Her name is Calypso

My Sunday run

I ran for 2 hours and really should have covered more like 15-16 miles in that amount of time. I would have done this too, but around mile 7 or 8 I lost all energy. I took around an hour for the first 8 miles and spent another hour on the final 5.

UPDATE:

I ran this again last Saturday and did it in three fewer minutes. If I can cut another 11 minutes off, I will be on the pace I need to do a 3:30 marathon. Assuming, of course, that I could run a 2nd 13.1 miler just as fast as a first one! dbp

Our new dog

Jemma just had to check out the pet carrier we got. The actual dog doesn't come untill Monday--Knock on wood. Update: Looking at the picture, I bet Dahlia could have fit. She wanted to try and crawl-in but I thought she was too big and would get stuck.

I was half-sleeping last night and watching HBO. I was awake for part of a show called Flight of the Conchords and it was great!

Here is a video by the guys from the show.

It is mildly not for kids.

Half-asleep HBO discovery.

Our weekend:

It started on Friday: My wife took all three girls plus a friend of our middle daughter to Ratatouille. At the start of the movie, they ran into a family we are friends with, and would be coming over to our place for an evening cookout.

I haven’t seen the film but I understand there is some point where there is a rally or triumph (of rats) and our youngest daughter whooped-it-up and shook her fist. The theater must have been fairly rife with kids but wife reported that the J. was the only one to give a shout out at that point in the film.

Meanwhile, I had gotten home from work around the time the movie began. I was a little late because a co-worker had come to me with a problem related to the density of steam (given the pressure and temperature). A CRC would have been handy—had one been handy, so I tried to find a table on the web and could not find one. I decided to get at least a ballpark figure by just using the Ideal Gas Equation: PV=NRT. What I got was around 28CubicFeet/Lb. I didn’t like the answer and so resumed the search for a table, which this time I was able to find. The table indicated an answer of around 10CubicFeet/Lb. I knew that water is not very ideal gas-like, so the true volume should have been less than what was calculated by the formula, a three-fold difference was kind of a surprise though.

Wife and children didn’t get home from the movie until around 9:00 and so it wasn’t until around 10:00 that the kids were all washed-up and tucked-in. We could then settle down and have our dinner.

Saturday:

The parents of our daughter’s friend picked the girl up nice and early since they had plans to go to Martha’s Vineyard for the weekend. We went out to a local farm to pick blueberries and look at dogs. They have and breed Shortie Jack Russel Terriers, which are shorter than regular JRTs, but also less hyper. The dogs are really sweet, and it was fun picking blueberries.

The party had us (of course) and two other families, each of which have two children. The seven kids played amongst themselves and really were no problem at all. We cooked on the charcoal grill: A whole chicken, followed by a dozen Italian sausages, then burgers and hotdogs for the kids, then a Korean marinade flank steak and finally sweet corn (in the husks). Yummy! My wife AKA sidedishsally, controlled herself and only made two kinds of salsa (hot and not hot) with tortilla chips, cheese (two kinds) and crackers, classic potato salad, green beans from our garden and fruit salad (which a guest brought). Drinks? Of course: Two kinds of beer, hard cider, and a couple bottles of wine. Later we had coffee with dessert. The kids satisfied their beverage needs with juice bags.

Conversations were wide-ranging and friendly: The two families we invited had not met each other, although the kids largely knew each other from school. So, a lot of the talk was a kind of get-to-know-you type of thing. One of the dads related some show he saw where I guess it was funny that war supporters were not enlisting in the military or something like that. It struck the storyteller as funny, because it showed the war supporters were not sincere & so forth. For myself, I couldn’t follow the logic. I mean, we are all for law and order, education and healthcare, but we can’t all be simultaneously doctors, lawyers, police men, teachers etc. We don’t expect anyone who likes a given service to go into that profession because that would be nuts. How dare you purchase an airline ticket if you are not willing to go to flight school and learn to fly the plane yourself—greedy bastard! On a more serious side: We are committed, for a lot of good reasons, to civilian control of the military. The idea that pro-war people have a special obligation to serve, and anti-military people do not, flies in the face of this ideal. As it is, plenty of people who believe in this war have signed up. Does this make anti-war folks more disposed toward it? Nope.

Sunday:

My wife’s parents came over, along with my mother in law’s cousin (who is much younger than my wife) for Sunday brunch. We had waffles, bacon, sausage and fruit salad outside on the deck. The weather was perfect: Sunny but not hot.

The cousin had to catch a bus back to NYC in the late afternoon, so he, my wife and I picked up S. from her sleepover and all drove to Wellington Station. Wow! There was tons of parking. Yeah, because the station was closed! Ah, there are free shuttle busses to the next stops. We got out at the Community College stop and walked up to Bunker Hill. We walked all over town from Charlestown to Boston Common. Sore calves this morning.

Lamb and Fish Grilling Marinade..

This recipe will vary depending on things like whether we have fresh mint or rosemary in the garden etc. but here is the basic formula...

First, squeeze the juice of 1/2 Lime into a small bowl (lemon is okay if you don't have limes)

Next crush a couple of cloves of Garlic with a garlic press into the Lime juice.

Then add a teaspoon of Olive oil, and half a teaspoon of Mustard. The Mustard acts as an emulsifier and keeps the Olive oil and Lime juice from separating. (I use brown mustard, but any kind is okay)

Last, add herbs and spices: Black Pepper, Red Pepper Flakes, Rosemary, Mint, Basil, Oregano etc.

