On Friday evening, we took the kids to go see Santa.

We had also tried to go see the big man the previous Friday, getting in line early but seeing the gross inefficiency of the line made us retreat. I waited in line with Lily for a good forty five minutes, to only see the line advance about twice.

We went to The Shops at Southglenn to go see Santa there. They have a big courtyard that is usually lit up with lots of Christmas lights year-round, and in years past, Santa has been outside near a big outdoor fireplace and under those lights. Except, last year, apparently Santa got pneumonia from sitting outside in the cold. So they moved to a different spot indoors.

The other ‘bonus’ about this is that it was free, and you are to bring your own camera to take pictures. Taking large volumes of pictures is something I am very, very good at.

So at about five o’clock on Friday evening, with cameras, kids, and gadgets in tow, we headed over to see Santa.

There was a small line. In front of us was a couple with a thirteen-month-old daughter. She and Lily were getting along just fine. Lily was in a great mood, smiling at everybody, clapping, and she was totally enamored with the lights and trees and decorations.

Owen went first, and he did really well given the last two years. I think he’s starting to get the association now. I also think he’ll be really sad when Christmas is over.

By ‘really sad’ I mean that he’ll probably be upset for about five minutes before moving on to something else, like with trick-or-treating at Halloween. The night after Halloween, after dinner he went and put on his hat and jacket and announced he was ready to go trick-or-treating again. We explained it was a once a year thing, and he just said “Oh, okay!” This reminds me that I need to get an audio recording of him saying this, because he says it in a very funny way.

Then we tried both kids together. I mentioned earlier that Lily was in a great mood, which you most likely (and correctly) understood was a precursor to this photo:

The bonus here is that you also get to see the peril of being your own photographer. It was a little dark in there, even with the teeny pop-up flash on the camera. Eventually the little Santa Sock Monkey won out, and she calmed down a bit.

Owen was excited to get outside and see more Christmas lights, so we kind of hung around a bit before going to dinner at Diego Zhang’s. We had never been, but in totally awesome family night style, we had a coupon and decided to give it a try.

It was a slider restaurant – tiny burgers. Lots of variety. Lots of small dishes. Then we rushed home to put the tired babies (and mama) to bed.

These things are the new best part of Christmas. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. And I don’t want to forget.

As much as I try and convince myself it isn’t true, I probably do want to own the Star Wars hexalogy on blu-ray. It’s kind of shameful.

But, know that for all the time I could’ve been arguing against myself in this post, I instead spent looking up hexalogy. Because sexology? Totally not the same thing.

I heard that Deus Ex: Human Revolution was a good game. And it’s $20 now, down from the $60 price tag.

I played the ‘first’ one back in 2001, but never finished it. I remember enjoying what I played of it before something else new and shiny came along. Joe liked it a lot, and generally Joe and I have the same tastes in games.

Except for UT insta-gay. Hate that crap.

Yesterday was busy.

Lily is officially nine months old, which is crazy to think about. Time doesn’t seem to go fast until you’re looking back and being introspective.

Compare:

Man.

I have been trying to use the video camera a lot more lately. In the very first video I took of Owen sleeping in this chair I remember sleepily, incoherently, and emotionally rambling how I never wanted to forget any of the moments, ever. But I have – we all do.

One day when I have a lot of time, I need to go through and prune our photo collection and get rid of photos like this one:

And, I need to actually edit and blend out the multiple videos I’ve gotten of anything that has ever been videotaped over the past three years. When?

Today we’re taking the kids to see Santa at our local uber-mall. This mall is kind of funny, because prior to 2008 it was all extremely high-end and very expensive shops and boutiques. Now it’s a handful of higher-end shops with a bunch of random filler thrown in. It should be a good time.

In other news, Lily just crawled across the floor, pulled herself up on the coffee table (the pulling up is new today) and spilled Owen’s water. Owen dutifully got a towel, wiped it up, and tried to put Lily in time out.

In 2007, when the Rockies went to the world series I obtained a fitted baseball cap, which is probably the first hat I’ve ever had that has properly fit my head.

Mom & Dad got Owen his Virginia Tech (or if you ask him go Hokies) hat a few years ago, and it still fits. He won’t go outside these days without his hat on. “I need my shoes, hat, and jacket, Daddy.”

I don’t have a go Hokies hat. I’d like one that fits, so that Grandpa, Daddy, and Owen can all have go Hokies hats.

Today has been a crappy day at work. I don’t think it is any more or less crappy than your typical crappy day at work. But I usually get a few minutes here and there to assemble a post. Today I haven’t had that time.

But, in the likes of unicorns and honest politicians, for Christmas I’d like a decent manager who is good at his job. Maybe I’m being unfair, but I feel like I’ve got a pretty honest appraisal at this point.

So obviously I haven’t updated in a while until fairly recently. The blog has been more or less dormant since Lily was born.

In the last week or so I’ve picked up the pace a bit, posting once a day or so. And in that time, I went from having zero spam comments to about fifty spam comments. It all coincides with when I started updating. Crazy.

So, far this writing – even though it’s mostly shameless self promotion, has made me realize a lot of things.

In between the lines of a lot of that analysis and crap are a bunch of things I subconsciously would like, without actually realizing it. Well, I guess I realize it now anyway.

When looking at yesterday’s post from the BBQ Brethren forums, particularly the pictures from the post about bbq ribs and other pictures along the way to that post, I noticed that all of those cuts are nearly perfect, with no tearing or off-grain mess.

For big cuts of meat like a brisket, flank steaks, ribs – I have been using our Wusthof 9″ Chef’s knife which I keep very sharp. It works well, but it is difficult to get a uniform cut.

A long time ago, when we got married, we registered for an electric carving knife. And we did get one – but when we opened the box, it was empty. And due to the weirdness of registry gift buying and shipping and whatnot, it basically never got resolved.

It dawned on me yesterday that with the amount of barbecue that our house generates, it would be totally sweet to have an electric carving knife. Then it dawned on me that I haven’t smoked any pork ribs in a while. Yay, weekend!

If you head over to the BBQ BRETHREN forums, you will find a trove of barbecue knowledge from professionals and enthusiasts.

Also, lots of food porn and even more food porn.

One thing I have learned from these forums is that there is an abundance of bbq rubs, seasonings, and sauces that I have never heard of before. One brand that seems to be uniformly appreciated and loved is the Oakridge BBQ brand.

I can’t say I’d have use for the venison rub – though apparently that’s what got them started. The single person who runs this front was perfecting a venison rub for his buddies at deer camp one season. And now we’re here. The habanero death dust seems to be popular on the forums, but I can think of approximately zero folks that live in my house day to day that would be interested in eating something rubbed with habanero death dust.

You’ve probably noticed that we like to take pictures with our dSLR.

We have an older entry level Canon Rebel Xsi. We have it paired with a 4GB eye.fi card, which is an SD memory card with a tiny wifi transmitter. This means that whenever we take a photo with our dSLR, it is automatically uploaded first to my PC, and then to THE CLOUD™ via Picasaweb online storage.

So film is truly free – yes, we could fill our 4 GB card, but since photos taken at home are uploaded in almost real time, this is hardly ever an issue. Plus, it takes care of the backup situation for us by putting it on my PC, where it gets backed up (also automatically) onto an external USB hard drive. And then, as indicated, THE CLOUD™!!!!

Often times we like to take pictures at a very rapid rate, and our little pansy pop-up flash struggles to keep up. I’ve been reading about the bigger, battery op flashes – and while you can spend up to $500 on a flash – something more reasonable, like this one here, would be something nice to have.

Potentially, we could take better pictures, faster!