Milestones in childhood

There are a lot of little milestones in a child's life that are a joy for their parents to be a part of. There's the first steps, the first tooth and their first words. A slightly less celebrated milestone is when a kid realizes that their diaper is full of poo. Serenity found her poo today. I'm not going to post any pictures of this but lets just say that she seemed to like the way it squished between her toes and get mushed in her hair. I got to come home to work and be greeted at the door by the poop monster herself.

Another thing has been bouncing around in my mind. Have you ever heard the saying "In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king." They fail to mention how the one eyed man is king of a bunch of blind people... which must suck! Just the thought of a kingdom full of people who can't find the bathroom is enough to convince me that I'd not really be envious of that guy with one eye.

I bring this up because I whole heatedly believe that San Antonio is the dumbest city in the world. Now, whenever anyone calls anyone else dumb they are at the same time saying that they are smart... or at least smarter than whoever they are talking about. It's not like ugly, you can be ugly and spot other ugly people, that's where ugly kids come from. You can't really be stupid and then call someone else out for being stupid.... because stupidity is relative. So, I know that when I call most of the people in San Antonio, roughly a million people, dumber than tits on a submarine... I know that may make me seem arrogant. Well, I'm not. I really don't think I'm smarter than the average guy... I just work harder than he does. The truth is that I am just so convinced of the rampant stupidity of this town that I can safely say with full confidence that this is the dumbest place I have ever had to live in. Yep, just like that one eyed guy... I'm stuck here, a guy with average intelligence... surrounded by a whole village full of idiots... and they can't find the bathroom.

Oh yeah, that tits on a submarine is brought to you by my old boss who would say that when the situation called for it. I once asked him if he meant tits on a bull or a screen door on a submarine. He turned on me and said "If you saw tits on a submarine you'd think it would be pretty $*#&% stupid right? Well then shut up!" He was a great boss.

Well, that's all I got for now. I have finals for college tomorrow and some more guitar lessons. Now I am officially lousy at playing music... instead of just being lousy at playing random chords. Eh... the only reason I'm trying to learn is for me really, I'm not out to impress anyone. Speaking of speaking, Joy wants to learn Italian. We got the Rosetta Stone for Italian and I loaded it up. I figure it's going to be just like our exercise equipment... except that I can't use the software as a place to hang clothes.

Taste the Heat

A while back Joy went to a woman's conference for her work. They had a bunch of booths there and one of them was run by these guys at Taste the Heat. They were the only ones there with a big pot on a burner and were actually making their sauce right there in the convention! She got 2 bottles of their 357 sauce. It is pretty much the best hot sauce you can find anywhere.


I used the first bottle on everything... and I mean everything. It has this great smokey flavor that can make any food better. The second bottle I tired to covet as long as I can but I eventually ran out. I thought that they're office was in Austin and I kept telling myself that we were going to go up there and get some more. When I finally decided to find some more of that great hot sauce I found out that they make it literally down the street from my house! It's about a 2 minute car drive away!! I got to meet Tom, one of the two guys who make the sauces and try their new salad dressing. He gave me a bottle to test out at home and it's awesome! I'm going to make his Tilapia recipe tonight. I'm also sending some to my brother-in-law who loves hot sauce. Hopefully, he'll like this as much as I do.

We also have most of the Knutson clan here in San Antonio. That meant another trip over to grandma's to rub elbows with the cousins. Of course there's Hayden with the coolest pose in the front of the picture... yes, he does that on purpose.

Serenity had alot of fun too. She ran around with someones shoes on, which is one of her favorite pastimes.

We also had another little girl named Lilly there for her to play with. Lilly wasn't to crazy about Seri... but I think it was because Seri just wanted to play 'Let's tackle Lilly!'


After that I went with Uncle Ray and the FIL to go see the latest Batman movie. It was really, really good. You could tell that they really set up to have the Joker in the next one... whoops! It sucks too because Heath Ledger did a really good job. It's funny because I read a thing about how many people think that he deserves an Emmy for his performance, so they got a couple of actual Emmy judges who explained how it wasn't the right type of movie for the Emmy's and that they don't consider it Emmy quality. Yep... I guess if the Joker would have slept with a cowboy somewhere in the middle of the film it would have been in the bag. Too bad really.

I'm almost done with this semester in school. I have 90's in both classes, which is a new thing for me. I'm pretty confident that I'm going to sail through the finals but I didn't really learn a whole lot about anything. Oh well, that's college for you!

