afrojet

Let the record note: these ludicrous allegations being spread around the internet that Howard K. Stern might be the legitimate father of baby Jack Skelton are totally and completely false, and frankly WILL NOT STAND!

My mother reminds me from time to time that when I was born it was during the time of the famous Watergate hearings. These hearings were on television and gripped the nation. My mother would nurse while watching the fates of important men and their political careers unfold. Well mother, it’s no different today. Well, except I can’t physically breast feed. And that riveting trial about important men? Ok, the trials actually about a bat-shit crazy dead model and her maligned drug posse. But damn I bet Nixon and his cronies on their worst behavior couldn’t make television this good.

This past December the misses converted her families old home movie from VHS to DVD. Here’s a little glimpse at Jack’s mom when she was a wee little one. Note: none of the old movies had sound, so I inserted a little J Cash to give it some bounce. Ain’t she a cutie?

Things move along at a rapid pace here in babyland. Jack is already adventuring into his fifth week on planet Earth. As parents we are still in the fog that comes from round the clock newborn care. I’ve become a bit edgy from all the sleep deprivation. The other morning one of the neighbors began jack-hammering concrete at 8 AM just as I had got the boy to fall asleep. He woke up. The other night a tele-marketer called (caller ID) at 8:30 pm (!) just as the boy was getting comfortable with the idea of falling asleep. The boy woke up. I would have answered the phone, if I could have reached through the cable wires and strangled the sleep intruder on the other end. Seriously, is it too much to ask that the rest of the world stop what it’s doing and get on the same page with us and our baby’s sleeping schedule?

Yesterday, we took advantage of another gorgeous day around these parts and went for a great walk through Gabriel Park with Captain Smalls and family. The boy loves his Baby Bjorn. All that bouncing puts him into a deep slumber. Attempts to rouse him so he could check out all the dogs at the dog park were in vain as he preferred to just sleep through it all. Afterward, we stopped by kid-friendly PB & Ellie’s Cafe. That place fulfills the top two requirements of new parents: 1) they serve beer and, 2) if your kid is screaming it’s no big deal because all the other kids are screaming.

Lately, I’ve been wishing I had the super powers to move things with my eyes.

Bonus: Some future house goodness on YouTube: The Plexiglass House, Appliances, Submarine Trains!, Verner Panton’s Visiona Video Tour, Mar Vista Residence in Second Life, Hybrid Machinima Experiment.

Super Bonus: Faster, Monorail! Kill! Kill! (trailer)

Like some strange haunting, I’ve become fully inflicted with Phantom Crying Neurosis (PCN). I hear baby Jack crying even when he’s blissfully under the spell of slumber. It’s like a prerecorded MP3 tucked into the tiny folds of my brain that gets randomly inserted into the playlist of life. Or like a bad pop song that you just can’t shake. Sometimes I hear the track playing all by itself, and instinctively I go marching into the babies room only to find the baby fast asleep. Sometimes I call out to the wife, “What’s up with the baby?” And she replies: “Nothing, idiot stick! He’s asleep. Now quit bothering me, I’m tying to bulk order strapless dresses from nordstroms.com while I still got all this extra cleavage.”

And so it goes. The worst is when there are other noises about the house like the dishwasher, washing machine, or the television. If any one of those devices is churning out sounds, then it’s a good bet my ears will pick up a frequency somewhere in there and turn it into a full blown “someone is boiling our baby in hot oil” melt down.

I’m not going completely mad. However, I might be projecting. You see, yesterday, there were three confirmed episodes where the kid began crying whilst asleep (visual confirmation was obtained through numerous red bars on baby monitor). Yet when the parents approached the crib, the kid had returned to calm and was totally sacked out. Did he have a bad dream? Do babies even have nightmares? Perhaps the answer is much simpler and instead of infant night terrors – that I can only suspect would involve being attacked by giant vanilla scented soothie pacifiers – he simply had to fart.

I have to say, I love the new Tram that’s running here in Portland. I don’t care if I never even ride the darn thing, I just like seeing it in action. The other morning I was driving down I-5 through some intense low lying fog. Just as I was driving under the tram cables, one of the pill cars burst through the fog with great majesty. Any Film Director would have given their Cinematographers left-arm for the shot.

Of course there are some stunning shots of the Tram up on Flickr (Like the one I stole for this post): tram, tram, tram.

Monorails are also cool. I want to live in a city with just monorails, trams, bicycles, and skateboards for transport. And flying skateboards.

If someone were to have told me yesterday that Prince was going to play a Foo Fighters cover during the Super Bowl halftime show, I would have slapped them and challenged them to a duel for spreading such lies. And yet, this did actually happen. What a cool world we live in sometimes.

Funk Soul Brother from Minnesota making us proud.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyT9cv1iEyw]

Bonus: Incredible Design – The Folding Chair. This would be my pick to win every furniture design award this year. Via bb.

