other kid, who had a birthday last week, gets his birthday party this week. It's going to be in a park at 10:30am because who doesn't like cake before noon. If you want to go, email me. We have had a mild summer* by Oklahoma standards this year. July is almost over, and we have yet to hit 100°, thanks to Al Gore. Need I remind you of the summer of '06 when we had 34 days over 100°? I thought not.


That being said, it is supposed to get to a hundred on Saturday, the day of the Party. Hopefully, we'll be out of there by noon or 1:00. Jackson is excited for the Party, and actually has no idea that his birthday was last week because we didn't tell him. I don't think his just turned 3 brain could have wrapped itself around the concept of birthday now, party later. My brain can barely deal. Let's just let him open a present now, I would say. You aren't getting it, Jenn would say. It's because I'm slow.


In other News:


Finally saw the Batman movie last night. It met my very high expectations and exceeded them. That's all I'm going to say, because I sure you can't shop for toilet paper without seeing a Welshman in a batsuit on the package**.


I am extremely excited for the Watchmen movie. I know Alan Moore didn't want it filmed, but let's face it, Moore is kind of a dick.


I'll tell you what I'm not excited about is The Spirit movie. It appears that Frank Miller has taken a beloved, wonderfully campy and groundbreaking strip from the '40s and is using it to further is juvenile, chauvinistic, über macho agenda. Don't get me wrong, I love a lot of what Frank has done. It just seems like as time went on, his male characters got less and less sympathetic, in direct proportion to his female characters wearing less and less clothing. But let's face it, Miller is kind of a dick. And can we please make a comic book movie without Sam Jackson in it for once?



Powers out.

*Way to jinx it, Powers!
**Wipe out crime!

Tomorrow my first born will turn 3!

Holy shit, time flies!

Jackson is turning into an incredibly smart little boy. I can tell because he has quickly become bored to death with just about everything, especially his parents. He needs constant stimulation, and luckily for us, he can't really stand the TV. Too slow. He'll watch for about 7-8 minutes before he's off and running. The only things that can hold his attention, other than constant movement, are sleep and building the tracks for his trains. Neither of which he does very often.

One thing he does love is soccer. He gets to run around for an hour kicking things. Right up his alley.

This year his personality has really come into the forefront. He is sweet and hyper and funny and has even begun to make up jokes. Jokes, people. He also likes to trick you, and he likes to hide and jump out to scare you. He picks out his own clothes, and like his dad, prefers t-shirts with comic book characters on them.
He has also developed broken record syndrome. He'll ask the same question over and over until you give a different answer and then he'll say "No, Daddy, its (first answer)!" and start all over again.

He also at that age where we spend equal amounts of time thinking either, "I can't believe how smart you are!" and "I can't believe what a little shit you're being!" Which I'm sure sounds harsh to anybody who doesn't have kids, but incredibly accurate to anybody who does. And keep in mind I said thinking, not saying.

All in all, he is an awesome kid, and I love him a lot. I chalk it all up the the wonderful parenting that my lovely bride offers, as I do not know dick. I have seen the importance of being around, unlike the constant stream of "father figures" that wandered in and out of my childhood. And I am trying real hard to not be the dad that comes home, scolds the kids for what ever they got in trouble for that day, cracks a beer and settles into the barca-lounger to watch sports, because you may as not be there at that point.

The second kid is awesome too, by the way. He seems so much easier than Jackson was. I know that a lot of it is that we have been through it before, but this kid has a completely different personality.

For one thing, Joseph sleeps. Jackson never slept more than 45 minutes at a time until he was over a year old. He still doesn't sleep well, and getting him in bed is still a constant battle.

Joseph is just happy and giggly and bright eyed and perfect. It looks as though he's going to have wavy red hair, too. Which is awesome as long as nobody calls him "ginger balls" later in life.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JACKSON!

A Big-ass long weekend.

