Daley Ponderings

Sunday, May 21st, on the way home from church, we saw what a gorgeous day it was and we wanted to go for a sail. We ate a quick lunch and then I took a nap while Jon and Jonathan prepared a picnic dinner and got the boat ready. We were all ready at the same time, and we headed off to the river.... (More)

Our first attempt at keeping a live Christmas tree live was a dismal failure, for two main reasons. One, we didn't take it down until April or some other such long time. Two, I misunderstood the instructions about misting the tree. What you are supposed to do is mist the branches to keep them... (More)

About a year ago I realized that the search results from search engines were returning different index pages from this blog, instead of the actual article that contained the term that the person was searching for.  This is because the index pages only show the last 10 articles and are... (More)

This is the hardest one I have ever worked on. [ Update 10/24/2006: thanks to you all reading this post and posting other links, I have since found more interesting ones -- look through the comments - the one posted on October 9th appears to be pretty hard, though maybe I just made a mistake on... (More)

Jonathan now has an imaginary friend. Her name is "Su-su" or "Soot-soot" or some combination/permutation of those sounds. She has a big house (not a small one) and she has toys there, usually three. We like to go to her house in the evenings if we aren't going somewhere else. He also has made... (More)

Wow . I think that is about all I can say. (More)

I got a notification from a credit bureau today saying that a new account had been opened by: Verizon Pen, PO BOX 165018, COLUMBUS, OH 43216. Since I haven't changed phone service since last year, it seemed odd that there would be a new account from Verizon.My mortgage company had their backup... (More)

Colin Portnuff, a guy who uses an AAC (alternative augmentative communication) device to communicate, was recently at a conference that some guys from my company (DynaVox) also went to. He has ALS , which is a degenerative disease of the brain. A number of our customers have ALS; I am not... (More)

I wrote it out formally about a year ago but it never got onto the blog. So below is the story. I'll post a comment on Jonathan's first post with a link to this one. Jonathan's Gentle Birth by Heather Daley This is Jonathan's birth story, but to really appreciate it, the... (More)

Jonathan likes to play with the water in the sink, using cups and sponges, etc. I have a "three strikes" rule - after water gets on the floor three times, he has to turn it off and stop playing. Recently, he has actually finished his play before getting to the third time. Christmas Eve, he... (More)

12/22 - We were playing the piano, singing some carols, and Jonathan sang, "Rejoice! Rejoice! Man-u, man-u, man-u, man-u, man-u, shall come!" Later that morning, way before his usual naptime, he was nursing and I saw his eyes roll back in his head, and the lids closing. This surprised me, so I... (More)

I just realized I haven't posted about the new baby in a while. We have decided to go to the same midwife that we had for Jonathan's birth. She is very excited and our first appointment will be in the middle of December. I am now 9 weeks along which means that the baby is 7 weeks old. He (I... (More)

Jonathan was playing with his farm puzzle, pulling out each piece, naming it, and making the sound that the animal makes. "Rooster, cocka-doo-doo" "Sheep baa" When he got to the pig, he only named it, so I asked him if he remembered what a pig says. If he did, he wasn't saying, so I told him.... (More)

Mom found this house while canoeing in the Merrimack River, and thinks it is just perfect for us. It does look great! There is a lot of land (13 acres) and a lovely place for the Black Rabbit to launch from. We have gotten used to Pittsburgh housing prices, so anything is a shock, but this... (More)

We recently switched our automobile insurance to State Farm, because Amica doubled their rates on our homeowners policy, a bait-and-switch sort of thing - they told me the estimated rate, and I agreed, spent a month trying to get the inspector to come look at the house.The only thing he pointed... (More)