Hola Amigos

Been a long time since I rapped at ya. Things have been, how you say, CRAZY around here.

1) Christmas Etc: We have had a great season - starting with dinner out on Friday the 21, guests here on the 22nd, hanging with Bella's birthfamily on the 23rd, Xmas eve at grandma and grandpas, Christmas proper, and now Pamela's parents, brother, and niece here through the new year! So it's busy. And the kids are trying to be troupers, but Bella is chronically low on sleep which impacts her mood, and Isaac seems to be a magnet for every single virus that checks into the Twin Cities, and is back with the sniffles, with occasional puke-age (though I think that might be more of a sore stomach from too much phlegm!)

But we have taken time to watch some videos (Bourne, BladeRunner), read, sit by the fire... so while busy, we've tried to have fun.

2) Work. Oh man am I ready for my new job. In the past 2 weeks I've got nothing but terrible news at work. For all of my project management mojo, I am limited to delivering what the Vendor can provide. And I've got lots of fresh info that says
- They're delivering what they can even later than before.
- What they're delivering won't be what we wanted particularly
- They're canceling future development in one area that we were counting on.

So once the docs hear about this, they're going to go ballistic. The software DOES do a few things well, but not SO much better than the system it replaced: This whole project was based around a "future state" that the next software release was supposed to deliver, and now they've canceled it. WHAT TO DO?

I've been documenting "Plan B" and "Plan C" and communications plans and what if responses like mad, hoping that we can act quickly once the docs DO go nuts.

But also, honestly, I'm counting the days until I'm done... which is sad because I do like to do a good job, and I do see that this leaves them in a limbo state, but I can't put off the new work any longer!

3) Sleep: With Isaac back into having a cold, he's been up a LOT in the night, and it's starting to impact my sanity. The big problem is that right now, he is EXTREMELY Daddy-focused. Pamela can hold him for 10 min, him screaming at the top of his lungs, and if I walk in the room, he stops, smiles, and reaches out his arms for me. At 1am, at 4am, I'm the only guy who can get him back down to sleep...

I've had some sleepy moments that have been frankly scary: I've had situations where I'm watching a show, and I could swear it's like clutch cargo - the lips and eyes move, but the faces take a moment to catch up - as if my rendering CPU is lagging and only processing the key information. I actually caught a 10 minute nap in my office (I'm glad I have a door!!!)

Ooh - Isaac is crying again. Gotta run.