The Fishies Come By

Tessa is afraid of sharks. We're not really sure how this started. Maybe it was this book with a shark in it. Maybe it was that show on TV. However it happened, now she doesn't want to go to sleep in her room. When we ask her why, she says, "There's a shark." Sometimes she says, "The fishies come by," which is even more frightening, in a Stephen King type of way.

We had a night light, but took it out, since we thought she was afraid of the shadows. I tried using a flashlight and shining it around her room to convince her there was nothing there. She's spent the last couple of nights taking my place in bed with the Missus, after I made a cowardly retreat into the guest room.

Tonight the Missus is down with a cold, and I spent a half-hour talking Tess into sleeping in her own bed. She's in there as I type, but I think she's still awake, sitting up and waiting for the fishies to come by.

I feel terrible. I would cut out my own liver for her, but I don't know what to do to stop her fear of non-existent marine life. Sometimes when I'm feeling especially old and creaky I dream about being younger again. I definitely would not want to be two-and-a-half again sitting up and waiting for the fishies to come by like my sweet little girl is.

The boy had a different take. "Tessa is afraid of sharks," he said. I agreed. Then he said, "Shark is on the airplane," recalling our trip to the Dulles Air and Space Museum that has a Flying Tiger with a shark mouth painted on it's fuselage. This does not scare him. He's out.

An Old Photo

Speaking of old photos, here's a picture of me with my brother and sister in 1976. We're all dressed up for the Bicentennial celebration. Our grandmother, quite the seamstress, made our costumes for us.

I'm trying to scan in all of our family photographs. It's a good idea to preserve them digitally, but it is taking a really long time. Some of the pictures are in pretty bad shape. This one wasn't too bad, but it is sort of faded and had some spots on it where the color emulsion appears to be breaking down. I used Photoshop to fix it as best as I could. I enjoy the work, but don't have as much free time as I used to.

I don't think it looks to bad--for a thirty-one year old picture.

Shorpy

I found a website that specializes in old photographs called Shorpy Vintage Photos.

I've always loved looking at old photos. A million questions occur to me. What did people do for a living? What did they eat? What was life like back then? What happened to all the people in the pictures? Did they have happy lives? What were they thinking at the time the picture was taken? Could they even in their wildest dreams imagine that one day a hundred years in the future someone would be sitting with a computer in their lap looking at their picture?

Anyway...it's a very interesting website. Enjoy.

Wrapped Around Her Finger

The twins woke up really early this morning. They didn't get enough sleep, so they were pretty grumpy and whiny.

Daddy was upset at them--they could tell. I went outside to put the trash by the curb without saying a word to them. When I got back in, they both wanted my attention.

Adam shoved his truck book in my face. "Read? Read?" he asked. I sat down and started reading to him.

Tessa came over, sat next to me and gave me a hug. "I love you, Dad," she said. I think it was the first time she'd ever said that without me saying it first. I got even more misty-eyed when she said, "Gimme a kiss, Dad."

I asked her, "You've got your old Dad wrapped around your little finger, don't you?"

She smiled at me and said, "Yep!"

Trip to Puerto Rico: The Food

We ate pretty well when we were down in PR. The hotel had a small restaurant, and we ate breakfast there every morning since it was part of our room charge. The twins were pretty popular with the friendly staff there, though I'm not sure why, since they were very loud and liked to run around. Adam had pancakes most of the time, or French Toast--we could cover his backpack in maple syrup and he would chow down. Tessa preferred the Fruit Loops.

My favorite were the pinchos, pieces of chicken or pork grilled on a skewer. The Missus's family always made great food, though everyone had other things on their mind, as you can imagine.

We took a drive to the southeastern part of the island one day. We had not been there before, and were a little disappointed at the trip--it was not as pretty a place as other parts. It was very poor, and the beautiful coastline was hidden by scrub trees and abandoned buildings.

On the way back we got a little lost, but we managed to find this cute little cafe. Since we'd brought their bibs with us, we bravely ordered spaghetti for the kids. The bibs would protect them, but not us.

As you can see in the pictures below, the twins enjoyed the spaghetti very much.

Trip to Puerto Rico: The Pool

The Holiday Inn where we stayed had a baby pool. The kids, especially Adam, loved it. Almost every day they asked if they could go swimming.

I took them down for the first time. Both of them got in and were doing well at first. I knew the real test would come when they fell down and got water on their face.

Adam fell down first. He got right back up and kept on "swimming."

Tess, on the other hand, fell down, got water on her face and pretty much never went back in. She would sometimes sit on the edge and put her feet in. Most of the time, she ran around the pool on the concrete, getting into trouble and driving her father crazy.

Or she would run away and I would have to grab Adam out of the pool and carry him, dripping, as I ran after her.

Fun times!

