Xmas FAQs

Okay, I rarely participate in these things but I could not resist. Christmas is just too important. Credit to my wife for starting this.


1. When is the best time to open presents?
As late as possible to frustrate those who are too anxious!

2. Have you been naughty or nice this year?
See above.

3. Real tree or imitation tree?
Real tree all the way, although I am embarrassed to say I do own a fake one. It was a good deal!

4. Favorite Christmas cartoon character?
Herb, the rhinoceros from a Claymation Christmas. Here we come a waffling!

5. Did you ever write Santa a letter?
I think only once or twice

6. Buy any Christmas presents online?
Not this year

7. Save the ribbon and paper or rip right through it?
Open slowly to increase suspense (see #1)

8. Sharing Christmas with family this year?
Yes, friends and family.

9. Ever ride in a one horse open sleigh?
No. Would you believe a one parent open wagon?

10. Ever roast a chestnut on an open fire?
No, I would really have to dislike Chest to do that. Who's named Chest anyway?

11. Favorite Christmas pie?
Mincemeat of course, is there any other?!

12. Favorite Christmas movie?
Scrooged. "Niagra Falls!"

13. Favorite Christmas song?
Currently O Holy Night (Josh Groban knocks this one out of the park), but O Come Emmanuel is a close second

14. People on your Christmas list; more or less than ten?
You put people on your Christmas list!? Weird.

15. Will you have a white Christmas this year?
Knowing Colorado, only in the morning

16. Do you believe in Santa Claus?
Of course!

17. Who would you like to kiss under the mistletoe?
Melissa!

18. Who gives the best gifts?
Santa! (see above)

19. Do you send Christmas cards?
Yes, begrudgingly.

20. What color best represents Christmas?
Red, thanks Coca Cola!

21. Do you own any Christmas music?
Can you say "Boney M"?

22. How many Christmas parties will you attend this year?
That I'm not hosting? 0

23. Does the postal worker get a gift this year?
Yeah, gotta give those guys credit. I wouldn't go for that whole neither rain nor sleet nor snow thing

24. Giving a present to a pet?
Yes. Will the pet appreciate the present? No.

25. Your shopping: All done, half-way done, just started, not yet started?
Not yet started. Yikes!

Blown Away

Good grief! I went on a run today after seminar and just about got blown away. The winds here are about 30 mph, which does not make the 33 degree temperature very pleasant. At least the sun was out. Regardless, despite a stiff headwind on half of the run I still managed to do my same circuit in 35 minutes. My ears are still red from it though, I need to get a little ear warmer!

Running update

I did get to go out running yesterday. It was chilly but sunny, so I ended up being hot by the end. Just a 35 minute trip, but it was a great pick me up for the rest of the afternoon. Hopefully I'll get out again tomorrow, but I have seminar at noon so it will be tough to find the time.

ESKIMOS!!!!!

What a game! I can't believe I got to watch my Eskimos win it in overtime. That was probably the best football game I have ever seen, down to the final minutes for the championship. Ricky Ray (the quarterback) really played a great game. I was thoroughly impressed with his ability to excel against a relentless blitz defense.



I thought I would add an anecdote to this post. The summer before I left Edmonton I won a call in contest for a TV station to meet some of the Eskimo players. We had no car at the time (nor could we afford the bus) so I had to leave 2 hours before the event to walk to the Eskimo house in Edmonton. I left the apartment on time (6 am) and got on the elevator only to have it break down with me in it. I wasn't about to let that stop me getting to see my Eskimos, so I pryed open the inner doors, found the safety release for the outer doors, and sqeezed through a two foot space to the floor below. I got there just in time for the event. In the end I did not win the tickets that were up for grabs, but I won an Eskimos baseball cap that I still wear to this day.



Way to go Esks!

Cable has not let me down!

I found out today that one of our HD channels is going to be showing the Grey Cup on Sunday! Woo hoo! That's worth the five extra bucks we pay for those channels. Last year I was hoping they would be showing the game in Vegas, but we were not at a big enough sports book to see it. So this will be the first year since we left Canada that I will be able to see the big game. To make matters even better, my Eskimos are in it. I hope they stick it to the Alouettes. I want to see them get plucked, all puns intended. Go Esks!


