Leafpile

If it's fall, it must be time to play in the leafpile:













Now, you'll notice that Thalia suddenly has short hair. Like, very short hair. Well, she cut it herself. Actually, she cut half of it herself. Then Brenna took her to the haircut place for an emergency hairectomy. I must say they cleaned it up pretty well, she looks quite cute with it short like that, although I think we're going to let it grow out. As it is, she kind of looks like she's auditioning for a chinese production of Peter Pan.


(Mary Martin as a non-chinese Peter Pan.)

Conference Mindset

So I was in Rome last week at a conference on disk galaxies. Rome was good, nice food, good wine, but exPENsive. My gosh the dollar just isn't worth squat these days.

But for the get-together in Boston that preceded the trip to Rome, John put together a visual of me at a scientific conference. I must say he's not far from the truth:

Boston Reunion

OK, a lot to catch up on. A couple of weekends ago, I made a quick trip up to Cape Cod for a reunion of sorts -- my friend Jamie hosted a get-together of friends from high school days (!!).


So John, the wizard of imagery, made up this poster to commemorate the event:

(yes, the little atomic "A" is our high school logo -- we were the Atoms, this is what happens when you go to a high school that was built in the early 1950s. I'm surprised the football uniforms weren't dayglo orange with a third arm coming out the side....)

I originally wasn't going to go -- I was going to Rome for a conference that weekend -- but on short notice decided it was something I couldn't pass up. So I flew up and met the crowd, it was worth every moment. And there weren't many moments, sadly, since I flew up Fri afternoon and flew on to Italy on Sat morning. Too short!

But good times were had, and here's (most of) the crew:


From left to right: Jamie, Cat, Angela, Kim, John, Janet, and Rick. (Toi is missing, since she is taking the picture. And, sadly, by that time I had left -- I was most likely sitting in an airport somewhere when this picture was taken....)

Thanks to Jamie for hosting, and everyone else for making the trip. After the short trip up there, Sat morning I was back on planes: Boston to Philadelphia, to Cleveland, to Newark, to Rome. I was pretty exhausted by the time I got there.

And Rome is the subject of the next post, when I get a chance...

Nine Straight

OK, so this was a tense day. Let's start with the good part:



14-9 Michigan over Penn State. That's nine in a row, you nitty kitties!

OK, now the frustrating part. That game was supposed to be a nationally televised game. But here in the lovely nuclear wasteland we call "Buckeye Nation," the game got pre-empted on ABC, who showed the ever-competitive Ohio State - Northwestern game.

Now when this happens, ESPN is supposed to pick up the national game, ie the Michigan game. When I saw on Thursday that that was the situation, I figured I had a 50-50 chance of actually seeing the game. I was being optimistic, as it turns out.

Sure enough, come kickoff, both ESPN and ABC are showing the OSU game. Which, by the way, ends up a 58-7 blowout which I can see on two, count 'em two, channels.

Bless my lovely wife, who, upon seeing my anguish, actually called the cable company to chew them out. No dummy she, she complained that we were unable to watch the Penn State game -- had she complained about missing the Michigan game here in Ohio, no doubt the nose-picking third-grade dropout OSU fan on the other end of the line would have gleefully cackled through his missing teeth at her....

Anyway, so I have to listen to Michigan on internet radio. Not good for my blood pressure. So for three-and-a-half quarters, I'm pinned to my laptop, staring at but not actually cognizant of the Michigan State - Notre Dame game on the TV (although I will point out that Notre Dame is now 0-4, heh!).

As it turns out, the cable company was showing the Michigan game, but in the non-high-def channels (non-high-def? do people watch that anymore?). I only figured that out with four minutes left in the game. I flip over in time watch Michigan move the ball downfield and then punt with 1:30 left. So Penn State now has the ball back, and is only down by 4. Dancing through my head are visions of Penn State returning the last-second game-winning touchdown misery that Mich bestowed upon them in 2005. And now I can't watch any more.

I can't.

I just can't.

So I went to the backyard and sat here:



Yes, I am sitting on a plastic picnic bench, nursing my Nosferatu, and trying to keep from throwing up.

