Happy Sweet 16(th Anniversary)

It's hard to believe that it has already been 16 years since Julie failed to come to her senses and actually said, "I do," when asked if she'd be my lawfully wedded wife. 

I still wonder what I ever did to deserve such an amazing lady in my life.  I also wonder what she ever did to get stuck with me :)

Happy 16th anniversary, darling.  To paraphrase something a wise, wise person once said,

"Marriage is like being on a wild roller coaster ride.   Now we're looking for weapons."

:)

We Did Something Right

Tonight my son was a little extra moody and arguementative with us (gasp, shock, surprise).  No biggie, but when I was heading down the hallway at 9:30ish and he was sitting on the edge of his bed looking mopey, that was a pretty clear sign that there was something wrong (and not just that he didn't get a bedtime snack).

Turns out that some of the kids at school are trying to impress him by saying that they have a PS4, which wasn't that impressive for a kid who's had a PS4 since launch.  Then they got miffed that he wasn't impressed.  And they made fun of one of Garrett's friends.

Not only that, but they're the 'popular' kids (in Grade 5) and wanted Garrett to be one of the popular kids, which involves swearing and beating other kids up.  Garrett told them that he didn't want any of that (in so many words).

I have to say, I'm impressed.  It's a lot easier (and fun) to do all that bad stuff and fit in and here's Garrett, at the tender age of 10, standing up for what's right.

It's always interesting to see what sticks when it comes to raising the kidlets and tonight was proof that we must have done something right along the way.  I guess I'll have to let Santa know that he can cancel that order of coal :)

Adventures In Aquariuming

We got a new 13 gallon tank for our adventures in aquarium maintenance.  It was looking pretty sparse yesterday with 3 tiny neon tetras and some gravel, but it's looking much more vibrant today now that there are lots more fish and some decorations!

And Then There Were None

Alas, I have sad news to report.

This morning I went out to check the robin nest because it didn't seem too lively and there was only one chick in there.  I figured it was a bit too early for the other three to have flown the nest but at least there was still one little guy left in there and maybe it would get big and fat since its brothers and/or sisters weren't fighting for worms.

Well, that dream is over.  Julie just called me up because the mama robin was having a freakout and when she turned on the light outside, there was a cat on the railing who quickly zoomed away when Julie yelled at it.  Unfortunately, when the nest was checked, there was nothing in there except a few pieces of straw and a streak of bird poo. 

It's a little sad.  Sure, they were just a few little robin chicks that happened to be growing up on our back porch, but they were OUR little robin chicks.  There's going to be a little something missing from our morning and evenings when we look out at the empty nest and don't see a beak or two poking out of it, looking for worms. 

The upside of this whole thing is that at least they made it a lot further than the brood from last year.  Those poor buggers didn't even make it out of the eggs. 

Next year we're posting guards...

Robin Has Babies!

Last spring, we had a robin decide that building a nest on our back porch railing is a super smart choice when it comes to survival of her brood.  Sadly, this proved to be an unsuccessful tactic for the passing on of her genes as something got into the next one day and smashed the eggs long before they had a chance to hatch.

Well, she's back again this year and this time her eggs have hatched!  Yesterday there were only a couple of babies in the nest but as of today, all four eggs have hatched.  The mom is a very protective bird and gives us the stink-eye whenever we're in our kitchen, but it's worth it to see the kids staring out the window as she feeds the babies.

Happy *mmph mmph*th Birthday, Julie!

It's Julie's (redacted) birthday today! Hooray!

We didn't do anything too crazy except go out to eat at Wok Of Fame (so yummy).  She also got to stand out on a lake watching the kids skate in the afternoon and I think she may have knit (or crocheted) a scarf.

Wooo!

15 WONDERFUL Years

Holy cow.  I can't believe that 15 years ago, I was able to somehow convince Julie to say, "I do" when we said our vows.  It has been a very wild ride since then and she's still sticking around, so I must be doing something right!

15 years ago we had the blizzard to end all blizzards and this year we had the crazy ice storm.  It appears that the 15 year gift is crystal, so I'm going to claim that I ordered all of that ice for our anniversary :)

Anyway, thank you to everyone who was part of our special day lo those many years ago, even if we don't see half of you nearly as often as we'd like to.

And Julie, I may not say it nearly enough, but I love you and can't imagine what I would have done without you in my life all these years.  Thanks for putting up with me and all of my shenanigans, work-related and otherwise!  It takes a special woman to deal with my crazy schedule and bad jokes. 

Happy New Year! (RIP 2013)

Well, 2013 was an... interesting year. I wouldn't go so far as to say it was a great year by any stretch, but then again, it wasn't a particularly bad one for us either, especially not compared to the crap we had to deal with in 2012. Let's just say that 2013 was an educational year. And in Julie's case, a year that she left far too many pieces of herself behind in (unintentionally in most cases).

