Caroline's 10th Grade Photo

The last of the trio of school pictures.  Caroline in the 10th grade at Calvary Baptist Day School.  As you can tell, this dad is in big trouble.  Fortunately, the boys are - for some strange reason - already scared of me.

WIRN: 12/14/06

What I'm Reading Now, as of December 14, 2006...

Fantasyland by Sam Walker.  A reporter from the Wall Street Journal joins an "expert" fantasy baseball league for the 2004 season, and chronicles it here in the same excruciating detail of the worst sort of roto geek who buttonholes you to talk about his own team.  It's actually a decently written book, with many interesting looks at the hobby, only veering off into bore-dom once the author actually drafts his team.

Take a Picture... It'll Last Longer?

Random thought of the night... 

Remember that silly phrase, perhaps made most famous by the now infamous Pee Wee Herman, of "Take a picture; it'll last longer" (do you think Pee Wee included the semi-colon?)?  Is that necessarily true?

The human brain can do amazing things, one of which i'm sure is store & recall life-scenes for a long, long time.  Perhaps long after a photograph degrades, what with its chemicals and cheap paper stock and all.  Maybe an old-timer could tell us. 

I thought of this while watching an old U2 concert on VH1 Classic.  These dudes (media?) in the front row were snapping away with Bono in sneezing range.  Missing the real reality to capture a two-dimensional archive.  I could have sworn i noticed a smirk on Bono's face; maybe he was thinking the same dumb thoughts as me. 

And could we not say the same about the artificial reality of the internet, with faux friends in ourspace, faux conversations on message boards, not to mention the faux intimacy that so many seek in this medium.  How much of real life are we all missing, i ask of the ether?

Emily's 3rd Grade Photo

Finally got Emily's school photo from 3rd grade scanned in...

What I'm Reading Now (WIRN)

I used to keep up with a separate webpage devoted to books & reading - my favorites, and what i'm reading now.  I've got enough separate things to keep up with, so i'll fold that into this particular AOL journal. 

What I'm Reading Now (hereafter WIRN) will cover books that i'm in the middle of, or just recently finished.

The Accidental by Ali Smith - quite the post-modern novel, a loathsome appellation to be sure, although one that works for the fan of the literary, the inventive, the novel-as-gimmick.  A bit freaky, and too much foul language, but every page makes you think.

The Worst Hard Time by Timothy Egan - remember in The Grapes in Wrath, those sad-sacks that fled the midwest dust bowl for the promised land of California?  Well, this is the story of those that were too stubborn or too poor or too dullard to flee, gutting it out in western Oklahoma or the Texas panhandle.  This is the story of my ancestors, more or less.  And i say that proudly.

 

Jackson Starts His Hoops Career

Jackson started playing basketball recently, in the Upward program at Calvary.  His Tigers had their first game on Saturday.  Upward is a very structured program, with mandated roughly-equal playing time.  At this age, they don't keep score and have a constant clock.  To prevent the hoop equivalent of beehive soccer, each kid on the floor gets a colored wristband, matching the color of one of the 5 kids on the other team.  That's how they know who to guard. 

One of my friends at work has a son on the team, too.  And my boss had a daughter who cheers for us (well, they cheer for all the teams at once).

In his first game, Jackson was awarded what we considered the top award:  "Most Christ-like".  (at the risk of being un-Christ-like by thinking of it as the top award)  He is such a good-hearted kid.

Aqua-Girl

Caroline has joined the swim team at her high school.  They compete against other private HSs around the area.  So far, she has swum the 50m freestyle, the 100m freestyle, and a freestyle relay.  She's pretty fast in the sprint, and competes well in the 100.

Minor Surgery for David

I bet most readers of this journal already know this, but David recently had some minor surgery done.  He had the tear duct in his left eye unblocked.  Fortunately, it was of the simplest solution - a quick clearing out of a small membrane, no cutting or tubes or complicated procedures.  Doctor was over & done within a half-hour, catching Julie and me off-guard grabbing a quick (but not quick enough) breakfast in the hospital cafeteria.

We left the hospital by noon, and by the time i got home from work, David was running around like normal.  The only tough part for his mom & dad was watching him get wheeled off without us by his side.

We thank everyone for their prayers and concerns.

Marvin vs. Terrell

In my brother's blog, he wrote a recent post about the relative performance of Marvin Harrison and Terrell Owens, two superstar wide receivers in the NFL.  This is my arena, my wheelhouse, so i decided to look deeper into the numbers. 

The crux of his argument was that the two WRs have played for different types of offenses.  But are those differences more than nominal?  He claimed that Owens' teams threw more to their RBs and TEs, a claim easily checked, but only by dorks like me.  In their 10+ seasons, here's what i found:

Marvin's teams averaged only 2% more passing attempts, generating 5% more pass completions and 7% more passing yards.  And it was true that the RBs/TEs were less involved on Harrison's teams, but only to the tune of 5% less.  If that was close to the margin of difference between the two players' statistics, I'd say The Calvinator has a point.  Instead, Harrison has logged a whopping 27% more receptions than TO, and 16% more receiving yards.

