Microbe Manager

So this has been the end of our week. Eight ounces of cough medicine, three hundred twenty-six tissues, two cans of chicken noodle soup, two checks for fever, and probably not an hour on the little hand where we weren't up for one of the two kids. Ryan had another up-at-1:25 couldn't breathe-and-upset-about-it coughing cement sinus fit, maybe thirty minutes after Ainsley had been up with Erin, or as I like to call her, Big Ben, bleating every hour on the hour. I had mistakenly taken NyQuil Friday night, which meant I was about as loopy as a ferris wheel when Ainsley asked me to try with her. I leaned up against the cold wall in the hallway, listening in, and, hearing nothing, I returned to bed, where she instantly started crying (Erin, not Ainsley, though she must have been close herself). That was Friday night. Saturday night, Erin was up from 1 till past 3, having to break a fever. I was finally able to get her to stay asleep in her crib, with the hands-on approach: put her down, and although she protests, if I'm lucky, she goes right back to sleep, with me holding a hand on her head and another on her belly or legs, just to let her know I'm still there. After a count to thirty or so, I'm able to start pulling one hand away, then the other, and finally get to straighten my back up and tiptoe away.
Perhaps she should get the NyQuil next cold.

To show how much the emphasis has been on the desnotting our children, today at breakfast Ainsley and I were getting sick of Ryan answering every request/command/question with "no." So I busted out a "Seinfeld" line on him: "You know what you can do with your 'no's? You can stuff 'em in a sack!"
"No," Ryan said. "You BLOW it."

The one saving grace is that each morning, and each afternoon, when Ainsley was able to get some zzzzs, I got to spend time with Erin, or both kids, by myself, which is a rarity. It was fun to hang out and watch cartoons and Def Leppard videos and eat Cheerios and practice crawling. I even busted out the ol' college-era synthesizer, letting both kids slap away the keyboard.

At any rate, the weekendendended on a high note, with the Redskins whupping up a can of openass on the Dallas Cowspurts. For the first time all weekend, Erin celebrated by actually sleeping through her first REM cycle.

Twiggy

Erin had a slightly belated 9-month checkup Thursday, and despite the required shots, she performed (and exists) beautifully, per the nurse practitioner. I forget the numbers exactly, but she's in the 75th percentile for height and the 25th percentile for girth.
Beach Volleyball?
America's Top Model?
Giraffe Masseuse?
Atomic Scientist Able To Reach Bunson Burners Up on the Top Shelf?

The possibilities, they are endless.

Update: 29 inches, 17 pounds.

Mucus To My Ears

Ryan has his second cold in as many months, and though I was able to battle away the three-pronged family plague that hit everyone last time, this one has landed square in my membrane. It was if I literally swallowed a bug -- I was feeling fine all day yesterday, I get home, Ainsley says Ryan has a cold, and right away my throat started to hurt.
Tried to go to bed 'early', but just as I was dozing off, Ryan woke up with a coughing/crying fit of asthmatic hysteria, choking out a phlegmmy jellyfish onto my chest that looked like the cheese on a pizza commercial.
Then my alarm went off at midnight, since Ryan has Happy Hands and likes to push buttons.
Then Erin was up two, maybe seven times, who knows, before the garbage truck arrived at 5:01.
Okay, Ainsley knows.
Ryan was a little better tonight, and better behaved, too. He gets to the hyper/rude/toddler point where we're just angry with him all the time, and it's exhausting. Yell at him, Erin starts crying. I can see the good in our little Darth from time to time, though: last night he was bouncing around on the changing table, swatting, being loud, saying 'no' an awful lot, when I told him he had something new in his knickknack shelf. He blew it off, yeah, I know, the little plane pin, seen it, whatever. "No, not the plane -- something you haven't seen before."
He stopped dead, and the most beautiful smile came over his face while he scanned the little boxes for something new. "Where?" he asked in a small whisper, like a kid hearing about Santa Claus for the first time. I handed him the "Friendship Pin" from my last TDY, with an American and Turkish flag set next to each other. We discussed how the latter had a crescent moon like the one on his wall. And he was all "May I please" the rest of the night.
To top off the fun, Erin crawled a good four or five knee-steps (towards the Russian churches music box in the middle of the floor), then watched and giggled and swung around on her haunches trying to keep Ryan, jogging around with his duvet as a cape, in full view.
I'm off to down some NyQuil.

