Category Archives: News

Things, Goings On, and Stuff I write

Apple Store

Sunday afternoon I went to the Apple store at the Cherry Creek Mall (or Cherry Creak Maul for you Star Warts fans). Wow. Those stores are so simple and effective. When you walk in you are not over-stimulated. The machines are the focus, and they have all sorts of configurations so you can see what it will look like when your machine is put together.

They also have all sorts of software and accessories, so you can buy all of the other stuff if you want it. They even had a kids station where Abby was excited to sit on a neat cushion ball while playing with an iMac 20″. Wow.

Of course I want the dual processor G5 with as much RAM as I can cram in there with the 30″ display. That would probably cost me over $6,000.00 USD so I won’t be buying it, however, it looks cool 🙂

GE 3D Sonograms

When we went in this morning for the sonogram we were stunned by the cool 3 dimensional sonograms that they were able to do with General Electric’s technology. There, in contoured detail, was my little girl. I squeazed Jessica’s hand because I think both of us were stunned as we watched not just a black and white bunch of blobs and lines but a real life baby. Sure, when we had Abby’s black and white sonogram it was just as exciting, but the dimensional detail was a neat difference. I will post scans soon… I have to get the scanner unpacked 🙂

She’s a Girl!

Our new baby is (going to be?) a girl. She’s not born yet, or course, but she’ll be arriving some time towards the end of October if all goes well. Her name will be Evelyn Hope Peterman or ‘Evy’ for short. If you think of it, pray for her, she’s got a little tiny cyst on her brain right now that the Dr. says will most likely go away before she’s born. We’re not worried because she’s God’s baby in the first place and He’ll take care of her. Evelyn means “lively and pleasant”, and Hope… well, if you’ve not got hope figured out then you’re hosed.

She’s going to be smaller than Abby coming out (most likely) and we’re afraid that she’ll be quieter as well, since she hasn’t kicked and wiggled as much as Abby was by now. Ha! Afraid she’ll be quiet… yeah right!

Jessica scared the crud out of me this morning as we were walking out from the restaurant after eating lunch: she mentioned periods, sharing bathrooms and other girl things like clothes. I told my buddy Tony: I’m going to have to bypass the shotgun and move straight to a bazooka.

Fold Art

No, not Origami, it’s a spoonerism. I’m finding that in my old age I just have a harder time empathyzing with younger teenagers. It could be any combination of things, but I’m going to give you a list of a few:

  • There is a growing age gap
  • There is a growing culture gap
  • I could be talking to all the wrong teenagers (don’t take that wrong)
  • Most young teenagers don’t know about the Far Side
  • I’m wearing the wrong clothes
  • I’m married and obviously must not have a clue about Jr. High drama
  • I don’t care for the clothes of the 1970’s 1980’s and the fashion is coming back therefore I look like a goofy 1990’s wannabe.
  • My sophisticated word humor including puns, spoonerisms and general vocabulary confuse them [“his lips are moving, I hear sounds, but I don’t know what he’s saying.” or, “Stewardess, I speak Jive.”]

In short I’m a relic at 27.5 years of age. I’m considering taking up cave dwelling and combing over my hair like my ancestors before me**

**not really, I’ve got a mortgage and my hair will never be combed over unless I’m incapacitated and the nurses are cruel to me.

Manual Labor

This weekend was full of exercise, manual labor and darn good times. Friday night we had a church party… in which folks were supposed to dress up as if they were in the 50’s. The 1950’s that is. I don’t participate in dressing as if I wish I were in the bygone era, but I did go and I did enjoy the fellowship and some ice cream with strawberries that were beat together in a fashion that resembled a Milk Shake.

Saturday we went for a long 4 mile walk. Long for me that is. I walk up and down my stairs most days so 4 miles just happened to excede my normal exercise quota. Then, in a twist that no one could predict, I was walking more in the evening with my dad when we happened upon our friends the Andersons and they happened to show us an Ice Cream maker that came with both a hand crank and a motor. In yet a more bizaare twist: I asked them to pick me up one at the warehouse club that they belong to (which I refuse to pay a yearly membership to) so that I now own one. Yummy. Our first ice cream experience with it will come shortly.

Sunday we went to church. Yeah, you knew that was coming. But after church the Kaes came over and we ate lunch and then painted the front room. In the eveninge Andersons came over with said Ice Cream Maker and so Sunday evening we made Chocolate Chip and Reese’s Peanut Butter Ice Cream. The price of the Ice Cream Maker will be made up very quickly with the quality of the hand cranked Ice Cream we created. I don’t know that we’ll use the motor because it’s just not needed. We then watched Finding Never Land. This is a darn great movie, but you’ll have to watch it to form your own review, it’s good – so I won’t review it to warn you not to watch it. Again, watch it, you will be pleased that you did, most likely. Unless you are not. No. I will not refund you the rental fee if you don’t like it. Yes. It does have Kate Winslet in it. No. She does not drown in this movie either.

Today I got up early and set out to Castle Rock, CO with my brethren in Christ, Laban Matthews’ brother’s house. Josiah Matthews has desided that it would be good to re-shingle his roof and re-side his house this week. By himself primarly. Seeing as how I am an able body man who’s a glutton for punishment I volunteered to help. It was actually quite fun and I enjoyed using the various roofing tools. Of course just before I left it started to rain. We had just finished ripping off the shingles on one quarter of the roof 🙂 God has a good sense of humor.

Also, I have finally gotten my ‘recording studio’ computer set up so look for a more refined “Pordcast” soon.

Bleedingest Edge

Well, I’m writing this post in the new Firefox 1.1 Alpha. Deer Park Alpha 1. This is not to boast, mind you. I’m doing this because my software has broken in various browsers that were not tested well enough (Read Firefox 1.03). If you’re a web developer or a person with a serious case of alpha-itis, you can download it here.

I can see the Apple influence on the UI in small places. While they haven’t tossed the Save/Cancel buttons, they’ve re-arranged how a few things work. There’s a help file popup that at least appear installed with the browser (I couldn’t tell at first whether it’s calling web based files or not) as well. Firefox 1.1 was rumored to support SVG, but I have not tested that yet. I will shortly and report back.

Update: SVG works. Brilliant. The future is looking bright, even if there’s literally clouds outside my window 🙂

Short Tales

This morning after watering the flowers with me, Abby asked me to sit down with her on the front steps because she wanted to talk. This of course if most father’s dream come true. I hope that we have ‘talks’ for years until Jesus returns or I die. She of course didn’t want to talk about boys, the meaning of life or breakfast, but instead she proceeded to tell me stories. She told me about a little girl names Abby, a story about Grandpa and Grandma (no last name given, so if you’re a grandparent reading this, pretend it’s you), and one story that started like this:

Once upon a time there was a little boy called my daddy…

Which she never finished, but it tickles me to be that boy 🙂

Dancing with the Stars

Reality TV may have possibly reached a new level of stupid: Dancing with the Stars. That’s right. It’s a dance competition wherein ‘famous’ (read: has-beens) people dance with people who have half a clue. Then, and I know you’ll be surprised: there will be judges who will grade their dancing. Stupid. Stupider. Stupidest.