So, not even counting the possibility that Marvin's team threw to their WRs more because of Marvin, and certainly not even counting the turmoil that seems to follow TO, this is a no-brainer.  Marvin has had the better career.

Earthquake!

This past week, Winston-Salem was hit by some earthquakes.  The first happened in the middle of the night Tuesday.  It woke me up.  My immediate thought was that this was what i expected an earthquake to feel like, but i dismissed that notion and figured it was just one of those big-sky thunder-rumbles you hear.  The long, rolling percussive effect when thunder seems to be taking up the entire sky.  We were expecting rain that night, so it had to be thunder.

I was back asleep within seconds, and would not have even remembered the episode.  Didn't give it another thought until Julie asked me later that afternoon if i knew that we had an earthquake.  So i was right!  Must have been an instinctive notion, my sub-conscious discerning that the rumble was from the ground up, not from the sky down.

It only measured 2.8 on richter, so my west coast friends may scoff.  These are noted only for their novelty, not for their impact.  No damage at the house, but there was reported damage at the mall stores.

Later that day, in primetime, we felt another rumble, also a 2.8.  It freaked out the kids, and they didn't want to be upstairs by themselves.

Emily's Wish List

A couple of mornings ago, Julie & i found this list posted to our bedroom door, on a large yellow post-it note, with a red sharpie title of "My Wish List" and in black sharpie, a numbered list of things she apparently wants for Christmas and/or birthday.  I post as is for your amusement, not as a shopping guide for relatives.  I provide links for greater understanding.

My Wish List

1.  heelys

2.  gift card to clars

3.  gift card to limited 2

4.  Grap altoy's

5.  15 dollers

6.  Purple & Green walls

7.  gift card to bilda bear

8.  Jump rope

9.  Goody outfit

10.  dream Life

11.  New shose

12.  tiger electronic

She closed with a big heart symbol at the bottom.  To my knowledge, Emily has not said a single word about her list to Julie, and i know she hasn't said anything to me about it. 

Camping with Jackson

Jackson has joined the Cub Scouts, as an entry-level Tiger Cub, in Pack 942 hosted by Calvary Baptist.  Last weekend, they had a Parent/Son Camporee out at Raven Knob, the Boy Scout campground for this area.  We caravaned out there on a gloomy Saturday morning, with the threat of all-day rain, nippy temps, and a brisk October wind ahead of us.  Being novice campers, Jackson & i were especially worried.  Well, Dad was worried, but the Tiger Cub could only think of all the fun he would have with his fellow Tiger Cub pals.

Everyone set up camp, pitching their tents on whatever flat plot of land you could find.  Saturday ended up being a wonderful day of good weather and lots of fun activities for the kids.  The Tiger den went on a hike through the woods and the mud.  They made terrariums (little flower squares in a sawed-off 2-liter soda bottle) for their moms.  We did the kangaroo hop (a sack race).  Jack did the indoor climbing wall, and did it well.  Then he got to shoot a BB gun for the first time.  Two hits on the target out of five shots.

Back at camp, the scoutmasters cooked chili and peach cobbler for dinner, then we went back to assembly at the big ampitheater for fun & awards & such.  Before it started, they piped music over the speakers, and when Macarena came on, a bunch of kids, including Jackson, ran down to the front lawn to dance around.  They kept dancing through several more songs, including YMCA and Sweet Home Alabama.  It was quite funny to watch a frenetic lawn-full of white, suburban little boys attempt all the dance moves they've seen on TV.  The running man, the robot, the Charlie Chaplin, hip-hop freak moves, etc.

After a campfire with s'mores, we all retired to our tents.  Before midnight, the rains finally came.  And they came and came all night long.  Heavy, torrential rain.  At least that's how it sounds under a small tent, with a tiny rain flap.  It didn't take much rain before i realized that our tent was leaking.  After that, i couldn't get much sleep, worried about disaster.  Water was seeping in along the walls where our gear was touchingthe sides, along the zippered front whereour heads/pillows lay.  Jack's pillow was wet.  The bottom foot or so of my sleeping bag was soaked, causing me to lay in a fetal position all night.  Please God, we pleaded, let the rain stop.

I was so proud of Jackson, because he never complained.  Not once.  I know his pillow was wet, and he had to be uncomfortable, and i kept expecting him to whine, but he never did.  It wasn't until he got up and found all of his clothes were soaked that he got upset.  We had to just pack up and go home, skipping the Sunday morning Vespers service, because the Scouts were supposed to wear their uniforms and Jackson was stuck in his pajamas.  Plus, i was just exhausted and frustrated by it all.

On the drive home, we heard the song "Praise You in This Storm", by Casting Crowns.  I know it's about a metaphorical storm and not a literal one, but we thought it sounded like our theme song of the day. 

"I was sure by now that you would have reached down, and wiped our tears away, stepped in and saved the day.  But once again, I say "amen", and it's still raining."

Jackson probably summed it up best, when he remarked sweetly and without an ounce of sarcasm, "that's OK, it's not like it's the end of the world."

Jackson in 1st Grade

This is the school photo for Jackson in 1st grade. I'll add the others when i can find them. Emily had to re-take hers, so we don't have it yet. Caroline's is around here somewhere, but she's not here to help me find it.

