Thursday Thirteen - Things I learned from my dentist

Disclaimer: These are opinions and stories offered by my dentist. Do your own research before making any decisions.

1. Always brush with a soft or extra soft bristle brush. You clean wood floors with a soft broom and not sandpaper, right?
   
2. Medium and hard toothbrushes should be banned like cigarettes. He thinks that the toothbrush industry keeps making them because of market demand, regardless of the evidence that proves that they damage teeth. The only thing they are good for are cleaning your car wheels.
   
3. Just because the masses think something is popular doesn't mean they are right. This is why Google is bad. (He has a lot of other internet conspiracy theories as well).
   
4. The Philips Sonicare toothbrush was developed by mimicking ultrasonic dental tools that are used by professionals, but they require proper technique that most people don't use. For more on this debate, see my previous post about Sonicare vs. Rotadent.
   
5. Medium/hard and Philips Sonicare toothbrushes take off a thin layer of enamel so your teeth feel smooth afterwards. Teeth are not supposed to be smooth and this means that the teeth are eroding. Eventually the enamel becomes so thin near the gum line that it causes tooth sensitivity that is not reversible.
   
6. Amalgam fillings have a 150 year history where composite have only 30 years. This means amalgam fillings are better because they are time tested.
   
7. The amount of mercury in amalgam fillings have gone down from the days when they were mixed by the dentist in the palms of their hands because they are premixed now.
   
8. The chemicals used in composite filling are still changing and the long term effects have not been established.
   
9. Composite material for fittings are still not ideal as the shrink during the curing process. He places the light on the other side of the tooth to draw the filling in as it shrinks toward the light.
   
10. He was extremely surprised that my company covers 100% for composite fillings and only 30% for amalgam, where it is usually the other way around. Let's not go into the $500+ dental bill I got for the kids last year because they put in amalgam fillings without asking first (another dentist whom we've since left regardless of their cool salt water aquarium).
11. There was a dental office that centered its business on replacing all amalgam fillings with composite ones. They created a sense of panic in people by installing a complex vacuum system to capture the mercury released into the air. Eventually the American Dental Association shut the office down.
    
12. My dentist successfully diagnosed two pregnancies based on the state of a women's gums before they knew.
13. Serious medical conditions such as heart disease and cancer are often linked to gum disease. Sometimes the earliest symptoms appear as a decline in oral health.
    

Wordless Wednesday - More Dolls

Poor Sleeping Beauty's head kept popping off so we tie-wrapped her neck shut. Looks like a necklace right?


Here's Polly Pocket borrowing one of Cinderella's dresses. Hmm, looks like Disney took the form factor right from Polly. Disney learned though that hair on tiny dolls (these are about 4 inches high) does not work. This hair was tamed only by putting it straight up.

Tuesday Toot - Adam Reads!

Just last month, I posted about Adam finally getting over his writer's block and writing his first grade assignments. But when it comes to reading, he had been doing minimum required for his homework every night (10 minutes) and the Pizza Hut Book It program. That is until we discovered the Magic Tree House series.



There was a special in the last Scholastic circular where you could buy 30 books from this series for $40. As you can see from the Amazon prices, $33 only gets you 12 books, so the Scholastic deal was really good (I did the same with the Harry Potter and Lemony Snicket books long before we started reading them - can't pass up a good deal). Still, $40 is a lot to invest in books that your child may or may not like. The reviews on Amazon looked very positive so I took the bet.

And suddenly, Adam has found that he loves to read these books! If he wakes up early, he stays in bed and reads. He said he woke up in the middle of the night once and read by flashlight for an hour (which I quickly put the kabosh on). Once while we were on vacation, he even chose reading over playing his Nintendo DS a few times! What is the world coming to? And to put icing on the cake, for his homework tonight, instead of putting down the usual 10-30 minutes of reading, he finished an entire book and recorded 1 hour and 3 minutes. Wowee, way to go Adam!!

I am so pleased that he has finally taken to reading and actually enjoys it. Except now he is asking for us to build him a tree house. Hmm, perhaps we can make a visit to a couple of our friends' tree houses (hint hint). Don't worry, he won't do any damage, he'll just be taking his books in there to read.

