closed

this blog is closed. I've decided that I'm a better consumer of blogs than a producer of blogs. I do like Flickr though, both the photos and the discussions. You can find me (and plenty of pictures) there.

Answering the Phone

My four year old now loves to answer the phone when it rings at our home. Yesterday it rang, and here's how the conversation went:

Olivia: Hello?
Caller (my mom): Oh Hi Olivia
Olivia: Hi Pau-pau (meaning Grandma)
My mom: I was calling to see if you guys could come to a christmas dinner
Olivia: I already had dinner

!!

Auto Show!

Oooh the L.A. Auto Show starts tomorrow. I have to admit I'm a bit surprised since I'm used to it being in January or February. I wonder if it's possible to take a 1 month old baby to the auto show. I suppose it could dampen the experience. Speaking of damp babies...

Starstuck Pumpkins

We took Olivia to the local pumpkin patch this afternoon. We had a star sighting. If she had been older I could have said, "look honey, that's Spiderman". Yeah it was Tobey Maguire with his wife and year old daughter Ruby. I saw him mostly because we were meeting another family at the pumpkin patch, and I kept scanning the area for them. Then I noticed all the paparazzi. Pretty amazing. Huge camera lenses, still and video cameras. They had step ladders to boost themselves over the fence of the pumpkin patch and take pictures. Oddly they seemed to have appeared at the same time that he did, like they followed him there are something. Yeah, I can understand how that side of fame sucks, but I'd take the money in exchange for some of my privacy no doubt.

My new addiction

I read a newspaper article about Webkinz, it's a bit old news now, but I guess a few months ago these were pretty difficult to get a hold of. It's sort of a beanie baby coupled with an online web version of the stuffed one that you feed and take care of like a Tomodachi. So anyhow I walked into Aahs the other day and picked one up for my daughter. She already likes a Catz game on her GameBoy where she takes care of a virtual cat. This seemed like something she'd enjoy and that I was curious about. Well... you start with 1 room and 2000 in KinzCash. With the KinzCash you buy your pet toys, clothes, food, decorate and add rooms to your house. You earn more KinzCash by playing minigames. In our household, so far I've earned most of the KinzCash and Olivia has done most of the spending. Pretty close to real life. But I sort of enjoy grinding through the silly mini games. They even have player tournaments where I can kick the butt of other Mom's trying the earn KinzCash for their 6-13 year olds. All in all a pretty good deal. But hopefully she won't still be playing this in a year. (The online subscription is good for 1 year from the time you purchase your most recent pet, no monthly costs like Warcraft or even ToonTown)

Newlyweds

Sure, young, crazy-in-love couples run off and get married in Vegas all the time. But what about my 70 year old mom and her 71 year old boyfriend!?! It's true after living together for 6+ years they finally decided to tie the knot. The happy couple chose to exchange their vows at that venerable Asian casino the Imperial Palace. Mom reports that it was just too smoky for her to enjoy playing slots for very long, but she did win a bit anyhow. I think she enjoyed the wedding ceremony too, and of course the outlet shopping on the way there.

Going Green

It's not the sort of thing I would have expected, but it happened. I watched An Inconvenient Truth and I can't recommend it enough. It's a compelling documentary, and it makes me want to buy a hybrid car and install solar panels on my roof. Even if you don't buy the argument (and I don't see how you couldn't), it's worth seeing, just to see what a really good PowerPoint presentation should look like. Put it in your Netflix/Blockbuster Queue right now.