Three day weekend!
Friday I tried to take Jackson to see WALL-E. What I saw of it was phenomenal. Unfortunately, Jackson being almost three and all, couldn't deal with it. We cooked out at our place with the whole family and then tried to go see an air show/fireworks display at the Jenks airport that we read about in the paper I work for that didn't actually exist. Nobody seems to know where the reporter got his info, including the security guard that turned us away at the gate. So we went to a park for a while and waited for the Jenks show to start. It was pretty good, but the little ones(We had Grace and little Zane in tow) once again couldn't deal, so once again we left early. Those of you out there that don't have kids don't realize the full severity of this, but parents are constantly late for things and have to leave early. It's just part of the package.
Saturday, I took Jackson in the morning to see the actual event at the airport, which was a 50th anniversary thing with a bunch of vintage aircraft on display. Some of which you could go in and look around. Jackson had a gfeat time, given the extreme heat.
It was then on to little Zane's 1st birthday party. Zane is an awesome little kid who belongs to Jennifer's sister. He dove into his little cake like crazy. He also got a shit-ton of presents. Everybody had a really good time. During clean-up, I broke a dish. That in itself wouldn't be bad, but I put the broken bits of glass into a trash bag, and while taking out that trash bag, I somehow stabbed myself in the leg. I'm going to guess that the glass bit went about a half and inch to an inch into my calf. There was a bunch of blood that didn't feel like stopping for like an hour. yummy.
Jackson stayed the night at the grandparent's place. Mostly because he fell asleep on the couch about 7:00, and we just left him there to sleep it off.
Sunday we did chores, ate leftovers and hung out at the Mall.
Fun, relaxing and painful.

How was yours?

-

Some clarifications.

I guess I was mistaken on a few points in my last post.
The Hotel Scarlett is staying in is an Extended Stay hotel, so they do have a fridge and a sink and what not. That was my bad. It still doesn't explain very much.
Also, we thought the cousins were going to be here much later in the summer than they were.
Hence, we thought Grace might possibly be here, and it would have been awesome if she were, but we weren't counting on it by any means. Sorry, Grace.


None of this means anything, as the cousins are now gone. They decided that staying in the Ronald McDonald house with their mom would be more fun than hanging out with us.
So be it.


Scarlett is still back east with her mom, and will be until at least another week. So things are a lot calmer now. All sudden-like.


I think we are going to sit tight on the whole Scarlett thing. Only because we do think her mom isn't actively trying to neglect her child, she just doesn't really know how to be a parent. We're hoping she slowly figures it out. Maybe we can help her with that.

-JP

A nice week-end and some crazy drama.

So we had a lovely weekend. Joe and Laura were and still are and always have been the coolest of people and the dearest of friends. We had fun times. Ate a boat load of food, and drank some beers. We actually did not make it to Momentum Tulsa because of all the food and beers we consumed Saturday night. In fact, except for a walking tour of Tulsa Saturday afternoon after stuffing ourselves at the Blue Dome Diner, we pretty much stuck close to home. Friday night we ordered pizza and made margaritas, and Sunday we just grabbed some Brunch before they headed back to Austin. Though afterwards, Jen and I took the boys to a birthday party for a two-years-old girl. Kellon is the daughter of a work buddy, and we had fun at the party. There was a pool and a pinãta and strawberry cake.


Joe and Laura did accompany us to Jackson's first soccer practice. He's two, so it wasn't really a practice so much as a bunch of little kids running around in circles. He had a blast. His one greatest love in life is running, so this may just be the sport for him. He also loves trains and puzzles, just so you know come birthday time.*


On to the drama. Remember the "massage therapist" who's kid Jenn watches during the day?
Well she and her roommate had a falling out while on a trip to Vegas or some shit. The roommate, who is also the receptionist at the Parlor, kicked them out. Now they are living in an extended stay hotel in the totally awesome part of town. She only recently got a car, but still doesn't have a valid license because of warrants out on her in like 4 states. So Jenn has to drive to the complete opposite side of town and hang out around a seedy hotel to pick up and drop off the kid now. This was not the Original deal. Originally, Jenn picked up Scarlett from a much closer and safer location, and They picked her up. The mom isn't really paying anything extra for gas, either. In addition to having to drive longer, Jen also keeps the kid longer. The OD (original deal) was to pick up Scarlett around 2pm, sometimes noon, and they would come get her around 9:30. Oh, no. It's more like 9am to 11pm now.
So let's talk about living in a hotel with a toddler for a sec, shall we? First, there is no kitchen. This means no fridge. Scarlett seems to subsist completely on food from the McDonalds across from the hotel. Last week, Jen picked her up at 9:45am. Scarlett had just woken up( which means she must have been up all night), and hadn't been changed(she was in the same diaper we sent her home in) or fed. Her mom handed Jenn $5.00, and suggested she get her some chicken nuggets on our way out. classy. 2) No sink. This means her bottles never get clean, and we have to wash spoiled milk out of them ourselves. yum. 3) While there are laundry facilities on site, The mom does not use them. The place is filled with dirty laundry, and after Jenn had gone through a bunch of winter clothing that didn't fit any more, she devised a plan. She bought a bunch of clothes Scarlett's size at a garage sale for like five bucks(after she told the nice soccer mom why she was buying a bunch of girl clothes when she obviously had two boys, the lady gave Jenn everything she had in that size for free), and she changes her when she gets her, then changes her back right before she takes her back. So sad that she has to do that. 3) No yard/place to play outside. A yard in not necessary to raise a kid, but it sure does help. The hotel has no amenities, not that Scarlett's mom would use them if it did. That kid barely sees sunshine unless she's with us. Jen has gathered that Scarlett just wanders around the hotel room while her mom watches TV and talks on the phone. She certainly doesn't do anything like feed her, that's for sure. Whenever Jenn gets her she's filthy.