I got out for a nice run today, and since I bought a little bicycle pump a few weeks ago, Elijah was able to ride shotgun in the joggy stroller. Went a little longer than my usual 3 mile route and was out for 45 minutes. I'll probably take the weekend off to recover and try to add a little more mileage next week. I'm definitely feeling like I'm getting in shape again, just gotta keep with it. That will be harder next week when the weather is nasty. I'm going to build off this week's momentum though.

Happy Thanksgiving

It's Thanksgiving here in the US (Canada had theirs already in October), one of my favorite holidays. I actually like the date for the US Thanksgiving more as it is so much closer to Christmas. It marks the beginning of the holiday season and kicks off an entire month of merryment. In preparation for this weekend's festivities I went for a run yesterday at work. It's still like 60 degrees here in Denver and it is nice to be out running in shorts and a T-shirt in November. We are supposed to get snow next week though. My run was only 35 minutes, but it was a good workout and it gave me the energy burst I needed for the afternoon. It turned out to be quite a busy day yesterday for me, even though half the campus jiggered off early. I paid for staying late though as the traffic was terrible going home. What normally takes me a half hour took me a full hour yesterday. I'm glad I don't have to do any more travelling this weekend.



In past years Thanksgiving has been a difficult holiday for us as we have not had any family to share it with. But we have always had wonderful friends who have opened their homes to us in the true spirit of the holiday. That is really what Thanksgiving has become for us. Now that Elijah is here, we will be cultivating our family's Thanksgiving traditions and I want Elijah to learn the kindness and generosity that should be associated with the holiday season. Thanksgiving is about thanking God for the gifts he has given us, Christmas is about thanking Him for the gift of Jesus Christ. We give gifts at Christmas to show our thanks for the gift God gave us. The holiday season is about sharing what God has blessed us with with others. The friends who have opened their homes to us have demonstrated this perfectly, and I want to do the same for others.



Elijah is up from his nap now, so we are off for a family walk. Have a wonderful holiday everyone!

What a day!

It's November 21 and it is 60 degrees here in Denver. It's hard to believe it's late fall. I decided that if I want to get out for longer runs I have to find a better time to do it, so today at lunch I went for a run around the campus. I found that if I went to the gym at lunch it was an hour and a quarter trip just for a half hour workout. So running at work fits the bill a little better. I went out for 50 minutes and covered a fair distance, both on streets and on a nice gravel trail. I could tell I had not been on a run that long in a while though, at 40 minutes I was really feeling it. I gotta keep with it though, the new home transition has been hard on me and my pants are not fitting as well as they used to!

Party Animals

Well we were party animals this weekend. We had our housewarming party on Saturday and a good time was had by all. I got to enjoy some of my scotch with some great friends, and Melissa even got to play her "Shout About Movies" game. Food was simple but tasty and drinks were plentiful. Our first guests showed up at three and stayed until ten. I can't remember the last time I had that much fun. In the midst of the preparation for the party I actually had time to squeeze in my half hour run! I got out again today and hit the gym for a half hour speed workout. It seems like I'm having problems finding more than half an hour to run, but it's better than nothing at least, and the speed work is good. I got on the scale at the gym though and I can see I have some work to do before Thanksgiving, which is next week if you can believe it. I couldn't.

Two-Thirty

I had my dentist appointment today, and it was as pleasant as it could be with someone rooting around under my gums. Not much build-up of anything substantial. It's nice to have clean teeth though. They made me take an antibiotic before the cleaning though, which I have not had to do before. I'm not really happy about the idea of taking antibiotics for no apparent reason, but they seem to think that my heart murmur puts me at risk for a nasty infection with the bacteria that is introduced into my bloodstream during the cleaning. My doctor has spoken to me before about it, I just haven't really taken them seriously. This is just another example of something that was never an issue in the Canadian health care system but here is a big deal. I guess you get what you pay for, and that perhaps all the lawsuits here aren't all that bad if they are keeping doctors and dentists on their toes.



Speaking of staying on ones toes, I did not get to go out for a run yesterday like I was hoping. Melissa had her dentist appointment yesterday and I had to take care of Elijah. I thought I might take him out in the joggy stroller but the tires are flat and I threw out both of my crappy pumps in the move. I guess I need to get a new one. Anyway, I substituted a run yesterday for a long walk instead. Elijah and I took the *long* way to Safeway and ended up being out for an hour and a half. At my pace we probably covered 7 miles. All that fresh air must have got to Elijah though as when we got back he went down for a 2 hour nap. That was a nice treat for Melissa when she got home. I'm hoping to get out for a run tomorrow before the snow hits. Yes, it is 75 here today and tomorrow we are supposed to get snow. Welcome to Denver!

