The Bishop of our ward is out of town for the next few weeks so as his First Counselor the responsibility to preside falls into my lap (a most uncomfortable feeling).  Along those lines, I was also responsible to get speakers for Sacrament meeting.  I called a few people (who did a great job!) and during two of the persons’ comments they mentioned how the talks assigned, from the most recent General Conference, were clearly intended for them.  One individual even mentioned how, when she originally heard the talk given by Sister Allred, it was for her a “life-changing moment” (I think were the words).

I’m grateful that the Lord is able to take something simple (me) and turn it into something wonderful for this Sister and Brother and, hopefully, for those that heard them speak.  I certainly don’t have the spiritual sensitivity I’d like – it’s not like I go around and see beams of light from folks’ heads and just know they need to speak on xyz on Sunday – but nonetheless it’s neat to be a part of that process whereby others have personal spiritual experiences.

Moreover, I’m grateful for all those persons in my ward that have accepted callings, whatever the role.  Their willingness to serve is what enables the Ward to function, and nothing the Bishop (or his Counselors) do would work if not for the members’ faithfulness.  To them, I am indebted and grateful.

So, when Alisa came home with the kids tonight they were asleep so I dutifully trudged outside to carry them upstairs to bed – that’s what Daddy’s do, right?  Unbeknownst to me, little Doodle also thinks so too, apparently!  He woke up some and as we were walking up the path to our front porch he said, “You’re carrying me – you’re the best Daddy!” and gave me a bug squeeze around the neck.

Don’t know about yours, but it melted my heart.  Life is full of challenges but nestled within them (sometimes deep within) are the nuggets that matter.  Such was this precious moment to me.

So that’s my new title and I kinda like it: Great Squirrel Herder.

In conversation today with some co-workers it was mentioned that it sometimes feels like we’re herding sheep. However, we’re not shepherds because sheep willingly follow shepherds.  We’re more like sheep herders, behind the sheep with prods trying to keep them moving in a certain direction. Someone else brought up squirrels instead, implying that’s more accurate than sheep. I told him I was going to steal it, which I have.

Run free my minion squirrels – divide and conquer!

Since I returned home from my mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in December of 2000, I’ve been employed in the technology sector (in fact, I was before my mission, too, but not for large enterprises).  And throughout that period of time I’ve been “oncall.”  For any that may be unfamiliar with the concept, there’s a rotation of x weeks (which depends on the number of others in the rotation) when any alerts, pages, problems, et cetera, land in your lap.  Some weeks there’s a little; some weeks there’s lots.  Always it’s blech.  And when you’re in technology management positions (as I’m not currently – yay!) it’s worse, because you’re essentially oncall 24/7/365.  True, the first set of alert(s) don’t always come to you, but you’ll be the escalation point.

So, I’m oncall this week…

I’m looking forward to a career, some day, when I’m not oncall – ever. 

Wahoo, let me tell you how excited I am that tonight is the last session of my Chemistry 1215 lab! Now if only my other classes would hurry and finish (Chem 1210 and two Calculus courses).

So we had an offer on our property in Auburn, WA about a month ago (we’ve had two offers now).  As part of their inspection results, they requested several items which simply didn’t, and still don’t, make sense.  Specifically, the buyers required that the foundation and electrical wiring be updated to 2008 code requirements.  It’s a 1941 home, not 2008; code changes don’t apply retroactively (for single-family homes, anyway).  There’s no problem with the existing foundation (i.e. slippage, cracks, etc) or wiring, so why (sh)(w)ould someone demand that a 1941 home be updated to 2008 code requirements?

We agreed to the buyers’ others requests but said no on these two items –  “No, we’re not going to rip walls out [which are lathe and plaster - not nearly as quick, painless, or 'clean' to demolish and replace as drywall] to replace wiring nor make foundation structural changes.”  Seems logical to me.  Surprisingly, though, the buyers walked.  Their agent’s message was that it “wasn’t good enough.”

Now, I understand this is a buyer’s market, I’m not an idiot (sometimes, anyway).  I understand that when you’re in a buyer’s market, and you want to sell, you sometimes need to play the dumb game of acquiescing to what are sometimes frivolous requests.  So we did that for all the other requests, we acquiesced.  But wiring and foundation?  No.

Maybe I’m just too dang proud, and 1yr from now when the property remains vacant and unsold I’ll wish I’d acted differently, but at this point, anyway, it still doesn’t make sense.

Poor Mrs. Smith hasn’t been able to sleep well in, oh, about 4.5yrs now (ironically about the same time she became pregnant with our first child… I doubt there’s any correlation, though).  Some days it’s worse than others.  Yesterday was one of those “worser” moments.  I feel impotent, utterly unable to remediate the problem.  Like most guys, especially engineers, when there’s a problem, we don’t want to just hear about it and do nothing – we want to fix it!  Well, I haven’t yet discovered the way to fix this one. 

Something’s gotta change for Mrs. Smith.  I’ve discovered that I can get by successfully with considerablyless sleep, from both a routine and once-in-a-while perspective (not that I don’t enjoy sleeping, I just have many obligations that require that I be elsewhere physically which thus precludes a lot of sleep).  Unfortunately, she’s the one that handles “Eagle,” the smallest Smith, and his sleeping habit (or lack thereof) is driving her bonkers.  And when Momma is bonkers, so goes the rest of the family relatively short order.

Clearly the Lord must know a better way, so I’ll continue to seek His guidance, because I’m at the proverbial wits end.  Any suggestions, especially from those that find themselves in a similiar pickle with their spouse?

So, for our date night I thought I’d surprise Mrs. Smith with ice skating.  It’s something we both enjoy immensely yet haven’t done since we’ve met over, over six years ago as of Halloween.  She’s even carted her ice skates around with her since we were married.

We dropped off the kiddos with the Finnels, with whom we have a regular babysitting-exchange (and the Tolleys – yay!), and were off.  Got some food at the Costco food court (much cheaper than a full-blown restaurant, that’s for sure) and were off the the ice rink.

We quickly discovered that neither of us were… uh, well, any good.  Any proficiency we’d had in our youth was clearly expired, along with general flexibility.  I did observe significant improvement in both Mrs. Smith and my own skating throughout the hour before we were kicked off the ice for the zamboni (how often does one get to use the word “zamboni” – neato).  Unfortunately, just as we were ready to get off somehow, inexplicably, Mrs. Smith fell and cracked her head on the ice – OUCH! 

On that cheery note we decided we’d better stop, so we went and got the kids.  Not the ideal way to end our ice skating adventure, or our date, but I think we’ll have fond memories of tonight’s date night… eventually.  Poor Mrs. Smith.  As anyone who’s smacked their head on ice can undoubtedly attest, it hurts!

“I fought the ice and the – ice won; I fought the ice and the – ice won“

I spent the day, from 9-5, in training for an XML database/application server. Although the concept is cool, it’s rather dry material to study for an entire day (no discredit to the presenter). I’ve noticed that many of the people present have heavily imbibed the “Kool-Aid” though, whereas I’m skeptical of the vendor’s claims.
Going on a date night tonight with my dearie, Mrs. Smith – wahoo!

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