A Rose by any other name

Well, we're still a ways off from the birthing day of little one and already there have been several requests to know if it's a boy or a girl and what we're going to name it. So here it is! We might divulge whether it's a boy or girl, but the name we are going to lock down!! If you must know, we do have the names narrowed and they do not include 'Henrietta' for a girl or 'Jakwon' for a boy.

Also, contrary to what one might think and knowing my love of the outdoors it won't be named, Hunter, Gunner, Gunnar, Trapper, Remington, Buck, Magnum (Although Magnum PI would be an awesome name to have and a good chance he would have a Ferrari someday), Gage or Thirty Ought Six. If it's a girl, it will not be Flora, Fawna, Fawn, Bambi, Rose, Autumn, Summer, Spring or Winter.

After watching the Dolphins play the last few weeks I am growing more fond of 'Pennington Miller'...........

Oh yes, almost forgot! The crib that Katies mom so graciously bought us was assembled by me the other day. Katie was a little worried after reading the reviews of it online, most people said it was much to difficult to put together. Most struggled for hours, some for days. Granted, there were some intricacies with it that probably require 4 sets of hands, but one person can do it if you don't mind putting in a bolt to hold something while you attach something else, then take that one out to make attachments elsewhere.

My point tho is, that the people that took 3 hours to 5 days to put this together are probably people that looked at the tool list and had to go BUY the screwdriver necessary to complete the task, then freak out when they saw that some screwdrivers are flat and other have little crosses on the end. Hopefully they didn't move down the row at Lowes to see the star head or hex head drivers. Anyways, I got it all put together in an hour or so and I'm not exactly Norm Abrahms. Here is the finished product:

Beings this is the last day of 2008, Happy New Years to everyone! I resolve in the new year to do two things.

1.) Have a baby.

2.) Find PI to the 10 millionth decimal place.

Figure I can go 50% on this one...........

P.S. Kaylan, quit asking me every day what they names are going to be
P.P.S. Kaylan wanted a shoutout in the blog so there is your shoutout.

Honey, I Shrunk The House

Well, Katie got a baptism by fire over the Christmas holiday. I think shes more used to quiet, laid back holidays with her family, 5 or 6 people, some food, a few games and generally just relaxing.

Christmas with the Miller side is a little more fast paced. Growing up, the house seemed small with 7 people in it, but not to the point where you turned around and someone was right there. Add 15 more people to the mix and things get a little hairier. It's like the entire house had shrunk since I moved out after college. Breakfast is conducted in 3 rooms, gift opening takes 2 1/2 hours and there's a constant stream of kids running everywhere.

In the past, I always just grabbed a few guns and went out hunting if things got too hectic in the house. Not that I didn't this year as well. Only this time Katie came along for the ride. I could tell she was thoroughly enjoying herself watching me tool around the countryside listening to sports radio and stopping every mile to look at something thru the binoculars. She did get to see some spectacular shooting on my part and learned where 50 people she'll never meet live or used to live. "See that clump of trees there?" "Used to be a house there. Herb Johnson used to live there until about '85, nobody lives there now." Enthralling.

Buck or Doe? We dont' know.

Going in for the ultrasound is kind of like downloading pics from a trailcam, you never know what you might see.

Are you going to get this?

Or this?

Little One decided not to be very cooperative this morning and never really gave us a good look at his/her face and they couldn't tell the sex either. After awhile the mystery became whether or not Katie was going to pee her pants or not. She didn't.

I wasn't too concerned about finding out what it was at this point anyways. We'll know sooner or later. The better news is that there was toes, fingers, two hands, two legs, two feet, nice round little head and a 4 chamber heart. I'm assuming those are all good things.

Faithfully submitted this 23rd day of December, 2008.
Douglas C. Neidermyer
Sgt. At Arms

The Ghost and the Darkness

Even though our apt is very nice, relatively new as well. Late 90's I would guess that it was built, there are a few "quirks" that one has to deal with. One of them is that the landlord "Chuck", (whom I've yet to meet in person, but imagine to look somewhat like Dwayne F. Schneider From "One Day At A Time" fame), hasn't grasped the concept of snow removal from his properties very well yet.
I'd like to take him aside and explain, "Now, from about November to April, this portion of the Earth is further away from the sun, you know what that is right? That big yellow thing in the sky that you used to stare at as a child? Anyway, when it's further away and water falls out of the sky, it freezes and turns to snow, got that?" I would imagine him to be nodding at this point. "When this 'snow' falls and the wind blows, it gets into great big piles." "That's when you come along and remove the snow, like we pay you to do." I think he's waiting for the spring melt to take care of it

I don't know how far it would get with him either. He's the same landlord that told Katie's brother over the phone that the root cause of his dishwasher noise was a pistachio that had fallen in there. Not that something had fallen in there, but specifically a pistachio. I'm going to refrain from calling him if I can.

