Time Keeps on Slipping, Probably on Thumper's Cars

Almost every day this week, Thumper's only had one nap. One nap. That's two hours of time that just no longer exist. It's like when Mr. Dark is tempting Jason Robards in Something Wicked This Way Comes.

"Second nap? Two more hours every day to write blogs and to read them. To write copy. To do laundry and dishes. Second nap? Speak now. Going... Gone."

I'm dreading the day when he tears the page on that first nap.



(Jump to about 5:40 to see the moment without watching the whole scene.)

I'm getting caught behind. I haven't worked out all week because now that my pneumonia is resolved, I'm having bronchitis problems. Of course! I'm behind on a copywriting project. I'm behind on a database project. And I haven't posted anything to my silly blog in almost a week. I'm already sick of my new header up there, but I haven't had time to make a new one.

It's a good thing my main job contains a large concentration of fun and smiling and laughing, or I'd be feeling stressed out. I had a pulse of 64 and a blood pressure of 110/70 at the doctor today. That doesn't sound like a stressed out man, and I think it's mostly because Thumper consistently makes things easier than I expect them to be.

Exception: after a long day yesterday that started on campus picking up my new "Supervisor" uniform, then our first Austin-SAHDs playdate in almost a year, then a nap in the car, then babysitting the cousins, he was pretty much an emotional and exhausted wreck by the time we got home. I'm having trouble working on the timing of snacks and lunch these days when his one nap falls right across the meridian line between morning and afternoon. But on the plus side, an exhausted baby means: he fell asleep in the 10-minute car ride home from the doctor this morning. An early nap! So I have a pretty good chance of getting a second nap out of him this afternoon! Time! To work! And I'm squandering it on my silly blog! I best get to being all productive and whatnot...

Missives

Dear Starbucks Drive-Thru ("Thru!") Lady Who Probably Would Prefer To Be Called a Barrista:

When I order a large coffee with an extra shot of espresso, please refrain from coyly attempting to indoctrinate me into the Starbucks Culture by teaching me its language ("Oh. A Venti Red Eye?"). Just pour the damn coffee. I appreciate the obnoxiously strong coffee when I'm driving 200 miles in the dark, and I appreciate the drive-thru ("thru!") window when I'm accompanied by a baby I'd just as soon remained asleep. I think your size names are stupid (how is a Grande not a large?), and when I come around again in a few months because I'm once again driving 200 miles in the dark, I won't remember if it was a Red Eye or a Red Bull or a Twitching Eye or a Tropic Thunder, or what. Thanks.


Dear Dog Owners:

Thanks for making the park smell like shit. I really appreciate the Value-Added Experience.


Dear Grandfolks:

Thanks for having us yesterday. We both appreciated your three big tubs of toys.



And thanks for glossing over the murder and mayhem in Little Red Riding Hood.



You get grandparent bonus points.




Dear Thumper:

Thank you for once again surprising me with how well you can handle a potential difficult situation. You were a joy and a pleasure, even when you were forced to spend six-and-a-half hours in a car in one day, and I'm not sure how I got so lucky.

Oh, and also, thank you for trying to climb into the stroller this morning while asking, "Jog? Jog?" I was disinclined to workout today, since I was up so late and was feeling under-hydrated after drinking those two Venti Red Eyes last night. You gave me the little push I needed.

Oh, and also, after you fell asleep on said jog, when I was transferring you from the stroller to the crib, thank you for waking just long enough to croak "Grape!" like a man in the desert gasping for water. It really made my morning.

Your etc. etc.,
Rodius

Does This Mean I'm a Webmaster?

I'm giving up a revenue stream. My largest revenue stream, in fact, that counts for almost half the money I've made so far in 2008. And I'm doing it voluntarily. Wow, it kind of makes me nervous saying it out loud like that. What the hell am I thinkin'?

Anyway, if I'm going to flush thousands of dollars down the toilet, then I guess I better get serious about soliciting other work, the kind of work that I can do from home nights, weekends, and naps. (Naps! Don't get me started. We're inexorably marching toward one per day, I fear. Kid didn't go down until 11:00 a.m. today! And he didn't even seem that sleepy. But Daddy's got bloggin' to do, son.) So to that end (the soliciting work end, not the bloggin' end), I done made myself a website.

When I bought irodius.com, I also bought a couple of other domain names, with the intention of someday doing something with them. But the website of my domain name registrar and web hosting service is extremely tedious to look at, and not intuitive to use, and I didn't know what the hell I was doing, and it took me enough time and effort just to get irodius.com to work with irodius.blogspot.com, and I didn't have the time to invest in learning about hosting, and and and.

