I Heart the Olympics

Well, that's it. Vacation is over for a while and since we're almost to 35 days prior to the STS-400 "launch", I'm about to get very, very busy at work.

By the way, can I just say that I love the Olympics. Gavin and I missed the opening ceremonies (on an airplane), but we've heard so many great things we might buy the DVD they're selling. I've been watching Olympics almost all day. There's always something on! So far today - volleyball, basketball, equestrian, handball, fencing, track, swimming, gymnastics, and probably more that I've forgotten in the wonderful variety.

My dad was saying that the ESPN radio guys were dissing on the Olympics. How lame. Anyone that can't see the appeal of the Olympics should be ashamed to call themselves a sports fan.

Update

I need to write more. My sidebar is longer than the post column. :P

Let's see... The doctor says I tore the Medial Collateral Ligament (MCL) in my left knee. It's a "significant" tear, almost all the way through. It's not real bad news, though, because the MCL usually heals very well. He doesn't think I'll need surgery, especially considering all the improvement I've already seen. I'm not wearing the brace for normal activities anymore, but no softball for a couple months yet.

This is my first full week in the office since the end of the last mission. There was personal travel, then family in town, then official travel, then personal travel, then being sick. My inbox is feeling the strain.

I have made a resolution to fly twice a week until I'm ready to take my check ride. I've been going too long between sessions since Christmas. Which reminds me, I never got a chance to post about my long cross-country. I'll work on that post tonight.

Referral?

The knee is definitely busted. It doesn't hurt so much anymore, unless I move wrong. But, I can feel the joint moving in ways that it definitely shouldn't. Anyone know a good orthopedic surgeon in Houston? I know a couple people have used Dr. O'Neill, but he doesn't have any new patient openings until the end of June. I don't think I'll be waiting that long.

Despite the busted knee, I'm still making plans to go to Tahoe next weekend. It's practically free, after all, since work is sending me to Vandenberg Thursday and Friday. All I have to pay for is a rental car to get to Tahoe and food. Can't beat that. Gavin didn't have a great skiing experience in Utah either due to getting slow skis (really, really slow), so I'm pretty sure he's going to fly out, too. Carina might go with grandparents for the weekend, or she might come since we won't need a sitter with me being crippled and all.

My parents are coming in tomorrow to see Carina. They've never had much luck with the weather here, but it is supposed to be pretty good this weekend. They'll like that as it's still winter in Wyoming.

Hodgepodge

In case you were wondering why my Flickr stream has pictures of empty parking spaces on it, it is because I took those photos as evidence of the mismanaged parking situation at work. I counted 62 empty unreserved spots on my way into my building today. It’s rather rediculous. All the parking people have told us to allay the frustration is that they’re going to eventually build a new parking lot - much further away from the building than the existing parking lot that they decided to tear up for a new office building, which means more people working around here… You get the picture.

In less boring news (to me), I got my kitchen fixed today! I’m not sure I ever blogged about our kitchen woes… Short version: The dishwasher was leaking. We didn’t know for a long time. The crap builder-installed particle wood cabinets disintegrated. Anyhow, it took two months of on-again, off-again looking for a contractor to hire one. We finally found one that a) showed up for the quote appointment, b) was on time, and c) actually seemed reliable. I’m very much looking forward to having a dishwasher again soon.

In even less boring news (to me and a few others), I dropped $122 today for four Astros tickets to the Yankees and Red Sox series. They're totally taking advantage charging more for those games - nearly double! And so begins the down side of not having season tickets this year.

What do you know?

Well, what do you know? An on-time launch! I was so sure the weather wouldn’t allow it. Now for 14 days of flying in space.

Carina is sick again, and I think she gave this one to me. I have a pretty stuffy nose. Fortunately, if I can make it through tomorrow, I get Friday and Saturday off. Hubby should get home Friday afternoon, so I can sleep extra if I need to.

The Rockies aren’t doing so well in the first game of the World Series. 13-1 in the 6th – yikes! I hope all that time off didn’t kill all the momentum.

Disappointment

The Huskies just lost to USC by only three points. This is the second year in a row that we've really battled against them only to lose by a slim margin. The silver lining is that I sort of expected USC to cream us.