Me: "Chuck, garage door is broke"

Chuck: "Probably a rouge elephant that ran into it"

Me: "Chuck, security lights went out on the outside of the building."

Chuck: "Alien attack. Without doubt. Gohrknids from Nebula 12 shooting lasers at them. Only logical explanation."

Anyways, what I wanted to tell you about today is the fact that there is this cold spot in the house. It exists specifically in the bedroom. The rest of the house, including the kitchen floor maintains a constant 102.8 degrees regardless of what you set the temp at, but the bedroom stays at a cool 64. Mind you this isn't an overly large apartment so I'm perplexed as to how the temp can vary that greatly between spaces 12 feet from each other.

I have two theories. One is that these apartments are the standard, crappy, cookie cutter ones that the builders in town pump out. Put in shoddy insulation, bad pipes and generally the cheapest materials they can find in order to overcharge people rent as quickly as possible.

The other theory, and Katie won't like this........ Chuck had these built on an old Indian Burial ground...... In essence, the building is haunted by the ghost of Chief Two-Feathers, or someone similar to that name. I tend to think this more to be the case. Nothing concrete to substantiate my theory, just a gut feeling.

So, if anyone knows a good medium I could get in touch with, that would be great.

Thanks.

Your Friend,
Scott

I'm a pickin....... AND I'm a grinnin!!

Man I miss Hee Haw. Kidding. It was a cool show and everything, good for a laugh and something that I'll hover over still, while channel surfing. Whatever happened to that show? I don't think it was ever cancelled, think one day nobody showed up anymore cuz they were passed on or in an old folks home. Hee Haw was one of those "marker shows" - it came on at like 7:00 or something on a Saturday night back in the day, when it was on, you knew that it was the start of the end of the weekend. Like on Friday nights, my Mom would watch Falcon Crest and Dallas, we'd watch too, not because we liked it, but because she would probably make popcorn and we'd get to eat most of it. Those shows marked the start of the weekend.

Where was I though? Oh yeah, nowhere yet. I kind of hinted at the subject in the title, but where I was going with this was that about 5 years ago I bought this guitar. Nothing fancy, bout a $120 Fender Squire 6 string. I was gonna learn to play the damn guitar. Growing up, my dad played guitar and he was pretty good. I think before 7 kids he had a band and rocked the greater Renville and Bottineau County area on weekends, but by the time we were old enough to listen he more or less did weddings and funerals, maybe Bar Mitvah's if there had been any Jewish population in the area, which there wasn't. He had a fairly wide selection that he'd play for us, Jim Croce's "Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown", The Batman Theme Song, The Gatlin Brothers "Midnight Choir". Leroy Brown and Midnight Choir stick out in my mind because if we sang along we got to say 'damn' and 'hell' without fear of retribution, which for an 8 year old is pretty cool.

Anyways, I would ask him from time to time how he learned to play. Said he taught himself as a kid, heard notes and strummed and changed fingering until it sounded right, put the notes together and formed songs. Simple enough I thought. I figured one day when I had an hour or two to spare I'd teach myself as well. That day came about 5 years ago. I bought the guitar, which came with this nice little "How to Play Guitar: The Fender Method". Damn!! Double bonus! I can cut my leaning time down to a 1/2 and hour and be impressing chicks at house parties by the weekend.

Page one: Welcome. Skip it.
Page two: Chords. Okay, G........ strum. Sounds good. Okay, C.......... strum. Sounds good.
Page three: First song. "Mary Had a Little Lamb". G,C,D,C,G,C,G,D. Piece 'O cake!!
Pages four to the end: Bunch of stupid songs that nobody will ever want to hear. Skip all of them and lets go to the internet to find guitar tab for Stairway to Heaven.

"Shit...... This is hard." Ok, lets stay away from Zepplin. How bout some George Strait. Chicks will dig a good George Strait ballad........ "Wow, this is really hard". "Ok, Duke is on ESPN, we'll learn the guitar tomorrow night."

Thats pretty much how the last 5 years have went. Brief periods of concentrated learning, followed by aggravation and layers of dust collecting on the guitar. I can struggle through a few songs. Kenny Rogers "Lucille", Staind "Excess Baggage", a Hootie and the Blowfish song or two and the intro to Dueling Banjos. Thats the extent of it.

I don't get it either! I'm not a great athlete, but isn't music kind of like sports? Hand/eye coordination, timing? When I was little, I picked up a ball and threw it. When someone pitched me a ball, I hit it. When someone showed me how to grip a football it went in a spiral. How does some no talent like Eric Clapton get off being able to pound out "Tears in Heaven"!?!? Ahhhhhh....... there's the rub! He learned early and practiced and practiced some more. My tone deafness and lack of timing on a four count rhythm is where I'm missing out! But my real issue is my lack of dedication.

