• A seven day void

    I seem to have misplaced last week. I had it right here, but I don’t know what I did with it.

    Upon further review, it may be more accurate to say it was taken from me. First there was the start of the new school year, which was good for two and a half days. Then there was court coverage, which was good for a couple more days. Throw in a thrown out back to cover the weekend and I find myself right where I started… seven days ago… at my desk, in my office, wondering when I’ll get caught up.

    UPDATE: this entry didn’t get posted on Monday due to a wicked bad sinus headache that cut my work day in half (or Tuesday due to good old fashioned neglect). If you’re keeping score: that’s eight days in the crapper.

  • Foul!

    “John! You cut me off!”

    The set up:
    Cheryl and I are side by side at the medicine cabinet. I am on the right, Cheryl to the left. We reach for the Costco size bottle of anti-histamine (approximately a 36 month supply) at around the same time. My hand reaches the bottle first, prompting Cheryl’s accusation of foul play.

    My conclusion:
    Because we were both standing in front of the medicine cabinet at the same time, and because I had no prior knowledge of Cheryl’s intent to reach for the bottle of anti-histamine, I cannot fairly be accused of a cut-off maneuver. In fact, given my relative position (on the right side), and the handedness of our reach (right hand), my hand had to travel farther than Cheryl’s hand to reach the medicine cabinet. (My hand had to come across my body, where Cheryl’s just had to come up from her side. Although I enjoy a height advantage, my greater arm length to height ratio negates this advantage.) Assuming an equivalent reach velocity, in order for my hand to reach the anti-histamine first, I would have had to reach for it first. And if I reached first, if anyone was guilty of a cut-off maneuver it was Cheryl.

    Pot, meet kettle:
    Now if you ask Cheryl, she’ll tell you that she was in the bathroom first, and had planned to procure her meds well in advance. I think this is a bunch of horseradish. Everyone knows the female of the species tends to have a longer bathroom to-do-list than the male. The male can hardly be expected to wait on the female to finish ALL of her bathroom related tasks prior to entry. I’d have to get up an hour earlier every day – and that dog just don’t hunt.

  • Ode to sitters past

    On second thought, I’m a tad tired for poetry. This will have to do.

    This past week was a bit sad for a couple different reasons. Nothing cataclysmic mind you, just run-of-the-mill melancholy. The most obvious reason was Beth’s forthcoming return to school. Beth had a hard year last year and I hoped (not just for my sake) that this year would be better. But the end of summer vacation was something we could see coming for months (years even), so it wasn’t a big surprise. The news that Adam’s part-time sitter was sitting on a lucrative offer to become un-retired on the other hand… was a surprise. We’ve been blessed with top-notch daycare for Adam, and we’ve known it. Knowing it and facing a loss of it was hard to swallow. How do you react to that? How do you tell someone you’re happy for their good fortune, and sad for the loss of their presence in your son’s life, without one of them sounding like a lie?

    As a graduate of the John Kerry School of Personality*, I suspect I didn’t do a very good job.

    *So sayeth the resident bitter Democrat (that would be me).