Car repairs

First off here's my accountability: I got to the gym today and went for a 25 minute run. I think the track there is about a tenth of a mile. I figure that because if I run at my 10 minute per mile pace it takes me about a minute to get around. Today was a speed workout so I alternated 2 minutes at a 10 minute per mile pace with 2 minutes at a 6.7 minute per mile pace. It was a good workout but not long enough. As I went at lunchtime I couldn't justify being away for too long. That coupled with the car trouble I had meant I could only spare a few minutes. But any amount of time is worth it I figure, especially when I'm trying to get back in the swing of things.



As for the car trouble, I pull into the parking lot and pull on my parking brake and the button pops off and flies into the windshield. So it took me about 10 minutes in the parking lot to figure out how to set the brake without the button. When I got back to work I called the Saturn dealer to see if they had the replacement part. They did, so I drove by there after work and picked it up. Twenty-five bucks and 5 minutes later the brake was fixed. I'm glad I didn't pay them to put it in as it was really easy and it would not have been worth the $75 worth of labor they probably would have charged.

Third Degree

As I seem to be getting the third degree from certain individuals, I will give a brief report on my running. The last time I blogged about it I had ramped up my miles to 20 in one week without introducing those miles gradually. I did end up paying for that and was achy the entire weekend after. Since then I have found the time to go running at least once a week, but not as much as I would like. It's a hell of a lot harder to find time to run with this job than it was before, so perhaps some accountability would do me some good. Last night, 30 minute 3-mile circuit, 450 calories burned.

Running update

Now that things are more settled with the house I've been trying to get back into the running groove. Last week I went running once, and this week I managed to go four times. Yes, even with the snow. The gym near my work has a jogging track, so I went there on Monday and Wednesday for my workout. I kind of like running at the gym as I can push myself a little more and not have to worry about running out of gas 6 miles from home. Also, on Saturday I went for a nice hour long run around our neighborhood. Of course it was gorgeous that day, and by today (Friday) the great weather has returned. So I decided to head out for a run today at lunch. So, four runs, probably about 20 miles, this week is a good starting point for my winter training. If I don't get into it now, it will be even harder to go out the door when it's cold and snowy out. The marathon in June is looming large in my mind, and although I won't start training in earnest for it until February, I should be consistently at 20-30 miles per week by then. Gotta start somewhere!

Trip to Home Depot

Well as I mentioned in my last post I had to mow the lawn this weekend. That required me having to buy a lawn mower, which apparently is not such an easy task this late in the season. I drove up to our local Home Depot hoping to buy a little electric mower that would easily handle our relatively small lawn. The week before we had been there and they had had a discount on fully assembled mowers, which we had no room for at the time. I thought nothing of it and assumed that they would keep a stock of mowers on hand at all times. So imagine my surprise when I asked someone if they had any lawn mowers (after looking unsuccessfully for about 5 minutes), to hear that they only had two. "Only two styles to pick from?" I asked. "No, just two lawn mowers." was the response. Ugh. So, not wanting to have to drive halfway across the city to find a mower I went out to look at them. Luckily there was a nice 4.5 HP Briggs and Stratton mower there that I approved of and, due to its clearance nature, it was only $70. So I decided to go for it, and I picked up a snow shovel while I was at it. Always be prepared I figure. So after a quick trip to the gas station to buy gas, I returned home with my purchases. Unfortunately the lawn mower did not come with any instructions so I kind of had to wing it. After I had put in oil and gas, and made several pulls on the starter it was evident that winging it was not going to work. But a few google searches later I had the instruction manual for the Briggs and Stratton engine that gave me the secret. Apparently their attempt to prevent people from chopping off fingers and toes had thwarted me from starting the mower at all. So after activating the safety bar, a single pull got me up and running. I picked the right day to mow the lawn too, as by the time Sunday night rolled around it was clear that the other item I had purchased would come in handy as well. By the time the snow ended yesterday we accumulated more than 16 inches. It was the wet heavy stuff too. Oh well, it's a lot easier to shovel when you know that it will all be gone in a couple of days, I'll probably be mowing the lawn again this weekend.

Friday, finally!

