I’m in California now. It was a bit of an adventure getting out here, but we got to spend a bit of time with family about halfway through. I’m not really sure if that broke up the trip, or just made it seem a lot longer. Anyway, here are some highlights:

Out of the states we drove through (Maryland, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, West Virginia again, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, and California), Texas and New Mexico had the best roads. And it wasn’t by some small margin, either. Some of the roads (interstates, even!) seemed to have been paved by drunken elk. I consider Oklahoma to be the worst, as our entire foray into the state was spent on toll roads, AND YOU COULDN’T TELL THEY WERE TOLL ROADS. Except for, you know, the paying of my hard-earned monies just to traverse the bumpy atrocities.

Also, there were a lot of signs warning drivers against “driving into smoke”. Now, I don’t know about you, but I don’t usually make a habit of seeing some black dense cloud of smoky fire and thinking “Hmm. I bet there’s something awesome in that cloud, like leprechauns tending purple unicorns and handing out Hindenburg-sized globs of rainbow cotton candy!”. Seriously. (If there /is/, someone let me know. I’ll pay the toll money and drive back, like, right now. Doubly so if the candy is on fire and crashing to earth.)

It was fun in Missouri, as I got to have the kids for a few days, to include fathers day. Caleb and Alexis are both potty-training, though Caleb’s way better at it, since he’s three. Alexis, being a year younger, tends to miss the cues a bit more often and almost-but-not-quite makes it to the potty.

Sunday morning, I was doing something on my laptop and heard some kind of commotion. Upon investigation, it was discovered that both of those two /adorable/ hobgoblins were in the bathroom, where Caleb had used the “big potty” and ‘Lexi the “little potty”. Except.. Well, Caleb had convinced ‘Lexi that she could pee standing up. I’m pretty sure that it had been explained to her that she couldn’t. But I’m equally sure that Caleb will grow up to be a state senator, governor, or some other equally devious criminal. In any case, Caleb looked immensely pleased with himself: “Daddy, ‘Lexis pees just like me!” Me: “Yes.. yes.. I can see that. *pats his head*” And he runs off to convince his constituents that raising taxes will actually lower costs of salable goods. Or, he ran off to play with his toy cars and trucks. You never really know with kids his age.

Apparently, Alexis had made a noble attempt at sort-of straddling the little potty chair, and.. well, it worked exactly as you would think it would; pee was /everywhere/. By everywhere, I mean that a cataclysmic, earth-changing /deluge/ of urine was standing on the floor of the bathroom. I don’t know how she even /held/ that amount of pee. She’s small, and the amount on the floor could have been more justly attributed to a small bull elephant. Or a rhinoceros. I think you get the idea; lots of pee, all on the floor. I was just relieved that the floor was linoleum and not carpet. Also, who installs carpet in bathrooms? That makes about as much sense to me as installing a trailer hitch on a Prius: The two things just don’t work well together. Several large towels and her third dry outfit of the day, and she’s back to coloring.

It didn’t occur to me until a while later that all this was on Father’s day. Then I realized that neither of them had actually called me “daddy” before. Last time I’d seen them they had not really gotten into the whole “talking” thing. Sure, their mother had tried to get them to say “Hi, Daddy” and “Bye, Daddy” on the phone; they’d make a valiant effort to parrot it back. This was just the first visit where both of them seemed to actually attach it as a name. After that, the usual parenting hassles seemed like more of a reason to smile:

Caleb: “Daddy! ‘Lexis needs new underwear!”
Me: “Did she have an accident?”
Caleb: “Yeah!” *proudly hands me said undergarments as visual proof*
Me: “Oh.. Uhmm.. thanks. Can you grab her clean pair from her bag?”
Alexis: *toddles into the living room dressed only from the waist up* “Daddy! I went potty!”
Me: “Yes, I see that. Good job.”

That’s it for the first installment. No promises, but I’ll try to post pictures and write more later.

out.

This was sometime last week. I swapped 802.11g cards in my little laptop, turned it on and watched smoke /pour/ out the front audio jacks.

The laptop still works, though, so I guess it’s not too bad. no internal wifi card, though. =\

Anyway, I really just wanted to test the new flikr plugin.

out.

.  I know I said something about this already on twitter, and the Tubes are still all lit up about it. The SciFi changing their name to “SyFy” is completely ridiculous. Also “SyFy” is slightly profane in Polish.

.  Quoting one of their execs about the change:

“The name Sci Fi has been associated with geeks and dysfunctional, antisocial boys in their basements with video games and stuff like that, as opposed to the general public and the female audience in particular,” Tim Brooks, who helped launch Sci Fi Channel, told TVWeek. “It’s somewhat cooler and better than the name ‘Science Fiction.’ But even the name Sci Fi is limiting.”

Really? Way to completely alienate your original audience.

.  On the other hand, though, “Sars Boy” on the PA forums says:

“bullshit they’re going to alienate their audience[;] you really think some neckbeard is going to stop watching stargate or BSG because of this?”

You decide.

out.

.  Photos taken of the kids the last time I was home.

Alexis chomping down on a delicious blueberry waffle.

Alexis looking adorable

Alexis getting her hair done by Aunt Betsy

Alexis, as seen through the mirror of the tractor she is

Caleb tearing up from the cold

Caleb and I riding in a trailer