Category: lil’ chino

the coming spawn

Posted on

mushrooms in the lawn

Happy Friday internets.  Sorry I skipped a couple days this week, but, you know… so it goes.

I’m remote desktop’d into my PC at home in California to write this entry.  For some reason, that’s awesome to me.  And, if by the preceding sentence it wasn’t clear, we arrived safe and sound in Oregon Wednesday night – where we were greeted by Grammy & Grampa and the familiar cold, wet welcome the Pacific Northwest.  Oregon is a gorgeous place, I just don’t know if I could deal with all those months of rain.

I think Keaton enjoys hanging out with her grandparents though.  When we’ve been here in the past, we’ve put her down to sleep in a pack-n-play in the large walk-in-closet in the guest room we stay in.  It may sound kinda funny, keeping her in a closet, but the space is big enough to be a “room” proper and it has a separate door we can close to give her some peace.  Anyway, sometime between the last time we were here and now, my folks actually transformed the closet into a little Keaton room.  It comes complete with her name on the door, Backyardigans stickers plastered all over the wall, a bookshelf with books, and a little kid-sized bed.  Now, that may seem even more funny… a converted closet-room… and perhaps it is – but the novelty now more than makes up for the therapy later.

Anyway… she seems to lover her own little space.  So, don’t call CPA OK?

Work today (yesterday as you read) was abominable.  I came here this week primarily for one two-hour meeting.  I had been dreading this meeting all week.  Not because it was going to be particularly challenging or difficult or anything… but moreso because it was going to be a stressful thing for me.  It’s hard to explain, but when I know I have to share a strongly held opinion of mine that’s counter to what the commonly held opinion of the group is – I get all stressed about making my point succinctly and eloquently enough to be as influential as I want.  Anyway, the meeting blew… but not for the reasons I just mentioned… blew though, nonetheless.

Forget it… I’m outta here.  I just have nothing to write and all I can do is sit here thinking about how much I wish it was Friday (remember, I write the night before).

Goodnight.

Posted on

and all i can think about is the music

7:15am on Sunday morning.

Sharaun’s arrived safely in Florida last night, and I spent the day cleaning and recovering from the party.  People ended up coming over for football Saturday, despite most of them having just left the night/morning prior, and we grilled ribs in the rain (with a huge umbrella shielding the fire).  I steam-cleaned the carpet and did general pickup and tidying.  Place looks good for a guy left alone for a weekend, I must say.

Keaton’s in the kitchen eating her waffle and yogurt (one of her favorites – Sharaun had a stroke of brilliance substituting syrup for a yogurt “dip sauce” and it works great).  When she’s done I’ll get her down and jump in the shower to shave and get ready for church.  Don’t tell Sharaun, but I brought her into our bed last night to sleep with me; I mean, it just seemed like there was so much empty space there.  And plus, it’s just her and I this weekend – so I can do what I want.  (I was beaming proud inside of the ponytail I gave her the other day when people told me it was an exceptionally good “Daddy do.”)  Since I’m working remotely tomorrow with her, I think we’ll go on a picnic for lunch.

OK, what about Halloween?

Halloween went great this year.  And not just the props or the party, but the trick-or-treaters too.  We got quite a few more than in years past and all of them seemed to get a kick out of the setup.  A setup which, by the way, remained 100% functional all night – gremlin-free for the first time ever.  So, yeah, Halloween night was the single solitary rainy and windy day all month… but ain’t that always the case?  Just before dusk fell on the street I had two uprooted tombstones needing repair and one backwards-facing witch I had to tweak.  But, things totally came together in the end and the wind even died down enough for the fog chiller to do it’s business.

The party also went off swell, with a great turnout and honestly one of the best times we’ve had at a party we’re “in charge of.”  Several people mentioned that it was fun – so I’m happy.  And guys, one of the best moments of the whole night for me was when the second distinct person came up to me and praised my garage playlist.  One guy even said, paying his third or fourth compliment, “Where can I buy this playlist?!”  Well, he screamed that, actually – over the cacophony of Wreckless Eric’s “Whole Wide World.”  Being that it was a somewhat hasty and totally eclectic mix, I was worried.  Look, I’ve now written something like three paragraphs about the dang iPod playlist… sheesh.

