theparkerfamily.org

  • ipod

    I’ve been without my music for about six weeks now.

    I really only use my iPod during work or commute (and I’ve been on leave) and then something got nosed up in Austin that caused all my music to disappear.

    so, when I finally got things straigtened out last night, it was a bit like the scene from it’s a wonderful life when Jimmy Stewart runs up and down mainstreet:

    Look, it’s the good old Sleater-Kinney! And there’s Kate Nash! Kathleen Edwards! Oh, Liz Phair, perhaps I missed you most of all.

    it’s probably a sign i need therapy … or better taste in music.

  • nanny, nanny

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    we have a nanny(-share)!

    back before christmas, we found a great family about six blocks away (still in mount pleasant) and started interviewing candidates earlier this year.

    we had a couple hickups along the way, including one candidate who said (as the wife of a diplomat) we weren’t required to pay taxes on her salary … which was great, until we check with hillary clinton’s state department and found out (less than four hours after we sent the email!) that it was sadly not true.

    for the record, it’s amazing how the gaze a tax-and-spend progressive starts wandering at the notion of (legally!) not paying taxes.

    so, we forged on and finally found our nanny. she’s got a decade of experience — including tons of early-childhood education study — and a real drive to get the kids out of the house. the crazy thing is that she’s also a DC-native-who-still-lives-here, which (baby sparklet excluded) i thought only existed at the hypothetical/mythological level.

    anyway, she starts for us on March 1st … the other family joins in on April 1st (their baby is a bit younger) when the whole nanny-ing operation will switch over to run out of their (much larger) brownstone.

    but the main thing is that we’ve got a nanny we love — which is a good thing, because it’s a little late to get baby sparklet on any daycare waiting lists.

  • week nineteen

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    photo of the week // week nineteen

  • “don’t make me go all ‘sic semper tyrannis’ on you, raggedy ann.”

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    See All the Photos on Flickr:
    playtime, washington, dc

  • belated valentine’s, pt 2

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    we made it to ben’s for lunch, so we are up to five out of the last seven valentine’s days … though this is (obviously) the first for sparklet.

    we actually tried to go yesterday — a saturday at ~5:00pm — but the place was packed out the door. turns out the trick is to go on sunday morning at 11am. apparently, ben’s is pre-hangover food, not post-hangover food … i guess it makes sense when you think it through.

    See All the Photos on Flickr:
    valentine’s at ben’s chili bowl, washington, dc

  • belated valentine’s, pt 1

    for belated valentine’s day — delayed due to that whole Austin/snow thing — sparklet and i chipped in for a photo album that the lady sparkler can keep in her work bag, so that she can gaze longingly at baby whenever she feels the urge.

    the photo album has one photo a week going back to sparklet’s birth … which seemed like such a good idea, that i’ve put the whole thing live as a ‘photo of the week’ tag on the blog.

    next up, we need to make our annual valentine’s pilgrimage to ben’s chili bowl … and the lady sparkler and i are working on a separate album (one of all the guestbook photos we’ve taken so far) to give to sparklet.

  • fire al trautwig

    it’s winter olympics season at the sparkler household, and that means it’s time to get angry and the god-aweful commentary for olympic sports. here are some of my favorites:

    for some, this morning started with agony and shock.

    someone had fallen off the cross-country track.

    these are biathlon fans. they know when to cheer … when the target is hit!

    piercing insight there, friend.

    spillane looks solid for the gold if he can stand up right here. spillane’s got it … america breaks through!

    actually, spillane did *not* get it. in all the jingo-istic excitement, the commentator seems to have missed that a frenchman came in first.

    in the previous three olympics, this man has left with nothing but the memories.

