Bonkers

Wow, it looks like I have even fewer readers than I thought--or maybe just fewer readers than I thought with literary pretensions. I'll leave it up for a couple more days, just to see if there are any stragglers out there, and give you the answers next week.

In the meantime, why don't I tell you a quick story about Evelyn. She's started to really figure out how this world works in the past few weeks. From walking, to putting things inside of other things, to refusing to eat certain foods at certain times (I don't think there's a food out there that she's consistently refused, except for the "meat" baby food. After tasting those items, I can understand why). We'll often find things where we didn't expect them, like a screwdriver in the refrigerator, or a stuffed animal in one of our pots. And of course, getting into the bathtub can be quite an adventure as well, just because we're never sure what might actually be in there.

The other day, Megan and I were having a conversation about, oh, I don't know what. Evelyn, as is her wont, decided that she needed either or both of our attention right then. And I mean, RIGHT THEN. She didn't take kindly to our admonishment to wait a few seconds, seeing as she doesn't understand the concept of time and all, and so decided to get our attention in a more forceful manner. She walked over to our bathroom cabinet, stood extremely close to it, and bumped her head gently into it. And by gently, I mean VERY gently--I don't think it would have bruised an overripe avocado. Then, she turned to us and cried, loudly, as if saying, "see what happens when you don't pay attention to me? I bump my head and get hurt!"

Megan and I were both trying not to laugh at this point, and needless to say, Evie got what she wanted--our attention. Since then, she's done it a couple more times, never hitting her head hard, but just enough to pretend that she's hurt. Ah, parenting. . .

Literary Contest

Geez, I didn't know it had been so long since I've posted. Apologies to my loyal readers (both of you--thanks Mom and Dad!) Work has been blowing up lately with projects, I'm inundated with writing claptrap, and Fort Wayne has been alternately buried in snow, then ice, but I'm sure you're not interested in excuses, gentle reader, only results.

Had an interesting e-mail from my friend Davis the other day. It listed the top 50 American Novels of the 20th century, according to Radcliffe Publishing (I think--too lazy to check the e-mail right now). Topping the list was The Great Gatsby, by Fitgerald, and rounding out the top ten were books like (ok, now I'm checking) Catcher in the Rye, Grapes of Wrath, and the Sound and the Fury.

Ok, here's an idea for you. I'll give you the names of the books and a character from the book. First one to post a comment matching the characters with the book title wins a "no-prize" (apologies to Marvel Magazine). I'm doing this w/o the help of Google, which means you can too, but of course, if you cheat, you'll be the only one who knows it. Well, you, and God. Enjoy!

Titles:
1. The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald
2. The Catcher in the Rye J.D. Salinger
3. The Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck
4. To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee
5. Ulysses James Joyce
6. Beloved Toni Morrison
7. Lord of the Flies William Golding
8. Nineteen Eighty Four George Orwell
9. The Sound and the Fury William Faulkner
10. Lolita Vladimir Nabokov

Characters (Done from memory!!!!)

Molly
Scout
Benjy
Ralph
Humbert Humbert
Tom J.
Daisy
(NO idea--haven't read Beloved)
Caufield
Big Bro

Good luck!

Birthday bliss

Well, we had a wonderful little shindig--pictures to be posted when I can get around to it. Preparations started Friday (Evie's actual birthday) as Megan started cooking and baking for the party itself, which was Saturday. Ham loaf was on the menu (tastes much better than it sounds . . . MUCH better) as well as other fixin's, and Megan decided to make one of those "theme cakes." You know, the ones in the shape of a Care Bear or Pikachu or something similar. Megan decided to do one in the shape of a train, which sounded simple enough.

Well, it wasn't.

After borrowing the molds from a friend, Megan baked the cake itself Friday, and started icing the thing Saturday morning. Two hours later, she was finally finished with it. Sporting Evie's name, a gumdrop coal car, and chocolate sprinkle wheels, the cake was a thing of beauty, befitting a first birthday of a first child, I think. What took the most time was the painstaking process of creating tiny icing "stars" that covered the sides of the cake. Instead of just slathering the icing on, the space had to be filled with little drops of icing, done one at a time. The effect, though painstaking, resembles impressionistic painting, a sort of "Seurat pastry," if you will. After all of that, it took Evie about 5 seconds to get her hands into the cake, an additional 2 seconds for her to discover that it tasted really good, and then about 10 seconds before she had the rest of it on her hands, face, lap, and parents. Good times.

