May 2005 Archives
Today was the last day of preschool for Henry. It was also a very difficult day for all of us for a variety of reasons I won't get into here. At the end of preschool, we got to take home Henry's "memory book" containing pictures of him through the year and some of his art and stories. We've already posted one of the stories; here's the other:
A Story by HenryThis is a story about a dog and a mouse. And they are laughing. And here is the dramatic part. He went BARK!
The mouse ran away and jumped through the air. He landed on a platform way up in the sky. And then there was an earthquake and the mouse fell off the thing in the sky and landed on the castle. Then he realized we was standing on a castle.
The End.
Reading this was a high point of my largely awful day. It's so very Henry; I could almost hear it in his voice as I read...
|
|
From an interview with Brad Cloepfil (warning: annoying Flash-based site), the Oregon architect responsible for the proposed redesign of 2 Columbus Circle in New York City as well as the new addition to the Seattle Art Museum, in last Sunday's New York Times Magazine, page 27:
"There's a lot of design energy going into eyewear. I'm designing glasses for Amy Sacks, a company based in Portland."
From an article on Terence Riley, architecture and design curator at the MOMA, in last Sunday's New York Times Magazine, page 37:
"It's a character flaw of many architects that they try to express themselves through their eyewear. I strongly urge them to work on this."
In other news, Kathy and I picked up our new glasses today. Pictures forthcoming.
|
|
According to this BBC News article, scientists at Haifa University in Israel have identified the parts of the brain that comprehend sarcasm. I can only assume that this part of the brain is somehow hyper-developed in the Mohr family. We're never sarcastic. (via Kottke)
|
|
CHILD: Mama, what's that book about the whole history of the Earth?"
MOTHER:Oh, the one we saw at the toy store? I think it's 'Life Story.' You have it up in your room.
(CHILD heads upstairs. PARENTS enjoy ten remarkably quiet minutes.)
CHILD (off stage): Mom, Dad! I found that book. It was in the Library!
MOTHER: Oh, okay, bring it down and we'll read it.
(CHILD slides book down stairs, then walks down himself.)
CHILD: I kinda had to pile up all those books in my room.
PARENTS (in unison): Oh.
|
|
Cool. Google Sightseeing used my suggestion. For those who don't know, Google Sightseeing posts interesting things found on Google Maps' satellite view. A couple weeks ago, they posted links to the former Goodyear blimp hanger in Akron and a tethered aerostat over Florida. In the same vein, I sent a link to the aerostat over Sierra Vista.
When Kathy's parents lived in Sierra Vista, their house was about a quarter mile from the aerostat base. Depending on the wind, sometimes it seemed like the aerostat was looming directly overhead. It made a nice landmark, though. On clear days, you could easily see it from I-10 near Tucson.
|
|
We ate at the new Blue C Sushi restaurant in University Village a few nights ago. Henry was thrilled. You see, at Blue C, the food travels around the restaurant on a conveyor belt. If you see something you like moving by, you can grab it off the conveyor and dig in. At the end of the meal, the staff counts up your color-coded plates and tallies the cost of your meal. We sat at the counter (there are also booths) where Henry had a clear view of everything moving by. At first, he wanted to try everything. Well, what he really wanted to do was take things off the moving conveyor. His interest in actually consuming things diminished once the food was in front of him. He did try some tuna and ate a bunch of fried potato thingies whose name I can't recall. The big hit food-wise was the Japanese cream puff, of course.
The biggest hit was the whole concept, though. Very entertaining for Henry. Near every table or group of seats, there's a nifty button you press, which then glows blue and turns on a matching blue light above your seats to summon your waiter. Our waiter was kind and child-friendly. There were quite a few other children in the place, as is typical of a restaurant in UVillage, and they all seemed to be having fun. The food was fine; I'm sure a true connoissuer would probably find fault with it, but for us it was edible and enjoyable. I stayed away from the raw stuff, anyway, since I'm pregnant, but liked the sesame noodles and spicy tofu.
