Talking to Myself Again

Murder in the Garden

Murder in the Garden, originally uploaded by Wally Hartshorn.

I took this photo on the same day as the previous one. It's on the other side of the same bush. Yes, the Japanese beetles are back in the area! Hopefully they won't be overly fruitful and multiply.

Actually, they're very nifty beetles. I had a large insect collection when I was younger, and I really liked these. Of course, I wasn't much concerned with gardening at the time, so my perspective was a little different.

Don't worry; the title of this photo is overly dramatic. It's merely assault and battery, so far.

Flower by our House

Flower by our House, originally uploaded by Wally Hartshorn.

These very large flowers were planted by the previous owner on either side of the garage door. They're beautiful! And we want to get rid of them! Seriously, the are gorgeous, but the plants are too big for that space, and they droop out over the driveway This will be more of an issue once we finally start parking both cars in the garage.

I Love Spring

Our redbud tree is in full bloom. One of many reasons why spring is my favorite season.

New Friends!

When I saw that the weather forecast for Thursday was 64 and sunny, I decided it would be a good time to use a vacation day so that I could enjoy the nice weather.

My hope was that we could do some yardwork and then spend some time at Lincoln Memorial Gardens. We succeeded in the first, but never got to the second. But that's okay, because we made a new friend!

While I was out in the driveway cleaning all of the trash out of the car (quite an undertaking!), I noticed a woman walking by with a young boy about Lando's age. They paused at the end of our neighbor's driveway, so I called Lando over and pointed them out, asking him whether he wanted to go over and say "hi". Lando always wants to greet anyone who walks by our house. Except for this time. For whatever reason, he suddenly decided that he wasn't interested. Luckily Dawn came out just at that moment, and after she pointed out that the little boy was playing in a puddle, Lando just as quickly decided that saying "hi" was a good idea.

The woman's name is Jessica and her son, Marshall, is 4 years old. He has an older brother, Jack, who is in kindergarten this year. While Lando and Marshall played in the puddle, Dawn and I talked with Jessica about raising kids, the joys of home ownership, and how we came to live in Springfield.

It turns out that Jessica used to live in Colorado, less than 20 miles from Manitou Springs where Dawn lived! And it turns out that her ex-husband grew up in Centralia, the same town where I grew up! Somehow or other, we've all wound up in Springfield, living within walking distance of each other.

Eventually the mini-playdate migrated to the front porch of our house, and we exchanged phone numbers with Jessica. It looks like we managed to actually find Lando a friend he could play with in the neighborhood! For that matter, perhaps a friend for Dawn and I as well.

It's amazing how having a kid can both isolate you from your old friends ("Sorry, too busy, Lando needs to go to bed early") and introduce you to possible new friends at the same time.

Games Night

Our friend Ann hosted a games night last weekend. That's right – we actually left the house and spent time with other adults!

Well, Dawn spent time with other adults, playing a game called Apples to Apples. I mainly spent the night downstairs playing pool with Lando.

I've no idea why Lando looks so forlorn here. I doubt it was anything Maddie said!

Notice Lando's shirt? That's right – Super Mario Brothers! Yes, he is a Nintendo child! He wins races in Mario Kart fairly regularly now and has actually made it through the first level (1-1) of Super Mario Bros. Wii. Lando and I spent most of the evening downstairs playing pool. Lando has enhanced the game of pool with his own custom rules, most of them taken from Nintendo games, including obstacles and boss monsters.

Also, notice the cat with the jack-o-lantern body in Lando's hands? That's Pumpkin. Notice the lack of Giraffe in Lando's hands? After 5 years at the top of the totem pole, Giraffe has finally been displaced by Pumpkin as the toy that Lando carries with him everywhere! We're not sure why, but perhaps it's because Lando's hands are now large enough that Giraffe's long-suffering neck was too skinny to be a comfortable fit. Whatever the reason, Pumpkin is now top cat!

Can you say "cute overload"? That's Anna on the left (Ann's daughter) and Maddie on the right (daughter of Donna, who is providing the lap for this meeting of toddler minds).

Aww!

Look! It's Cute Thing 1 and Cute Thing 2!

And that concludes this installment of "Little Kids Being Cute Just by Existing"!

Family Portrait

I'm not sure whether we've ever taken a real "family photo". Lando needed one for a preschool project, so we decided the fireplace would make a nice backdrop.

Lando is standing on the fireplace hearth; he's tall, but he's not that tall!

After we took this photo, Lando was sick, so he didn't go to preschool. Then there were 2 days when preschool was closed for a workshop and parent-teacher conferences. So it wasn't until more than a week later that we were finally able to get this photo to his teachers. I haven't seen the result yet.