Thanks for all of the birthday wishes. Lucas, if this blog is still around when she can read, you can bet I'll be looking up your comment and showing it to her.

Next time: Marketing Musings

Happy Birthday, Evie!

Today is my first daughter's first birthday. I remember around this time last year, when Megan and I had lunch at a local restaurant on Valentine's Day, and then went in to the hosptial for her induction. At this point, Evie was two weeks late, and according to the prevailing medical wisdom, the womb becomes a hostile place for a baby after about two weeks or so. On the advice of our physician, then, we checked in to DuPont Hospital in order to start the long, painful (for Megan, especially) process of labor.

Two days of increasingly painful contractions later, a different doctor (not our physician, but a very nice lady) recommended a C-section due to failure to progress. At that point, we felt as if we had come that far, we might as well finish the process, so we agreed to the C-section, and not 20 minutes later, I got to see Evelyn's face for the first time.

She was a pretty big baby, weighing in at a massive 10 lbs., 8 oz, with the chubbiest cheeks you'd ever seen. Holding her for the first time, standing in the corridor outside the OR while they finished taking care of Megan, I don't remember feeling much at all, except relief that both the baby and Megan were okay.

One year later, I feel like things have finally started to sink in. Evelyn's life, her views, her character, her memories of growing up--many of those things are directly or indirectly going to be influenced by our parenting and the type of home we give Evie. My prayer is that her childhood is a happy, stable one and that she grows up knowing and valuing the things that are truly important in life, particularly a relationship with God in the person of Jesus Christ.

But that's all for the future, right?

For now, we've got a birthday party planned for tomorrow--I'll try to post pics here on the blog. If you have any birthday wishes or comments, I'll pass them along, though it seems most likely that they won't have much of an impact on her yet, seeing as how she can only say about 20 words or so. More on her party on Monday!

Simpsons Characters a-go-go

Considering the Simpsons, there are a wealth of characters from which to choose a favorite. Homer is probably the favorite of many--it's hard these days to see how/why Bart became so popular so quickly, as Homer has eclipsed Bart in both funny lines and in depth of character. I think it's a little too difficult to come up with an actual favorite character for me--I'm going to have to give you my top three, with little explanations (hey, I've only got 5 minutes here) as to why they're my favorite.

3. Nelson Muntz: From his relentless "haw-haw," tinged with a touch of pathos and smothered with a generous helping of derision, to his curiously cool jean jacket and short, short pants, Nelson can always be counted on to deliver the goods.

2. Mr. Burns: Surprisingly humane at times, devilishly evil at others, Mr. Burns represents a tragic figure, at least in his own mind. The rest of the town just wished he'd go away.

1. Homer: A real struggle to put him here, as I was thinking of going with a "chic" pick like Lyle Langley or Lionel Hutz. However, his mix of humanity and stupidity (some would argue they're the same thing) paint Homer as a curiously existential everyman, both scorned and embraced by this mixed-up world of ours. Homer, ours is indeed a disturbing universe.

The Simpsonzu by *spacecoyote on deviantART

First off, check out this link:

The Simpsonzu by *spacecoyote on deviantART

Anyone who knows me knows I'm a huge fan of both The Simpsons and japanese animation. I think that the artist, Space Coyote, did an excellent job of putting The Simpsons into an anime format. It puts me in the mind of (heh, I just like saying "puts me in the mind of") the episode where Homer gets a peek at what his kids would look like if they were drawn . . . normally. You know, with five fingers and hair that actually separated instead of hair that looked like a starfish and paper bag edge.

Anyway, I hope you at least clicked on the link, and I apologize for not doing my 5-minute update every day. I have a feeling I'll be apologizing a lot, but that would be throwing in the towel before I even begin, so I'll try to fight that feeling and instead, move on to my weekend with a light heart.

By the way, who's your favorite Simpsons character? I'll give my answer in my next post.

Next time: Simpsons Characters A-Go-Go

Further thoughts

Sorry for the lateness of this post.

In terms of further thoughts on Hillsdale Homecoming, I think the first word that comes to mind (or words, in this case) is unfulfilled potential. The weekend seemed to hold so much promise, and yet (though it did deliver lots of grins and good times) it felt like it fell curiously short of its potential. None of the blame for this is due to my friends, who were magnificient as they always are, nor does it fall at the feet of the great Hillsdale College, unless you want to count the cotton candy. The reasons for the disappointment were primarily internal--you really can't go home again.

