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Cora’s now begun preschool. She’s 3 1/2 years old, very intelligent we think (as Garrison Keillor puts it, “where all the children are above average”), and has always been just a bit shy. OK, if you’ve actually met her, occasionally painfully, throw a fit if you get near her shy. That’s changed somewhat as she’s gotten older, but it was still with some trepidation that we considered her going to kindergarten as her first exposure to not being the focus of mommy/daddy/grandma’s attention and doting. So, we essentially decided to move the pain up, to when the doses were smaller, and the outcome was less dire if she hated the whole experience. Off to find a preschool we went.

Our criteria for the appropriate school? Very limited. Do you have kids? Do you have adults to watch those kids? No obvious electrocution/drowning/falling out of windows hazards? Great! You’re the one for us. Actually, it was even slightly more relaxed than that. We knew two families in the church who were sending their little girls to a particular school, and we kind of figured if it was good enough for them…

So Cora’s been to school on Tuesdays and Thursdays for two weeks now. And she comes home to tell us about stuff that we didn’t get to see her do. Up to now, when she told us stuff, there was this mind mapping that had to go to figure out what precisely from today she’s found interesting to talk about. 3 year olds aren’t great on giving context. But you witnessed her whole day, mostly, so you had the keys. Now, though, there’s a whole set of stuff that she does that we’re really interested in finding out about, and dependent upon asking just the right questions to get her impression of the situation. Very odd experience… Not something we were really prepared for with a 3 year old.

Jason has it even weirder than me. I’m used to coming home, and only getting snippets. Heck, I only _want_ snippets. He’s used to seeing the whole thing in gory detail. And now there’s this set of details Cora may choose to reveal or not reveal. New friends, new experiences, … our daughter has a life of her own at 3 1/2!

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Got a spam comment today that made me laugh out loud. In amongst the porn spam (mature porn? uh, yuck!), the drug spam, and the vacuum spam (?), I had a spam comment from the Pampered Chef.

I almost left it up, just because it amused me so, in amongst the rest of the trash. I can imagine some housewife sitting at home, trying to expand her Pampered Chef sales so that she can get just one more plastic scraper to round out her set.

Pampered Chef: bringing the ingredients and utensils of spam to my website!

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We got us a new puppy! Rufus, whose name comes from both the movie Dogma, and from a surprised recognition that the name actually comes from the Bible (Romans 16:13 – Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord). Somehow puts Chris Rock’s portrayal in an even weirder light.

Rufus is a beautiful pup: his mom is a huskey and his dad is a border collie, so he’s got these wonderful blue eyes and ears that stand up. We took him to a church picnic yesterday so that he wouldn’t have to stay in his crate all afternoon. I think we rated an extra notch or two by our Sunday school kids, just for having such a neat puppy.

The girls are getting used to having a puppy in the house. He’s done the Snoopy grabbing Linus’s blanket thing a bunch of times to Callie, and grabbed Cora’s teddy bear a bunch of times, too. So far, the teething damage has been minimal: he seems to have more fun grabbing something and running with it rather than chewing on it. Looking forward to maybe having a running partner when he gets a bit older – little guy’s fast!

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We’re in that section of commandments now that first graders are usually safe with. Commandment 5 turns out to be the easiest commandment for them to remember (“Honor your father and mother”), and also one of the easiest to break. After 5, though, 6’s “Thou shalt not kill” is a pretty easy one to write off for a first grader. None of our kids are sitting on death row. (As is the case with most things in Christianity, things are not as simple as they seem. The whole point of those commandments, after all, is to point us to a savior without whom we’d otherwise have no chance of satisfying the law. If one of the laws was truly a write-off, you’d then have the 9 “real” commandments plus that easy one anyone can follow, with savior or no.)

Explaining number 7 to a first grader turns out to be a whole heck of a lot of fun. Number 7, for those of us who weren’t indoctrinated in the law growing up (like me, who’s learned a lot of things through trying to explain it to first graders) is “Thou shalt not commit adultery”. Dangerous waters to be treading in, but you also don’t want to leave the kids completely mystified as to what this command is that we’ve just insisted that they memorize.

OK, I thought – kids understand marriage, two people, only married to each other. That’s how I’ll approach it. “Who here has thought about getting married when they grow up?” One hand, out of 20. Not going to get out it that easily. “We’re going to talk about the seventh commandment today, which is about adultery. We’ve worked very hard to figure out the best way to explain this, since kids your age generally aren’t as familiar with this command”. Connor raises his hand – “I know what the definition of adultery is!”. Instant teacher shutdown – ain’t no way this kid is going to give his definition to the class.

Needless to say, a very difficult lesson to teach. I THINK we made it through, being true to the lesson without being TOO enlightening. I still wish I could have heard the conversations in the kids’ families after church. “What did you learn about in Sunday school today?”

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The last couple of years have been hectic, work-wise, such that my workaholic nature easily amassed a large PTO balance, since I never really took any time off, even given that I had to eat my PTO balance down to 0 when my daughter was born. Our company has a limit of 120 hours that you can carry over from year to year. I started the year with 119.

Did some math tonight. Given my accrual pace and the limited amount of PTO I’ve taken thusfar this year, I need to take 15 days between now and the end of the year just to break even to the 120 barrier again. Plus I’m taking a week of training at the end of August that doesn’t count towards those 15. So, we’re talking a month away from my various projects in the next six. Uh, I think I’ll be losing vacation time. Damn.

