Unexplainable

I won't prepare you for this photograph except to say: this is one of the greatest photographs ever taken.

Kids

A couple people that I have reconnected with on Facebook have asked for some pictures of my kids. So, since I think my kids are pretty much the cutest (and what self respecting father doesn't?! the only difference in this case is that I am right...buahahahahah!)

 

This is one of my favorite pictures of my daughter. She looks so completely innocent that it makes me smile. Then you add the puppy face makeup on top of it, and there just isn't anything more I can say. She got this face paint do-up at the open house we had when the market didn't suck as much as it does now (it still sucked then too though). We had a couple people come look at the house, but I think this picture might be the highlight for me...oh...and the AWESOME florescent green with gold faux overcoat paint job in our bedroom. I didn't sleep well for several weeks.

 

 

This is the Girl in all her Joy School Graduation glory. She was smiling to humor me I'm sure, as she would have much rather been outside playing with her school mates. She did great during her program, she kept an eye on the boy who was rubbing his eyes the ENTIRE time during singing. Afterwards, she asked "Why was so-and-so rubbing his eyes during all the songs?" I didn't have a good answer, but at least she made sure he was ok and didn't let the singing interrupt her watching him.

 

No, my boy is not staring at the wall. What you can't see is the television that is in the little alcove not 2 feet in front of him (ok, more like three or four). His favorite spot for television is one of two places: as close as he can get physically to the television, or tucked nicely in next to me on the sofa. I prefer that latter.

 

 

Slide-o-Wife made this outfit for my boy from a button up shirt she found at the DI. I've been trying to convince her she should sell them based on the number of comments I've gotten at church from various mothers as to how they wished they had one. I haven't had success yet. The wheelbarrow in the background sat in that position for roughly 8 months after my wonderful wife went out and did some weeding for the first time ever in her life (j/k). I piled more weeds on it about a month after this picture was taken and then finally disposed of it all when half of it blew around the yard during a storm. Sweet.

So, there are my kids. Enjoy.

Don't Read My Blog

I'm trying some reverse psychology on the lot of you...

Chili con Family

My family has been out of town for nearly a week (Tuesday). When my family is out of town that usually means I stay up REALLY late writing code, browsing the web and general geekery. This time has been completely different. I've stayed up REALLY REALLY late writing code, browsing the web and general geekery.

I miss my family quite a bit. It's the small things that really get to me and make me into a sappy dork (which I don't mind). I miss when my wife wakes up just a little bit when I am leaving and says "I love you" in her sleepy voice, and then falling right back to sleep like it never happened. I miss my daughter wanting to type her name on my computer. I miss my son getting so excited when I get home that he shakes a little bit. My wife is the noticer and rememberer in the family (she can remember outfits she wore when she was three, I have a hard time remembering what I wore yesterday without looking in the dirty clothes hamper), and it's not until I don't have something that I realize how much I notice and how much comfort it brings me.

My wife would insert a comment on how sappy I am...I miss the way she makes fun of me... :-)

This coming week I am committing myself to running again. I used to run 6 miles a day (3 in the morning and 3 at night) and I actually really enjoyed it. It's hard to start back up again after 3 years of not doing it though. I can often find rationalizations for not going out, but once I'm out and hit my stride, I do like it.

The intervals program I did a couple weeks ago was pretty good as well. It is supposed to increase the amount of oxygen your body can process, and increase your speed over all. I liked the results (and the workout I got from it) when I did it and need to get back doing it.

Dirty Little Secret 6

Macy Gray - I Try

What the crap am I thinking?

Let's tally up the things against her (and this song):

1. Her voice is scratchy and annoying
2. The guy in the video is more feminine than she is
3. All her songs seem to be about someone leaving, beating or betraying her...sucky for her
4. the hair...I mean...wow
5. she's not Serj Tankian
6. the video is about as exciting as watching dirt

You can see below two videos that relate to this song. The first is the actual music video from this pile of crap that I can't stop myself from listening to over and over. Why, oh why do I love crap?! I guess I can't really call it crap since I like it, but I should think its crap.

I think it's the chorus of this song that really gets to me. I like the progression during the chorus and later in the song, the raw sound that she has in her voice. It also has the infamous step up that I once heard is what makes a lot of songs popular and mainstream, people like that change in key.

Here's the video and then a parody following it by the Wayan's Brothers.

Macy Gray - I Try
Uploaded by hushhush112

ExML

We have been using an open source library called ExcelPackage at work for generating spreadsheets based on some data from a database. I really like the library, the API is nice and easy and allows for some powerful stuff. There are some things that I would like added (and some other people have things they want added), but the developer seems to have disappeared.

I decided to fork the project and so have created the ExML project on CodePlex. I was originally thinking of calling it ButterCover (I was tired when I came up with it), but changed to ExML later.

Please put requests in the discussions are on the project and I'll try and implement them as quickly as I can.