GeekBaby

You know how kids make spoof lyrics off of songs they enjoy singing? Kee made up this:

"The programming colors are one, two, three,
red, green, and blue..." (because that's how light interacts with emissive colors)."

Little A sings it that way in primary and the coolest part -- she knows what it means. Ha.

An Open Source Life

I am so inspired by this video. I love how they are so deep in the struggle of how to manage mass collaboration. I love their lack of greed. I love how Linus has his kids running on stage and making it impossible to listen to Stallman's great speech.

I have spent the last few days listening to it over and over again, thinking about how it could work that general philosophy into the daily mix of things.

GamerGirrl

Picture mother & daughter sweetly snuggling together at night, reading stories, talking about the day.

Daughter: "I'm thirsty."

Mom: (jokingly) "Thirsty? I'm thirsty too... I think I'll drink your hair..." (goofing)

Daughter: "No, *I*'m thirsty."

Mom: "You're thirsty? Oh... eat my hair then." (offering hair)

Daughter: "No, mom, I'm really thirsty. I'm low life."

Low life?

If you get it, you must be a gamer!

And yes, I know that technically, it is "low mana" for thirst and "low health" for hunger, but: 1. she's only 5, and 2. she was so tired.

Sweet Tax Night

Filing taxes last night was so nice. Really. No, really! We got all the kids to bed then spread out our massive piles of books, receipts, notepads, and laptops. Going over the receipts we laughed about all the craziness of last year until that magical moment, 11:54 when E pressed Send.

Maybe it was so nice because we rarely get stress-free nights like that. (Yes, relatively speaking, taxes are now peaceful compared to other things.) Maybe it was nice because we got to see 2006 at a glimpse -- we did so many great things last year! I love finetuning life so it was fun for me to see what choices we had make & debate whether or not I would make the same "mistakes" now. We made a lot of great choices last year and the choices that didn't make good sense tax-wise were good choices morally. There's something so powerful about making lots of good little choices. They accumulate. What is that called? Compound moral interest? There must be a great economic term for it.

It was really encouraging to see the year in one breath like that. Usually, on a day-to-day basis when I am struggling through the goo of the day's mismanaged schedule, I feel highly unproductive, ineffective, like I am making a long list of poor choices. But, when I look at the big picture, I can see that a lot of that discouragement is just the naturally feeling of trudging through goo. Big ah-ha for me.

The Obsessive Click

I can't stop checking my email, looking for those orders that coulds, should (if only they would!) be pouring in. I know it is because we have done minimal advertising, no one knows about us yet, but on the other hand I had this magical, mystical belief that if I built it, it would explode into success without me ever lifting a finger for marketing.

Time to grow up.

the Web Fairy

The Tooth Fairy has been outdone.

I have a Web Fairy. Every night I go to sleep with some random wish that some part of my website will be fixed. Last night it was part of a product page; tonight it is that I wish my FAQs page will be fixed, not just a flat html page like I set up, but a fully formated pretty page like the rest of my website.

I wish the wish and when I wake up, my web fairy will have granted my fondest dream.

Of course, I suspect my web fairy is a middle-aged old guy with bloodshot eyes, messy hair, and a certain stench who doesn't sleep much because he's always fixing the web site until the early morning hours.

I love my Web Fairy.

Cranial Elasticity

We are at a 1,798 on the stress-o-meter scale. If we don't crack today, we never will.

What is there to stress about?

* car stolen -- husband has been with a car since he was 15yo, without this source of comfort, he's very unhappy

* son off in WA using big, sharp tools such as circular saws and chainsaws -- me so nervous

* starting of new company, ordering heaploads from suppliers, hoping that if we build it, they will come

* stupid allergic cough has me in nasty fits throughout the day

* 06 taxes due soon. We do it ourselves. Always. Not enough time

* property taxes just doubled, actually more-than-doubled

* a kazillion other little things that I should worry about, but don't.

When the stress hits, such as "oo, look, we just got a $2,500 bill for increased property taxes. Wonder where that's coming from?" ... when that hits, I just take a breath & remember:

"The strong woman is one who is able to intercept at will the communication between the senses and the mind," and I intercept, intercept, intercept. After all, I have four little sponges around me -- it's ok to be yucky myself, but yuckiness x4... yikes.

So, I intercept with, "Car stolen? This should be interesting..." and "Son gone to WA? At least I miss him (so, so much). Imagine if I didn't miss him. That would be sad." Intercept. Bright side. Moving to a better neural path.

Reminds me of my oldest, Conquerer, who ranked super, super high on an optimism test. He ranked so high that he was classified as the type of person who says, when the sky is falling, "The sky is falling? It's raining? I like rain! Mmm... feels good."

I'm so lucky.