Photo Hunters - Unique/Funny Signs

I seem to have a penchant for photographing signs, so I had lots to choose from this week. I took this picture of this "Bad Dog!" sign along the Cliff Walk in Newport Rhode, Island this month. Now, what I can't figure out is if the bad dog is inside the fence and will rip you to shreds if you get past the barbed wire. Or if the dogs you are walking are bad if they get too close to the fence. Or if you are a bad dog for thinking about trespassing. We often call our kids "bad kitties" when they misbehave so maybe that's what they meant. And they made about 20 of these signs to put around this fence. Bad Dog!


This tsunami sign was in Dana Point, California. Thankfully, my hotel was right next to this sign so my company put me up safely. There were plenty of hotels and restaurants situated below the sign. This sign is located right under the 35 mph speed limit sign below:

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Where are my kids?

No, I haven't fallen off the blogging wagon, I took my family on a business trip during school vacation week and left myself with absolutely no extra time or room (literally - I holed myself up in the bathroom for the sk*rt editors call-in). And I left my blog without a photograph of my beautiful kids on the front page! Obviously not keeping up with my exploitative mommyblogging. No, I don't hock their ridiculous antics for advertising cash (much), I incessantly post pictures of them for all the world to drool over (pimp!). This picture was captured entirely by accident as they were in no mood to behave as shown in these shots:



Now back to your regularly scheduled program.

Thursday Thirteen #40 - Earth Day Challenge Results

Here's my belated Earth Day post where I take up Boss Sander's challenge of trying to reduce my trash to nothing for one day. Since I knew this would be impossible, I documented every piece of trash I threw out instead, with commentary on possible options to reduce and reuse it. And somehow, it neatly fits into a Thursday Thirteen post as well.

1. Blister package for Claritin substitute. All medication of this type, no matter how large the quantity, is encapsulated in blister packaging which is completely useless. You cannot reuse it or re-purpose it in any way and it is made from a paper, foil and plastic combination that is totally non-recyclable. What are my options here? Not take the medicine and suffer through spring time allergies? Fight this sort of packaging and endure the wrath of the lobbying group that made this sort of packaging mandatory to safeguard children from accidental overdose (moms like me most likely!)? Or perhaps it is the pharmaceutical industry covering their ass. Can't complain there as they are the ones who ultimately write my paycheck in the industry I work in. I looked at my 3/4" x 3/4" blister pack remnant and threw it in the trash.
2. Paper plate, plastic knife and napkin. That morning we had a meeting at work which included breakfast. Once you enter the work realm, any thoughts of reducing trash is thrown out the window. Convenience items are available so you don't waste time on washing dishes and focus on work. What would be my options? Bring in my own plate and knife and cloth napkin and look like a total dork? I ate my bagel and threw out the paper plate, plastic knife and napkin like everyone else.
3. Half gallon milk container. Now this item was recyclable but not at work. It was easier to jot it down on my list rather than washing it out and bringing it home to recycle.
4. Plastic packaging for a USB to Serial converter. I need this device for work so not buying it is not an option. These blasted heat-sealed plastic packages are the cause of many cuts and swearing sessions. Again, they are not made with recyclable plastic and cannot be reused for anything. So in the trash it went.
5. Paper towels used in the bathroom. Now this is something that I will not live without when it comes to public bathrooms. I certainly won't touch the door handle with wet hands. And I won't bring a cloth towel from home to use every time I go to the bathroom (dork alert again). It may be possible to bring the paper towels to the paper recycling after I come out of the bathroom. But normally, I simply threw it out in the bathroom every time.
6. Tissues for my nose. Claritin is good but not that good. I don't think I go a day without using tissues. Of course to prevent the spread of germs, I throw them away immediately (this reminds me of an SW engineer not throwing out his tissues when he was paired with another engineer doing extreme programming - yuck!). Options? Use a handkerchief? I can't stand the thought of stuffing my germs into my pocket. So it will probably be tissues for life for me. At home, we usually burn our paper trash (not great environmentally, but it does reduce trash going into landfills), but I won't be hauling my germy tissues from work to burn at home.
7. Tuna fish foil package. Or rather some plastic foil combination again. I know that you can send Capri Sun drink pouches to TerraCycle to be made into cool bags, but they don't have a need for these tuna packages. And I still won't be getting Capri Sun because they aren't 100% juice.
8. Plastic relish package. I used one of those condiment packages from the cafeteria to put into my tuna. Since I rarely have tuna for lunch, I can't see buying a relish jar to store at work. And even if I did, the chances of me bringing it home to recycle afterwards are pretty slim as well (see milk in #3).
   
