Babes and Beer |
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Drinking beer, being married, and raising kids.  A Nosuch affiliate. 
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Wednesday, June 27, 2001
I've been thinking. Not a whole lot, this idea just came to me, but wouldn't it be cool to have a Clan Lord like engine, and some good tools so people could make their own graphical MUDs based on the engine? It would be even cooler if you could link MUDs that agreed to, expanding the world yet further...
I'll have to think about that some more... Monday, June 25, 2001
Whoa. It's 5:30am. I've been sleeping for 6.5 hours straight. Today I return to work fulltime, after a week off and two weeks of half days, and apparently Bridget decided to deal with Isabel herself all night, and I slept through it all. I haven't had more than a 4 hour block of sleep all month.
That's the sweetest thing I can imagine right now. Sunday, June 24, 2001
Bah. SIDS. The bane of any parent's existence. They don't know what causes it. It's rare as hell. Yet it still manages to be torture.
They say that putting the baby to sleep on it's back helps reduce your currently-microscopic odds. However, Isabel LOVES to sleep on her tummy, and hates to sleep on her back. Every so often she'll jerk, and if she's on her tummy, her arms don't move much, and she stays asleep. On her back, the twitch causes them to flair about, waking her up... Zillions of kids, including damn near everyone who reads this, slept on their stomachs just fine. However, if I decided to ignore the waves of propaganda about this, and DID catch the 1 in a million odds, I'd probably never recover from the guilt. In the meantime, Isabel and I probably lose an hour of sleep each night over this issue. Mmmmm, Bridget made her tasty homemade cinnamon rolls this morning. Damn they're good. In addition to being gorgeous, funny, smart as hell, and my best friend, she's an awesome cook. I tell you, waiting for the *right* person to marry has paid off in spades. Thursday, June 21, 2001
Ugga. Lost the $15 back at poker last night. Had a good time, though. My friend Jack played, he hadn't played poker for about a year.
Had two Kokanee's, it's not a bad mega-lager. Also had a Bridgeport IPA, which is one DAMN tasty beer. Made in Portland. I love India Pale Ales, lots of great hops flavor. They're too strong/bitter for some, it's an aquired taste. Bridget took Isabel to meet up with some ladies from our childbirth class today, so I had a free hour to clan. Hooked up with a bunch of DM mates, Shard, Connie Crete, Prinkus (BEER!), Ledward Vicious, Monkey, and a bunch of others and we took over Noids via totally disorganized Zo-like kamikazee raids. Loads of fun. It cracks me up that with zero detha Humbaba was one of the best bricks there. Also spent an hour reading. Been trying to finish up Peter F. Hamilton's "Night's Dawn" monster trilogy, which is six books in the Yoo Ess since us stoopid Yanks can't handle 1400 page books like they can in the UK. I'm on the last one. The first book (two in US) were AWESOME. Great epic space opera, a grand well-devised fairly original complete universe, well fleshed out and well done. It's slowed down since then. Finshed Vernor Vinge's "A Deepness In The Sky" last week, it kicked ass. I've got a pretty huge paperback scifi/fantasy collection, probably over 1000 volumes. I should count 'em sometime. I *really* should get off my ass and finsh entering them into my PalmPilot so I know what I have and what I am missing. I *hate* it when I buy a book I already own, or pass on a rare-ish book at a used bookstore because I think I already have it. Wednesday, June 20, 2001
So Boeing, after being a Seattle company for around 100 years, is moving their corporate headquarters to Chicago because the CEO is tired of long flights. Well, gee, no shit, Sherlock. Everyone hates long flights, partially because your planes are uncomfortable as hell.
I can't imagine why 80% of the headquarters folks here aren't going to move to Chicago. I mean, c'mon. Today it is 77F outside. That's like insanely hot to someone who's lived in Seattle for a while. We're used to nice mellow temps, not too hot, not frickin' freezing. Chicago, from what I understand, has total extremes of temperature. Ugga. No thanks. Speaking of weather, the easiest job in the US has to be the San Diego weather man. "Um, it's gonna be nice again today. The six day forecast is for nice sunny weather. Back to you, Bob!" Tuesday, June 19, 2001
I've been having a blast clanning these days. Lots of my Dwarven Militia buddies on to do things with. Last night at 3am Isabel got fed/changed and decided she wasn't sleepy anymore, so I held her and clanned for an hour with Hawkthorn and Weinstephan. Man those two definately need adult supervision, they almost fell to 4 large vermine in South Forest. heh.