    … nothing besides a gold medal.

    we have a deep russian team. then, the americans. then, the russians … that’s your trilogy.

    russians, americans, russians. yup, that’s three.

    he’s a bit the germaphobe … always taking purell around with him. he doesn’t drink except for the occasional swig of cognac to cleanse his mouth of germs.

    tmi. not quite to the clintonian/jacksonian/woodsian level, but seriously … he can sleep upside down in a hyperbolic chamber, and it’s none of my/our/your business.

    i wish i could just blame NBC as a whole (and i may later) but each one of these linguistic “gems” was said by the same man … NBC olympic commentator al trautwig.

    if the name sounds familiar, it should.

    he is the same #*&%$ who brought you grotesquely over-wrought commentary for NBC’s gymnastics coverage in Beijing (including his 2008 pièce-de-résistance, lamenting “a catastrophe of epic proportions” when Alicia Sacramone fell on a floor routine).

    seriously, NBC … you’ve paid $3.5 billion for the rights to cover the Olympics since 1999, so maybe it’s about time you read the founding principles of the Games:

    The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.

    i don’t think it’s much of an exaggeration to say that mr. trautwig’s over-wrought hyperboles are undermining the very games he’s covering.

    exiling trautwig from gymnastics to cross-country/biathalon coverage (while quite the statement about his perceived worth) isn’t enough. the problem is, he doesn’t have the commentary skills to cover little league matches in the Parkersburg, West Virginia.

    if he’s under a contract you can’t get out of, let me suggest you transfer him to KXGN in Glendive, Montana. as a parking attendant.

  • dear kate

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    dear kate,

    well, it’s the last full day of our paternity leave together.

    we’ve spent the morning at the ice skating rink on the National Mall — where we saw an ice skating Nun, and the four foot tall snow drifts that kept you in Texas for so long — and the afternoon at the Natural History museum.

    of course, after spending the last 10 nights sleeping in a flimsy pack-and-play, you’ve been asleep pretty much non-stop for the last 18 hours, so I’m not banking on you remembering much.

    so, just in case you don’t remember our wonderful talk today, I want to thank you again for the last four weeks. i don’t toss out religious imagery much (I’m what your Mom would call a stuffy-bottomed Episcopalian) but our time together has really been a blessing.

    due to your Daddy’s inability to sit still, we’ve done an exhausting metric ton to keep us busy: a week home sick; trips to American Indian and American Art museums; walks around the Georgetown Waterfront and the National Aquarium; not to mention that “bonus” week we had in Austin.

    however, the parts that I have loved the most are the little things in between … like today sitting together at a cafe, making goofy faces on the Metro, watching your face light up at every kind of light source you can imagine.

    part of what made today extra special was that, after carrying you around for much of the day, you started wailing each time I tried to put you down. i am sure that it was just gas, or maybe a diaper rash … but i’m going to pretend that you knew this time together was coming to an end, and wanted to be held just a little bit longer.

    you are just a good-natured baby, and have been incrediably patient with Mommy and Daddy as we’ve been broken-in as parents.

    people told us from the very beginning how babies put everything in perspective, and while Mommy and I smiled and nodded at the advice at the time, the last four months with you have shown this to us in ways words could never explain.

    with that in mind, let me say that we love you in ways that you may never fully understand, at least not until you have a little sparklet of your very own. (and if that’s the case, that’s fine with us.)

    we both know that things will change over the years — we’re guessing you’ll hate mommy at the onset of puberty, and daddy once you start dating — but our love for you will be as constant as the stars you seem to love so much.

    all the love in the world,
    mommy and daddy

  • exodus

    we’re back, and it looks like DC had every bit as much “fun” as we thought while we were gone.

    while we were out, one of our favorite ways of keeping up with the snow was by following darrow montgomery’s photos at washington city paper’s blog. the above photo was taken about 100 feet from our place (for those who know Mount Pleasant, that “open” sign is at Heller’s Bakery) during the height of the second storm.

    i can’t really fathom what it must have been like.

    in the end, our long weekend in Austin for Auntie Nadine’s wedding turned out to be an 11 day journey. and, based on the size of the snow drifts, it seems being “stuck” in 40 degrees-and-rainy Austin was probably the best option.

    still, it’s good to be home.

    PHOTO: the above photo is courtesy Darrow Montgomery and/or the Washington City Paper. check out the rest of Darrow’s work, and the City Desk blog.

  • out: ladybird johnson wildflower center

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    See All the Photos on Flickr:
    out: ladybird johnson wildflower center