eight months later.

Lyra is eight months old today.

In just 240 days, we went from this:

to this.

There are many things that amaze me about these kids every day.  For example, I'm constantly amazed at how different Quinn and Lyra are already shaping up to be, now that their personalities are starting to form.  From the start, Lyra was a completely different baby.  She's more alert and aware than Quinn was at her age, and she uses her hands far more--Quinn never even tried to hold his own bottle even when he was going on a year, and Lyra constantly tries to seize it.  She's a frequent and enthusiastic thumb sucker as well, whereas I've never seen Quinn's thumb in his mouth in almost three years.  (Yeah, he'll be three on Valentine's Day...time flies.)

Same DNA background, same hospital, same house, same foods, same attention, and even most of the same clothes (hey, we're cheap, and who cares if she's mostly wearing blue?), and they're already totally different kids.

Oh, and all you dads out there who have a leave-the-house kind of daytime job?  You're both lucky (for the breaks you get), and unfortunate (for all the firsts you miss), but there's one thing you need to keep in mind.  When someone asks you whether your wife works, you need to reply, "Hell yes, she does--she's staying at home with the kid/s." 

It's not that parenting is physically or intellectually difficult, but there are two things that make it one of the hardest jobs I've ever done.  First, there's all the stuff you need to be able to manage at the same time, and under challenging conditions.  (Try to change a kid's poopy diaper while the phone is ringing, and the other kid is doing that non-stop, low-level whining for attention.)  Then there's the fact that you're on the job all the time, without much of an opportunity for sanity breaks.  There's a constant, low-level stress(with occasional spikes during the day) that has a cumulative sort of effect, and it does chip away at your mental state after a while.

So, get a baby sitter every once in a while, and take your SO out to a dinner that doesn't involve bibs and airplane noises, and they'll stay sane.  And for all that is good and proper, don't ever assume your stay-at-home spouse doesn't have a "real job". 

about that roof.

So we had the builders out here yesterday to evaluate the roof and find the source of the water leak.

It turns out the roof was put onto this house by intoxicated simians with no knowledge of physics and/or static design. Our roof pitch is insufficient for the snow to slide off (the builder said it's such a low pitch that it might as well be a flat roof), and there's so little insulation under the roof that the bottom layer of snow melts very quickly. We had 20-degree weather yesterday, and there was a layer of running water under the snow. It melts merrily, flows to the edge of the roof, freezes into a nice crust of ice, and the water running up behind it just sort of pools behind the ice and then finds nooks and crannies to yield to gravity and come down into the house.

The source of the troubles is one spot on the roof where the roofing nails have popped up due to ice pressure, and the pooling water goes right down the nail holes and into the plywood of the wall below.

I asked the roofer what he'd do if it was his place, and he said, "build a roof on top of the old one with sufficient and uniform pitch to it." They measured out the roof, talked the details out with me, and gave me an estimate for the work that would be required.

Sixteen thousand dollars, give or take.

They're planning to extend the peak of the roof by about six feet, build a new shingled roof on top of the new structure, and insulate the old roof below. Work can start in January, since they don't need to take the old roof down, and nothing will be exposed to the elements.

We could have the old roof repaired for quite a bit less than that, but the problem would only resurface, since the issue with the roof is basically built-in, and I want to only spend the money once for doing it right, instead of spending less more often for half-assed work.

So, that's basically it. The two minor leaks at least have stopped, but Quinn's room has water dripping down in two more spots, and is basically uninhabitable for a toddler. His room is right below the junction of the upper and lower roofs, the spot where the water comes into the plywood, so it's taking the brunt of the damage. Today, I'll be relocating him into Lyra's room temporarily, and she'll have her crib in our bedroom again until that room has a proper roof over it once more.

I'm trying not to get too awfully cranked up about it. We can pursue action against the inspector who signed off on the sale, and the seller who almost certainly failed to disclose the water problems (the roof has signs of being repaired before in the troublesome spot), but I'm not holding my breath waiting for a stream of dollars.

