Category: Tommy

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From the mouths of babes

Conversations that before you were a parent you never imagined really happen and in hindsight can’t believe you had:

Dad, agitated: "Noah did you go to the bathroom downstairs when you got home from school?"
Noah, exasperated: "No."
Dad, perturbed: "Tommy did you poop downstairs?"
Tommy, annoyed: "NOoooo Daaad."
Dad, disbelieving: "Sarah, did you go to the bathroom downstairs?"
Sarah, sharply: "Nope!"
Dad, grasping at straws: "Amy did you use the potty downstairs?"
Amy, lying: "Nuh uh."
Dad, befuddled: "No one used the bathroom downstairs but there’s a giant poop in it?!"

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Finally at my desk!

None of the children made their bus today. That means I drove to an elementary school, a middle school, and the high school (twice) because one of the high schoolers grew ill and required a stop at Target for medicine. That one was not contagious and refused the offer to stay home. Ok. I’ve filled my Monday crap quota. Can I have the rest of the day in peace to get some work done?

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My son needs your comments. Please help him!

My oldest son is doing a class project in ecology. He is writing two posts a week and soliciting comments which he will compile or aggregate into his report. He cannot complete his project without comments. Please take a moment and read his posts. If you are so compelled, please comment on as many as you can. Thank you!

His posts to date:

Please make the comments on Tommy’s blog.

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Blogfest was a blast!

Rich pulled together another great gathering of great minds. Hopefully Lissa will have the official round up. You know..my beer damaged brain keeps wanting to introduce her as Leesuh but her name is Lihsuh. I’m so sorry!

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In attendance were Cathy (minus business cards…sorry), Rich, Lissa, Tommy, Victor Agrenda (Knoxvillians probably want to read him here), Joseph Agreda, Frank Murphy (and son), Jon Katsiros, and a friend of Jon’s (sorry..I missed their sites). Michael Silence had planned to attend but something must have come up. Apologies if I left anyone out.

We secured a large space of the absolutely packed (and valet parked) Wild Wing’s Cafe. Now we probably overstayed our welcome. Little note to management, simply asking if we could free the table would be better than slowly turning up the radio. When the radio didn’t run us off, they turned the televisions to a ball game at LOUD volume. As we left, the TVs suddenly quieted. That was funny! The venue was nice but I think we are still looking for the ideal spot which combines fun, food, adult beverages but child friendly (I suppose that’s optional), wifi, and the ability to socialize.

What happens at a Blogfest? We get to see the faces behind the words we read in feed. Of course as video and audio become more prominent by citizen journalist publishings that statement loses some of its oompfth. Still, nothing compares to the energy and dynamics of real life conversation which is what I believe Loic Le Meur (Whoa! He’s my younger brother’s age!) is attempting to duplicate with Seesmic. New ideas are generated, laughs, laughs and more laughs, food is consumed and beverages, economic and social boundaries are breached bringing people in different walks of life and opposing political views together on common ground, introductions are made and new readers created in this pioneering land of blog. Overall, good times are had. Of course, I miss seeing Randy Neal, Dr. Helen, and the blogfather himself, Glenn Reynolds at the table. Lookout Glenn! You’ve just been RealityMeAlanched! And yes, to all those I didn’t name, I missed you too!

Oh, one, is that Sylar?! (Sylar’s IMDB) And, two, my wife thought one of the guys in attendance had "really sexy eyes."

Other Blogfests:

Update: Lissa posts about A Wild Blogfest and Rich has his wrap up. Frank has posted blogic: the gathering and Tommy put down a few sentences. Cathy talks about the restrooms at Wild Wings Cafe.

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I slept with alligators.

I have made a commitment to my children, the Boy Scouts of America, and myself to get out in the wilderness periodically. Often these are weekend trips. Occasionally these are longer. Noah, Tommy, and myself, along with fifteen other people, just spent 5 days in the Okefenokee Swamp. We camped on Mixons Hammock. We canoed upstream into strong head winds for 3 miles to Billys Island to see the ghost town (complete with a school, church, theater and more) where 600-800 people lived while the swamp was logged from 1909 to 1927. Billy’s Island showed the most evidence of the fire that began on May 5, 2007. We also canoed The Narrows to see the head waters of the Suwannee River. (see the canoe map of Okefenokee Swamp).

Tommy floats toward an alligator.

