Give me a break people

This is really getting ridiculous. You remember the story in Boston where there were a bunch of lighted signs put up as an advertisement, and everyone thought they were bombs planted by terrorists? Yeah.
Here's a new one... from the same city.
This EE student, obviously afflicted only by bad taste in fashion, made a lighted design with LEDs and taped it to her sweatshirt. See below for the picture.

Now, maybe her only mistake was walking into an airport with this, but please people. I have probably 20 breadboards like this covered in much more bomblike circuitry. Am I going to be arrested now for being in possession of a "hoax device"? Everyone says that people need to be more aware, we all need to help look out for terrorists. Fine. How about people also need to be educated on the basics of what terrorist activities really look like?

Here are a few starters:
1) The circuitry involved to make a real bomb that runs on a 9 volt battery will be MUCH more complex than the one pictured above.
2) Terrorists don't scotch tape their bombs on the outside of their clothing.
3) There are a lot of gift shops in the Boston airport that sell cheesy light-up clothing that is scarier than her sweatshirt.

I would put these up on a readerboard somewhere for the general public to see, but I don't want to get arrested for planting a lighted bomb. Oh the irony!

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/22/us/22airport.html?ref=us

-The Krunchy Krab

My inspiration came from within...

About a year ago, I bought Family Tree Maker at Half Price Books, and it included a free year of Ancestry.com - which is a great value. So, I used it a bit back then, but then got lazy and lost track of it. Then suddenly a few weeks ago, a large debit to Ancestry.com appeared on our bank statement... ah yes, I see I now have another year of it.

So I've started my research again, with the gusto that can only accompany a pocketbook that has been emptied. (Translation: I'm getting my money's worth this year!)

I noticed kind of a cool tool built in - when you're viewing the profile of any person in your tree, you can have Ancestry search for famous people related to that person. I was viewing my grandmother's page at the time, so I clicked on it, and got about 50 results. Almost all are relationships like "17th cousin 12 times removed" or other such distant relationships.
There are several famous poets, some presidents and some president's wives, among others.

But one caught my attention. It is a direct link - and Ancestry tells you the authenticity of each link in the chain - only 1 link in this chain has less than 5 out of 5 stars. Do with that what you will.

Anyway, apparently I am a direct descendant of Geoffrey Chaucer. He is my 20th Great Grandfather. I myself had already researched and built my tree back to the third generation below him. Ancestry linked the last three generations. See below for the lineage:

18th Great Grandfather of Shirley Marie Russell

Geoffrey Chaucer(1343-1400)
Alice Chaucer(1369-)(5 stars)
John Manning(1402-1436)(5 stars)
Hugh Manning(1432-1502)(4 stars) (This is the earliest person I had in my tree)
John Manning(1481-1542)(5 stars)
Henry Manning(1501-1583)(5 stars)
Henry Manning(1560-1614)(5 stars)
William Manning(1589-1666)(5 stars)
John Manning(1614-1688)(5 stars)
Jeffrey Manning(1640-1693)(5 stars)
Mary Manning(1663-1692)(5 stars)
Elizabeth Hull(1679-1733)(5 stars)
John Doty(1709-1757)(5 stars)
Samuel Doty(1733-1817)(5 stars)
Anna Doty(1765-1830)(5 stars)
Jonathan Parker(1781-1847)(5 stars)
Anna Parker(1803-1888)(5 stars)
John Albert Allison(1829-1885)(5 stars)
Mary Etts Allison(1874-1936)(5 stars)
Gladys Watchous(1901-1938)(5 stars)
Shirley Marie Russell(1925-)(5 stars)
My Father(1945-)(5 stars)
Me(1978-)(5 stars)

Back in high school, a project in our AP Honors English class was to write our own comtemporary version of The Canterbury Tales. I still have my copy somewhere - I need to look for that. Now I know how I got that A - it was my destiny to write that paper!

-The Krunchy Krab

What Time is it?

As is our usual custom to let our daughter think it's her idea to go to bed, tonight I asked her, "Do you know what time it is?"

She promptly replied:

"It's xylophone time!"

And then she sat down in front of her xylophone and began playing.