The other night I participated in a volcano rescue on Devil's Island. It was my first time past McBolie cavern, and reinforced how much I dislike pathfinding. It was also strange because I was following Elenis as the leader, yet Aki was along acting like the leader sometimes, which made the group a bit confused. There was a high-horus healer I had never heard of before, Aly or something like that. It seems strange to me that there are relatively powerful characters that I don't know, but I am definately not in the 24x7 rank-whore crowd. Humbaba rarely exceeded 14hrs/week at the best, and now that time is split with another character. Lava walkers were pretty easy for Humbaba, thankfully. I've had Humbaba on an all-Evus diet for a few months now, he's getting close to where I want him and evus is a good way to maintain that. It's amazing how little sleep you can get adjusted to. Monday, June 18, 2001
Ok, that's cleaned up, she's much happier. I've got her in a sling now, too. It's much easier to type with both hands free.
On Saturday I went to a friend's wedding. He's married to a Russian penpal he hooked up with. It's sorta difficult for his peer group, since they seem to have very little in common, and her priorities and values are all different. Before the wedding a small group of us took the groom out to this hoity-toity cigar bar at a hoity-toity new golf course. I do have to admit that I like the swanky cigar bar. Loads of real wood, deep leather seats, a nice billiards table, and it was almost all to ourselves. We had some damn tasty cigars (I mooched a Partagas from a friend), beer, and I had a wee dram of Lagavulin 16-yr old single malt Scotch whiskey. Mmmmm. I *really* like Lagavulin, it's my favorite single malt whiskey. Just let a wee bit roll down the tongue and savor the complex flavors... Afterwards we had to play some stupid Russian games where the groom has to earn the right to see the bride. An example: There was a sheet of paper with five or six numbers written on it, and the groom had to tell what those number meant. Of course, the idiot didn't know what any of them were... Gaaa!! It was torture. Our flasks were empty before we got through that challenge. The next challenge was inside the apt building at the bottom of the steps going up to their floor. Fortunately, our friend who did the photography snuck us a bottle of Maker's Mark out of the groom's booze collection. That fortification was needed. The challenge was to physically compliment the three wives who were running the games. One was pretty damn hot, and one looked good, the third has a nice personality... Ugga. Anyway, by the time we got to the reception hall, I was pretty tanked. Bridget showed up with Isabel, and I had fun showing her off. She's such a cutie! Ugga. Anyway, by Sunday I had that not-so-fresh-feeling, but Alka-Seltzer is a wonder drug, that, a #2 Extra Valueless Meal at Rotten Rons, and some beers put me straight for the beer fest on Sunday. The weekend was definately a blast!
Hmmm. Long fun weekend. My first Father's Day as a father. Isabel is totally cute these days, she's making more funny noises. Loads of fun.
BEEEER festival ruled. I love sitting around trying various beers on a lazy sunny Sunday afternoon. My friend Nate brought a hortload of walnuts and we ate those. Bridget and Isabel joined us about halfway through. Ugga. Gotta go, Isabel just blew out her diaper... Thursday, June 14, 2001
\yell BEEER!!!
BEeeeeeEeeeeeeEeEEEEER!!! On Sunday, which will be my first Father's Day, I'm going to the local beer festival. I absolutely LOVE going to beer festivals. Lots of tasty beers to taste, what more can you ask for? Hopefully I'll be able to add to my collection of beer t-shirts. I should probably wear my lovelyDwarven Militia t-shirt. Damn I'm tired. I took a couple hour nap today, but am still so damn tired. I got a 2hr and a 1.5hr block of sleep last night. Ugga. Isabel is damn cute tho, she's really porkin' on the weight. She's a full pound heavier than birth in just two weeks. She's got a nice double-chin now.. heh. Wednesday, June 13, 2001
Won $15 at poker tonight. Not too shabby for a $5 buy-in.
Used GameRanger for the first time the other day, to play NetFungus. I used to play single-player Fungus all the time, having humans to play with rules. I've got about a 15-3 record so far. I wish either GameRanger or someone would track wins/losses, so I could better find people who are a challenge, and avoid the chaff. I can't wait for NetFungus to support 4-person network play. Fungus is sorta Othello with Tetris pieces. I know its been on the Mac for around a decade, but would be curious to know if it's on any other platform or was a Mac original. Haven't played Clan Lord in a few days. Damn I am tired. I got about 3 blocks of 90 minutes sleep last night. Sunday, June 10, 2001
Went to a friend's not-a-bachelor party last night. He got married legally in April, but they're having a big public ceremony next weekend. It ended up being pretty boring, we went to a corporate "English" pub (Elephant & Castle, OTC stock PUBSF) which is really kinda lame. I vastly prefer George & Dragon, which is run by an ex-pat Brit and has a much more authentic "feel" to it.