On the plus side, the house is warm and dry except for one room, the fridge is full, and the holidays are around the corner, so all is well. When I used to go to Barnes and Noble in Knoxville with Quinn, I couldn't pry him away from the wooden train tracks in the kiddie book section, so this Christmas, he's getting a train play table of his own. I'll have to put it together clandestinely, and the size of it doesn't lend itself to wrapping, but I'm looking forward to seeing his face when he sees what Santa crammed down the chimney for him.

notes from a weekday.

I didn't want to leave the house today, but Quinn kept bugging me to "go to the store, daddy?" all morning, so I finally caved in and saddled up the War Wagon just before lunch.

We went to the neighborhood grocery store, where I picked up some alibi Diet Rite, and some sandwich components. In the cheese aisle, where I was browsing for sliced Muenster, Quinn gazed at the variety of cheeses of all kinds, and kept repeating "Cheese!" in a hushed, reverent sort of tone.

After the tenth awed "Cheese!", I nodded and said, "Yeah. What a friend we have in cheeses!"

The older lady over by the yogurt section shot me a scandalized glance, but I think I heard her chuckle as we moved off with our sliced Muenster.

Other activities for the day: keeping the kids fed and content, making lunch for Quinn and myself, cleaning up the kitchen, and using the brief hour of "I can't believe they're both napping at the same time!" to practice ILS approaches with the Baron 58 in "pea soup" meteorological conditions. That's about a typical weekday for me.

quinn and pals.

Quinn likes to go on errands with daddy. All I have to do is announce that we're going to the store, and he'll dash off to his room to get ready.

"Getting ready" entails grabbing a big armful of stuffed critters off the bed, and then waiting at the front door for daddy to catch up. Leaving the house without his fuzzy pals is unthinkable. There have been days where he's been content with just one or two of them in addition to the ever-present Schmusetuch, but on most days his stuffed posse needs to be at least three strong.

And don't think he'll leave them in the car once we're at our destination...they all have to ride in the shopping cart with him.

Here he is, ready to roll with his pals.

keep your village away from my kid.

Over at Roberta X's blog, there's a good piece up on the morality of taking from others to pay for what you can't afford, even if it is your child's life on the line.

Keep your village away from my child, I say.

I love my children more than anything. I'd do anything to save their lives if they were in danger, up to and including giving up my own if necessary. To tell you the honest truth, if one of them was so sick that our own money and all our insurance couldn't pay for a lifesaving treatment, there's a microscopic chance I may even violate my own libertarian ethics and steal to get the money.

But in the highly unlikely event that it ever happens, you can be damn sure I'll have the decency to do the stealing myself, instead of using Uncle Sugar as an intermediary, and then feeling all entitled to the loot. At least I'd run the risk myself.

Theft is theft, even if it's "for the children", and no amount of fancy apologist language about "social contracts" and "fairness" can make it not so.

squeee.

The sprogs have developed a new (and apparently highly amusing) form of communication in the ultrasonic frequency range.

The dogs are on the couch with their paws over their ears.

can i get those back, please?

Random shot of a toddler with size 7T feet wearing adult size 9 shoes. Five minutes later, he completed the stylish outfit with a purple-and-blue pair of swim trunks, worn as headgear. Alas, I was on the phone with the real estate agent, so I wasn't able to grab the camera to document the fashion statement.

Boy, do I have an album together already for the day he brings home his first date.

almost halfway to a year.

Little Miss Lyra is five months old today. Time flies when you're juggling an infant and a toddler all day.

(Not literally, mind you.)

Isn't she a most serious baby? I swear, that kid has the most focused and intense gaze of any infant I've seen.

make it stop.

Contrary to popular belief, just having kids will not cause brain damage in parents.

Being exposed to kiddie songs all day, however, will.

