Lasagna

Our friends from the bookstore came over this afternoon/evening for dinner: my repertoire is obviously becoming limited, since we fed them something we've given them before, possibly even this year.
Now, granted, they are family (in all but bloodline) and we have them over almost every week, but still, to be repeating menus already is rather distressing. The flip side is, of course, that lasagna, with freshly made noodles, is rather wonderful. And they don't seem to object:-)

Yours, using my noodle,
N.

Time with Skibo

Since LOML and Boo were away today (and tomorrow), Skibo and I had a chance to have some nice time together. We had one of his friends over for dinner --- we made pizza, which was nice --- and then we all sat and watched Pinocchio together. A lovely time was had by all. And since he was up a little, but only a little, later than usual, he went to sleep reasonably quickly and easily.

Tomorrow morning we'll take Monty for a long walk, and then get to making lasagna for dinner:-) And listen again to lots of loud rock music --- he has become insistent over the past couple of days that he wants to listen to wild rock music --- by which I believe that he means electric guitar played fast and loud. Time to dig out some old 70's albums....

Yours, enjoying the one-on-one time for a little while,
N.

Two budding photographers

LOML and I have been discussing for months getting Boo and Skibo their own decent point-and-shoot cameras: we'd bought an awful one for Boo a couple of years ago, and even though the pictures it took were terrible quality, it brought her a great deal of enjoyment. And now Skibo's the age she was when she got it, so last week I went online and bought two cameras: identical, of course (essential with children!) except for colours (I hate colour coding by gender, but he wanted blue, and likewise she wanted red...)
So this afternoon, after the cameras arrived, they spent a good while going round the garden, taking pictures of feet, plants, hula hoops and more.

The most amazing thing about all this? In a period of a few minutes, Boo took enough photographs to take up twice the amount of memory that I had on the hard drive of my first laptop, fifteen years ago.

Yours, happy they're snappy,
N.

By and large, comparisons between "now" and the novel "1984" tend to fall flat, since the novel was designed to be a parable --- a description of how terrible things could become if society was willing to let it all go bad:.

But this seems to be a reasonable comparison. Which to me says that the current situation must be unreasonably bad.

Yours, being unreasonable, I'm sure,
N.

Privateers

Ron Paul needs to change his name. Then he'd have a ready-made theme song.

In response to the problems being posed by piracy, Paul is apparently suggesting that the US government issue letters of marque, commissioning privateers to go and take out the pirates.

Stan Rogers, in perhaps his best known song, Barrett's Privateers, addressed this issue. Of course, as a theme song it would suck: it tells of a crippled privateer,

"now I'm a broken man on a Halifax pier, the last of Barrett's privateers".

Still, sometimes any anthem is better than none. So, here's to Ron Paul becoming Ron Barrett.

Yours, privately,
N.

Dolphins are our friends

I like this story!

Yours, a huge fan of dolphins,
N.

Burnout

As always at this time of the year I am beginning to feel burned out. The semester has another week or two to go before exams, and in both the high level research course and the folding course I'm feeling uninspired to come up with new material. I will do so, of course, but I'd be happy if they snowed us out for the next two weeks.
I'm definitely in need of the couple of weeks break I'll get before the summer gets crazy: and then I get 13 weeks of hectic, counting down to the beach in August. I think I'll just hibernate for the two coming weeks:-)

Yours, burned, but not blistered,
N.

Prefering Boo's development to Skibo's

Skibo is, at the moment, going through an "all boy" development phase: lots of running, shouting, banging, hitting, etcetera. Boo is jumping further and further into reading. I prefer the latter to the former.

Mind you, I gave her an additional incentive today: she had a magician come to school this morning, and enjoyed the tricks tremendously. So I mentioned, just off-handedly, that once she can read well enough she'd enjoy finding my books about how to do magic tricks....

Looking forward to more magic from them both, especially when Skibo's worked through this phase,
N.

Baking again

For the first time in well over a week I pulled out the yeast and flour: and this time, a number of other ingredients -- allspice, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and raisins, and baked some hot cross buns. Yes, I realise that traditionally I should have baked these on Good Friday, not Easter Sunday, but I didn't have the time or energy Friday, and I did today.
LOML pronounced them the best hot cross buns ever --- or at least here. Truth be told, I thought that they were pretty good too.

Yours, crossing another item off my list,
N.

Bad influences

We had friends over for dinner this evening -- nice people, and we don't see enough of them. But this evening we were reminded of just how much of a bad influence their children can be on ours. Ours, of course, you'll realise if you've been reading for a while, are absolutely perfect. Except for when they are not. But this evening, in response to playing with their friend, they've adopted his habits and even now are bouncing off the walls instead of going to sleep.
Most distressing. And LOML and I are ready for a ridiculously early night, and this is getting in the way.