 I've got some big plans for work in 2014 that should see me with a few less gray hairs by the end of the year if I can implement them all. And hopefully this year the kids will get out and learn even more crazy things (like skiing and how transdimensional phase shifters work) and Julie will end 2014 with all of her body parts attached!

I say this every time, but hopefully I'll get a few new pictures posted shortly. I got Julie a new camera for Christmas and it's actually resulting in pictures that look great. I just need to figure out how to get them off the camera!

SAVE THE LAST HUMANS

Oh me oh my, the PS4 is delightful.

I went to the midnight launch last Thursday night and after about a 45 minute wait in the cold, I was able to get my mitts on the newest of the next-generation systems to hit the market.  Given that I was working all day the following day, it may not have been the wisest move to go to the midnight launch but I figure that if this generation is anything like the last one, I'll have a good 8+ year wait before the PS5 launches and at that point I'll be far too old to stand in the cold.

The only retail game I've purchased so far is Assassin's Creed 4 and what I've played is fantastic.  I did eventually enjoy AC3 last year, but it took a long time for it to sink its hooks into me and the main storyline and main character in AC3 was mediocre at best.  Given that the only part of AC3 that really stood out to me was the naval combat, I was pleasantly surprised that AC4 started with a naval combat mission, which looked phenomenal.  I'm still less than 10% complete in the game (one of these days I'll leave Havana) but I'm quite looking forward to sailing the briney deep and looting ships at sea.

All of that aside, the game that really has me addicted to the PS4 is RESOGUN, which is an absolute blast.  It's a simple, modern take on Defender from back in the day, but between the awesome sound and music design and perfectly fine-tuned difficulty, I just keep coming back for more.  One of these days I'll manage to save all of the humans on level 1!


Not to gush like a fanboy, but the last console I bought at launch was the PS2 and while I wasn't quite as excited for the new systems this time around, I am really enjoying my time with it so far and am also interested in seeing how the launch of the XBox 1 goes later this week.  I got into a bit of a Twitter spat with some guy bemoaning how disasterous the PS4 launch was and it got me wondering if I'm going to be happy if things go off without a hitch or if I'm secretly hoping for a bit of a debacle...

Either way, I'm happy that we now have consoles that are on par with modern PCs so that my beloved PC games won't have quite the number of design limitations placed on them that the last-gen systems were forcing come the last couple of years.  And given the emphasis on the indie scene, esp. with Sony, there will be a lot of neat, quirky titles for me to tinker with in the coming years... and a lot of them are being given away for free, which is even better!

YES! YES! YES!

Last night Garrett and I went down to the ACC to catch the live taping of Monday Night RAW.  It was a hoot and we both had a great time.  Our seats were surprisingly amazing, as we had figured that we'd be lucky if we were only up in the nosebleeds and instead we were essentially on the floor!

Here are a few of our pics from last night.  I was particularly impressed by the Damien Sandow impersonator on the subway and the amazing Daniel Brian puppet.  The Randy "Macho Man" Savage impersonator wasn't half bad either!

Scarfing down some pizza before the show starts.

 

 We were one step up from the floor.  Amazing seats.

 OOOOOH YEAAAAH!

Garrett was able to get a few signs up on TV during the crowd shots.

 

The boom camera rig was pretty cool and rolled right by in front of us.

 

"THIS IS AWESOME!"

 "YES! YES! YES!" This Daniel Bryan puppet respects the beard.

This guy had a fantastic Damien Sandow costume.

 You're welcome.
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What I'm Reading: A Dance With Dragons, The Ocean At The End Of The Lane  
What I'm Playing: Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs, Outlast, P3P  
What I'm Watching: Breaking Bad: Season 3, 4, 5 and new episodes

These Are The People In My Neighbourhood

Just wanted to share a couple of pictures of the lovely ladies in my life...

And they say *I* am the weird one...

I wonder where she gets it from (see above...)

Kara's SK Gradumaration Day!

It was Kara's SK Graduation day today. She got a little mortarboard w/ the tassel and everything, then we had a nice picnic outside with the class.

 

Of course, the best part was that they all walked into the class as a procession to The Imperial March :)

Young Love

So it seems that Garrett has a girlfriend.  Or at least, that some girl has Garrett for a boyfriend.

Oooooo!

I don't think there will be any smooching anytime soon though.  That seemed to turn his stomach pretty fast when I asked :)

It's Funny Because It's True

I need to get this blown up as a poster.

Happy Birthday Kara!

It was Kara's 6th birthday today and boy oh boy, did she ever get her money's worth in parties this weekend!

Yesterday we went to SkyZone in Mississauga for her party with her friends. It's a pretty cool place where they can jump on trampolines and dive into giant foam pits. I saw at least one kid stuck in the foam pit with just a foot sticking out and no way to get back to the surface :)

Today she had her family party with her aunts and uncles (and aunts-to-be) and cousins in attendance. It was nice to finally have the kids use the backyard and run around in the sunny (though chilly) afternoon.