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The itch is back. Never really went away. Just went dormant for a while. 26.2 is calling me. Calling me to what looks like an impossible goal, at least in terms of aiming for this fall. My longest run of late has been 4. My brain’s sick enough to say, well that’s already 1/6 of the beast. (My brain also tends to give me the benefit of a few more miles after a long run: I’d rather not peter out 2.6 miles before end end.) I’m registered for a ten miler at the end of August on the theory that I’ve somehow gotta be able to run 10 miles then to be able to run 26.2 in October’s local marathon.

Jason’s out of town this weekend, else I’d push the 4 to at least 5 and maybe 6 depending on my hubris. I have hopes of waking up before the girlies tomorrow and putting in some miles on the treadmill, though treadmill running for me is a wonderful exercise in complete and total boredom in which I never seem to accomplish the miles that I intend. Put me out on the road or on the trail and I’ll make the distance, particularly if I don’t have to do multiple rounds around a loop where I get to make a decision to stop at some point. N miles is best done in an n/2 out and back kind of setup. Then I only really need to aim to get to n/2: after that n is inevitable, given that I gotta get home somehow.

Thinking/scheming tonight: half-marathon in October locally, full marathon on a flatter course in November near my sis. But then there’s no real backup plan: if I stick to the plan as-is right now, November can be my backup. Better get to bed, so the plan of the run in the morning can hold true, regardless.

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Our Sunday school class (19 or so 1st and second graders show up each Sunday) is examining the 10 commandments over the summer quarter. We’re up to #3 – not taking the Lord’s name in vain. The Israelites took this so seriously as to never say the Lord’s name…. today we typically count ourselves to be “in compliance” if we don’t pronounce any of a variety of curses including the term “God”.

I’m glad I have a lesson plan laid out by a curriculum publisher who’s thought through how to explain this to a group of 1st and 2nd graders, and gotten through the concept of honoring and revering the Lord’s name. Otherwise, my lesson would look something like this: “Here, if you or your parents use this particular term, either out loud or in your mind, you’ve broken the 3rd commandment. This other variation is pushing the limits. Now let’s all practice not saying “!@*!””

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We have a cat, Joe, who’s lived with us now for 6 or so years. He was a shelter cat, picked up from a no-kill shelter to be a companion for our other cat, Harley. Joe wasn’t a kitten when we got him, but we’re not really sure how old he is. He’s lived a good life with us, been reasonably well-behaved and is definitely a gentle and loving cat.

The problem: we had our basement renovated, including getting new carpet installed. Joe has now decided that that carpet is much to be preferred over his litter box for a portion of his daily activities. Joe’s gotta go.

Just to reassure folks that we’re not animal-dumpers, we’ve actually invested a fair amount of time and dollars in solving this problem with this cat. This has been fairly long and involved, as I’m horribly biased against getting rid of animals for reasons of inconvenience. And like I said, he’s a generally good cat. He just seems to think that this particular carpet is more appealing than litter. The vet checked him out and gave us the non-reassuring news that it’s behavioral, rather than physical. As in, he’s just chosen to do things this way: there’s nothing physically wrong with him.

So, tomorrow (I think) I’ll be taking Joe to live with my mom, in hopes that her carpet isn’t as appealing. This solution has its drawbacks, in that it (of course) comes with strings attached. Mom’s pushing that we not get any more cats because she doesn’t want any more “dumped” on her. I’m allergic to cats and really not a fan of litter box duty: it’s an easy enough constraint, though I’m chafing at the idea that she thinks that because she’s volunteered to take the cat and in fact is unhappy with the idea that I’d give him to anyone else that she’s entitled to then claim that I’ve “dumped” the cat on her. I haven’t decided just how much to point that out to her, or to point out that in fact in our family’s history she “dumped” two cats who were similarly causing destruction in our family’s newly refurbished basement into another home. Keeping those quietly in my back pocket for family peace…

So, Joe, you’ve been a good cat till now, and I’ll be happy to visit you at Mom’s. But your pooping ways just can’t stay and our attempts to cure you have been for naught. Harley will just have to pick on someone else…

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Seen on the back of a cake mix: calorie breakdown for cake as mix, and cake when baked. Loophole: those of us who eat the batter! Add in the calories burned worrying about salmonella, and you might have a real light food!

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Had to stop by my alma mater the other evening to return some books to the library. It’s the summer session, so the set of students out and about is pretty slim. Over and over, though, each student that I did see had a cell phone pressed to his or her ear as they moved about campus. Standing at the bus stop in the dark: cell phone dimly glowing. Walking to the library alone: cell phone to the ear. The best was two students obviously walking together: both with cell phones to their ears.

The entry’s title is ‘Communal Non-communicativity’: it’s as if we’ve decided that there’s no value in the chance encounter communication. Each spare moment is precious, and that communication slot has to be used for something important; something already known; someone on your speed-dial.

That same night, I had my cell phone hooked to my belt. Earlier in the day, on my walk to the supermarket to grab a bite for lunch, I had called a friend. Making good use of the time, I thought. The other day, on my drive home, I called another friend I hadn’t talked with in a while, just to catch up. The odds of me finding the time after I had gotten home were just so slim, using the commute time worked wonderfully to catch me up on her life.

Been running across articles and reading a book lately on Americans lack of shared experience or random cross-pollination of ideas. What we lose when we concentrate solely on our individual interests, be they an iPod full of “our” music, customized news sources, chat rooms online, … That’s a whole entry of itself. But it was just surprising to see it in action so forcefully on a walk across a darkened college campus.