Strong Hearts and the Joys of Cereal

After all of our experiences, and hearing many similar stories from friends and co-workers, I can safely say that the one thing all parents go through is the "Just to Be Sure" syndrome. Two weeks ago the Missus brought Jack in for his 4-month checkup. The doctor performed the usual tests and measurements. All good. He checked his pelvis, ears, eyes...all perfect. Then he listened to his heart, like he did at every visit.

"hmmm."

This is not the sound you wnat your doctor to make when listening to your child's heart. The doctor told the Missus that he could hear a whoosing sound, which could be an indication of something called a functional heart murmur. This in and of itself could be nothing, but sometimes a functional murmur can be a by-product of something more serious.

"It's most likely nothing, but JUST TO BE SURE, I'd like to have some tests run on Jack." So a week later we wound up at St Francis Heart Center for an EKG and an echocardiogram and a consultation from resident super-doctor Sean Levchuck. Sure enough, the Doctor told us that not only was Jack perfectly fine, but the sound was due to his heart being exceptionally strong, and that when it pumps the blood through the valves, the massive strength (my words, not his) caused everything to vibrate slightly.

No matter how much you convince yourself that there's nothing wrong, that everyting's going to turn out okay, to actually hear the words is a thrill and a relief that knows no equal. We went home and celebrated with the boy's first taste of semi-solid food - rice cereal:

First results? Not so good. Apparently a life of getting food shot directly down your throat via the latest in Nipple Delivery Technology doesn't give you patience to actually chew and swallow your food. Jack eventually leaned so far back he threatened to pop out of his chair.

The very next morning? It was like he discovered the Elixer of Life. We couldn't get the food down fast enough. 2 minutes after this picture was taken, he had gotten food over 87% of his body and had managed to pry the spoon away from my hand twice.

The boy may look like his Mother, but he eats like his Dad.

One Link, One Video

I've been sitting on a couple links I kept meaning to share, but apparently kept forgetting.

1. Subject: Death Metal - I'm not a big fan of Homestar Runner, but Sean sent me this link months ago, knowing my penchant for the Death Metal. And with the second season of Metalocalypse now showing on Cartoon Network, the release of the Dethklok album as well as the news that Brenden Smalls will actually be touring as Dethklok this year (with a little help from a few of my favorite musicians), I thought now was a good time to share this: http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail141.html
2. Talking Cats - This was something from my trip to Austin, Texas. My friend Steve is many things, but chief among them seems to be "lover of cat jokes." I am informed by his wife that Steve can spend hours amusing himself on the (I guess) popular website stuffonmycat.com. Normally this type of stuff does nothing for me, but when Steve told me about a video of cats actually talking, I was intrigued, moreso when he attempted to emulate one of the cat's bizarre conversation. I won't anything by going into it; instead simply watch the video below. It makes me crack up every time.
   Talking Cats - The best free videos are right here

Baptized!

Yesterday, amidst a flurry of frantic activity including missing socks and car keys, last-minute cleaning, a mix-up concerning Amaretto versus Amaretto creme, and the inevitable chaos that comes with having a large Italian family in a small house, we managed to Baptize the boy. Despite some initial misgivings on the part of your truly, we opted for the "Chef Boyardee" look - complete with mini chef hat:

I like it. It works, and Jack was pretty content wearing a funny hat for a few hours.

Both the Missus and I were concerned about what his temperament for the day would be - the past few days he's been waking up every 3 hours at night screaming to be fed, and during the day he's been refusing to nap and can go 6-7 hours perfectly content to not eat. And God Bless him, up until about 5 minutes before we were called up to perform the actual ceremony he was the proverbial Little Angel, all eyes and cooing. Here is the scene a few moments later:

I can only assume that, at the last minute he was having some second thought about "doing this whole Christian thing." However, the actual reason for his screams are far more mundane:

Bottle time, baby. When they want to eat, they want to eat NOW!

After that he was great, the whole family came back to the house for some drinks and snacks before heading out to the party proper at our favorite little restaurant. All in all a great day, and seeing so many people I call "family" gathered to celebrate with us caused a lump to rise in my throat, only to move South and settle as a warm glow in my heart.

In Which We Once Again (Gladly) Set Ourselves Up for Failure

Let it be known here and now that I'm fully aware October is rearing its ugly head, which means it's once again time for me to attempt to review a given number of horror films, only to fall miserably short again.

Will that stop me from trying? HELLS NO!

So my modest goal this year is just to beat last year's grand total of 12 (I never finished my review of KAIRO (PULSE) and will probably fail again this year). As always, I'm currently taking requests: if there's a horror movie you love, or even a horror movie you hate and want to see if I hate it, too - let me know! My only guidelines are:

1. It can't be a movie I've already reviewed on this site.
2. It has to readily available - either at the local theater, rental house or on Netflix...I'm not afraid to spend a few bucks to see or purchase a flick, but I'm not going to shell out $39.99 for some Danish import with no subtitles.

I already have a few titles lined up that run the gamut of old, new, cult, foreign...you get the picture. Anyway, here's a little of what you can expect:

SEE...the sweat drip off my brow as I approach the end of October only to suddenly realize that once again MAD LOVE was watched and never written up, despite my overwhelming love for it!!!

HEAR...screams of anger and disgust as my wife walks in to find me huddled under the blankets watching TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE with my 4-month old son...again!!!

FEEL...the dripping sourness and exhaustion as I pound away on the keyboard at 3:30 in the morning before work trying to finish my review of THE BIRD WITH THE CRYSTAL PLUMAGE as my 5th cup of coffee slowly plays havoc with my digestive system!!!

Yup...should be fun.

Glitch--UPDATED

Seems my post on making the tomato sauce is suffering from a wicked case of Gremlins. I swear all the pics were working late last night when I fed that cute Mogwai my Snickers bar...

uh-oh.

Fixes should be up by this evening.

UPDATE: Uh, not sure, but I re-sized the pics and re-published, so the Tomato Sauce post should be showing pictures again.