Tomorrow we go to our last Astros game of 2007. Talk about disappointment. It's Craig Biggio's last game, so it's sure to be a classic, regardless of anything else. I wish the Astros could have put together a better season for his last year, though.

It was starting to storm right about the time I had scheduled to go out to the airport today. So, no flying for me. I'm scheduled tomorrow afternoon after the game, too, so maybe then.

There sure has been a lot of disappointment today.

The Early Bird

I was going through some old posts applying labels, and I came across this one.

Note to Sarah and Jose: Maybe the glow skull needs to start work early this year...

Bathtime

Carina's umbilical cord stump fell off a couple days ago, and tonight we gave her her first "real" bath. In the infant tub, of course, but she actualy got to sit in the water. I think she liked it a bit better than the sponge bath - she didn't start really screaming for a few minutes. It may have taken us a bit too long, though, because I think she was a bit cold when she came out. She's been sleeping like a dream this evening, though. :)

Last I wrote, I was starting to plan my first Astros outing since the birth. A) I needed a break and B) it was the Mariners! Sarah was out of town this weekend, but Jason thought he'd be able to go. The idea grew on me to the point where after I found out Jason was going to be stuck at work and couldn't find anyone else to go with me, I went anyway. It wasn't bad. All the season ticket holders around us wanted to hear about the baby, so it wasn't really like I was there by myself. I had to leave at the 7th inning stretch because I really need to get to bed early these days. But, still, go me!

2-5-8

Gavin and I went to meet the baby’s pediatrician yesterday. Isn’t that an awfully grown up thing to do? You’d think at 30 I’d consider myself grown up, but I find there are some things that make me feel more so than normal. Anyhow, the pediatrician was good. He seemed quite pleased that this engineer couple didn’t come in with a whole legal pad full of specific questions to ask. I always feel slightly unprepared when I don’t have specific questions, but I think it usually releives whichever service provider we’re interviewing. "Ah, a laid-back couple. Finally!"

It suddenly dawned on me this week that since you’re considered full term 3 weeks before your due date, that means that I should be ready to have this baby any time from 2 weeks from now until 8 weeks from now in mid-June. The two weeks thing really snuck up on me. Suddenly, I’m thinking about how to package projects up for other people at work, needing to pack a bag for the hospital, needing to call the diaper service and arrange for the first delivery, and on and on. And yet it’s hard to take it seriously because the due date is still more than a full month away.

I took a stadium seat with me to the baseball game last night, and it at least helped me watch the Astros lose in moderately more comfort. Really, you could see the writing on the wall in about the 2nd inning last night. It just wasn’t going to happen. And then there we were in the 9th, with Jason explaining to his friend that "I know it’s 12-2, but we have this thing about leaving the games early. As in we don’t..."

Blink!

Time is just flying by these days. I really don’t know how I’m going to get things done if the days pass so quickly. My week starts Monday morning and then, Blink!, it’s Wednesday. Blink!, it’s Friday!

Last night Gavin graciously agreed (like that better Gav?) to go to the baseball game with me, since Sarah and Jason were both busy at work. He spent the whole time playing with his camera, which is probably all that prevented him from getting really bored in about the 5th inning so I should not complain. I went to relieve my baby-compressed bladder and get food in the 4th inning, and the Astros decided to start scoring runs while I was gone. Luckily, there was more action to be had once I got back.

Two observations on games this year:

1) I’m going to have to start getting food before we sit down all the time, because they seem to run out fairly quickly. They were out of pizza and foot long hot dogs by the time I went out in the 4th last night.

2) Stadium seats and baby enhanced hips / swollen feet are not a good combination. I was pretty uncomfortable by the 7th inning or so last night.

Anyhow, I got to see another Astros win, so yea!

Motivation

Becca did me a favor tonight and shamed my lazy, pregnant butt into taking the dogs for a decently long walk. I have been really terrible about not getting exercise during the pregnancy. I'm just too lazy to make myself go out and do something unless it's scheduled. This is why playing softball and volleyball is really good for me. Playing co-ed rec softball may not be great exercise, but it's better than sitting on my sofa in front of the TV.