Dr. Suss

Okay, what the hell is this thing, anyway?

I've seen it alternately described as a dog, a leopard, a bear, and a 'silly animal'.

It's rather "Baloo"-esque, only with the long tail of a jungle cat, but the red spots of not one.

It looks diseased, like how things get the flu on old Bugs Bunny cartoons. Are there new Bugs Bunny cartoons?

And what the hell is this "violet" thing, anyway, halfway through after turning blue, orange, and green? It's PURPLE, I'm trying to teach my son, people, er, "Robert." Violet's a poetry flower. The dude's spots are purple. Not even purtle anymore, now that my son has grown out of that. Though his yellows are still pretty 'lellow.

The Fantastic Four

Finishing up a three-day weekend, courtesy of the boss letting me take back some time lost prepping for my last TDY. The good news is I've stopped dreaming about the trip, which had started to permeate every molecule of my soul. The bad news is that I've started dreaming about running for president (I concluded that despite the fact that Obama couldn't remember the words he was kareokeing to, I didn't stand a chance but might become Secretary of Defense and wondered if I were too young), and being on the receiving end of a WWII-era bombing raid when I was happily sitting by the pool with Eric.
Tink, tink, said the bomb that landed, but did not explode, next to the jeep about twenty-five feet behind me.
Anyhoo.
Friday we had a "do" at the Canadian Attache's house, and Ainsley got to come thanks to the brave and talented child-handling skills of one of her friends. I was glad she got to meet some of the folks I work with, as well as a bunch of the attaches.
Ainsley had appointments Saturday morning, so I spent a good four hours with the kids myself, out at Fair Oaks Mall, getting fruit cups and chicken nublets into both, after having to almost give up on the whole adventure when I couldn't figure out how to open the stoopit stroller and Ainsley was temporarily away from her cell phone.
After naps, I suggested we walk down treacherous Smoketown With No Sidewalks to a new playground by a lake with a fountain and geese. More just a playset than a playground, it was still a lovely evening, hanging out in the grass eating freeze-dried apple chips, toes tickling the grass. Just in love with my family. Just happy.
Sunday I met some new friends of Ainsley who have two sons close to our kids' ages who hail from Alaska and yet still love Mexican food. Their eldest has two enormous stuffed animals, which Erin seemed to appreciate. Not that that's a gift idea hint. We already have enormous stuffed animals, with heartbeats and drool.
Today was another Daddy With the Kids day, and we hung out in Occoquan and ate pizza and fed cheerios to the aquafowl. We hooked back up for dinner, going out for some spicy meat that we told Ryan was called "chili."
So he shivered.

Stuck on Sis

Ryan has a crush.

I was singing "I Feel Pretty" at the dinner table the other night (as you do), and Ryan decided to join in:

The Tough Bewhiskered Testosterone-y Manager of War Paternal Household Unit: "Who's the pretty girl in that window there...who can that attractive girl be-eee?..."

Ryan (sing-songy): "Errr-innn..."

This particular attractive girl turned 9 months old on Tuesday. When properly motivated, she will crawl across the carpet. Say, to grab her mother's cell phone when the funny jingle/vibrate song comes on.

You know, I could have waited an entire decade before having her interested in cell phones.