Photos of the new A4

Finally Got a New Ride

After more than 9 years with the Sebring convertible, i finally decided on a new car.  Well, new to me anyway.  Got a 2003 Audi A4 Cabriolet (i guess that's German for convertible) from a dealer down in Charlotte that specializes in off-lease, single-owner, high-end vehicles. 

It's silver with a black top.  Just over 30k miles.  The bigger, 3.0 liter engine.  Pristine condition*. 

It's the car i really wanted all along, which is probably why i could never make up my mind of what to get until i figured out the solution of getting a used one.  We had dabbled with a new Saturn Aura or a Pontiac G6 hardtop convertible, which led me to consider the new Volkswagen EOS hardtop convertible.  I finally concluded that, because i drive so few miles, my best bet was something a few years old with moderate mileage.  Let someone else pay for the new car depreciation, and i can still drive it for several years with few worries about degradation.

* "Pristine" was the term Julie used to describe the car to Emily & Jackson (they were with us when we bought it).  On our way home, we stopped at the rest stop close to Winston and then the car wouldn't start**.  Emily, who is reading a book on the Titanic, chimed in, "that's just like the Titanic.  They said it was unsinkable and it sank.  And you said this car was perfect, and it's not."

** It wouldn't start because the security system detected a key that didn't belong to the car.  Or so it thought.  The 2nd keyfob had apparently never been programmed for this particular vehicle, and that mucked up the system.  When we left the dealer, it started fine because the 2nd key was tucked away in the center armrest console.  I had popped it in my pocket at the rest stop.  I made a frantic (well, you know me, it wasn't really frantic) call to Julie to come back to the rest stop to help me or pick me up, as the case might have been (she had taken off in the Suburban first and didn't notice that i didn't follow, because of a bad wreck on the entrance ramp back to the highway - this is all classic chaos theory).  Then a frantic call to the dealer.  The guy there is the one who figured out the problem.

I'll post photos in the next entry.

The Memory Lane of Atlanta Highways 120 & 9

This weekend, i drove to Atlanta & back for my Windsor (we still call it that even though nobody works there anymore) League fantasy football draft.  Since Phil has moved to Florida, i now have to make the drive, 5 hours each way, by myself.  I left home around 7am Saturday, arriving in Marietta in time for lunch with Shane Jones & David Ayers at Wild Wings, sitting outside at the "tiki bar".  Shane also brought his son Stephen

The Hyatt at Windy Hill, where i normally stay for these weekends, was inexplicably sold out, so i booked a room at a Wingate close to where the draft would be held.  After lunch, i drove from Marietta to Alpharetta, through old Roswell, to the hotel.  This is the route i drove hundreds of times when Julie & i were dating.  So it was a hot afternoon (top up, it was so hot) jaunt down memory lane

The QT on Old Canton & 120, for a late night Diet Dr Pepper.  East Cobb Church of Christ, which we visited a few times.  That new (new when we moved away, anyway) fancy shopping center.  East Hampton subdivision, home to a swim meet & a place to see Christmas lights.  The movie theater where we saw Sixth Sense.  The strip center that used to be anchored by a toy store (or was it a KMart?), where i bought Candyland for Caroline.  Holcombe Bridge Road, where a mile or so east would be Brookwood Grille, site of our first date.  Crossville Road, where a mile or west is Van Gogh's restaurant, a wonderfully romantic dinner with the pre-ordered & personalized dessert.  North Fulton Hospital, where Emily Grace was born

Roswell town square park area - some sort of art festival.  The stoplight at Willeo Rd, at the bottom of 2 big hills, where i almost wrecked the U-Haul as we moved Julie's stuff into my house.  We ate at that Chili's and shopped at that bookstore & a dozen other places.  The church that was on that one prime corner, cleared to make way for a ritzy office park.  The twists & turns & lane shifts that i expertly navigated on a daily basis to set records & personal bests (a minute in the car is a minute i'm not with Julie), still latently mapped in my brain.

It all reminded me of the wonderful time we had together inAtlanta.  Memories that are the beautiful hardwood floors carpeted over by time, life, and fatigue.  These journals, in all their forms, are my way of keeping the carpet peeled back

Never Negotiate with a (Future) Lawyer

I wrote this in my journal on August 5th.  Not quite retro enough for my other blog, but i thought it was worth sharing here...

Funny exchange between Emily & Caroline just now.  They both have summer reading assignments -- Caroline gets Hamilton's Mythology & All Quiet on the Western Front, while Emily has to read a dozen titles -- and they are both lagging with just 10 days to go.   So, after dinner (Julie made yummy fajitas with home-made salsa and sangria), as they made their way upstairs, Caroline proposed a deal.  They would have a contest to see who finished their booklists first.  Emily immediately protested "no fair, i have to read 12 books & you've only got one."

Caroline countered “yes, but it’s like 300 pages”

“Let me see it”

“Look how thick it is.  300 thick pages.”

“Thick pages make it easier, not harder.”

