Home with the baby

By cormander

My wife and baby were discharged from the hospital this evening, everyone is healthy. We can’t help but keep calling the baby Phoebe, as she looks EXACTLY like she did as a newborn. So I keep telling myself; “The baby’s name is Hazel, the baby’s name is Hazel.” Hopefully I’ll get used to it!

Then again, I was called by all of my brother’s names by my mother on accident while I was growing up. So I guess no parent is immune to mixing up their children on occasion.

It’s a girl!!!

By cormander

This morning at about 5:29 AM my daughter was born, weighing in at 6 lbs 9 oz, and 19 inches long. This is my 4th child.

We’re naming her Hazel. Here are some pictures:

Sundays in Utah

By cormander

I have a love-hate relationship with Sundays in Utah. On one hand, the roads are completely empty because a large percentage of the population are Mormon and they are either at home or at church.

On the other hand, hardly anything is open, so there isn’t much to do.

Lucky for me, it’s starting to warm up, and the local Zoo only closes two days out of the year (Christmas and Christmas Eve). Since I have children who love animals, and we have a membership which lets us in free, we went there today. It was fun, and there weren’t a lot of people there.

Perhaps taking the family to the Zoo will become a common Sunday activity this spring and summer.

There aint no rest for this geek

By cormander

The song There ain’t no rest for the wicked is right on the dot. It is perhaps also very true for even the non-wicked people as well; especially in this kind of economy. These words just say it all:

Money don’t grow on trees.
I got bills to pay,
I got mouths to feed,
There ain’t nothing in this world for free.

So I basically have to have a job for the rest of my life, that is if I don’t save for retirement. Perhaps me getting a director or (heaven allow) executive position somewhere will help in the saving for a retirement. I mean, I look at the CTO where I work and think to myself; “I could be doing that in 10 years.” And it’s not just wishful thinking either, I’m getting my degree for a reason.

But at least for now, there aint no rest for this geek. Job, school, working extra, and young family.

I really need a new car

By cormander

I have a ‘98 Dodge Caravan that I got almost 3 years ago. It was given to us by my wife’s parents in exchange for our Nissan.

When we had to move away from Hawaii and didn’t have the money for it, I took out a loan on it for $6,725 (the then value of it).

Today I have concluded that since we bought it, I have paid around $5,000 in maintenance costs. Half of that was a brand new transmission, the rest were odds and ends. Today I have to drop another $700+ to replace an axle, two tires, fix an oil leak, among other things. The last time I had it in the shop was about 2 or three months ago where I had the electrical system fixed, and the oil changed.

It seems like every few months I have to drop a load of money to keep it going. It all adds up to the point where you know you really need a new car when the upkeep for it has tallied up to be almost what you paid for it in the first place.

I sure hope I get a good bonus after the Holidays. This Van will last us a lot longer and cost us much less if I didn’t have to drive it to and from work every single day.

My son is “The Repeater”

By cormander

Yesterday my daughter turned 4, so we let her decide what she wanted to eat for dinner. Like any little kid, she gets a big bright smile and says, “Pizza!”

Not having been to a “sit down” pizza place since we got to Utah over two years ago, I packed up the family in the Van and we went looking for one. My wife thought she remembered seeing one that is on the way to Wal-Mart so we headed in that direction. When we finally located it, I started to pull off the road into the parking lot. I made the turn a little too soon, and my wife says;

“That’s the sidewalk, stupid!”

Instantly, the boy (who recently turned 3) repeats it. My wife covers her eyes with shame while I’m laughing. He just loves repeating things, and seems to know when it’s something he shouldn’t say. I admit with some embarrassment that he’s repeated swear words, and they aren’t all words that my wife says.

But, nonetheless, I found it very funny.