There is more. A lot more. Ask Jenn about that.


So what is to be done? Scarlett had a different babysitter on the weekends up until recently(she was with us for up to 12 hours most weekdays, and with these other people on the weekends).
The other Babysitter works at the health department, and called to ask a few questions of DHS.
They said that when they get a call, they usually take the kid for a period of two weeks while they do an investigation. And int this situation, unless they found drugs or drug paraphernalia on site, she's not actually doing anything illegal. There is no law against being a shitty mother, just an abusive one, and nothing here technically qualifies as abuse. Jen is going to sit tight for the moment. We both feel like Scarlett's time with Jenn is the healthiest time she spends with anyone. If we put her into the system, there is no guarantee that they would put her somewhere decent. At least this way, we know she's taken care of. And we get paid as well.


However, new variables have arisen. Jackson has two cousins that live in Grove. Their mother just had a new baby(a story unto itself that could rival this one). Jenn suggested a few months ago that when the baby comes, the older kids could come to Tulsa, stay with their grand parents at night, and stay with Jenn during the day. This was also suggested at a time when we all thought Jennifer's sister would be living in Tulsa by this point. Well, the cousin's mom and the baby had some complications, and the baby was born early, and they were both life-flighted to St.Francis Hospital in Tulsa a few days ago. Depending on the health of mother and child, we may have the cousins for the entire summer. Also because of various reasons, Jenn's sister isn't here yet.


Scarlett and her mother are currently on a trip back east to see family. When they get back, it may shake out that Jen would be responsible up to five kids all by herself every day. That's way too much for her, especially since Joseph is still nursing. Jen's parents were going to pay her for keeping the cousins, and I think she feels like if that money is good enough, she'll let Scarlett go.
Personally, I'm hoping they just stay out east and start mooching off family there.


Suggestions? Comments? What do you guys think?



-JP

I think they should have started at the other end.

Been a while, eh? But I start almost every post these days with some form of that.

So what I'm really excited about is that my friends Joey and Laura are coming here for the weekend! This is extra cool, because I have a lot of friends that I'd like to see, but with the kids and all it's a little hard to pace everybody up and take off, even for a weekend. So when friends come to me, I think that's extra cool.*

I'm not sure what all we are going to do, but it will be fun regardless. I do have some press comps for Momentum Tulsa tomorrow night, so we may do that. I don't think I have seen Joey since he and I went to Denver last April. Far too long in my opinion. Joey is also who we named our second son after. He rocks.

Also Jackson starts soccer this weekend. That's exciting. That boy loves to run, and soccer just might be the sport for him. At this age, it is more like magnet ball, where they all just clump up where the ball is and kick at it until it squirts out, and then they all converge on it again, but what are you gonna do?

Looks like we're going to need a new roof, thanks to all the severe weather we've been having.

Other than that, not much going on.

-JP


*Take the hint, people I'd really like to see.

Memes LOL

Count the memes!

All hail! All Weekend

So we sat through two separate and intense hail storms over the weekend, both about 11:00 am, both fierce. As you ca see above, the bulk of the hail was about the size of a quarter. It looked like it had snowed, and we had a drift in front of our door about 4 inches deep.

More pics here.

-JP

A lot of time...