I don't usually put in all of those spices: I leave out the Red Pepper if there are kids or spice intolerant adults. I normally use Mint or Rosemary, but not usually both etc. And, I like to add salt while grilling rather than in the marinade. When we have fresh Rosemary or Mint, I like to chop it up finely before putting it into the marinade.

The marinade should be pretty thick, I normally spoon it onto the Lamb Chops and then spread it around. You can put the marinade on the meat a day ahead of grilling, but most of the time it is applied no more than 30 minutes prior to grilling.

Added Note: I use almost exactly the same mixture for grilling Salmon (fillets or steaks), just leave out the Mint and Rosemary. You have to grill the fish the same way (not as long though) as the lamb--directly on the grill, over the coals. No wrapping in foil.

dbp

A funny video

I originally came across this on Althouse, but then my 10-year-old daughter saw it and loved it. So, she tried to view it from her Mac mini on YouTube and also from Althouse, but it was slow to load and wouldn't play right. Just to let her see it, I tried just posting it to my own blog and now it seems to play fine. dbp

My Sunday Run...

I was hoping this would have ended up being 12.5 miles, but only ended up being 10 and change. It took me 100 minutes and one second.

Running Calorie Counter

Here is a site that has a pretty good Calorie counter.

I like it because it takes into account what you weigh, how fast you go and how long you run.

Dahlia and Kim

Flash Animation--not to be missed!

This is really good. I have played it on my PC and on my daughter's Mac, so just about anybody should be able to view it with no troubles. It is a fight between a lootiefull* stick-figure and his creator. It is called Animator vs. Animation II. There is so much going on on the screen that you will have to view it a few times to get all the details. Of course, this is part of a whole genre of stick-figure flash animations... Enjoy, dbp

Lootie is a Konkani* word which means what it sounds like: Full of mischief.

Konkani is the ethnic group centered around Goa, India. And the Konkani word for Konkani (the language) is Amchicala. FWIW.
Animator vs. Animation II by *alanbecker on deviantART

My Sunday 13.5 miler.

The Good news: I haven't run this far since I was 18. The bad news is that it took me 116 minutes (8:35 per mile) That is 35 seconds/mile off of what I need to do in a marathon and this was only a little more than half-marathon length.

An Email Dialog Between a Mother and Her Daughter

Dear Mommy,

It's soooo hot out side. I know that if you had to go outside, you wouldn't want to because of the heat. I know that you're trying to be nice when you take us out somewhere, but if you are all mean and crabby while doing it, it's not fun for us. Maybe you should think about that!

- S.

Dear S.,

It is very hot outside and I know I wouldn't like it because I don't like hot weather. But I thought you and D. might enjoy getting outside for a bit since you have been cooped up inside all day. The heat doesn't seem to bother you guys very much.

Good point about me ruining your outing by being crabby - I understand and I am sorry for blowing up at you. I was trying to do something nice for the two of you and I had to give up working out to take you to the library. Remember - I have very little free time and if I use it to do something, that means I can't do something else. I was upset at you because I felt you didn't respect that fact. But mostly I was upset because not only did you fail to pick out a book but you also blamed me for that failure. You had the audacity to accuse me of not giving you enough time (we were there for 45 minutes) and not helping you (I submitted the request for the book you wanted that they didn't have and I told you to look for another book in the chapter book section).

Let us make the most of these outings and let us not be so crabby.

I love you,

Mommy

Dear Mommy,

Thanks for the compromise. I'll be thankful when you take us out on trips. But you don't act all crabby while doing it. I also understand that you thought that we would like some time outside. Since it was so hot I didn't feel like doing anything outside. So I came in.

Thanks!

Love, S.!

Dear Moonoo,

Thank you too! Here is a Haiku to tell you how I feel about you...

Delicate as flame.

Fierce as fire. Bright as the Sun.

My Surenna glows.

I love you,

Mommy

My Sunday 9-Miler

This run took me 77 minutes! That is like 8:34/mile and I plan on running a marathon in under 8:00/mile. I don't think so.

Jemma Takes a Bow

I should note that you can (and should) zoom in on the video. Just right click and choose Zoom in.

Jemma's Dance Recital

Mullets...

Yesterday my older sis sent me a funny ppt. on this odd hairstyle. Now, I don't know anybody personally who sports a mullet, I still have a theory about its appeal:

It has the same shock-value of really big obnoxious tatoos, without all the expense, pain or permanance.

ADDED: For those who haven't seen me in a while...

This is not a picture of me! I am white, skinny and possibly disreputable looking. But this is just a picture I harvested off of the internet tubes. dbp

Separated At Birth?

Last Saturday on our anniversary weekend in Boston, we got the chance to visit a Thomas Moser showroom. I had gotten ideas and dimensions for the hutch I made from various sources; but mainly from the picture below.

My view upon seeing it in the wood: Theirs features better workmanship than I can do. OTOH, I spent about $1000 on the wood and hardware and theirs is about 15K. So, there is that.

Their rocking chairs are unbelievable and worth every penny of the $1400 or so that they cost. Someday I will have one. That is a life goal.

One thing I did differently from Thomas Moser is that I used a lighter wood for the back. It gives a nice contrast to the cherry in the front and it provides more light so that you can see the items that are in or on the piece.

Surenna's Father's Day Drawing/"Poem"

She drew this in just about 5-10 minutes on Father's Day.