“Sweet Child O’ Mine” by Guns ‘n Roses

I think it’s safe to say that we have dodged a bullet with Zoe and the Chicken Pox.  It’s now been almost a full 4 weeks since exposure and she hasn’t broken out with the little white pox.  Thanks the Lord!

Last week I got an Xbox 360.  I’m such a slave to gadgets, it’s so bad!  When the original Xbox came out, I resisted until after the first price drop.  The Wife got me the Xbox for Father’s Day.  Note that I had been a father for all of a month at that point, but I still qualified.

This time out, I was determined NOT to put forth much effort in obtaining one.  I didn’t pre-order to slap down any money to reserve one.  I just would occasionally check with various stores when I happened to be near one to see if they had any in stock.  My local Game Crazy(tm) had one last Wednesday, so just picked it up.

First impressions are that PGR3 look pretty good on the ol’ high-def TV.  I’ve only played with it for a couple hours in aggregate so far, and I only have 2 games (PGR3 & Tiger Woods).

Some early observations:

• The Windows Media Connect support for media files is nice to have.  I have a Roku device upstairs that I use to stream music to the living room.  Now I have the same access to the music in the downstairs HDTV room.  Nice.
• The WMC music UI scales for shit.  God help you if you have 300 unique artists to scroll through.  I don’t even want to try scrolling through song titles.
• I love – LOVE – the wireless remote and that it turns on/off the console VIA RF (RF!) as well as IR!
• The optical out port on the A/V cable does not hold the toslink cable very well.  Lame.
• The boot sound scared Andrew the first time he heard it.

Overall, an improvement over the original Xbox.  Heck, it’d better be.  So far, unfortunately, the game selection has been less than inspiring.  I’m sure it will improve over time.  Unfortunately, the game library for the PSP really didn’t.  Sony has really under-performed with its handheld console.  The UMD movie format is all but dead.  And the PS3 will likely not see US shores until 2007.  This should be interesting.

Meanwhile, I’m looking to unload my Xbox and associated games and accessories.  Drop me a line if you’re interested.

My son Andrew does not like to go to the QFC.  However, he really enjoys going to the PCC.  He also seems to derive much enjoyment out of saying “the Pee See See”.  He’s very deliberate about it.  He enunciates QFC just fine, but he doesn’t seem to put as much personality behind it.

Recently, our local QFC has undergone what I would call a “fancy facelift”.   It’s nice.  Sorta like shopping at the UVillage QFC without all the parking hassles.  And you still occasionally get accosted by those guys who just need a little help with their car or maybe $20 for gas.  No childcare, though.

My iPod Shuffle (512MB) doesn’t work. Whenever I try to play it, the orange and green lights blink on the front. Whenever I plug it into a USB port, Windows seems to recognize it but iTunes does not. Unfortunately, Explorer doesn’t let me do anything with it (e.g. no Format, browse, etc.).

I’ve only had it for 5 months or so. Now I have to deal with Apple support. Lame.

Well, it’s been over 3 weeks since little Zoe has been exposed to chicken pox.  Dare we declare victory?  I feel like it’s almost jinxing it.  I’ll wait until we reach the weekend.  Then, victory is OURS!

It’s been 15 days since our daycare provider contacted us about little Zoe being exposed to the Chicken Pox virus. So far, so good (knock on wood). Little cutie is still pox free and happy.
We had a scare last week when one of our friends told us their son started puking the night after the boys got together for a play date. Andrew never got the stomach bug, so we dodged a bullet there. I’m really hoping Zoe can dodge this one.

I think we have another week of watching and waiting before we can declare victory….

I vaguely remember the day I got chicken pox. I was in Kindergarten and it was a day like any other, I suppose. Except the next thing I knew, my mom picked me up and I got to stay home and watch TV for several days. Not a bad deal unless you mind the itching.

Now that I’m a dad, I worry about things like my kids getting the chicken pox. I suppose it’s part of that “parental” protectiveness thing. Last week our daycare provider called us and notified us that one of the kids at the daycare had broken out with chicken pox. Since Zoe isn’t 1 year old yet, she hasn’t been innoculated so – of course – she’s at risk.
This sort of thing is upsetting on a number of levels, but mostly that my little girl will be very uncomfortable at the very least – and may be at risk of something more severe at worst (*knock on wood*) – in two to three weeks. It’s funny because it’s not something I would’ve given a thought about for me at age 5, but for my kiddos it’s got me going.

Well, there’s still a chance she might not come down with it. You never know, I suppose. She doesn’t come into extremely close contact with the infected kid and our daycare provider was kinda keeping her separated due to her runny nose, but chicken pox is extremely contagious and that kid was shedding virus well before anyone knew he had it, so it’s probably more than likely she’s infected. Our doctor’s office says that due to her breastfeeding and the fact that Mom had chicken pox as a kid that there may be some chance that Zoe will beat it. Let’s hope she does.

Can you imagine a face like that being unhappy?

Heh, this is pretty amusing. Plus, I didn’t know that about drinking pop solo.

Y’know, I think I like mucking around with the blog infrastructure more than actually writing the blog.

One of the things I’m going to be messing around with shortly is adding InfoCard support to my blog.  I’ve asked Kim Cameron for his WordPress InfoCard code and I can go and get my cert to get it up and running.  Pretty exciting!  Now all 2 of you who send in comments may need to sign up for an InfoCard!  Spam be gone!

I’m also trying to figure out how to get dynamic traffic info on this thing.  I’m probably 80% there.  Whee!