Well, this week I checked into their free hosting. I even put up a website, and then I realized why the hosting was free: they put an ad for their services right at the top of your pages. And if you use frames, which is what I originally experimented with, their ad shows up at the top of every frame, too. I ultimately decided against frames, but still, that ad at the top declaring that "this site is hosted for free by" just didn't strike me as the most professional look for someone soliciting work. So I bit the bullet and invested the $60 for a year's worth of hosting. So I hope I can get at least $60 worth of work out the thing.

I decided not to connect this site to that, though. Not only would my secret identity and that of my wife and son be revealed (though who knows; maybe they ain't that secret if someone really wants to know), but I wouldn't want the occasional foul language, poop talk, and my exposed political non-beliefs here to affect someone's decision to use or not use me in a professional capacity.

But if you need a Filemaker database solution, or have some audio you'd like transcribed, or maybe you have a web page or two for which you'd like some copy written, drop me a line. As a result of getting more intimately familiar with the hosting service's website, I actually setup my irodius.com email. I think I only ever got two legitimate emails to my irodius Yahoo address, but still. Now I have a real one. Email me! I'm rodius at irodius.com. I told Aerie she could have an irodius address too, but she was unimpressed. I don't think she realized that she's living with a genuine Webmaster. And small business owner with real business expenses to deduct this year. And blogger to almost a dozen people. I guess the brilliance of my internet stardom just doesn't dazzle her jaded eyes.

I Think I've Been Blessed

Leaving the Greater Stadium Area after working football, even though my legs and feet were sore and tired, I was in a particularly good mood for a couple of reasons. First, at the height of load-in, at the busiest moment when all the folks were coming in my gate, one of my bosses stood beside me and asked, "Does it always go this smoothly?" Why yes. Yes it does. Second, we were out of there with daylight still left instead of at 10 or 11 at night like the last two games, and I knew that both of my loves would still be awake when I got home.

As I approached my car, feeling beneficent toward the world, a presumably Crazy Homeless Man stood on the corner. He pointed with vehemence, with his entire arm, his entire body, at each car and pedestrian passerby. Then he put his palms together in front of his face and bowed. The he pointed with vehemence at the next passerby, and bowed again. He was roundly ignored.

When he pointed and bowed at me, though, I put my palms together in front of my face and bowed in return. He looked at me for a moment, then nodded with vehemence several times, as if a deeply held conviction had been confirmed. Yes, that nod said. Yes. Fucking-A. That's what I'm talking about. Yes! Then he waved at me, then pointed with vehemence at the next passerby.

Huh?

Fleet Foxes "White Winter Hymnal"

I was following the pack
All swallowed in their coats
With scarves of red tied 'round their throats
To keep their little heads from falling in the snow
And I turned 'round and there you go
And Michael you would fall
And turn the white snow red as strawberries in the summertime.

Why I Don't Talk About the Bailout

Here's another 100-Word Challenge from Velvet Verbosity. These are fun. I'd kind of forgotten about them, so I added VV to my blog roll to help me remember.

Moral

In 1992, Bruce Springsteen sang that there were fifty-seven channels and nothin' on. Now, only fifty-seven channels seems quaint. Provincial. Like how many you're allowed in England. Or France. Here, in America, the Greatest Nation on Earth, we're into the hundreds by now. At least. Maybe more. The cutting edge. 24-hour news channels. Passels of passionate pundits yelling at each other for their due while the crawl contradicts. The moral of the story is no moral, is passivity: we can do nothing because we can know nothing, because everybody knows something different. We are crushed beneath an avalanche of information.

Living Up to His Old Man's Athletic Legacy

I'm trying to teach my son to kick a ball. I say, "Kick it! Kick the ball! Kick it!" Then I kick it across the room. He looks at me blankly. I go get the ball. I say, "Kick it! Kick the ball! Kick it with your foot!" I wave my foot at him. "Foot! Kick it with your foot!" He squats down, grabs my toes, and says, "Toesh!"

"Yes," I say. "Toes. Kick it! Kick the ball with your toes!" I kick the ball across the room. "Toesh!" he says, and runs to retrieve it. He carries it back, holding it up. "Kick key!" he says and hands me the ball. I put it down. "Kick!" I say. "Kick it! Kick the ball! Kick it!" I grab his ankle and swing his foot into the ball. "Yay!" I cheer. "Good kick!" He runs after it. I think he has to get it now. He'll at least poke at it with his toe. No, he picks it up. He runs back to me, holding it up. "Kick key!" he says. "Kick key!"

Apparently I have taught my son that the name of that particular ball is "Kick It." Maybe he's more the musician type.