Uniquely Qualified

I keep trying to find a new job.  One that pays better, is steady, and is more suited to my particular skills, passions, and talents.  I am not sure what type of job this actually is, so I thought I would switch things up, and put the ball in the court of the employers.  I’m open to just about anything.  Here is a (partial) list of my qualifications and experience:

• I am very comfortable doing public speaking, and have addressed groups of 100 or more many times.
• I have a great beard.
• I have a BA in Studio Art and an MA in Art History.
• I am currently employed by three different entities, working primarily as a vinyl & leather repair technician, an Art History professor, and an apprentice steel detailer.
• I’m really good at making choices based on design or aesthetics.  My wife makes me go shopping with her for handbags and shoes, and I always have an opinion, and I am always right.
• Wherever I work, I am the guy that fixes stuff when it breaks.  Now that I own a home and work in a 100 year old Victorian house, I have mad handyman skillz.
• I cook well, and make an incredible fried egg sandwich.
• I am the guy that everybody calls when they have a problem with their computer.
• I can do 42 consecutive pushups (and counting).
• When I yell the answers at the screen while watching Jeopardy, I figure that I would win the episode about 70% of the time.
• When the zombies come, I will know exactly what to do.
• I love kids.  I have two awesome little boys, and volunteer in the toddler nursery at church.
• Whenever I go to the mall, whatever it is that I am there to buy is inevitably on sale.
• I am an obsessive internet researcher, which allows me to buy top-quality appliances and win at fantasy baseball every year.
• I can kill giant lizards with a shovel.

You’re out there.  You need me.  I am the only man perfectly qualified for the job.  Just call.

My new favorite blog

There, I Fixed it. Some fantastic examples of human ingenuity and do-it-yourself engineering.  Enjoy.

100 Pushups or Bust

So, thanks to Facebook taunting from  The Wife’s cousin (update your blog already, Dooran!), I have started doing this 100 Pushups challenge thing .  Probably most (if not all) of you reading this have already seen me muttering about it on Facebook.  Anyway, here it is in short:

Some dude put up a series of charts that supposedly will get you doing 100 consecutive pushups after six weeks of doing sets of pushups 3 times a week.  I am halfway through week 3, and it seems to be working – I did a total of 100 pushups this morning, spread across 5 sets and 15 minutes.

It is impossible to be manlier (left) or foxier (right).

I think I like it because there are a bunch of charts and stuff, and because doing 100 pushups in a row seems old school manly, like something that the Sean Connery of Thunderball could have done.
So, what is the point?  A couple of things:  I have been posting this on Facebook and telling everyone I know I am doing it to keep my lazy self accountable.  The idea is that I will feel like a real ass if I have to tell everyone that I quit.

More significantly, it is the first time I have kept to any kind of a workout or fitness regimen for longer than two consecutive sessions since I was 15 years old and Coach Winstead yelled at me to “get my little peenie” into the wrestling mat.

This fits into my whole trying-to-be-a-grownup thing.  Like, what kind of a man do I want to be?  What example am I setting for my sons?  One of the things that I was always in awe of as a kid was how physically strong my dad was.  I want to be strong like that for my sons.  I have always had a real tendency toward being a pale kid, and I want better than that for my boys.

This is the origin of the term “pale kids.”  This show was great, and doesn’t get nearly enough run.

I heard some thing on the radio about character being developed by  making small promises to yourself, and then keeping them.  This in turn leads to bigger promises, and then promises to others, etc.  I suck at this.  100 Pushups is my first concerted effort to assert some discipline over this part of my life.

Plus, The Wife said she’d make me shepherd’s pie if I can pull it off.

Follow my progress

My l’il anthropologist

So, yesterday I was watching the Travel Channel – one of those shows about a tribe in Brazil or somewhere that starts with the “Warning: Indigenous Nudity” message.  The group in question was completely naked, except for huge wooden lip plugs, and feather headdresses glued to the foreheads of the women.

About halfway through, the LittleDoo wakes up from his nap and wanders downstairs.  He sits down and watches the show with me, not saying a word.  This is highly unusual – unless Special Agent Oso is on, he always wants me to turn on one of his shows.

After it ends, we had this conversation:

Me: What did you think of the show?

Boo: It was good.

Me: What did you think about the people?

Boo: They were big.

Me: ?

Boo: Big enough to go outside yif no shoes on.

Then, later on, discussing things further with Mama:

Mama: Why do you think they were naky [trans. "Naked"]?

Boo: Maybe they wanted some sun.

Gratuitous Plug for Myself

One of my many jobs is a vinyl & leather repairman.  Our company services Southern California, and our website needs some more exposure, in the form of incoming links and clicks.   To that end:

Click on this bad boy

We repair auto and marine interiors, and service both private customers and those within the industry.  We especially like it when insurance adjusters put us directly on their estimates.

Aggressive Marketing

[This story is about 3 weeks old, from right before Henry was born]

So, my nearly 10-month-pregnant wife was waddling through the mall the other day, and the ShamWow guy yells to her from about 30 feet away “Hey!  This could come in really handy if your water breaks!”

Free dinner!

The in-laws invited us to the Souplantation for dinner tonight.  Hell yeah!  Salad with as many beans as I want, soft serve a-plenty, and chili on everything.  Life is good.

An absence

Okay, I actually have a few things that I have been wanting to blog about:

Cormac McCarthy, Moon Sand, home ownership, my upcoming second son, Batman: The Animated Series, Lego Star Wars, Obama, Lucille’s v. Pancha, etc.

Maybe I will at some point.

Keys

I feel like I should write something profound here (as if I were capable) but right now I am just too happy and tired to bother.  The fact that my main man Josh rolled up with a bottle of Gentleman Jack isn’t really contributing much to my verbosity, either.  Good lookin’ out.

I have a house now.

Nearly There…

So, we went in yesterday to sign the loan docs to finalize the purchase of our house.  The Wife and I both took the day off of work.  To be fair, it wasn’t just to sign papers- we also had to vote (hooray for Obama!  Boo on Prop 8!) and go to an ultrasound appointment (Papers is rocking strong).  We drug the Littledoo in tow, and drove all the way up to Redlands.  When we got there, to our shock, we discovered that instead of recieving back all or most of our $2250 deposit (which we were led to believe would happen) we instead were being asked to pay an additional $1500.  That puts us $3750 further in debt than we were expecting.  You hear about this kind of crap happening all the time, but it was still a shock.

Anyway, we are negotiating with the lender, and it looks like they are going to be able to magically whisk away the additional $1500, but we are still on the hook for the deposit.  It is shocking to me that buying a house is pretty much the same as buying a used car, simply with more zeros attached.  They know they have you by the balls right at the end, and you don’t have any other options without cancelling escrow.

Whatever.  We’ll figure it out.  I should be posting something about the feel of the keys in my hand within a week.  I hope.