Main > Joel's March 2008 News
.:Picture of the Day:.



 

Sunday, March 30th 2008

After my wife spent all of Thursday in labor pains, we finally went to the hospital early Friday morning. At 2:46pm, and 13 mins of pushing (!), we welcomed Miss Lily Rebecca Ipe to the great big world.

I camped out in the hospital room for the entire weekend on a convertible chair, unlike last time in 2005 when the previous hospital staff wouldn't allow me to sleep over back then. Josh stayed with his maternal grandparents for those few days. My sister and her husband, and Num's mother and Josh, came to the hospital on Saturday. We went home on Sunday.

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The arrival of Miss Lily Rebecca Ipe
The ever growing Ipe family
Ready to go home from the hospital

Everyone is doing fine. New March and April family photos in the gallery.

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Tuesday, March 25th 2008

I was in Pennsylvania for the day today. There's really nothing more exciting to tell you about.

I saw this video online, alternatively named "The Picard Video" or "The Picard Song." It's composed of various Star Trek: TNG clips of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, set to a dance theme. Corny, of course. But something about the tune, how strange it is, or simply how they sped up / slowed down Picard's statements to match the beat..... I tell you, it is a hypnotic piece of Star Trek weirdness.

The baby is coming, and soon. All of the couples we know who were pregnant the same time we were have delivered in the past 7 days. We're the last ones! We're trying to get the place ready for the new addition, and settle on non-traumatizing first and middle names for the kid. We're also both trying to rapidly complete all our outstanding tasks at our respective workplaces. Not easy, I tell you.

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Sunday, March 23rd 2008

For everyone celebrating, Happy Easter. On the way to church this morning, we stopped at McDonald's for breakfast. I had one of those McGriddles sandwiches. A pancake-egg-sausage-cheese sandwich? Wow, that was so good. I wish I had invented it. That may become my next go-to item breakfast choice when we go there for breakfast. Next on the news, 600-lb Indian-American man helicoptered out of his house to fat farm.

I'm back from Toronto, and I'm not going back until mid-April. Yea, I'm home. I've been uploading photos, up through last night. Check out the February birthday gathering from March 7th, and March Family photos (including Josh's birthday party.) I also uploaded all the remaining family photos for March, so I'm caught up in that department. We went to my friend Kenar's surprise 30th birthday party last night, but I'll work on those later. I have some office work to do now, and I have to join the mass housecleaning. I think I also figured out how to upload video off the camcorder, so I'm attempting that next.

I thought this video was funny. Not what I expected, based on the title.

I fixed up a number of songs/albums information in my iTunes library. Anybody care? You don't, but I do. I'm even sleeping better. Well, I'm sleeping better because of that, and after I found that pea under my mattress. Who the hell put that there?

Under threats from our cable company, we recently upgraded to digital cable, and we're the no-so-proud owners of a stupid cable box. We upgraded, because the alternative was being shut out of almost all non-CSPAN channels. I installed it Friday, but I don't see how the picture is even remotely better. Meh.

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Sunday, March 16th 2008

I told Joshua that I was going on the airplane today. He said, "I'm going on the airplane too." I asked him where he was going, and he said, "To the airport." Why? "To find you." At that exact moment, I got some dust or something in my eye. Strange coincidence. :)

Off to Toronto I go. Enjoy your week, I'll be back home Thursday night.

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Saturday, March 15th 2008

What an adventurous trip to Toronto. Myself and another coworker flew on Continental Airlines from Newark Liberty Airport to Toronto Pearson Airport Sunday evening. First, the flight was delayed about 45 mins on a Boeing 737 (a medium-size airplane, mind you.) After a fairly uneventful flight, we arrived a little late at 8:15pm. By the time we passed through customs and made it to the baggage claim, it was 8:30pm. We waited at the baggage claim as new luggage showed up, and all the bags continued to pile up. Where was all of our luggage? There were lots of people there. Whose luggage was this? It was piling up.

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Over 2 hours standing on the lost luggage line

At about 9:20pm, we thought the worst, and walked over to the baggage office, and found a long line. Talking to one of the Continental Airlines personnel, out of 120 expected bags, only 80 arrived. That's why the line was so long. It took us until after 11:30pm to finally drop off our completed paperwork at the counter. I couldn't believe it. Lost luggage, all we had were the clothes on our back (and laptops), and we had to be in the office Monday morning bright and early.

How could they forget 40+ bags? Absolutely pathetic. No chance to get it all later Sunday night, as the next and last flights were one of those tiny Embraer jets -- Continental wasn't going to stuff an extra 40+ bags on that small jet. Our only hope was the 8am Monday morning flight.

