Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Monday, December 21, 2009
Happy Four-Month Birthday, Katie
Where does the time go? Today marks Katie's fourth month since her birth. The fourth trimester is over. It's hard to believe that four months have flown by already. It's also hard to believe how much Katie has grown. Our little girl who barely fit in our hands a few months back is no longer a newborn - she's a fast growing infant who loves to play with her toys, talk our ears off and stare at us. It's actually shocking how fast she is growing. Every day, we look at her and realize she is bigger than she was the day before. There's no doubt this kid will be a talker. This evening, when I was giving her a bath, she spent about five minutes telling me a story that I couldn't quite follow. Or maybe she was trying to sing. It's hard to tell.
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Katie's Dreaming of a White Christmas
The weather forecasters tell us that we just survived our first blizzard. For days, people have been buzzing about the coming storm. Yesterday morning, the stores were packed with panicked shoppers stocking up on groceries. Looking at the events of the last 36 hours, I'm faced with a few options. The first is that blizzards are no big deal and people should just calm down. The second is that this wasn't really a blizzard, just a snow storm. My third option is that this was just an extremely mild blizzard. Personally, I'm leaning to either option two or three. Whatever you call our storm, everything outside is now white. Looks like we will be having a white Christmas, which is fitting since Katie has been hearing her mom sing songs about it since this summer.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Katie's Second NBA Game
Last night, I was given NBA tickets so we could take Katie to her second NBA game (the same tickets as last time). Unfortunately, Katie just received her immunization shots at the pediatrician earlier that morning. We probably should have turned the tickets down, but Katie seemed happy and healthy enough, and it is not everyday we get offered these great seats, so I accepted the tickets. Katie thoroughly enjoyed her first NBA game, and we figured Katie would enjoy spending the entire evening being held - so going to the game seemed like a good idea at the time.
Unfortunately, about the time we got to the arena, Katie became very, very unhappy. We sat down in our seat and her extreme unhappiness continued. We considered just leaving, but Wife suggested that she try taking Katie for a walk around the arena.
Wife and Katie quickly made a new friend - an usher in charge of one of the best areas in the arena. Long story short, the usher set wife up with a chair in one of the corridors where wife and Katie had a perfect view of the court. For the next two hours, Katie got to meet all of the Knicks' dancers, team executives and countless celebrities who used the corridor to get to the court or their courtside seats. Everyone stopped and cooed over the adorable baby at the game. Wife recalls that she and Katie were treated like royalty.
While Wife and Katie spend the night watching the game and chatting with stars, I remained in our seats where I got stuck next to a foul-mouthed drunk guy who just wouldn't shut up. Funny how things work. It was certainly a night to remember.
Unfortunately, about the time we got to the arena, Katie became very, very unhappy. We sat down in our seat and her extreme unhappiness continued. We considered just leaving, but Wife suggested that she try taking Katie for a walk around the arena.
Wife and Katie quickly made a new friend - an usher in charge of one of the best areas in the arena. Long story short, the usher set wife up with a chair in one of the corridors where wife and Katie had a perfect view of the court. For the next two hours, Katie got to meet all of the Knicks' dancers, team executives and countless celebrities who used the corridor to get to the court or their courtside seats. Everyone stopped and cooed over the adorable baby at the game. Wife recalls that she and Katie were treated like royalty.
While Wife and Katie spend the night watching the game and chatting with stars, I remained in our seats where I got stuck next to a foul-mouthed drunk guy who just wouldn't shut up. Funny how things work. It was certainly a night to remember.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Friday, December 11, 2009
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Our Thoughts and Prayers are with You, Scrabble
I received a telephone call from Scrabble's daughter this evening letting me know that Scrabble was in an extremely serious accident. Scrabble is a daily reader of our blog and a good friend from yesteryear. Those of you who know Scrabble, and even those of you who don't, say a prayer for her.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Monday, December 7, 2009
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Saturday, December 5, 2009
I Can't Believe I Missed It
Last night, I stayed up and watched the Laker game. At about 1:30 a.m., after watching the Lakers blow a nine point lead with less than five minutes to go, I became so upset when my guys went four points down with less then ten seconds to go that I shut off the television. This morning I learn that the last five seconds of the game turned out to be one of the best comebacks in history. And I missed it.