The mosquitoes were horrible. Noah came within 2 feet of absentmindedly stepping on an alligator as he ran toward his friends yelling, "whatcha lookin’ at?" The raccoons were bold coming within 10 feet of people. A snake visited the camp and decided to nap under Tommy’s tent. We saw alligators, vultures, woodpeckers, red tailed hawks, frogs, frogs, and more frogs, lizards, snake, raccoons, turtles, fire ants, red ants, a mouse (canoed down the Narrows with us), and plenty of mosquitoes. Meals were delicious. The company was excellent with stories and guffaws. Burn cream was administered for bare feet near the fire and sunburn on the skin. Cuts were mended and headaches treated. Overall, no one sustained any substantial injury. I think everyone had a great time. This was my second year in the Okefenokee. I look forward to more!

Now I have to compress 3 work days worth of work as well as administrative duties into a single afternoon. It was worth it!

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From the mouths of babes

Dad, 6:30am: Turns on bedroom lights
Dad, 7:00am to Tommy: "Are you going to school today?"
Tommy: "Yes Dad."
Dad, 7:10am to Tommy: "Get up!"
Dad, 7:20am to Tommy: "Are you going to school today? Get up!"
Dad, 7:29am to Tommy: "Sarah’s leaving."
Tommy springs to action: "It’s 7:32. I didn’t have a chance of making the bus today!"

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And what a merry Christmas it was!

Merry ChristmasTo all to whom I have not responded, thank you for your well wishes!
To all to whom we did not send a card, you were not forgotten! There was probably a technical reason like needed your address or my mad cow caused me to fail to get you on Cathy’s master mailing list.

Miracles and angels came through to help pull together our Christmas at the last minute. The children were well gifted and very happy with their presents. iPod nanos..the gifts we didn't buy We had a wonderful visit from both sets of grandparents and Aunt Kelly.Cathy and I promised to be budget minded and agreed to not buy each other anything which is why we are both now the proud owners of new iPod nanos. We both cheated feeling the other was well deserving of a new toy.

dreaming of Santaafter Santastockings filled with caremagic sparklesMax and RubyYou'll shoot your eye out!

Each year it seems one of the children gets a bum deal. This year it was Sarah’s turn. Both Tommy and Sarah received new office chairs for their desks from their grandparents. They were thrilled! I prompted Tommy to hold off on assembly until I could help him. Sarah did not heed my warning and broken open the package of numerous parts in the midst of our unwrapping mess and started assembling without checking the parts list nor understanding the instructions. (She’s going to drive like Cathy! "It felt correct to turn this way. NO! I didn’t take a left turn at Albuquerque this time.") We could not find the screws! 6 screws AWOL. We even pulled the trash back inside and went through every piece of wrapping and package that had been discarded. Tommy learned and quickly went over his parts list only to find a critical piece missing. We quickly discovered his critical piece was already attached to his chair. It wasn’t until a day later that Sarah and I drove to Home Depot and purchased bolts and washers that we realized her bolts were already in their respective holes. Sarah's broken toeWe figured this out because we could not get the new bolts to go into them! Doh! She also received a Nabaztag but it still isn’t working. Story to follow. which is finally working! After creating an account at Nabaztag, you can send a message to her rabbit over the Internet or with your phone and it will speak the message to Sarah. Oh, I almost forgot. When assembling the chair, Sarah dropped a heavy part on her foot breaking a toe. Poor Sarah!

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The children had a fantastic Christmas and so did Cathy and I. Now back to work so I can finish paying off this one and put away for Christmas 2008!

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Too cool for warmth

The morning jacket report:

The kindergartener had tears this morning because she is attired in these cute blue jean pants with a matching shirt and matching hoodie jacket. But it is frigid outside so she was required to layer her winter coat. Dad, having not put coffee in his body yet, did not have the sense to suggest she put the hoodie in her backpack and wear the winter coat to school then switch. So, she cried because she was wearing a shirt, a lightweight jacket, and a winter coat and just knew her classmates were going to laugh at her because she was wearing two coats! Innocence lost at 5 years old?! At 5 we worry about how others perceive us?! I thought at 5 we just lived to play?

Middle schooler. Umm.. He and I were caught up in trying to solve the Rubik’s cube (which was first marketed when I was in the 6th grade! How circular! My best time ever was 25 seconds in math class.) so I’m not sure if he was even wearing clothing.

High school freshman. 1) Next time she tells me she "didn’t have time to brush her teeth" she can just miss the school bus! 2) She wore her jacket! But pranced off to school in short pants… I would have forced the tooth brushing issue but was too embarrassed at the thought of dropping her off in carpool.

The high school senior made guttural noises at me when I demanded he pick his coat up off the ground. I told him to wear it and he grunted and walked out the door carrying it in his hand.

And yes, I remember been too cool for warmth. Doesn’t change the fact that I’d like to seem them dress appropriately.