A Cup of Metal

A private person by heart, I can think of only one location in the past 22 years where I've gotten to know my neighbors, if you don't count college dorm rooms (Hi, Milissa and Tom & Janet up in North Dakota!). Perhaps it's just my inherent transient nature, spurred on by the fact that we've always been the new people on the block. I'm sure if I ever got new neighbors we'd be the first one out with the welcome beers. Woman who stopped by with cookies after we moved in? BFF. Person across the street with the broken basketball hoop and screechy tweens keeping my kids up during nap time? Don't be expecting Christmas Cards, because your name escapes me.
As it is, in a cul de sac of six houses, I only know two people. After over 4 years. Although one of the people's dogs I know. Tully. But don't commit that name to memory, because Griffin is bound to eat her any second now, once her untethered curiosity of our patio refrains from being cute.

At any rate, I'm happy with my insular, protective ways, but appreciate that I at least do know somebody in the case of an emergency, like tonight, when the piece of crap Specialty Southpaw Can Opener I bought my wife two months ago stopped working, rusted and immobile like a miniature recently unimmersed Titanic. I was in charge of making dinner for the rest of my family, arriving in just five minutes, and dammit They Will Have Peas.
I called Ainsley's phone for advice, but she directed me to a backup postage stamp-sized little metal hinge with a point on one end with a name like P-36 or something, which Army people used to open cans of sardines in the Spanish-American War. No, dammit, I'm not going to go poking willy nilly until the tin becomes whiffled enough to leak out the ingredients. This is the 21st century.
So I stomped across the cul de sac in my socks, knocked on the door, and throist the can upon Matt. "Would you please open this?"
Bless his heart, he tried to twist it open in mock superhuman strength, but reverted to a regular can opener, something I can't even provide for my family.
This is why, as I've said many times, vegetables are bad for you.

A Sight For Sore Feet

Suffice it to say, I did not screw the turkey.
Which was an office joke for there you had to have been, but it’s still rather relevant. After several weeks of planning and some late nights and weekends and missing my children learning to crawl and going into Kindergarten, a near-flawless Counterpart Visit was executed by me and my office cohort.

Remembabouttit
Thanks to Ex-Hurricane Hannah, I woke up not only with a newly arrived houseguest (who had been stranded at Dulles) but to a message from my Airline saying how sorry they were for the inconvenience of canceling my flight until the next day. So there’s transportation issue #1. I quickly called and rescheduled with another airline from another airport, then hydroflew up the Fairfax County Parkway in a driving rain just in time for boarding. Don’t think I’ve been to JFK for thirty-four years, and don’t care if I don’t go back again until 2042. What a mess. But after greeting my guests, I caught a tab, which is the neither a taxi or a cab, but I’m typing quickly so let’s just stick with it, with a TV and GPS in the backseat that helped pass the time into Manhattan. I LOVE this century.
The lobby of the Hyatt at Grand Central Station was lovely, though the room was rather ordinary. I met up with an old ex-AF friend for dinner and a movie (! What’s that?), enjoying the purple heck out of “The Dark Knight”. Only the second flick I've seen all year.
The next day was beautiful, so I strolled around and had a small breakfast sandwich and cup of tea in the middle of Times Square, before heading to LaGuardia to start The Official Trip on our Official Aircraft, a luxurious C-9 that looked like a mini Air Force One.
After a dinner at The Chart House in Alexandria overlooking the Potomac, we settled into our VIP hotel rooms on Bolling AFB, used for all visiting generals. Truly the biggest, nicest billeting I’ve ever been in (a four-star general was a recent guest in my unit).

Just Capital
Days like this made all the tough preparation time worth it. An honors ceremony at the Air Force Memorial, complete with 16-piece band, two honor guard flights, a wreath-laying ceremony, a drummer and bugler playing “Taps”. Just spellbounding to be a part of. Took our party around to meetings and briefings in the Pentagon the rest of the day, before heading to the Chief of Staff’s residence to help out with the dinner (I was not an official invitee, but I still got to eat a heavenly piece of Sea Bass back in the kitchen). After dessert, the efforts of the chef and support staff (us included) were graciously recognized by the Chief, and then gifts were exchanged after a few songs from an AF Celtic Quartet. Just an amazing night to end and incredible day.