Oh, and just in case you’re that guy… here… it’s just over six hours of music and it’s way better than Sharaun’s:

Grandaddy – A.M. 180
Nine Inch Nails – All The Love In The World
Cut off Your Hands – As Happy as Can Be
Ben Folds – Bitches Ain’t Shit
2 Bad Mice – Bombscare (Original version)
The Breeders – Cannonball
Kanye West – Celebration
The Cure – Close To Me [Closet Remix]
Shout Out Louds – The Comeback
Phoenix – Consolation Prizes
The Hold Steady – Constructive Summer
Led Zeppelin – D’yer Mak’er
Of Montreal – Eluardian Instance
Cut Copy – Feel the Love
Animal Collective – Fireworks
Band of Horses – The First Song
The Streets – Fit But You Know It
Modest Mouse – Float On
Modest Mouse – Florida
Black Moth Super Rainbow – Forever Heavy
Jimi Hendrix – Foxey Lady
The Chemical Brothers – Fuck Up Beats
Wailers – Good Good Rudie
Kanye West – Good Morning
Clor – Good Stuff
Led Zeppelin – Good Times Bad Times
Slade – Gudbuy T’Jane
The Helio Sequence – Harmonica Song
Cut Copy – Hearts On Fire
The Cloud Room – Hey Now Now
Explosions – Hip Drop
Black Kids – Hit The Heartbrakes
The Bravery – An Honest Mistake
Animals – The House Of The Rising Sun
T. Rex – I Love To Boogie
Of Montreal – Id Engager
Modest Mouse – Interstate
The Strokes – Is This It
Bob Marley & the Wailers – Jamming
The Go! Team – junior kickstart
The Go! Team – ladyflash
The Chemical Brothers – Leave Home
The George Baker Selection – Little Green Bag
Iggy Pop – Lust For Life
The Hold Steady – Massive Nights
Chuck Berry – Maybellene
Ohgr – Minus
The Cribs – Mirror Kissers
Led Zeppelin – Misty Mountain Hop
The Strokes – The Modern Age
Malajube – Montreal -40°C
Soul Brothers – Mr Kiss a Bang Bang
Johnny Osbourne – Murderer
Menomena – Muscle N’ Flo
Cloud Cult – No One Said It Would Be Easy
Animal Collective – Peacebone
The Most Serene Republic – Phages
Built to Spill – The Plan
Alexander Henry – Please Be True
Prodigy – Poison
Jay-Z – Public Service Announcement (Interlude) (Produced By Just Blaze)
Jimi Hendrix – Purple Haze
Prince – Purple Rain
Wolfmother – Pyramid
Nirvana – Radio Friendly Unit Shifter
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – Refugee
The Strokes – Reptilia
The Beatles – Revolution
The Rolling Stones – Rocks Off
Jason Collett – Roll On Oblivion
Beastie Boys – Root Down (Free Zone Mix)
Clash – Rudie Can’t Fail
Weezer – Say it ain’t so
Of Montreal – A Sentence Of Sorts In Kongsvinger
Beastie Boys – Shake Your Rump
Lily Allen – Smile
Beastie Boys – So What’cha Want
Wolf Parade – Soldier’s Grin
Ben Folds Five – Song for the Dumped
+/- – Steal the Blueprints
The Beatles – Strawberry Fields Forever
The Hold Steady – Stuck Between Stations
Postal Service – Such Great Heights
Prince Buster – Ten Commandments of Man
Kanye West – Touch The Sky (Feat. Lupe Fiasco)
The Arcade Fire – Wake Up
Vampire Weekend – Walcott
Lou Reed – Walk On The Wild Side
Eagles of Death Metal – Wannabe in L.A
Pixies – Where Is My Mind?
Wreckless Eric – Whole Wide World
Cloud Cult – The Will Of A Volcano
Jackie Opel – You’re Too Bad
Wolf Parade – You Are A Runner And I Am My Father’s Son
Spoon – You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb
The Faint – Your Retro Career Melted
The Strokes – 12:51
Jay-Z + DJ Danger Mouse – 99 Problems

Goodnight.

