A Snoopy Scare

Tonight Fiona, Jadon, and I went out for a nice dinner called Amber Waves at the Radisson Hotel near Knott's Berry Farm. Well there was a person dressed up in a big Snoopy Costume walking around meeting all the restaurant patrons. Fiona got a little excited because she just loves Snoopy. I told her I bet that Jadon will get scared of Snoopy. She didn't think so (that shows her how much she knows her own son). Well Snoopy came over and greeted us while we were eating and he came over to Jadon wanting to give him a hug. Jadon got all squirmy and then he busted out into full on tears. I in my entertained self, busted out in laughter. I just enjoy seeing how Jadon reacts to situations. Am I just mean or what?

What's Jadon saying nowadays...

Here is a list of Jadon's extensive vocabulary (don't ask me how he comes up with some of his words):

"ba" - bird, milk, bus, block, bread, ball, box, book
"ba ba" - bottle, grandpa, grandma, auntie, bubbles, bye bye, broccoli
"vwa" - fan
"vwa vwa" - water, flower, ring
"da da" - dada, doggie, dogs
"ya ya" - yogurt
"pa" - pail, please, pen, pants, park
"pa pa" - poo poo, trash
"uh puh" - open, help
"car"- car, crayon, (almost anything with four wheels)
"cup" - cup, most containters
"ah kun kun"- alligator, elephant, ice cream truck, ice cream
"ah puh" -apple
"teah" - cat, cookie
"ma ma" - mama
"may" - mail
"nya nya" - lion
"ah" - eye
"up" - up
"ta ta" - glasses
"na na" - night night, banana
"shh-a" - sand
"ah ma" - Elmo
"je da" - Jadon
"ka ka" - cracker
"ay" - egg
"fwe fwe" - fish stick
"ra" - rice

Where's the Remote?

My family and I just came home for dinner. After washing up and cleaning the dishes I immediately head for the couch. I'm tired and I want to watch some T.V. I look for the remote but I can't seem to find it. I look on the T.V. set and it's not there. I look on the sofa, not there. I look under the cushions and it's not there either. Where the heck is the remote? I notice Jadon goes to the dinning table and grabs something. He ends up bringing me the remote. I was in awe. How cool is that? I didn't even train him to do that. Now if I can only get him to get me a cold one from the frig.

A New Car!

Yesterday was car shopping day. We were going in with the expectations of looking for a car and if we found something we liked (with the right price), we'd buy. We had planned to go down to the Irvine Auto Center and look at the Nissan Quest. I opened up a newspaper and saw a lease add for a Honda Pilot. I told Fiona that we could first check out the Pilot and then look at the Quest. We never got a chance to look at the Quest. Fiona, Jadon, and I went down to the dealership after lunch at about 2:00pm. We tested a silver Honda Pilot EX model. First we made sure that three baby car seats could fit and they did plus there was some good leg room. Next we test drove it. Not too bad of a drive. Finally we talked numbers and 3 and a half hours later, I drove our new car home. Negotiations weren't optimal but we we satisfied. The dealership was going to give us a crappy value for trade in on our Mistubishi Outlander, so now we have to figure out how to sell it. But hey at least we won't be driving a mini-van.

Google watch...

I checked my stock this morning and boy what a nice surprise. It jumps up to $176/share, up $27/share, +18%. I almost thought about selling my other stocks and putting it all in Google at $140.

What's the bladder with me?

I have always had a small bladder thus making me piss more often then probably most people. At work I probably pee once every hour or two. It's not like I am consuming huge amounts of liquids. But here's the weird thing, yesterday I was watching a 2 hour movie. Jadon actually napped for three hours so I was able to get in an entire movie. For some reason almost every time I watch a movie at home, I have to literally take a piss every five minutes. I'm doing this about 15 times. I usually don't flush so I don't waste water. So I eventually get pissed off (no pun intended). Maybe I need to get checked out. Anyways I thought I would just share that. Now I have to go to the bathroom.....