Now everyone has gone home, the mess is cleaned up and everyone is sleeping. Sounds like a pretty good weekend to me.

I'm Broken From March Break

So we had a pretty packed March Break, all things concidered.  We hit the Sweetwater Festival down at Crawford Lake, visited the ROM, saw a few movies, wandered around the Science Center and even had a whole day where Garrett & I didn't leave the house or change out of our PJs. 

I even put a full day of work in on Wednesday... man, was that just on Wednesday?  It feels like 3 weeks ago...

Suffice it to say that while I'm not necessarily chomping at the bit to rush back to work tomorrow, I'm glad that the kids are going back to school :)  They were getting just a tiny bit too squirrelly the last couple of days.  I don't think Kara stopped talking since Friday...

Now to count down the next couple of days until my birthday.  Woo!

Eternity

High up in the North in the land called Svithjod, there stands a rock. It is a hundred miles high and a hundred miles wide. Once every thousand years a little bird comes to this rock to sharpen its beak. When the rock has thus been worn away, then a single day of eternity will have gone by. - Hendrik Willem Van Loon (thanks XKCD)

And if we're lucky, I may even post a new update during that timeframe!

The sad thing is that I have a lot I could talk about (Monster Jam, Garrett's many presentations at school, how crazy my job has been, some cool games I've played) but I have either been too busy or too tired to compose a coherent thought of late when I finally do sit down at the computer.

Lord willing, if I get a chance in the next couple of days, I'm going to cobble together a nice little slideshow/album of pictures of our adventures since January and throw it up here.  Of course, I think I said that a month ago.  But I mean it this time!

I Lost On Jeopardy...

So the online Jeopardy! tests were this week and tonight was the last night. I signed up earlier in the day and spent most of tonight waiting patiently for my chance to squeeze a little of the trivia knowledge out of my brain in the general direction of Mr. Trebek.

Alas, I'll never know how I may have done BECAUSE FLASH CRASHED ON ME 20 QUESTIONS INTO THE TEST!

Stupid Flash.

I just sat there in shock when the screen suddenly went grey and a little sad face appeared to tell me that the Flash plug-in had crashed.  Then a mad scramble ensued to try to log back in and salvage whatever was left of my chance at glory.

Alas, 'twas not to be. I was greeted with a smug little picture of Alex saying, "Sorry, you're too late for tonight's test. TRY AGAIN NEXT YEAR, LOSER!*"

Ah well. It was pretty challenging, the 20 questions that I did do. Not super hard, but you only get 15 seconds per question to read and answer, and it's all typed in, so you can't even just shout out a quick guess.  It may have also gone smoother if I'd realized that I didn't have to hit Submit after each question. Sigh.

I think the only thing left to say is that I didn't even get a copy of the home version...

Till next year, Alex.  Then we shall meet on the field of trivia once more.

*I may have read something into his expresssion...

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a very happy New Year's Eve last night and was able to either sleep off their drunk or at least relax and take it easy today!

We had some friends over last night and played Quelph (which is an awesome board game, esp. if you have no shame :) and watched the ball drop online from NYC.  The kids even had a couple of countdowns when their friends left at 9pm and then again around 11 when they finally went to bed.

So far, 2013 is shaping up nicely.  We had more friends over tonight (and played more Quelph), Garrett & I painted his room and I've beaten at least one videogame today. 

Heck, I'm on call for work and only had to take one or two calls.  Huzzah!

I'll probably do a 2012 in review for us as a family tomorrow or the next day, but in case I don't, let's just say that 2012 was a year upon which I'll look back with very mixed feelings.  It was a very interesting (and positive) time for me on a professional level but it has been a pretty rough year for us as a family (I'll spare everyone the gory details, but we all came out of the fires for the better after a long road with lots of help!).  And we moved to our nice new house, which was worth it on multiple levels. 

So see you later, 2012.  We're going into 2013 and are ready to kick some booty!

Is This Thing On?

Well, I really dropped the ball on updates this past month (or two).

Chalk it up to my being insanely busy at work (hooray for year-end stuff!) and doing all sorts of stuff with the kids and Julie instead of posting here!

We've got all of our Christmas shopping done.  We've painted Garrett's room.  We've unpacked pretty much all of the boxes in Mount Boxalot.

Now we're on vacation and looking forward to Christmas with everyone!  Since we've all survived the Mayan Apocalypse, I hope that I'll get back to the blogging in the new year with something closer to my old output instead of the sporadic updates these days.

Keep following my Twitter to see me ramble about my lack of sleep and curse water in all its forms (seriously, it's out to get me!) and thanks for keeping me on your feeds!