 

You’d think the 15-year-old would have the clear advantage in this negotiation, but Emily’s stubbornness & cleverness hold up to Caroline’s experience & sweetness.  Caroline offers the terms – “if you finish first… [her pause is not for effect; she’s making this up on the fly.] you get to sleep in my room for a week.  No, a month.  And i’ll give you $20, no $10.”

“No, you said $20!”

Ten

Fifteen

Ten

Eleven

 

Stalemate.  Emily’s not buying it.  Caroline doesn’t want to lose a hooked fish, even if it’s her sister, so she searches for an alternative.  “Ok, how about you sleep in my room for a week & $15”

‘How ‘bout a week & $20?”

“Grrrrr!”

 

The teen-ager re-tacts.  “Ok, what do i get if i win?”  I chime in, “you get to sleep in Emily’s room.”  I get the teenage eyeroll.  And the 3rd-graders chuckle.  Emily ponders.  “You get to read my books.”

A laughing “no” from Caroline.  “I know… you don’t bother me with my friends for a month.”

Apparently, this seals the deal & both retreat to their room to get a head-start on the other.  

 

It’s humbling to learn that you are, at best, the 2nd best negotiator in the family.

 

Postscript: Emily surged ahead in the first few days, and everyone said that she would win easily, and that Caroline made a bad deal (it somehow ended up back at the original terms of a month & $20).  So Emily told Caroline that she would stop reading for a few days to let her catch up.  Caroline's tortoise then beat Emily's hare, which was probably best for all involved.

Jackson Gets Bold

Last night, Jackson had his school friend Haley over for playtime and dinner.  This is his special friend, a girl, if you catch my drift.  So, we're eating dinner, and Julie is telling me this story about some funny things that Emily said about not wanting to have a baby when she grows up ("I'll just get one at that place" - she means an orphanage).  And how she doesn't want to live by herself, and that she'll just live with Jackson. 

And Jackson pipes up, now live at the dinner table, that Emily will have to sleep in her own bed in her own room, because Haley & he would be sleeping in the same bed.  Everyone giggles, and no one is sure what to say next, stealing quick glances at the girl to see if she's gonna bawl or punch him or what.  But she is giggling herself.

Somebody says something about getting married, and i josh well, you better be married.  Jackson says that the person he wants to marry will be... and he pauses, and i'm expecting some adjective describing the type of girl he wants to marry, like funny or must love video games, but instead he closes his sentence with a pronoun... you, as he gestures toward his friend.  She giggles again, "ha ha, you said you wanted to marry me."

Julie may remember more details, or better details, but it was a pretty funny episode.

Left Handers Day

I missed Left Handers Day yesterday, August 13th.  But maybe that's because i was doing whatever i do to make more money that you poor righties.  You can't argue with science, especially statistics. 

That 2nd link reminds me of one of my many poorly-conceived and crafted science fair projects in high school.  One year, sophomore or junior, i posited the thesis that lefties were more intelligent than righties, and "proved" it by using the PSAT scores of the sophomores & juniors in my high school.  I got permission from the school to give everyone taking the PSAT a survey about their handedness preferences.  As i anticipated, we southpaws came out on top.  What i didn't understand, and no one helped me understand, was the concept of sample size, and why the average score of the 5 lefties (if that) that took my survey might be skewed by one outlier score.  Say, by that of the author.

They also didn't help me understand my senior year when i just copied a computer program out of a magazine.  It searched for prime numbers.  I didn't pretend it was my own or anything; i just thought it was cool.  My unoriginality didn't bother the judges.  They slapped a ribbon on my board and sent me to regionals, where the big city judges stuck me off on a side-wing, so the real projects, like "The Mathematics of Snowflakes" or "Microbial Antagonism" or "Study of sterility in plant hybrids (F1 and F2)".  I mean, F1 and F2; how can i compete with that?

Nowadays, the search for prime numbers is big business.  Maybe i could resurrect that old program and search for the first 10-million-digit prime number, and snag that $100,000 prize.  Maybe they'd even throw in a cool decoration for my basement.  But i'm guessing my Dell Dimension couldn't handle the bandwith, since the crew that found the last prime number (over 9 million digits long) cobbled together over 700 computers.

The Ron Clark Story

Last night, we watched The Ron Clark Story, a made-for-TV movie on TNT.  Ron Clark is a schoolteacher most famous for his book The Essential 55.  He has taught poor rural kids here in NC, and in Harlem, NY.  I love these kind of stories, and it's one we've seen before, probably most well done with Stand & Deliver, with Edward James Olmos & Lou Diamond Phillips.  Also similar to another (different) Mr. Clark film in Lean on Me, with Morgan Freeman.

I so admire teachers like Clark who go into the rough environments, not least because i know it's something i could never do.  And i don't take it for granted, to have a very contrasting educational experience, both in my own childhood and today with my own kids. 

We had open house at Calvary tonight, and the contrast couldn't be more stark.  A huge church auditorium full of parents.  Even more significant, perhaps, was that both Moms & Dads were there in roughly equal force.  Instead of a Ron Clark having to trudge the streets of Harlem to find caustic or indifferent or downright missing parents of his students, Calvary has hives of WASPs (NTTAWWT) swarming to the teachers right in their classrooms. 