After dinner (bangors and mash, mmmmm) we went to Jillians, which is a yuppie pool hall/arcade. There the groom-already-is got plied with drinks (let me tell you, plastic disposable shot glasses are classy all the way...) while the gang oogled this girl with a pretty damn impressive boob job who was selling Coor's Lites for $3.50. (Pint of Guinness for $3.50, or a bottle of swill plus an oogle at some boobs for $3.50... By the end of the night half our gang had coors lite... ugga, no accounting for taste) Anyway, eventually we passed our victim's amazing alcohol tolerance level, and he was escorted to the men's room to chunder. Afterwards, barely able to walk, he was sat in a chair near our table, right in front of boobie-girl. He sorta slumped over, one hand in the ashtray, and we continued to play pool. Then he leaned over further and yackked all over the floor. Joy... Needless to say, that was it for the evening. We hauled his drunk ass outside, and loaded him into his ride. They drove off, then one of the other guys remembered he has the driver's licence of the designated driver, so we called him up and told him to come back for it. As they drove off again, the victim was leaning out the passenger window for yet another technicolor yawn, making it at least a hat-trick. Mind you, this was at like 10:15pm... Oh well. Much of the gang decided to go out drinking further, but I decided to go home and see how Bridget and Isabel were doing. Bridget's sister is staying the weekend with us and they were going to watch some DVDVDVDVD or another. The house immediately south of mine (a split-level I call "That 70s home") is a rental, and since yesterday was graduation at UDub, they had a knock-down drag-out party. I fell asleep sometime after the band started their 2:30am set. Fortunately for them, I don't begrudge them a party, so I tolerate the noise. Even more fortunate for them, the house on the other side of them isn't occupied, the owner I belive is in a nursing home and the family hasn't dealt with it yet. Thursday, June 07, 2001
Woooo! Ok, last night kicked ass. First the Mariner's won their 14th straight. Then we fed Isabel at 11pm, and she went right into milk-induced food coma, and slept in her crib until we woke her at 1:30am for diapering/feeding. We put her back down, and woke again at 4:00am for more diapering/feeding. Then she slept until 6:30am... That means I got three nice solid 2+ hour blocks of sleep. I feel amazingly refreshed!
This energy spurred me to release the first Streaming Pod Video for those who want to see Isabel In Action Wednesday, June 06, 2001
Ah, my brother Dan. He's #5 in the batting order, five years younger than myself (I'm #3 son). I'll have to post more about him sometime, he's pretty interesting. A few years ago he flew down to Peru and walked/hitchiked/etc back, took 14 months.
Last November he left to go visit India, and currently he managed to get into Tibet. He's backpacking, but he's really hippy, not REI style yuppie backpacking. His pack is usually 90-100lbs. Anyway, I get a funny email from him, he wants to know if email can be monitored. No shit, Sherlock! Of course the Chinese govt. is reading it, don't send me something that will piss them off. He got arrested and spent 3 days in the pokey, and had to pay a $80 fine. Can't wait for him to return next month and let us in on the details. He is incensed at the occupation of Tibet, so he decided to hold, and I quote, "NATIONAL FUCK ALL BASTARD PIG OPPRESSIVE COCKSUCKERS DAY!". He was the sole celebrant.
Ok, I forgot how to put html in this, so I'll just throw the URL in and see what happens:
http://www.ocean.washington.edu/people/staff/ericl/isabel-day3.jpg There's a picture of Isabel (aka Humbaby) racked out on Mom's shoulder. Tuesday, June 05, 2001
Damn I love popcorn.
Here's my current obsession: I've got a 8.25 quart tupperware-like container. I take it and fill about 1/4 of the container from a big-ass Costco bag of white cheddar popcorn. I then put in the microwave a bag of Blast-O-Butter microwave popcorn. This stuff is pretty nasty by itself, WAY over buttered. I put 1/3 to 1/2 cup of popcorn kernels in the air popper, and aim it over the contain so the air heats the white chedder popcorn in there. The blast-of-butter goes in next, and the air popcorn goes in last. I mix it all together nicely, the "butter" (obviously not butter, but some dyed petroleum distilate) from the microwave popcorn covers everything perfectly, and the air popped corn acts as a perfect buffer. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!
