Hmmmm.....

Why No Internet?

The guy from Comcast figured out what caused our loss of internet connection, it turns out I accidentally plugged the router adapter into the modem jack and the modem adapter into the router jack and apparently this is what electricians and communication experts refer to as a bad idea. The modem fried - fortunately it was rental. Now we are renting a brand new one.

The Zaheeda Issue

Though this site is supposed to be for updating friends, family and well wishers on the comings and goings of Maya, I can’t help but take an opportunity to use this forum for the general airing of grievances about Zaheeda. I understand she is pregnant, and that being pregnant brings a certain level of fatigue and discomfort. But it is my opinion she is using this condition to exhort extraordinary concessions, favors and assistance from her immediate family members - more specifically, me. When she was pregnant with Maya she worked eight hours days, standing on her feet at TJ Maxx dealing with obnoxious customers all day, and I don’t remember her being that worn out when she got home. Now it seems after 5:30 PM she’s done for the day and all remaining obligations and commitments fall directly to me. What am I do or say? To say anything would leave me looking like a self-centered jerk. Well, I am not going to bite my tongue any longer. I’m not going to sit back and quietly submit to this familial slavery. It is not a question of do I, or do I not want to do certain tasks... No no - this is about right and wrong. This is about justice. I stand before the world and say, “I am being taken advantage of by a pregnant lady!”

We are down for a couple days

We've been having technical difficulties, our cable modem seems to have died, and we have no internet. The only way we can post this is by getting on through the neighbors wireless signal. Rhyme Time with Maya is being delayed for the week. The Comcast guy is going to be out tomorrow aftrernoon to rectify the problem.

Christmas Tree

Zaheeda is in the process of putting up the Christmas tree. I say in the process, because the tree is in the stand and in the living room and all the ornaments are in boxes around the tree but it is taking awhile to get it all put together. Since Zaheeda's been pregnant things seem to take a little longer than they did before - it will get done eventually though, she may be losing a little speed but remains diligent.

Thanksgiving

We along with millions of other fools will be hitting the road this weekend for the Thanksgiving holiday - Zaheeda has the bags packed, the ipod charged and we are ready to go.

Celebration of Cultures

At school today all the kids in Maya's class brought a dish native to their ancestors home country. Maya being the culmination of a whole mixture of cultures decided on Guyanese food and brought plantain chips to share with the class. We figured this was better than paying homage to her Swedish ancestry since nobody in their right mind would want to eat Scandinavian food.

Rhyme Time with Maya #2

Winter Winds, by Robert Frost

Laboratory Tests Conclude

How can you argue with science?

Baking Day

Maya was hard at work in the kitchen today making pizza and bread. Everything turned out pretty good

Here she is eating her pizza. The only toppings we had were cheese and black olives but it seemed to work.

Here she is with the french bread (or liberty bread, as it's referred to in the congressional cafeteria).

Not The Daily Show

This is for Maya's Grandma who is probably going through some The Daily Show withdrawal.

Late Night Snacks

Living with a pregnant woman is not all bad however. Last night it was 10:30PM and I was hungry, so I started looking all over for something good to eat - and by good I mean not fruit. As luck would have it I found the perfect food in the freezer downstairs - microwavable vegetarian corn dogs! To my surprise Zaheeda agreed to have some too - she's become much more open minded about these late night snack things since becoming pregnant. So I made the corn dogs and we laid in bed and watched TMZ. Yep.... Lying in bed, eating corn dogs and watching TMZ - I guess you could say we are pretty much living the dream.

Victim of Circumstances

In reading the baby news for this week their advice to fathers is:

“Living with a pregnant woman is not always easy.... “

Well I say amen to that. I realize now that when she gets upset about having to pay for new computers (and computer related accessories) it’s not about me, it’s the pregnancy. I’m just a victim of circumstances.

More Penguin News

The other day Maya asked me if I would pay for her to become a member at Club Penguin - this being the website she visits to hang out with her friends from school where they are all little penguin avatars. The benefit of becoming a member of Club Penguin is that you can spend all the virtual coins you’ve earned by doing different activities to buy virtual stuff for your penguin. The catch is, it takes real coins to get the privilege of spending the virtual coins. Well I said no. I could have gone into a long spiel about how when I was a kid I rarely even got quarters to play Ms. Pac Man, but I simply said no - because parenting like art is all about drawing lines, and I chose to draw one at the paying of money to buy things for a computer generated penguin.