I can hear the boy beginning to squeak through the baby monitor so I’m not sure how much time he’s going to allow me to write anything of consequence. Those wee little monitors control my life now and bark furious orders and bold proclamations. Things are definitely on his schedule and he’s the big boss. This week the boy’s been gaining strength. He’s got little fists of fury and can deliver a healthy kick if you’re not paying close attention. He’s developing intense control of his neck and practices by leaning way back to stare up at the ceiling. He’s still sleeping with gusto and keeps to a fairly regular schedule which helps out a lot.

Kelly’s mother has been around this past week which has been incredibly helpful. I think the ideal ratio for baby parenting is three-to-one. The mother-in-law gave Kelly and I a chance to dine out – just the two of us – Friday night. We were desperate for margaritas, so we went down to one of our favorite Mexican restaurants. Usually this restaurant is packed when we’ve been there on a Friday night. But when we walked in, the seats were sparsely populated. Things seemed a bit off. We took our seats and a few seconds later our happy waiter came over and delivered his opening line: “Hola, can I interest you folks in some chips or some appetizers. Perhaps I can start you out with some Cokes or some waters.”

“No Thanks”, I said. “We want Margaritas! Big ones! In fact just empty out some salad bowls in the back and make our drinks in those.”

“Oh sorry, sir. We lost our liquor license and we don’t have any booze any more. Not even beer.”

As new parents, who rely on the concentrated power and mental stabilization that comes with the healing medicinal properties found in booze, this was far-and-away the worst news anyone had spoken to us since the boy arrived in our arms. A mexican restaurant with no booze is like a bird with broken wings.

Pictured Above: My first attempt at a ReadyMech Flatpack toy. Via Massdistraction.

It’s weird to think that at this point the cats are more self sufficient and smarter about cleaning up after their poop then baby Jack is.

Basically, at this point, I feel like I’ve been reduced to an underpaid city Outflow Clean-up Engineer. If it’s disgusting, smells terrible, and springs forth from a living orifice, then I’m there with my bag of cleaning supplies. In the early morning fog of sleeplessness, I’ve accidently tried putting diapers on cats, and mistaken the dishwasher as the machine for cleaning the baby’s clothing.

This morning I ran out to get the Sunday New York Times, excited at the thought of catching up on the worlds activities. Only, when I opened the front page, I found myself looking blankly at the text like a dumb stick; none of the words on the page made any sense and what I was able to read seemed to have no bearing on the goings on at the Skelton Ranch. So I decided to put the paper aside and instead, resume my favorite new activity – staring endlessly at the floor.

So far the boy has been sleeping like a champ. I can’t even imagine what state I would be in if this wasn’t the case. This week we worked on establishing a nice little routine where the boy eats at 8, 11, 2, and 5, or essentially every three hours. He’s usually alert for about an hour and then he needs to get back to his sleepy place. So at every juncture we’ve got about a two-hour window to either sleep, work, run errands, or clean. I really appreciate those little windows and I’m amazed at what can be done in two hours.

I guess he needs all this sleep now. He’s still booting up, upgrading his memory and installing drivers for his peripherals. During awake times, we’ve been relaxing to the psychedelic swirls of the iTunes visualizer and micro head nodding (we’re working our way up to head banging) to the soothing sounds of Lullaby Renditions of Metallica.

Afrojet Tip For New Dads: Stay clear of beer and head straight for the Whiskey. It gets the job done cleaner and faster and won’t make you drowsy.

We just got Jack home a few hours ago. It’s been a blurry couple of days. How do I even begin to write this post? How do I even keep my eyes open and my mind centered long enough to compose my thoughts? When I started this blog oh so many years ago, I never imagined that someday it’s pages would hold the photos and stories of my son . . . our son . . . our son, Jack.

So where to begin? How about from the top?

Last Wednesday was another bizarre snow day here in Portland. The roads were still treacherous and people were, for the most part, keeping to their homes. The wife didn’t go in to work that day and wasn’t feeling all too hot so she elected for a nice cozy day in bed. I worked ferociously that day, much like I had been in the days previous. I had a gut feeling that the due date was fast approaching. Time was running out. I was cramming to get as much done as possible. Around dinner time I tested out the roads (they were getting much better as the day wore on), and drove up to the Lebanese deli to pick up some dinner. Back at the ranch, I gorged myself on heaping portions of falafel, hummus, and tabuli, perhaps knowing that it might be my last meal for awhile. The misses lost interest in dinner almost instantly. In general, she was already feeling out-of-sorts. After dinner, we snuggled-in to watch The Extras on DVD. And then the fun really started.

We were about halfway through The Extras episode (the one with Samuel L. Jackson), when the misses went upstairs to go to the bathroom. She was gone a long time. I sat there staring at a paused image of Ricky Gervais pointing at something off to the right of the screen. Then the misses appeared at the bottom of the steps. She was tearing up as she whimpered softly, “My water just broke.” I walked over and we shared a nice long reassuring hug. Then we (or at least I) went into battle mode.

8:30 pm. It took us about an hour to get ourselves showered, packed, and organized for the trip to the hospital. We arrived at the maternity triage at Saint Vincent’s at about 9:30 pm. In the elevator on the way up to the maternity ward the misses had another huge gush of water breakage. Dare I say, we arriving in style!

