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According to the logs, today was my 50th visit to the gym. I’ve put in 22 hours and 30 minutes of Cardio time, worth 19,001 calories. And 6,224 reps on the weights, for 372,843 pounds of lifting. Those numbers seem impressive to me, as well as the 4″ of waistline and one shirt size I’ve lost. Far more important to me though is that I feel healthier. I look healthier. I am healthier!

My kids impressed me, again, the other night.

We were working on a perfect time waster tailor made for kids. All of our CDs were in the front closet, and finally needed to be moved back to the den. So I waited in the back as they ferried the CDs back to me, and got them rolling by putting a CD in their hand and leading them back there.

After about 6 trips, Jane showed up carrying a bucket full of CDs. Huzzah! On her own she had found a better way. And 5 seconds later, Isaac appears with a baby buggy stuffed with discs.

I love solving problems, it’s the best part of my job. As I’ve watched my children do the same thing, to figure out how the cap goes on the bottle or how forks work better one way than the other, it simply makes me smile.

I was the last kid in kindergarten to learn to tie his shoes. I remember because I held up a pizza party for everyone once the whole class was on board. Conventional wisdom is to get behind the kid and show him how to tie his shoes. Since I was left handed, I just couldn’t get the hang of it. Once my mom got that, she sat in front to show me, and Voila, pizza for everyone.

There was a very fidgety man at the bus stop today, attempting to bend time to his will. Not a minute passed when he didn’t check his watch. Or jog out into the street for a better view of the bus that aparently would never arrive. All the while mumbling abaut his lot in life.

What was he hoping for? Would the driver detect his fidgeting and start plowing through traffic as if Dennis Hopper had strapped a bomb to it? Maybe the oppsite route would flip around and imediately take him to his destination. If he worked up a good enough frenzy, maybe the connecting bus or meeting he was going to would simply wait for him from shear will.

Certainly there were non mystical options at his disposal. If the bus took too long, maybe he would just set out on foot. Maybe he would call a cab. Or get into his car parked around the corner.

This probaby isn’t an isolated incident. Surely many elevator buttons have met his wrath. Hours of hold music have witnessed him shouting at the wind. His carpet at home lays threadbare while his wife primps one last time before leaving.

Imagine how much happier his life would be if he embraced the simple idea so many others are also unable to follow: Accept that which you can not change.

It’s finally beautiful in Tucson again. 66 right now, very light breeze. I’m on the back porch abusing the technology. Logged in wirelessly on the laptop and listening to the new BNL album streaming from the PC.

Today was a nice lazy day. Did nearly nothing all day, but finally did a little bit of grocery shopping at the end. When I left my family was having a pillow fight. A giggling wife and children causes a smile which takes a week to wipe off.

And when I went shopping, I spent $42 and saved $19! Woot! More impressively, I stuck entirely to the list we made beforehand. (Technically I did add an item to the list midway through the store, but it still counts, honest)

Work is going well. Very busy but I don’t feel quite as harried about it. In the last two weeks we’ve started using a project management tool called PHProjekt. I’m actually digging it, despite my overall reluctance at managing my time in general. It finally got to a point that if I didn’t start keep track of all the balls in the air, they’d all come crashing down on me.

Someone moved into the empty cubicle next to us yesterday while her office is being painted. In about an hour it was transformed from an empty husk to something with character and function. While I barely knew this woman before, I can tell she likes tea, south park, stuffed animals, and open VMS. (The “I heart OpenVMS” sticker on her monitor was a clue).

It makes me wonder what someone who looked at my desk would think. It would appear I really, really like sunflower seeds. I apparently like coffee, since I have a Mr. Coffee on my desk (which is fantastic for heating water for tea). I collect plastic lids for some reason. He likes the Diamondbacks. But above all, clutter is the order of the day. People who draw conclusions from cluttered desks will have many to draw from my desk.

Some of the more interesting discrete items on my desk:

• An year old orange, shriveled to tangerine size.
  
• A buddha
  
• A santa clause monitor cover, the last gift I got from my Mom
  
• What was once an orange jello/whipped cream desert cup received as a “gift” about 4 years ago. It looked kind of scary from the start, and now…
  
• A bottle of olive oil, from the same gift basket.
  
• A thing of jiffy pop, same source.
  
• Rear view mirror on my monitor
  
• A huge bag of sunflower seeds that dwindles over the course of a few months to a small bag of sunflower seeds, when it is magically replenished by the sunflower fairies from the north.
  
• A movie still from Cinema Paradio.
  
• A wallet size photo of my nephew when he was maybe 6 months old. He’s 6 now.
  

I hated Halloween. I mean, I really hated Halloween. It’s about the most curmudgeonly stance I’ve probably ever have, and but I’m slowly shaking it. Like most of my irrational fears and things, my kids are making me reconsider everything. Although there’s not a ton to reconsider, it’s more like evolving into less of an ass.

Even as a kid it wasn’t my thing. I think I stopped going out at 10 or 12. Dressing up wasn’t my thing. But as I got older it became something to dread, to really out and out hate. (I’m overusing hate here, which is not a nice word, but plenty of people can attest to how often I’ve attached it to Halloween). As I got older and tried to quantify my dislike, it boiled down to this: Halloween is an excuse for people to be stupid. And not wacky stupid, but stupid stupid. Like the guy I saw roller skating down a very major street, in the middle of the street, wearing a black mask and a black cape, in the middle of the night. Dumbass. But because it was Halloween it was somehow acceptable.

After a time I realized a deeper reason, a more formative one. As a kid, maybe 6 maybe 10 I don’t remember, something happened to a classmate’s brother. While out on Halloween, someone drove by and threw a flaming sack of shit in his face. His mask caught fire and now he’s disfigured. I have no idea what became of him or even his name, but that’s a big piece of why I hated halloween.

But I’m getting over it. Jane is insanely excited to be Tinkerbell, and Isaac will be a fine Captain Hook. And I’ll be all grins.

The phrase of the day from Miss Jane. While evaluating the new Barenaked Ladies album over dinner, Jane asked, “Daddy why aren’t you getting jiggy with it?”

I was at the dentist today because I had general pain and I thought my crown was coming lose. It’s not, nor did he know where the pain was coming from. He did say people can come in with general mouth pain that just happens because people clench their teeth during times of stress without even knowing it. He mentioned it could definately cause me problems because I have “impressive musculature”.

It’s bizarre, but that totally made my day. I have impressive jaw musculature! Woohoo!

For a long time I’ve been amazed by my daughter’s vocabulary and reasoning skills. It’s possible, even likely, most kids develop like this and most parents don’t realize going into it how quickly they learn. But fairly often she still says something that either shocks me or cracks me up or both.

This weekend, for instance, we went to Phoenix to my mother in law’s place. As we got off the interstate Jane was anxious and a little cranky, and asked where we were.

Her: Where are we?
Me: About a mile from Nana’s house.
Her: I want to be there now.
Me: We’ll be there in less than 5 minutes.
Her: I want to be there RIGHT NOW.
[insert a few rounds of RIGHT NOW]
Me: Well maybe when you get older they’ll have transporters and you can be there instantly, but we still have to drive there and it’ll take 5 minutes.
Her: *hmph* Well let’s get there straightaway.

Straightaway! From a 3 year old! Where does she get this stuff?