Eric: May 2007 Archives
May 26, 2007
So the hockey season is over. We lost our first (thus only) playoff game 3-0. Our goalie let in a pair of really soft goals, but to be honest they just outplayed us; they deserved the first goal and obviously that was all they needed.
The summer season starts in a few weeks; I think it will be interesting, because the league admin wants to shake things up a bit. This last season it seemed like emotions got a little high; there were several actual fights, at least one "abuse of officials" misconduct, etc. From what I've heard, in the leagues up around Dallas that kind of thing is endemic, in part because the teams stay together season after season, which leads to a build-up of rivalries and resentments. In the league here, we re-draft every season, which usually helps to keep that kind of thing to a minimum. In my experience, anyway, when you play with different people from season to season, you build up friendships, and it's harder to get mad at a player when you know them from a previous season.
The last few seasons captains have been allowed to "protect" players from the draft, and several goalies became captains, both of which allowed teams to keep a "core" of players together, and it seems like that helped contribute to this season's unpleasantness. So this summer, the league admin requested all new captains, eliminated "protected" players, and isn't allowing goalie captains. Hopefully things will get shaken up a lot.
Also, at Jenny's urging I put my name in for captain, and got selected. It should be an interesting experience. Noone who knows me should be surprised to know that as soon as I heard I'd been selected, Jenny and I put together a spreadsheet of the players in the league and started filtering. I really want to have a fun, clean season, but it would be nice to win some games, too. ;) So after a couple of hours working on the spreadsheet, I have a plan for how I'm going to make my picks. I'll have to do a little revision after the new player skate on Tuesday, but by and large I feel pretty good going into the draft. We'll see how I come out, though. ;)
May 22, 2007
First off, congrats Fiona and Simon on the birth of their baby boy! I can't wait until we get to come visit. :) He sounded like he had a very healthy set of lungs on the phone.
Second, some Ollie updates.
One: The test results finally came back. Ollie has no genetic abnormalities, i.e. no Cystic Fibrosis, so we are assured (again) that he's entirely normal, just skinny, the same way his mom and her sisters were as babies. (Believe it or not, I was not skinny as a baby. ;))
Two: Photos from Louisville are up. There are also a couple of other random photos you can find by going to the Recent Updates Album.
Three: Given his recent interest in food (by "interest in" I mean "grabbing food off our plates") we talked to our pediatrician, and so Ollie had his first real food this morning: some cooked, pureed sweet potatoes. His facial expression was pretty priceless; I have video of the deed itself and a few photos of the "aftermath" I'll try to post soon.
May 9, 2007
Not that I don't like traveling and seeing my family, but I'm a homebody to the core.
Ollie seems to like home too... tonight he put himself to sleep for the first time, no fuss at all, just lay him down (awake), kiss him goodnight and close the door.
May 8, 2007
So we have returned to Austin. Ollie was amazing on the return trip as well; on the first leg, from Louisville to Chicago, the woman sitting next to us commented as we landed that he was the best-behaved baby she'd ever seen, and after the Chicago to Austin leg, the woman in front of us said he was "very good". Of course, given the lateness of the flight (7:30-10 PM), that was entirely because Jenny had the bright idea to swaddle him in a blanket, and he fell asleep in my arms for almost the entire flight. Still, he did really well and I'm proud of him. He works hard to be cheerful even when he's tired or hungry.
For example, as we were leaving my parents' house the other night, it was really close to bedtime and he was pretty tired, so he was kind of fussing as I put him in the carseat. I started up the car and as we left the subdivision he started singing to himself, which was just heartbreakingly cute. Jenny and I started singing to him as well, and he went to sleep shortly thereafter.
Ollie picked up some new tricks over the week, he's making lots more sounds (including a K sound and a Th sound we hadn't heard before) and getting better at rolling over. Enough better that we can't swaddle his arms anymore at night, because he could roll over and suffocate himself. Unfortunately that's going to mean he has to get used to sleeping unswaddled, which led to me staying up with him until 3:30 AM last night. :-P Hopefully tonight will be better.
We're glad to be home, we had fun visiting people and I know everyone loved meeting Ollie, but it's nice to have our own bed and our dogs and cat and all. :)
May 3, 2007
Tonight Jenny and I are leaving Oliver with my parents while we go out to dinner. This will be the first time he gets put to bed by someone other than Jenny or I (and I think the first time since the NICU that neither of us will be with him).
I am freaking out. :-P I never thought it would be this hard to hand him to someone else for a few hours, even someone I know and trust as much as my parents.
(The title of the entry comes from a set of clothing Ollie has; it's pretty apropos considering this trip, our upcoming trip to Williamsburg, the trip to New Orleans after that, and possibly a trip to Baltimore in October.)
I have to admit, I was a little trepidatious about taking a four-month-old on a six-hour plane trip. He's got his schedule, and lately he's gotten to the point where he's interested enough in things that unless the room is dark and quiet, he has a lot of trouble falling asleep, but he still needs a nap every three-four hours or he gets pretty unhappy.
The trip started out the way they always do: our flight from Austin to Houston was delayed long enough that it would have been faster to drive to Houston and start there. Still, Ollie took a bit of a nap before we got on the plane and he didn't seem to mind the ear pressure as we ascended, which was a nice surprise. And of course on a plane there's always people to look at, talk to, make faces at, etc, so that helped. But overall Ollie was an angel; even though we had to detour around a storm in northern Texas, which meant we didn't land in Louisville until after 9 PM (our time), and he was clearly exhausted, he was obviously trying very hard to be happy and cheerful and friendly. There was very little crying. He's such a great baby and a hard worker. Of course, he slept terribly that first night; he slept maybe an hour, and then he was basically awake until 4 AM (mostly with Jenny; I'm a bad husband) and then slept until maybe 8.
Yesterday was better though, he got more regular naps, which always helps. We went out to my parents' house and he met my dad, my brothers, and my maternal grandmother. He really seemed to enjoy it, smiles all around except for a brief tired/fussy period in the middle. As expected, my dad managed to make him laugh as we were getting ready to leave because it was close to bedtime and he was fussy/tired. :) He went to bed readily enough, but traveling seems to have thrown him a bit (or maybe he was still tired from Tuesday); he woke up every 2 hours. Still, it's better than nothing and I can live with that schedule for a while if necessary. :)
Anyway, I just wanted to record for the world that my baby is a world-class traveler and incredibly outgoing, and I'm really proud of him. :)