9. Plastic and wax wrapper for Babybel cheese. Now this cheese definitely has packaging overkill, but it is convenient and tasty. All food in the US is overly packaged and it is almost impossible to buy anything besides produce without packaging. A lot of it is recyclable, but there is so much that isn't. I remember the start of Germany's Green Dot recycling program in 1991 where manufacturers or retailers are required to "take back" their packaging or ensure that 80 percent of it is collected rather than thrown out. Then 80 percent of what's collected has to be reused or recycled. It is fraught with financial issues, but then again Germany has high recycling awareness at the manufacturer level. Until something like that is implemented in the US, packaging in general will continue to a huge impact on garbage.
10. Three plastic packages from ramen noodles. OK, now I have to admit what I cooked for my kids that night. I did add turkey, peas and corn to balance out the junk food group. And I did spend an hour before dinner playing soccer with the kids instead of slaving over the stove to create a more nutritious meal.
11. Plastic bag from bagel chips. Yet another food package with a foil/plastic combination.
12. Banana peel. We are woefully lacking in the compost department. I will throw large pieces of compost food into the woods behind our house, such as melon or pineapple rinds, but most of the small stuff still goes in the trash. The thought of having a bin with semi-rotting food on my counter just doesn't do it for me, especially in the dead of winter where I would rarely take it out, or in the heat of the summer where the smell would instantly be overpowering.
13. Foil gum wrapper. At least some gum wrappers are entirely paper and can be burned, but the long sticks almost always come in the paper foil combination.
    

Photo Hunters - Thirteen

Here is Dova's Disney Princess collection. In the back row are her six Princess Babies: Tinkerbell, Ariel, Belle (Beauty and the Beast), Aurora (Sleeping Beauty), Snow White and Cinderella. This was before Disney cast out Tinkerbell as a princess as she is only a fairy. You must be either born royalty or marry into it, although Mulan is neither (but she is Chinese, woot!). Since Dova didn't have Jasmine and didn't like any of the full size Jasmine dolls, she picked out the seven Disney Princess figurine set with Jasmine, Ariel, Belle, Aurora, Snow White, Cinderella and Mulan. This was also before Pocohantas was added. And poor Giselle from Enchanted was not added because she was portrayed by a real actress who needs real royalties. Oh, the turmoils of the Disney Princess cult!

Creative Play - You're Doing It Wrong!

I heard this story on NPR, Creative Play Makes for Kids in Control, about the Tools of the Mind program which promotes creative play as a means to promote self-regulation in children. Now I totally agree that today's kids have too many structured activities and that can lead to issues with self-control. According to a companion NPR piece, Old-Fashioned Play Builds Serious Skills:

It turns out that all that time spent playing make-believe actually helped children develop a critical cognitive skill called executive function. Executive function has a number of different elements, but a central one is the ability to self-regulate. Kids with good self-regulation are able to control their emotions and behavior, resist impulses, and exert self-control and discipline.

But the techniques outlined in the Tools of the Mind program left me thinking that they totally missed the boat. Preschoolers are asked to make a written plan before they play, making them think in advance about what they are going to do and then follow the plan. They are talking about 4-year-olds! I'm sorry but filling out paperwork before playing is not creative play, it is inundating poor innocent children with the drudgery of the adult world. They are in preschool for crying out loud, not trying to get an MBA. They have to fill out paperwork whether they want to play with play-doh or to play outside during recess. To me, this is not creative in the least. I can see kids preferring to write "slide" over "sandbox" because it has less letters. It's one thing to promote self-awareness and self-regulation, but to the point of stifling any sense of spontaneity and fun? Besides, even in the software world of agile development, it is all about being able to change your design and implementation quickly and not having to be tied down to fully detailed specification at the beginning of a project. Let's just say that I would never survive this preschool.

