https://buy-zithromax.online buy kamagra usa https://antibiotics.top buy stromectol online https://deutschland-doxycycline.com https://ivermectin-apotheke.com kaufen cialis https://2-pharmaceuticals.com buy antibiotics online Online Pharmacy vermectin apotheke buy stromectol europe buy zithromax online https://kaufen-cialis.com levitra usa https://stromectol-apotheke.com buy doxycycline online https://buy-ivermectin.online https://stromectol-europe.com stromectol apotheke https://buyamoxil24x7.online deutschland doxycycline https://buy-stromectol.online https://doxycycline365.online https://levitra-usa.com buy ivermectin online buy amoxil online https://buykamagrausa.net

Category: Holidays

Thanks

I have a lot to be thankful for.

I love where I live.  There are so many things I appreciate about the United States, its culture, its system of government, its people.  I might feel the same way if I lived in some other places, but the fact is, here I am, and, for all that I occasionally criticize aspects of this country, its culture, its government, its people — I am very thankful I am here (versus, say, Somalia).

And I love living in Colorado, in the Denver area, and in this very cool house we’ve been slowly making even better. Thankful I had the opportunity to come here, and live here.

I’m thankful for my family.  My Mom and Dad, even my Brother.  My In-Laws are pretty cool, too (waves).

And, of course, my wonderful wife and my incredible daughter.  To have them in my life is so incredibly keen, I can’t begin to describe it.  Profoundly thankful.

And then there’s my friends, and my job, and living in an era with More Internet, Less Plague, etc.

I have a lot to be thankful for.  And I am.  I’m thankful to all the people who have made my life as really good as it is.  And, yes, I am thankful to my Creator for however it worked out that I’m here to enjoy it.

Poorly seasoned

Because doesn’t everybody “CELEBRATE SUMMER” on September 1st with a big bag
of Halloween candy?

Declaration

American Flag

[…] We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. […]

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Happy Independence Day, all.  Be safe.

Memorial Day

Memorial-Day-ArlingtonTo those who served and who died in their service, know that you are remembered.

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

— Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918), Canadian Army (1915)

While Lt. Col. McCrae’s poem is more often associated with Armistice Day  in November, in the US we refer to that as Veterans Day, which offers tribute to all those who have served and come back to tell the tale.  His poem during the battle of Ypres in WWI is, in this country, at least, more fitting to this day.

Not all who served were noble heroes, nor all deaths uplifting, nor all all the wars and conflicts fought worthy. But in the end, we honor the sacrifice of those gave their lives in the armed forces of this country. May they rest in peace.

Easter, morning and evening

Easter Morning …

We’re usually not big Easter Sunday attendees, largely because of the pomp, circumstance, and crowds.  However, due to various (self-volunteering) circumstances, we ended up all serving in the mid-morning Easter Mass at our church — Margie and I both as eucharistic (chalice) ministers and lectors, and Katherine as acolyte (altar girl).

That all went fine, and it was kind of cool all serving together.  The only down side was that they let the kids go before the final choir “Hallelujah” and blessing in order to do the Easter Egg hunt out on the lawn. And  there was Kay, watching through the window as all the kids ran around, grabbing Easter Eggs while she sat, waiting for the service to finish …

Well, she was more than a bit crestfallen, and even though she headed out as soon as all was done and she was un-vested, the eggs had all been gathered up …

… until the folks organizing the event realized that she’d missed out on the festivities, at which point they cracked out the reserve eggs (plastic shells with treats inside), and various kids still around volunteered some of their eggs and “hid” them for Kay to find.

A lot of fun, and a really neat example of caring for one another.  Nice.

Easter Afternoon …

imgTag

We are usually the Easter locale for our social circle, and this year was no exception.  We had De and Ray, Jackie and Kaylee, Doyce and Kate, Stan and Joanne (his mom, first-time guest), Randy, Dave G., Amanda, Angie.  Full house, and much fun, with much consumption of hors d’oevres beforehand.In a break from tradition (acknowledging both the left-over clutter from home improvement projects and the growing age of the young’uns), we held the Easter Egg Hunt out in the front yard.  Randy, Jackie and I planted the shells.  Kaylee (at 4) was allowed to run around at full tilt.  Ray and Kay had to run back to their baskets on the front patio with each egg (two for Ray) they found.  Tremendous fun, it seemed, was had by all.

Margie made a yummy dinner of ham, lamb, cheesy potatoes, and asparagus and zucchini. Various desserts were brought by various participants.  Several bottles were extracted from the wine cellar.

A very fun occasion, and great to have everyone over. My only regret is … it’s Sunday, and a work day tomorrow.