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Tilt Shift Photography

Star (Shangri-la Therapeutic Academy of Riding) Lenoir City Christmas Parade 2007

I’ve been wanting to try out some tilt shift photography which is the art of using a tilted lens to blur the foreground and background giving the real picture the impression that it is actually a scale model. Unfortunately, building a tilted lens for Cathy’s camera is very low on my list of priorities. Luckily, I learned you can simulate the effect in photoshop! Pictured above is my first attempt. That’s Tommy on the STAR float in the Lenoir City Christmas parade.

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Dear Substitute Bus Driver

If you are going to lie and claim that you stopped at the two stops which you didn’t even slow down for, you better be able to substantiate it! And how is it that your bus appeared so empty? Were no children at any of your stops today? An official complaint has been filed with the transportation department. Next time stop your bus even if you do not see any children at the stop.

If you are a Knoxville parent searching for ways to deal with busing issues, be sure to put the transportation department’s phone number, 865-594-1550, in your cell phone’s address book. We would have fewer busing issues if the school owned the buses instead of contracting them.

Update: The bus did eventually pickup the high schoolers. Turns out their official stop is on the other side of Northshore Drive and roughly 80m (120feet) walk down a busy, overgrown, narrow road with no sidewalks. This would be the section of road with 2 crosses and piles of roadkill. So the substitute driver likely stopped at only official stops. I have to file paperwork to make the stop that the bus has stopped at for at least 7 years into an "official" stop.

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Excited to See Tommy Grow Up

I am participating in a transition fair at West High School today. It is good to see so many familiar faces! Tommy’s teachers are there. Old friends are there. I like chatting with the parents of Tommy’s peers, the professionals, and people we have gotten to know over the years. The social opportunity, chance to catch up, and sharing of information is almost more valuable than the actual workshops. We talked our way half way through the first session!

This fair is exciting because Tommy has done so well for himself. I am excited at the prospect of Tommy going off on his own to further his education and then move onto be self-sufficient with a career. So unbelievable to consider either possibility since earlier in Tommy’s life we had assumed he would always live at home or otherwise under someone’s wings.

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SuperDad

Tonight was the elementary school’s open house. It may have been only the kindergarten open house but the cub scout troop was meeting so there were enough cars at the school that a couple of people parked on the lower branches of some of the trees and a couple of SUVs managed to find some space on the roof. Cathy went early and helped sell year books. I caravaned the children around town as we picked up Sarah, Sarah’s friend, and Tommy from high school activities. We ended up at McDonald’s having dinner with some cub scout friends of ours. In due time, we dropped Molly and Tommy off at the house with hopes Tommy would do some chores and the rest of us deploy to the school. Look out! Chaos coming!

We had a wonderful time, saw some friends, had pleasant chats with teachers, Sarah fell chasing Evan and bled all over the new kindergarten rug, and Amy was able to show off her school. As we came to a close, I noticed the volunteer form horribly empty so I inquired and put our names down. In that time, already-over-volunteered-Cathy stared on in dread as I swiped another bit of time out of her life with a few strokes of a #2 pencil. While she was entranced with my unsanctioned scheduling, Sarah and Evan departed, followed shortly by Amy. As the ever confident Amy found herself alone in the hallway, she took it upon herself to walk out the front of the school, through the dark parking lot, and off to the playground. The parents got a frowny face tonight. Sarah and Evan took one hall of the school. Cathy raced to the gym. A couple of scout dads joined in the search with one commenting "my child is missing too…but he’s old enough to walk home!" The teacher joined the posse. Amy was found on the playground and as she was walked into the school, her name blared across the school intercom so that all visitors became away that the McCaughans lose their children.

Didn’t Noah go with us? Anyone seen Noah?

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Last Night’s Dream

I remember two dreams. Both involved Tommy. One was about camping. But this post is about the other one.

We are in a car. I am in the back seat against the door on the passenger side. Cathy is sharing the seat with me just to my left. Some girl is in the middle but it is kind of like an opening to another row of seats so perhaps she is in the back-back and leaning forward to the middle row of seats; she is holding an unlit joint between her thumb and index finger but mostly concealing it in her hand. Then a shadow of a person is in the other middle seat on the driver’s side. Tommy is driving. A police officer pulls him over. We all sit there stunned. We make no attempt to get the girl to conceal her illegal substance as the officer approaches the car and makes eye contact with her. He comes to my side of the car and takes the joint from her, makes a comment and hands it to me. As he walks away Cathy points out that the police officer is going to arrest me so I eat it.

Now I ask you, what the hell was Tommy doing driving?!