I had a great time at the baseball game last night, even though the result was less than thrilling. I'm excited that it's baseball season again. I like baseball. :)

Here's a little friendly constructive criticism for the Astros, though... I think we should gracefully retire the "Killer B's". I mean, there are only two legitimate Killer B's left - Biggio and Berkman. It was very sad last night when they tried to make the intro work by including Burke and Bruntlett. I mean, Bruntlett is in Round Rock right now. And I think Burke is a great kid; I'm really excited to see how he does playing every day this year. But, he hasn't quite earned Killer B status yet.

Let's let this team find their own identity. Come up with something new.

First Real Set of 4

This was, I think, the first rainless weekend we’ve had in about a month. I celebrated by getting a great flying lesson in on Saturday. We went up and did a few stalls. I’m still not great at doing a banking stall without making the bank too steep, but it’ll do. I finally went into a power-on stall with the ball uncoordinated enough to make the airplane roll. My instructor was glad it finally happened, because he wanted to see at least one that rolled on me.

Then we went back to the airport, and I did 3 touch & gos plus a full-stop. My first three actually went very well. I was remembering what to do before told most of the time and I made pretty good soft landings. After the first one, I even was able to remember what to do to get off the runway again without much prompting. The last landing was a bit rocky, because I flared too much and ballooned and then pushed forward too much and ended up porpoising down the runway for a bit. Ah, well. I was going to screw one up eventually.

When we got back to the airport, there tons of planes around and all of them were being all kinds of crazy. One tried to cut me off as I was turning crosswind (after takeoff) on my 2nd touch & go. One was flying a right hand pattern. One started pulling out onto the runway before the plane taking off was past it. One got to the numbers and stalled his engine before takeoff. It was enough to make me a bit nervous!

Yesterday was the super bowl party. It went swimmingly, although I’m not sure how much time any of us spent watching the game. We got lots of approval for the new TV.

We also started the process of registering for baby yesterday. We’ve got a way to go, still, but we had fun. The first “impluse” registry item is a set of speakers you can clip to the side of the crib and plug your MP3 player into. It’s just a gimic, you could get the same thing with any set of portable speakers, but how cool is that?!

45-10

It was a fun first half. We were merry, watching A&M in a bowl game. Unfortunately, the second half wasn't much fun as Cal scored 31 unanswered points. C'est la vie.

Flying Back West

Next week I fly back out to JPL for a few days, talking about software and then the Mars atmosphere. Should be a nice trip although it will take nearly the whole week. I get to come back to the Halloween party that Jen and Mark are co-hosting. Maybe I'll find a costume out there.

Today Jen and I lazed around the house, watching football (Huskies lost in overtime, A&M won in overtime) and last week's Battlestar Galactica episode. Perhaps one of the most exciting TV I've ever seen! It was great. I went back and rewatched a few scenes. Adama is my hero.

Tomorrow my parents come down for lunch and then perhaps I'll go over to Ellington Field to catch the end of the airshow. If the weather is good tomorrow morning Jen may have her first flying lesson.

In Denial

We had a pleasant weekend visiting with friends. We had what basically amounted to a slumber party in Fort Worth, with a bunch of us from Houston driving up to visit our friends that moved to D-FW a few years ago. I lost the staying-up-late contest, falling asleep in a chair in a very loud room full of people.

It's back to work after what seemed like a very short weekend. Next weekend is Columbus day, though, so we're talking about going camping for the weekend. Now we just need to figure out where to go last-minute in October in TX (not easy).

I won't talk about the biggest news of the day. I am trying to concentrate on other, less heart-rending things.

Mow Pattern

I think the grass in Pitsburg right now is probably the coolest mowing pattern I've ever seen. They've mowed a giant baseball into the outfield with circles radiating from it. To see it (kind of) go here and click on the "Ausmus' sac fly" video. I've heard that some clubs are using chemicals now to do the mowing patterns. I wouldn't be suprised if this one was chemically enhanced. Still cool, though.

It really works

OH - MY - GOD!

It seems the gods of baseball really would like for the Astros to keep the $750 I had to pay them for post-season tickets in advance. I can't believe what's going on right now. All hail the magic glow skull.

Bow Down

Today was a good sports day.

The Astros won in the bottom of the 9th with a Luke Scott walk-off homer - the first of the season for the 'Stros. That places them in 2nd in the NL central and 3rd in the wild card. They seem determined to rekindle my hope for the post-season. It's not quite there yet. Even if they sweep the Cardinals this weekend, which I think they can do, they still have to win 4 more than the Cards in the next week to win the division. Or 5 more than both the Dogers/Padres and Phillies. And this must be done in Philidelphia. The Astros haven't had much luck against the Phils this year.