(Have I mentioned my love-hate relationship with football?)

Anyway, the most amusing part is that while I am sitting on a playschool picnic bench and drinking beer, I hear -- simultaneously -- both my wife and my neighbor yelling out to me from the two houses "it's okay, Chris/Honey, it's over."

And with that, Michigan's ninth straight win over Joe Paterno's Nittany Lions is in the books. I can now exhale.


(Sorry, Joe...)

The Black Crowes

So I've been listening to the Black Crowes all morning. Amazing stuff that never gets old -- they can really lay down a jam, and their live stuff is particularly good.

Style: hard rock with a heavy blues influence. Cross the Rolling Stones with Led Zeppelin, and you'd be close to the Crowes.

You could peel the paint off your walls with some of these tracks. Highly recommended!

Our Long National Nightmare is Over...

...at least for this week.



38-0 Michigan over Notre Dame. Thank you, Notre Dame, for being worse than us.

Programming Note

So for those of you in the Cleveland area, Monday morning from 9-10 I will be on WCPN (90.3) along with my colleagues and friends Dan and Stacy talking about "Dark Matter" -- and no, that doesn't refer to Michigan's chances in the Big 10 this year. Er, maybe it does. Anyway, tune in!

If they post a podcast, I'll link to it so you can listen to it afterwards. Update: Here's the podcast link. Click "Listen".


And that night from 6-8pm, come on down to the Great Lakes Brewery to chat about Dark Matter with Dan and I at the Science Cafe...

Peaks and Valleys

And so college football has kicked off.

Yesterday we took the girls to their very first football game ever, Case at Oberlin. (Yes, both schools have a football team; they're in DIII.) Free admission, 50-yard lines seats, all that fun stuff.



The girls managed to sit through a half before being bored silly, so that's probably all one can ask for their first game. The indoctrination process will be slow but steady.


(Case won, by the way...)

Now, I hope they will grow up to be more like their mother than like me when it comes to football. She loves football, enjoys the games, rides the highs and the lows, but then seems to have this ability to (figuratively) walk away from the stress of it all.

I, on the other hand, will probably die of ulcers from watching the game. I love it, but I am edgy and stressed watching games, and it kills me a little bit each time when Michigan inevitably implodes a few times each season.

Which makes yesterday a classic example of my love/hate relationship with the game. While it was tons of fun taking the girls to a game and explaining what a punt is, a few hours north of us this was happening:



(Thanks to the boys at MZone for this perfect visual description of the Michigan game...)

sigh.

I love football.

I hate football.

I'm going to go throw up now.

Wedding Photos!

Okay, I'm only about 8 months behind getting these things up -- thanks for patience, all.

And thanks so much to John P for being our photographer, he did a great job with a rather motley set of photo models (well, my wife excepted of course. And my girls. And my parents and my mother-in-law, naturally. And my sibs. Well, okay, basically the motley crew consisted of me and my best man. And the Maryland crowd. And a few others. You know who you are. Yeah, I'm talking about you, Silva.)

ANYWAY.

Photos are finally available.

Go here: http://picasaweb.google.com/cmihos and browse.

There are albums from a bunch of great folks (John's photoset will have the formals, if that's what you're looking for...). If you have pictures you haven't sent in, let me know -- we'd love to have them.

Now, be prepared: rather than decide the best pictures, I took the lazy way out and uploaded everything. So there are approximately a thousand photos there. Feel free to wade through and download anything you want.

These albums are all web-and-computer-quality photos. If you want anything for fancy printing, drop me a note -- we will be getting higher quality images (and some color-correcting) from John for his shots, and those would probably be better for sending to a photolab. Or if you want to crop and blow up a section of one of the images, I have higher resolution versions available. So check with me before trying to do any dramatic changes to a picture -- I will probably have something better for you to work with...

Have fun -- we sure did!

Calendar Problems

So for the past three months, "School Starts" has been written on my calendar for next Friday (Aug 31st).

Since I teach Mondays and Wednesdays, that means I don't teach next week.