Friday, December 4, 2009
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Please Help Us
Wife is getting ready to put together a picture book for Katie. We simply have taken too many pictures to put all of them in the book. We have a few favorites, but we would be extremely grateful if our family and friends (and even the random people we don't know) would help us chose pictures. Please, leave a comment on the posts of your favorite pictures that you think we should include. Thanks for your help.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Monday, November 30, 2009
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Katie's Starting to Move
Life is about to become much more challenging. Katie has started moving. No, she's not walking around. She's not even crawling yet. However, she is becoming a surprisingly effective scooter. Life has been so nice when we could treat her like a football. We've been tuck her under an arm and carry her around with us; when we need to get something done, we set her down - and she has always stayed. Generally, that place we would set her down in our little apartment is in the middle of our big bed. No more. Now, when we set her down on her back, she somehow scoots. For instance, I just set her down in the middle of the bed, and I sat down on one side. Within a couple of minutes, she was cuddling my leg. I moved her back to the middle of the bed. A minute later, she was snuggling with my leg again. I then tried the experiment again - same result. So, the point is...no more putting Katie in the middle of our bed unless our focus is on her.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Our New Neighbors
A new little coffee shot/bakery/ice cream parlor/hole in the wall just opened up across the street. One of their items: ice cream shakes for a $1.25. This place takes real ice cream, milk and chocolate syrup and blends up 12 ounces for a buck and a quarter. It's probably a good thing they weren't there this summer when Wife was pregnant.
Friday, November 27, 2009
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Monday, November 23, 2009
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
You Can't Make the IRS Say "I'm Sorry"
This week, the Tax Court ruled that they CANNOT make the IRS say "I'm sorry" to a taxpayer. You can read the case HERE. Or you can just read the fun part below:
HT: TaxProf Blog
The part of Caldwell's motion which we characterize as a "Request for Apology" asks that we require the IRS to enter into the record "a written apology to the Petitioner, signed by the Commissioner, Internal Revenue Service" ...
The Tax Court may exercise jurisdiction only to the extent authorized by Congress. See sec. 7442; Naftel v. Commissioner, 85 T.C. 527, 529 (1985). ...
Despite the Court's warning to him in the previous case that the Court's powers to grant relief are limited, Caldwell has not stated why he believes that we have jurisdiction to order the Commissioner of Internal Revenue to apologize to him ...
The IRS objected to the Request for Apology on the ground that Congress has not, through section 7430 (relating to administrative or litigation costs) or otherwise, authorized us to grant such relief. [Fn.3] We agree.
We lack jurisdiction to order the IRS to grant the relief requested in the Request for Apology, or similar relief, and will accordingly deny the Request for Apology.
[Fn. 3]: The IRS further argued that the Federal Government's sovereign immunity would prevent us from granting such relief. Since nothing of which we are aware even suggests we could grant the relief, we need not consider whether sovereign immunity prevents us from granting it.
HT: TaxProf Blog
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Monday, November 16, 2009
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Katie's First NBA Game
This past Friday night, Katie attended her first NBA game. Katie was fortunate enough to get to watch the New York Knicks against the Golden State Warriors. What made this game memorable is that we were able to see two of the very worst teams in basketball this year. With the Knicks loss, they are off to their worst start ever, 1-9. We were a little worried that the arena might be a little too loud, but we realized that it is impossible to get too loud for the Knicks this season. As the Knicks got blown out, the loudest noise were the boo-birds and the chants of "Get LeBron...get LeBron."
We were given the Firm's tickets. The Firm has two sets of tickets: the very, very good seats and the shockingly awesome seats. We were given the Firm's very, very good seats. This was a fun area to be in because we were surrounded by D-level starts (or maybe even G- or H-level stars) who seemed to think they were really important and that it should be their pictures on the big-screen for everyone to see they instead of the A- and B-level stars whose faces constantly appeared. Wife and I were humored by the moaning and complaining of these self-centered narcissists trying to get noticed. But, you know who did get noticed? Yep, our little Princess.
We were given the Firm's tickets. The Firm has two sets of tickets: the very, very good seats and the shockingly awesome seats. We were given the Firm's very, very good seats. This was a fun area to be in because we were surrounded by D-level starts (or maybe even G- or H-level stars) who seemed to think they were really important and that it should be their pictures on the big-screen for everyone to see they instead of the A- and B-level stars whose faces constantly appeared. Wife and I were humored by the moaning and complaining of these self-centered narcissists trying to get noticed. But, you know who did get noticed? Yep, our little Princess.
A Sad Story: Madalyn Murray O'Hair
Click HERE to read the sad story of Madalyn Murray O'Hair, America's most famous atheist. You may want to get a cup of coffee first; it's a long article.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
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