tfl: The Flatiron Life

Our wedding photographer has a new website up. He spammed some old clients about it last night, asking to spread the word. He is good and I would recommend him.

I was browsing around and found that Jos and I are one of the featured couples on the wedding display.

“Unless the state of Texas violates their own election laws, Congressman Barr will be the only presidential candidate on the ballot,” says Russell Verney, campaign manager for the Barr Campaign and the former campaign manager for Ross Perot. “Texas law makes no exceptions for missing deadlines.”

The Texas Secretary of State Web site shows only Bob Barr as the official candidate for president in Texas.

“We know all about deadlines,” says Verney. “We are up against them constantly in our fight to get on the ballot across the nation. When we miss deadlines, we get no second chances. This is a great example of how unreasonable deadlines chill democracy.”

“Republicans and Democrats make certain that third party candidates are held to ballot access laws, no matter how absurd or unreasonable,” says Verney. “Therefore, Republicans and Democrats should be held to the same standards.”

More here

I think we all know how this is going to turn out.

Congratulations to Derek Tomaw.

Last night things were not looking well for the South Putnam Eagles football team. But then they forced a turn over and

On the ensuing drive, Derek Tomaw gave the Eagle offense some life, as his first three runs of the night went for 17, 14 and 10 yards, respectively. A Hunter Edwards pass to Frame for 27 yards set up Knight’s first score of the evening with 2:23 to go in the quarter.

He ended the game with 9 carries for 44 yards. South Putnam went on to beat Owen Valley 35-12.

(If you have a Tomaw you would like to nominate for “Good Job, Tomaw!”, please send us an email.)

1. What do the Care Bears do when low pressure systems move through?

2. Pickle Me Elmo. Accessories include a jar and pickling salt.

The old hood is getting violent. A real gang war is underway.

Maybe our crazy neighbors wanted to keep Labor Ready out of the area for their own good?

IMG_0798, originally uploaded by flatiron32.

I know. Jonah’s public is clamoring for new photos and we don’t have that many new recent ones to share. I think this one is funny, though. This is a glimpse into one of Jonah’s new favorite pastimes - pulling books off of our shelves and eating them. As soon as we get a chance, we will be making a trip to the land of Thor and cheap furniture to purchase doors for our bookcases.

Nothing in our house is safe these days. If it’s dangerous or dirty (think George’s food, litter box, toilet bowl brush, electrical cord, disgusting tennis ball wedged into the drain in the basement) it’s the most fascinating thing Jonah has ever seen and he would like to eat it. I have pretty thoroughly baby-proofed Jonah’s bedroom, which has greatly improved my productivity. Several times a day Jonah and I shut ourselves in his room while I compute or fold laundry and he plays contently.

Jonah is getting very fast and steady when he stands up and walks along the furniture. It still kind of weirds me out when he wakes up in the night and I find him standing in his crib, peering over the edge with his sad little face.

Speaking of sleep, Jonah’s not doing it. This has made for trying times in the Tomaw household. He still wakes up 2-3 times a night normally, but the last few weeks have been littered with nights that almost felt like he was a newborn again, awake and restless for hours at a stretch. Needless to say, we’re exhausted and frustrated and at times tempers have flared.

As far as eating, Jonah’s doing pretty well on the whole. He can be very opinionated and still clams up for green vegetables, but he likes all of the fruits and yellow vegetables he’s had and has recently taken to pureed meat combinations for dinner. Now that he has almost eight teeth, it’s fun to give him little bits of things from the table; no matter what it is, he always makes the most awful face at first and then opens his mouth for more if he likes it.

Life is tumultuous with Jonah at 8 1/2 months. It ain’t easy, that’s for sure, but to watch him discover the world is an amazing thing.

Last week I found ping.fm thanks to a friend, Eric. This allows users to update statuses and micro-blogs across sites. So my status on twitter, facebook, and pownce are the same.

That was not enough for me. Ping connects to about 20 different services. So I have been adictivly registering to all these services. Today was bebo. What does bebo do? I dunno, but I had to sign up!

Most of these sites give you the option to scan your address book to see if anyone is already on their service. Bebo had this two. I found bebo’s screen quite confusing and that is when tragedy struck. I spammed every email address in my address book!

Crap! I wonder what fallout there will be from this and how long it will last.

Well it has been a while since I have felt like a total failure, my time was due.

Today, I help my old friend Justin move back to Chicago. Justin and I met as interns at AMS in 2001. We then roomed together our first full year out of college.

He has been in Virginia for the last 5 years and it is great to have him back. Though it is a little weird, because it is as if he is all of a sudden back in my life. (Note: I don’t communicate often with people I don’t see regularly, even if I still call you “one of my good friends”. Shout-out to Tory and Corey.)

I also met his girlfriend. She is very nice and seems like a good fit for him. She handles his fits of rage well.

Justin is back because he is starting his MBA at U of C. And get this, the little punk does not start school until September, but has a week long “team building” trip for school to Argentina! I hope he builds strong team bonds while skiing the Andes!

I discovered Muxtape today, via Kevin Rose.

Basically, you can put together online mix tapes and then other people can listen to them. Pretty nice, if you just want to listen to random music. I really like it, but it probably helps that I like just about any music that does not sound like it would be on the radio, and that these people making the mixes seem to mostly like un-pop music.

Yesterday I hung out with some of the 3 guys in Jos’ family and we went to a Cubs game. It was a lot of fun. Two of the group are from St. Louis and we saw the Cubs kick the Cards.

Like I said, a lot of fun. However, as is often the case when I am with non-tech guys I begin to feel inadequate.

I like sports. I like to watch sport. I like to cheer for sport. I know the rules and can play sports. I know when something is a pretty good play in most sports. I even like to watch Sportcenter, if nothing else is on. But, I have never had any interest in following sports.

Usually this only manifests itself in people saying “Good/Tough Year for the Cubs/Hoosier” when I am wearing a cap. I usually just a agree or say “Oh, I didn’t see the game today.” Not a lie; I didn’t see that game, but I also did not see any of the other games, or read about them, or watch the highlights, or memorize the box scores like it seems like everyone else does.

So when I hang out with guys, they will start talking about some great trade some teams made, or how so-and-so is a on a streak. Oh, and didn’t he play on the Animals a few years ago. Man, the Nowhere Native are playing as well as they did in the 80’s!

I can follow along and pretend like I get it, but wow! The nerdy math part of sports appeals to me, but it is the formulas I am interested not remembering every pitcher’s ERA.

In the end I am torn. I understand the appeal of closely following something. It is a form of nerd, just not one I have ever found attractive. I think I would like to know more so I can participate, but every time I have tried in the past I have tried I just loose interested.

Also I think of the good points to not knowing anything. The best being when I watch a game, I have no idea how someone is going to do. As far as I am concerned every batter might hit a home-run. Every pitcher has a good change at a shutout.

I wonder if there ais an RSS feed I can read that would give me just enough info to take me to the next level of guy-dom, with very little effort.