Perhaps I had such a strong reaction to this story because as a child, I analyzed everything to death, so that any new experience would end up feeling mundane after I mulled it over in my mind. It took years to for me to chill out and simply experience and enjoy new things without having to know every last detail and over-analyze them. The strangest thing about this NPR story was that I couldn't agree more with the concepts of creative and free play but couldn't disagree more as how they implemented it. (Am I over-analyzing this or what?!)

Another alarming part of the story was a quote from Adele Diamond, a professor of developmental cognitive neuroscience, who described her first visit to the school, "I was totally blown away. The kids were sitting together working quietly. It was like a second-grade classroom instead of a preschool classroom. I couldn't believe it." OMG, this just tells me that these are Stepford children. The kid in them have been beaten out and replaced by robots.

According to Howard Chudacoff, a cultural historian at Brown University, "[in the old days, children] improvised play, whether it was in the outdoors… or whether it was on a street corner or somebody's back yard. They improvised their own play; they regulated their play; they made up their own rules." Now this is real creative or free play. Not some kind of forced business plan play. I watched my children play tonight and found this to be entirely true. With no toys, video games or TV, Adam decided to take my sweater and pants and put them on. First it was just a gag where his pants would drop while he walked around which elicited many giggles from Dova. Then it evolved into Adam actually pretending to be me, and I became his husband Doug. He took on my mannerisms as well, lying on my side of the bed and taking out the camera to take photos (of course he went for my real camera and I had to intervene and tell him to use his own). Dova took on the persona of Adam and put on his bathrobe and talked about how she liked to play hockey. Every aspect of this make-believe was extremely accurate, especially the quotes such as, "I'm not taking you shopping because you'll be difficult." It took quite a bit of self-regulation to assume these different roles for over an hour.

The preschool that Adam previously attended and that Dova now attends does believe in child-directed learning and real free play. Sure they have some structured and group times, but there are plenty of times where children are allowed to choose how they will play. For this summer, I found another private school that has a pool, so I signed them up for their summer camp program. When we visited this school last month, it was completely pristine and beautiful and the children appeared to be extremely well-behaved. Boots were lined up neatly outside each classroom on a tray and mittens were individually pinned up on a drying rack. Did the children actually line up these boots and pin their mittens or do the teachers spend the entire time tidying up after them? We left with the feeling that this school was too good to be true and perhaps they were all Stepford children. Hopefully, our kids won't have to write any business plans during camp. Either way, it has a pool, so that decides that.

So my take home message from these NPR stories is to promote more free play. I know that Adam plays too many video games and has too many sports (hockey and soccer have games and practices four days a week), and Dova watches too much TV. But we do send them outside to play and force them to play with each other without TV and video games. Sure, they get crazy and out of control, but that will eventually promote more self-regulation right?

Thursday Thirteen #39 - Earth Day Edition

Here are some things that we've done to reduce, recycle, reuse and preserve our precious Earth.

1. Install a dryer vent that can switch from venting outdoors to venting indoors during the winter. In the wintertime, the thing you need most in is warmth and moisture. This provides plenty of both, plus your home smells like clean laundry. This kit is relatively cheap (~$20) at Home Depot.
   


2. Install CFL light bulbs everywhere. Not only do they save money in electricity, they keep your house cooler in the summer.


3. Use a real cup for water at work. The amount of styrofoam cups that are used at work is mind boggling. You don't even need to wash a water cup that often and I use the extra water at the end of the day to water my plants.


4. Use a ceramic mug for coffee. Yes you do have to wash a coffee mug out, but thankfully this just deters me from drinking coffee every day.


5. Printed out recycling signs and posted "No Cans / No Bottles" signs over the garbage cans at work. Recycling is very new in my workplace in New Hampshire (totally different than in Massachusetts) and I cringe every time I peer into the garbage and see a bunch of plastic bottles and cans (which I will sometimes fish out if they aren't covered in food). So far the signs seem to help the number of people carelessly tossing their recyclables away.


6. Recycle everything that is recyclable at our transfer station. For several years we were able to recycle #3 to #7 plastics, especially those #5 polypropolene yogurt cups, but now we are back to #1 and #2 plastics only. Glass, aluminum, steel, cardboard and paper are all recycled. And they have a convenient Salvation Army drop-off for clothes.
   