Do come in, it's so nice to have your child, please put the big pile of supplies in your child's locker, and don't forget to sign up for all the field trips and classroom parties.

More Pix of David

Three more photos from David's birthday. As you can see from the 3rd one, i embellished a bit in my last entry about the messy cake. Artistic license and all that.

Link to photos

David Turns One

David celebrated his first birthday yesterday. All the grandparents sent wonderful gifts, and David enjoyed ripping off the paper and stomping (with his siblings) on the bubble wrap. He's a grabby-hands motorboat of a boy, with the lightning-quick movements of a defensive-minded basketball guard, and so he stuck his hand at the single candle of his small round birthday cake before we could blink. No burn, fortunately, just a little wax and a quizzical look on his face.

We (which means everyone but me) let David fist his piece of cake. And everyone (but me) giggled as he naturally smeared it all over his face trying to eat it. Not that i'm a stone-hearted schoolmeister or anything, just that such a spectacle is the province of the red-necked, in my book. And so the only things missing were birthday gifts of lottery scratch-offs and middle-of-the-day longnecks.

But i digress. This day was about our youngest child, not as young as he once was, growing up. He's quite a guy. Nearby you'll find a photo of him, taken yesterday on his birthday. Happy Birthday, son!

Splurging on Freedom

After my successful gallbladder surgery, i slowly began testing the waters in the (once-angry) sea that is my digestive system.  After that first week of recovery, and nibbles here and there, i decided to give it a whirl.  We had lunch at Time To Eat, a burger joint in Clemmons.  I splurged with the cheeseburger, onion rings, and a milkshake.  Let's shoot the moon!

My hard-working pancreas passed with flying colors.  No pain, nothing.  I guess this medicine stuff really does work.

Since then, i've had to make up for lost time, and catch up on all the ice cream i've missed.  Eating a bowl almost every day.  That was the thing i missed the most these past several months.  I don't care about the still-evil french fries; i'm over those piles of grease.  But i gots to have me some cookies & cream, or chocolate chip cookie dough (note to one manufacturer:  it's supposed to be blobs of the dough of chocolate chip cookies - so to speak - not blobs of non-descript cookie dough within chocolate chip ice cream; there's a difference; don't screw it up!) or anything with caramel in it.

Dangerously enough, our bathroom scale picked this key moment to die on us, so i don't know how much catching up i've really done.  My nadir weight, which actually came a few days AFTER the surgery, was 166.  I hit that one morning, and only one morning.  Probably in the mid-170s, but everything still fits like Josh Baskin at the end of Big or like David Byrne of the Talking Heads in Stop Making Sense.

Were i really to muse right here, i'd ponder the metaphor of expanded freedom, and our tendency to make unwise choices with such freedom.  Or how sometimes we need to be saved from ourselves, to be, as Leslie Phillips once sang, "free from no borders".  My diet has no borders any longer.  And while i wouldn't go back to the days of pain and trepidation, i do miss the discipline that came with it.  Now, that discipline must come from within, or at least from a place that pulls us toward life.

Movie Review: Hoodwinked

Hoodwinked is a computer animated film, wrapped around the childhood tale of Little Red Riding Hood.  The added plot, pretty thin and a weak rip-off of the anti-big-box-retailer sentiment, is that a recipe bandit is stealing all the recipes from the little shops in the forest.  And so when the wolf is caught at granny’s house, with a tied-up granny in the closet, he appears to be the prime suspect because granny is known as the primo goodie-baker in the whole forest, and one of the few remaining to have so-far escaped the wiles of the bandit.

 

One delight of the movie is that it shows that same timeframe/scenes from the different perspectives of Red, the Wolf, Granny, and some other characters.  What seems to be isn’t always that way, and the film handles this with a good deal of wit and cleverness.  There are enjoyable, interesting side characters, such as Japeth the Goat (played by the son of Bill Gaither), who claims to have been cursed by a mountain witch so that he has to sing everything he says.  Or Nicky Flippers, the cerebral frog detective voiced by David Ogden Stiers.

 

I also enjoyed the chock-full pop culture references that only the grown-ups would catch.  The entire Wolf character (hilariously voiced by Patrick Warburton, best known as Puddy on Seinfeld) is a complete riff on Chevy Chase’s Fletch.  There are references to Star Wars, The Matrix, and i’m sure plenty of other things i missed.

 

So Hoodwinked is a nice combo of fun & giggles for the kids, and also enjoyable for their parents.  While the bandit mystery isn’t all that hard to solve (even my kids figured it out), you should find plenty to make this a worthwhile rental.

Day Trip: Black Mountain

Last week, i picked up a magazine about day trips in North Carolina.  Yesterday, we decided to take off and do one of the suggested trips, to visit the small mountain town of Black Mountain (note: site was down as of this writing, so keep trying).  What a cool little town!

Black Mountain is about 2 hours from Winston-Salem, right on interstate 40 this side of Asheville.  Its "downtown" is full of quaint, quirky shops.  Our first stop was the Acoustic Corner, where David (not our David, of course) educated us on the nuances of banjos, dobros and mandolins.  Then, there was map store, the gourmet chocolate shop, antique stores galore, a household gadgets place called the Common Housefly (don't ask me why).  There, the kids immediately smelled the coffee aroma, and i showed them the bins of beans.  Jackson had apparently never seen coffee beans before, and he asked why they made coffee out of bugs.