Hopefully, I'll get farther on my under-the-stairs project. If I do I'll get some pictures.

Happy feet

I picked up a pair of these sketchers this weekend. I've never bought a no-lace shoe before... but these rock!

I wore them to work today and had a great day! I didn't know that the secret to a happy life is comfortable footwear! It's kind of like wearing slippers. Anyway, they come in brown and I'm going to get a pair of those to so I can wear them with my other pants to work.

The other thing I got is Universe Sandbox. It's this cool 3D galaxy simulator... you can literally play with stars!


I used it to try and explain to Hayden how the Earth circles the Sun. We ended up making planets crash into each other and explode. It was really fun. Unfortunately I didn't get any screen shots of it because my free trial ran out. It was really fun though! I might just actually buy it.

It's more of an art then a science...

Let's say you haven't done laundry yet this weekend. Let's also say that your 1 yr old daughter needs a shirt. Sounds like a big problem? Not if you're me! I found Joy's pink bandanna and with a little tying we have an instant shirt.




I'm telling you, I should write a book or something! We were only going to Target anyway... and in this town, you're lucky if other people are wearing pants. Ah, San Antonio... the village of idiots.

Speaking of fat people, we saw Wall-E the other day and since we are one of the fattest cities in the history of super sizing, there were a lot of really fat people there. It was great when it came to the part where everyone in the movie was to big to walk... you could feel the tension in the theater... and the desire for more Krispy Kreame. I thought it was funny anyway.

Take your Hayden to work day

My office let us take our families to work on Friday. This is a pretty cool thing because we usually can't let anyone in anywhere near where we work. My office was off limits, which sucked because that's where all the cool stuff is! Hayden had a good time eating pizza and asking everyone in uniform where their airplane was.


After that we went bowling and had some fun. Hayden did pretty good... the bumpers helped though.


It got a little boring waiting for his ball to make it all the way down the lane, but when it did it usually took out 4 to 5 pins.

The other big news of the weekend is that I got all the wiring done for the cubby space. I added power and a light and switch as well as got all my computers wired up. So, now I have a link from upstairs to downstairs and I have two switches in place... so I can pretty much run a wire anywhere I need it.


I'm just really impressed that I didn't electrocute myself. I only racked my head once on the eves of the attic and cut my finger with the wire strippers as well. All in all, it was my least painful project to date. The way I see it, if you don't bleed a little, you're not trying hard enough!

The next step is to fix up the entry way to the cubby space. I'm going to get the wood today and try to get that done tonight.

Oh, we finally got our stimulus paycheck on Friday. It went to bills, which isn't that much fun but it gets us that much closer to being debt free. Personally, I think that the stimulus payment was a stupid idea and was a band-aide where major surgery is needed... but I do like money so I'll shut up.

Lastly, my crappy lawnmower that I inherited from the MIL is finally dead. Well, it's finally jerked up enough that I bought a new one. Just to paint a picture, I got this mower as a gift from the FIL, a man who has kept a broken wheelbarrow for 40 years (I swear this is the truth) because it works good enough for him... and the wheel only falls off some of the time! It's a great quality when you can really wring the life out of your tools... but not when you're the guy inheriting those tools!

The new mower is great. It does all sorts of neat things that the old one didn't do... like run and cut grass. I think that this is the first new mower I've ever used. My dad bought a new mower once that I can remember, but we ran it all day without oil when we first got it... so that became the old mower really quick!

This mower actually came with it's own oil... which would have been great to know before I bought oil for it. It also came with this big sign that said "Don't start this thing without oil!" I must have gotten the Arnold edition or something.

Well, that's about it. The grub guy is suppose to come this week and get rid of our grubs which will make our lawn look better. I'll believe it when I see it. I have a ton of homework to do and I'm also suppose to be learning 'take it easy' on the guitar. My version isn't quite there yet!

Flying saucers in our future?

An engineering professor in Florida thinks that he has figured out a way to make a viable flying saucer. By using electrodes to ionize air he can create a plasma field that will repel non-polarized air and create lift and thrust. Here, read about it yourself.

Ah, plasma... is there anything it cannot do? It can make speakers, create lift for flying saucers.... and catch ghosts.


Oh, speaking of Ghost Busters... didja know that they're making a new GB video game. I personally like the old one.


I think it's going to be funny that I'll be telling my grand kids things like "When I was your age we had only 8 bit graphics and we were happy to have it!"

"Sure grandpa... why don't you tell us about that up, up, down, down code again!"

