Picture Update

The August pictures are up, which include some images from Devin's baptism and Grand-daddo's visit a week later.

Love the Java

Whoa. Check this out. Coffee is actually kind of good for you. According to an article from the Associated Press, a recently study concluded that:

the average adult consumes 1,299 milligrams of antioxidants daily from coffee. The closest competitor was tea at 294 milligrams. Rounding out the top five sources were bananas, 76 milligrams; dry beans, 72 milligrams; and corn, 48 milligrams. According to the Agriculture Department, the typical adult American drinks 1.64 cups of coffee daily.

Innerspace

The four of us made our first real trip together all by ourselves. We headed out to one of the local caverns, Innerspace Caverns in Georgetown.

Renee thought that Aidan would be intrigued, and he was... sort of. That is, he was when we first brought up the idea — yesterday — and it slowly ratcheted downward as time progressed.

By the time we actually arrived at the ticket window, Aidan was still somewhat excited. However, with the 15 minute wait for the tour to start and some trepidation about the cave in general (which revolved mostly around its contents, including dinosaur fossils, so Aidan continually asked things like, "are all the dinosaurs dead?"), Aidan wanted to head for home before we even entered the cave.

Once inside, Aidan didn't want any part of it. I carried him for the entire .75 mile walk, up and down the slippery walkway. It was actually pretty fun, and I think Aidan grudingly enjoyed himself. Renee and I both agreed that perhaps the best part was that there were little bats flying around in the cave, buzzing past our heads; Aidan seemed quite unfazed by them. Still, when it was all over, he went quite willingly to the car.

Picture Update

Here's a mid-month update for all of you out there who are waiting for more pictures of the little dragon...

Aidan at School

Some observations from Aidan's teacher at school:

• While we were working with the tools to repair our bike, Aidan gave a little lesson about how we use screwdrivers. He explained to everyone how to hold it, be careful, and watch what you are doing — it was too cute how everyone stopped to hear and listen.
• During lunchtime, I watched as Aidan helped a friend pour his milk and when he was done helping his friend hold th milk pitcher, Aidan told him, "now say thank you."
• Aidan did a very nice job at lining up and finding his name in our classroom. He has learned to recognize his name.

Devin's Baptism

Papa, Grandma Deb, and Aunty Sandra came down for a long weekend to help celebrate Devin's baptism. The weekend went by very quickly, but we had a good time.

We were able to schedule a nice, private ceremony after a regular mass. Jeffrey and Sandra stood in as the godparents (they may look familiar; they are also the godparents for Aidan).

48 days

After 48 days of waiting (since the car accident), I finally received my car back yesterday. It looks like the body shop did a very nice job; there's only one very small detail (at least right now it feels like a small detail) that may or may not be an issue. I'll see if I can get another opinion on this detail, and then take action on it, if necessary.

But now, comes the fun part: trying to collect from the other insurance company.

The big issue is the money for the car rental. The reason that the repair took 48 days is due to miscommunication (at best) or non-communication from the other guy's insurance company. Knowing that I wouldn't be "guaranteed" that Geico would be able to recover money from the other insurance company, and with my personal confidence that the accident was completely the other guy's fault, I figured it was going to be in my best interest to make my claim with the other guy's insurance.

So, at all relevant moments, I declared to anyone who would listen that I did indeed have a rental car and that I was filing my claim through the other guy's insurance. It wasn't until day 23 that the other guy's insurance agent told me that, despite the fact that my car was not drivable, they would only cover my car rental while my car was being repaired. Which, at this point, it wasn't, because this insurance agency wasn't done with their investigation. Wonderful.

As of that day, July 19, I switched my claim over to Geico and, for the most part, it moved along well. By my count, it took about 16 days for my car to be repaired, so I could expect to possibly get reimbursed for as little as 16 of the 48 days of the car rental, which would stick me, by my estimate, about $800.

Why is it that, because of someone else's carelessness, that I'm possibly going to be stuck with having to pay for someone else's mistake? That I have to go through all the inconvenience, frustration, anxiety, and possibly loss of money, when all I did wrong was be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

How ridiculous.

Shooting Stars

There's supposed to be a good meteor shower tonight and around 9 p.m. I mentioned to Aidan that it might be fun to go sit in our hammock and watch the sky. He agreed.

I told him that we could watch the shooting start, stars that look like they're falling from the sky. As we were walking outside, he started to look worried.

"I don't want to be out here," he said. "I don't want them to fall on me."

"Oh," I said. "They won't fall on you; they only look like they're falling. They're shooting stars. They look like little streaks of light that go across the sky. They won't fall on you. You'll be okay."

At that, Aidan covered his ears. "I don't like the sound they make," he said.

"They're not like fireworks ... they're like ... just lines of light in the sky. They're just shooting starts... What do you think they'll sound like?"

Aidan then made a sound like a laser gun ... shooting stars. "They'll come down and shoot me, like my spaceship. I want to go inside."

And thus ended our first real meteor-shower watching party.

Glitter Vader

Aidan's been playing with my Darth Vader mask a lot lately. It's pretty old (I think I bought the mask back in 1999 or 2000) and it has a flimsy velcro connection to keep the mask together. It was not made to be taken on and off repeatedly, which is what Aidan usually does.

Thus, the velcro strips are separating from the mask. Renee tried to glue it back together, but the plastic just isn't holding the glue on.

So, today when I got home, Aidan wanted to play with the Vader mask. I told him about the state of the mask, the glue, why it wasn't holding together, etc. Aidan pointed to a strip of excess dried glue and asked, "is that glue?" I told him it was, but that it wasn't doing its job.

Aidan wasn't too upset, which I found slightly odd. But I was happy that he took the news so well. So, I went off to take care of something else.

Then, I notice Aidan walking over to get his play vacuum cleaner out of the closet and wheel it over where his arts-and-crafts supplies are kep. He starts vacuuming the floor.

Why was he vacuuming the floor? It turns out that he spilled a bunch of glitter on the floor and he wanted to clean it up. All on his own volition, with the only tool he knows: his play vacuum cleaner. Very sweet.

But why did he get the glitter out? Because the Darth Vader mask had glue on it. And what do we do with glue? We decorate it with glitter!

It's a Thin Line Between Love & Being Scared

Aidan and I went to a minor-league baseball game last night and had a great time. I think Aidan really would have prefered to see Johnny Damon (he was asking for him several times), and even asked me if I wanted to see Aven Martik (after several attempts, I realized he was trying to say Jason Veritek). I had to admit that, yes, a Red Sox game would have been very exiting to watch...

But we still had a lot of fun. We met several friends at the game and there are plenty of activities for the kids; inflatable castles to jump in, playscapes, and even little ponies to ride, and the mascot, Spike.

Aidan was looking for Spike the second we arrived and the few times that we saw Spike, Aidan would try to wave to him.

While on a trek around the stadium to find the ponies, we came across Spike up close and personal. Actually, it was a bit of a surprise for the both of us, as there were lots of people milling about, and it was hard to see very far. Aidan was holding my hand and walking on his own, so his visibility was significantly less than mine.

However, the people parted and right there in front of us, bigger than life, was a huge, person-sized bulldog wearing a railroad conductor hat and overalls.

"Hey, Aidan, look! It's Spike," I said, thinking this was a good thing. Aidan looked up, saw Spike and screamed. He dropped my hand, turned around and ran in the opposite direction as fast as he could.

This kind of put a damper on the rest of the evening, but still, it was a fun outting. On the trip back to the car, Aidan said that he'd rather go to Red Sox game again to see (at this point, Aidan drops my hand and strikes a pose) Johnny Damon.

That's my boy!