The icing, though, came with a TELEVISED Washington vs. UCLA football game. Which the Huskies WON. Which makes them 3-1, 1-0 Pac 10. I knew Tyrone Willingham would turn things around. I am buoyant, at peace. GO DAWGS!

Oh, and the A/C got fixed this afternoon, which is a good thing because it was HOT last night.

Tagged out at home!

So I played softball tonight. It was fun. I tried too hard the first game, and then did great the second game when I relaxed. Too bad the first game was with my team and the second game was when I substituted for another team since Jen was still at the Astros' game.

I got to play third base today! I played it for a few games a couple of years ago, and really enjoyed it then. Of course, I had little idea of what to do this time since I didn't remember much. Thanks to some pointers from Matt and Nick, I did okay. I helped with an out in the first inning and later I overthrew first base when I probably should have just held the ball. My hitting sucked. The game ended and I wasn't tired at all, since I hadn't gotten on base and I hadn't run much since I was playing in-field. I was kinda bummed, I felt like I could have done better.

So when the team we just played needed two more for their next game, I said sure. They were nice people, said they saw me play 3rd and asked if I wanted to play shortstop. Well, they were very generous, but I didn't want to mislead them (or get frustrated trying a new position), so I declined and said I'd be best at outfield.

"How does left field sound, Gavin?" "Sure, Chris." As we jogged out to play the other sub, Donna, also from my team who had seen me drop several balls in the outfield the week before, mentioned to me that left field got a lot of fly balls. "I could use the practice," I said with much bravado. She also mentioned to me that we were playing against the only undefeated team in our league. (Gulp.)

My first at-bat went right to the pitcher, but I got hits the rest of the time. In the outfield we played alright, and then... fate struck. It was getting dark, and the ump noticed that some of the outfield lights weren't working. We couldn't play safely in the dark, so, he moved us to the other open field. Which is the co-ed rec field, with the fenceline much closer and the bases are a bit closer together. After playing in the competitive field, the co-ed field seemed tiny! But, it meant that we didn't have to run too far in the outfield. I caught 4 fly balls with some nice spotting by Donna, let one bounce off my glove, and then made an awesome play backing up third.

One guy was running from first to third and so I sprinted in from left field towards third... seconds later to see the ball overthrown past third and rolling along the left fence. In moments I was on the ball, just as the runner left third and ran for home. I scooped up the ball, fixed my feet, and hurled it perfectly to the pitcher who was able to make the tag a few feet in front of home! It was awesome! My best play of the season so far!

We ended up tying the other team, went into extra innings, and managed to beat them by one run! I caught the last out. I think playing on the smaller field helped us win, but hey, we'll take it. It was a lot of fun. I need to stop trying so hard when I play on my team and just relax a bit. Until next week!

Hope

I got a Travelocity alert today that plane tickets to Denver can be had for $143 - roundtrip. If only I had unlimited vacation time!

I have high hopes that college football will not be completely depressing this year. The Huskies are 2-1. That means we only have to win 4 more games to be bowl elligable. Admitedly, four more is twice what we won all year last year, but they really do look better.

The ghosts of Huskies past are now going to haunt me for just hoping for bowl elligibility. There was a time when anything less than the Rose Bowl was a bitter disappointment. How times do change.

Kids Say

OK, so it's way past time for me to post already.

I talked to my sister yesterday. She says that Caroline has been asking for us ever since we left Wyoming. She was in the grocery store the other day, and there was a guy that looked *a bit* like Gavin. Caroline starts yelling "Gabbin! Gaaaabbbin!" across the store. Jessica had trouble convincing her that it wasn't Gavin. They also took a car trip over the holiday weekend, and as soon as they buckeled Caroline into her car seat she started demanding "Jen! Come Jen!". Doesn't that just melt your heart?

I had a busy weekend. Here's the short version...

Sundance Grill in Seabrook is good, but the birds are mean (I got pooped on and pecked at) and the tiki tourches catch on fire - more than they're supposed to, I mean.