Has passed since my last entry. At least for me. What have I been doing?
Well, last week-end, Jen's family had their Family Reunion. It was small this year, as the younger generations tend to not go very often. It usually a pain in the ass is why. This year was no exception, but I had a lot of fun despite myself. The Reunion is usually held at beautiful Lake Murray, near Ardmore, OK. The reason is because half of us live in Oklahoma, and the rest in Texas, so we just meet in the middle. Lake Murray is very beautiful. There is camping, a Marina, and a Resort on site. It was one of Roosevelt's public works projects during the New Deal. It has not been updated since, and the maintenance has been lackluster. It is what I fondly refer to as "Jank City." We asked them on the phone if they had a couple of cribs they could throw in our room, which they did, and tried to charge us $10 a night for, which would have been $60. I let them know as nicely as possible that that was a crock of shit, and they waved the fee. This was a good thing, because both cribs were of the old fold-up variety from the '50s and didn't have any of their hardware attached any longer, and would completely collapse once more than a half a pound of pressure was applied. The first time it happened, all I did was put a pillow in it. Classy.
The wonderful thing is that children don't care about shit like that, and there were a lot of kids in attendance. Jackson's time was monopolized by his cousin Jaezie, who at almost 4 years old, is like a swarm of bees. It is as though she was raised by wolves. He sister Lenzie is awesome. At 9, she's smart and witty and wise beyond her years, which makes Jaezie that much harder to figure out. Jackson seemed to start to have a good time as soon as we implemented the "Hands to Yourself" rule, which made everybody happy.
Anyway, the weekend was filled with swimming and Grilled food and Smores and running around and tired kids and fits and evil breakfast buffets* and was actually quite relaxing even though Jen and I really didn't sleep much.


The best part was our trip to Arbuckle Farms. This is a place where old (and I do mean OLD) zoo and circus animals go to live out their days eating food out of wax cups held out of car windows by timid housewives and scared children. What a magical place! It was more fun than I thought it would be, and a lot less pathetic. The animals were friendly and only the ostriches were dicks, but in my experience, most birds are dicks. Since we rarely went over 10mph the whole time, we let Jackson sit in the front seat, so he could see everything. He had a BLAST.
Flickr set here.

The rest of the weekend was anti-climactic, to tell you the truth. We left Monday morning, but next time I'm leaving Sunday night, and sleep in my own bed.

Tuesday and Wednesday, we kept Gavin, the son of our dear friends Brandon and Gretchen, as his usual babysitter had a death in the family. They are about 6 months apart in age, and entertained each other better than any adult ever could. Wednesday night, Scarlett stayed the night so her mom could go clubbing, to mixed results. She's a sweet kid but has some problems. Mainly due to having little or no supervision most of the time. She kept us up all night screaming because apparently sleep is where the clowns eat you. That was fun. Jen had her up and dressed and out the door as soon as the call came, at 7:00am.

So that's about it. That's what I've been doing.

Go away now.

-JP





*
"Is the oatmeal instant, or do you make it?"
(blank expression)
"It's instant but we make it."

In which I tell you about my week-end.

So it is all sudden-like summertime here in the south west. We hit 91 degrees a little while ago.
The good news is that we didn't get the hot until after the weekend. The weekend barely cracked 80, and was awesome because of it.
Friday Jackson had been asking Jen all day to go to the play area in the mall. He loves that place. I think it smells like feet. While in the area of town dedicated entirely to commerce, we decided to get me clothes. I was going to wait until I lost a little more weight (26 lbs so far!), but the fat clothes weren't cutting it, and I seem to have hit a wall in my weight loss for some reason. It may be that since Joey goes down at 9:00 now, I wasn't able to use the exercise machine while I watch the Daily Show like I was before. More on that later. So we got me some clothes that would be good for work, but also light enough for summertime. Rock. We also went on a fruitless search for a Sit and Stand stroller which allows two kids in one contraption. Everyone was out, which was a bummer.*
We were going to watch The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford when we got the boys to sleep, but when we realized it was 2 hrs, 40 min long, we decided against it.
Saturday was a big day. I put together a crib we procured for Joey, as he is out-growing the bassinet. This has the added advantage of being in his room rather than ours, so I get to exercise during the Daily show again. We then split up for a while, Jen taking Joey to do some grocery shopping, and I took Jackson to the bank. His piggy bank was over flowing and he got to put it into the big machine, and he thought that was awesome. All the cash went into his savings account, except for a few bucks for him to pick out a toy with. All he wanted was a hot wheels car, so he got a little bag of candy as well. You know what that is? That's bonding, mofo.
After naps and what-not, we started gearing up for the post-mother's-day-barbecue. Jen's sister came down from the City with her little boy, and Cousin Ryan came down from Stilly accompanied by his new girlfriend. Prior to the meal, Jen's mom found us the stroller we wanted at a place that sells baby stuff that we totally forgot about. yay! We ate a bunch of meat and pasta salad then decided to go to Mayfest. We had a grand time eat Mayfest, except that the Lemonade guy we went to first was a total dick. We wandered around, watched Larkin for a while and went home. All the kids fell asleep fast. I think a lot of the adults did as well.
Sunday Jen made an awesome brunch. Pappa B and Nana came over,and we all visited and played with the kids. We spent the after noon lounging around Jen's parent's house, and I fell asleep watching Temple of Doom on the sci-fi channel. We made a pizza, and Jackson almost fell asleep at the table, as he had no nap and had just gotten out of the hot tub all relaxed.
We went home, and I mowed the lawn while Jen got the kids in bed. We then watched The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford , which was really good, if a bit long. A stellar cast in that one.
Then sleep. Well, a little sleep. Jackson has been waking up a lot lately. I don't know what that's about.