-The Krunchy Krab

Growing up

I have become increasingly aware that I am entering a new phase of my life. Both of you who are reading this are thinking, "Duh!" Yes, I know. Three years ago I was in grad school, with no children, and I didn't own a power lawn mower OR a radial arm saw. I also had more hair. Everybody Loves Raymond was still producing new episodes, and everybody knew that John Kerry had multiple Purple Hearts.

2004 was designated the International Year of Rice (by the UN), and Howard Dean let out the scream heard 'round the world. The Patriots were still winning the Superbowl on a regular basis, and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King won 11 Academy Awards.

The Abu Ghraib scandal was just being exposed, and Oldsmobile was producing "The Last 500" cars of its existence. The pickled heart of Louis XVII had not yet been buried, and the Pistons beat the Lakers 4-1. SpaceShipOne achieves orbit, and Saddam Hussein's trial began. Lance Armstrong won his 6th Consecutive Tour de France, and "Rathergate" enters common usage.

Martha Stewart went to jail, and the Curse of the Bambino is broken. Colin Powell was out, Condoleezza Rice was in. Three years ago, the name Ron Artest had much different connotations. It was snowing in Southern Texas, and tsunamis were crashing into southeast Asia. Three years ago, Julia Child was still alive, as was Christopher Reeve.

Ok, so there was a trip down memory lane, but that has nothing to do with me. Well, I guess as I approach my first 29th birthday, I'm just realizing that I now get more excited about a sale on diapers and grapes than a sale on the newest technology device.

Ok, I'm rambling and not making a point. I guess I've also lost my mind in my old age.

-The Krunchy Krab

The easiest transition ever

This is a big weekend for my daughter. This is the weekend when she gets to sleep in a "big girl bed" Ok, it's not a completely different bed, I just took the front rail off her crib so it's like a daybed. I wanted to do it on a weekend to take the pressure off my wife, because that way I would be here at bed/naptime to help.
So, when she woke up from her nap yesterday (Friday) I removed the rail. As soon as she found it, she started using the newly accessible bed as a play table, all her toys were soon on the bed. I was convinced that as soon as we put her down and shut the door, she would just get up and play on the bed again. Boy was I wrong.
My wife completed the bedtime routine, said goodnight, and walked out the door.

Not a peep.

1 hour later...

Not a peep. We go in to make sure everything's ok. Sound asleep.

The nice thing is, now we don't have to go in there during the night when she drops something on the floor and wants it back.

Of course, we were both interested to see what would happen this morning... figuring she'd either sneak out of her room when she woke up and terrorize the house, or she come flying into our room, jumping on our faces to wake us up.

Wrong again. She stood at her door and gently knocked to be let out. She didn't yell, didn't pound on the door. Just went tap-tap-tap-tap-tap.

Now if potty training could only be this painless...

-The Krunchy Krab

It's all over :(

Well, that's it. The powers that be in my fantasy baseball league decided that the best tiebreaker to get into the playoffs would be points for, instead of division record. Thus, my final standing is this:

My team is the third line down in the top section... slightly highlighted in yellow. My record was 11-12.

So, since only the top two teams go to the playoffs, my season is finished. Rats. I had just beat the team directly ahead of me this last week, thereby establishing my dominance over him forever. It turned out to all be for naught.

-The Krunchy Krab

Do I have to have a title?

A lot of photography books will tell you to adjust your aperture so your depth of field keeps all the flowers in focus. I really prefer it this way - the few that are at the focal length really "pop" while the rest are more soft and muted in the background.

Yesterday's picture was taken with my old point and shoot Nikon Coolpix 885. Today's photo was taken with my Canon Digital Rebel XT.

These flowers were in the backyard of one of my wife's former co-workers, who had us over for dinner just before they moved out of the house they'd lived in for something like 40 years. They had a cool house, full of vintage decorations. Anyway, this was in their backyard - the photo was taken one of the last times I was there.

-The Krunchy Krab

Photography and Me

I aspire to be a good photographer someday - I think I've got a knack for composing shots. Without a lot of training in the mechanics (aperture, shutter speed, ISO, etc) a lot of my pictures leave something to be desired, but I do have a sizable collection now that I'm fairly proud of.

