The Scrappy Indiana Jones

Christian just completed all three "movies" on the Lego Indiana Jones Wii game. Occasionally Christian would put together his own Indy get-up but he always refused to be photographed until now. My favorite part? Look at Christian's crooked smile - just like the Lego character.

Erika's Self Portrait

Our three year old Erika buried herself in our art studio the other day. By "buried" I mean posting a "do not disturb sign", locking the door, blacking-out the windows, and refusing to come out for 24 hours. Occasionally she would make demands on Heather like "More Paper NOW!" and "I'm out of gummy bears, WHERE ARE MY GUMMY BEARS!" Heather gently complied by slipping more art supplies and Haribos under the door. I awoke at 3:00 a.m. and pressed my ear against the studio door. Erika was muttering to herself "no, No, NO!, its just not right" as I heard paper crumpling and falling to the floor.

The next morning, just before I left for work, Erika burst from the studio panting and exhausted from a hard night's work. She was delighted with herself. "I did it, I really did it this time!" she exclaimed. I peered behind her into the art studio and saw literally mounds of scrap paper and empty art pens littered across the floor. In her hand she held her first self-portrait, and her first foray into photorealism. She gently layed it in my hands and stared intently at my eyes waiting for my reaction.

I wept. Just look at the structure of her work. You can almost see her cheek bones and facial muscles laying beneath her semi-translucent skin. The effervescent smile, the glisten in her deep brown eyes, even the faint scar above her left eye from her recent accident were spot-on. I think I'm going to fire her manager and rep her myself. I'm going to be rich!

My Christmas Shopping is Done

To everyone I shop for, your 2009 Christmas will be the most memorable yet. There's been so many great products this year like shamwows, snuggies, slap chop, and Little Umi - the lifelike monkey doll (http://nelsonsinspace.blogspot.com/2009/02/most-incredibly-likelike-baby-monkey-eh.html) that it would be silly not to complete my shopping early. I had a few difficult persons to shop for, you know, persons who already owned snuggies, and I was clueless as to what to buy for them until I opened today's coupon section of the Sunday paper. Our friends at The Bradford Exchange Collectibles have announced the release of their latest blockbusting product - The Three Stooges Wacky Talkie Plate Collection. Does it get any better? Yes, it does. Squeeze their ties and they say "Oh, a wise guy, eh?" and "Woob woob woob!" Just three easy payments! Who might be so lucky to receive these plates? Well, I don't want to give that secret away but let's just say a few lucky ladies are going to receive these heirlooms - women love the stooges.

Holga rama

My second set of Holga 135 photos. I love the photo of Christian jumping through the rope. Holgas make persons look different. The photo of Heather below doesn't capture the real Heather. Some people would say that a camera that can't accurately capture a person's likeness is not worth the plastic its made of. I disagree. I like the surprise.

Outlook Not Good

I've moved my office from the 16th to the 19th floor and immediately decided "Hey, this would be great time to ruin my computer's continuity and send my practice into a tailspin." Hell bent on ruining my life, I bought a new computer with Vista and attempted to load a new copy of Microsoft Outlook this morning. I've tried Yahoo calendar and Google calendar but they're just too slow. I search, edit, and bang away on my calendar all day long. Outlook's compatibility with X1 Desktop Search was too valuable to ditch for an online calendar. Well, Outlook wouldn't install. It wouldn't install! On a brand new computer running Vista it wouldn't install! After an hour on the phone to Microsoft support, buttons suddenly started disappearing; you know, important buttons like email's "send/receive." Well after another half hour of remotely tinkering with my computer the tech got it running. I can't wait to walk into work tomorrow and find it not working.

The Juliet Chronicles

Juliet continues to put on the pounds. She's easy to make smile and laugh now except when she's on camera. She's a very good baby. Now's she fighting to turn over onto her tummy. Right on schedule.

Why Church

Any regular church goer can list a thousand reasons why he or she attends services. I don't need to repeat them here. But occasionally I'm going to add some of the great wisdoms and witicisms I hear from regular members of my congregation. Today we were discussing the dangers of pride. Not the pride you have in your child's accomplishments, but the harmful pride summed up by Ezra Taft Benson as "[pitting] our will against God's. . . The proud wish God would agree with them."

Then Patriarch Jerry Kinison added, "If humility is to see things as they really are, then pride is to see things as they are not." I asked the Patriarch whether the quote was his and he said that it was. An excellent quote. I might reduce it to "Humility is to see things as they really are" and I hope I always remember to attribute it to Patriarch Kinison.

Orchid or Onion

Here's an update on the exterior of the house. As you can see, there's a lot more siding. The near-black stucco accents should be finished soon. The interior is being painted. I expect they're going to stitch the new and old wood floor together this week.

San Diego has an architectural "contest" each year where they announce their favorites (orchids) and their not-so-favorites (onions). I'm sure our home might make some eyes tear but to me it looks as pretty as a terete vanda (papilonanth).

Pinewood Derby Mayhem

Last night the local cubscouts held their annual Pinewood Derby. I had made pinewood derby cars for the kids to play with a year ago. Shortly after last year's derby I made a third car out of clear Lucite. Yep, I glued a couple of blocks of plastic together, carved it, and polished it. It smelled like Dad's dental lab. I dubbed it the Ghost Car. I thought the audience would go wild when I pulled it out of the bag and layed it on the judging table but for the life of me I couldn't find it - argh!

Well, we had enough cars for Christian and Erika. They entered the unlimited class which allowed non-cubscouts to race. Neither won their races, but both would have tied for first place in the design category had we stayed a bit longer. The kids loved it but the mayhem was a little too much for us to take. We split as soon as the crowd gobbled up the last of Heather's chocolate sheet cake. Exhausted by the day we hit the hay around 8:45 p.m. and all fell asleep by 9:00.

Now I'm planning a pink car for Juliet. I have some left over cocobolo and walnut for some new models.