-Powers out.






*I am so old.

A shopping spree, houshold projects, and a death.

Okay, so been a while. I had to play a lot of catch-up at work after the Denver trip. In the meantime, spring finally showed up, the Avs got their asses handed to them by the Redwings, The new season of Doctor Who started, and a new Portishead album came out. One of these things is very good.
So this week-end, we took Jackson on a shopping spree. He shot up a few inches over the last two months, and everything he owned magically didn't fit any more. So we went to the Mall, and to Target, and made him try on a bunch of stuff, when he just wanted to look at the toys. It took all day, but I think we have sufficiently clothed him for the remainder of the summer. He got a Hunk and and Iron man shirt, so that's cool. I'm glad I'm allowed to pick things out every so often. ( I bought him his first comic book while in Denver, a Spider-Man one-off meant for a younger age group. I read it three times on the plane ride home.)
We also attended a graduation party for our friend Craig. It took him 6 years and three schools, but he finally did it. He got a degree in History, which he will now use to be a Carpenter. Go, Craig!
Sunday, we did a whole mess of projects around the house that have been building up since we moved in. We painted the living room, replaced the sink sprayer which was leaking, fixed the bedroom toilet, which had broken in the dead of night about two weeks ago, causing it to refill loudly, and take forever when it did. I also put up some shelves in the living room, which still need to be stained, and I fixed the two holes on our fence that we obtained during the last big storm. It is actually, technically our neighbor's fence. I would have just waited for him to fix it, but he's in a rental, so he doesn't give a shit. But since the dog from two houses down was getting into our yard through various holes in fences and picking fights with our dogs, I decided to just hop the fence and repair the holes with whatever that guy had lying around.
Also on Sunday, my ex-step dad David died. For those of you who know me well, you know that he was the reason I moved out when I was 15, and the source of most of my bad self-esteem and neurotic behaviour. I am having a hard time trying to figure out how I feel about that. He had been sick for quite some time. A fact that I was unaware of until my mom told me while I was in Denver. And now he's dead. I don't know if I really needed to talk to him about anything, or if going to the funeral will bring me any kind of closure. I'm pretty sure I made my peace with all that a long time ago. What I do know is that there is some sort of emotion there, I just can't lock it down. For good or ill, and even though I haven't had any contact with him for 17 years, he had a strong impact on my life. The funeral is on Friday, and I don't know if I'll go yet.
Okay, Debbie Downer. Lay off.

Everybody have a good week!

-JP

D-Town Goodies.

Well, that was fun.

We are back from Denver, and we had a really nice time. We got to see the family, and we got to show off the newbie. It was stressful at times, but fun over all. What family visit isn't?

We started off Thursday night with a massive pile of luggage and two car seats that needed to come with us. The boys behaved very well on the airplane, and Jackson was very excited. He's still talking about it. Joey just fell asleep. Jen and I are a good match, sometimes in ways that I never imagined. Case in point: Neither of us get sick to the point of throwing up on airplanes or boats, but we both get mildly nauseated. For some reason known only to airplane people, if you are travelling with an infant, you have to sit on the right side of the plane. So the way the tickets shook out on out teeny tiny little plane, Jen was in the window seat on the right side, then there was a big fat guy next to her, then the isle, then Jackson and I were on the other side. The Dude in the isle seat was eating this massive sandwich that he brought from home. He kept adding packet after packet of mayo and mustard the whole time he was eating it, and it was making our collective nausea that much worse. Blegh. We were happy to get off.