Someday, I'd love to set up a site like this, but not having the time right now to take my camera with me everyday, I'll have to settle for posting some of my favorite shots from the past. I tend to pick some abnormal subjects - things most people wouldn't think of shooting. Anyway, here goes:

This shot was taken several years ago now, from the window of our (cheap) hotel in Vienna. I was a graduate student at the UW, and had been invited to lecture at the 2004 Eurosensors conference. How can you pass up a free trip to Europe? We quickly bought a ticket for my wife and went. As crummy as this hotel was (half the time we had to walk up the stairs, because the elevator didn't operate if someone didn't latch the door properly upstairs) I'll always have fond memories of my time there. Vienna was a beautiful city to explore, I hope to return someday.

-The Krunchy Krab

I'm ... semi famous

Click here to see a great video

Yep, that's me in the black fleece vest.

So the story goes like this:

A guy named Jubal, who is a producer for the Jackie and Bender morning show on KISS 106.1, made an announcement that "Justin" would be performing live, for free, at Gasworks park this thursday morning. Since Justin Timberlake is coming to the area very soon, everyone assumed he meant him, but he really meant a guy named Justin who also works for the radio station.
The hoax stayed active for several days, people took time off work, made travel plans, etc, to come see the free Justin Timberlake concert. Then everyone found out the truth, and the radio station suspended Jubal for an unknown number of days.
However, the show must go on, so for the next few days, they tried to get the word out that the concert would still happen, but would NOT be Justin Timberlake. Angry callers flooded the studio, "I took the day off work!... My mom called in sick!... That's just mean, ohmigosh I mean, like, really really mean, like you know what I mean?"
I work about 100 yards from Gasworks, so I was actually worried that parking might be an issue, assuming that either a lot of people didn't get word that it was a fake concert, or a lot of people showed up because it was a novelty. There were plenty of spaces.
So, around 8:50, I get up from my desk, and say to our intern "Want to go to a free concert?" "Sure!" We headed down the stairs to Gasworks.

When we arrived, it appeared that a small crowd had formed, but it quickly became apparent that everyone that was there besides us worked for KISS. We were the only people who showed up at 9:00.

Two guys were singing on a single speaker PA system. They ended up singing about 5 songs, and Jackie and Bender joined us live during their show several times.

About 9:20AM, the Red Bull folks showed up. By that time we had attracted a crowd of about 6 people. Everyone got free Red Bull!

Everyone except us left, and then these two people came. They took the day off and drove up from Tacoma. From what we could tell, everyone who came besides us thought Justin Timberlake was supposed to be there. A group of 4 high school aged girls came, very obviously dressed for a big concert... and looked totally disgusted with what they found.

In the end, we all had a good time, and I got to get out of my cubicle for awhile. Yes, my eyes are closed. When I get a copy of the picture taken with our intern's camera, I'll post that. My eyes were open in that one.

-The Krunchy Krab

Just what you want to hear

I was at a get-together yesterday with some friends from highschool. When I called home to see how things were going there (our daughter has been especially 2 lately) I heard her run up to my wife in the background: "Mommy mommy! Elise wants to play with knives!"

It was a tad worrisome...

You might be an adult if...

I was just thinking to myself today of the things that I never would have imagined doing as a kid. Here are a few of my thoughts defining adulthood.

You can walk into a department store and not immediately ride the escalator three times.

You have ever overheard a conversation such as "I was watching XYZ channel last night and there was a great documentary on..." and did not immediately stop listening after the word documentary.

You have ever paid money for anything related to a toilet. (Plunger, tissue, seat, parts, etc)

The fact that TUMS has calcium makes you more likely to buy it.

Life is not a competition (to be the Biggest, Best, Strongest, Richest, Poorest, Busiest, etc..) to you.

In response to being asked, "Do you want to Mucho size your drink? It's twice the alcohol!" you have said, "No thank you, I don't care about the amount of alcohol."

You have ever decided to replace the ground beef or sausage in a recipe with ground turkey.

You've attended a class reunion without getting drunk.



I may add more later as I think of them.