So, I'd go again. It was fun to see Henry so excited about the whole thing.
|
|
The Mariner's record is basically the same now (12-17) as it was last year. They are again in last place in the AL West, again suffering through a nasty offensive slump with some pretty shaky starting pitching, too. Like last year. But, it still doesn't feel as bad to me as last year did. Somehow, I have more hope that Adrian Beltre will start hitting, more hope than I had in a Scott Spezio turnaround last year, for sure. The games I've seen have been more interesting, with the Mariners battling back and sometimes winning after falling behind a few runs. Maybe the pregnancy hormones are affecting my outlook, making it sunnier. (Ha!) I haven't been posting about every game we've attended, and that will probably continue. I'm a bit distracted this year. And, just how many more games will we attend this year? It's hard to say. It depends on when the baby arrives, and how things go after. Some babies sleep peacefully through things like ball games, visits to the store, fireworks displays, etc and some... well, some do not do anything peacefully! Can't tell ahead of time which you're going to get!
|
|
I've mentioned Henry's love of jigsaw puzzles before. One of the struggles we've had has been to convince him to flip the pieces right-side-up first. He'll complain that he can't find a certain piece while most of the puzzle is upside down. "They're much easier to find," we tell him, "if you flip all the pieces over first."
As if to prove us wrong, the other day, Henry put together a puzzle completely upside down (the puzzle pieces, not him). It wasn't a big one (30 pieces or so), but still. Touché.
|
|
From a researcher at McMaster University, we learn that Slow Balls Take The Swing Out Of Young Ball Players (via kottke). It turns out kids have a harder time seeing slow motion than fast, tending to see slow moving objects as stationary.
I've definitely found this to be true when pitching for Henry. He can't reliably hit really fast pitches, but has just as much trouble with really slow ones. There's a sweet spot in the middle where he can hit most every good pitch (and a lot of the bad ones).
|
|
"Jennifer Aniston is in two of my favorite movies."
We watched The Iron Giant with Henry last weekend (his first and only PG movie so far). For those who don't know, it's the film Brad Bird made before coming to Pixar to make The Incredibles. Based on the book by Ted Hughes, it's a beautifully animated, well told tale that utterly flopped at the box office and eventually found its audience on DVD.
Office Space has been on my mind lately as I've been tempted to answer those Telefund calls with a line from the movie: "corporate accounts payable, Nina speaking, just a moment..." (which, in the movie, is repeated ad nauseam in the background noise of the office). It's an irreverent and hilarious look at dehumanizing corporate culture that utterly flopped at the box office and eventually found its audience on DVD.
On the other hand, Ms. Aniston didn't quite make the cut for Der Himmel Über Berlin, aka Wings of Desire, or A Room With a View.
|
|
I know Caller ID has been around for a long time, but we just got it on our home phone line last year. The convenience of knowing who's calling won us over on our cell phones, so when I had to call Qwest about our DSL service (faster for less money, but only if you call and ask for it), I added caller id to our line. Through the wonders of Ovolab Phlink, caller ID data shows up all over the place. I wrote a little script that sends the information to our Squeezebox music player, which is conveniently visible in our living room. The same script sends the ID to all the Macs in the house, which display it using LanOSD:
Of course, our phones
Thanks to the National Do Not Call Registry, we don't get that many unwanted calls to begin with, but those we do get we can usually identify thanks to Caller ID. Our phones can do distinctive-ring based on caller id, too. So, for those few persistent telemarketers we don't want to deal with (I'm lookin' at you, RPI), we set our phones to just not ring at all. If the caller doesn't leave a message, it's as though the call never happened. Cool.
Recently, we started getting calls from Telefund, Inc., which apparently does telemarketing work for "the nation's leading progressive non-profit organizations," including our local PBS station. They're pretty persistent. If we just let the machine answer, they call back later in the evening. When this has happened in the past (you're not off the hook yet, RPI), I've eventually given in and answered the call to tell them not to call again.
Yesterday, though, I was feeling particularly annoyed, so I picked up the phone and said "Telefund, Incorporated, how may I help you?" which prompted an immediate hang-up on the other end of the line (and no more calls for the rest of the evening). Ah, bliss. Today, they called again. This time, I answered "Telefund, Incorporated, how may I direct your call?" I expected another hang-up, but instead got a very polite, very flustered, and very apologetic telemarketer. Hmm.
|
|