Friday, we just bummed around town visiting various people, mainly to show off the kids. We had some lunch at Angelo's after hanging out at Pablo's most of the morning. We did get to meet Jeremy's new girlfriend, who is awesome, and he should hang onto that one. :) Then we had to go back to the house in the sky, as Jackson calls it, for a nap. Travelling with children is very very different than being on your own. Basically, you have the morning to get anything done. Children wake up at ungodly hours in the morning, but they need a nap in the afternoon. So our little schedule usually requires everything to stop around 1:00 so we can get Jackson fed and down for a nap, which lasts at least an hour and a half, giving us just enough time before we have to start dinner to not get anything done.

We went to the White Fence Farm for Dinner with Jackson's pseudo-cousin Emily and her family. They make farm food there, meaning that if anything is remotely healthy, they either deep-fry it, or add mayonnaise, nipping that shit right in the bud. Yummy. The kids got to feed sheep and get that "farm experience" That we could get 50 feet from our house. It did have a playground out front, though. So they basically ignored the food and played. Friday night we went to Sputnik, and had a lot of fun. We left fairly early because we were both tired, so it you didn't show up, there is your out next time I see you.

Saturday we collected my dad and his wife, and went to the Children's Museum. Holy cow, did Jackson have a fun time there! If you didn't know, one of Jackson's great loves in life is trains. Making complicated track systems, then making the trains go along them are some of the most fun he has, as it feeds his OCD* the equivalent of comfort food. He just zones out on it for hours. Well, The Children's Museum has a whole room dedicated to this purpose. He had such a good time, that when we tried to show him other parts of the facility, he would duck out when we weren't looking, and run back to the train room. We had a lovely lunch, and some naps. We shopped a bit on the 16th Street Mall.

Saturday night, Tim took me and Aaron Taylor to the Hockey game. I can't even say how cool this was. I'll try in increasing levels of coolness: Hockey - Avs on TV - Avs in playoffs on tv- Avs in person - Avs in playoffs in person - Avs in playoffs in person in club level box - Avs in playoffs in person in fully catered club level box - Avs in playoffs in person in fully catered, including booze, club level box - Avs in playoffs in person in fully catered including booze club level box with a TV showing the Avs game!!!! They won. They advanced to the second round. I won. Everybody won. Except Jen, who had to stay at home with my Mon and not eat a real dinner because my mom's on some diet. Jen didn't win. Sorry, sweetie.
Sunday, Tim and I took Jackson over to Millennium park and to the kiddie Park on Speer. Jen went and had a lovely breakfast with Turner.

Sunday afternoon, we hung out with my Dad, who has a train set in his basement. Yay for Jackson. We then went to a Pizza place off Leetsdale for dinner, where there was a train set. Yay for Jackson, who refused to eat in lew of there being a train set there.

Monday we basically packed and went home. The trip home was a bit more of an ordeal. After the crew was delayed on an earlier flight, we sat on the tarmac for a while while they looked at a mechanical problem, which didn't go away. We had to de-plane(just as Jackson fell asleep), wait an hour, and get on another plane. We got home 2 hours late. oh well. at least we are home.

A good trip, but I wish I had more free time to hang with friends. Whenever we bring the boys, I feel obligated to let the grandparents spend as much time as possible with them, and I don't yet feel comfortable leaving the boys with them without one of us there too. As they get older, that will ease a bit. I hope.

So, yeah. Pics here.



Enjoy.



-JP



*Jackson does not actually have OCD.

Kibbles 'n' bits

1)The entire Oklahoma Powers Klan will be in Denver this weekend. Those of you who live there and want to see me should give me a call. You know who you are. Since we will have bits kiddies and time is short, a lot of our time will be spent with family, since the Oregon Powers will be in town as well(I have a hankering to make "Powers Family Reunion" T-shirts). We all usually hang out at the coffeeshop more than is healthy when we visit, so chances are about 70-30 that one of us will be there at any given moment. Jen and I plan to "whoop it up" at least one night. I think Friday. I don't know when. Depends on the wee folk. Maybe Sputnik? Anybody have a better idea?


