Per the Aftervictory Code of Secrecy, all I can say is that I’m still a web designer, but now working in the public sector. It’s quite a thing to change a job when you’re the sole source of income, but they made me a pretty outstanding offer. So far so good there.

Two years
Hard to believe but it’s been two years for us here in the northern of the two Carolinas. It’s gone by so fast! Still a little weird to write ‘NC’ on our return address labels.  It’s still good though, and still tough to be away from our family and friends.

Cars
We now have three cars, which for those keeping score us one more car than licensed operators. Kate and Ted cruise around in the Versa while I take either of the remaining vehicles to work.

Keeping versus trading in came down to value. While we would have received some money for a trade in, we get much more value out of having an extra car. By equally spreading the mileage over the older vehicles, hopefully we can delay having to purchase a commuter car for me for a while.

Television
As new parents, our TV time is pretty limited. After Ted goes down for the night, there’s only maybe an hour before we’re both asleep. We have to choose our viewing wisely.

We watch almost all our TV from the internet. Sites like Hulu.com and the various network websites allow us to watch what we please whenever we like, without having to pay for cable tv.

Right now we watch The Daily Show, How I Met Your Mother, and the very dark comedy Its Always Sunny in Philidelphia.

If you haven’t checked out Hulu.com yet, you need to. It’s way easy to use, free, extremely well thought out in it’s design, and has a ton of shows, many from long ago.

A short list of things I would have written long blog posts if I wasn’t so into the whole parenting thing*.

1. The iPod Touch.  I picked this up as one-last-toy-for-me before Ted was born and can’t seem to not have it with me, ever. It’s like the iPhone, but without the phone part (and without the $60/month fees). Music, movies, Gmail and wifi internet in a tiny little package.  It’s awesome all around and has totally changed the way I think about the mobile internet and UI’s.

2. The new Portishead album called Third.  I listen to it all the time now, it’s great at-work music.  It’s been nearly a decade since they put out music, and the wait was well worth it.

3. The inevitable and long overdue demise of the giant SUV as daily driver.  Unfortunate that it comes with the price of declining economy, soaring food prices and a certain sense of dread every time I fill up.  It is exciting that the capitalism around it is spurring innovation and futurist thinking though.  Ted will no doubt fly his jetpack over homes made from recycled Tahoe’s.

4. Web technologies I’m learning about.  The past few months at work (and in freelance work) have filled my brain with new exciting knowledge about web design and the construction of websites.  I’ve spent a bunch of time learning about WordPress (the system that powers this blog), Drupal, and the jQuery javascript framework.  Learning is good, and I feel more confident about my skills with each passing week.

5. Fatherhood as subject matter.  I like writing and would like to write more about being a dad to Ted.  It’s the new highlight of my day, coming home to a family and hanging out with Ted on the weekends.  He’s high-maintenance, but every time he smiles at me I know what we’ve done is totally worth it.  I also know that its probably also diaper-change time.

Hopefully going forward there will be lots more posts on fatherhood.

* Full Disclaimer: I took a two hour nap after coming home from work today. Clearly there’s some time out there, just not as much for blogging.

Ted wanted to help me with my web design work.  At first, he just couldn’t concentrate.  He kept throwing pencils into the ceiling tiles.  Not productive:

Then he told me about this really big idea he had for a website.  Something about social networking or something, but for babies.

I was pretty happy that they all came to have lunch with me.  I found that hanging with the family around lunch time is way, way better then working.

My last day at work is this coming Friday. Good thing since I am past ready to be done there. Lately on Mondays by 9:00am I was having the exhaustion I usually feel on Fridays at 3:00pm.

I made a giant “to do before baby” list. I think I am stressing myself out about not knowing when he will arrive. Do I have two weeks left? Do I have six? I tend to tell myself that I should just think six, so I don’t drive myself crazy with the waiting… but then there is the whole -but we must get everything done before he gets here- angle and what if he comes tomorrow? Ack.