-The Krunchy Krab

The encyclopedia of me

It's come to my attention that a popular blogging er.. theme right now is going through the alphabet, picking things for each letter that describe yourself. Since I myself once even subscribed to the theory that real men can wear pink, I will go ahead and do this. I won't however take 26 days to do it... the thought of that is depressing to me. I will instead take approximately 26 minutes.

A is for Allergic

My allergies, past and present: Nuts, Milk, Pork, Egg whites, Peanuts, Pollens, Dust, Cheese, Animal Dander, and various other foods and things too plentiful to mention. Case in point: I reacted to everything on the allergy test, including the saline injected for a control.

B is for Balding

The follicular branch of my armed forces has been in a steady retreat since 1994. From what, I am not sure. Probably from my sister who used to lock me in the bathroom and shove bread under the door so I wouldn't die. Later in life, I look back on these times and wish that we had stripped the carpet in my parents' house earlier in life because the bread wouldn't have gotten shag hair all over it with the current hardwood floors.

C is for Chainsaw

I like my chainsaw... someday maybe I'll spluge and get myself a 36" Husqvarna beast, but for now my 18" Craftsman serves me well. Show me a log, and I'll show you a pile of sawdust.

D is for Driving

I spend a good portion of my life driving. My commute is much shorter now than it used to be... but I still spend more than an hour a day driving too/from work. I wish I had a Ferrari...

E is for Elise

Elise is my daughter... there were about 24 other things that would have worked for E, it being a popular letter and all, but she wins. If you want to see why, just browse through some of my other posts.

F if for Fire

I would be disappointed in any guy who didn't use fire for F. Fire is cool. I've almost burned down many houses with fire. Also many ants. That was one of the times I almost burned down a house.

G is for Generator

The power had better go out this winter, let me tell you. Washington had several power outages this last winter, one lasting several days... weeks for some people. After the second major outage, I went out and bought a generator, and then spent the better part of the next few months (with long gaps) installing a transfer switch so we can run pretty much our whole house off of it. Of course we never had another power outage again. Figures.

H is for Holly

My wife Holly always used to complain that I didn't have a link to her on my blog, but I have a link to the subservient chicken. Since then, I take every opportunity to link to her. Again, I thought of many things for H, but she wins.

I is for Integrated Circuits

Being an electrical engineer, I spend much of my life working, thinking, and dreaming of integrated circuits. I've even designed a few. They were real dope. Anyone who's studied CMOS design is now laughing, the rest of you think I'm a dork, and you're right.

J is for Jose

Whenever my wife and I (did you see how I threw that link in there?) go on a trip, we purchase purchase something unique from where we went. On our honeymoon, we bought a Mexican marionette doll with maraccas, who we named Jose. He hangs on the wall in our daughter's play room.

K is for Kicker

Like many guys in high school, I used to be way into audio systems. At the time, the speaker of choice was the Kicker Solo Baric - I dreamed of building a system around them. While I never owned a Kicker, I did retrofit my parents' Chevrolet Celebrity with a nice custom pair of speakers that just about blew the rear window out. When a friend of mine from high school years later rode in that car with me, he said all he remembered about that car was driving really fast listening to really loud music.

L is for Lincoln Head Cents

A couple of years ago, I took up coin collecting. Collecting old money takes quite a bit of money however, so that hobby is on hold until I win the lottery. Before I came to that conclusion I managed to build a fairly respectable collection of, among other things, Lincoln Head Cents.

M is for Mom's Rolls

My mother's rolls are famous... I will drive 2500 miles through tweed to eat them. My brother in law will opt out of conflicting Thanksgiving/Christmas dinners with his family to eat them. Yep, they're that good.

N is for Numismatics

I have a couple of books on coin collecting, and in one of them it tells you to tell people you are a numismatist because it will impress them. I know I've already covered coin collecting with L, but the book told me to drop this title to impress you.

O is for Old Stuff

I like to collect old stuff. Old publications, cameras, tools, coins, books, etc. I've even got an old desktop seismograph. Again, a hobby that takes a fair amount of money, so it's kind of on hold for awhile.

P is for Php

I do a lot of web programming, both for work and personal use. Most web programmers are loyal to a language, mine is Php. It was originally meant to stand for "Personal Home Page" - it's a pretty simple server side language that can add a lot of power to your webpage.