One of the most annoying things of being a stay-at-home parent is the inevitable fact that a.) kiddie tunes are catchy and easy to remember, and b.) your kids will listen to a lot of them. Even with limited TV intake, most of what will be watched is going to be saturated with cutesy little songs, and in the age of cheap and plentiful electronics, many toys for kids have their own catchy tunes.

You can. not. get. them. out. of. your. head.

I have lost count of the days when I had an endless loop of the Doodlebop song, a Baby Signing Time tune, or the ABC song from Quinn's little Alphabet Train Station playing in my head all day long. It's enough to slowly and surely chip away at parental sanity, more so than any number of poopy diapers or wall murals painted with momentarily unattended samples of diaper rash cream.

Sometimes I have to get out the headphones and listen to some Nine Inch Nails or Rage Against the Machine just to try and dislodge the Underpants March from Quinn's "No More Diapers" DVD, a tune that has the ability to attach itself to your brain like one of those face-huggers from Alien. I'm generally a classical music and instrumental soundtracks kind of guy, but such relaxing fare is powerless against the cloying sweetness and easy-to-remember catchiness of such insidious kiddie fare.

All those parenting books at Barnes & Noble? They don't tell you shit about shit. Oh, sure, they teach you how to change diapers or deal with your toddler's temper tantrum without killing him, yourself, or the both of you, but they are absolutely silent on subjects like "getting sticky kiddie music out of your noggin."

Maybe that's a market niche right there.

If you're thinking about joining the Parenting Club (where nervous tics, thousand-yard-stares, and subscriptions to the Bourbon of the Month at the local liquor store are complimentary welcome package gifts with your membership), then you need to prepare yourself for the toddler years. Buy an iPod, and load it up with the loudest, most furious German rage-and-angst stuff you can find. Rammstein is a good start.

Then, when you find yourself humming the Underpants March all morning, you can put on the headphones, and have a cleansing wave of "DU HASST! DU HASST MICH!" shouted by angry Germans at maximum volume flood your brain, hopefully stomping out that insidious little tune...at least for a while.

quiet day.

I took the kids over to our weekly play date at a friend's house. We usually alternate between indoor playtime and trips to the zoo or the park.

When Quinn was sitting down for lunch with his little pal Greta, they started squealing at each other in turn. One of them started, and then the other responded, and for a few minutes, they had a great time having a squeal conversation and laughing their little heads off at each other.

It's kind of hard to have a bad day after watching a three-and-a-half year old and a two-and-a-half-year old conversing in high-pitched sounds and then sharing belly laughs.

In other news, the magic elf box under my desk is now a Core2Duo system, thanks to the humbling and amazing generosity of my friend Mark. Those new Intel Core 2 chips are something else...half the heat and two thirds the power consumption of the Pentium 4 line, and twice the performance. My old Pentium 4 runs at 2.8GHz, and the new C2D is clocked at 1.86GHz, but the C2D canes the P4 in every conceivable category by a very wide margin, despite running at a gigahertz less. I need to wait a few more days for the new video card to get here, but once that spare PCI-E slot holds some nVidia goodness, I'll be making MS Flight Simulator X my bitch.

(If you didn't understand half of the previous paragraph, you're probably not a computer geek, and you may safely disregard everything past "belly laughs".)

fashion disaster.

I guess I can rule out "fashion designer" as a possible future career for Quinn.

Then again, who knows? That look doesn't look too outrageous compared to what I see at the mall these days.

dispatch from the munchkin zoo.

Quinn has adopted an interesting pattern of regression.

He's very sweet with his sister. Since we brought her home, he's never shown any hostility towards her, despite the fact that he's quite jealous of the attention she's receiving. Lately, he has been trying to reclaim some of that attention by falling back to baby behavior. He climbs into her little swing, despite the fact that he's completely outgrown it. (The little motor on the swing whines in a most pathetic fashion when the thing is occupied by a 25-pound toddler.) He wants to take his meals in the high chair now, even though he graduated to his own little meal table a few months ago. When he started that particular habit again, he wouldn't eat very much unless I fed him, but now he has at least reclaimed his autonomy in that respect.

