So here I was thinking it’d be a great idea to build a proxy server for my iPhone that would drop flash, downsize images, and generally strip out the bandwidth sucking web for when I am out and about on the 3G tubes.
I figured someone must have done it and sure enough google has been there. Google Wireless Transport does this without the need for a proxy server. You can enter a URL directly (not too interesting), select
After just over a week, we finally have heat for the forseeable future. It’s amazing how such a simple thing that we more or less take for granted kind of puts everything on hold when it is lifted out of our lives. It sounds spoiled, but not having heat has just kind of taken all of the motivation to do things away pending a fix. Weird.
Anyway, hopefully my inspiration to blog about my stay-at-home-dadness will be rejuvinated.
CB has got herself employed at an interesting sounding job, so we are back to living large 
She even has this week as a kind of mini-vacation before starting work.
Liam hasn’t been sleeping great. We aren’t sure if its the heat, the teething, or attempting to wean him off some of his drugs. Hopefully it was the heat.
We continue with quite possibly the worst customer service experience of my life. That could be an exaggeration, but it is front of mind and happening now, so it’s the worst ever. We are now five days with a broken furnace and three days without any actual heat. It’s not bothering me that they may not be able to fix it until a part arrives (October 26; 7 more days), but rather that we can’t get a straight answer or responses. They have told us five times so far that someone will be getting back to us within some specified time-frame and we have only had one actual such callback. If you ever have the chance to not buy from Sears, take it. They have lost my patronage completely and irrevocably.
Liam has been well, though. Friends loaned us a space heater, so we’ve been able to keep him comfortable. He’s been having some fussy naps. On Saturday he fell asleep on my chest on the bed. He isn’t very cuddly and hasn’t done that since just after he came back from the hospital. He ended up napping for two additional hours. Despite my arm falling asleep, I didn’t want to move him.
We had a good weekend in Ottawa with CB’s side of the family. Liam had three nights that were supremely pleasant and one that was slightly more, er, hellish. The doctor says its just teething, but I can’t help but suspect he’s channeling Sam Kinison (1:38 specifically). Seriously though, the kid’s got a Marlon Brando (search for cotton) thing going on and I am SOOOO glad I have no conscious memory of cutting molars.
We had a couple of good visits with CB’s grand-dad and some Thanksgiving quality time with the family. I don’t know if its the air or what in Ottawa, but I always sleep better there.
We visited the Museum of Science and Technology, which I’d recommend for any with toddlers. I actually preferred it to the Ontario Science Center. Liam was taken with the trains and an oscilloscope/keyboard/speaker installation. Looks like daddy might be visiting the electronics shop.
Speaking of auditory-verbal therapy, Liam wowed me today. We had one of those toys in today’s session where you put the shaped object into the slot with the corresponding shape. He got 5/6 first try after a little deliberation. It was very cute to watch as he assessed the block, assessed the receptacle, assessed again and then popped the block in the right slot. The one he got wrong was he was trying to put the six flowered petal shape into the four petal slot. It reminded me of an anecdote about Dick Feinman where he used to spend a fair bit of time thinking through a malfunction in an early generation electronic radio from only a description of the problem and then would proceed fix it in a few moments. Yes, I am starting to equate my child with Richard Feinman. Deal with it. After today, game on!
We also had Liam’s one year wellness appointment. The doctor is quite pleased with Liam’s progress. If we continue to use his corrected age for length (I guess we call it height when you can stand consistently) and weight he will be off the charts shortly, so the doctor is going to start using is actual age for charting (he’s about 50th percentile actual for height, weight, head). This is pretty huge news as that is not supposed to happen until two years old for someone as premature as Liam.
It’s been a busy week despite two days of it on the road or in Ottawa. We’ve been fighting with the furnace and getting a Sears repairman in. They say there’s no such thing as bad advertising, but let me try: Sears; you suck! You can’t book a freaking maintenance appointment without first trying to upsell and then f*cking it up and causing a one day delay with no heat. Good thing, our positive karma is intact and I seem to magically be able to restart a furnace. Next time I’m going with someone not Sears you bad, bad company. Saying you suck insults the suckage of those I have said suck in the past. You’re so bad, I bet Scott Adams has a cartoon that accurately lampoons your company’s approach to customer service and sales without referring to you specifically.
Anyhoodle, off to Gymboree in the morning.
menu p.s. Not much interesting to report this week. Being away “forced” us to order in on Tuesday, I can’t remember what we had yesterday (what’s that about? 