Q is for Quotes

My website in college evolved a lot over the years, culminating in my quotes webpage. For all four years of college plus three years of grad school, I collected quotes from my professors which, when taken out of context were humorous. A very small collection of them can be seen at http://www.moedaddy.com I still do hope to someday put them all back up again. My department hired an intern from SPU this summer, and he had heard of my website (I graduated 6 years ago) so now I feel it's my duty to resurrect it.

R is for Ranger

My old faithful truck, my 89 Ford Ranger. I've had it for almost 12 years now, and it's just about got 200,000 miles on it. I'm hoping it makes it - I'm adding miles quickly, since I commute in it just about every day. It will be a sad day when I retire that truck.

S is for Squirrels

A family of squirrels dedicated to the destruction of my plants lives near my house. My wife's tulips were reduced to stems, my five marionberries dejuiced, and our herbs and vegetables dug up. I have tried fences and quickly moving projectiles (bb-gun) but have yet to win a battle. I have an ally though - our neighbor has a small yappy dog who chases them up and down our cul-de-sac and up trees. I love that dog.

T is for Tippmann

Back when I was in college and thought I was poor but really didn't know the meaning of the word expenses, I bought a paintball gun. I love it... I can go to a field, pay just the field fees and then waste all the poor suckers with rental guns. While they paint the trees behind me, I pick them off one by one. I was horrified though to see while walking through Walmart the other day, that they now carry the Tippman Custom 98. It just seems wrong.

U is for Uff Da

Being from a Norwegian family, I enjoy a good Uff Da every now and then. 'Nuff said.

V is for Variegated

It used to be I could drop this word into a conversation with my wife and she was impressed. Now I have to compete with guys who know the technical terms for various pieces of bedding. I wonder if Bryan Adams had this problem...

W is for Window Air Conditioner

Remember the generator? Yeah, this summer we had a massive heat wave for a couple of days. Steve Pool (author of Somewhere, I was Right) promised more hot weather coming up. What did I do? On a record setting hot day, I went to Lowe's and bought an air conditioner. I couldn't wait to fire it up. What happened? The next day the temperature dropped 30 degrees. That is not an exaggeration - We set a record of 95, the next day it was 65. My life never changes.

X is for X? What the heck do you put for X?

Yeah.

Y is for Yeast

I like to bake... not so much pastries, etc, mostly breads. Yeast is my friend.

Can you tell I'm getting tired?

Z is for Zelda

Probably my favorite series of video games of all time. The only problem is keeping up with the gaming systems I need to play them all. My wife got me a Gamecube for my birthday, so now I'm catching up on Windwaker and Twilight Princess. Enjoyable games, all.

Well, that concludes the encyclopedia of me. Ok, it took longer than 26 minutes, but you wouldn't have known that for sure until I told you. I hope you enjoy it, I'm going to bed.

-The Krunchy Krab

"I notice you because you stick out like a... like a big yellow thing stickin' out."

After reading this blog of my wife's I felt compelled to go take the quiz myself. Results are below:

You're The Catcher in the Rye!
by J.D. Salinger
You are surrounded by phonies, and boy are you sick of them! In an ongoing struggle to search for a land without phonies, you end up running away from everything, from school to consequences. In this process, you reveal that many people in your life have suffered torments and all you really want to do is catch them as they fall. Perhaps using a baseball mitt. Your biggest fans are infamous psychotics.
Take the Book Quizat the Blue Pyramid.

The Catcher in the Rye? Hmm... Maybe some of you know me better than I know myself if that's true. Then again, I'm apparently surrounded by phonies, so I can't take anything you say seriously. I'm a man without a castle.

Draft time!

The draft for my first fantasy football team this year was this morning. It went MUCH better than last year... last year I had the 11th pick, which means my primary RB was Chicago's Jones. Yeah, not a great year on that front. I woke up just before 8:30AM, thinking I had a few hours to finish getting my players ranked. When I logged on, it said my draft was starting in 1 minute... oh yeah, that was 11:30 Eastern Time that the draft started! Glad I got up when I did!