On the plus side, he's already having fun with her. She'll sit in her chair and let out her little baby bird chirps and squeals, and he'll crack up like you wouldn't believe. Once they're a little older, I predict they'll keep each other busy enough to give daddy a break every now and then.


Here's Quinn keeping himself occupied with one of my Model M keyboards. He'll sit in front of it and depress every number and letter key in turn, complete with accurate narration.

"It's a letter Q key. It's a letter W key. It's a letter E key..."

That's usually good for ten minutes of shower time for daddy.


Here's Quinn with his cornucopia of ride buddies.

Whenever I tell him to get ready for a car trip, he'll start collecting his comfort objects to come along. We usually don't leave the house without him clutching the array of objects you see in his hands: the Schmusetuch (security blanket), the giraffe, the polar bear, and the fleece blanket. He'll leave them in the car once we get to our destination, although sometimes he'll insist on taking them along into the store, which means he takes up the entire upper deck of the grocery store cart with himself and his assorted stuffed pals.

Developmental psychology is an interesting field, that's for sure. You can read all the books in the baby and toddler section at Barnes & Noble and think you're prepared, but there's nothing in the world that will prepare you for this job. You only ever have all the answers on raising kids before you start having them.

diabetics beware.

One of the perks of having kids is that you can always post a cute baby picture when you have nothing else to blog at the moment.

Here's a cute baby picture.

notes from a weekend.

We spent the weekend in Georgia at Robin's sister's place. Her sister has three kids ages thirteen to nine, and they are...rambunctious. Within a few hours of our arrival at my sister-in-law's house, her kids had taught Quinn how to say "oh, shit" when he drops something, and demonstrated for him how to burp the alphabet from A to Z. (That's an impressive skill, I have to admit--my brother can swallow air and burp on command, but I've never acquired the ability.)

On the way to their house in Buford, we had to brave the Atlanta periphery at rush hour. While we were in walking-pace traffic, I saw something that I've never seen before in my life: the thermometer displaying outside air temperature showed 117 degrees. (That's 45 degrees celsius, for you Euro-types.) The air conditioning in the van was blowing at maximum, with the air flow selector set to recirculate the inside air, and it was bearable, but I could tell that the vehicle was just about at the upper limit of its thermal operating envelope. We passed several cars that had quit on their drivers, and the thought of breaking down in 117-degree heat with two small children in the car made me wince.

Our usual communal weekend World Of Warcraft gaming has slowed down a bit. Robin goes to work extra hours every other Saturday or so, and on her off weekends we usually have too much other stuff to do. Occasionally, we manage an hour or two of questing after the kids are in bed, but life kind of takes precedence over quests and instance runs right now. I've read of people who neglect or even starve their offspring because of World of Warcraft addiction, but those people have severely faulty wiring in their cranial fuseboxes. If I ever choose playing computer games over taking care of my kids, I hope that someone beats me to death with my own keyboard.

Finally, a question to my readers who are a.) parents, and b.) gun owners: how do you keep your home defense or carry weapons secure from toddler access, yet reasonably fast to bring into action without having to rely on dexterity (that may not be there when something goes crash at three in the morning), spend half a grand on mind-reading hi-tech gun safes, remember number combinations, or have a key on your person at all times?

I have my own method right now, but it's probably imperfect. The carry gun is stored well out of his sight and reach, and unloaded, with a full speedloader next to it. It takes about three seconds to bring it into action, and charging a wheelgun from a speedloader is beyond the knowledge or dexterity of any toddler, but his skill at getting into things is growing daily, and I want to find a more permanent and secure solution.

(Yeah, I know that an unloaded gun is no good to me if someone knocks down my door, but there's a much higher likelihood of my kid shooting himself with a loaded gun than there is of me not having the time to perform that well-practiced three-second loading procedure.)

some random munchkography.

