Wizard of Oz

Quick Hits

/ Shane / Leave a comment
  • These days, Evie insists on have tights sticking out of her drawer with her drawer closed, so it looks like legs sticking out. Those legs represent the Wicked Witch of the West.*
  • Nothing makes me feel less manly than having the alarm go off in the night. I guess I should feel the opposite, like big strong protector of the household, but really I’m just reluctantly jabbing a stick into dark rooms to startle anybody in there, ready to run at the first sign of trouble.
  • Although Oliver can’t walk yet, we discovered he can open the front and back doors. We have lever handles, and it turns out those handles are just a little lower than the rest of the doors in the house, so he can reach and pull if he really tries.
  • Babies are generally very good at getting you what you want, but a baby with sunglasses on is irresistible. I forgot about this since Evie was a baby, but it never fails. It’s like the atomic bomb of cuteness.

* EDIT: It has been pointed out that the legs would more correctly represent the Wicked Witch of the East, which is true. But come on guys, she’s three!

Quote Monday plans to kill again

/ Shane / Leave a comment

Evie: “I want to wear these sunglasses all the time. I’ll wear them in the house and I’ll only take them off when I’m sleeping. Then I’ll be just like daddy.”

Evie: “Can you imagine? Dorothy had to walk all that way, and she didn’t even complain?” – She came up with this as motivation all on her own! The sidewalk is no yellow brick road, but if it keeps her from complaining…

Evie: “I was almost asleep, but then my potty ticket woke me up. It kept talking to me, saying, ‘I’m lonely!'”

Tom: “What kind of cheese is it?”
Evie: “Shark.”
Me: “Sharp.”

Evie: “I have a plan to kill an imaginary person.”
Me: “What’s your plan?”
Evie: “To kill an imaginary person.”

Good Weekend / Bad Weekend

/ Shane / 6 Comments

We had a really good weekend. And yet, we also had a really bad weekend. It’s funny though, because this bad stuff kept happening, but somehow it didn’t really ruin anything.

On Friday, I went outside to take the kids to the library, and I found out I had a really low tire. I have a compressor, so I put air in and went to the library, no problems. However, when I got home, as soon as I opened the car door, I could hear the air coming out. It was pretty loud, in fact, you could hear it all the way up to our back door. The tire had gotten wet from melting snow, so you could pinpoint the source of the leak pretty easily. However, we didn’t really need the car anymore on Friday, and on Saturday I got it repaired for $15. No real life disruption whatsoever!

Unfortunately, that was just the beginning of our trouble.

Saturday morning, Sara was using the microwave, and it was acting funny. As she demonstrated it for me and we played with it, starting and stopping it, the power to the microwave suddenly went out. This was followed shortly by the stove, and then later by the refrigerator.

What I know now is that something in the wall came loose, causing a small electrical fire (which I smelled at the time, but assumed was the microwave). Since the microwave was on, it fed back power to the stove, frying the control module and all the outlets on that circuit. The refrigerator is on a separate circuit, but they share a common ground (which is apparently common, and correct), which blew out the outlets on that circuit, but did not fry the refrigerator.

The whole thing is very frightening! From what the electrician said, it was just a random thing that could have happened anytime, anywhere. Luckily, there wasn’t too much damage. We have to pay for the electrical repair, a new microwave, and a repair for the stove. But it’s not as pricey or disruptive as a house fire, that’s for sure!

In fact, it didn’t even disrupt our plans for the day! We went ice skating.

Neither Sara and I are ice skaters. I think I’ve gone 2 or 3 times in my life, and I mostly remember them as being full of pain and humiliation. I was going for Evie’s sake, but I didn’t expect to enjoy it. As it turned out, I was something of a natural! I never fell a single time, and after the first time around the rink I was passing people, skating around people, doing triple lutzes, etc.

Nobody was more surprised about that than I was. I don’t know if it was just because I was trying it for the first time as an adult, or if it is because one time I had this awesome dream about ice skating and when I woke up I knew I could totally ice skate.

Even Sara ended up skating. She wasn’t even going to come, originally. After Oliver woke up from his nap, she ended up coming over to take some pictures. Finally, she ended up borrowing Ron’s skates, and we took a turn around the ice! I was really glad about that, it was a lot of fun. A mom even commented how nice it was to go skating with your sweetheart. Awww! And even despite that comment, I think Sara had a good time.

Now I’m kind of jazzed to go again. We live close to a skating rink that only costs $6 for skate rental (no charge for skating), so we’ve kind of been wasting the opportunity. Evie didn’t like it at first, but she went around a few times anyway and was disappointed when it was time to go home. Her two favorite parts were 1) the hot chocolate, and 2) in an attempt to make her laugh to keep her from getting frustrated, I called her “scissor legs” which she found endlessly hilarious.

The other big highlights of the weekend were teaching Evie how to play and then actually playing a rousing game of sardines around the house, and the most elaborate game of Wizard of Oz I could imagine. There were costumes and scene changes. Since my mom more or less knows the movie line by line, it was very specific. I have a bad feeling we will be reproducing this one for a long time to come (and with Evie, that means doing everything EXACTLY THE SAME as the first time).

So it was the worst weekend in a long time, in terms of bad things happening. But when I look back on the weekend, I only remember it being a good weekend! Not too shabby!

Halloween Link Wrap-up

/ Shane / Leave a comment

I realize it is after Halloween, and I kind of missed the boat on some of this stuff. But I’m not saving it until next year, so I need to clean these out.

Check out this recipe for a creepy, edible “meat hand“:

The finger nails and bone sticking out of the back are onions. Most of the rest of it is like a meatloaf with cheese melted on top.

Link via InteractiveReader (on twitter)

Second off, check out this geeky pumpkin wrap up over on MegDesk.

Third, check out this clip from NPR Science Friday, that discusses important research into zombies and how their brains work. (The audio is about 15 minutes)

Link via my mother-in-law, who actually called me on the phone to tell me I should be listening to it live.

Finally, I know a lot of you readers are big Wizard of Oz fans, so I give you this:

Link via PlanetDan.