This morning I put together his stroller (thanks Chris!). And this weekend I will be packing my bag to bring to the hospital. Hopefully we will get a lot of cleaning and de-cluttering done too.

Zoe has been taking advantage of me lately. She knows how long it takes me to get off the couch and if I yell at her for getting on the kitchen counter or trying to steal my drink, she just kind of keeps at it and waits till I actually make it off the couch. She can be kind of cruel. Of course she knows she is easily forgiven and has been especially cuddly lately as well. Her new favorite spot is to climb right up into my armpit when I am laying on my side. Of course with all her weight on my stomach. Pat always asks me why I don’t make her move when she has me trapped in some uncomfortable position. What can I say? I am a sucker for a snuggly purry cat and willing to put up with a certain amount of uncomfortableness to keep her happy. She’s extremely good at getting me to relax, so its a trade off.

So what’s new with me?

I am working less hours now. I told the store manager that I wouldn’t mind if he cut back my hours as long as I was still full-time. He decided to give me Fridays off! Now every weekend is a long weekend. It is super sweet.

On Sunday my co-workers threw me another baby shower. It was so nice. I couldn’t believe how many people came to celebrate with us! Its great to know that Ted has lots of local people who care about him! He got lots of handmade blankets, necessities, cute outfits, a diaper cake, and even another handmade sweater and cap set. Have I mentioned how lucky he is? And Pat and I too.

I haven’t decided when my last day at work will be. The idea of going into labor at work is as unappealing as going into labor home alone. I think I am leaning towards the home alone idea and therefore might leave work two weeks before my due date. I don’t know. Too many big decisions for me. Guess I am feeling overwhelmed in general these days.

Saturday I went and took the Celica to get inspected, and besides a license-plate-light that was out, it passed and received a new sticker. Pretty crazy that it’s the second North Carolinian inspection for my car… but more crazy that its the seventh inspection for the car since I drove it off the lot. Seems like just yesterday I was throwing all my savings into a shiny silver car. I really didn’t think it would last this long, but am glad it did as we really can’t afford another car as shiny as the Celica. Kate’s car is getting a turn on the ol’ inspectotron this weekend. Her car’s had even more inspection stickers then mine… but she doesn’t drive like a maniac so it’s not really surprising that her ride still rides.

Festivus

Kate and I did our holiday shopping in (almost) one fell swoop over the weekend. We also picked up a tree from the Raleigh Farmers Market, as its all about locally-grown-tree’s and nice people who put trees on stands for you. Our friends Kat and Matt invited us over for Christmas day this year, so we’re looking forward to that.

iMac

I like my job and what I do, but up until last week my job only provided me with a computer built in the same year as my car. It was a great computer in its day, but not really up to snuff for today’s modern website worker. I don’t have proof, but I suspect it was burning oil. Or silicon.That all changed when they brought in a brand new iMac for me to use. This computer is sweeeeet in every way a computer should be. Big screen, dual monitor, and chock full of ram so Photoshop runs quickly. It even has software that runs Windows on it, which makes testing websites much easier, since I don’t have to get up from my desk and find a Windows computer every time I make a new page. It’s come a long way from the original iMac.

Photo Gallery

Our Rockland-ave photo gallery is currently busted. The hosting company upgraded their server software, and our gallery software apparently doesn’t play nice with it. Hopefully this weekend I can check under the hood and get it to work. Makes a guy want to print out all his photos and put them in a shoe box.

We have been having very cold weather lately. Two nights in the twenties and yesterday I had to scrape a thick sheet of ice off my windshield for the first time this season. Oddly enough it is supposed to be 75 degrees on Monday and Tuesday. I am still not used to the weather down here.

I have started feeling Ted kick. Very surreal. Even after months of morning sickness, ultrasound photos, and a rapidly expanding waistline, it doesn’t feel real that we will have an actual baby around here in April. The kicking and punching going on inside is definitely making it feel more and more like there really is an actual infant in there.