It took awhile to get through triage. There was some confusion about whether her water did actually burst. None of the pH tests were coming back positive but her “elevator” story and the physical proof of a completely soaked maxi-pad had the nurses convinced it was go time. Also, the big whopping contractions started at this point. Our OB doctor was called to confirm that things were in motion. He arrived around Midnight, did a quick exam, stood up and said, “yup, you’re staying here. You’re already dilated to six centimeters.” Gulp.

At around 12:30 am we arrived at one of the birthing suites; a nice big room with lots of medical devices, super high powered lights, and a Skylar 1000 birthing bed. Nurse Allison was the nurse on duty and she started to get the misses prepared for an epidural. The epidural guy arrived shortly thereafter and within the hour the misses was hooked up to an IV and had a large needle stuck in and taped to her back. I usually do really poorly around needles. Hell, I’m downright lame around blood and hospitals for that matter. I was sure I would have to at least be seated if not absent for some of these procedures. But the adrenaline and the moment took over and I had no problem with any of it. When push came to shove some kind of semi-detached curiosity mojo won out and I relished every moment, every needle, every gory detail.

After the epidural, we had a few hours of calm quiet time, where we waited as Kelly’s body just did its wonderful womanly magic. I caught a few winks on a couch in the birthing room but not many. Around 5:00 am the nurse did another exam on the misses and she was proceeding nicely to 9cm of dilation. The nurse was a little concerned that the misses’ contractions were not as regular as she would have liked. She suggested, in full nurse jargon, “A whiff of Pit” or rather, a few drops of Pitocin to get things regular and even. We agreed to the “whiff of pit”, and within minutes of the Pitocin coming down the IV the contractions were evened out and increasing in strength.

6:00 am. 10 cm of dilation. Time to start pushing.

Here, things get a little hazy. I was in full coaching mode, helping the misses though each contraction. For each contraction there were three pushes back-to-back with a deep breath in between. One of my jobs was to do a 10-count for each of the pushes. Words of encouragement flowed out of me like I was Gene Hackman in Hoosiers. Words, that in any other context would have sounded so foolish, the misses and I would not have been able to keep a straight face.

1 … 2 … 3 … 4 … 5 … 6 … 7 … 8 … 9 … 10

And so we went for three fun filled hours. Baby Jack was moving, but he was taking it very slow. The misses was a champ and persevered way beyond what I thought humanly possible. At around 8:30 am we could all start to see Jack’s head starting to make an appearance. However the doc said that he still probably had about a half hour to 45 minutes to go. The misses was spent. The doc said that a little vacuum suction would get him out in no time at all. Team Skelton agreed this was a good plan B strategy. The doc got a good suction attachment on baby Jack’s huge mellon. The wife gave two more rounds of pushing and with the doctor pulling . . . squish . . . plop . . . WAAAAAAA, out he popped.

8:53 am.

Welcome home, son.

The story doesn’t end there but that’s all I’ve got time for now. I’m getting an urgent memo over the baby monitor from the new CEO of our family. I’m still having trouble deciphering his accent but it sounds like lunch is being ordered.

Jack Michael Skelton
Born: January 18th, 2007 at 8:53 am.
Nine pounds, one ounce.
21 inches.

Everyone is doing well. Mom & Dad are exhausted. More to follow. Hopefully in the next couple of days.

Whoa. Portland got all jacked up yesterday. We were sucker punched by a super sneaky snow storm that no one predicted. Like everyone else here in Portland, the news weather hooligans are completely high. Only they must have a direct pipeline to the super hairy purple buds, because they are consistently so incredibly off the mark. Last weeks predicted snow storm turned out to be an amazing sunny day. Yesterday’s “possible dusting of flurries at higher elevations” turned into a shit storm of inclement weather and horrible decision making.

Portland and Beaverton Public Schools neglected to close their schools until it was too late, leaving many kids stranded at school. Later, one of the news channels interviewed some head honcho from Portland Public Schools and asked why he dropped the ball on closing the school sooner. The guy being interviewed got irate and said, ‘Oh I don’t know, maybe because we watched you’re shitty weather forecast last night, which didn’t make any mention of four inches of snow by eight o’clock in the morning.” Ok, maybe we didn’t curse. But he reallywanted to.

The picture above was taken close to home. Real close. End of my driveway close. You can actually just make out the end of my shoveled driveway in the bottom left hand corner (that’s Minnesota training right there!). The scene is typical for Portland drivers in this kind of weather; a menage a trois of bad decision making. The first car, is a silver Passat, parked on the side of the hill after an unsuccessful summit attempt of Mt. Alfred. He left his car there. And then over the course of the day his car acted like a magnet, collecting two more “friends” who were traveling down the mountain.

Needless to say things haven’t improved a whole lot by this morning. Portland’s three plows haven’t bothered with Mt. Alfred yet. I’m pleading with the misses not to go into labor just yet because I don’t think my snow shoes will carry the weight.

Bonus: Nice car crashing footage from yesterday. Volvo will no doubt want to use this for an ad some day.