7. Pass on children's books to co-workers with younger children. For that matter, I also pass on adult books that I no longer need on my bookshelf.


8. Register with CatalogChoice.org. I registered in October last year when they first started up and immediately entered all the catalogs I receive. Unfortunately, the catalog companies have been slow to respond and only a few have confirmed that they have received my request. It is a great concept though and if enough people join, perhaps catalog companies will wake up and pay attention!


9. Register with Direct Marketing Association to stop catalogs. Since these people are actually on the side of more direct marketing, they try to scare you from signing up by putting up this disclaimer:

   If your name goes on the DMA's Mail Preference Service you will no longer receive mailings about magazines that may interest you. Most discount coupons that save you money at the stores will stop coming and so will the catalogs that make holiday shopping easier. This means that you will not receive free product samples nor offers for new books, records and tapes.

   For many people advertising mail is fun, informative, and a convenience. It gives you time to consider a purchase carefully without any sales pressure. You can make your selections and order from your home at any hour of the day or night, any day of the week. If a piece of mail doesn't interest you, simply toss it into the recycling bin. The choice is yours.

   Um, I think most people get past the junk mail is fun stage by the time they hit 20 or so. Yes, I don't want junk mail! And hello? What about shopping on the internet? And I still get plenty of free samples that I actually want from FreeStuffTimes, thanks.
   

10. Register with OptOutPrescreen to reduce the number of credit card offers. I registered in December, and there has been a slight decrease in offers, but not really enough to put a dent in the junk mail.
    


11. Decided not to buy a minivan. We've decided to stick with our trusty Toyota Echo which is still getting 40-45 mpg at 135k miles. If we do take a long car trip or vacation, we'll just rent a minivan then instead of having to take the hit on the mileage all year round.


12. Walk or bike at lunch instead of taking the car to the gym. In fact I canceled my gym membership for the spring, summer and fall and will rejoin when it gets too cold to exercise outside.


13. Spread the word on biodegradable forks spoons and knives. These are prevalent in our customer's site in Toronto, Canada, and all the trash from the cafeteria goes into a composting bin. I haven't seen them in the US yet, but it is a really cool idea. The forks are great quality and very comparable to heavy weight plastic ware.

This post is also doing double duty for Thursday Thirteen as well as Hump Day Hmm's Earth Day edition. Reduce, recycle and reuse!

(Not So) Wordless Wednesday - Tea for Two?

Since we were only one of two couples staying during our recent visit to the Cliffside Inn, they graciously delivered our tea to our room. This is more food than two people can eat for dinner! And since we were on vacation, we gladly ate almost the entire selection and then went out for a late dinner as well. NOM NOM NOM!



On the top row, house blend tea, tea sandwiches (chicken salad and capers, cucumber and cheese, goat cheese and tomato, no eggs and caviar this year ), spinach, peppers and cheese on puff pastry and mini sausage quiches. On the bottom, scones with butter and jam (the only items we didn't eat), chocolate chip cookies, macadamia white chocolate cookies, carrot cake with chocolate frosting, and 7 layer coconut caramel chocolate bars. All freshly baked and prepared of course. We still can't shake the extra two pounds gained from this indulgence.

Keys to a Great Software Demo

Last week I did a live demo of the software that I have developed at work to our technical group, engineering managers and application engineers. Instead of tooting myself, let me use my boss's words. I conveniently scheduled the demo in the morning before my quarterly review.

• Your demo was outstanding.
• You had to overcome a lot of obstacles, switching back and forth from the Powerpoint presentation to the software, handling the instrument, and jumping over the cord to reach inside.
• Your mix of slides and demo was really good.
  
• Bullet points on the slides were nice and short. (I applied the Guy Kawasaki 10/20/30 Rule of Powerpoint).
  
• Your pace was really good, everyone remained interested.
• You were very calm and collected and put everyone at ease.
• Keep up the great work.
  

Whew! What seems like calm, collected and professional Angela is actually a nervous wreck for the few days before the demo, especially a few hours beforehand. Of course most of the work was in the preparation and here are key things that made it go smoothly.

• Rehearse every move in the software so as not to fall into any unknown and potentially buggy areas.
  