Oh well.

Yours, ready for sleep before my children are,
N.

Tornadoes

My sympathies this evening are especially with those affected by the tornadoes in Tennessee and elsewhere. We had the tail end of the storms brush by us --- giving drenching rain and a stunning light and noise show for a couple of hours or so --- but fortunately without the twisters.

Yours, in sympathy,
N.

Another round of congratulations

To Dr-to-be E.S., who successfully defended a lovely dissertation this afternoon, has a great job lined up, I send my warmest congratulations!

Yours, happy to celebrate,
N.

Doomed. We're doomed.

I had hope that it would never come to this. LOML and I tried so hard to prevent it from happening. But yesterday we succumbed, and henceforth we are doomed.

Yes, Boo has a Barbie(TM) doll. With "cuttable" hair (it attaches with little plastic snaps, which can be detached using a special pair of "scissors"). Said hair remained completely untangled for at least ten minutes after the package arrived in the house, and for several minutes even after the package was opened.

Of course, the opposite of "completely untangled" is not "completely tangled", and it hasn't quite reached that stage yet. Several hours to go before then, I suspect.

Oh well. We fought a good fight. Boo won.

Yours, defeated,
N.

My superpowers have been stripped away

My superpowers have been stripped away from me, my cape hung up to attract moths, my stockings donated to worthy causes (destitute bank robbers, probably). I have been reduced to a mere mortal again.

Yes, my designated parking spot expired this afternoon. As of tomorrow, if I wish to park within a five minute walk of the office, I will have to resort to mere mortal talents: getting to the office before 7:23. And staying there (except for the openings at 11:27) until at least 3:30. It makes for a late lunch, but what the heck -- I get to park!

Yours, rejoining humanity,
N.

The zoo

To the zoo today, with children on spring break. Lots of fun for all.
Unfortunately, we got back into town and my sinuses closed up again. Definitely something in the air in town, I'd say.

Yours, taking the day off blogging while clogged,
N.

The end of nuclear weapons?

It is a nice goal. And I think that is is clear that Obama is correct: if the world is to be rid of nuclear weapons, then the US will have to take the leading role. I can see almost infinite difficulties, but I can also see hope, and perhaps a few faint paths that could be trod to get there from here.
And without the attempt, it is certain that we won't get there. And with North Korea and other nations at the moment, it looks like getting there would lead us to a better future than the alternatives.

Yours, hoping we can lead,
N.

Blocked sinuses make me cranky

Cranky, tired, and tired and cranky.

Yours, stuffed,
N.

The piano

The piano is a success so far.
Not in terms of the amount of music that has been made (unless you count my tapping out nursery rhymes with occasional easy chords) (which I don't).
But yesterday, LOML, who has never played the piano, figured out how to tap out a tune, and Boo and Skibo are accepting of the idea that they should try playing a scale, or a chord, etc for a few minutes before they get to play with all the cool sound effects (seriously? gunshots? helicopters?) for a few minutes more. And so, three out of the four of us can now manage to "play" Twinkle Twinkle Little Star relatively correctly, and reasonably smoothly. And Skibo will get there soon enough:-)

Yours, all keyed up,
N.

A lovely child

Boo is a trip sometimes. She can be such a pain, but then on occasion she makes up for it all and more.
This evening, Skibo was being the pain. Royal PITA pain. We were sitting playing (with) the piano before bedtime, taking turns at the keyboard. And it was Boo's turn, so I asked him to wait for her to be done: she immediately offered to let him on at once, but he'd already stormed off in a huff and was tantruming out on his bed. So she went in, and immediately started to try to comfort him, gently trying to help him out of his snit, really trying hard to make him happy. For a six year old, she's an amazing armchair psychologist.
Not that she got him out of the snit, mind you: but at least he stopped screaming!

Yours, proud of my little girl,
N.

A good day

My promotion took another step forward this afternoon: I met with the Dean, who kicked the process upstairs, with a positive recommendation. Only three more levels of the process to go.
I rushed home from that meeting to pick up Boo and head to the art exhibit, in which I had entered a piece of origami. I took third place in the category, which is nice (there were three pieces entered, but the other two were by students of mine, and I am much happier for them to finish ahead of me!)
Finally, after snatching what should have been a quick bite to eat but wasn't (thanks to the local bar and "grille"'s efficiency) I rushed off to supervise the rowing team's election. And this year, they finished in time for me to be home before midnight(!) unlike last year.

And that was just the part of the day after I left the office!

Yours, looking forward to relaxing next week,
N.