) and tonight I attempted a new recipe of my own concoction: “north meets south” chicken: herb and Maple Mustard marinade with a Jack Daniels BBQ sauce finish. The BBQ sauce overwhelmed the mustard though 
I should’ve seen that coming. Epic fail.
The little man’s schedule has eased off a little. We had a good physiotherapy session on Tuesday morning and followed up with the recommended stair ascent/descent practice.
In the afternoon, we went to the Lil’ Bean and Green cafe in Leslieville. It was a nice place to hook up with other parents (i.e. moms). The play area was good for the tykes, but did have a few age inappropriate items for Liam. The cappuccino was good, but the snacks were a little uninspired. They post that it is $3 for the kids to play, but they didn’t charge us so maybe that is only if you don’t purchase anything. The operator seemed a little too keen on Oil of Oregano rather than Alcohol to clean the kids toys, but we are pretty careful with Liam. I did a little bit of a search to see if there were any studies comparing the two. I couldn’t find any, so I’m sticking with alcohol which is proven to work.
Today’s auditory-verbal therapy went well. We baselined Liam again so we’ll be finding out next week how is doing against expectations. He has definitely improved which is all we are really looking for at this point, but it’ll be curious to see how he fairs against an average full term child. At 4 months he was measuring as approximately a 2.5 month old.
It’s been a busy couple of days. Yesterday, we hooked up with a friend from Alberta that we haven’t seen in a couple of years. The whole “gang” was there and everyone seemed strangely much the same. It was all the somewhat-older-than-toddler kids that set an unusual tone. These are people for whom the memory association is drunken halloween and cottage parties.
The food update: I was able to squeeze in some roasted egg-plant and red pepper panini’s for the three of us before heading out yesterday. Somewhat surprisingly, Liam was more than game and seemed to like the egg-plant. I managed to discover the Green Dragon which has a tangy pulled pork sandwich that I have to say I enjoyed more than the one at the Auld Spot. We ended today with couscous, mustard BBQ chicken, and a spinach salad with vinaigrette, pears, steamed yellow zucchini, and toasted almonds (no nuts for Liam, of course).
Today was filled with Gymboree (structured yuppy play time) and swim class. It sounds simple, but it’s amazing how quickly the time in between gets filled. Both were fun. Mom was even able to come and watch the swimming. The pool is cold, but Liam is usually pretty game. I’m going to have to get him a neoprene suit, though. He got his first dunking today. I was a little reluctant, but it was part of the program and he weathered it well. No coughing, aspirating, or anything. Not at all what I expected.
You may have noticed a theme of food throughout my posts. I’m quite enjoying being at home and cooking. I was always so burned out or late while working that I haven’t been in a cooking groove for a while and it’s good to be back in the saddle.
You’ll also noticed I dropped the Born to be Dad thing. I was going to do a weekly summary that would be the S01E01 (season 1, episode 1), S01E02, and so on, but I can’t be arsed.
Due to a touch of cold I didn’t get to participate, but I did get to watch the little master in his Gymboree class on Friday. He was climbing, occasionally rolling, crawling, throwing and chasing the ball, and so on and so forth. He’s still a baby and already so much older than expected. I can’t get over how much different he has become as he has gained mobility. Leaps and bounds. Leaps and bounds.
We had a couple of days without, er…, regularity, so we had to bail on a parental get together in the afternoon in favour of the first medical visit on my shift. All is well though; the boy is fine. I’m assuming this is the first of many such false alarms.
Today was a day off of sorts. I spent the morning with him while CB attended karate class, but she took over in the afternoon while I shopped. It was rather nice to get out alone. I’m starting to get into a bit of a groove. I planned the menu for the week using Epicurious that hopefully accommodates all three of us. Tonight was a simple but hearty shepherd’s pie. It went over well with all parties. Not the most healthy of foods, but it matched the pleasant fall day we had today. It’s great to have the time and energy to cook again.
Another good day. This one began with an early hand-off from the maternal unit to allow her to job hunt. I fed the lad and prepped him for our outing to his weekly AVT appointment. We got out a little late. CB had to search for her October Metro Pass. … which it turns out I never handed off to her when it got mailed to us. No harm no foul, though. We made it on time and the aforementioned Metro Pass made the proper change of hands later in the day.
