I was looking at some old links I’ve saved on del.icio.us and stumbled across the Freakonomics blog. One of today’s posts caught my eye.
While I do have a small urge for a pizza dinner tonite (here’s looking to the end of Passover tonite) I can’t say I’d ever be the one paying $731 for a Pizza.
This past Sunday Ari, Simeon and I joined some friends in celebrating the Swedish pseudo-holiday of Waffle Day. At some point, conversation turned to a writing assignment given to the 7th grade students of one of our friends. Another friend at the table actually came up with the topic – Design a new elective for your school.
Apparently the topic selecter, now having the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, would have liked a course on ‘basic life skills’. It wasn’t until later that night that I remembered a 5th grade class event that is exactly what he described.
In 5th grade, my class spent a few weeks preparing for a day at Exchange City. I didn’t realize at the time just how lucky I was to have access to this. Looking at their site, even today there’s still only 21 of these operating throughout the US.
Basically, Exchange City is a miniature town run by kids. Everybody has a job that earns them a paycheck. After taxes, they are left with their spending money with which to go around to the stores and cafe to buy stuff. We had a city mayor (elected beforehand if I recall correctly). People were written up for breaking city laws. Too many citations (or a citation for a more serious offense) and you stood in front of a judge. For those running a business, they had to take out loans for startup. Accountants had to understand payroll and balancing the books. We had a radio station, newspaper, printers, gift shop and more.
It really was a lesson in basic life skills.
I was the accountant at one of the stores, which meant I was in charge of payroll. So, at noon, when I’m ready to go out to lunch (just like everybody else) I have people lined up waiting for their paycheck.
Lesson Learned? If you are willing to accept one last task, as many people as possible will take advantage of it. Once that happens you can practically forget about leaving on time – or leaving at all.
Definitely a good life lesson to learn early.
Posted in Education, Reflection
Last weekend, Ari and I purchased a new Burley D’Lite bicycle trailer for Simeon (after failing to transport an older model we could have borrowed). Then we watched all week as it rained and snowed.
Today, having turned out to be quite nice, Ari finished getting the trailer set up and then took Simeon out for a trial run before dinner.
I think his face says it all.
Random blog title for a bunch of random thoughts. Here’s hoping this a decent update having been so long since my last post. I will work on posting more often…
I thought we were getting the latest photos up, but they seem to not be there. Once they’re up I can show the new table we bought for Simeon. He’s now sitting a table for meals rather than in a high chair. Getting to be a big boy.
Within the last month and a half at least 2 molars have come in. I can never see his bottom teeth, but I have seen 2 molars on the top.
Work is plugging along. Been quite busy recently and I’ve been working a few nights. Waiting for more QA resources, but with everybody so busy and the need to clarify how the QA team should be organized, it seems to get pushed. Nothing new – unfortunately.
Last weekend we had plans to go on a bike ride with Simeon. On Saturday we stopped by the house of a friend’s brother to pick up a trailer only to find that we couldn’t collapse it to fit in the car. So, rather than biking on Sunday, we spent time researching and buying a new trailer. At least this one fits in the car and should last quite awhile.
We at least didn’t let the day go to waste. Especially with the one nice day of weather. There’s a mountain with a load of trails about 10 minutes from the house. We chose a 2.5 mile hike with 600 feet of elevation gain. More of a workout than I expected – Simeon has gained quite a lot of weight since our last hike. Ari carried him the way up, I carried him the way down. My legs felt it the next day – though luckily not too much.
Speaking of weather. Tuesday was supposed to be the first day of spring. Spring means sun and sprinkles, but that’s not what I came home to Tuesday night. First I saw the trees along I-90 – covered with snow but only rain hitting the windshield. The closer to home I got the thicker the rain became. By the time I was parking in the garage big, fat snowflakes were falling and anything green had a layer of snow.
Anyway. Time to get back to things. New pictures should be up soon. I’ll make a note when they’re there.
It’s official – the winter wind storm shall from henceforce be known as the Hanukkah Eve Wind Storm of 2006.
They note a few of other submissions. I wonder how many Colbert fans submitted “Stephen T. Colbert Wind Storm of Truthiness”.
Posted in Channukah, News, Winter Storm
Tuesday night is my game night. After work, Simeon and I meet Ari at a sushi place before going next door to play games. Tonite, I got there before Ari and stopped in to say hi to people – noting I’d be back in 45 minutes or so. 30-45 minutes later, I pay for dinner and go next door, only to find the group started a 2-3 hour game only 15 minutes earlier (too late to join, and too early to wait for another game). I ask Ari to take Simeon and I follow him out of the parking lot, a bit upset and disappointed.
Until I get past Issaquah, that is. It’s snowing. Huge flakes. Directly into the windshield. Making it very difficult for me to see the road. I’m going 20 miles under the speed limit the rest of the way home. Considering I’ve been worried about the front alignment of my car this last week, I’m pretty nervous driving on the interstate. Get even more nervous as I head up the last hill to my house and find the snow is sticking (amazingly more-so on the parkway than in the alley behind the house).
Thank goodness they started the game without me.
Thank goodness Simeon was the safer car.
Here’s hoping that I can at least go to work tomorrow. Simeon can go to daycare and I can keep my appointment for an alignment check.
Posted in Games, Winter Storm
Ari is a big Dr. Who fan. In fact, Tegan is named after one of the Doctor’s companions. A couple years ago, they brought the show back with a new doctor. In an episode from last season, they even brought back an old campanion – Sarah Jane Smith (who looks remarkably like Battlestar Galactica President Laura Roslin).
This weekend we discovered two relatively new spin-off series. The Adventures of Sarah Jane Smith and Torchwood (which I just discovered is an anagram of Doctor Who).
Ari is already hooked on Torchwood.
Posted in Television
A hug and kiss from a lion – how sweet!
Weekend before last, while Ari and I were solving puzzles, Simeon spent the weekend with D&J. I was quite nervous the night before – mostly about how the night would go…
As I figured, my worries were for naught. He did get upset a couple times when he realized mommy and daddy had still not returned, but overall he had a good time. Although during the week, the boys are on relatively the same eat and nap schedule, the weekend always throws things off. In some respects it worked out for the better – D only had to worry about one boy at a time. In some respects, it made it a bit more difficult – she didn’t really get any downtime.
What did help (or so I hope) is that Simeon goes to sleep 2 hours later than J, so D didn’t have to try and get the boys down at the same time. And, as I mentioned, there was no need to worry – though a couple of my warnings did help. I pointed out his new tooth and mentioned the pack ‘n play may end up too confining and wake him up. Between a dose of tylenol before going to sleep and bringing him into bed with her after he woke himself up, the night went pretty smoothly.
I think the weekend together was great for the boys. J got to be big brother and Simeon had somebody to encourage his development. Since that weekend, Simeon is almost always on two feet rather than crawling around. In fact, he’s even standing up from a sitting position without assistance from animate or inanimate objects. He also now prefers to eat with utensils rather than his hands. Usually this means mommy helps him stab a piece of food, Simeon then eats the piece and immediately holds out his fork and says ‘ma’. Not sure if he’s saying mama or more, but I know he’s expecting me to stab the next piece of food for him.
The weekend came to a close when Ari and I picked Simeon up around noonish on Sunday. When we finally started heading out to the car, we all said goodbye and J had this very sad look on his face. How cute is that?
Posted in Simeon
Piya's Perspective 