Talladega Nights is 60% funny, 15% boring, and 25% over the top.

We were the "Bubba Burger Lucky Row" at the Astros game. We got t-shirts and coupons for frozen hamburgers shaped like Texas.

I hate cleaning.

One more of my friends is 30 now.

Josh went to DC, and I ate lots of fried stuff.

Not Motivated

I got up early to observe a sim at work this morning. The run was boring. Basically what I've gotten out of the experience is sleepiness all day so far. Plus, the uncharacteristically low humiditiy in Houston this week is really tempting me to ditch work early and fall asleep on a blanket in my yard. If only.

Sarah already wrote about the confusing end to last night's baseball game. You need one of those every so often. Something that just makes you go, "huh?". It's particularly nice when it results in a win.

Tonight is our first game in the new "competitive" co-ed softball league. I had heard that some of the annoying co-ed rules (like if a guy is walked with 2 outs, the next girl can just take the base) were not going to be used for this league. But I just went and read the rules on the website, and it still has that rule and a couple other annoying ones in there. I think it's basically going to be like co-ed rec with homers.

Obnoxious

Sarah, Jason, and I went to the Astros game last night. We sat in front of the most obnoxious fan I have ever had the misfortune of sitting near. It started in the first inning. This annoying, nasal, loud voice starts yelling that our pitcher (Buchholz) sucks. Preston Wilson sucks. Biggio needs to protect the plate better. Blah, blah, blah. (This is not a rant against someone rooting for the other team - he was an Astros "supporter".) He was one of those guys that has to make a comment after every play. This tendency was magnified by the fact that his wife knew NOTHING about baseball and kept asking things like "Why isn't he running?" (he's already out).

But the culmination came during the 7th inning stretch. I have never heard a worse rendition of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame". It was nasal, monotone, and still LOUD. After we sat back down, he proclaimed loudly to his wife that if the Astros didn't score at least two in the bottom of the 7th, they were going home. Sarah, Jason, and I all felt sort of bad for hoping the Astros would get retired in order.

He left. We enjoyed the 8th inning rally much more than would have been possible with him there. And then Lidge came in and things sucked again. But not as much as if that guy had still been there.

World Cup

We're over at Sarah's apartment in the morning, watching the US-Ghana game in the World Cup. It's critical that the US win in order to proceed into the next round. Plus Italy needs to win today, which they seem to be on their way to do. We just can't believe the penalty kick called against the US at the end of the first half.

People were wondering if I would really show up to watch soccer, since they know I'm generally lukewarm about sports. I like sports, I just have a short attention span. Plus, we had donuts this morning. Always a good thing to lure me with. :)

Near Thing

The rain kept the temps down during the early part of this week. But today, it was full-blown Houston in summer. It particularly sucked because I had put off mowing the grass half a week too long, and had to mow tall grass in the heat. It's my own fault, I knew I should have done it Monday or Tuesday.

The Astros game tonight was fun despite the fact that the 9th inning rally fell short for the 'stros. Andy Pettite almost got a tripple by hitting the ball a mile up the middle over the centerfielder's head. Would have if he could run. The ball was up on the hill in centerfield before it was picked up. You know after hitting the ball that far, Andy had to try for three. But you could see as he rounded 2nd that he was laboring HARD. His knees were coming up to about his ears and you could SEE him puffing. He was out by a step and a half at third, but you can't blame him for trying.

Gotta work a bit tomorrow. At least it means that we're getting close to flight.

Slug Fest

I went to the Astros game last night, and it sucked. You can read what Sarah wrote about it if you're interested, I don't want to depress myself by rehashing it. Of course the Astros are currently trailing the Giants AGAIN by 6 runs in the 8th. What happened to our offense? What happened to our pitching? :P

I was a total slug this morning. I didn't have to show up to work until this afternoon, so I slept in. Late. My alarm clock woke me up at 11am late. I guess jetting out to the west coast for the weekend isn't the way to put yourself in an early morning mindset. I'm going to have to go in at a decent hour tomorrow because we have some presentation charts due at noon. :P

Astros now trailing 10-1. :(

I've been slowly turning into an ice cube during my sim today. Becca and I called the facility guy 3 times to complain. I don't think it does any good. I'm going to start coming to sims in a parka. Something with a fur lined hood might get the point across.