As you can see, the noob sports a fierce fauxhawk now.

We're going to see Lyra's grandma and aunt in Atlanta over the weekend. I was thinking about using some of Robin's hairspray (and maybe a fair quantity of hair gel) to work that flat mohawk into a more impressive vertical orientation.

legion at ease, i gotta feed the baby.

Bottle-feeding an infant is a time-consuming process that ties up one hand to boot, namely the one holding the milk hopper in position. I usually entertain myself with various computer-related activities while feeding munchkin #2, but my favorite games are out of the question because they require either an uninterrupted block of time, the use of two hands on mouse and keyboard, or both.

Thankfully, I found the ideal game for this scenario--Rome: Total War. I bought it a few years back when it came out, but I hadn't played it much, since most of our computer play time is taken up with communal World of Warcraft questing. Rome: Total War is a turn-based strategy game with real-time battle sequences, so it's perfect for playing turn by turn as time allows. I can play two or three turns per feeding session, and then just leave the game running in the background until I'm ready to hit the "end turn" button and advance the action.

Now, the strategy part of the game is pretty cool, but the really fun part is the real-time battle module. When you shuffle your legions across the map, and they come in contact with an army or settlement of the opposing factions, you can choose to have the battle resolve automatically (if you don't have the time to fight it out), or you can take charge of your army and test your mettle on the battlefield. If you choose that option, you're in control of unit deployment, formations, marching orders, and so on. When the battle commences, things usually go to hell quickly, and it's a lot of fun watching thousands of little animated legionnaires under your command duke it out with the Gauls, Macedonians, Carthaginians, and other assorted adversaries.

Yesterday I was wrapping up my conquest of the Greek city states, advancing an army on Athens.

(geeky battle narrative follows)

The Greeks oblige by marching their army out and meeting mine in front of their capital, which means that I won't have to start a costly siege and pry the defenders out from the streets of a fortified city. I deploy in standard manipular formation--skirmishers out front, cavalry on the flanks, and the center consisting of Hastati in the front and Principes in the back. The Greeks have mostly hoplite companies--hard to crack from the front, but easy kills when you flank them. My plan is to have the skirmishers thin their formation a bit, then hold them by the nose with the infantry and kick them in the ass with the flanking cavalry.

So far, so good. I advance my little troops in neat formation, ready to tag and bag the Greeks, when Greek reinforcements arrive on the battlefield. Just entering the battlefield in the distance are a bunch of Spartan hoplite companies whose presence in the area was unreported by my scouts.

Festive. Now I'm the meat in a hoplite sandwich, with a Greek army in front of me, and a Spartan army coming up from behind. Splitting my army and taking both on at the same time is not an option--I'm already outnumbered, and I don't have enough cavalry and velites to go around to support two different infantry battles.

Fine--screw the original plan, says I. The forward formations of skirmishers are just about to make contact with the Greeks, and I whistle them back and have them retreat through the ranks of advancing infantry. The Hastati and Principes get new orders: double-time on the advance, and rush the Greek front without the customary exchange of skirmisher missiles. The enemy skirmishers dart out in front of the hoplites, trying to bother my infantry, but I order in the flanking cavalry and disperse them.

The main lines clash, my line of Hastati holds, and I send the Principes around for a flanking attack, while riding the cavalry all the way around the enemy formation to nail the coffin shut from behind. The Greek line crumbles like a stale muffin, and their units start routing. My little digital legionnaries want to pursue and mop them up, but I order all units to halt and reform. I get them back into formation and wheeled around just in time to engage the Spartan army which has now traversed the battlefield. Lather, rinse, repeat, and the Spartans are sent packing as well. Athens is mine, and the Greeks have lost two fair-sized formations against my understrength one. I am Maximus, baby--a military genius who can direct his legions while topping off the tanks of little Miss Lyra.

Vanquishing enemy armies while feeding the baby: how much of a geek am I?

oh, the shame.

