An evening with Lucie

A bit random, but fun.

oh boy...

Last night Melissa wanted to attend a debate party at the local republican party office. I don't really inform myself enough about anything besides acid/base disturbances lately to form a political opinion, but I generally tend to support Barack because he's such a smooth talker and just looks dreamy, don't you think? Anywho, I'm proud of Melissa for at least giving a crap. When she arrived at the party they had only set up a dinky little tv to watch the debate on. She called and asked if she could come and get our projector. I explained that it was broken and half the screen was dark. She said, "it's just for a few college kids, and anything is better than this t.v." So she came home and I pieced together a rickety ensemble of outdated electronics including some old pc speakers and a dvd burner so that their crappy Coaxial cable connection could be tubed through our dying projector. When I arrived, toddler in tow, it was considerably more than "a few college students." In fact, Frank Donatelli, deputy chairman of the Republican National Committee, was there preparing to speak. (Where's Waldo (Josh)?) I nervously fumbled with my crappy electronics, right behind the speaker, trying to see if I was even going to be capable of producing a picture. I finally got it working. Remember this is a projector, just like at your local movie house, albeit shittier, and the student leader comes over, while all the lights were still on, and says, "Um, does it get any brighter?" I informed him graciously that the lights would need to be turned down. However, even with the lights down, it looked like crap. The leader continued to bitch about the brightness and how "it seems skewed!" [Relating this story to Rygar later he thought I should have replied "maybe it's their perspectives that are skewed."] Anyway, as soon as I was at least 39% sure that it would at least be watchable I wrassled up my wild child (who chirped through Mr. Important's whole speech, btw) and tore out of there stopping only to tell my wife that I would never forgive her for this embarrassing moment. At least I'm famous now. I'm sure I'll get lots of misdirected credit from my republican superiors for being a McCain worshiper now.

Watering the stars

I was watering my lawn tonight and Lucie came out to help. Besides figuring out how to control the firehose sprayer and getting daddy (and herself) sopping wet, she also decided to be really really cute. She was pointing the hose straight up and I said "are you watering the sky?" And she said, "yes." Then she spotted the first star that was out and said "water...star?!?!?" She then tried to water the star and reached out for it like it was an ice cream cone. I must admit, it was pretty dang cute.


She forgot how strollers work.

Remember when I did this?

sweet.

oops

Melissa calls this "pregnancy brain."

Ta-da!

Although it gets off to a somewhat rocky start grammatically, the video from the skydiving place arrived and it is AWESOME! Check it out:


Also, many more pics to follow when I get a second. Like this one:

Wow and WOW.

So...I went Skydiving today and actually survived. Unfortunately the video is being mailed to me on Monday so I can't put that up just yet. However, in the meantime, here are some pics from the day, including the other wow: I got to fly a freaking plane!!!! I went up with my good friends, Julie and Brian who each jumped 4 or 5 times today. During their second jump (I think) the pilot let me fly copilot. See the pics below. This was pretty much the coolest thing I have ever done in my entire life. Riding copilot was cool enough, but then as soon as the skydivers had jumped out, he did a total nose dive and then said "Grab the controls!!!" I grabbed and he let go!!!! He motioned for me to turn from side to side. I did. Then he motioned for me to REALLY turn side to side "LIKE THIS!" he says as we almost roll over from side to side!!!! Then he had me do a 180 all by myself and even...get this...fly straight into a giant cumulus cloud!!! I was completely out of my mind excited. I just laughed and laughed. Then he motioned for me to let go and he lined her up and we touched down. UN-FRIGGIN-BELIEVABLE! And all this was before I even went sky-diving!!! I will save that description for when I can put the video up. Let's just say it was even MORE insane!!! So great. What a day. I think I could have jump-started a car with my sweat today I've been so revved up. Unbelievable.


P.S. And I get to go to work at 5:45 tomorrow (Sunday)!!! [trombone: wah-wohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh]

Best Wedding Ever

I love you, guys!

Meet baby #2

She looks like a Claire to me. (Don't you say it, Pete!)


Baby #1's pretty cute herself. Here she is eating her birthday cake. Can you believe Lucie's 2?


Daddy got Lucie a Beta fish for her birthday. Turns out fish are really boring.

Lucie has a doctor's play set complete with a pager that we had never put batteries into. Yesterday we finally did. She pushed the buttons and it made a beeping sound not unlike my real pager and she started saying, "Shit! Shit! Shit!" Guess one should be more careful when a toddler is listening.

Movie time.

W.

All's Fair...

We went to the Missouri State Fair today in Sedalia, Missouri. We're talking middle of nowhere, here. It was pretty sweet.