April Fool

harley-quinnLast night, Katherine asked across the dinner table, “Is it okay, since tomorrow is April Fool’s, if I do some pranks?”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know.”

I pondered a moment.  “It’s okay, if …”  I started ticking off on my fingers.  “… it doesn’t make a mess.  And if it doesn’t hurt anyone.”  There, I thought.  That covers the bases.

Kay pondered some more.

“And,” I suddenly piped up, “only if the person would be likely to laugh about it as soon as they learn the joke.”  Yeah, gotta cover the emotionally harmful pranks, too.

She nodded.  “What about … something with whipped cream?”

I gave her an eye.  “That sounds messy.”

She grinned and laughed.  “Yeah …”

Note 1.  I confess I did engage in an April Fool prank today, this one, at the office.  I have no idea if it caught anyone, or just caused a smile or two.  I thought it was pretty funny just to read.

Note 2.  To make up for the above, I used April Fool’s Day as a safety topic in two conference calls I was on, suggesting that if a prank had any sort of physical component or might leave any mess, to give it some serious consideration as to whether it was really safe … and, if unsure, figure out something else to do.

Note 3.  I would suggest that if we could avoid making unsafe messes, hurting each other, or doing anything to each other that wouldn’t cause a mutual laugh afterward, the world would actually be kind of a cool place.

Happy New Year

Since I’m writing this on my Blackberry, I won’t write at length.

This past year, 2009 has been long and stressful in many ways, but I remain blessed by a good job, a wonderful family (immediate and extended), fine friends, a nice house in an excellent state in a really good country (critiques notwithstanding).

My life is rich. Even if it were better in some fashion, I’d still find things to bitch about.

I’ll have to save the New Year’s Resolution retrospective until I have full keyboard and blog access. From what I recall, I’ve done better at some than others, with triumphs and tragedies (to be melodramatic) in most of them.

Here’s hoping 2010 is even better, for me, my family, my friends, my country, my world, and my (as Asimov used to call them) Gentle Readers. May the New Year treat you all well.

A semi-official Christmas (etc.) message from ***Dave

Hey-howdy. My relaxing vacation continues to be a bit harried — but with today being prep for the big Christmas Eve dinner, tomorrow being our usual multi-household gifting-n-eating marathon, and Boxing Day starting out pre-dawn to race to the airport for the flight to Hawai’i (and, yes, everyone should have such “troubles”), I wanted to take the opportunity to …

… thank my readers here, end of the year, for sticking with DDtB through thick and thin. Though the individual posts have gone down a bit, I’ve tried to fill the gap with copious Google Reader “unblogged bits” and various Tweets, and hopefully it’s remained interesting, entertaining, and (for those who track the mundanity of my life) informative. But without folks actually reading and commenting … it would be a lot less in a lot of ways.

… thank my wife, who puts up with her life being posted here, too. And with my whipping out my Blackberry to Tweet things at odd intervals. And with my saying, “Just another minute” as I plow through a few dozen more Google Reader items (or, “Just another minute” as I spend the next hour finishing off some blog screed).

I have no idea what my connectivity Hawai’i is going to be — and, no, I’m not going to track down an Internet cafe in order to blog. But I’ll likely be tweeting, and posting photos, and stuff like that. But a lot of the year-end “New Years resolutions” and “bundles of swag comparisons” and “Top Ten Cheeses Eaten in Luxembourg in 2009” posts are probably going to be missing. So sad …

So, in case I don’t get anything written on the topic before then …

  • A very merry Christmas to all.  For those who adhere to the religious aspects of the holiday, may the incarnation help you feel closer to God.  For those who adhere to the social aspects of the holiday, may giving and good cheer fill your lives (and good food your stomachs).  For those whose proclivities are toward another faith (or none at all), accept my sincerest wishes of happiness and contentment in the days to come.
  • And a very happy New Year to all as well.  Celebrate safely, enjoy the time together, welcome the rising sun as the months lengthen, take this opportunity to renew and resolve, to leave regrets behind, to relax and to dwell on what is … and ought to be … of importance in your life.

Aloha!

Margie update

  1. She continues to be in good spirits and doing well.  Well, dealing with various GI results of pain meds (and finding the right balance of compensation for same) is causing her some difficulties.  But that’s relatively minor.
  2. I picked up handicapped parking placard (temp).  Yay! We get all the good parking spots!
  3. Margie talked with the orthopedics department to make an appointment.  She took the position (as cued by Dr. Eric) that she needed to see the doc on the 16th, because on the 17th we were flying to California.  Reaction: not batting an eyelash about the flight, but the 16th was too early to take out staples.  However … Margie pointed out she could go to a KP clinic in California, which they were happy to say was okay.  So … looks like maybe flight to California (and beyond to Hawaii) is still on … though Margie is still going to talk with her primary care physician just to clear it with her.  Dr. Eric already approves.  Crosses fingers …
  4. Yikes! That’s only six days away!  PANIC!