Fast forward -- we spent the next two days trying to get our luggage. Shame on Continental. With all the barcodes and tracking systems, the phone and website have no updated information. Customer service has no information, because they only know what's on the website. We went to the airport, and ticket counters were closed, and the baggage claim office unstaffed. Paging at the airport did nothing.

I finally got my luggage on Monday night, as we camped out at the locked baggage claim office for an hour until some guys came to drop off more luggage. They let us poke our heads in to take a look inside, and I saw my suitcase. No luck for my coworker. We went back to the airport Tuesday night, and he finally got his. Absolutely pathetic. If nothing goes wrong, you're fine. As soon as you have a problem, good luck.

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Stargate: The Ark of Truth
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Rounders
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9 years and 180K miles later, we're still together

The rest of the week was alright. My flight home on Friday at 1:30pm was delayed after I arrived at the gate. They asked us to board the airplane, and then taxied us to some parking lot, and we sat there until 3pm. I got work a lot of work done, so it wasn't a total waste of time. It was nice to finally get home.

This morning, we took Josh to the hospital for a sibling class. Becoming a big brother or sister is a big deal, and so is no longer being the center of attention. The class was basically for these little kids to see the hospital, learn how to diaper (their doll or stuffed animal), and make a card for the baby. Josh's favorite part was seeing a newborn in the maternity ward. He really, really got excited. Good for him. My earliest recollection is going with my Dad to the hospital to see my Mom and my new little sister. It was a big day for me, and I'm certain it's going to be a big day for Josh too.

My wife was working this afternoon, and I rented Stargate: The Ark of Truth, a direct-to-DVD movie continuing the Stargate SG-1 storyline since the show got cancelled last year after 10 seasons. Decent movie for a Saturday afternoon. I also watched Rounders on DVD. An interesting movie -- I'm not a fan of poker, but I like the directing, a different type of story, the interesting characters, and.... isn't that all you need?

I never got a chance to mention it, but Josh's 3-year birthday party last Saturday went very well. We hosted a dinasaur-themed party at his gym for his classmates and some family friends, with pizza and and egg-free cake. Josh had a good time. Afterwards, some of our family members and us went out to a Japanese hibachi dinner. Josh ate with chopsticks like me, loved the fire, and had some orange sherbet to top the evening off. A big day for a little guy.

BTW, I hit 180,000 miles on the Honda last Saturday night. Just 20,000 more miles to go.

I have lots of photos and video to post. Photos are easy enough, but video -- oye. I'm having such trouble getting the camcorder to output video. I'm debating simply to go through a 3rd-party service to export it all to video for me. Am I crazy, or giving up too soon? February family photos are up. I published new MOBLOG photos too. I'm hot, aren't I?

I'm heading back to Toronto Sunday night. At least it hasn't been too cold this time around, compared to last month. And no snowstorms, and I'll keep my fingers crossed this week too.

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Saturday, March 1st 2008

After all the repair work done on my Honda with 179,000 mile on the odometer, it may still be experiencing some rough idling, but you know what? It still passed the NJ motor vehicle inspection. I was pretty surprised, but I grabbed the completed paperwork, and bolted before they could change their minds.

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We passed! I'm street-legal for another 2 years.
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Swingers starring Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn

We finally watched Swingers, starring Jon Favreau and Vince Vaughn. I liked the movie. It was a little on and off in the interesting department at times, but overall, interesting movie. I liked it when they were all BS'ing together. That's how guys are. We BS with each other.

I finally cracked open my CISSP review book today. I've also started taking practice exam questions online at CCCure.org. They're so hard. Oh the pain, the pain!

Thursday night, I went to put something away in our master bathroom, and I heard a dripping noise. Thinking it was the shower, I started walking over to the shower, and stepped on a very soaked bathroom mat. In shock, I found the source to be a leaky toilet tank. The valve or whatever just stopped working -- how does that happen? May God bless the Interweb, because you can find so much help online. Nums found some online help with fixing a leaky toilet tank. We went out to buy parts tonight, so I intend to earn my plumbing merit badget fairly soon.

The Iron Man movie trailer is out. No, no, no. You don't understand. THE official Iron Man trailer. It looks very good, so I'm stoked.

I added some additional random pics to the MOBLOG. It'll change your life.

Under the careful direction of my wife, I made her patented oh-so-tasty pork chops, and onion-flavored diced potatoes for dinner Friday night. I added a fairly tasty recipe-on-the-fly-but-regardless-I-should-use-less-cayenne-pepper-from-now-on vegetable medley. I am a man of many talents.

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