Lucie decided to enlist after she saw this Cobra (not an Apache). The soldier said we could push any buttons we wanted. I went to push the missile launch button and had to pause and ask again, "any button?" "Yes!" She said. I pushed it! It was awesome!


Here you see Lucie returning from her first sortie. I heard she had a few run-ins with Charlie, but she won't really talk about it.


Daddy flashing his new fake/lame guitar tattoo on the Merry-go-round. Not cool.


Mommy got a tattoo today, too.


I put these in black and white because the red & white tent made them all look like it was raining tomato soup. I accidentally remembered how cool b&w is. The petting zoo was far and away the coolest part of the fair.


Very Versus-esque.


Lucie's mind was in a perpetually blown state.


A Zebra!


More of said zebra.


Daddy helping feed some sort of dromedary.


Totally sweet.


The lady behind me was telling her husband, "Now this must be the Yak. They thrive in cooler weather." Close enough.


Left the color for this one. Crazy-huge bird. Emu?


Still blowing her mind. This camel was so cool.


He made Melissa just a bit nervous though.


They eventually kissed and made up.


Some crazy-huge rodent. Cavy? Kavi?


Lucie bear.



Kind of tired. Time to go. It was awesome though.


Happy B-day Gar! May you find many many more iphone apps.

so...

So, my boss (not just a boss, but THE boss) has a pet peeve. He hates when people start their sentences with "so..." I'm in a lot of trouble.

Some recent pics:

Baby birdies in the nest right behind our deck.  They're gone now.  Our little babies are all grown up!

Lucie bear. 

Lucie bear at the 4th of July shindig.

Andy maxing and Mel relaxing.  

The cat was wanted on the phone.  

Man Land

I made an impulse buy about a month ago.  You know that huge playset for sale at your local warehouse shopping facility?  The one that looks like it would take a month to build?  Well, it did.  And it is awesome.  I built it almost entirely by myself (not bragging...wait, yes I am) with a bit of help from the mrs., Brad, and Andy.  It came in 5 huge boxes that took 2 minivan trips to cart home.  The first page of the instructions reads "This project will take 2 moderately skilled individuals 20-24 hours to build."  Or one painfully inept person about a month.  I'm pretty sure the neighbors think we're nuts.  Check it out:

After one day: not very encouraging.

Not much to look at yet, this was after 2 days of work, I think. I took great pride in ignoring the advice in the manual: "This step requires at least 2 people." HA!

In one more session the upper deck was finished.  

The beginnings of the playhouse.

Now with some walls.

A roof!  And Camera tricks!

More roof.

Slide and bridge.  There's a "rock climbing wall" on the right.  The rocks are plastic molds, but close enough.  

The tunnel!  Would not have been possible without Bradley.  Thanks, dude!

The finished product (finished tonight!)  I'm on one of the swings.  This picture was taken in the dark (13 second exposure).  I'm so proud, I could cry.  Just wait till Lucie gets home to see it!  If you look closely there's an address marker and a doorbell.  And the lights are on.  

I'm working on getting a gas generator and a refrigerator/tv for the upstairs.  

Filmfest

No caption could live up to this. Just watch.

Sweetest PC

Why didn't apple come up with this first? I feel like NASA after Sputnik.

Thank you, Conan

Who knew Jesse Jackson was an aspiring urologist?

Haven't been depressed for a while...let's try this:

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebrities - Collage - Morph

Swingers

Business class.

Lucie's first trip to the ER

It was bound to happen. Our daughter practically bounces off the walls most days, so she decided to try it literally yesterday. My poor mom was watching her and she fell back and hit her ear on a stupid brick ledge in the basement (which has since been covered in nicely forgiving pipe insulation). Mom felt so bad, despite me telling her that it could've happened while any of us were watching her. Anywho, we had a pleasant outing to the Emergency room and Lucie scored 6 stitches. Daddy was an idiot and let her eat so they couldn't sedate her. Instead I got to pin her down while they worked. All of the doctors were wonderful and the finished product looks great. She recovered almost immediately and is back to running around like a meth-head. All I've thought about since then is what a miracle it is that she doesn't have scars everywhere. Here are some pics of the blessed event. WARNING: some of them are not for the squeamish!

The waiting room.  She ran around trying to wound herself further. 

The wound!

Playing with syringes and gauze is fun!

Now with topical anesthetic on.  Still smiling.

It's about to not be fun.  Daddy knows.  Lucie's starting to figure it out.  

There was a lot of this going on...


And this...

All better!

I wish we had a picture of all 6 of us trying to keep her still and "happy" while she got sewed up.  It was work!  But Lucie took it like a champ.  Check that one off the list of rites of passage!