2) This made me laugh out loud at work: http://www.theonion.com/content/node/77275


3) As some of you know(or more accurately, will think: oh, yeah...), Jen quit her job with the Cancer People in order to take care of the wee folk. She could do this because we have a cheap mortgage and virtually zero debt. We still just about break even. So in order to have some extra scratch and maybe help fund our kid's college careers, Jen was looking for a party-timey, makey-money type of thing. She has plans to make and sell some children's products, maybe do some bookkeeping for her mom-the-CPA, you know. Things where one can make money without actually having a job. So then a post came along on Craig's List for someone wanting a baby-sitter/nanny for the late afternoons and evenings, times when daycares don't often operate. Jen looked into it, and after a few emails and a visit, it looked pretty good. She'd be getting paid (a lot) to do what we do anyway: Play with kids in the afternoon, feed them and get them ready for bed. The little girl is a total sweetheart named Scarlet, and is 15 months old, right between Jack and Joey. Pretty perfect, right?

Well... What is weird about it, is what we have come to find out about the mom. She just moved here from California, with basically just the kid and the clothes on her back to get away from some sort of abusive relationship. She's working as a massage therapist and is roommates with the receptionist. They seem to have known each other for a long time and seem to be sharing the child-rearing responsibilities. Okay. Sure.


Turns out that it is the kind of massage parlor that has theme rooms and throws around words like "discreet". When describing the staff, all of whom are pictured on their website in the masseuse version of Hooter's gear, they say things like: "An brunette beauty with a winning smile who can take you to new levels of blissful relaxation". Yep.


And the mom pays us in cash. Nightly. So there's that. Think what you will.


4) There is no fourth thing.



-JP

Drama on a Saturday, or: My wife is a hero....

Because she saved a little girl's life last night.

Jackson went to his grand parent's house tonight, so we were free to pal around a bit. We went to the natural food market, stopped to get some coffee, and then were heading to a big box store to get some paint for the living room. As we were driving along, we spotted a 5 year old little girl running barefoot in the middle of the street, with a bunch of traffic backed up behind her.

"Is that a little girl?!" she asks.

"I think so," I say.


Before I could even get the car stopped, she was out the door. I stopped the car in such a way that I was blocking both lanes, and started to call 911 on my cell phone. Luckily, a few people on the other end of this started doing the same, and a few more people had their cells out as well. Jenn managed to get the girl stopped and sitting down between her legs, and she had a death grip around the little girl's waist. There was obviously something, I don't want to say wrong with the little girl, but you know what I mean.

I was still on hold with the cops. Actually, after being transferred to the police, the phone was still ringing. Jen had one of the other people who stopped to help get a big white teddy bear that Jackson swiped from his grandmother's office a few weeks ago out of our car. They gave it to the girl and that seemed to be calming her down a bit. About this time, in a weird twist of fate, a lady came up saying she knew the girl, because she taught at the local elementary school, and the girl's brother was in her class. Turns out the girl's name is Willow and she is autistic, and a runner. Teacher Lady calls home, and has her husband look up the parents phone number in the school directory.


I finally get hold of the cops, and give them the run down. I tell them we're between Yale and Sheridan on 101st, but that's not good enough. I have to get out, leaving Joseph in the car which is parked across the only two lanes of traffic. The lady finally gets hold of the parents. Then we wait. In the middle of the road. With an autistic kid with a giant teddy bear in Jennifer's lap, and me trying to direct traffic on one side of the road, and teacher lady on the other. With asshole drivers speeding by and honking and giving us dirty looks, which was freaking out Jen and the little autistic girl who wouldn't budge from her spot. The fact that she was even letting Jen touch her, let alone have a death grip on her, was a freaking miracle according to the teacher lady. Jen tried to calm her down as best she could. She would struggle to get up from time to time, but Jen just talked to her, and sang songs (which the girl didn't like very much, and lightly hit Jen on the head to make her stop) and rocked her, and let her play with the bear. We waited for what seemed like 20 minutes. And guess what? The parents showed up before the cops did. In fact, the cops didn't show up at all.

The mom shows up and explains that they were all eating dinner, and Willow was calmly playing with some dolls on the patio, right outside, where they could all see her from the dinner table. She was there one second, gone the next. Usually she goes out the gate into the neighborhood, but this time she scaled an 8 foot privacy fence, on the other side of which was 101st Street. They noticed pretty quick, but were coming their neighborhood, not outside it. We all have hugs and thank yous and what not, and I call 911 back to tell them not to bother, but can't get through, so I hang up. Some EMTs in an ambulance showed up right as we were leaving, and get the low-down from the mom. We go on our way, full of adrenaline.

Over the next hour, as we wander the isles of the big box store, The police department calls my cell three times. Twice to get directions to where the problem was, and the other to see if I had an emergency.

"I did," I tell this last one, "almost two hours ago."