And since Monday the 3rd is labor day, my first day of classes is actually Wed September 5th.

So I have another week and a half before teaching.

Since this is a new course, I have a good bit of prep work to do. I was planning on doing said prep work next week before classes start.

About an hour ago, I realized the "School Starts" note on my calendar refers to Abra's first day of kindergarten classes.

My classes begin on Monday.

sigh

looks like i'll be doing course prep most of the weekend...

Beloit Snappers Game Report

So last night Brenna and I took Thalia to see the Beloit Snappers take on the Burlington Bees (Abra was on a sleepover). Yes, minor league baseball at its finest. The Snappers won 6-1. Random thoughts:

- The Snappers' first two runs scored on an overthrown ball at first base. Very appropriate for A-ball baseball, I thought!

- Thalia very much was intrigued by Snappy the Turtle.

- I saw a number of 8-10 year old boys in the stands with Mohawks. Must be something in the water on the Wisconsin/Illinois border...

- They had pictures up of ex-Snappers who made it to the majors, including one of Prince Fielder. As the guy in line behind me at the beer stand said, Fielder's butt was a lot smaller when he was in the minors. If he's been injecting steroids, I guess we know where he injected them...

- "The Bees versus the Snappers" sounds very much like a 4th grade soccer match-up. I thought maybe the players were all going to eat orange slices together during the seventh inning stretch.

- Most amusing sight of the night: on the way out, the free giveaway was loaves of white bread. People were grabbing bunches of bread loaves and running out of the stadium. It looked like a UN relief operation.

- Cheap, cheap, cheap night. Minor league ball is tons of fun!

New Dinner Policy

So the girls have been exploiting a loophole our dinner policy. The rule is (a) you need to finish your supper to get dessert, and (b) if you don't even make a credible attempt at eating supper, you head straight to bed. So on nights when they don't feel like having dessert and we serve something that strays one iota from the desires of a 5 and 3 year old (ie anything that has, you know, actual taste to it), they have been simply opting for an early bedtime. The next morning they wake up hungry and then chow down on cereal and bagels and make us (brenna, really) race around making them a heap of breakfast.

Well, that gravy train came to a screeching halt this week.

New policy: if you make no credible attempt at dinner, feel free to excuse yourself and head straight on up to bed. And then expect to see your dinner plate placed in front of you the next morning for breakfast.

Yesterday morning, Thalia learned we were actually serious about the policy, which prompted a crying fit and a trip back upstairs to bed. About 30 minutes later, she came back downstairs and finished her supper.

This morning was Abra's turn. No crying jag, but she decided not to eat it, then asked for a bagel, and then was rather nonplussed when her supper plate was returned to the table. She did finally choke it down (how dare we serve her cheesy pasta to eat!) and then got her bagel once she was done.

Remember, girls: you mess with the bull, you get the horns.



Oh, and I'm sure news of this policy will trigger one of my mom's fondest childhood memories of her sister Maggie. I'll let her (or Aunt Cay) tell the story in the comments if they wish....

Dad

So for most of the time since the wedding the girls have been calling me "Chris", with a "Dad" or "Daddy" sprinkled in here and there. But suddenly, about three weeks ago, the word "Chris" disappeared from their vocabulary, and I am now simply "Daddy."

I'm not sure what caused that change; they said nothing about it to either Brenna or I, but just simply stopped calling me Chris. Who knows what the thought process is? Not me, but I'm just happy for the change...

Lying to the Cops

Abra, speaking to the nice policeman who visited our block party to talk to the kids about safety:

"Oh, all we do is stay inside all day and watch TV."

sigh. NOT TRUE!

Isn't lying to a police officer something like "obstruction of justice"??

Concerned Citizens, Junior Division

So a few months ago, the girls and I were driving around and Abra suddenly started asking questions about the Iraq war. "Why are we fighting a war?" "Are kids being hurt?" "Why doesn't the President stop the war?" So I suggested that she write the President and ask him to stop the war.

She did. She wrote (well, she dictated and I transcribed) and said that if he stopped the war, she would do five things that he wanted. (She never actually said what those five things were-- obviously she has caught on to the art of politics pretty well!)