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday Paul! I know it's only the 19th over here but since your in Thailand, I figure I'd give you a shout out. I was just thinking how old my brother is and then I did the math, boy you're old! Jadon's got an old uncle =) Hope you have a great one.

Some More Jadon Tidbits

-Jadon can now go up and down the stairs by himself. He actually crawls up the stairs and he descends down the stairs on his belly (I'll have to catch that one on video).
-Jadon is our janitor. When we have trash (tissue, paper, teabags, dry sheets, etc) on the floor, we'll ask Jadon if he can throw it away in the trash can and he does. After he throws it away he double checks himself and looks in the can again.
-He likes to close the bathroom and laundry doors. He's starting to figure out how to open doors as well.
-He likes to conserve electricity and turn off the lights.
-When we wash Jadon's hand, he goes to get his stool/chair and brings it to the bathroom sink and steps right onto it.
-Jadon is still scared of ceiling fans. I have no explanation for this except that he could have seen something on tv a long time ago. The fan doesn't have to be moving and he gets scared. He starts to cling on to me really tight and he lays his head on my shoulder (sometimes he starts to burst out into tears). So now we have to avoid restaurants that have ceiling fans. The other day we went to a Marie Callenders and they had ceiling fans. We were just about seated and he starts to panic. Luckily they had a room with no ceiling fans and so we moved and once we were settled in, he was a happy, happy boy.
-Jadon is trying to be a real sneaky little boy. We'll put him in his crib for a nap. At times it can take him an hour or so to fall asleep. During that time we can hear him on our baby monitor babbling away or playing with his "doggie." Anyways, I'll go up to his room and open the door. Jadon will see me and he'll freeze (whether he is standing up or lying down) and pretend he is sleeping (but his eyes are still opening). The first time I caught him doing this he was lying down and when he saw me and just froze. Another time I caught him, he was standing near the rails and he was still standing but he dropped his head as if he was trying to fool me into thinking he was sleeping.

A Day Off

Today was a day off for me because there were no patients scheduled. Fiona and I dropped Jadon off at his grandparents this morning and went to Babies R' Us to start on our registry for the upcoming baby shower (tba).

At noon time we had a rendevous appontment with Fiona's mom and had lunch with her. We ate at this new Asian buffet down in the Buena Park Mall. Not to bad. They had some good grub. Fiona and I are always looking for some good buffets. At one point during Fiona's pregnancy we must have gone to Hometown Buffet at least 5 or 6 times within a two week time span. It got to a point where the cashier recognized us.

I love these middle-of-the week day offs. I would not mind working four 10 hour shifts.

Best friends

This is Jadon and his nighttime-best friend "doggie." He loves him very dearly. At times you can catch Jadon sucking on his fingers and gazing intently in "doggie's" eyes. Now it didn't start out at love at first sight. After every nap or sleep we would go into Jadon's room only to see "doggie" laying on the floor, outside his crib.

Jadon tidbits

This past week Jadon is attempting to say his name. He points to himself and says his name. I think he pronounces it as De-da. Fiona's mom thinks he is saying Je-da. Fiona can't distinguish it from da-da.

For the most part, Jadon is turning out to be really shy. He either cries when someone approaches him or he'll go up to me or Fiona and ask us to pick him up. One way that he'll show that he likes you (or that he is comfortable with you) is he will go up to you, lift his hands up, and say "up." This past Friday we met up with Shirley & Gat for dessert and Jadon took quite a liking to them quickly. Usually he cries or panics until he gets use to other people but he clicked with them in a snap. He was extremely giddy and full of energy. He was so hyper that he ran into a wall. Luckily he was holding onto his milk cup which braced the impact. Boy did I laugh hard.

Jadon is starting to show signs that he might be ready to be potty trained. Before he goes poop, he says "pa-pa" and soon enough there it is. Sometimes before he pees he says "pa-pa" and grabs his crotch. Typically tots learn to potty train at about two years. We'll probably wait until after the twins are born to train Jadon. Fiona's read up that if you train a kid to potty train and then there is a significant change in life (i.e. siblings being born) they tend to regress. So we'll probably wait until after the twins are born to train Jadon.