Gifts, good and bad

While hanging out at the hospital today, Margie and I did some serious plowing through catalogs for our annual Christmas shopping.

There is much stuff that is so “meh,” and much stuff that is so beautiful.  But some items of note (no links, alas, though I suspect you could track them down if you were so inclined):

REALLY STUPID GIFTS:

  1. “Baster Tongs” — They’re tongs to use BBQing.  One of them has some dangly bits of plastic on the back side of the tong blade, which ostensibly can be used as a basting brush.  My take on it is that they will end up dripping baste everywhere as you use them as tongs.
  2. “Pot Protectors” — Okay, so felt pads and the like between fine china to keep one item from scratching another sounds like a good idea.  But special pads to keep pots and pans in your pots-and-pans cupboard from scratching each other when you stack them … sounds kind of anal.

REALLY COOL GIFTS:

  1. “An Alarm Clock, Sir” — A very cool English decorative alarm clock, with either different versions for men or women or different decorative trim you can apply.  The alarm consists of the voice of Stephen Fry, doing Jeeves, clearing his throat, expressing regret for awakening Sir or Madam (depending on the setting on the clock), and making some apologetic witty bon mot.  With enough phrases to last for 6 months before repeating.  Jeez — utterly impractical and quite expensive, but delightful in concept.

Wish Lists are up(dated)

Mine’s updated: Dave’s wish list

Katherine’s is updated: Katherine’s wish list

Margie wants interesting cook books. And, um, other stuff. But she’s keeping it a secret …

(Actually, I kid. She’s just not an Amazon-listable person. Clothes from Coldwater Creek and interesting things from Williams-Sonoma or Crate & Barrel are always considered cool. Anything else, honey?)

Thanksgiving retrospective

Had a very nice Thanksgiving yesterday.  Stan, Dave N., Dave & Jen & Anna, and Lee & De and Rachel all came over around 3, we sat down for dinner around … 6:30ish, I think, and a good time was (it appeared) had by all.

We ran into a few problems with the turkey fryer blowing the breakers on two of the circuits we had it on.  We eventually unplugged the garage fridges and that solved that problem.

So, fried turkey (yum), Margie Mashed Potatoes, Stuffing, Gravy … green beans, alas, were forgotten until the last moment.  Some choice wines from the cellar.  Pecan pie (by me) and apple bread pudding (by De) for desert.

Good times.

Today:

  1. Cleaning people come.
  2. Need to get back into the NaNoWriMo thing for today.  Both Kay and I are in striking distance!
  3. Margie’s upgrading her machine to Win7.
  4. Need to cook one more turkey.
  5. Relaaaaaaaxxxxx …

That last point is important.  The advantage of Thanksgiving being on a Thursday is (if your job is that way) you get a four-day weekend.  The disadvantage of it is that you spend the very first day of that four-day weekend running around like a lunatic (for “you” read “I”).

So … realaaaaaxxxxx … except for making the mistake of checking my email and seeing unpleasant things going on in Europe.  Oh, and doing NaNo.  And … um … whatever else.

Veterans Day

To all who have served our country in the armed services, in war or peace, family or friend or stranger, thank you.

Unblogged Bits for Tuesday, 10 November 2009

Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries ….

Trick or treat!

Kaylee, Katherine, and Buster the Pumpkin.

Unblogged Bits for Saturday, 24 October 2009

Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries ….

Unblogged Bits for Monday, 24 August 2009

Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries ….

Aaaand … home again

We flew back from Faerie last evening, a wholly uneventful jaunt save for the irony of my pointing out the signs saying that only full-size console games or full-size DVD…

We flew back from Faerie last evening, a wholly uneventful jaunt save for the irony of my pointing out the signs saying that only full-size console games or full-size DVD players needed to be pulled from luggage … at which point, the X-ray guy demanded we pull the portable GameBoy and portable DVD player from Katherine’s carry-on (they overlapped in the X-ray, you see, so he couldn’t tell what they were). Oh, and the gal who had to riffle through one of our bags to determine that the light fixtures we’d bought from Ikea weren’t bombs. Oh, and the guy who sent our 30 lb. piece of check-in down the conveyor belt first so that when he measured the two at 52 lbs. we had to shuffle the extra stuff into our already-full carry-ons. But aside from all that, the flight was fine.