Walknig the campus of Hillsdale, I expected to be suffused with a powerful sense of nostalgia, of longing for days past. That was certainly my experience during my few visits back to the place--for a moment, on a fall day, I could almost believe that my whole college life was stretching out in front of me once again, with all of its ups and downs (mostly ups). The glint of the light on the leaves, the sound of the wind and the far off chiming of Central Hall, all conveyed a powerful sense of possibility. This sense would quickly fade as I remembered that those days were over and done with, that they would never come again, and that if I tried too hard to recapture them, I would only come across as pathetically as Will Ferrel in Old School, only with more clothes on and less funny.

None of that hit me on this latest trip. Perhaps it was because I've entered a new phase in my life, one that leaves little time for such reflections. It may be the case that I'm having such a good time now that I'm able to put those memories where they belong, in the past (but I doubt that's the case). Maybe it was the numerous changes at Hillsdale itself, as well as the feeling that all of the students seemed so young. Whatever it was, I didn't have that powerful nostalgia, and, as someone who likes to feel such things deeply, I almost missed it.

Almost.

Next time: Something I haven't thought of yet.

A short digression

You gotta love this quote from Daily Wealth, one of the free Internet newsletters I subscribe to:

Right now, a Big Mac is more expensive in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico than in Japan. Big Macs are more expensive in Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania than in Japan. They're more expensive in Turkey and Saudi Arabia. You have to dig as deep in the barrel as Pakistan to find a country where a Big Mac costs the same as it does in Japan. The Economist points out the big discrepancy in the current Big Mac prices: "'Perhaps the most telling numbers are those for the Japanese yen, which is 28% undervalued against the dollar, and the euro, which is 19% overvalued."

This certainly wasn't true when I lived out in Japan, though I always loved getting a Big Mac and fries whenever I could, which wasn't often as I lived out in the inaka (translation: boondocks). Part of it too was probably the fact that I could only get McDonald's when I was in Osaka, which usually meant I was visiting Joel, picking up family, or picking up my then-girlfriend, now wife, Megan.

Memory is a suprisingly powerful and surprisingly evanescent thing. To this day, getting a Big Mac evokes memories of a warm, well-lit restaurant tucked up under a concrete pillar, with windows facing outward onto the bus terminal where I would always go to either change buses to get to the airport, or to start the long walk to Joel's apartment. I'm sure if a marketing executive from McDonald's were reading this, he'd be be cackling with glee. Evanescent because I can't recall a specific time when I went into a McDonalds and purchased a Big Mac--all I have is a foggy cloud of warmth, light, and saturated fats.

I'll wrap-up the Homecoming saga tomorrow.

A Day at the Game . . . continued

After juggling some rocks and squinting in the late-morning sunlight, I finally beheld the welcome sight of my wife and young daughter driving up in our beat-up Camry. Lo and behold, Dan and Lisa Simpson, and their baby, Susan pulled in right next to Megan and Evie! Besides being terminally cute, Susan seems to have inheirited the calm disposition and gentle manners of both of her parents. It was both odd and deeply satisfying to see Susan and Evie interacting with each other, and certainly sent my the wheels of my brain spinning to think of them being friends in the future.

All of us together loaded up the caravan (there's certainly a lot more stuff when you have a baby!) and headed to the EAR to see what was left of the breakfast buffet. Apparently not much, as one of the alumni there said they saw Tony and Lucas roll through the breakfast table, cheerfully taking strawberries, cheese, and everything else they could pile on those little hors d'evours plates. One pleasant conversation with Dean Barker later, Megan, Evie and I were headed to the various alumni tents to meet up with the rest of the class of 2001, seeing as how it was our 5 year reunion and all.

Apparently, not many members of our class received the memo, because besides the group that Lucas was responsible for bringing, there were probably a total of maybe 7 other alumni there. Maybe it was the fact that for being a member of the class of 2006, all you get is a CD case with the Hillsdale logo on it, while the class of 1956 was getting engraved pens and such. Megan, Evie and I stayed for the first quarter or so of the game, but after Evie fell asleep on my shoulder, we decided to pack it in and let her sleep on the way home, slightly sunburned, but satisfied that a good time had been had by all.

Next time: Further thoughts and New Chapters