Posted on

weekending

Man, today worked out great.  A Sunday like the Sundays of old.  I mean, after church, we all went down to the town square and sat under the old oak tree for an afternoon concert.

Yeah, well, maybe not exactly like the Sundays of old… but we did come home church and take a family-style nap – all three of us sacked out in various places around the house for a couple hours.  Quite nice.  Later on I put together a new set of shelves I bought for the garage; more storage for our ever growing collection of stuff we don’t need.

The weekend otherwise was normal.  Dinner out with some friends Friday, the crew over for beer and football Saturday (and helping put some last-last-minute touches on some of the Halloween decorations), and then a chili-cookoff at Ben & Suzy’s place later that evening.  It was a nice low-obligation weekend with no real “work” I had to get done, since the props are all up and running (minus the new one I didn’t build… there’s always next year).

If you couldn’t tell already, I don’t have much today, like I said I whiled away the afternoon on the couch listening to music and napping.  I do, however, have a little Keaton audio I took tonight on the trusty iPhone.  I wanted to share her new joke with you guys.  Yeah, I taught her the joke (Mom did laugh, but wasn’t exactly anxious for her to go around telling it to all her friends, either… but that’s what dad’s do, right?) – but she’s getting really good at telling it.  Here, I’ll let her show you herself:

[audio:keatons_joke.mp3]
She has her dad’s impeccable timing.

Wasn’t that awesome?  She’s been telling people this “joke” for about a week now, and, even though it may sound perfect, her timing still needs a little work (what you hear here benefited from a little editing wizardry from dad).  Anyway, perhaps another generation of class-clown in the making…

Goodnight.

Posted on

stick to blocks

A pleasantly productive-feeling Monday at work.

As the pendulum swings, this was one of those days where I felt like some of the work I do may actually impact something for the company when all is said and done.  I guess that means later this week it’ll swing back the other way and I’ll be left reminding myself the beast wouldn’t blink were I to disappear off the Earth.  Thankfully, my family still needs me.

Well, maybe not tonight… since Sharaun’s out and I’m here alone (Keaton’s already sleeping) listening to some John Mayall on the iPod.  And, even though I’ve turned down the volume on the Halloween display’s “ambient sound” (which is just howling wind, hooting owls, and some crow-caws on an endless loop) the sound is still dribbling through the front door and driving me mad.

Mmm… gotta be some blog around here somewhere…

Usually sometime after I get home in the evening, I’ll queue up the day’s episode of Countdown and watch it.  I know, I know… it’s about as left-loving as you can get, but I sometimes temper it with some O’Reilly Factor just so I’m not 100% brain-poisoned.  Anyway, today Keaton came out and sat on my lap during the show and, after a couple minutes of watching, told me she’d like to watch a Backyardigans.  Not really thinking before replying, I chose the flat-out lying route and said, “This is The Backyardigans, babe.”  “Not it’s not!,” she corrected me, “it’s Obama!”

Wow… too much politics on the TV methinks.  I don’t need a policitaclly aware two-and-a-half year old, thank you very much.  Anyway, we already have her saying prayers for McCain and Palin every night at 5pm PST (3pm CST, 2pm EST) so the liberal Satanists don’t make all the weddings be gay weddings.  Dude, kidding… totally kidding, OK?  Sheesh.

You know what I find amazing to think about.  Once, in the year 2003, I wrote a blog on the world-wide-web about some of the silly things I used to do back in gradeschool – which, by the way, was way back in the year 1988.  Then, that entry garnered a comment from someone who was actually in that fifth-grade class with me so many years ago – and he remembered me doing the silly stuff I was writing about.  That, my friends, is one of the reasons I love blogging (not that it happens all the time or anything).  But, really, the internet has made some amazing things possible… no?