Where's the Beef?

We had one of our corporate bigwigs visiting us today. It was more of a "get to know you" meeting, so there wasn't a lot of pressure on us and we weren't going to get yelled at. Better yet, we were going to get fed. I thought we were going to get lunch, instead we got breakfast. Not that I'm complaining, but I didn't pack anything and our cafeteria is still just a pipe dream.

Did anyone say Mickey D's?

I headed over for a quick drive-thru run. Now I don't know about you, and I may be dating myself badly, but every time I go through a drive-thru, I think of Joe Pesci in Lethal Weapon 2. Doesn't everyone? That was a great movie, back when Mel Gibson was still cool, before he got all anti-semitic.

Riggs (Mel) and Murtaugh (Danny Glover, before he got all anti-American) take Leo (Pesci) to the drive-thru. Leo yells about how they "F--- you at the drive-thru. They know you're gonna be miles away before you find out you got f---ed!" [This is a family blog.]

This Mickey D's I went to seemed to be really on the ball. There was a long line of cars, but they had a girl walking car to car to take orders. (Mine: two small cheeseburgers and a diet Coke.) I was able to pay quickly at the first window and my order was waiting for me at the second. I was on the road and back in my office before I knew it.

I unwrapped a burger and took a bite. Then I realized why they were able to get my order done so quickly: they didn't put a burger on it. Where's the beef?

I thought I heard Leo yelling down the hall: "They f--- you at the drive-thru!"

Hotel, Motel, Holiday Inn

Usually we stay with The Missus's aunt when we go to Puerto Rico. We figured it would be too crowded this time, so we decided to stay at the Holiday Inn in Ponce. We had seen the place every time we'd gone to the island in the past, since it sat up on a hill right off of the main highway to her aunt's.

It ended up being a pretty nice place and the people there were very nice. They even found two cribs for the kids. Unfortunately, the twins were able to climb out of them pretty easily and the room got pretty small after ten days. You can see the results in the picture below of Tessa squeezing Mommy off the bed. Adam just thinks it's funny.

The hotel had free wireless internet, which was cool since I had my work computer with me. The connection worked well, but I was never able to get much done there. Too much was going on. My laptop did get some use playing the kids' Dora the Explorer DVD. Over and over and over. There's a picture below of the kids watching it.

The day after the funeral, the Missus went to help her mom and sister with various errands. I stayed back at the hotel with Tessa and Adam. It would be easy, I thought, I'll just take them to the pool. I didn't count on the rain. The hotel is also a casino, and looked like a lot of fun. There wasn't much for children to do. Or for dad's with two restless children to do.

The rooms were on the third, fourth and fifth floors. There was an elevator at either end of the hall. So I ran them. We went up to the fifth floor, ran down the hall to the other elevator. Then we went to the fourth floor, ran down the hall to the other elevator and took it to the third floor. We repeated the process until we were all exhausted.

Lesson learned: they always have more energy than Daddy.

Arecibo Observatory

We took one day to behave as tourists. This was the fifth time I had been to Puerto Rico, and I really wanted to see the huge radiotelescope at Arecibo. We had tried before to see it on a previous trip, driving all the way there only to find it closed to visitors.

As the crow flies, it isn't that far away from where we stayed in Ponce. However there weren't any roads that took us that way. Instead, we drove pretty much around the whole western coastline of the island. The twins got hungry half way there, so the trip ended up taking the whole day.

The telescope installation was pretty impressive to see. The scale of the artifact was hard to capture in a photo. A pretty cool place for a geek like me.

The twins enjoyed their visit too. They loved pushing the buttons in the exhibits and talked about it all the way back. We bought them some ice cream there and they talked about that too.

They looked really cute walking up and down the hundreds of stairs between the parking lot and the visitors center with their backpacks on. Everybody comments about how cute they are.

Sad trip to Puerto Rico

The Missus came back from Puerto Rico on Saturday the 15th, to my great relief. Her dad was doing better and her sister was heading down to help, so she was tentatively hopeful.

Monday she got a call from her sister: you'd better come down here. Her dad had taken a turn for the worse and was back in the ICU. She really wanted to bring the twins with her, thinking it would really help her mom, so we planned to all go down. I did the best I could to put things in good order at work and we all flew down to Puerto Rico on Thursday the 20th.

It was a good thing we did. My father-in-law passed away that Saturday. The Missus got to see him a couple of times before the end, so I was happy that we were able to be there.

Mi suegro was a good man and a good father to the Missus. A naturally gregarious man, he always made me feel welcome in the family. I'll miss him.

The Missus is doing as well as can be expected.

The twins, of course, knew nothing of what went on, and seemed to enjoy their new experiences. We took a lot of pictures of them too. I will talk about some of their adventures and post some of their pictures in future blog entries.