matching tracksuits

Limitations

Tuesday 27 March 2007

The other day, I got a comment at another website that meant more to me most other comments I’ve received put together:

Hello! I want to say thanks, because you was (no, are still) very good english teacher… you’s lessons helps me very much, now I’m live in Ireland, and I m still learn… If you want to write me: [email and name redacted]: 1,2e ”zarzadzanie inf, terrorysci…”bye

In a class of “difficult” students (who, in retrospect, were angels), this young lady was one of the few students I could count on consistently. She caused any disruption; she rarely came to class unprepared; she rarely wasn’t smiling and happy.

Naturally, I wrote back. And of course I got this in return:

A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its recipients. This is a permanent error. t the moment you cannot send a message to [reacted], try again later ¹: retry timeout exceeded

I tried again, knowing it was a futile effort. Still, the thought that it might not go through, and she’ll think my response to her invitation to contact her was, “Um, no thanks,” irritates to no end, so I tried. And yet again.

And so, I. Z., if you are reading this, please know: I wrote you back, but onet.pl is cranky and often does not take email from my account.

Which leads me to a question for all tech folks who read this (both of you): What could be causing a consistent problem with delivering email to Polish servers from a given account here in the States? I’ve asked tech support for my web host — they think I’m crazy. But consistently email sent from any address that uses the server this site is hosted on gets bounced back, or simply disappears. As in, “Did you get that email?” “What email?”

What I wouldn’t give, sometimes, for a return to consistent use of regular mail for correspondence…

-1 ↩

Skills

Monday 26 March 2007

At first she mastered control of her eyes. About the same time, she worked on controlling her head. The Girl has more or less mastered those skills.

Next come the hands. That's a little tricker -- they still fly around like she's a hyperactive orchestra conductor. But then, in calm moments, she surprises us all and holds her bottle.

Crowded Bathroom

Sunday 25 March 2007

When we're bathing and photographing the girl all at the same time, it gets kind of crowded.

What Jesus Wouldn’t Have Done

Sunday 25 March 2007

One of my favorite little sects out there is the Restored Church of God. It's leader, David Pack is The spokesman for god -- by his own humble admission, an apostle, with the same authority as the Apostle Paul. Yes, that Paul, of New Testament fame.

After Katrina hit the Gulf coast, he, like many other ministers, gave a sermon about what True Christians© should do to help.

True Christians© should, in short, continue preaching the gospel and warning the people -- synonymous in his group. The gospel -- the True Gospel© -- is simply that Germany is going to rise again and this time beat America, take it into captivity, and basically make the Nazis look like daycare playmates.

(Confused? It all goes back to ancient simmering hatreds. America, of course, comprises the real Israelites, along with the French, the Dutch, the British -- the Lost Ten Tribes. Germany is Assyria. History -- ancient or otherwise -- is not a strength of this group's theology. )

False Christians (the vast majority of the 2 billion Christians in the world world, who are deceived and actually worship Satan) give to relief organizations. True Christians© (David Pack's group -- representing at most 0.00005% of the world Christian population) don't.

His reasoning, though, is stunning biblical hermeneutics. I clipped the relevant portion from the sermon.

After Changing

Saturday 24 March 2007

After we change the girl's diaper, she's usually pretty happy. I guess I would be too, considering her movement patterns -- save it all up for one big explosion that leaves a mess so big that it creeps out the diaper here, there, and sometimes everywhere. It must be a relief finally to get changed.

We finally got some footage of the after-diaper fun.

“When are infants supposed to…?”

Wednesday 21 March 2007

A developing child goes through so many “firsts” in that initial year that it’s easy to forget about some of them.

Take for example the first time L grabbed something other than a someone’s finger.

A parent’s finger is warm and I suppose somewhat inviting to be — conducive to being, at least — held. A plush toy? Not exactly soft, but warm I suppose. Perhaps this just means the end of a short era of preferring Tata’s finger to just about anything else?

Another big development is the ability to sit.

It’s a long way from sitting with supports to sitting alone. But like everything else has to this point, I expect the one to melt into the other unexpectedly.

Sunday Morning

Sunday 18 March 2007

The Girl slept fitfully last night. Friday night she drifted off at eleven at didn't wake up until five Saturday morning. That is a survivable schedule. Waking up every couple of hours is not.

Morning comes and I take care of the girl while K sleeps. After her 7:00 feeding and burping, L lies on the bed between us, looking up at the ceiling, smiling wildly at who knows what. She turns her head and looks at me and an even bigger smile breaks.

Later in the morning, in the guest room with babcia, she looks at the bright morning light coming in through the window. Calm.

A bit of motion and she looks my way. Of course I have the camera...

A change, some rocking, perhaps a nap -- then it's time to start over.

90+ Days

Saturday 17 March 2007

L's 90 day money back guarantee would have expired yesterday. But unlike the magazine subscription we recently purchased, various CDs we've bought, tons of clothes, pipes, pens, furniture, etc., we haven't said a word about taking her back.

It's not a question of depreciation -- far from it. She's far more dear to us now than when we brought her home from the hospital -- so dear, in fact, that we continue to invest regularly in various upgrades. And she attracts quite a crowd:

"[We think] we'll keep her."

Sick

Tuesday 13 March 2007

The Girl has been sick-ish. Lots of saline nose drops and bulb syringe work as a result. Lots of crying. And least significantly: a beautiful weekend spent inside.

L is at the age now where she's starting to recognize things -- including bulb syringes. Which means she sometimes starts before the whole process starts. Then, the degree of difficulty increases significantly as she jerks her head from side to side, crying, snorting, and being generally miserable.

And so now that we're at the point of L's life we were all sort of looking forward to (the time when she's not so fragile as when she was first born), we're looking forward to when she's able to communicate her needs, and, more importantly, we're able to communicate with her.