The question then. Can a 35 year old man learn the guitar still? I would love to be able to play someday, cuz I think my kid would like to hear music and kids should be exposed to it so they can decide for themselves if they like it or not. My New Years resolution is to at least try.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go crush my high score on Guitar Hero II for "Sweet Child of Mine" and then maybe Metallica "One". I hope Guitar Hero: World Tour has "Stairway to Heaven" on it cuz I will crush that too.

The Flu - a great weight loss option.

It's been a few years since I've acquired the Flu Virus. I guess if I would have struggled I could have made it to work today, but it's like 40 below and stuff and the rest of them don't need this so I'm stickin to the house for the day. Luckily, Katie has gotten a flu shot so she should skate out of this pretty well.

There's lots of things to do on days like this. Take medicine and watch TV is what I'm going to be doing. I don't think I'll sleep since I took an hour nap and slept for 12 hours last night.

So far this morning I've watched TORA! TORA! TORA!, which for those of you that haven't seen it, a much better movie than Pearl Harbor cuz there aren't any stupid love stories to cover up the subject of the movie.
Then I watched this......
They were like doing yoga and workout stuff, but it was in a church or something. Very weird.


Then I watched this.......

Sorry for the poor picture quality, but they were really flying around the room square dancing. I think this is filmed in Wishek, maybe Linton. "Live, Laugh, Love...... GO DANCING!!" Hell yeah!!

Here is my personal favorite when it come to square dancing.

The Uncle Rico Factor

"Back in '82 I could throw a pigskin a quarter mile".


I'm not going to assume that all of you know who Uncle Rico is. Watch Napoleon Dynamite. If for nothing else, the laugh factor. None the less, Uncle Rico is a character in the movie that's stuck in 1982 and his missed shot at at quarterbacking his high school football team to a state title when his coach failed to put him in the game.

What you ask, does this have to do with this blog?

Well, let me lay it on you.

See, everyone assumes automatically that a guy would like his child to be born a boy, carry on the family name, teach him about sports, play catch, etc. All of that would be very cool, but let's do a little math here. I'm 35 right now, soon to be 36, so when it's actually time to engage in sporting activities with him I'll be in my late 40's, maybe even 50. Yes, it's all about teaching, but it's also about when he puts 10 straight pitches on a frozen rope back past my melon to be able to call on the fastball, little high cheese, chin music. I wouldn't like intentionally throw at him, but dammit, the inside of the plate is mine and he's gotta earn it from me!!!

I on the other hand, will be the Jamie Moyer of dads......

Dripping in sweat, saying "oh yeah, try my knuckle curve on for size." Whack. Past my head.

"Ok, how bout the change up" Whack. Past my head.

"Guess the change up doesn't work when it looks exactly like my fastball."

I'll be just like Uncle Rico, telling him "You shoulda seen me back in '91..... back in '91 I could throw a pigskin a quarter mile."

Thats a lie, I couldn't throw it a quarter mile, 60-65 yards maybe, but he wouldn't know that and at least in his eyes, before he wised up, he would envision a combination or 2 parts Dan Marino, 1 part LaDanian Tomlinson and 1 part Greek God. Kind of a Zeus that could pick apart a 4-3 defense.
So, the question, wouldn't it be great to have a son? Yes, yes it would. I'm now going to the gym to lift until my arms fall off, then run 10 miles........... every day for the next 15 years!!!

U-Haul Me

Well kids, I'm moved into the new apartment with the little lady over here in "West Bismarck". It's a nice little place, but it's also a little place. It's odd how you can accumulate so much stuff in the last 7 years. The Olympic weight set that sat in the garage at 2607 is making a nice paperweight in this garage as well. So right now we're trying to fit a square peg in a round hole with all of this stuff. I threw a bunch of stuff before I left and a bunch more after I got here, but all of the rest of the stuff is like rabbits and keeps multiplying.


Anyways, logistically right now it wasn't worth trying to move both of us into a new place and we wanted to be settled in when the little one got here so we'll make do for now.

It's a little weird too, I lived at 2607 for over 7 years, which was the longest I had lived in one spot since I graduated high school. It did kinda suck leaving after living with Olney and Nichol so long, but I guess we all were bound to leave at some point.


It got me to thinking tho on the best/worst places I lived. The trailer house in Sherwood built out of cheese graters where the wind whistled thru it and my roommate forgetting to put propane in the tank so that we had to turn the oven on with the door open to heat the place for the night - worst. The Ponderosa (farmhouse on a farm), by far the best. It was the only place I lived where I could wake up, wonder what to eat for breakfast, look out the window and see deer feeding in the snow, crawl out the back window with a bow and arrow and 20 minutes later be frying up deer backstraps. Me and Brother Bob also had to maintain a trapline for mice which wasn't so good, but trapping the squirrel in the attic was pretty fun.


Well, now I'm just rambling. Better posts to come, just had to get the formalities in.