Random Access

Here’s a little something for your Thursday morning: Diana (l) and Vanessa in their Johnny Jump-Ups.

[FMP width=”600″ height=”338″]http://blog.echopulse.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Adventure-Babies-Action-Theatre-3.m4v[/FMP]
Right-click or ctrl-click this link to download

This video was taken on Sunday, 04 March 2012.

Wednesday – 07 March 2012
It’s the middle of the week. And it’s new comics day. And it may or may not be Pasta and Movie Date Night.

But, more importantly: It’s Diana’s 6-month birthday!

Both little ladies are doing well, despite long crying jags in the wee hours of this morning: Diana started around 2:30, Vanessa around 4:00. We’re trying to get the girls to learn to put themselves back to sleep when they wake up in the middle of the night, so we didn’t go immediately rushing in to comfort them…
…which made for a long couple of hours.

…which, in turn, led me to sleep on the couch downstairs so I could get my last few hours’ sleep (and not have an encore presentation of Monday).

But, by the time I looked in on them around 7:15, they were all giggles, grins and kicks.

Kids. Go figure.

Stray Toasters

• I just called SaraRules! to confirm that we were attending Utah Opera’s upcoming production Elixir of Love. She assured me that we were and then made a “get your towel/don’t panic” comment. I was proud, amused and a little scared (all at once) by this.
• Drug Policy as Race Policy: Best Seller Galvanizes the Debate
• Race and justice in America: inspiring Ted talk
• Rush flushes Rush!
• 
• My current lack of a model railroad is making me want to take my HO Scale train equipment and make a door layout.  And I just realized that I have some US HO train gear, as well as a fair bit of Marklin train equipment, that I inherited from a coworker of SaraRules. What does all this mean?  Simply put: I could do a double-sided door setup — US on one side; EU on the other.
• To Lose Weight, Just Drink a Gallon of Coffee
• Web Sites Shine Light on Petty Bribery Worldwide
• 
• Does Batman Carry Shark Repellent?
• Peyton Manning and the Indianapolis Professional Football Club have called it quits. Kudos to Manning for his professionalism during the press conference. Also, I noticed something:  Peyton Manning and NCIS‘ Sean Murray look “a bit” alike…

    
  Peyton Manning (l) and Sean Murray

  …and I don’t think that I’ve ever seen the two of them in the same place at the same time.  Just saying.

• Astronaut’s photo of amateur astronomers “flashing” space station
• Toy Shining
• 
• Arrests Sow Mistrust Inside a Clan of Hackers
  • Anonymous hacker-turned-informant helps feds arrest five

Namaste.

Tuesday – 06 March 2012
After a less-than-stellar start to the week, let’s see what today has to offer.

I apparently woke up on the wrong side of the bed planet yesterday. Of course, saying “woke up” implies that I really slept Sunday night, which I did… though sporadically. By the time I got to work, I could tell that I was in a poor mood. With that in mind, I tried to avoid too much interaction with coworkers — I didn’t want to inadvertently take off someone’s head for no good reason. It seemed to work.

I left early, as the girls had their six-month check-up yesterday afternoon. The doctor had nothing but good things to say about their progress/development. (That was good to hear.) Then the immunization shots – and the screaming – came. (That was not good to hear.) When we got them home, we put the girls down for naps. They woke up in good moods. Thankfully. After some play time, baths and bottles, the girls went to bed for the evening. SaraRules! and I watched some TV and unwound.

Stray Toasters

• She Has No Head! — Support the Good
• Holder: Constitution doesn’t cover terrorists
• It’s gonna be the future soon:
  
• Instruction for Masses Knocks Down Campus Walls
• Black Students Face More Discipline, Data Suggests
• Should Batman Kill the Joker? Perspectives from Five Famous Philosophers
• Topless, windshield-less Lamborghini Aventador J unveiled
• Fortunately, we haven’t had to go this far… yet:
  
• In a Flood Tide of Digital Data, an Ark Full of Books
• The USA’s 150 scenic byways could soon lose federal funding
• MIT awards pirate certificates to undergraduates

Namaste.

Saturday – 03 March 2012
Okay, okay… there’s neither electricity nor much boogaloo in this video, but there are a couple of cute kids:

[FMP width=”500″ height=”281″]http://blog.echopulse.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Adventure-Babie-Action-Theatre-2.m4v[/FMP]

Vanessa (l) and Diana, just hangin’ out.

Taken yesterday morning, during Diana-Vanessa-Daddy Day.

Namaste.

Thursday – 01 March 2012
March kicks off with an NBN Technical Friday.

And there’s snow; granted it’s from last night…

… but it’s still snow.

After getting Adventure Babies to bed last night, SaraRules! and I settled down to pizza and a movie. Yes, it was “Pasta and Movie Date Night,” but we decided to call an audible and have pizza instead. For our movie, we watched The Thing (2011), a prequel to the 1982 movie. It wasn’t awesome, but it was far from the worst movie that I’ve seen.

Stray Toasters

• World-Dominating IKEA Now Makes Fully-Furnished Houses
  I think I need a moment to let this sink in…
• How a Three-Year-Old Girl Introduced Her Dad to Superhero Comics
• North Koreans Agree to Freeze Nuclear Work; U.S. to Give Aid
• 
• As a follow-up to one of yesterday’s Stray Toasters:
• Davy Jones, Monkees Singer, Dies at 66
• Davy Jones of The Monkees: A towering multimedia star
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot…?!” file: Panel backs booze-sampling measure.
  At face value, this doesn’t seem to belong in the WTF file… until you read the following:

  The bill would allow restaurant owners to attend trade shows attended by liquor wholesalers where they could taste — but not swallow — the drinks they might want to put on their menus.

  YeahbuhWHAT?!

  “It’s not about consumption,” [Senate Minority Leader Ross] Romero said. “It’s about providing restaurants and high-end businesses that offer wine the ability to sample them before they purchase for their restaurants.”

  Senate President Michael Waddoups, R-Taylorsville, voted for the measure but only after Romero made key changes — including requiring a member of the DABC to supervise the sampling process. Romero made the change readily and the bill now moves to the Senate.

• The Internet Justice League
• SaraRules! got me a Green Lantern wall calendar for Christmas. I flipped it to March, expecting to see… well.. a Green Lantern, what with St. Patrick’s Day being smack dab in the middle of the month. Nope. Who’s there instead: The Indigo Tribe. #confused

Quote of the Day
Today’s nugget of wisdom comes by way of Texts From Last Night:

A houseboat for a bachelor party is a terrible idea, we nearly die when on dry land, so how the hell are we supposed to survive a 3 day binge on a massive lake?

Namaste.