Entertainment shockers

As recently as today and over the past week there have been some deaths in the entertainment industry that have been a shocker to me. The first one was Rodney Dangerfield, comedian. He passed away at the age of 82. I most remember him in the films "Caddy Shack" (a true classic) and "Back To School."

This morning I found out that Christopher Reeves died of heart failure (a common complication from paralysis) at the age of 52. He was known for his roles in the Superman movies. I recently caught him in his cameo role of "Smallville" where he plays a billionaire aware of Clark Kents origin.

The third one, a famous baseball sports player, Ken Caminiti. He played for the San Diego Padres and retired a few years ago. He died at the age of 41 due to a heart attack. His big accomplishment was when he led the Padres to the division champion and won the NL MVP.

Car Problem

Yesterday I was meeting up with Fiona her doctor's appointment. I was pulling into the ticketing booth of the parking lot. I rolled down my window and took the ticket and then as I was rolling it back up I heard a loud snap. The window stopped midway. I tried to roll it up again but the motor was stalled. So I rolled it down and it went down with a "whir" and then I rolled it back up but it only went up midway. Then all of a sudden I heard another snap and then the window just slid all the way down. I couldn't roll it back up. You can hear the motor but nothing was happening. Great! I called a Goodyear and asked how much it could cost. They said $65 just to diagnois it and if the motor was bad it could tack on a couple of hundred of dollars. Just great! Fiona decided to call the VW dealership. Without much questioning they said bring it on in. After the doctor's appointment we took the car in. They explained that there is a plastic clip that holds the window up and that it has a tendency to snap. They went on to tell us that this problem exists in most VWs since 1998. Fortunately this was a no charge and that they would fix the other windows. Just imagine if it was cold weather or even raining and this happened.

Ultrasound: Week 20

Yesterday, Fiona and I went in for an ultrasound appointment. Everything turned out fine. With yet another opinion from a different tech, the babies still appear to be girls. So far three techs and one doctor have said that they were girls. So it seems pretty definite. The tech was able to tell us what they weigh just from measuring their head, abdomen, arm and leg bones. One weighs 10oz and the other weighs in at 11oz. Right on track.

The Google Express

I haven't been known to do well in stocks. I've actually lost a lot of money when the dot.coms were hot. Well a few months ago I applied to try to put a bid in the Google Auction. I went through the whole process of getting the bidder ID number and answering some questionaires, but at the end I was rejected. So I waited for the stock to go IPO and bought a measily 8 shares at $101/share. As of today, it's hovering at $139/share. Not bad.

Sleep Lover

One of my favorite hobbies (if you want to call it that) is sleeping. Back in my earlier school years, on weekends, I would sleep a good 12-14 hours waking up at about noon. On weekdays I would get a good 8-9 hours in and take afternoon naps. I found that during these years, I have never pulled an all-nighter except when I had a little party towards the end of high school (parents were out of the country). Once I tried to pull an all-nighter to study for finals. I put on a pot of coffee and I drank most of it. I was still able to go to sleep. Caffeine has never really done anything to keep me awake. Those were the good old days.

After starting work for Healthview (now known as Body Scan International) back in 1998, my schedule has me waking up at 5:00am. So I'd try to get to sleep by 9:00pm and get 8 hours of sleep. After getting married I still tried to get 8 hours of sleep but that would not be the case. With my wife's schedule (she didn't need to go to work until 9:00am), she wouldn't want to go to sleep until later. That meant that I couldn't sleep until 11:00 pm. Now I'm down to 6 hours of sleep per weekday. That made me look forward to weekends even more because I was still able to sleep in and get 10-12 hours. Even until this day I'm not use to my schedule. I find that I am neither a morning person or a night person. If I could dictate my schedule, I would wake up at 7:00am and go to sleep by 9:30pm.

