Book of the future

Have you seen Amazon’s Kindle?  Sweet!!!  ‘Nuff said.

To me, it looks like a large PDA.  At $399, it ain’t cheap.  You can buy a laptop for that much, but it won’t be as light or slim as the Kindle.  If they could combine the Kindle functionality (read a book, buy online, download a book, etc.) along with an ad-hoc note taking capability (like a tablet PC) — I’d be willing to pay a premium for that.  If they take it one step further and allow for document sync between my Kindle and the Amazon servers — and then that syncs with my PC (Linux) so I have a local copy — I’d be sold and pay a premium!  I’m thinking something along the lines of Novell iFolder, but an embedded version that I don’t have to worry about.

Abracadabra!

Thomas played a magic trick last night. He was waving Lauren’s princess wand and said, “Abracadabra Boom! Make Mommy disappear!” It just so happens that I was working downstairs in the office, so I wasn’t physically upstairs with the kids. Thomas figured that his magic trick must’ve worked since mommy wasn’t there.

Then Thomas tried to make mommy reappear again… except his magic didn’t work this time! Mommy did not reappear! Where did she go!?! Thomas, in a panic, started crying for mommy. Po-Po and Lauren were with Thomas. Po-Po said, “Thomas, STOP crying! You made mommy disappear, now just do your magic and bring mommy back!” “I can’t! LoLo - YOU DO IT! Bring mommy back!!!!” Thomas cried as he tried to shove the magic princess wand back into Lauren’s hands.

I still don’t know why he wanted to make mommy disappear, but I know he wouldn’t do it again! “It’s too hard, mommy!”

Chinese School

We take the twins to Chinese School every Sunday afternoon from 2-4PM. I don’t know if they are enjoying it or not, but I definitely dread going every week. Why? Well,… here’s a glimpse of what my 2-hour in the Chinese School is like.

Lauren & Thomas recently went through potty training (yes… you all know where I am going with this). They are not 100% trained yet, but I’d say they are 95% trained. A couple of Sundays ago, we went to Chinese School as usual. Shortly after the class started, Lauren said “mommy, mommy, my pants!!!” I look down at her pants and saw that she had already pee-peed in her pants. To my horror ~ I had to discreetly grab some tissue paper and wipe her seat while dragging her to the girls room down the hall! As we dashed for the Girl’s Restroom, I told Thomas to stay in the class room and wait for me. But of course, as soon as I got into the Girl’s Restroom, I heard him coming after us. “Alright, both of you, in to the stall with mommy. ” I quickly cleaned up Lauren as much as possible, but still needed to take her to the car to change her pants. Thomas went potty while I cleaned up Lauren. I took Thomas back to the classroom and asked one of the other moms to keep an eye on him for me while I run out to the car with Lauren.

When Lauren and I came back (which was no more than 5-10 min.), I noticed that Thomas was not in the classroom. “Where did he go?” I asked. The other mom said, “He wanted to go potty, so I sent my husband in with him.” Great, I thought. A strange man taking my son to the bathroom. I quickly went to the Boy’s Restroom just as Thomas was coming out. I thanked the man and took Thomas back into the class.

Now, I know, you must be thinking… how bad can it be right? Well… it’s just about to get even worse. To make a long story short ~ Thomas ran out of the classroom 30 sec. before it was to end (I was packing up the book bags), tugging at his pants as he ran down the hall. “Wait, Thomas! Wait for me!” I chased after him out into the hallway, only to see him running with his pants down around his ankles… yes, I had a full view of his skinny little behind… and the parents (there must’ve been 4-5 of them standing in the hallway as Thomas ran towards them) saw EVERYTHING.

“I need to go potty!!!” Thomas yelled, as he laughed and ran down the hall to the Boy’s Restroom.

Sometimes I really wonder ~ why do I put myself through this “torture” every Sunday?!

Halloween 2007

Last year we took the kids trick-or-treating around the neighborhood.  Of course they were only 2, so they got tired very quickly.  I think we went to 5 houses total and then they were too tired. They liked the candy though…  Pics here.  Of course, they still love candy today.

This year we decided to try trick-or-treating at the mall.  For the kids, they loved it.  They were dressed up as Doodlebops — Lauren was Dee Dee Doodle, and Thomas was Rooney Doodle.  What’s a Doodlebop?  They’re fun characters from a kids show out of Canada… We’ve actually been watching them for a while now, but they recently must have signed up with the Disney Corp because now they’re on the Disney Channel every day.

Sidebar:  I’ve noticed that the production special effects have been ramped up significantly too.  What used to be a pretty funny, low budget show is becoming more and more “digitized” with flashier animations and music.  Ah, gotta love that Disney effect!

They got lots of candy and goodies from the mall.  Trick or treating from store-to-store was good in that the kids got lots more candy per foot walked, so I think they had much more fun.  Also the fact that many more people were around and it wasn’t dark outside helped too.

Some stores gave out candy, some store gave out stickers.  Lauren and Thomas like both stickers AND candy, but I think Lauren likes candy even more.  After she realized that some stores were giving out stickers instead of candy, she started being prejudiced.  “I don’t want stickers… I want candy!”

Are you feeling better?

I thought this was really cute, so I had to capture it.

Thomas was sick last week so I kept him home one day. Lauren came home from school and was so excited to see Thomas.

“Hi Tommy, are you feeling better?!”

“Yeah…..”

“Alright! High 5!!”

Mommy - I have a secret to tell you…

Out of the blue one day, Thomas ran up to me and said, “Mommy, I have a secret to tell you.” He then put his little skinny arms around my neck and whispered into my ear and said, “I love you, Mommy.” (awwwhhhhhhh…. doesn’t that just melt your heart?! For all the parents out there, you all know what I mean!) I gave him a big mamabear hug and whispered into his ear, “I love you too honey!”

Meanwhile, Lauren was standing next to us witnessing all this kissing and hugging between Thomas and I, she jumped in and said, “Mommy, I have a secret to tell you too!” Thinking that she’ll say something similar, I asked, “What? What’s your secret?”

“Mommy, you are SMARTER than you think.” (This was before Lauren turned 3.)

House I helped build - the finished product

In May 2006, during a work-related trip to New Orleans, I helped build a house thru Habitat for Humanity. It was an amazing experience and I’m looking forward to the chance to do it again in the future. These are the finished products; photos taken by my colleague.

View the larger photos at Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kevinchin5/sets/72157602812426900/

10 Ways the World Could End.

From a TED talk in 2002… Stephen Petranek reviews 10 possible dooms-day scenarios and some possible solutions.  While some generate snickers and chuckles from the audience, there wasn’t one of these scenarios which is DEFINITELY not going to happen.  I think it’s interesting that these problems are just as relevant today as they were in 2002.

I’m not the only geek in the house…

Apparently I’m not the only geek/gadget-guy in the house… My 3 yr old has figured out how to fly the mini-remote-control helicopter I got for my birthday.  No, I did not show him how to do it.  He learned by simply watching me.   Kids are amazing.

Solar Panels for the home?

It’s a great idea, but the upfront costs are too high…  I visited the Sun Power website and they have a calculator that can help you estimate the cost savings and approx cost of the project.  For me they seemed to estimate about $20,000 for the panels minus a $2000 Fed Tax credit.  Plus my electric bill would be about the same.

I wish more R&D would go towards funding technological advancements of this technology.