Ok, here's as much of the delivery story as I can remember anymore. With 20/20 hindsight, I think I might have wanted a video of at least the last few minutes and actual birth...
I'm not going to put in too much explanation of birth jargon and stuff, if you're interested there are lots of places with detailed explanations... Bridget woke me up at 2am because she thought her water had broken. At 2:15, she had a contraction. We started timing them, they were 10-12 minutes apart. The birth class said to go to the hospital when they were 5 minutes apart for at least an hour. We called the doctor's office, and were told to probably wait a few hours, but not much more because her water had broken. Once it breaks, they like to have the baby out within 24 hours I believe. Anyway, her contractions were getting more and more painful, and closer and closer together. By 4am there were like 7-8 minutes apart, some 3-4 minutes apart, so we started gathering our stuff for the trip to the hospital. We got there around 5am, and she'd had contractions about every 6 minutes that hour. We arrived at the hospital (Swedish here in Seattle), and since it was night, we had to enter via the ER, since the main entrance is closed at night. The ER nurse took one look as us and laughed, and said, "Let me guess: You want 5th floor labor triage" We went up to triage, and the nurse there put us in a room. She hooked up a fetal monitor, and a pressure monitor so we could follow the contractions. She also checked Bridget's cervix, which was still 2cm dialated, but 75% effaced. There was no sign of amniotic fluid, so she used a little strip of stuff to test for it, and it was negative as well. A resident was woken up, she checked B again and took a swab to look under the microscope. She confirmed that Bridget's water had NOT broken, and it must have just been watery mucus. Bridget's contractions were every 3-5 minutes now, but even though she was in pain during them, the triage nurse told us we were in early labor, and to go home, and come back when the contractions were so strong she couldn't walk or talk through them. Basically she was a little condescending, saying in effect, "You ain't seen nothing yet, honey" She looked like she was trying not to laugh at us. So, at 7am, we went home. Bridget's mom and her aunt, who is a doula, had showed up at triage, so all four of us went home. Bridget was feeling pretty nauseus from lack of food, (she'd normally have 2am and 4am meals) so we fed her some crackers. Once we got home, I left her in the care of her mom and aunt, and immediately went back to bed to try and get some extra sleep, since we'd only gotten about 2hours. I was woken at 9am, and from upstairs I could hear the loud moans from Bridget. Her contractions were lasting from 60 to 90 seconds, and she was obviously in far more pain. I went down, and her aunt had been helping her with different positions, trying the birth ball, over the back of a chain, etc. She was breathing through them pretty good, but obviously it hurt like hell. We went back to the hospital about 9:45am. I had to put her in a wheelchair at the entrance and wheel her into triage. The same nurse was there, and she was almost laughing again, like "See? I *told* ya it would get much worse!" Bridget was walking to the bathroom, and had a contraction so she stopped and leaned against the wall facing away from us. The nurse laughed and said she almost NEVER sees pregnant ladies who still had a definate waist. At that point she was 4cm dialated, and her water broke, so the triage nurse gave us a passing grade, and called for a labor nurse to bring us to our room. We got an *awesome* nurse named Leslie, she was great. The birthing suites at Swedish are very swank, hardwood floors, beautiful wood cabinets and trim, ensuite bathroom with deep jacuzzi soaking tub, TV/VCR/CD player (What? No DVD? I'm offended! j/k), and a long bench for the dad to sleep on. There was a little bed for the baby, and in most cases, the whole thing happens in that room, no need to go anywhere, and the baby never leaves us. When we got the the room, Bridget was 5cm dialated, and we wanted that epidural ASAP. They have to put a liter of lactated ringers in via IV before they'll give the anethesia, so our nurse looked at Bridget's tiny veins and said no^&%*way. She got a nurse who was supposed to be a pro at it to try to get the IV in. That nurse failed twice, painfully. Ugga. Finally the anethesiologist came in and got it in first try. When he came back and gave her the epidural, it was about noon, and she'd gone from 4cm to 7cm in about an hour! The epidural was awesome. She was able to relax and not stress out. It did, however, basically pause the whole process. By 1pm she was still at 7cm, so they put in a intra-uterine pressure sensor to see if her contractions were strong and regular enough. They were deemed not so, so she was given an IV of pitocin to stimulate things along. By 3pm she was fully dialated to 10cm, and they got things ready for delivery. At 3:20pm she started to push, and at 4:50 she was done, and Isabel was born. (This took over almost an hour to type, had to use Magic Bouncy Chair to calm her down so she'd breastfeed...)