As a result of his AVT, the little man had a later nap than usual. Once he rose, he assisted me making pizza for the family. The doctor said he should be eating all we eat, so game on. Beer and wings tomorrow. Seriously, I wanted to kill off some purees sitting in the cupboard, so I made him a variant pizza with a sweet potato puree instead of tomato sauce (potential allergy), whole wheat crust, roasted red peppers, fresh peppers, pears, apples, bacon (just a little), and dusting of two year old cheddar and parmesan cheese. It was almost as good as the pizza for CB and I (tomato sauce/BBQ sauce mix, green/red peppers, bacon, olives, dried tomatoes, portobello mushroom, cheese).
I assumed he wasn’t going to like it, so I hopped him up on a pear and some cottage cheese with prune puree. He loved it, though.
For those of you new to my pizza, the absolutely amazing no fail crust is as follows:
1. mix yeast/warm water/sugar (per packet instructions) and let sit for 15 minutes
2. add 2 tbsp oil (any light oil – infused are very nice)
3. add and mix flour until you have a not very sticky dough ball
4. Let rise for about 20 minutes
5. Roll it out and add sauce
6. Bake for about 10 minutes at 425 before adding toppings and cooking the toppings (thanks for that Nellie)
I woke up to shit, more shit, and some extra shit on top of that. Oh, did I mention the shit? Up to the elbow really. Swimming in it. The boy dipping his hands, feet, and any other appendage he could get in to it. Good times that fatherhood thing.
Pretty good day, despite the … you know. Fairly uneventful. We spent a little time on the swings and see-saw in park in the morning followed by a nap somewhat later than usual. We cut the park short ’cause it was a little cool. The boy and I picked up some Gyros at Louis’ Meat Market. Best Gyros in Toronto. For the search engines: best gyros in Toronto.
In the afternoon, we visited a daycare. It was my first exposure to one of the daycares we have been looking at so I’ll reserve judgement and avoid liable by not naming it. The staff seemed very nice and access is reasonable for us once transit is considered, if a little remote. The menu was much better than expected, even admirable: all local and somewhat ethnically diverse. No fucking Kraft dinner or hotdogs (no disrespect to Kraft, but your processed food lines are shit, as above; you have redefined irony). I wasn’t pleased with the outdoor play area though. I imagine five year olds smuggling in smokes from the outside for the three year olds to use to barter for time on the weights. It might be an acceptable place to park the boy while looking for better, but I can’t see leaving him there long term other than to learn him some street skills.
My rather capable and responsible niece did a little babysitting while we attended a Mt. Sinai seminar on having another child after having a preemie. I have to say here that Sick Kids and Mt. Sinai are amazing hospitals. ’nuff said.
Any-hoodle, I’m now trying to decide whether to watch Heroes (the wife not being interested in season 4). I apparently have first watch on the boy and may go for a jog while the wife unit nurses him. I may not be up to that if I indulge in a little late night “TV”.
Liam had another busy day. We started off with a somewhat dozy breakfast and morning playtime with dad. My adult household counterpart did the handoff after nursing and I sort of slogged my way through the morning meal. I wasn’t too interactive. He wasn’t too interactive. A little caffeine induced personality augmentation picked things up. He’s a real bear until he’s had his first morning coffee.
First thing, Liam played the drum and xylophone whilst I listened to some interviews on CBC. As CB put it, the Richard Dawkins sermon was rejuvenating. I think of it as a periodic vaccination against the sheep (see here also). He was discussing his upcoming book The Greatest Show on Earth, The Evidence for Evolution. I’m looking forward to it. I’m always a little hit and miss on his writing. I agree with him whole-heartedly, but I find him confrontational. Despite his protests I think he goes out of his way to be somewhat provocative. I don’t blame him, though. It sells book and I’m all for calling out the BS.
In any case, we spent the afternoon at neonatal followup. This was Liam’s one year followup. He did quite well; no surprises. We pretty much knew where he’s ahead and where he’s behind. With fingers crossed: everything is on track. I came away from it feeling we want to coddle him less (my words): make him point and choose when he wants stuff more often. We tend to anticipate his needs too readily. We are quite attentive, but we are supposed to encourage more active communication. In short, we have to let the book and toy provisioning get a little thin to make him go essentially ask us for stuff. He already does it for food, so we know he has it in him.
Because of the followup appointment, he had a sketchy nap. I was able to put him to sleep with little fuss, although we did do it in a lingering “story … sippy-cup … story … sippy-cup” kind of way. He really seems to like that and gets lulled to sleep. Very time intensive but enjoyable for me.
Oh, he took the afternoon sippy-cup again and did better on the evening one. Woo hoo (also the Sick Kid’s approved AVT sound for a train FYI).