Anyway, we dropped the letter in the mail and that was that. I figured we were being added to a Homeland Security list somewhere, but who isn't?

So today both girls got letters back from the President. Here's what they said (click on the image for a bigger view):



And, of course, they each got pictures! YAY!



I can't wait until their mother comes home and sees this!

(Sadly, no mention in his letter of stopping the war...)

Best. Complaint. Ever.

Abra: "Dad? Thalia's forcing me to do things!"

And she's off...

OK, so Brenna just pulled out of the driveway, on her way down to Columbus to take the bar exam. Cross your fingers, say your prayers, send your reiki, rub your rabbit's foot, whatever you can do is appreciated! Of course, most of all, she's a smart lady and has studied hard, and I'm confident that she will do what she needs to do down there...

In the meantime, it's full time Mr. Mom duty for me (and the girls), for three days. Cross your fingers, say your prayers, send your reiki, rub your rabb -- oops, I already used up all that, didn't I? Suddenly, I feel like Michael Keaton:



Anyway, here' the first Single Dad Dilemma to ponder. Tomorrow I take Abra (and, by default, Thalia) to swim lessons at the pool. To get to the pool itself, you have to go through the showers. How, pray tell, do I do this -- drag 'em through the men's locker room with their eyes closed, or shove 'em towards the women's locker room and hope they come out the other side?

egad, they didn't teach me this stuff in grad school....

Skool Daze

So the local school board, in their infinite wisdom, decided last fall to close down our neighborhood elementary school. The school right down the street from us. The school Abra would start at in a month's time, and Thalia two years from now.

When the school board started the process of deciding which school to close, they stressed community involvement in the issue. They would hold open forums, ask for community feedback, look at the financial picture, etc. And then make a reasoned decision based on all these factors.

What a crock.

The board took two schools off the board right off the bat, for reasons which still remain unclear. Then when both the financial models and the community input pointed towards other schools for closure, suddenly, magically, the school board produces a new document saying our school, Coventry, needed another two million dollars worth of repairs.

And then they voted to close it.

And a week afterwards, that repair estimate gets quietly "revised" to about a tenth that cost.

What a scam. There's more -- including the school board violating sunshine laws, lying under oath, predetermining the decision, etc -- but I'm too disgusted with the whole situation to type it all out. If you want to hear more, go to the OPEN blog. And while you're there, think about donating to the OPEN fund.

But it gets better -- now the school board is asking us to support a new levy. And therein lies the point of this post.

I have lived here for ten years, without children until the last six months. And every time a levy vote came up, I voted for it, despite the fact that I had no kids and, for a long time, believed I would never have kids. But I believe in public schools, and have supported them at every turn. They are a critically important part of a community and deserve our support. And afters years of supporting my local schools, I now find myself with children of my own to use the neighborhood elementary school --- and they close it down in the most duplicitous manner.

And now they ask me for more money.

I wish I could give it directly to the individual schools, to buy books, to renovate buildings, to transport the kids. I wish I could give it to the teachers, to get paid competitive salaries, to buy supplies for their classrooms. I wish I could give it to the students, so they could buy notebooks and pencils and play in music groups and sports teams.

But I can't. The money I give isn't ultimately managed by the schools, or the teachers, or the kids -- it's managed by the school board. And I don't trust them to make honest, ethical decisions to help the schools. Not after this. And I'm not giving them my money, or at least not my support on the levy.

So here's my promise: if this school board resigns, I will support the levy in full. Without that, you're not getting my vote. And I'm not alone in that -- I have talked to many people who say the same thing. Long-time public school supporters, levy supporters, who now are unable to trust this school board.

So, to the CH/UH school board: support the schools by resigning your position. Or go ahead and try passing the levy without Coventry. Your choice. But if you opt for the latter, good luck with that. I think you'll be in for a surprise.

Astro Updates

The Alambre wildfire, 2 miles away from the observatory, has been contained and no longer threatens the telescopes. This is good, since I am flying out there tomorrow morning.

And then there's this other piece of good astro-related news.

