Adam's September - 4 to 4 3/4 months old

Hi everyone - just catching up with Adam's picture gallery month-in-review. This was a big month for Adam as he turned the corner on mastery of thumb-sucking and, consequently, self-soothing which means he has also been a champ at getting to sleep with little fuss and with rare exception sleeping all the way through the night (Mom and Dad are very pleased with this development)

It probably also helps that Mommy, baby, and me have established a routine of evening feeding and storytime (as narrated by Dad) that give him a set cue of actions that proceed his departure to sleepytown.

September also saw a visit from his white grandparents who don't get to see Adam all the time; he put on a pretty good show of smiling, cooing, and laughing - Adam's always up for a performance for visitors.

Lastly, the later part of the month (unfortunately not captured below) has seen a resurgence in luxurious black hair atop his head, making his crib mullet a bit less distinguished. Perhaps with that he'll get enough natural self-confidence to where he can sell that compensating red Power Wheels Corvette.

poor kids - ye know not the real Homer

i feel bad for the kids of today who watch what currently passes for The Simpsons on TV. due to the tendency of syndication to re-run only more recent 'old' episodes, they'll probably never get much exposure to the Simpsons' glory days of the early to mid 1990s when the writing staff in place was finely honed on the right mix of comedic elements (not to mention that Conan O'Brien had a hand in producing & writing on some classic episodes).

case in point, one of my favorite episodes involves Homer trying to slim down by ordering a subliminal weight loss tape, only to be sent a subliminal vocabulary builder instead. as the days pass Homer's command of the English language grows in league with his waistband.

(passing the prankster son Bart in the kitchen and opening up the refrigerator for a drink)
"Now there's a Machiavellian countenance. Oooh, a sextet of ale!"

(Marge and Homer discussing his weight loss progress)
Marge: I'm not sure that tape is helping. You ate three desserts tonight.
Homer: Forbearance is the watchword. That triumvirate of Twinkies simply overwhelmed my resolve.

(Marge and Homer, again discussing weight loss progress)
Marge: Homer, has the weight loss tape reduced your appetite?
Homer: Ah, lamentably no. My gastronomic rapacity knows no satiety.

(Lisa and Homer, the final progress check before Homer loses his patience with the tapes)
Lisa: Dad, do you know what today is?
Homer: The vernal equinox?
Lisa: No! It's been two weeks since you got that tape. Let's get you on the scale! [Homer gets on the scale] You've gained thirteen pounds.
Homer: Disingenuous mountebanks with their subliminal chicanery! A pox on them! [discards tape]

(naturally, without the vocabulary tapes Homer quickly reverts to his standard intellectual capacity)
Homer: Marge, where's that... metal deely... you use to.. dig.. food?


the printed words don't really do justice to hearing them emanate from Homer's gently buffoonish voice, but you get the idea.


compare that to the current writing staff's efforts that seem perpetually set to Angry Sarcasm, the lowest rung of the comedy ladder - the Simpsons have been on the air for 20+ seasons but the real Simpsons died out somewhere around season 8 as near as i can figure.

it's just odd to think of new viewers starting to watch the show fresh in season 16, 17, etc. and not knowing that Homer used to be a mild-mannered innocent childlike figure while Bart and Lisa had the real adult discussions on love, friendship, death... now it's just Homer calling everyone a jerkass and getting injured in increasingly violent / bloody ways while Bart & Lisa have reverted to petty kids' squabbles.

hopefully ten years down the line i'll read about some Simpsons renaissance where the grown-up second or third wave of Simpsons viewers will rediscover the best seasons, where intricate comedic writing of a quality rarely seen before or since created instant classics with every episode.

More Adam pics + some playmat happy time video

here are some photos from Adam's August, in chronological order with accompanying increasing hair loss, plus a video - if you listen closely (or turn your computer speakers up loud enough), at the end he makes a definitive statement without saying a word.

over the last few weeks the little guy has really amped up his level of smiling, cooing, laughing, and happy squirming - he's getting nice and active with an appetite to match and Grace and I are enjoying every minute

Adam at 16 weeks

he's in the process of losing the hair with which he entered the outside world, time for him to buy that Power Wheels Corvette to soothe his ego

you have officially expired all of your Bueller goodwill

you know what? nuts to Ben Stein for being the first person i can recall meeting the celebrity threshold who is hawking "free" credit scores to the dumb public.



i saw his TV ad yesterday - just another in a long line of various companies purporting to give the consumer free copies of their credit scores and/or reports only to have them enrolled in one of those automatically deducted monthly fee programs for 'monitoring services' and such.

technically that's all fine and good by capitalistic standards - money exchanged for services, even if the exchange is set up on the sly - but where Stein should really feel shame is that he is perpetuating the trend of obscuring the fact that every citizen in the country is guaranteed by federal law to be given free copies of their credit reports (with no strings attached) once a year through annualcreditreport.com, the website set up by the three credit agencies to satisfy government legislation requirements.

FTC website FAQ on federally mandated free reports

sure i don't like those annoying freecreditreport.com musicians either for doing the same thing, but at least with them i get the feeling that they're motivated by desperate financial need - to me it's feasible that they are actually living out an existence in the same squalid conditions as depicted in their commercials.











if Ben Stein is doing it out of desperate financial need then he must as good with managing his money as your typical straight-out-of-high-school pro athlete. Mr. Stein, i say 'good day' to you sir!

Adam's Fun-Time Rolling Party

our little man did some serious physical feats of baby strength this weekend, executing the advanced-level back-to-tummy roll no fewer than six times in the space of ten minutes. you could hardly stop him

the crazy gentleman

there's a certain personality on the streets of downtown Houston of whom i've up to now only heard legend from one of my coworkers

however in returning today from an offsite lunch i was able to bear witness to the intriguingly puzzling situation

black guy, probably in his forties or fifties, well - dressed: fedora, matching ironed slacks, dress shirt, formal tie, polished shoes.

all the above + location of downtown Houston is a normal formula for modern businessman (well the fedora would be an anachronistic touch but i digress)

what makes the detour to crazytown is that he spends his time standing on the corner yelling angrily at the crosswalk signs.

what's more, apparently his ire is reserved solely for the "walk" stick figure; whenever the "don't walk" hand is visible he has nothing to say.

the concepts of 'well-groomed' and 'arguing with inanimate objects' are as incongruous as oil and water or toothpaste and orange juice.

it's so baffling and interesting that i felt compelled to stick around and listen to the details of his complaints against "WALK" guy. unfortunately midwestern sensibilities prevented me from openly gawking at the spectacle so the true nature of his beef will likely remain a mystery.