News and Notes

I know, it's unusual that I post during the day, and no, there is nothing wrong. It's just that I'm at work, there is no one else here, and since I've been such good employee for so long that I don't have a whole lot of last minute emergencies that just must get done before I leave two weeks from today. I'm actually contemplating digging in to a couple of new projects I hadn't started yet, but they might take longer to get done than what I have time for, and that would just bother me for years. So instead, I blog, and I read.

The kids are both doing really well. They turn 11 months old tomorrow, and they are really getting around. I took some good videos last night I should be be to post tomorrow. Reece is running around the house, and doesn't fall nearly as often as he use to. We've even let him run around outside , though we're pretty careful around curbs and things. I'm not sure his depth perception is quite there yet, and curbs may be an issue for the foreseeable future. He does have a thing for chasing the neighborhood cats, and they've already learned to be afraid. Be very afraid.

Lorelai is standing and cruising (walking holding on to things), but not yet independently walking. She crawls at high speed and squawks like a truck backing up as she does so to let everyone know 'I am on the move!'

We've spent the last couple of nights trying to finish up putting a large collage of pictures into a frame that we bought about 6 months ago. Choosing your favorite pictures of your kids is really hard. What's worse is printing a picture of your kids, then finding out it doesn't fit properly into the frame, or something else was wrong with that print. Then what do you do? Destroy a picture of you child? Just throw it in the trash? Seems... wrong.

We had made up Christmas pictures to send out to everyone but we got started on it late, and then found out that they spelled my name wrong on the card. My first name. Really? Yes, really. So we had to get them reprinted. So expect your 'Happy Holidays card' to arrive just in time for Martin Luther King day.

Of course, I've been dealing with the fallout from resigning at work. Most people here are happy for me, or a little jealous. They assume that since I'm becoming a consultant, I'll be making a ton more money. That's not really true when you take into account some of the benefits I am losing because I am going to a smaller company that just doesn't have things like 401K matching and Employee Illness Leave. This wasn't really about the money. It was about the opportunity to expand my skill set and to move on to the next step of my career. 8 1/2 years in one spot in the IT industry these days is a very long time. Most jobs are 5 years or less these days. It's not that I don't appreciate the stability, but it has its price. You get comfortable. You stop training. You stop paying attention to what is going on in industry. Next thing you know, you're so far behind that you can't get caught up without taking a year off and going back to school and hoping you can get a job after that. There's no doubt that this a risk, but life without a little risk gets pretty dull after a while.

Lisa and I have been shopping for furniture for our living room and trying to decide what to do with our TV / stereo, etc. We think the TV is too big for our space, now that we have kids, so we may sell it and downsize a bit. If you know anyone who wants to buy a 2 year old Hitachi 50" Widescreen LCD Projection TV, let me know. Buying furniture when you have two young kids in the house may seem a little ridiculous, but mostly we're buying it to allow us to put things into places they can't get to, so we're justifying the expense that way. We actually took them shopping on Sunday and they did pretty well. Lorelai always does better when she is on someone's shoulders, though she tends to pull hair and chew on your head.

Our plans for this weekend include more furniture shopping (and hopefully furniture buying if we can find something we like), maybe a little yard cleanup if the weather isn't too bad, and just some relaxing time laying on the couch reading a book playing with the kids.