sup

Dada & Avery read a book.

all kinds of awesome

Dada & Avery read a book.

There’s your Christmas spirit.  Just hanging out, telling stories.  I’d say reading a book, but it was more like eating a book.  She’s just now able to get the object of her desire to her mouth, so long as she uses her entire body to do it.  So she’s a drool monkey, but she’s getting uber abs at the same time.  If it were me I could probably live with that.

She doesn’t really care for lying down if it can be helped.  She wants to sit up and chat with the big folk.  And sometimes she has to tell the whole story.  I could not tell you what it’s actually about, but it sounds very exciting.

I’m excited just watching her.  She’s ravenous for experience, drinking it all in.  You can see the wheels spinning, the gears clicking.  If you happen to be looking at her when she has a new experience, you can see her tiny eyebrows go up.  Record record record.  Now is probably not too soon to start watching the language.  And the tv programming choices.  And possibly wearing pants.

Odd.  I just paused my typing.  It seems very quiet.  The Chaos team would have a chuckle at my expense here.  Is it my fault I type with authority?  Is it such a bad thing?  Maybe if you’re a keyboard.  Or trying to sleep.

Mum & Avery at the Museum?

 

Are my girls at some fancy museum on the Upper East Side?  No, but I can certainly understand why you’d think so.  That’s our living room.  Yes, it’s true.  No, we didn’t hire a decorator.  I just dabble in photography and we found a nice place to do canvas mounting.  If you’re very nice I might tell you where we had it done.

And yes, they really are my girls.  My beloved wife for life, Marjorie, is the taller one there, and the little snuggle bear is Avery Peppermint, my daughter.  She’s… 14 weeks now?  I think?  15?  Time to shift the count to months.  This time next week she’ll be three months old, and officially through her fourth trimester.  I cannot imagine how bored to tears she would be if she were still cooped up in the womb.

Today’s side project was clearing out the second bedroom.  Avery’s room slash my office.  Space is always at a premium in New York, so since moving in we’ve had a few boxes on the floor full of stuff that just did not have a home.  Still doesn’t, but drastic measures needed to be taken so we can pack for the trip.  Do not open the closet.  Do.  Not.

A wise man would go to bed right now.  So I will imitate the wise man, and everyone will think I’m wise.  Big day tomorrow.  I need the brain for planning and the awesome for being… awesome.  Sleep is a good idea.

 

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Italy prints

the wind up

Merry Xmas to us!  Look what arrived today:

Italy prints

Bah!  You can’t get it from a web-optimized iPhone jpg.  These prints turned out gorgeous.  They look like oil paintings.  Just… smashing.  Thank you, Venice, for being so photogenic.  I couldn’t be happier.  Except now the other walls are clamoring for attention.  Patience, friends.  Your time will come.  Of course, that sale happens once a year, so it could be a while.  Dangit.  Somebody buy my script.

Gorgeous!

I’m feeling awfully fortunate these days.  Avery and I must have spent half an hour just looking at the Christmas lights, neither of us saying a word.  She drooled some.  Me too, though that might have been the smell of Marjorie’s banana muffins.  Or the homemade cinnamon granola.  See?  So fortunate.

As planned, I connected with the nice lady at the tech/design school, and it sounds promising.  I’ll put together the job description and she’ll post it to the system, and we’ll be partners in education.  A thing Fuel knows something about.  In the new year we’ll meet for an extended talk about how our worlds might complement.  I’m hopeful.  The Italian team is working some magic, but I want to get them some help, especially on the UI – something with which none of us has much experience.  She’s very pretty, but she wants to dance.  The app, not the nice lady at the tech/design school.  Well, unless it’s also true in her case.  I have no idea.  I’m sure she’s lovely.  You should take her out dancing.  You neglectful bastard.

This week, Fuel needs to wrap its official 2013 planning sessions.  Chaos will take what time it can get.  I think I have some mixing coming up.  Wednesday should be especially good.  An abbreviated Chaos session, followed by the Fuel jam, and hopefully somewhere in there we hear back from [A-List guy for Secret Project].  And then Lee and I are attending a fete at the Canadian Consulate in honour of Barb Stegemann, whom Canadians know from The Dragon’s Den and her company, The 7 Virtues.  Neither of us have met her, but she heard about us and wants to meet.  So we’re going.  And then we’re supposed to take her out to see some comedy.  Neat.  Whatever shall I wear?

Adventure.

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all up in the chrismizz

How was your Sunday?  Christmassy?  MaxiChristmassy?  MegaYule?  Marjorie and Avery hung out at home today while I combed the Upper East Side for gifties and stocking stufferage.  By my estimate I walked about ninety blocks.  No giant ass Snickers, though I could have used the snack/meal/enough to feed a family of four for a week.  I had a good time on the hunt, but I wasn’t sad when it was over.  Bit of a sore knee.  I did find some goodies, but I think I’m going to have to go out there one more time… there’s a lot of New York.  Or at least there are a few more blank spots on the checklist.

I am probably a pain in the ass to shop for.  True story.  I tend to have everything I want already.  Beautiful family, good friends, fantastic job in the greatest city in the world.  All the toys a man could want.  The toys I don’t have but want are prohibitively expensive.  A new monitor, maybe.  How about a new lens for the ol’ point & shoot?  Time to upgrade the camera too?  A new set of wheels maybe.  A new car would be nice… or should I be thinking more like a family man?  A nice family vacation?

See?  A bit disproportionate to my current economic status.  Perhaps just a new t-shirt then.  Oh, which reminds me:

If you’re looking for the fun way to throw some support at the victims of Hurricane Sandy, these shirts will do that.  Every dime will go to relief efforts – I’ll publish the details on the Chaos Complex website at the end of the tax season.  We hoped to have our own silk screener for this, but that somehow wandered away.  So, we made a Zazzle store.  Lots less profit (donation) but also no overhead.  Here’s the flash window, maybe, if it works, and in case you’re not on an iOS device:


View more gifts at Zazzle.

And if it there’s nothing there, just click the link.  I’m too tired to mess with the html right now.  I’m sure you’ll hear more about the shirts over the next few days.  We really want to do something fun but meaningful to help out.  And hey, that shirt is fun.

Meanwhile, kids, it’s time for bed!  May your Monday be shiny.  Hugs and such.

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