After lunch at My Father's Pizza, where we sat on the streetside deck, in the rain alternating between drizzle & downpour, we strolled up & down Cherry Street.  The Seven Sisters Gallery.  Ice cream cones at the soda shop.  The Ivy Corner antiques (Emily: "I know why they call it the Ivy Corner... because it has ivy and it's on the corner of the street.").  Bone-a-Fide, a bakery for dogs.  Yes, dogs.  The Black Mountain Iron Works.  Garrou Pottery.  And ending with the Town Hardware &General Store, which was full of old-timey things.  Oh, and the amazing used book store, a special treat for bibliophiles & antiquarians.

We spent the most time in Song of the Wood, learning how to play the hammer dulcimer, the lap dulcimer, and other mountain instruments.  We bought a Bowed Psaltery.  I hope to post a picture soon of Emily playing it.  She picked it up almost immediately, easily figuring out how to translate the tunes she knows on the piano.  I have to play it backwards/upside down, but i've got it, too.  Maybe next time, we'll get a starter hammer dulcimer, or maybe a mandolin.

Back from Hosptial

Can't write much, but wanted to let everyone know that i'm back from the hosptial after my laproscopic gall bladder removal surgery yesterday.  Not in too much pain, just an annoying wavering pain in my right shoulder muscle.  The docs say it's from releasing gas (CO2 from the surgery, not intestinal gas), but i'm not sure anymore.  Seems the gas bubbles would have been worked out by now.  Anyhow, keep it treated with a hand-held massager and a heating pad.  All in all, that's not too bad.

I remember absolutely nothing about the surgery.  Kudos to the needle-doctors.  Though the writer in me would really like to have had a conscious experience to tell about.  The last thing i remember was being asked what color cap i wanted (though i had to be reminded afterwards about even that much), and how i warned the nurses that they better pick the right color (Duke blue, not Carolina blue).  Shades of Reagan and his quip:  "I hope you're all Republicans."  After the cap caper, my next memory was of the rough jostle transferring me off the surgery gurney to the post-op recovery bed.

That's Not Smart, It's...

The kids (sans David) & i recently went to a local Single-A baseball game (Winston-Salem Warthogs) for a family fun pack night, where you get 4 tickets, 4 hot dogs, 4 drinks, and 4 carousel rides for $20.  It's a great deal.

Anyhow, as we were walking out of the stadium to go home, Caroline was finishing up some ice cream.  You know, the kind that comes in a little upside-down baseball helmet.  I knew that she had already had cotton candy, too, but didn't use her hot dog coupon for any real dinner.  So i started on a short daddy lecture -- "so you didn't have any dinner, got cotton candy, and then got ice cream.  That's not very smart."

Emily then piped in.  "No, that's not smart... it's genius!"

Today, she riffed off that line, knowing that she gets laughter and mileage off it.  I was telling the kids that I was instituting a new house policy, that if i told them to put something up, and they failed to do so, that i would take it and dispose of it in some manner (up to and including trashing it).  Emily bantered back (not sassy, she does this to be engagingly funny) that she didn't like that rule.  I explained that at least they get a chance; it wasn't like i was just going to nab anything i saw laying around.  I would give them one chance to take care of it first.  Emily wanted to know if they could get TWO chances.  I said, "no, why would you need to be told twice?  Do you have two brains?"  Only a beat later, Emily told me that she does indeed have two brains -- one for the smarts stuff, and another for her funny, genius stuff.

How do you argue with that?

#1 Song on Your Birthday

Ran across a website that can show what song was #1 on the day you were born (or any other day).  I looked up our family's...

Me - I Got You Babe (Sonny & Cher)
Julie - You Can't Hurry Love (The Supremes)
Caroline - Rush Rush (Paula Abdul)
Emily - Candle in the Wind 97 (Elton John)
Jackson - Smooth (Santana)
David - We Belong Together (Mariah Carey)

The site also suggests looking up your "life theme song", which is the #1 song on your 18th birthday. Mine was "Every Breath You Take" by the Police.

How about you?

P.S. Note that when the site comes up, it will ask for a password & login.  Ignore that, and click on "Birthday Number One" from the menu at the top of that page.

Where's the Rest of Me?

I've avoided mentioning this, because it's my brother's thing and all, and he appears to have reached a plateau, and i didn't want to horn in on his thunder (how's that for a mixed metaphor?), but i've been losing weight.  Down 20-25 pounds to the mid-170s.  Can't remember the last time i've been this slim (if you can rightly call it that).

Started with a few bouts of abdominal pain, most likely related to the gall bladder.  I think i must have reached my lifetime limit of cheeseburgers and french fries (now known as "the most evil food in the world").  You must only get so many, so make them good.  No cheap cheeseburgers - that's my sage advice.

Even though i had checked out pretty well in last year's physical, i decided it was time to act.  Not any special diet, and so far, absolutely no exercise.  Just a few simple things...