• Print out your Powerpoint presentation with the Notes view. Once you move away from the presentation and to the software demo, you can't refer to it on your screen any longer. Duh.
  
• Use the bullet points in the Powerpoint as a checklist for all the things to demo in the software. This seems obvious, but when you are in the middle of clicking through several features of the software, it may hard to remember every thing that needs to be covered before moving to the next slide.
  
• Use the Notes field in Powerpoint to signal when to go to demo. Sometimes I had two slides before a demo, so this was really helpful to maintain the correct order.
  
• Test your logistics way ahead of time. You need to set the demo up and test at least one slide's worth, especially when it involves a piece of hardware. In my case, there was a meeting in the room directly before my demo, so I arranged with the other meeting holder to set up the instrument before and leave it in the room during his meeting. This allowed me to place the instrument in a spot that was not in the way of the pull down screen, get a video cable extension, and start right on time. (My video cable extension was not quite long enough as I still had to jump over it during the demo).
• Watch your time. This is one area which I didn't have a good grasp of beforehand. When I rehearsed the demo, it took around three hours to determine everything to cover (I had a one hour time slot), but I knew it would go faster in the actual demo. There were a few things that I decided to compress as time grew short, but I managed to cover all the key elements. Having a mental list of everything that is essential to include is crucial.
  

So even though I was completely over-prepared, I was still nervous. Thankfully, all went well and the only glitch was a small hardware one and not in software.

Photo Hunters - Twisted

This tree can be found near the Chinese pagoda along the Cliff Walk in Newport, Rhode Island. It reminds me of twisted trees you see in Chinese paintings.

I played around in Photoshop and got this really twisted looking tree using the "neon glow" effect.


Here is a detailed shot of these twisted branches


If you don't know what I mean by twisted trees in Chinese paintings, the artist Wang Dachuan does.

Wordless Wednesday - His and Hers Nintendo DSes

Here is my son Adam's Brain Age 2 Nintendo DS with the free rainbow stylus pack and my Zelda Nintendo DS with the free feather stylus (we swapped games of course). I lucked out and got in on the surveys while they were still open (yes, I obsessively checked every few days).

I had a tough time with the title of this post and had to determine the plural of DS from this site. Jury is still out on the plural of stylus. I would go with 'styli' and not 'styluses' and I hate that the dictionary says both are acceptable! OK, enough words for this Wordless Wednesday. This post was published five days ago using draft.blogger.com.

Is it The Secret?

I'm finally back with a Hump Day Hmm hosted by Julie Pippert: Using My Words. I've always felt that I determine the course of my life and it is not predestined as fate. It is a function of my own hard work, choices and decisions. Control control control, logic logic logic. But then, there are coincidences that are too good to be true and unexplained fortunes. Is it God at work? Is it karma? Is it the universe answering my call?

Last year, a life coach come by work and give a seminar on achieving your full potential and attaining all that you desire. It sounded intriguing, so I went even though I have it all (I'm kidding of course, there's always room from improvement, especially in the child behavior department). The woman looked wacky and wild and said breathlessly "I'm going to stop talking and put on the video." We sat mesmerized for 20 minutes. She turned it off before it finished and said that you too can learn how to attain everything you desire if you fork over $30. Now, I'm not one to fall for this new age bull crap, but there were things in this video that rang true in my life. So I ordered the video. And what was this answer to everyone's desires? It was The Secret. This was long before it was famous and readily available at BJ's or Amazon.

The premise of The Secret is the Law of Attraction. Ask the universe for what you want, live your life as though you have it, and you shall receive it. Could it be so simple? Let's examine some of the events in my life:

• I'm in a dead end job in Connecticut and I really want to move back to Massachusetts. Wouldn't it be cool to work for a company that was close to MIT and founded by MIT alumni? I get a copy of the Boston Globe. On the front page of the help wanted section, there is full page ad for a startup company in Cambridge, MA. I interview and end up getting my dream job.
• I am married and we are trying to have children. We both agree that we would like to have a boy first and then a girl. We imagine this so hard that we start expecting it. We are very pleased when we find out that our first baby is going to be a boy. By the second, we knew from the start that it will be a girl and find it hard to erase this expectation going into the ultrasound. All went as planned. (OK, stand down the daggers from the eyes of parents who didn't get their preferred sexes!).
• I'm looking for a daycare provider while I am pregnant with my first child. We go from family to family daycare and can't find one that we are happy with (from feeding kids french fries, to favoring their own kids, to utter filthiness, the list goes on and on). I believe that I will breastfeed my child and think, why don't I look for one near my work so I can nurse him at lunchtime? The first family daycare I found was within a five minute walk from work and it was the best place that we saw. I nursed both children for an extended time thanks to this daycare.
• I'm commuting an hour each way to work and even though this is my dream job, I would rather work closer to home. The kids will be entering school soon and it would be nice to be nearby. There is no industry near my suburban town, so I don't even try looking. A friend was unemployed and found a job that is 15 minutes from my house, but they do not need software engineers. A year or so later to my shock, I get laid off from my job. By this point, the company near my house is working on a project that needs a lead software engineer. I interview and get the job that is 15 minutes from my house with our schools located halfway between home and work.

So are all these coincidences a result of hard work, choices and decisions? Not exactly. It's almost as though they materialized through my imagination. I will say that I am extremely grateful when things go my way. And I'm starting to believe that if you express gratitude for the things in your life, more will come your way. Now I'll just have to ask for better behaved children and a new pair of skis.

Just in case we forget

Adam and Dova's favorite activity is jumping off the couch.

Parental amnesia is a wonderful thing because you'd strangle your kids if you remembered all the exasperating things they do. I remember that Adam had a terrible year between 2 1/2 and 3 1/2, culminating right around the time Dova was born after he had turned 3. But when I try to remember exactly what he did or how he acted, nothing specific comes to mind. I only remember a conversation with my mom while I was in the hospital giving birth. She said that he was totally out of control, throwing things on top of the fridge and that we'd find all sorts of stuff behind there someday (a few years later, we sent him behind the fridge for some other reason and he fished the stuff out). And as bad as he was, Dova was much worse. And it lasted way past 3 1/2. But lately, almost imperceptibly, she has actually gotten better. During our recent getaway to Newport, she didn't have any meltdowns in front of the grandmas, where last year she pushed one of the grandmas to a breakdown through all her tantrums. And although she will still argue the fact that she doesn't need to go to the bathroom when she wakes up, before bed or anytime we ask her to go, she has actually sometimes been more cooperative than her brother in other areas. Could it be that she is finally getting past her terrible two's and three's?

So this post is a reminder just in case we forget all of her toddler antics. Like when we were in a gift shop in the Orlando Int'l Airport and she found out that the lollipop she wanted (the last remaining of its kind) had a torn wrapper and I refused to buy it. We headed towards airport security and she had a screaming kicking tantrum on the floor for 20 minutes and we ran into someone that we hadn't seen in years. Fortunately she also had kids so she totally understood the "Oh, ignore the screaming child on the ground, that's not ours."

Or the time we went to Chunky's Cinema to watch Mr. Bean and she didn't want to go. We had to drag her screaming through the entrance to the theater and we had to leave her screaming in the back hallway. We sat down and pretended we didn't know who that screaming child was before she finally calmed down and joined us. And then she had to sit on my lap the entire time and wouldn't sit in her seat. All for a fun family activity on Labor Day.

And last but not least, this past weekend when I went grocery shopping. We got an extra large cart so she could sit inside with the food. I'm used to the fact that my kids are the loudest, craziest kids in the entire store and as long as they are not getting too many looks that aren't knowing smiles, not crashing the cart, not drawing blood and not putting things in the cart that I don't approve, I usually don't intervene (which means I am intervening every two minutes). This time they were playing some sort of war game with the Jet Dry. While I had turned away to pick out string beans, I hear a thud behind me and Dova had just dropped a bag of apples out of the cart. It was a bomb, she explains. Arrgghh!

I am grateful that she is slowly but surely getting better, but that only means that she is growing up. And soon she'll be too smart for her own good like her brother. Just last night Adam asked me whether house spiders live in the walls of a house. I replied that I didn't know. He shot back with "How can you go to MIT if you don't know if house spiders live in the walls?" Yikes, is he already realizing that his parents are fallible? Better brush up on my knowledge of everything.