Futurama Day again

Maya has successfully done her practicing 45 minutes every day for another month so that means she gets another season of Futurama. When you think about it she should just practice because she's supposed to and we shouldn't have to resort to this bribery just to get her to play her violin. Nobody buys us presents for doing the things we are required to do.... (These are the words of a man who is begrudging the fact that he has to fork over $19.99)

The Behavior Again

Lately Maya has been having difficulty listening, be it when her mother tells her to take a bath, brush her teeth or put on lotion. She has also been doing a lot of sassing back, stomping around the house and being generally disagreeable. Needless to say her popularity around the house is dropping faster than Tom Cruise's Hollywood box office receipts, and if this trend continues this normally happy home will grow to be an ever increasingly unpleasant place for her to reside.

Rhyme Time

We've finally launched Maya's weekly poem reading podcast. You can get to the podcast here, and once you get to the site you can either click on the episode you want to listen to (which there is only one so far...) and listen to it online, or you can click the subscribe button and it will download to iTunes automatically every time we post a new episode - we will try to have a new one every Monday. Also you will notice that we included pictures and links in the artwork window if you would like more info, to read along, etc. Hope you enjoy.

New Look

Decided to give the site a face lift. No real reason for doing so other than I was beginning to tire of the old one.

Changing

Maya started helping Zaheeda change diapers on the daycare babies today. I was thinking that when her little brother or sister arrives we could make Maya the official diaper changer. If she does a good job maybe we can move her up to burp and puke responsibilities.

Writers Strike

Maya doesn't know a lot about contracts, royalties and residuals but she does know what shows she likes and in this picture it is pretty clear that Larry David is not writing Curb Your Enthusiasms and Matt Groening is not writing Simpsons or Futuramas - well this labor dispute better resolve itself quickly.

X-Wing Launch

This is cool! Why is it cool? Well, it just is.

Leaves

Today is the last day of the week for Maya as tomorrow she's off from school again. Boy she seems to have a lot of days off, doesn't she? I'm going to suggest she rakes the leaves up tomorrow - she started that project on Saturday and only made a little pile of leaves and then came inside. Apparently the thought of raking leaves is much more fun than the actual raking of leaves.

First Glimpse of Snow

Maya said she saw the first snow of the season yesterday, Oh how exciting! Soon winter will be here, and of course that means Christmas, and of course that means presents, and of course that means happiness. Isn't snow wonderful?

Weekend with nothing to do

First weekend in a long time that we've had nothing to do - no lessons, no concerts, nothing - and we did nothing.

Zaheeda playing with Photo Booth

We couldn't do this with our old computer, so surely this justifies the price of the new one.

If Ever You Tire of Gizzy

The perfect pet. Do you think he catches squirrels?

Hard at work in MayaMac Studio

Maya's working hard on a new project at MayaMac Studio that should be completed in the next week - we would tell you what it is, but this is what's known in the business as a teaser. She is really turning into the consummate recording professional and approaches her work with a focused even keeled professionalism that is well beyond her years. Hopefully this is not cause for a rift in our relationship as the years progress. Sure she's all cute now but when she's sixteen and tells me she wants a bigger cut of the t-shirt sales... Well, lets just hope it doesn't come to that.

Worst Book Title Ever

Isosceles Cheese

Ice Cream Social

I have to take Maya to the Ice Cream Social at the school tonight, which would be a fun thing to do if it weren't for the pesky socializing part of the deal. Zaheeda seems to be getting out of a lot of these kinds of things lately, in fact ever since she's gotten pregnant she being slacking on a whole host of tasks and responsibilities. Anyway, I'm going to take Maya and we'll have a good time. Maya can eat ice cream with her friends and I'll talk with the mothers... Yes it's always the mothers. Maybe we can discuss the difficulties of dressing kids modestly these days (see our post from 10/29), you know with the influence of The Brats and The Pussy Cat Dolls and all. What's a mother, I mean a father to do? Or the the outrageous price of Hanna Montana tickets... Do you know what the ticket brokers were charging to see her at the Excel Center? But what's a father, I mean a mother to do? The kids love Hanna Montana... What are you supposed to say? 'No you can't go see Hanna Montana, why don't you stay home and read a book?' They will think you are totally not with it....

So yeah... We're going to the ice cream social.