Zoe has been climbing all over me like a mountain goat lately. She insists upon sitting directly on my belly. Maybe it is less mountain goat, more mother hen trying to hatch an egg. I wonder if it is the warmest spot around or if she somehow knows there is somebody in there.

Hot
104 degrees again? I guess it is southern living. Central air is sweet. We went for a dip in the community pool last week and that was refreshing.

Lawn
Why does some of our yard have grass that grows almost two feet high in a week, and some not accept grass at all (just dirt patches)? The whole yard thing requires lots of learning. It’ll be a fine day for western civ when robot gardeners come on the market. Then it will be a sad day for the same civilization when the robot gardeners join together and form a super-robot that enslaves the lazy suburbanites like myself. But it’ll be good times before the great robot revolt.

Workin
My new job continues to be both rewarding (web design every day? yes please) and kind of intense. Lots of long days and learning. It’s still a little weid to use Photoshop every day and not use Excel all day long. Allegedly they’re replacing my 7-year-old G4 at work with a shiney new iMac, which is exciting.

Speaking of Webbish
Tonight I’m going to my first Raleigh/Durham Adobe User Group meeting, which I believe will be cool. Hopefully it will fill my noodle with knowledge and let me talk shop with some other designers in the field. When I try to talk about Typography with the cats, they generally just walk away. Moses will actually bite me on the leg when I talk about kerning.

Congrats
Congrats to my sister Kristen who just graduated with a master’s degree in something so fancy and smart, I can’t even begin to describe it with words.

500
Our five-hundredth Rockland-Ave.com post is coming up soon! Insanity!

The main building, because it is a newspaper, houses a gigantic printing-press-conveyor-belt system that is an engineering marvel to behold. Daily papers are printed, sorted, and stacked across a gigantic warehouse expanse. It’s great to watch it through the observation windows above, and it’s directly below our new office. And it is loud. Volume Set to Eleven loud.

That loudness finds its way into our office for almost 2/3 of the day. It’s exactly what I’d imagine doing web-design on a subway would be like. Lots of loud noises that start and then stop after twenty or so minutes, followed by room-shaking. Complaining about the noise gets you You’ll get use to it responses from people, so hopefully I will get use to it. I’m also considering the purchase of some noise canceling headphones

The good news though, is that my new digs are a shorter walk from where I park, which means less hobo-accosting.

The only downside (and really it’s hardly that bad) is that because its right in downtown Raleigh (as in the look, there’s the capital building kind of downtown), the parking situation isn’t perfect. Work pays a little bit of the parking, but it’s not free.

I can either park right close to the building I work in and pay a small fortune (eight bucks a day), or I can park four blocks away and pay just over a dollar a day. A dollar a day is fairly reasonable. I decided on the cheap lot for my first month.

The only downside of the cheap parking is that it’s in a not-so-savory neighborhood, in a lot behind a company that builds burial vaults. It’s also right on the other side of a set of railroad tracks, and my lot is on the wrong side of the tracks. I haven’t been accosted or anything, but I have run into some sketchy local folk who always seem to want to chat. I also found a woman’s shoe in my spot one morning, which I imagine has a story behind it.

Another complicating factor is the fact that I just found what I imagine is oft-considered the holy grail of urban automotive storage: consistent street parking. It’s sort of near sketchy-parking-lot, but a block closer to my workplace and requires no monetary contributions on my part. It’s nice – no parallel parking required either.

The only downside of this parking situation is that I have to arrive and claim the spot before 7:30am, or I’m outta-luck. I normally arrive at work pretty early, but always having to be there at 7:30 is kind of tough.

For the next few weeks I’m going to try the street-parking routeand see how it goes. Ultimately I’d like to find a backup street-parking spot that is perhaps a few blocks further away but always available if I’m running late.

So, that’s my anti-climactic parking-related blog post.