Speaking of parent-teacher conferences, we met with Lando's teacher, Mrs. House, to find out how Lando is doing. The short version is he's doing great! She did say that he doesn't like to dance, which was no surprise to us. Whenever the kids are asked to perform something like "Itsy Bitsy Spider" or "I'm a Little Teapot" (or whatever it is the kids do these days), he doesn't want to do it. We've noticed the same thing at Funshop, as well as at the preschool holiday shows where the kids put on a performance.

So far, despite his high energy level and friendly nature, he is not interested in being a showman!

Artist in Residence

Here's Lando demonstrating his artistic talents in the area of painting. (This was actually from 2 weeks ago. I'm a little behind!)

A Paen to New Balance

I got some new shoes the other day. If you don't believe me, here's a photo:

Some of you (perhaps mainly those with a Y chromosome) might be wondering, "What was wrong with the old shoes? They don't look so bad." Others (perhaps mainly those with a matched pair of X chromosomes) might be wondering, "Why did you get a new pair of shoes that are exactly the same as the old pair of shoes?" A few of you are trying to remember what a chromosome is.

If this was a Scratch-n-Sniff photo, I would ask you to scratch the old shoes and take a whiff. (Actually, go ahead; you never know.) Yes, they reeked. Not, I hasten to add, because of my feet! Instead, they were apparently baptized at some point by one of our cats. I've no idea which one or when it happened, but for the last couple of months I had been noticing a slight scent of urine. I mainly noticed it at work. At first I thought it was my clothes. Then I realized that I mainly noticed it when I was sitting at my desk. The reason was that, while sitting down, I'm closer to my shoes!

After I realized what the problem was, we washed my shoes in the clothes washer. That was apparently a mistake, because they smelled much worse after that! I'm guessing that washing them just brought the scent back up to the surface.

So, for those of you wondering the first question, there's your explanation.

As for why I got the exact same type of shoes (New Balance 993's), this is at least the 5th pair that I've owned. Many many years ago, when I first began running, I was introduced to New Balance shoes. At the time, being a basketball player, I wore red Converse All Stars, just like pretty much everyone else. The first pair of New Balance running shoes I put on were a revelation: Shoes didn't have to weigh a ton and have soles with all of the shock absorption abilities of, uh, something that doesn't absorb shocks very well!

I don't recall what model my first New Balance shoes were. I remember they were a royal blue color. Later I began wearing New Balance 990's. Eventually New Balance discontinued the 990's and replaced them with the (nearly identical) 993's.

What can I say? I'm a creature of habit.

Besides, I love my New Balance 993's!

Okay, I'm done. I'm expecting a check from New Balance any day now.

P.S. I did notice one difference between the old 993's and the new ones: The old ones just say "New Balance" on the tongue of the shoe; the new ones also say "Made in USA". I consider that to be a somewhat nice selling point, while at the same time somehow funny. I'm not sure what that says about me.

P.P.S. Incidentally, when you wear size 15A, the Internet is a wonderful way to find shoes that fit!

Front Yard Winter Wonderland

Snow + hill + preschooler = sledding + snowman building = winter fun!

New camcorder + new video editing software + me = video.

We've had lots of snow this winter, but most of it has not been good for playing in. It's either been bitterly cold or deposited on top of sleet. However, on Valentine's Day the temperatures were near freezing, the earlier snow packed well, and the falling snow made everything even more magical. The music, "Walking in the Air" by George Winston, seemed appropriate.

(Note to myself: Ten years from now, when my surly teenage son barely even grunts at me, remember to watch this video.)

Snow Tennis

On Sunday evening, Lando declared that he wanted us to take him to the tennis courts next to Funshop (in Lincoln Park) so that we could play tennis. The high that day was 48°F. Strangely enough, we weren't especially eager to do this.

However, we would be going to Funshop on Monday to pick up the materials for the new session (which will begin on Feb 4), so I told him that we could play a bit of tennis then. True, it would be cold, but I knew that he would only want to play for about 5 minutes anyway.

I was wrong.

Worse than that, not only was it much colder (well below freezing) and dark, but we also had ice, snow, and wind to go with it. Perfect tennis weather!

I'm not sure how long we were out there, but it was at least 30 minutes, perhaps more. Long enough for Dawn to go inside the Funshop building, complete all of the necessary activities, then come back out and join us for a bit more tennis.

Lando plays tennis on our Nintendo Wii regularly. One of the activities involves hitting a tennis ball at a wall, so Lando wanted to be sure to do that. Incidentally, he's actually using a badminton racket, because he prefers it over (heavier) tennis rackets. Perhaps this will be a new trend in tennis!

One advantage to playing tennis at night in the middle of a snow/ice storm is that you don't have to wait for an open court. You have your choice of any of them. Or, if you prefer, all of them!

Lando originally was playing behind the backcourt, just like he's seen tennis players do on TV (and on the Wii). Luckily I was able to convince him that he was better off playing a little closer to the net.

"Lando, Mommy's frozen solid, so we should probably go home now."