I guess I have to end this somehow…

It’s 11:16pm now and I just got up from my laptop-side perch on the couch (the iPod is playing Ben Folds Five now, their self-titled debut… a truly seminal album from my college years) to take a pee.  As I rounded the corner into the hallway I gasped aloud at what lay before me: There, at my feet, was my beautiful and sound-asleep daughter laying face-down on the carpet in the middle of the hall.  I was actually so surprised to see her there I stood shell-shocked for a few seconds before scooping her up and taking her to bed.

She does that sometimes, sneaks out of her unlocked door and army-crawls to within inches of the hallway where she can hear and/or peek out and see Sharaun and I – but we typically hear her do it and can redirect her right away. I have to think she was there for quite a while tonight, she looked completely comfortable.  Dang this lulling music and stupid howling Halloween wind for masking her telltale steady breathing!  If the iPhone camera had a flash (I know, ridiculous, right?) I would’ve snapped  a picture to accompany the entry… but as it stands you’ll have to take my word for it.

That girl is hilarious to me.  I less-than-three her so bad.

Goodnight.

Posted on

pumpkins in a wagon

Sunday and another busy weekend draws to its end.

Tonight, after I cleaned out the Halloween workshop (garage) so we can put the cars in again, we packed Keaton into the wagon and all went for a walk down to the market to pick out some pumpkins (funny enough, we didn’t actually buy pumpkins while we were up at the real pumpkin patches last weekend – so we did the “city” version instead today).  It was a nice trip, and, besides, I’ve never pulled a wagon through the aisles of a supermarket before.

Saturday I made the final-final (fingers crossed) repairs and adjustments to all the props, and they’ve all been running fine since.  Now if they can just make it to Halloween night and be in good working order so I can entertain some trick-or-treaters, I’ll be happy.

As Fall continues to creep up around us slowly here in Northern California, I find myself wishing we’d get a good hard rain.  We haven’t had rain here in what seems like forever, since our seasons aren’t as wide-open as places like my previous home of Central Florida.  And, even though we rarely get any worth-mentioning thunder and lightning, I’d gladly take a day stuck inside for a decent thunderstorm.  Something about rain, and I’m certain I’ve written about this before, something about being safe and dry indoors as the rain pours down outside… is very soothing and satisfying to me.  So c’mon rain, come get us wet over here… I’m waiting.

While I was cleaning the garage today, I wanted to put a couple ten-foot lengths of conduit up in the rafters for storage.  Keaton had come out with me (she absolutely loves spending time with me in while I “work” in the garage, she hovers around me asking me questions about what I’m doing and offering to “help” – I love it), and she was tossing around a little bouncy ball as I picked up.  Seeing the unused conduit, I grabbed both lengths near the middle and began to swing them around to position them towards the rafters.  I watched as I maneuvered them so I wouldn’t hit the hanging florescent lights or the workbench behind me, but as I did I heard aloud “thud” and immediately thought I’d hit the workbench.  But, as soon as I heard the impact Keaton began screaming.

In a panic I dropped the pipe and turned to see her bent over clutching her face.  Freaking out now (the sound of the pipe hitting something had made me think I hit something really solid, so I knew she had received a good whack), and cursing myself for working with the long and awkward pieces of metal while she was around, I darted over and scooped her up.  “Where does it hurt, baby?,” I asked, brushing her hair from her face.  Oh crap, she was holding her eye… “My eye!,” she wailed.  Getting more worried, I asked her to open her eye, half expecting the worst.  Thankfully, her eye looked fine, and I finally noticed the little red mark on the bridge of her nose – near her eye but not in her eye.  After the couple seconds I’d taken to initially check her out, I rushed inside with her still crying to put some ice on the bump.

Turns out that after some ice and comforting, she was just fine; but I ended up feeling like a careless dad again for smacking my own daughter in the face with some metal pipe.  It’s a good thing the Lord makes babies tough, ’cause they get hurt a lot it seems.  I’m just waiting for the first broken bone or stitches… you know it’ll happen.