Healy's Waking Nightmare

Maybe Healy had a bit too much bad catnip the other night, because when he woke up he was being visited up-close by a giraffe and a purple unicorn.



That's gotta be a little disconcerting. Freaking out cats must be hard work, though, because later the giraffe fell fast asleep clutching her binky:

The Yorkshire 500

OK, I must say one of my more amusing pleasures is watching Abra and Thalia riding their bikes down the sidewalk. Thalia's on her trike, of course, and Abra has a two-wheeler w/ training wheels (borrowed from Colleen -- thanks, Colleen!).

Thalia knows she can't ride faster than Abra, but if she beats her out of the driveway and onto the sidewalk, then she can block. Abra will come up behind her, and Thalia will start drifting left and right, so that Abra can't pass.

This is hilarious to watch from the back (which is where I am, usually with a dog leash in my hand...), where Thalia is constantly drifting left and right, frustrating Abra's attempts to pass. Abra, who is not well-renowned for her patience, is typically howling "Thalia, let me pass!" at this stage. Meanwhile, Thalia pedals on, swinging left, then right, then left again.....

I am thinking of putting a number 8 sticker on Thalia's bike helmet.

"Whose" doing the writing at Yahoo?

Yes, OK, I'm kind of anal-retentive about writing, but things like this drive me up the wall. Is Yahoo hiring fifth graders to write their web content these days?

Overheard at the Breakfast Table

Thalia: Is Mommy going to class forever?

Abra: Thalia, do you know what "forever" means?

Silence

Abra: Forever is longer than people live.

Silence

Abra: When Mommy and Daddy die, we will still be alive.

Long Pause

Thalia (somewhat concerned): Then who will make us breakfast?

Picture Dump

So here are a few amusing pictures lying around on the camera:

Abra is a proud Safety Town graduate today. (Safety Town is a progam run by the Cleveland Heights Police Dept which teaches kids about personal safety, being a good pedestrian, etc). Here's her graduation picture:



Meanwhile, Thalia had some tasty juice next door at Jon and Molly's, which give her quite the impressive face:



(Am I the only one thinking of the Joker here???)



And, back at the ranch, Healy decided it was just a little too much work to reach the top level of the cat tree:



Snapshots of our life....

What's your dirt doin' in mah yard?

I dunno, boss...

Actually, it must be mulch season! Abra and Thalia called this "Mount Mulch" and had a ball playing on it. Their parents -- not so much of a ball hauling it all around the yard. But the gardens look better, and next time we might get away with a bit less (maybe 5 yards instead of 7?)...

An Exciting Day

So today Wacko finally went to the groomer (U Dirty Dog) to get his summer haircut. Thanks to all of you who voted to spare him the worst of the razor. Instead, he got a haircut that's short enough to keep him cool, but not so short that he looks like a mutant from Planet X. Here he is:



(Here's a "before" picture to remind you of what he used to look like....)

But while I am standing at the counter at U Dirty Dog picking him up, my cell phone rings, and it's Brenna saying that we have to take Thalia to the emergency room. Evidently Thalia's head lost a battle with the arm of a rocking chair (which is pretty impressive -- I would have bet that Thalia's head is the harder of the two...).

So I zip home and we pack everyone in the car for the first of what is sure to be many family trips to the pediatric emergency room. They did a great job, and so did Thalia -- she sat through them putting a stitch in her eyebrow without a single tear or cry. That's my brave girl! (Abra, of course, was chattering away -- luckily the doctor was good at simultaneously sewing and answering the questions of a 5 year old). So here's our girl is posing with her brand new bandage:




So now both girls are in bed, the newly shorn dog is asleep, and the cats are all suspiciously wondering what all the hubbub was about. Just another fine day in the Mihowski household....

Healy Listens to Technotronic

Pump up the jam
Pump it up
While your feet are stompin'
And the jam is pumpin'
Look at here the crowd is jumpin'
Pump it up a little more
Get the party going on the dance floor

The Yorkshire Redemption

So flash back to last August. I have this huge three-sink cement laundry tub in the basement that I have HATED for years. So when my Dad and my brother and nephew are all in town, they help me reduce it to a rubble pile (think sledge-hammer-applied-to-cement project) so I can finally replace it with a nice simple laundry tub.

