Lifestyle Change

I just joined a gym. I've never been part of a gym. It's not that I never exercise, but I think the real reason is I've just been too cheap. Why go work out in a gym when I can play ball outside or buy a small set up weights at home or a Wii Fit that I don't use enough. I also work at a place with access to any gym activities that you can imagine, but because it's at work, I just don't find myself hanging out there a lot. I could never make that part of my routine.

And I guess I've always felt there's something a little cow-like. Being one of the herd in going to a gym, waiting in line for a cardio machine and then leaving. I'm a free-range exercise sort of guy.

But there's a new, very nice gym in the neighborhood. I've gone twice this week, and it's not crowded. It's actually nice. So for the time being, I'm going to try and be dedicated about going. Maybe the money factor will be enought to keep me motivated for a while. Maybe, I'll just find that it's not so hard and it's good to work out. I hope so.

And I'm dropping cable tv in exchange.

Daddy Day '10

I think this is the first time father's day actually felt like father's day, or at least that I really felt like a father myself on that particular day. Not that, Wifey and kiddo haven't made the effort in past years, but Little J actually seemed to get it this year. She made a couple cards as projects at school. I got a new ipod to replace the one i threw in the laundry. I got to work on some writing, work out and have one of my favorites, fish tacos for dinner. All in all a great day.

Something that's been bothering me for a while.

I'm pretty much convinced Republicans don't really want to solve the illegal immigration issue. They just want another wedge issue to burnish their conservative credentials.

I think we can all agree we need to tighten the borders and prevent more illegal. Or some form of that. I think one important place where the system is borken is that it is much easier for poorly educated workes to sneak in than it is for well educated people to earn their citizenship by the book. It takes years.

But what the Republicans refuse to acknowledge is there are 12 million here already. No amnesty. No plan to send them back. Just keep things the way they are and yell about how there are too many illegals.

Apparently any plan where these 12 million people don't first return to their own country in amnesty. Even if they are required to pay penalties, learn English, etc. Somehow, Republicans love to yell about how they are abusing the system, but show no interest in actually fixing the system.

This really isn't a difficult fix. Tighten the borders. Create a tough but fair path for people to pay penalties and stay or go home. Tighten the laws on the employers that keep illegals employed.

There just isn't the political will to do that.

Important Question

I know she's still young. The question was probably unfair because she's had no chance to study up on the issue. It was going to have to be a gut decision. We were watching the game and I asked, Green or Purple? And she said, "Green!". I'm not a Celtics fan. I sort of dislike them, but in these Finals it comes down to who do you hate less. But good to see that even if I didn't bias the question in anyway, her gut was in the right place and I won't have to disown her quite yet.

Some quick election day thoughts.

That woman Orly Queen of the Birthers is running for Secretary of State in California. She's running on a platform that all voters and all people running for office need to supply a birth certificate or some other nonsense. Word is she actually stands a fair shot of winning the Republican nomination today. I'm curious to know if she's actually paid the $20k in fines that have been handed out by the courts for her bogus Obama attacks. Somehow she's still waiting for that smoking gun that Obama was born in Kenya.

And yes, it doesn't matter who becomes California's next governor. Not for the big issues anyway. Whoever it is will be just an ineffective as Arnie and probably never get approval ratings above 30%. The State is just built so no one will address any issues.

Funny quirk though. All Republicans want more tax cuts. And of course, even though they don't advertise it less services for everyone. Prop 13 requires 2/3 approval for any tax hikes, but there's nothing like that for tax cuts. What it essentially means, is once you've lost that revenue stream, you're never getting it back. Sooner or later, that's going to just kill the State.

Writing Class Etiquette

Just some points about the online class. We have a weekly chat scheduled to talk about various topics and discuss pieces. Although there are about 15 people in the class, there have never been more than 8 students in any chat. It makes for a more manageable size, but I wonder if people have just decided it really isn't worth it unless the class is discussing their specific piece or whether they are just too busy or if we have an actual classroom if attendance would have been equally spotty.

The other thing is doing critiques. There are one or two people who haven't contributed to reading anyone else's pieces, and only seem interested in having someone read their own piece. Not great form, but I"m not going to lose sweat over it. But I was a little surprised to see someone called on it yesterday. She said something like, I've read your piece but I'm not going to comment on it at all, because you've had three weeks and you haven't said anything about my piece yet. I guess that's fair, but you would hope something like that wouldn't happen in a writing class. Everyone is just working on writing better stuff. Everyone should be helping each other. I don't know why it can't be that easy.

She hates school?

Day 1 was okay. Day 2 not so good. Maybe that's when she really made the realization that the new school was going to be a permanent thing and not just a one day thing. Or it could just be that she got sick. She had a temperature of 102 when she got home. So all I know is that she was cranky. I guess we'll have to wait until Day 3 to sort that out. She and I are home today.

Brand New School Year

The first of June brings about another possible dramatic event in our lives and a milestone for Little J. At 3.5 she's venturing on to her third school. Long time readers will remember that at 2.5 she lasted about two weeks before being kicked out of her first school, an initial wrong step in her educational career that the parents will never forget.

So she's been attending a co-op program about 5 hours a week, with great teaches, lots of parents, and an incredible amount of room to explore and be a kid. It has not been the easiest school year for us. We've had a cop job that took a million hours and the pick up and drop offs were an ongoing struggle even with the assistance of the local grandparents. J loves it there.

But her current co-op doesn't have a full summer session. And next year there are two potential programs, either a three day program or a 4 day nursery school program. Each comes with additional parent challenges that we aren't equipped for. We were supposed to be in-class at least once a week this year and we couldn't manage that and manage our issues with #2.

So today she starts a bi-lingual full day school. Essentially it's English most of the day with a 2 hour Chinese School program thrown in. They also provide organic lunches. J has matured a lot in the last year. We're hoping that there won't be any issues. We're 90% confident that she's pottytrained enough, and ready enough to handle the slightly more academic program.

Wifey called a couple hours ago and J seems to be adjusting fine on Day 1. It doesn't sound like a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but we've discovered there is little that is less settling than not having your daycare/school situation in place.