Ok, Isabel is looking like an angel again. We've got this bouncy-chair that has vibration and makes ocean wave noises, she's not big enough to sit in it alone, but I can put her in it and prop her up with my hands, and it puts her to sleep darn near instantly. I call it the Magic Bouncy Chair. She can't resist it's magic sleep field...
As far as sleep goes, at least so far it's really not that bad. If there thing I learned in Marine Corps boot camp besides killing people and surviving and marching and spit-shining boots, it's the ability to sleep anywhere, anytime. I can be asleep in 3 minutes, noise or no noise, light or no light, sitting, leaning against a wall, lying down... As an example, back in 1988 during the Monsters of Rock (aka Monstrous Cock) tour (Whitesnake, Dokken, Metallica, Scorpions, and Van Hagar) I sleep through Dokken's entire set seated in a hard plastic Kingdome seat. The biggest deal with sleep is you don't get a long stretch of it. I probably got 6 hours last night, but half hour here, 1.5 hours there... This causes me to have some mighty weird dreams. Most recent was a clan lord dream: In the dream, I'd been playing CL and fell asleep... I woke up and Humbaba was wandering somewhere I'd never been, and fighting a few ferals. Then he got jumped by 7 or 8 artak, some of which were albino. Then an Orga Fury-sized blue Orga with a green aura came along. I was trying to flee all this stuff long enough to send a sunstone message and ask WTF I was seeing and maybe get a mystic to tell me where I'd wandered. Monday, June 04, 2001
\yell BEEEEEEEER!!!
Isabel Anne Lundquist was born on Saturday, June 2nd, at 4:50pm. 8lbs, 1.5oz, 21" long. She's VERY perfect. Well, ok, she's got these super-amazing long simian finger and toes, (that's all my fault, not Bridget's) it looks like she could play piano with her toes. Ugga. I'm exhausted. We're just home from a very pleasant two day stay in the hospital, everything is going great. I'm about to head down to the airport, my youngest brother (he's #6 son, I'm #3) is returning from spending his senior year of college in Sweden. I'll get pictures of her up soon. -Eric/Humbaba Saturday, June 02, 2001
Wooooo!
\yell BeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEEEERRR!!! Bridget's water broke at 2am, and we'll be heading to the hospital soonish. Baby baby baby BABY baby baby BABY!!! Wooooo! \yell BEEEER!!! Friday, June 01, 2001
Some friends had to be in LA all week for work, and came back last night carrying two dozen Krispy Kreme donuts. It can be hard to believe how good those heroin-rings are.
I am in an investment club. It's mostly a bunch of my friends who were all in the same fraternity in college. (I wasn't in a fraternity). To steal a phrase from the Hash House Harriers, it's really more of a drinking club with an investment problem. We're doing well so far, we're beating the S&P 500, and only 2% of professionally managed funds manage to do that. Of course it's not tooo tough with such a small portfolio. It's call The Porter Group after the beer we were drinking when it was founded. I tried to get them to buy KKD last year, but since Krispy Kreme isn't here yet, they didn't understand how addictive hot rings of herion can be. It was at $30/share when I wanted to buy, and now it's at $75/share. There still isn't a Krispy Kreme in WA yet, someone bought the franchise rights and is supposedly opening nine of them, the first one was supposed to open in June, then August, now late Fall. Pshaw, yeah, right. Probably next spring. I normally have to get my fix in Vegas.
I can't believe the Seattle Mariner's are currently at 40-12. That's so bizarre. It's almost like they're for real, and not just on a flukey hot streak. Woooo! Anyway, for a hardcore football (American football, not that yawn-fest we call soccer) fan, it's fun to have another sport to while away the long sad months between Jan and August.
I'll readily admit to being a 100% total fair-weather baseball fan. Last year I couldn't name half the Mariners, and this year I obscess over their stats. Sometimes I amaze myself.
Still no baby. Today's the due date, but only 5% of babies hit their due date. We went for an hour-long walk last night, that got some good contractions going but didn't trigger full labor. The contractions are good, they help soften and ripen the cervix. We've now got an appointment at the hospital for next Tues to begin induction if we last that long. It starts with two applications of prostaglandin gel (which helps soften/ripen) on the cervix on Tues, followed by pitocin (which induces labor) on Weds. |
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