The new PC

Joy's PC is on it's way out the door (by out the door I mean reloaded with Ubuntu and turned into my new web server) so we had to get her a new one to work on. We took a chance and bought a ZT system from QVC. It's a new brand out there that I thought was going to be pretty cheap but get the job done.

It turns out that the PC is pretty nice... shockingly nice is a better way to put it. It's a dual core Athlon 2.6 GHz with 4 GB of DDR RAM and a 320 Gb Seagate HDD. It came with a 19 inch flat screen and get this... a valid copy of Windows Vista Home Premium! I know you don't think that is a big deal but... for the first time that I can remember, I own a legal copy of a Windows product. I know... I'm speechless. I tweaked it out and got the annoying security pop ups to die (it's User Account Control if you want to get rid of it like I did) and I might just keep it loaded.... naw, I'll wipe it tonight!

The only problem was a broken speaker which I used my years of technical expertise to fix...


with duct tape!

So, the darn thing fired right up and runs really well. We'll see how it handles the long road ahead but so far so good. It even has pretty good cooling and is running at a steady in the low 50's.



Oh, and by popular demand... here's a picture of Seri's painted feet.

What I learned in my staff meeting...

Today in my staff meeting I learned that if I drink just the right amount out of my energy drink, I can balance it on the bottom groove of the can. I also realized that I really don't pay any attention at staff meetings. I really hope that they were not talking about anything important!


I had a little helper this weekend while I was cleaning. Serenity found one of Hayden's socks and followed me around wiping down anything she could reach. It was pretty cute... now if only she could fold laundry!

High end speakers may cause minor death.

Here's a video for speakers that use a plasma arc to manipulate the surrounding air to make sound. Now, I'm not sure about all the science involved but I think that unicorns come and use fairy dust to send happy waves to you ears... yeah, that's how it works.



The best part is that the plasma arc can cause o-zone poisoning and eventual death... but they sound great! You can read more about it here.

Hellboy II is coming out and I already don't like it. It's directed by the guy who did Pan's Labyrinth, which was a really weird movie that had all these wild CGI things running around. It's being promoted as this cool fantasy movie with lots of crazy detail. Now, check this out.


Hellboy has this big stone hand... it's his right hand... so, notice anything weird in this picture? Yep, that's his right hand... de-stoned. I might be some cool part of the plot but more likely, they screwed up. Man, a multi-million dollar budget and the get the arms messed up on the main character! It might be a case of dirty ashtrays on the airplane... or the movie might end up being good despite this... but man, it's going to bug me the whole time I'm watching it. Oh well, I'll still see it.

That's about it for me. Time to go grab Joy and try to do something on this long weekend. We've been rained out of everything so far... but I did get all my homework done and cleaned the house pretty good. I have to practice some on the guitar... I kind of misplaced my lessons for the week, oops!

Out cold

I had this great idea that I was going to play with the kids and get them really tired out so I can clean up the house today. Mission accomplished!


Now I get to spend the rest of the day cleaning... wait a minute... aw crap.

Woot XBox 360!

I finally got the 360 working the way I wanted. I wanted to rip all my DVD's to .avi's so I can scroll through them and select a movie without having to deal with putting a DVD in the player. The big problem I had was with my wireless. I run wireless N at home and while it works great for downloading, it sucks for uploading... so if I had to high of a framerate on my .avi files it just couldn't handle hosting them to the 360. I messed with it for a month and couldn't get it to work. So, I finally ripped open the area under my stairs and got enough access to make the 360 and my downstairs PC wired. Right now, the PC still uses wireless N for Interent access and I have a second wired NIC for the Xbox. It works awesome. I can rip .avi's at 100% and play them with no hiccups on the TV. I have about 50 movies so far... and when I get all of our DVD's on the PC it'll be about 100 or so. Oh, and here's the stairs. When I'm done it'll be finished out with drywall and made into a little play nook for the kids toys.


Here's my new wallpaper for work. If you want to use it feel free. It keeps me motivated when I'm just updating endless Visio drawings.


Oh and Hayden finished his first puzzle all by himself. He was pretty stoked about it... and the fact that it was pirates added to the coolness factor.


Well, that's about it for now. It's the fourth but it's been raining all day so I guess we're just going to be homebodies today. We've got all of Joy's aunts and uncles coming down next week so that'll be fun. I think one of the cousins might stay with us... if I don't scare them off. For some reason Joy's family thinks that I'm rude. I don't know where they get that from at all!!