§            Eat breakfast.  Usually either a cup of oatmeal, or a grown-up cereal topped with banana

§            Don't eat anything past 7pm... 8pm at the very latest

§            Portion control!  It's not so much WHAT you eat, but that you don't eat too much of it.

§            Lots of water.  No more sweet tea.

§           Absolutely no french fries!

The Happiest (and sometimes most stressful) Place on Earth

For the kids' Spring Break, we went to Orlando for the whole Disneyworld experience.  Caroline has been to the Magic Kingdom a time or two, and Julie & i went as kids, but this was our first time as a family, and the first time for the little ones.  6 & 8 are good ages for it, i think.

Lodging: i found a great place, and a great value, called Regal Palms Resort, located about 15 minutes west of Disney, away from the bustle of Orlando, but you can never get away from the traffic.  We rented one of their 5-bedroom houses, complete with a backyard pool.  It was so nice to spread out, and give everyone (well, everyone except David) their own rooms, rather than being cramped into hotel rooms.  I would recommend this place for anyone, though it's probably better to get one of the houses, and avoid the high-traffic, likely worn-out townhomes.  The kids had a blast at the huge clubhouse pool, complete with lazy river and a very cool waterslide.  We couldn't have been more pleased with how this choice turned out.

Parks: we did all 4 Disney parks - Magic Kingdom, Disney/MGM Studios, Animal Kingdom, and EPCOT.  My least favorite was Magic Kingdom; my favorite was probably MGM Studios.  Our favorite ride - and this was a unanimous vote - was the Tower of Terror at the Studios.  Plus, we got to see a theme-park-version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, and the day-end Fantasmic show was wonderful.  The best live show we saw was the Lion King show at Animal Kingdom.  The best of the 3-D shows was Philharmagic at MK.

Other: we checked out the Holy Land Experience, which i found pretty interesting, though a little expensive.  And we saw the La Nouba show by Cirque du Soleil.  It was also very expensive, but worth it.  If you've never seen a CdS show, you owe it to yourself to catch one.

But the part that made it quite special was that my parents got to join us.  It was nice to have them there to enjoy the week with their far-away grandkids.  They treated us to a wonderful character breakfast, the Supercalifragilistic Breakfast at the Grand Floridian hotel.  We got to meet Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Alice in Wonderland and the Mad Hatter, and Mary Poppins.

All in all, it was quite a full, and quite a special, week.

A Too Late (and wrong) Final Four

I was on vacation all last week, so i didn't get to enter any bracket contest, but my Final Four choices would have been Duke, UConn, UCLA, and Boston College. 

David at 7 months

Here's our little guy. He's just started crawling, and you can see in these photos how he wouldn't sit up or still for the photographer. Too many places to go, too many things to do.

Methodology of ACC Statistical Analysis

This is how i approach my statistical evaluation of basketball players.  For the ACC analysis, i enter in the player stats, for all games through the end of the regular season, for everyone playing at least 15 minutes a game.  The stats considered are: FG%, Free Throws Made, 3 pointers Made, Rebounds, Assists, Steals, Blocks, and Points Scored (i also sometimes throw in Points/FGA).  The list is then culled down to the top 72 players (an average of 6/team) based on those stats. 

I calculate the average and standard deviation of this group in each category, and then compare each players stats to these metrics.  This gives you a "z-score" (remember stats class?) for each player for each category.  Those z-scores are summed (i use small tweaks to the category weightings, so it's not a straight sum), and then translated into my 100 point scale.  That scale is designed to accumulate enough points for the entire group, such that they total an average of 100 points per team.  Since the ACC is now up to 12 teams, that is 1200 points.

Let's take a look at Shelden's year, for an example.  He averaged 10.4 rebounds/game, compared to an average of 4.4 reb/game for the top 72 players.  The standard deviation for this group in rebounds was 2.1 reb/game.  Take Shelden's 10.4, subtract the mean of 4.4, for a difference of 6.  Then divide that 6 by the 2.1, for a z-score of 2.9 for rebounds for Shelden.  Do the same of the other 7 stats to get a total z-score.  The translation formula will remain proprietary.

ACC 2006: a statistical review of players

Every season, i do a statistical analysis of the top ACC players in men's hoops.  The method is described below (or in a later post), for those so interested.  But here are some results and observations...

§         The #1 player in 2006 was not JJ Redick, but his teammate Shelden Williams.  Now, right off the bat, this may cause you to pooh-pooh everything about this approach.  I can understand that; it actually troubles me, too.  Redick has done some things this season that are just phenomenal, and perhaps the model can't capture that adequately.  I know the model is agnostic about things like career record-setting and reaching milestones and "first-time-since-David-Thompson" scenarios.  Those things are rightly considered when voting for All-ACC and POY.  But this approach tries to measure impact to the team winning games in this one season, and it was pretty clear from my results that Shelden is tops.  He was the #3 scorer, the #1 rebounder and shot-blocker (quite easily), #2 in FG%, #3 in FT attempts (an extremely important metric), and #4 in steals.  Just a dominant, dominant season on both ends of the floor.