OK folks, gonna stop writing now and read a little.  Have a good Monday and I’ll talk to you later.  Bye.

(Pssst!  OMG can you please look at the picture of Job and Keaton Megan posted last night (scroll down, it’s the last one.)

Posted on

getting my #2 time back

Friday, and despite thinking this whole evening that I wasn’t going to write, here I am sitting down at 10:30pm giving it the old college try.

My favorite thing about Friday?  It’s always followed by Saturday and that’s the day a bunch of people come over to our house to watch college football all day.  Thursday, even Thursday’s good because it’s almost Friday.  But, whatever…

You know when everything is going right with your complicated animated Halloween props and you’re all like, “Man, my complicated animated Halloween props are dialed-in this year!”  You’re all proud and happy and triumphant and stuff?  Isn’t that always the time that the blacklight you have mounted to the underside of the porch decides to fall off and hang in the path of your crank ghost’s motor arm?  You know, totally tangling the thing into a twisted mess and nearly overworking the motor to the point of death?  Yeah man, me too.  That crap always happens to me.  Ugh… just more work guys… just more work…

Keaton likes to do this new thing where, while I’m seated in the bathroom, she opens the door and asks me, among other random and non-urgent questions, how I’m doing.  At first I found this a little disturbing – as even in my own house around the woman I’ve been with for fifteen years, I’m a door-closed kinda #2 guy.  But, as she continued to do it (displaying an almost ESP-esque knack for knowing when I’m pinching a loaf), I guess I sort of got used to it.  Lately though, I’ve taken to latching the door while I’m in there.

Why?  I’ll tell you why.

I miss my smelly little sanctuary.  No one used to bother me in that room; I could read the Newsweek (or stray People if Sharaun had left one), surf the internet on my iPhone (is that gross?  I kinda think it might be gross), or simply rest my chin on my hands and enjoy the silence.  And, as much as I love my daughter – even to the point of allowing her to interrupt my bomb-dropping – I just need my time, y’all.  So, she’ll come to the door, fiddle with the handle, ask me, in a muffled voice, “Dad?  What are you doing, Dad?,” and eventually give up when I don’t let her in.

And that’s how I got my #2 time back.  Goodnight.

Posted on

no tengo nada

Sorry for no Monday entry.  Sunday I spent the post-praise day working on the Halloween props, and with dinner guests that evening I found not a common moment between me being awake enough to write and me wanting to write.

Anyway, the props are about 80% ready – still some wiring and cable-tacking and fine-tuning to do before everything’s perfect.  Of course, setting things up wasn’t with out issue, and I found myself frustrated and pressured by some imagined deadline.  I’ll be happy if I get everything dialed in this week, and then can spend some time working on the “new” prop to see if I can get that working before the 31st.  I’ll let ya know.

I’ve really got little to post today… but I did want to share a little bit of why our daughter constantly amazes me.  And yeah, I guess this is sort of dad doing some bragging… but…

See, she’s got this little “music table” toy that sings all sort of songs.  It’s actually from when she was little, but we keep it around because she still enjoys it and it’s good for our friends with cruisin’ babies.   Anyway, the thing sings counting songs and the alphabet – and does both in English and Spanish according to how a little switch on the side is set.  Apparently, Keaton’s been practicing her alphabet in Spanish.  Check it:

[audio:alphabeto.mp3]
Better than I could do.

Awww, that’s the cutest Spanish alphabet I’ve ever freakin’ heard (that last bit goes something like, “La cancion del ABC y la sabes bein, cantas la tambein”).  I love that girl like she was money.

Oh and because I’m so behind in updating Keaton’s gallery, Megan posted some new pictures of Keaton (and one hilarious one of yours truly too) – and Bill posted some of Keaton and Jake from our first debate-watching party (yes, we’re old) – and Ragan posted some from when they visited.  Go check them out here, here and here, respectively.  Thanks for doing my work, folks.

Goodnight y’allz.