This week has been quite hectic for me and I am glad it is winding down now. At the beginning of the month I volunteered to give a talk for our Biomolecular Structure Program. At the time I had no idea what my schedule was going to be like, but I was interested enough to go out on a limb and say that I would do it. Originally the date was set to be the 28th of September, but fortunately it was moved to October 5. As all of our housing problems went down, the fact that I had to give a talk always was dwelling in the back of my mind, but there was nothing I could do about it. When we finally closed last Wednesday I breathed a sigh of relief and then realized that I now had only a week to prepare. But I figured I could make it. Then Thursday and Friday went by and so many things had to be dealt with at work that the talk got pushed aside. Oh well, I thought, I'll just work on it on the weekend. Well the weekend went by with chores and shopping, and still no talk. Ugh! Thankfully Monday and Tuesday were relatively quiet on the job front so I was able to dedicate two solid days to making the slides and practicing. When Wednesday came I was back in the groove and gave a good presentation. It wasn't one of my best talks (I caught myself using the word "basically" way too much) but it was pretty good and it seemed to engage most of the audience. I think the hardest thing to get over when giving a scientific talk is the fact that someone will always be drifting off during the talk. It doesn't seem to matter how good your talk is, some people just aren't interested and can't keep awake. That's my expereince at least. I did manage to keep the important people awake though and had some great questions at the end (that's always the best way to gauge if your talk hit home or not). I'm glad to have it over now though, and as this Friday winds down I'm really looking forward to relaxing this weekend. Sure, I have the lawn to mow, but that will not deter me from enjoying myself. Plus, I get to have pancakes tomorrow, and take Elijah to see the local fire station!

Relax? Who has time for that?

Well the weekend is over already, and it seemed like it was never there. There were so many things to do and buy for the house that we hardly spent any time there at all. Saturday we had a consultation with ADT to get our security system up and running again. Then it was off to Cherry Creek to get some new drinking glasses. This was something we had been putting off for a while, waiting for the move. We had lunch there then drove back, hitting the grocery store on the way home to get food. By the time we got back I just had time to vacuum before it was time to make dinner. Our dinner was great, roast chicken on the grill on a bed of potatos and onions. It's always good to have an entree that makes it's own side dish. We bought a nice bottle of wine to go with it and I was able to enjoy a glass of that with dinner. We decided to watch the Return of the King but by 9:30 we were too tired to finish it. Sunday we were up and out the door for church and off to our local mega outlet type store for more shopping. We hit Petco to get food for the cat, Bed Bath and Beyond for all sorts of house stuff, and Home Depot for new locks and other hardware items. By the time we got back from all that it was afternoon, and there was just time to eat and put all the locks on the doors before we were out the door again for a walk down Smoky Hill to the Safeway. Pizza dinner, and then we were in bed again by 9:30. Crazy! But the busy days were well worth the sacrifice as now I feel like the urgent chores have been done so that when I get home from work during the week I don't have a billion more things to do. Today I hope to go for a run for the first time in two weeks. Our neighborhood is on a huge hill, so I'm expecting to get my butt kicked.

Spam Comments

For the few of you who comment on this blog you will notice a new addition to the comment form. It will ask you to verify the word that is printed in the window before your comment will be added. I'm getting tired of deleting spam comments every time I post, so this should thwart those wiley comment-bots.

Boy oh boy what a ride!

I haven't posted in a while so I thought I would break the silence. It's been a roller-coaster ride the past two weeks, but now that it's over I feel like I can address everything that went down. The last day I posted I hinted at some of the issues associated with the loan that had come up. They were all annoying but not insurmountable. It usually involved me having to fax over some piece of information to verify this or that. But on Monday the 19th a bomb got dropped on us. The bank told us they could not give us a loan for the house. This happened 5 days before we were supposed to close, and on the actual loan commitment deadline. We were devastated. By the end of the day we had a single long-shot to go on, but were not going to be able to make the commitment deadline, meaning our earnest money ($2500) would have been lost if we could not buy the house. We were assured that by Tuesday we would have an answer yes or no. Needless to say having this all happen well after it should have (all the problems we were having were immigration related and should have been caught during the pre-approval stage) got Melissa all riled up and she started kicking butt and taking names. By the end of Tuesday the answer was no, but another option had become a possibility. Our original loan could not happen but the bank was willing to try to push through a different loan (which ordinarily would have required a 25% down payment for non-permanent residents) with our 5%. But we would have to wait until Wednesday. Finally Wednesday came and we got the new loan. Being completely jaded by the whole process, I was not willing to count on anything anything until the keys were in my hands. That happened yesterday. So now having lost our hopes and dreams, worked through anger and depression, lived with cautious optimism, and moved-out, closed and moved-in in a single day, we can proudly say that through it all we survived an are now homeowners.