Today I managed to break a 1.2-million-dollar aircraft. (Thankfully, it was mine...and a digital rather than an actual aircraft.)

I spent my past forty-odd flight hours trundling about Europe in a Cessna 172, which has fixed landing gear. Today, I decided to do a leg of my pretend cross-Europe flight in my old pal, the Beech Baron 58...which has retractable landing gear. (Some of you may anticipate where this is going.)

So I come in for a perfect landing at Vaernes in Norway...80KIAS, two notches of flaps, textbook flare, and touchdown right on the numbers, smooth as silk.

*skreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee*

"Hey, what are those sparks in front of my windshield?"

*facepalm*

That'll damage your ego. Nailing the last twenty-odd landings with a fixed-gear C172, and then neglecting to hit the gear lever on final and ignoring the "GEAR UP" warning on the dash that's merrily blinking away. Put back the keys for the light twin and go back to the Sky Moped, rookie.

Light blogging...I've been busy juggling the kids. (Not literally, mind you.) I get a few hours in the evening, and maybe another hour or two in the middle of the day, during quote-unquote "nap time", which Quinn spends playing away in his room six days out of seven. The short one is putting on some weight, and now only wakes up two or three times a night as opposed to every hour and a half.

Mark Pixler, of Dillon's Blue Press catalog, has asked me for permission to run "Why the Gun is Civilization" in their September issue, which is enormously flattering. I may be able to contribute more to The Blue Press in the future, which is even more flattering. Their readership/recipient list constitutes a non-trivial amount of readers, which is an awful lot of exposure for a little niche blogger like myself.

distressing.

There are many things that change when you have kids. One change you don't expect is that you can never read the news the same way again. Bad things happen to children every day, and such things are reported in the media every day, but as a non-parent, you tend to read them and sort of shrug them off. "That's terrible," you say, and then you go on to the next news item and have a sip of coffee.

When you're a parent, you can't ever read something about a child dying without imagining yourself in the parents' stead, and just the thought of losing one of your own kids is enough to twist your guts. Parents simply aren't meant to outlive their kids, and losing your own offspring is a deeply unnatural occurrence.

Via Crystal, we learn that New York City blogger NYC Watchdog lost his five-year-old son in a drowning accident.

Ambulance Driver shares the story of a call involving the death of a six-month-old baby.

Non-parents read these kinds of things and say, "Gee, that's terrible," and they mean it, but they can't quite comprehend the primal fear that creeps up in a parent's mind when they read the same thing.

If someone were to ask me to summon up the essence of being a parent in one word, I'd reply without hesitation with "worry". Those little bundles come wrapped up in worry, and it stays with you pretty much every moment of every day. It's one of the things you take on in exchange for the smiles and belly laughs, the hugs and the tickle sessions. Nobody in their right mind wants to burden themselves with it, but we do it because we can't un-love our kids. Not worrying about someone means you don't particularly care about them, and in that context it's only natural to worry more about our children than we do about even ourselves.

Despite this, you can't let your worry consume you if you want to stay somewhat sane. All you can do is to take precautions, and then let them toddle off and find their way, and tell yourself they'll be okay.

That's what parenting is: controlled insanity. Those of you who think it's nuts to want to put yourself through such an experience--you're absolutely right. Those of you who take up that burden and wouldn't trade it for anything--you're absolutely right, too.

still teh noob.

"No, noobie...you have to pull the leg of that frog thingy to make the whole thing buzz. Don't you know anything?"

good advice.

I don't have anything funny or insightful to share today. Miss Lyra is still running on a nocturnal schedule, so my attention is taken up by Quinn during my regular waking hours, and by Lyra during my regular sleeping hours. Robin and I are at the point where we sit together at night while she's feeding Lyra, and we get all nostalgic about those days when we actually got more than four or five hours of sleep.

Anyway. This, too, shall pass. In the meantime, I'll leave you with some sage advice from the product box of my old Norinco Makarov.