"I know this hurts, but I need to do it so you'll be able to breathe better."

Souma yergon, sou nou yergon…

Thursday 08 March 2007

Throughout much of the world, March 8 is a day to celebrate "the economic, political and social achievements of women." It's International Women's Day, and though it was (according to Wikipedia) first celebrated in America, it's not widely known here. Perhaps the fact that the organization that initiated it was the Socialist Party of America. And most places that still celebrate it with any real vigor are (or were) communist or socialist. (In the minds of many Americans, those terms are equivocal, I know.)

Extra points for knowing the significance of the title without resorting to Google.

Poland is one such country. Though I lived there for seven years, Women's Day never worked its way into my unconscious cultural calendar. I took the cues from those around me and never really made an effort to remember it myself.

In retrospect, that was a very bad idea. That realization occurs most forcefully when you marry a Polish woman and then come home March 8 empty handed...

At the Tone

Tuesday 06 March 2007

J (K’s mother) has a new Polish friend (call her “M”) here in town: a retired doctor who just moved to the area. They met the “Welcome to America” party we threw J a couple of weeks after her arrival. They hit it off, and exchanged telephone numbers, with the promise of getting together again soon.

J called M a few days later. She didn’t get in touch with M, but left a message. J waited a few days, and, after hearing nothing, called M again. And again, no answer. J left another message and, after a few more days, began getting concerned.

Eventually, M returned the call. M, however, didn’t know she was returning a call, for the first thing she asked J was “Why didn’t you call?”

“I did call,” J said, explaining the messages she left on the answering machine.

“There were no messages from you,” M said. She suggested they hang up and J try to call and leave a message again.

J hung up, waited a couple of seconds, and called. She left a message, then waited. M called back in about ten minutes, asking why she hadn’t called.

“But I did call,” J confusedly protested.

M asked to talk to K, and asked K to do the same. “Maybe she’s doing something wrong?” M suggested.

K dialed. She left the message. M called back shortly and confirmed receipt of the message.

Then K had an idea. She had her mom dial the number, and it was all clear.

Though she was calling from a cell phone, J didn’t know that she had to put the area code in as well. M, in fact, didn’t include it on the piece of paper she’d given J.

“But what about the voice I heard?” J asked.

And so K explained what “Message JG-23…” means.

Early Thanksgiving

Monday 05 March 2007

K's mom obviously won't be here for Thanksgiving, but we still wanted to give her some idea of what it's like. So my mom did the obvious: cooked a small Thanksgiving dinner.

Turkey, dressing, potatoes, green beans, giblet gravy, rolls and a nice chardonnay. And of course for dessert, sweet potato pie.

The dressing and the pie were the big hits. Made from cornbread (itself a novelty), the dressing is doubly unlike anything in Polish cuisine. As for the pie, the notion of doing anything with a tuber other than boiling it and serving it with salt and pepper is fairly foreign to the village Polish way of cooking.

After dinner, it was time to pull out the thread collection and discuss one of those things that crosses most all western cultural boundaries: crafts.

Wiki wars

Sunday 04 March 2007

From Language Log, I recently learned about Conservapedia, which, as you might guess from the title, is a conservative Christian version of Wikipedia. (Language Log was interested in Conservapedia's erroneous entries on linguistics.)

Conservapedia's welcome message includes the following explanation: "Conservapedia is a much-needed alternative to Wikipedia, which is increasingly anti-Christian and anti-American."

Conservapedia's entry on Wikipedia begins,

Because anyone can edit it, and because of its system of governance, it does not have standards similar to those of printed encyclopedias. As with any wiki, the balance of the content in Wikipedia inevitably represents what its contributors find interesting to write about, rather than what encyclopedias traditionally contain. Thus, gossip and hundreds of thousands of entries about pop songs or celebrities are pervasive on Wikipedia. (Conservapedia)

And what does Wikipedia, in turn, say about Conservapedia? Until recently, nothing. Wikipedia redirected "Conservapedia" to "Eagle Forum," and the entry itself was in the "Articles for Deletion" bin. Most voting for deletion feel it's not notable, it's trivial, etc.

And then Language Log mentioned it, and over the weekend, it's reappeared...

Twenty-Second and Twenty-Third Firsts

Thursday 01 March 2007

L is almost eleven weeks old, which means she's entering that period where every day she does something new for the first time. A few of the recent firsts:

She's slowly discovering that those spindly things sticking out from her sides are arms -- her arms. This morning she tried to bring her hand to her mouth after holding it in front of her, studying it for a few seconds before slamming her hand directly into...her forehead.

L has added a new cry to her repertoire: the "I'm bored" cry. She likes to be toted around the apartment so she can see anything and everything.

Lastly, she's discovered her voice, and learned that it too is subject to her control. And so she's taken to making vowel sounds to show her interest and her joy. We've captured it twice on video.

Cartographic Roots

Tuesday 27 February 2007

K is a cartographer. As such, she has an abiding interest in maps. As such, we have a very nice map of the region of Poland where she comes from (and where I lived for seven years) hanging in our forayer.

L is turning into a smiler. It's gone from "Honey, come quick! She's smiling!" to a many-times-a-day occurrence. In fact, she smiles on-cue now. Sort of.

Whenever we hold L so that she can see our forayer map, she smiles -- 99% of the time. We've caught it on video a couple of times.

The question is, what is so fascinating for her about that map? It has nothing but muted earth-tones; it is extremely low-contrast; it is very detailed -- all the things a baby L's age are not supposed to find particularly interesting. But she loves it -- she comes closest to laughing when looking at it.

Maybe she senses that mom's a cartographer. Maybe she senses that its a representation of her roots. Maybe she just gets off on low-contrast images...