After Jadon was born, I could still get the 6 hours/night of sleep during the weekdays. On weekends though, I'd be lucky to be able to sleep in until 9:00am. Usually I hear Jadon wake up talking to himself at about 7:00am but I'd go back to sleep and get another hour in until Fiona gets him. I find myself taking more naps but some times it affects my nighttime sleeping to the point where it takes me an hour or so to fall asleep. This has been even more prevalent within the past couple of months. My quality of sleep has diminished. I don't know if it's due to the summer heat or that I am subconsciously stressing over the coming of the twins. I miss sleep badly. I miss it so bad that when Mondays hit, all I'm thinking about is waiting for Friday nights to come so I can sleep in.

*yawn* I'm so sleepy now and it's not even 10:00 am yet. Time to take a nap.

The exciting but scary unknown.

PART IV (continued)

Having a kid changes your life, obviously. Having twins is surreal. Going from a party of three to a party of five is mindboggling. I keep thinking "how am I going to pull this one off?" Not only is the family size and cost growing but our income is about to decrease. Fiona probably won't be working for a while and my job hasn't yielded me a raise in the past three years (and it doesn't look like one will be coming in the near future). I am just not in the position to quit this job and take another at a lower starting pay. It can be really scary to think about but I try to take it one day at a time and just deal with it as best as I can. So what's our plan?

So far we have been test driving minivans. Now keep in mind we are anti-minivans. Fiona just cringes at the idea of being a "soccer mom." We have just about ruled out driving SUVs because Fiona doesn't want to drive anything bulky and the small-midsize ones won't yield us enough space to put three baby car seats in the rear seats. I previously owned a '99 Ford Explorer and she didn't like that one. Thus that was the reason why we got our "transitional" suv, the '03 Mitsubishi Outlander. Not bad to drive, it just won't fit three seats. And we test drove the '04 Kia Sorento, not a bad looking suv. That barely fit the car seats but sitting in the front was tight, even for Fiona. As for the minivans, we have test driven the Honda Odessey (actually rented this one a few months back), Toyota Sienna, Nissan Quest, Mazda MPV, and Dodge Grand Caravan. Fiona didn't like the look of the Odessey, I didn't mind it at all. The Sienna was average but a little out of our budget. We both didn't care for the Grand Caravan. I liked the look and the price of the Mazda MPV. It had a sporty look (if you get the sports package) as far as minivans go and it comes close to our budget. Fiona doesn't like it at all (I think she hates the brand). I didn't like the look of the Nissan Quest but we both liked the interior and the drive. The console is very unique and the drive is quite nice at 240 hp. But the price is slight above our range. So for now we'll have to take the wait-and-see approach and hopefully some of the prices will come down.

Another priorty of ours is in regards to Jadon. With the strong possiblity of Fiona being laid over in the hospital for a month or so, we are in the process of exploring who will look out after Jadon besides myself. My work schedule goes from 6:00 am - 2:00pm. So who watches him then? Luckily Fiona's parents own their own business so Fiona's mom has the flexibility to watch him during the days until I get home. And because I get up so early in the morning, it wouldn't be feasible to wake up Jadon and bring him over to his grandparent's place or to have his grandma come over early in the morning. So we have been exposing him, over the past two weeks, to sleeping over at his grandparent's. Boy, does he hate change (just like his momma). He hates it it so much that he cries like a newborn. His body turns all red. I feel sorry for the little tyke.

Making room for the twins is another task that I am dreading. We are going to be converting our third bedroom-converted-to-computer room. That room has a good amount crap in there. Fiona's been telling me to hold off on doing anything until it gets closer to the delivery, but Im' starting to get antsy. The television set will probably have to go in Jadon's room. The computer and desk will probably go into our room. And the rest of the boxes in the closet will probably be spread out throughout the house. We're already starting to outgrow our townhouse. I would love to move into a bigger house but Southern California is so freaking expensive.

Well that pretty much brings you up to speed on what's been going on in a nutshell. Life is grand, ain't it?

Site renewed!

After being idle from blogging I have finally gotten around to it. With that, I have revamped the site. Hopefully I will be disciplined enough to blog more often (now that I have internet access at work ;)). My last blog site revolved around my baby (and parts of my wife and myself). This time around it will involve not only my life but various thoughts, articles, and interesting tidbits.