Date ‘n Ambassador

A short flight to Wright-Patterson AFB in Ohio started the morning, including the best hashbrowns I’ve ever eaten, plane or no plane. Crunchy as cracker jacks without being burnt. (Part of my job was selecting all the in-flight meals.) Eggs with cheese and onion, tea, a fruit cup…it was just a thrill to be eating on a plane, let alone with cloth napkins and metal utensils.

Took the troupe for whirlwind tours of my old Academic Stomping Ground at AFIT, the AF Research Lab, and the National Museum of the USAF, to include a catered lunch (an awesome salad with grilled chicken) in a VIP room overlooking the “Early Years” exhibit with dirigibles and WWI aircraft hung from the ceiling. Headed back to DC to visit the Embassy, then a quick change into suits to go to the Ambassador’s house, and when I say house, I mean castle. I need to learn how to ambass. The dogs would SO love living in a place like that.
I de-invited myself from the dinner, since per tradition only the principals attend, so I hung out looking all important in my suit with the security folks out front and bantered about for three hours while others watched DVDs or grabbed some chow in Dupont Circle.

Criss Cross’ll Make Ya

The long day from Bolling to Andrews to Langley to Peterson to Nellis started out in a comical way, with the 22-bag luggage vehicle not starting (transportation issue #2), forcing us to call an audible and throw the suitcases into the airmen’s three personal cars and hope they could make it onto the flightline without molestation. Briefings and tours at Air Combat Command preceded a 3.5-hr flight to Colorado Springs’ Space Command, where cool breezes keeping clouds just nibbling at the top of Pikes Peak tickled the cockles of my loinage. Or something. After a few short Get Ta Know Us briefings, we were back on the plane to head to Las Vegas, the westward sun keeping everyone going a little longer. Helped out by the homemade spinach-n-artichoke dip.
It was a bit of a cluster getting everyone and our bags into our hotel (The Palazzo, attached to The Venetian) but the room was amazing, 5-star luxuries with a two giant Plasma TVs, a smaller one in the bathroom, glass shower doors, remote-control curtains, chocolate water, gold-laced toilet paper, and live baby seal slippers.
A dinner by a waterfall at the Wynn Hotel next door was just so-so (more presentation than substance; ended up cracking up at my dessert plate when it was placed in front of me), then we battled Strip Traffic to go catch one of the Bellagio Water Jet Shows before letting our guests throw some money into a slot machine, just to say They Had Done It. We went to bed around 1:30am, East Coast Time.

I-15ED

Received briefings all day at various Nellis sites (USAF Warfare Center, Weapons School, Red Flag, UAV simulator), then tried to head back to our hotel, but the left-rear tire of our bus had to go and explode on the Interstate, leaving us slightly delayed (T.I. #4) but injury-free. We had a wonderful dinner at Pinot Brasserie in a semi-private room (windows looked out into the alternately slutty or shabbily dressed walking by) and then took in a Las Vegas Spectacle in the form of the nautically odd and bombastic “Le Reve” (French for “The Freaky-Ass Dream”), a Cirque-Du-Soleil-esque romp that had some pretty cool stunts, water gymnastics, and aerial bungee-tastic effects, but also had very weird characters (frog-men, goblins, un-comedic men in comic relief wearing white tuxes and wings). The scantily clad wet women were offset by the even scantilier wet bald men who seemed in greater abundance, and the music was just a smidge over the top. I’m still debating how it went over with our guests.