The house was, for the most part, intact. I do think we had a raccoon wander through — the gingerbread house on the dining room table was partially demolished, and skittles scattered here and there. The cat food downstairs was untouched, but that upstairs was sprinkled around a bit. Most important, some of the bathrooms showed raccoon dirty raccoon prints around the toilet seats, though not much food-washing debris within.

That was it, though (helped by our latching the pantry, perhaps), so no worries there.

Oh, and then there was the cable bill. We pay our cable bill automagically via credit card each month, tickety-boo, and I’m usually pretty lax at examining the cable bill. Well, back in October, the credit card was expiring, so they sent us a letter to let us know. I called and cleared it up on 23 October (per notation on the letter). Except, apparently, the card was declined (or miskeyed, or whatever). Did Comcast send us another letter? Nope. Any phone calls? Nada. E-mails? Zilch. Did the bills get put in envelopes that looked any different from the “Everything’s okay, thanks for paying by credit card” envelopes? Nuh-uh.

So we got back home to no cable TV (and no DVR) and no Internet. And an excellent reason not to take Comcast up on those offers to take over our phone service, too, since of course we had to call them to find out had happened.

Harrumph.

Well, got that all cleared up, but in the meantime, we opened the gifts around the tree (more goodies! yay!), then, with Katherine a-bed, Margie and I watched the whole Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog DVD (I mean, the whole DVD, bonus features and all), stayed up way too late, but got to sleep in our own beds, which was quite nice.

Nice vacation, great to see the family and friends, but it’s great to be home.

You say you want a Resolution (2008-2009 edition)

Okay, time to do the recap of last year’s resolutions and set some new/refreshed ones for this year. Spend more time with Kitten. Keep up the karate stuff, but…

Okay, time to do the recap of last year’s resolutions and set some new/refreshed ones for this year.

Spend more time with Kitten. Keep up the karate stuff, but also be more involved on a daily basis with her homework and other stuff. Get that time in before she decides that Daddy is (like New year Resolutions) passé. 

I think I did okay with this this year. I tried to get Katherine more involved in stuff around the house (sometimes self-servingly), I tried to stay in touch with what-all she was doing, and, of course, we maintained the karate stuff.

Get my virtual world in order. Get my blogs updated and cleaned up. Increase traffic to WIST. Get my photos caught up, including the stuff I have on other sites.

The blogs are still running on older versions of MT, but I made very significant progress on photos (using Flickr, and getting all of my 2008 photos, of which there were a plentitude, up), and got into a solid, regular rhythm on WIST, leading to a slow, steady rise in traffic.

Write. Edit. Write. No real progress with that this past year. It’s not clear to me how, amidst all the other commitments I have, how to leverage this — but it’s something I really want to do.

This one was just a general flop. It’s a matter of devotion and investment of time, and I just didn’t. Disappointing.

Be fit. Repeat the 1,500 miles, keep up the karate — and find a new Geek Diet tool. Get back under 200 by June, and to 185 by the end of the year. There are some things I can do toward that end (that are sustainable and rational); I just need to do them.

Mixed bag here. On the one hand, I did make the 1,500 miles (close but solidly), and kept up on the karate. On the downside, I didn’t find a better Geek Diet tool, and my year-end weight is actually (at 217) higher than it was last New Year.

Ditto for last year’s addendum, of course.

Well, I hope I’m being a good, supportive, helpful, loving husband. Margie still puts up with me, so I guess I’m doing something right.

So, what to do for this coming year?

I’m going to take for granted that I’m going to be an involved husband and father. No specifics I can think of to do with this.

  1. Be fit: A true cliché, I know, but … Continue with the 1,500 Miles to Nowhere program. Continue karate. And … yes, start tracking calories again, convenient tool or not. 200 lbs. by 1 June, 185 by the end of the year. Next year, no question about whether 36s need to be exchanged!
  2. Be photographically organized: Continue with the photography conversion and updating. All 2009 photos, four additional years at my discretion will get uploaded and online in a single place.
  3. Be blogically up to date:  Movable Type to the current version and all features working once again.
  4. Be genealogical: New! Get my genealogy research back up and running … one of those outstanding “projects” that never seems to quite get traction.

That’s a lot, frankly, given what seem to be constant conflicts for time. I’d say they’re in priority order, too, and my main focus will be back on #1.

I’m not putting in anything “creative” in there — writing per se is dropping off the list this year, given both track record, competition, and recognizing that I get at least some of that out through other venues. In a sense, all the items 2-4 employ some some measure of creativity (and writing), and that will have to do for the nonce.

Happy New Year!

  Welcome to 2009!…

 

Welcome to 2009!