Tuesday Toot - I replaced my iPod battery

It has been months since my iPod has gone on the blink and I have been hemming and hawing about either getting the battery replaced for around $70 dollars or buying a new iPod. What I didn't know as a self-respecting geek, was that you can just pop the thing open and replace the battery yourself. I learned this from some true Apple core geeks on my last business trip. These software engineers had really cool MacBooks running Windows XP and OS X, with custom designed graphic skins. One guy was using MacJournal to take all his notes on his super quiet keyboard, while I typed away loudly in Microsoft Word on my POS Lenovo T60 (company issue, can't complain). I almost considered getting a MacBook for about a microsecond. That evening I ordered a $10 battery from BatteryShip.com and the day it arrived I went to replace the battery.

Thank goodness for the internet and the folks at ipodhowtovideo.com. The replacement went exactly as the showed and took me no more than 10 minutes. And best of all, my iPod works like it is new! I am so psyched!

Photo Hunters - Glass

Here are two glass vases. The first one looks like painted green glass, but it is actually a clear vase with leaves from a bird of paradise plant lining the inside. The second is from our favorite restaurant in Newport, RI, Tucker's Bistro. Every year when we visit, we are always greeted to a beautiful display of tulips in a lighted vase. I just noticed that this year's vase is different from last year's.

Curly Hair

I instantly fell in love with this curly haired doll that Dova got from Burger King (plus I had a blast setting up this "studio" shot). Her hair is larger than life and full of beautiful curls that I envied as a child with straight straight straight hair. For some reason, girls always want to have something different than what they are born with. My best childhood friend had curly hair and would kill for straight hair. Dova, for some reason, would rather have dark hair like her brother and me rather than her beautiful brown hair with red highlights. At least they are proud of being half Chinese. I was more ambivalent about being Chinese until I was older.



Back in the eighties when big hair was in, I succumbed to perm mania, which would look simply unnatural nowadays. This photo was from 1989 when I was 22. Of course I picked a flattering picture of myself and not the horrible mugshot I had on my passport (it even scares Doug). I hope big hair never comes back and I am very happy with my straight hair now. Just wish it weren't so gray!

Thursday Thirteen #38 - All out of whack

Every year, Doug and I take a mini-vacation away from the kids and have their two grandmas watch them at our house. And these 2 days quickly set our routines upside down. Here are thirteen things that got out of whack.

1. House - The grandmas are not quite as strict about having the kids clean up their toys. When we got back I found all sorts of things under the aquarium table: poker chips, fish from a fishing game, plastic easter egg halves, spoons, monkeys from monkeys in a barrel, and ice from Don't Break the Ice, too name a few. When I asked Dova what all that stuff was doing there, she said "that's my garbage can." I instantly hit the roof and all relaxation gained from vacation disappeared.
2. Dova - Our daughter was replaced by a sweet girl that showers you with kisses instead of being grumpy and difficult. A welcome change!
3. Adam - Our normally well-behaved son became totally manic and out of control. He even stepped squarely on my foot with his hockey skate after hockey practice. Calm down!
4. Work - I somehow managed to erase from my brain all details of the specification I worked on last week. But the general manager stopped by today to give me a personal atta-girl. At least someone thinks I know what I'm doing!
5. Eating - We expected to overeat, but for whatever reason things were not moving so well on the other end. I had low energy and felt lethargic on the last day because of it.
6. Walking - We are starting our 10,000 step program at work again this year and I forgot to put on my pedometer on the first day yesterday.
   
7. Sk*rt submission - I managed to keep posting on the first day, but totally fell off the horse on the second.
8. RSS reader - I had to mark stuff read without reading today because I just couldn't keep up.
9. Tuesday Toot - I had a great post planned but it never happened. Good thing it comes around every week.
10. Wordless Wednesday - ditto.
11. Book giveaway - I totally forgot to pick a winner for my book giveaway yesterday. I finally did tonight, congratulations Bebemiqui!
12. Blog template - I tested some changes on iPhone bytes, but never intended to leave it for an extended period. Good thing no one reads it anyway!
13. Contest bytes - So many contests to blog, so little time! Check out the $25 freebie I posted tonight.