Anyway, this year I had the 3rd pick, which is just about perfect, in my opinion. Finally, I was able to grab one of the top three RBs, which happened to be Shaun Alexander. Definitely an upgrade to my offense. By the time I got to pick again, I was able to grab Matt Hasselbeck. Last year I had Peyton Manning. Oh well, I think he'll have a better year than last.

Let's see... at WR I have Reggie Wayne, Deion Branch, and DJ Hackett, which is definitely an upgrade from last year... I think I had Darrell Jackson, Bobby Engram, and someone else who didn't score me any points.

My second RB is Marion Barber, not great, but still way better than my second RB last year.

Jeremy Shockey is my TE, and Josh Brown is my K... I expect Shockey will greatly outperform my TE last year - Jerramy Stevens.

Oh yeah, and my surprise pick - I managed to pick up the Bears defense in the third round... no one else had even thought about picking a defense at that point.

As you can probably see, I'm screwed in week 8 - my QB, both RBs, 2WRs, and my K are all on byes. Sadly, my only coverage is Rex Grossman, Dominic Rhodes, and Dwayne Jarrett. I'll have to pick someone up on waivers later on. The rest of my byes are covered pretty well.

I suppose I'll have to pick up at least one more team - this time on foxsports. I hate the java interface for fox though - it requires a refresh of the page for the stats to update, while CBS updates live and very quickly.

Hopefully I'll be able to keep all my fantasy action straight - with the Mariners picking things up now, I'm back in the playoffs in fantasy baseball. In fact, I'm crushing the top team in my division this week - he has no division losses yet this season. Bwah hahahaha

-The Krunchy Krab

A day in the life of two ladies...

It's time for another picture post.

My daughter had a friend over today. We ended up going outside to enjoy the great weather. Thus began the great adventure...

The meeting was called to order by my daughter's friend. The picnic table proved a good place to plan out a busy day.

Being avid rock collectors, they decided to peruse the fine selection of gravel adjacent to the house. Being purists, they naturally left their finds here in order that future enthusiasts might enjoy them as well. Also because daddy gets mad when he has to re-grind his lawn mower blade.

Their rock collecting finished, they decided to play rock-paper-scissors to see who would choose the next activity.

Having won the contest, my daughter led her friend on a bold adventure to the far reaches of the backyard... otherwise known as the forest area. Despite the appearance, her father is winning the war against the weeds, but there have been many long battles.

After their long trek, it was time to play tennis. Warmups took place on the grass court near the wood pile.

The actual match soon commenced about 10 feet away on the world's shortest tennis court with the invisible net. They were fairly evenly matched, although my daughter's friend was able to actually swing the racket, so I can only assume that had my daughter been able to serve a ball in the general vicinity of the swinging racket, her friend would have likely won.

Playing catch proved to be an activity they could both participate in equally. They started a little far apart though...

Yes, that's much better.

Having completed the feats of strength, they climbed into the car to go shopping. Apparently, they were planning on visiting the fruit market. They never did bring me the broccoli I asked for though. In case you're wondering, that car is really only about 2 inches wider on each side than my daughter, so her friend is actually sitting on her, but somehow my daughter managed to get her arms around so she was the one steering.

They had some car trouble on the way...

But being master mechanics, they were soon on their way again.

After my daughter parked the car, my neighbor started chainsawing (yes I was envious) something in his backyard. My daughter's friend went bonkers - "A man is sawing in the bushes! Yay!" They both had to go investigate.

All in all, it was a productive day between two good friends. Refreshments in hand, they settled down at the table to reminisce about times gone by when they were young.

-The Krunchy Krab

I need to write another book...

After reading this blog I am compelled to write a book about a boy who makes a welcome mat, but decides to rebel and write, "We're so glad you came"

-The Krunchy Krab

A hardcore blogger I am not

Well, I tried the daily blogging, and it burned me out. So, rather than make any promises about how often I'll blog, I'll just say that I'll try to do it twice a week or so, which I think is often enough to keep my wife happy, and not often enough to burn me out so I have to take a sabbatical.

That being said, I'll move on to my actual blog for today.