My Agent Vinny

Hello, Topeka, said our aircraft during a mid-country refueling stop, before landing in a pouring-down LaGuardia airport. The local OSI agents had arranged for our transportation to supplement the luggage and passenger vans I'd rented, since we don't have a military base to draw from up there. Pretty cool to be in a six-vehicle convoy, lights flashing, snaking from lane to lane, until our snake skidded into the back of the SUV in front of us (thankfully with no passengers), denting the heck out of the grill. (T.I. #5) We barely had times to plop our bags on our opulent, historical, but smallish Waldorf Astorial beds before needing to change into suits again and accompany the group to the UN Ambassador's residence in the Upper East side, though I was again forced to thumb-twiddle outside.
Saturday the clouds cleared, allowing us to enjoy DV access to the 102nd floor of the Empire State Building, with clear views up and down the island. Many grins all around. A shopover at Macy's was all that was left before having to say our verbal chestbumps back at JFK, where I waited until I saw the status of the flight change from "Final Call" to "Away from Gate" to, sigh of relief, "Departed."
T.I. #6, however, forced my 7:10 flight not to leave until 8:45, so I didn't get home until 11:30. Blistered ankles from new and dressy shoes all week, tired bones from being constantly on the go for seven days, it was so wonderful to relax the next day with two little munchkins who sport an uncanny resemblance.
Still, I'm stunned by how, dare I say, 'easy' the trip was. But six weeks of planning had me knowing the schedule cold, and, once arranged, it was simply just pulling back on the matchbox car and letting it go. The folks at the outbases went out of their way to accommodate us.
And I get to do it all over again in six weeks.
I'll be breaking in my shoes in the meantime.

Jimmy got crappy gas mileage

And I don't care.

The last two months, my average gas mileage has plummeted 5-9 mpg.
However, the last two months, I've gassed up exactly: twice.
All due to my incredible lack of driving since early July, slugging to work most days, or even just toodling ten miles up the road to the Metro stop, not allowing my car to warm up enough to turn the battery on...maybe just as I'm pulling into the park'n'slug lot. It'll get worse in the colder weather. We usually drive the minivan on weekend, so the Hybrid just doesn't get much of a workout. But compare the last three summers (early June to early September):

2006: 4,615 miles traveled, 14 fillups, spending $444.47 at an average cost of $2.84
2007: 3,858 miles traveled, 11 fillups, spending $346.41 at an average cost of $2.69
2008: 1,546 miles traveled, 5 fillups, spending $225.45 at an average cost of $3.72

Granted, I was driving back and forth to Norfolk all summer in 2006, but still. Fortuitous timing letting someone else's fingers do the walking, as it were, with gas prices so stratosphophical.

Worker's Comp

Took a hard briefcase to the quad this morning just after exiting the Metro. Pinhead. If I had any time at all to exercise, this would be upsetting. As it is, the only athletics in my life involve taking the recycling out to the end of the driveway.

Unless typing counts. Worked each part of the three-day weekend, with the only consolation being that I didn't have to wake up early or be concerned with personal hygiene much, being the only one in the office. Get a lot accomplished when the phone's not ringing, e-mails aren't popping up, and new Metallica is streamable. "Day That Never Comes." Check it out.

I've also done some deadlifting, in the form of a twenty-five inch female baby person, whomst I have been able now three times to get to sleep and put to bed. It's that tricky transition from crook of my arm-to hand-to bed. Iffy proposition, but great when it works. Saturday morning, after being up an hour with Ainsley, I took over at 6 and got her to sleep right away. I didn't want her to risk waking back up and stirring the household, so I just wandered around for fifteen minutes and then sat in the chair with her an hour. A fast, quiet, peaceful hour, still unfortunately thinking about work. Also naked people. The mind tends to wander.

Beyond the three days this weekend, I've been averaging a get-home time somewhere between 6:30 and 7:30 (and leaving earlier and earlier, ~6:15), so that blows. I don't like how surprised my son is to see me at the end of the day. I don't like that the only spousal conversations I can have are in whispers after we've gotten the kids down and every finger crossed that they'll stay that way. I do like that my wife is crazy cool and supports my silly devotion to duty. My boss promised me some 'comp' time. I told him, "My wife thanks you."