Fast Forward

So, I'm back from Cali and I've already gotten right back into work. I had to go in for a while after I got back to Houston at 1:15PM, but I ducked out early. I was tired, and I'm going to have to work enough later this week.

This next part is going to drive Sarah nuts. When I got back from seeing Jo at Mely's tonight, I turned on the TiVo to watch the Astros game. After three innings it was 8-0 Giants. Now, I'm still a bit tired, and I have to get up early in the morning. So rather than suffer through this game for 3 hours in real-time, I'm watching it on fast forward. The low setting, so I can see what's going on. See, I told you Sarah wouldn't like it. For the record, this is the first time I've ever done this. But it was so depressing to start with, and I don't like reading game recaps as much as watching. Think of it as a visual recap... :)

For only the second time, I think, since I started listing my next trip in the header of my blog, I don't have one there. I don't actually have a trip planned at this point. Oh, sure, I have grand plans that include catching my niece's 2nd birthday party in August or sneaking off to Colorado for a weekend of backpacking. Those are just vague plans, though, with no target dates or even sureties of coming to pass. It's the Shuttle mission. I just can't make plans. I was in this same situation last year, too, but I had a smaller role in the mission and Sarah had the Washington trip planned for Labor Day that I could put out there as a tentative. Now there's nothing. Anybody wanto to plan a trip somewhere for Labor Day that I won't be able to commit to until August?

Late Game

Last night I went to my second extra-innings Astros game of the season. Jason and I stayed until the not-so-bitter end (~12:00AM) to watch Preston Wilson win it in the bottom of the 14th with a sacrifice fly. I got home at about 12:45AM, and was consequently unable to get myself to work on time this morning. No harm - I'm just in the office today.

The high point in the evening, in my opinion, was th 4 innings of scoreless late relief that Dave Brokowski put together from the 10th to the 13th. Brokowski, who I had to look up this morning, is new to the Astros. His best season to date was 2004 with the Baltimore Orioles, when he went 3-4 in 56 innings over 17 games with a 5.14 ERA. However, given how Qualls and Gallo (and to a lesser extent, Wheeler) have been doing so far it's nice to know we have another option for long relief.

In other non-baseball news, I'm scheduled for my final rendezvous cert sim on May 25. :)

Recap

How has my week been you ask? Well, I'll tell you.

Monday: Home at 7:00, play with dogs, relax

Tuesday: Home at 5:30 to put dogs inside, Debbie's at 6:00 to go to baseball game, extra innings, home at 11:45 or so, play with dogs, no time to blog, sleep

Wednesday: Cheesecake factory after work, home at 10:00, play with dogs (who are getting mad at me by this point), no time to blog, sleep

Thursday: Up early for sim, softball after work, home at 8:00, play with dogs (who are mad and demanding attention), call my sister and end up on the phone until 1:00 AM, no time to blog, sleep

Friday (so far): Up sort of early to prep for meeting, convince dogs to go to the bathroom out in the rain, pick up donuts on the way to work, write this during 15 min of downtime this morning

The bad news... 1) I have to do laundry or I'll have to start wearing [edited for TMI] 2) I'm sleep deprived

The good news... 1) Tomorrow is Saturday 2) Gavin's coming home tonight

Me, Run?

At the risk of following Sarah and making my contribution to this blog into a running blog...

I went jogging late afternoon yesterday in Glendale, the weather was perfect, around 78 deg. Last Saturday I went jogging in Berkeley up Grizzley Peak road, which winds and goes uphill. So my legs were pretty sore. In Glendale, I jogged up a road straight away from the place I was staying at towards the mountains just to the north. My legs felt the tightest that I can remember, it was not comfortable for a few minutes. Fortunately they loosened up and I reached the entrance to Brand Park, where the mountains start. It looks like it would be a good place to run with trails and perhaps mountain lions to keep me on my toes, but I was already very tired. So back I ran. Covered about 3.3 miles in probably 27 minutes.

Hookey

Playing hookey from work to watch baseball all afternoon is very satisfying. Especially when the Astros win in the bottom of the 12th. :)

The only trouble was the traffic out of there. I spent 45 minutes trying to get on the freeway because I was going north instead of south, and I don't know the secret way to get on in that direction. I don't know why people chose to commute.