Notes from the Bachelor Pad

Pamela has been gone 2 nights now, with 4 to go.

1) Zinsser needs a lot of playing, and he sees me as "the guy who plays fetch with him", not "a guy I can cuddle with". Last night Uncle Ant was over for a little bit (he brought dinner for the four of us, and we had a small bit of dessert single malt before he left and I put the kids to bed), and Zinsser passed out on Ant's lap. I have had maybe 10 minutes total of Zinsser cuddles. I'm maybe feeling a little jealous.

2) The kids have been a blast. Bella lost another tooth yesterday (eating popcorn), so we got ready for the Tooth Fairy, but this morning was so busy that she didn't check to see if the fairy came through with the goods (which I believe he did). Today was a bit wild with getting Bella off to Synchro, doing a handoff mid-practice to Grandma and Grandpa, then spiriting Isaac clear across town to HIS swimming lesson.

3) After Isaac's lesson, he was VERY hungry and insisted on going to Perkins, where he devoured a plate of Mickey Mouse pancakes, 3 strips of bacon, a handful of my american fries, and a cup of apple juice. I had a classic breakfast (eggs, bacon, pancakes), and it was good.... BUT when I walked in the house to find G&G with Bella back, I discovered they had gone to Cosetta's for lunch AND brought me back a sausage and peppers entree with a side of mostaccioli (however that is spelled). I resisted for 2 hours, thinking it might make a good dinner... and then just devoured it. And now I'm a bit woogy from the overstuffedness.

4) What, can it already be time for Pamela's computer to die? The current model lasted for 3.5 years, and I don't recall there being big problems with it... maybe one hard disk crash? Certainly nothing like her previous one which we took out back and buried behind the garage in 2006. But the motherboard is on the fritz and it's been spontaneously rebooting and giant strange lines going across the screen, and really really long waits for things while the spinning wheel of death goes. It hasn't truly DIED in the strictest sense, but if it were a human, we'd be looking at palliative care around now.

Since I'm on the road so much, Pamela's iMac is something of her lifeline to the world - she's more active on Facebook, her forums, keeps in touch with church and synchro, email... it's important. And almost every evening's call with Pamela had some sort of "I'm worried about my computer" talk, which is just extra stress we don't need. So I decided (and cleared with her too - no surprises!) to replace the mac during her vacation. We got the low-end iMac (21"), and I moved everything across. And it is wonderful.

The new keyboard is super tiny and cool, and the new mouse is just amazing - it senses finger gestures across its smooth top - so you sort of "pet" it with two fingers, and it scrolls up or down. Very surreal. Anyway, the kids love it, the screen is better (we didn't go for the BIG screen - it's not needed), the iChat camera is better, and it's not going to die anytime soon (knock wood).

As to the other one - with it in such shaky condition, I have qualms about selling it (hard to say "dying computer, not sure how much time you'll have with it" in an eBay ad) - I'm thinking about setting it up on the 3rd floor as an 'extra' work computer (for kids videos too) until it dies (and make sure everything I do on it is backed up). Maybe not.

5) Isaac is definitely showing interest in toilet training now - he's at around 50% participation now, as long as it's convenient. He does like to get M&Ms as a reward.

6) With all of the busy-ness of the past weeks, it's a bit of a quiet one here, even with Pamela away. The kids are doing a LOT of playing (I think that Carly from up the block actually lives here now), and all are getting along pretty well. I'm staying on top of the chores, and playing a lot with the dog... so I'm pretty happy. All that play gets the kids are pretty tired, so 7-8pm bedtimes are not a problem, which lets me get caught up on shows...

The new Ricky Gervais Show on HBO (download for free through iTunes) was absolutely hilarious - It's just an animation of his podcasts from years back so I'm late to that game, but it's truly funny stuff. I'm not going to get started on Lost, though. Nuts to that. But with Dollhouse done and Fringe on hiatus until April, I actually don't have THAT much to watch.

Allright, that's enough updating for now. I'll go see what that scream was all about now.