Looking back at it now I can see the hand of God moving in all of it. God saved this house for us, it was on the market for months before we saw it at a higher asking price. God got the loan for us, if the immigration issue had been caught at the beginning of the process we could not have got a loan at all and would not have been able to even look at houses. Because the bank messed it up they were willing to go out on a limb to get us the loan we got. I have learned a lot about the way God works through the past few months. He gives us blessings and miracles everyday, but never hands them to us on a silver platter. Like a good Father He wants us to learn and grow from every experience. This means that He will always have his will done in the end, even if we have to do some of the legwork. Would we have got the loan without Melissa's complaints? Would I have got this job if I had applied for it right away? Would I have been able to take this job on our current visa if I didn't know what I've learned about immigration through our time here? Probably not. All of these issues we've had have been God's design. It's easy to forget about your faith when everything goes your way, it's only in the hard times that we really remember who is in charge. Needless to say I will be asking my saviour to bless our house tonight with a dram of Ardbeg; one of God's gifts for another.

Bluetooth Kicks Ass

On another note, I got a new phone this week. My old one was two years old, and Verizon allows you to get a $100 credit on a new phone when you sign another two year contract. So It gives you a little scratch to buy the more expensive models. I bought the Motorola E815, which I have been waiting more than two years for. When I bought my laptop in March of 2003 it came equipped with the ability to communicate wirelessly with Bluetooth enabled devices. But when it came time to get my new phone the last time, Verizon still had no Bluetooth enabled phones. So I went without. It turned out to be fairly good timing, because soon after Verizon picked up the Motorola V710, which was Bluetooth equipped, but hamstrung into only accepting connections from a Bluetooth headset. This phone turned out to be one of Verizon's biggest fiascos in the geek community, as Verizon kept stating that they would release a software upgrade that would allow the V710 to communicate with computers, but they never did. The end result was a phone that would not do anything you would want a Bluetooth device to do, mainly sync contact and calendar information wirelessly with your computer. Earlier this year the E815 was released and has had not much but rave reviews. The Bluetooth is now functional, and can be used to sync with your computer. Of course Verizon states that this is only possible with the purchase of their connection kit, but those of us blessed with an Apple computer can accomplish this seamlessly with iSync, which comes with the computer.


Anyway, I was happy to have a new toy and I was all set for a day of geekdom setting up the phone with the computer. Unfortunately, Apple foiled my plans and within 5 minutes I had set up the phone and synced all my contacts and calendar info. It was too easy. It works absolutely perfectly, every time I change a contact or appointment on my computer with one click it's on my phone too. And the opposite is also true, with one click all contacts I've added to my phone are on the computer. And my phone doesn't even need to leave its holster. This has been very useful at work as not a day goes by now where I don't have someone that I need to add to my cell phone. Now I just need to get a headset, as it always seems that someone is calling me when I'm driving to or from Boulder. Man, there was a time when I was embarassed to wear my phone on my belt, now I'm talking about a headset! What a difference a different kind of job makes.

Crikey!

I can't believe that some people buy more than one house in a lifetime. Or worse, refinance! Every day it's something different with these people. I keep telling myself that at the end of this I will finally be in a house but as the closing date draws closer all these issues and questions just add to my stress level. I just have to make it through 8 more days.

This vacuum sucks!

Well our new vacuum cleaner was delivered yesterday. Our old vacuum we got when we were married and it has lasted 8.5 years, but it was pretty much useless by the end. There was almost no suction at all. So we decided to buy a Dyson, which everyone seems to go on and on about. We found one on Amazon.com that was factory reconditioned and considerably cheaper than the new ones. Since we knew we were going to be buying a house I wanted to make sure that the old vacuum never got a chance to (not) clean it. Plus we will be able to give the apartment a good cleaning when we move out. We tried it out last night for a bit and the suction is incredible. It pulled up a ton of dust from just a small patch of carpet that had been "cleaned" just a few days before. Plus I no longer have to worry about buying bags. Needless to say, I may actually enjoy vacuuming this weekend.