 

§         The final outcome of this analysis is a single-score metric for each player, using a scale of 0-100.  The best season i've logged, going back to the late 1980s, is Tim Duncan's senior year in 1997, where he scored a 96 on my scale.  In 2006, Shelden scored a 81, good for the 8th best season over the past two decades, and the best posted by a Duke player since Laettner's final year in 1992.

 

§         Redick finished with a 68, a clear second place in the ACC (Tyler Hansbrough of UNC was 3rd with a 49, to give you some sense of the scale).  His scoring output was more than 4 standard deviations above the average of the top 72 players in the league.  That is simply amazing.  The league leader is usually 2.5-3.2 stddevs above the mean.  I've never seen anything close to Redick's 4.3 mark this year, and while the model accounts for that, maybe it doesn't do it well enough.

 

§         I agreed with the media's first team All-ACC of the big 3, plus Craig Smith and Sean Singletary.  For 2nd team, I would have had Cedric Simmons (NC State) and Jamon Gordon (Va Tech) in place of Justin Gray and Guillermo Diaz.  For 3rd team, i like Alex Johnson (FSU) and Zabian Dowdell (Va Tech) over Bennerman, Canar-Medley and the inexplicable JR Reynolds.  The writers lazily focus too much on scoring output, to the detriment of other things that lead to winning basketball.

NCAA Tournament

About to go on a run of basketball related posts, starting with a pre-look at the NCAA Tournament.  I am a big proponent of the Sagarin ratings, and use them here to plot projected brackets.  The #1 seeds are: UConn, Duke, Villanova, and Texas.

Top 4 seeds by region:
1. UConn
2. Carolina
3. Florida
4. Gonzaga

1. Duke
2. Ohio St.
3. LSU
4. Pittsburgh

1. Villanova
2. Illinois
3. Tennessee
4. George Washington

1. Texas
2. Memphis
3. Kansas
4. Washington

Duke's "draw" is of most interest to me.  Remembering that this is purely fictional, Duke would have Delaware St. in the first round again, just like 2005.  In the 2nd round, we'd get the winner of Oklahoma and Wichita St (what a match-up that 8/9 game would be, given the geography).  In the Regionals, you're looking at Pitt or Iowa.  Then, facing the survivor of Ohio St, LSU, West Virginia and FSU to go to the Final Four.

Last 4 at-large teams in: Texas A&M, Syracuse, Arizona, and Colorado
Last 4 teams out: Notre Dame, Louisville, Creighton, and Alabama.
Teams Out that are probably in: UAB, Seton Hall

Emily Writes to President Bush

Don't know if anything in particular prompted this, but Emily wrote a note to the President on an index card.  Here's what it said...

2-2-06

Dear Mr. President

if you know who Michael D Scott is, well he's my Daddy.  I am 8 years old.  Can I have a pictuer of you?  If I can there is a pictuer for you on the back.  Can you and I be pinpales.  I just want you to know that you are my favorit president.  Good bye.

Love your friend Emily (heart sign)

On the back was a drawing of Emily hand delivering her letter to Bush.  There is a tree and a flower, and a bird.  She says, "Here you go."  And he says, "Thank you."

Then, she added a second index card, saying...

Do you also know Megan Hunter?  She is my friends sister.  She sent you a letter to I think.

What Does Caroline Mean?

This was also done by Emily, again with the advice of her big sis Caroline...

C. cheerful

A. agressive

R. not like rat

O. oh cool

L. loving

I. in a good place

N. nice

E. expressive

What Does Emily Stand For?

Found this in Emily's handwriting, but i think her big sister helped her some.

E.  stands for entergetic

M. stands for a merry soul

I. stands for inteligente

L. is for lovely

Y. is for young

Emily's Record Book

I have a series of good stuff from Emily.  Now that she has learned to write sentences and express her thoughts, we are treated to a marvel of comedic poignancy (or is it poignant comedy?).  I'll start with...

Emily's Record Book

1. Yawn for 1 minute.

2.  Run 17 laps without walking (correction: these laps are not around our kitchen island, as previously reported, but somewhere at her school, and add up to a whole mile)

3.  (drew a picture of her hands with interlocked fingers) and bend them back.

4.  Run around the room and scream "uuuuuuuuuw"... well, you get the point

5.  Bug your sister for an hour

6.  Ski down a slope

Jackson the Theologian

Jackson bounded up to Julie and me recently, and informed us that the devil likes us when we do bad things.  Julie clarified that the devil may like the bad things, but he never likes us.  Jackson said, "yeah, he's a jerk!"

"The devil's a poopy-head.  He's the s-word."

(Note: the s-word in our house still means stupid, and is pretty much the pinnacle of a bad thing to say.  Jackson decided to see how far he could take it, and we, of course, let him pass.)

Everybody who goes to Texas Throws Up

That's a quote from Jackson, reacting to the news that his Grandma and some of his Texas cousins (i guess all of his cousins live in Texas, now that i think about it) had gotten sick, and to his own sickness.

Now, Caroline is sick.  David's been sluggish all day, and Emily has a bit of temperature.  Mom & Dad are ok so far.  Oh, and Clancy threw up, too, but he didn't go to Texas; he just tried to eat a whole sock.