Yesterday was my daughter's second birthday party. It was a hoot. A lot of work, but still fun. We had 32 people total, including ourselves, with 11 children under the age of 6. I'm sure my wife will correct those numbers, but I think they're close. Maybe she'll humor me ;)

Anyway, we tried to keep it simple - it was a Curious George theme, which seemed to go over well. I went to Costco and bought a thousand bananas and used them as weights to hold all the balloons. Ok, maybe not a thousand, but any more than 4 bananas might as well be a thousand to someone who hates bananas. My sister apparently didn't get the theme, because she couldn't figure out why we were using bananas to weigh the balloons down. In the end, she just decided we must have just had too many bananas and they were convenient.

We barbecued, which worked great. Hamburgers, and my soon to be infamous teriyaki chicken. I can't really take credit for the teriyaki chicken yet, the sauce is a recipe I stole from Canlis, which, if you're going to steal a recipe from anywhere, steal one from Canlis. They know what they're doing.

The weather cooperated, which meant that the somewhat-less-than-a-dozen kids were able to burn off their energy outside, which I think was appreciated by everyone over 4 feet tall. After lunch, we brought the presents outside. Now, my daughter appreciates presents mostly because she knows they lead to cake. So, it was a constant struggle to keep her involved in the present opening. Fortunately, there were approximately 10 other children there who were more than happy to help open presents. Below is a shot of my daughter receiving a helping hand from her cousin:

Eventually, it became more of a group effort...

The wind started to blow, and the tissue paper was everywhere. With every new toy, my daughter's arms would wave: "Other toys! Yay!"

We decided to move inside for cake and ice cream. This proved to be a big mistake, as I think leaving the presents outside was just too traumatic. My daughter began to cry and whine.

Cake makes everything better.

A mouthful of cake makes an excellent cry muffler. See? No cries escaping that mouth. Of course there are now chocolate crumbs all over my house, but that just means the house smells like chocolate.

So far, my daughter has spent time playing with pretty much all the toys she received, but she has of course latched onto a few key ones. The first is a cool drawing book from Aunt G and Uncle B. It's a handmade fabric covered folder that holds a drawing pad and several erasable crayons. I was worried yesterday when my daughter disappeared into her bedroom for several minutes without making any noise, and when I went into her room, she was sitting quietly in her rocking chair, drawing in her new book.

The other favorite has been the doll sized baby stroller. She walks all over our house, pushing the stroller:

It was the first thing she grabbed this morning... she wouldn't eat anything or do anything until she had pushed her stroller all over the house, crashing into the walls, waking her mother up. Yesterday during her nap, I strapped her bunny into it as a joke. Now she won't put anything else in it - we tried to put a doll in, she removed it and put the bunny back.

Also - she "parks" the stroller for the night on top of the toilet in our hallway bathroom. When I took her in to brush her teeth last night, she came down the hall pushing her stroller down the hall, into the bathroom, then she picked it up and set it on the toilet and said "Stoller parked. There."

She's napping now, and I'm watching the Mariners crush the White Sox as I blog. It's a good Sunday.

-The Krunchy Krab

I don't even know what to say.

Not three minutes had elapsed, and my wife turns to me and says, "I'd like to get some pinking shears."

I might have to go use my chainsaw.

-The Krunchy Krab

Bunting

Don't get excited Bob I'm not talking about baseball.

My wife just said to me, "I'm going to make bunting for our daughter's birthday."

As a man, I'm proud to say that I have no idea what that means.

Peace out.

-The Krunchy Krab

"We don't dip our toes"

Tonight at dinner, my wife and I had finished eating, and so had left the table to try to finish restoring order to our house before our nephew came home from sports camp. I walked into the dining room in time to witness my daughter with her toe in her mouth, a feat I have not been able to accomplish since Reagan was in office.

I didn't think much of it at first, since she often puts her feet on her head to highlight my lack of flexibility. Upon glancing back though, I watched her take her toe out of her mouth, dip it in a leftover puddle of sauce from dinner on her plate, and promptly put her toe back in her mouth.
Ah, now I understand. Having eaten all the other vehicles for carrying sauce to her mouth, she was resorting to using the utensils God gave her.

A few seconds after this realization, my wife uttered the quote in the title, and I walked to the computer to write this blog.

-The Krunchy Krab