The Kickstarter - Day 12

We survived the weekend and the halfway point of the Kickstarter campaign for Dad's Family Organizing, Event Scheduling, and Household Planning Calendar. In and of itself, surviving the weekend is no small feat, particularly this time of the year. First of all, we are looking down the barrel of two long weeks without regular events or school. Second, we voluntarily extended that vacation by pulling everyone out for a sick day on Friday. Ewok flu, it was.

So, a three day weekend is nothing to sniff at. But it means we are going into the week with birthday parties, Christmas events, and obligations to attend. We have to fit preparations for these into an already packed weekend.

Preparations make you must. Weekend you shall have not.
Also, be never tired of Star Wars references will we become.

The Kickstarter - Day 5

Today, I was going to discuss how interesting certain aspects of the Dad's Calendar Kickstarter setup were. The site has some very thoughtful and gentle ways to make sure you're not a total crank, and if you are, you've at least put some effort into the enterprise.

However, that came to a screeching halt at about 10pm last evening when the five-year-old decided to barf her way down the hallway. This morning we got the older one out the door to school, parked it on the couch for twelve rounds of Octonauts, and I've decided to add an extra sheet of stickers to the calendar. They're going to look like this:

The Kickstarter - Day 1

On Wednesday, I put up a Kickstarter campaign for Dad's Calendar. Not just Dad's Calendar, it's actually Dad's Giant Family Organizing, Event Scheduling and Household Planning Calendar.

Ahem.

Two interesting notes so far.

A post about microwaves, written while hungry.

We don't have a microwave. It's not out of some high-minded (easily debunkable) ideal of what constitutes healthy eating. It's that the apartment didn't have one, and we've decided against spending the counterspace to get one.

It's completely fine, save two instances. First, popcorn. Sometimes you just don't want to pull out the kettle and make a zeppelin sized sack just to watch a television show.

The Move

I recently got a note from a friend announcing that they were moving cross country. It's a dramatic gesture, and a uniquely American one. People in other countries migrate. We embark.

It's been thirty months since we made our own cross country move. At times stressful, exciting and harrowing, it can still feel like we are on this grand adventure and will be forced to return to real life at any time.

But we are getting to the point that this is real life. Our youngest has now officially spent more time living in Seattle than she did in Maryland, and the oldest is only a year away from the same. I found myself indifferent to the beginning of the Ravens' season. Slowly we are more in tune with the local weather trends (the start of Vitamin D supplement season) than we are those back east (mold allergy season).

So, given you ever undertake such an adventure as we have, I can now say there are five things you should know about moving cross country:

Skyfall done spoilt us.

I enjoyed watching the new Bond movie, Spectre. Initial viewing does prompt several questions:

1) Does Bond ever look at something that will NOT be later used as a weapon?

2) How does one redo their makeup and hair on a moving train?

3) Does Bond ever sit down on a boat?

4) How does one *flip* a helicopter?

Gaming on this side of the Unpleasant Ditch

I've had interesting thoughts. They've tackled the topics of the day. There were many very insightful concepts and perspectives bounced around. They never made them to the page. I've been playing a new game.

Going through old business cards.

I still have a stack of business cards from work. They're mine. Or at least they have my name on them. Plus various jobs that I haven't held in years.

Steam, it's how you feel to make it real.

For the last few weeks, I've been a regular visitor to the gym. Last spring, I had a good routine going, with both kids out of the house for a few hours each week. But this fall finds me in the gym three days each week. I can't say I'm enjoying it, but my blood pressure is down, which is why I'm there to begin with.

There was a delay to the start. School took an extra ten days to get going, given a strike by the teachers. The hardest part of the delay was not the actual lack of school. It was the uncertainty. We had the end of the summer pretty well planned, and then it kept inching along.  But the teachers won some needed concessions, and we got ourselves back in order.

So when I finally got to the gym sans kids, the goal was not just to exercise, but also to take a breather. That sent me straight to the steam room.