I have a stack of journal articles I should be plowing through in preparation for a meeting tomorrow. Many of them are actually in French, Russian or German and are from the 1950's-60's. I am actually really surprising myself with the foreign ones how much I can glean from the plots! Enough to get the jist of the article, or so I think. We will see if my counterpart came to the same conclusions when we discuss them tomorrow. (I am now seeing why the much despised Dr. L in grad school forced his students to take a few years of German.) I do work in a place with people from many different countries. I know people from Germany and the former Soviet Union that I am betting I can send excerpts of the papers to for a quick translation.
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Leif was up twice last night. Each time for at least 45 minutes. The first time (after listening to me whine greatly during the day) AB got up. After standing next to the crib, patting his back and hushing Leif to sleep without any success, he committed the cardinal sin of picking him up. What resulted then was not really a surprise. Leif struggled to get down and then bolted across the house to our room to get me. I got up with him and sat, rocking him to calm him and then to sleep and carefully depositing him back in the crib. An hour later he was screaming again. This time he was *not* getting out of the crib. I hurried to the nursery and sat there working to convince him to lay his head down and go to sleep. After 30 minutes of this AB came in where I rudely chewed him out (unjustly). He took the next shift and got him down in another 20 minutes where he slept until *gasp* 6:15am.
We are heading back to taking the hardline with him in the middle of the night. No getting out of the crib unless a complete necessity. Like I said yesterday, going to bed? Not a problem. It's the constant wake ups.
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AB is feeling better. We went to lunch today for a Safeway deli sandwich. Last week we got 4 coupons in the mail for free lotto, megamillions and 2 scratch game tickets. I never play the lottery here, but for some reason whenever I am in Colorado I buy lotto tickets. I think mostly it is peer pressure because my mom always does. So since I am standing in line with her, I may as well too.
We redeemed our coupons for a stack of tickets (lotto and scratch). The lotto tickets yielded nothing, of course. But the scratch ticket otoh... we are on a streak! A $2 winner that we turned over for another 2 tickets with another $2 winner and so on. After 4 days our streak is dead. Two losers today. I am sure the goal is to entice the general public to play the games and get us hooked. If that was the intent then giving me a $100 winner would have been far more effective! Since I am now finished.
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I am really, really tired of sales people. I am buying a large piece of lab equipment and have asked for quotes. The vultures are circling. I have the quotes, I need to review them all still, but if another sales guy calls me asking where his quote fell I might just scream. I have two that have called twice a day for the last 4 days. I have written their numbers down since their affiliation doesn't come up on my caller ID. I am now screening.
One guy is hell bent on me because in the last bid series he lost out on a $50K piece of equipment. He swears up and down that his quote didn't match bid request (his fault, not mine). I am *this* close to telling him next time he calls that if he doesn't quit breathing down my neck I will pull his quote from the stack and toss it. I have had it.
The other guy is just seeming more and more like he isn't on the up and up with me. The company is defunct, but he sells the refurbished instruments and another company he is affiliated with has taken over contract to produce the equipment, but he has yet to get me a quote. Yet won't tell me who the company is so *I* can contact them. His quote for his refurbished piece-o-crap has landed in the garbage can and the yet to exist quote on the new system is teetering.
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Leif was so funny this morning. At 6:15 am he was ready for his morning moo-wee. We went to the living room and I put on Nemo. I am so sick of Nemo I could puke. It appears that Leif may be feeling my nausea for it too as he was mad when it came on. Fine. I stopped it and started Teletubbies.
Yes, I Tivo Teletubbies for Leif. He really does like them. He calls them "Tubs". And thinks the rabbits on the landscape are neat. He really gets into saying "hello" and "bye bye" and dancing to the music. I know most adults really, really hate them. But you know, I don't for some reason. Maybe it is just "not Nemo" for me. Or maybe I feel a little rebelious letting my son watch it because Tinky Winky is SO obviously gay. You really just can't even argue that he isn't. But you know, that purple boy blob's need to carry around a red purse just doesn't strike me as an issue that is important. So Teletubbies it is!
This morning we got to daycare a few minutes late. About half the kids were there and each had a little ring of bells. Wow this made my morning drop off easy. Leif put his lunch away, hung up his coat, paused for his kiss and then ran to the back of the room to get his bells. Once he had the beloved bells in his hand he was king of the mountain! He waved them in all the other kid's faces (they all did have their own). And then he started dancing and making as much noise as possible. I waved when I left and he waved back with a huge smile on his face.
Leif is obsessed with using the potty before bath and is very successful with it so far. He has used it the last week consistently and thinks it is awfully neat. We clap and praise him and then he gets into the tub. He hasn't "asked" to use it any other time. Although he does "ask" to sit on the big potty every morning while AB is in the shower. I hold him up there with his clothes and diaper on and give him TP. He wipes and wipes, then puts the TP in the toilet and flushes it. Our plan is to put everything in his court. I am quite convinced though that this is just a phase and his interest will wane as quickly as it popped up any day now.
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AB has class tonight. My plan is to Tivo Survivor like I usually do so we can watch together. While this is happening I am going to set up our home network. I am really excited about this and anxious to enable the computer's cable and DVR. What has really prompted this urgency is two fold. Sunday at 9pm (Desperate Housewives vs. The Sopranos) and Tuesday at 10pm (Boston Legal vs. Amazing Race). We don't watch many other TV shows with fervor. AB watches 24, but the violence in that has been bugging me and I have quit. He also watches ER, but I am a little tired of that drama and far prefer Grey's Anatomy. Oh and wait, AB has his Friday sci-fi night... Why is it then that 4 of our 6 "must see" shows fall opposite each other? Haven't the TV execs done their demographics studies? Someone is going to lose here. Or maybe they just count on all of us to have multiple Tivos. (Obviously we have succumbed and this little issue tossed a high end computer with these extras into our lap.)
Ok, I am off. I must get to those journal articles and then leave early to go get Leif and go home. C is coming over at 4:30 to visit, so that will be fun!
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