"Yeah, were really busy tonight," she says.

Good thing I wasn't bleeding.
I can't tell you people how proud I am of Jennifer. She ran out into Saturday night traffic to help this poor little girl without batting an eyelash, while I stayed in the car, on the fucking phone. She's so good with children, and was the absolute perfect person to happen to be driving by, because she knew exactly what to do, or figured it out pretty damn quick. The second best person to happen to be driving by would have to be a teacher at the girl's school. How freaking awesome was that? But still. Jen did a fantastic job and I truly believe she saved that little girl's life.

I totally married the right person.

-JP

Fold-ins, Dions and Women of Ill repute.

Okay, this is about the coolest thing I've seen in a long while. I keep going back to it.

Every even slightly nerdy boy in America went through a phase where Mad Magazine was about the coolest thing ever. I actually started reading Groo: The Wanderer specifically because Sergio Aragones did the little doodles in the margins. I think he still does, actually.

This is Jackson with a Dinosaur. Over Easter, he kept making his Nana take picture of him holding each of the .99¢ Dinos that he got in his bucket.

This is Joey throwin' gang signs

His flow be fresh.

Oh, yeah. So they finally put a lock on the gate they put up to block the bridge I used to use to go over the train tracks to get from the parking lot to work. You get all that? Too bad. The bridge has been unsound for car traffic for about ten years, and is now unsuitable for foot traffic as well. Instead of repairing it or knocking it down, they just blocked it off. All that doesn't matter. What matters is that my route to work is now two blocks and 7 minutes longer. Actually, that doesn't even matter for this story either. What matters is that when walking to work now, I go over a new bridge. This morning, just before I got to the base of the bridge, about a block away from the parking lot, a car pulls up. A woman gets out and the car speeds off. No bid deal, she's just getting dropped off, even though it's a really weird place to be dropped off because it's not really near anything. Why didn't they just go ahead and go over the bridge and drop her off on the other side. But then she doesn't go over the bridge. She goes under the bridge, where there is only a small space before the fenced-off train tracks start. And I thought to myself: Ha Ha! Crack Whore!

That is all.

-JP

Family weekends...

... are generally more hassle than reward, thought the reward part usually makes up for it. If that makes any sense. This weekend, we're taking 5 kids under 10 to see Sesame Street Live.
Being a parent is weird in that, as I would never in a million freakin' years have any desire to see Sesame Street Live, I do have a huge desire to watch Jackson see Sesame Street Live. Him getting a kick out of it will make it totally worth it, and I now have a massive amount of respect and understanding for my step-mother who took me and a friend to see Weird Al back in 1985 when I was 10.
There are 5 kids because cousins who live in Grove are coming in for it, and since Jen's mom, a CPA, is neck-deep in tax returns, she had to give up her ticket, and we are taking the child of a family friend. So my two kids, two cousins, and a family friend. Everybody got that? The cousins being in town means we pretty much spend the whole weekend at the In-laws, wrangling various children and preparing meals.
We may all go to the Air and Space Museum on Sunday as well. I hope that isn't too much stimuli for one weekend. Or too little.
Wish me luck.

In other news:

One of my favorite comic artists, James Jean, has done some work for Prada. Now that's big time.

Another Fav, Adrian Tomine, who hit the big time with Illustrations for The New Yorker and Weezer, has a comic up on NPR's site to coincide with their story about Long Duk Dong's cultural impact. The fact that a story about Long Duk Dong's cultural impact even exists makes me love NPR that much more.

I think because of Veronica Mars, Heroes and Fanboys, Kristen Bell has now replaced Sarah Michelle Geller as geekdom's favorite hottie. Because of this. And this. Nerds are going ape-shit.

South Park Studios has launched. Every episode of South Park. Free. No shit. My favorite is Mecha-Strisand, because of Robert Smith.

I think that's all I have.


-JP

In which I show you another baby pic

Joey has decided that he enjoys waiving his hands in the air. Waving them like he just doesn't care. He also has this crooked smile that just kills me.


Bow down to the cuteness*--->


Um... I don't have much going on right now. Just humming along.
No new geek news, nothing too exciting happening at work...
Jackson is gearing up to go see Sesame Street Live in a few weeks with his cousins.
He's getting crazy good at jigsaw puzzles.


So, um... yeah.


-JP




* You are not worthy.

Holy Crap!

Lost military rocket crashes into Tulsa apartment building




Watch the skies, people!




-JP