But okay, how do I get rid of the rubble pile? There must be at least 600 lbs or more of cement lying on my basement floor. So I call up the city, and they say "yes, put it on the curb, we will pick it up."

I doubt this. I doubt it greatly.

But okay, I took a little bit of it to the curb and piled it up (kind of a mini Stonehenge) to see if they would take it.

Of course, they didn't.

So I call the city again, and am told "oh, to be picked up, it has to be in a container."

A container?

"Yes, no more than 40 lbs per container."

Now, this is an enormous pile of fist-sized concrete shards, with stiff structural wire lacing through many of the pieces. I can't just put them in garbage bags or cardboard boxes; they aren't strong enough to hold more than a few pieces, and the wires will rip the bags/boxes to shreds. (It should go without saying that I'm too cheap to hire someone to take this stuff away.)

So, I break the thing down even further and, piece by piece, week by week, toss a little bit into a garbage bag and take it to the curb. I feel like Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins' character) in The Shawshank Redemption, who digs a tunnel in his prison cell and carts the cement from the tunnel out to the prison yard, little by little, of the course of many years.

All winter, into spring, I'm taking these cement shards out in the weekly trash, little by little. And tonight, the last of it got set out of the curb. It's all finally gone. Time to go to Zihuatanejo...

Wacko Shave-down Poll

So Brenna usually has Wacko shaved down each spring. This year, Wacko pulled me aside and whispered "ix-nay on the ave-shay." Now, I can understand his reluctance -- I suspect all the other dogs laugh and point at him when this happens. So I figure we'll see what our devoted MGW blog readers have to say about the issue -- should he get shaved this spring or not??? The poll is below, feel free to weigh in.

To help you with your decision, I'll first post a picture of him with his beautiful long coat:



Isn't he a fantastic looking dog??? And now, in the interest of a fair and balanced presentation of both sides of the issue, here is what he looked like after his shave-down last spring:



Hmm. Well, as they say "We report; you decide." So here's your chance to weigh in: shave, or not?

Trip Log

So the car trip (driving Cleveland -> Northern Virginia and back again) actually went very well. Notable mile markers:

mile 1.9: Abra pulls out beeping toy cellphone.
mile 2.1: Chris confiscates beeping toy cellphone.
mile 5.3: First "Are we there yet?" (Abra)
mile 21.8: Second "Are we there yet?" (Abra)
mile 21.9: First "Is it lunchtime?" (Abra again)
mile 36.0: First rest stop (Brenna)
mile 68.4: First "I need to go potty" (Thalia)

and so on. As we crossed the border into Pennsylvania, Abra asked if they spoke English or Spanish in Pennsylvania.

The return trip was even smoother, the girls were great. At mile 1.2, Thalia announced "I'm hungry," but they settled down for a long while. At mile 233, I said to Brenna "the girls have been fantastic", so of course at mile 234 Thalia spilled yogurt all over Abra, and at mile 236 Abra gave the first "Are we home yet?" -- but given she has just had yogurt spilled all over her, who can blame her? The girls then settled back down, and except for a very occasional "how much longer" out of Abra, it was a fine ride...

I think I got off lucky this time...

Are We There Yet? Are We There Yet?

Tomorrow I do my first extended drive with the girls in the back seat -- 7 hours from Cleveland to Northern Virginia.

Wish me luck!

Saturn

So I'm an astronomer today because my parents took me out when I was a little kid and showed me the stars. And one of the most vivid memories I have of my childhood was when I got my first telescope and pointed it at Saturn.

Tonight I took the girls out and showed them the Moon, Venus, and Saturn through the telescope. Abra was very excited. Thalia was too, but also a little tired. But Saturn was beautiful, a little white ball with tiny, perfect rings.

(No, not my picture of Saturn, this one
came from Cloudbait Observatory)

In this era when we see spectacular images daily from an array of space probes, space telescopes, and mammoth ground-based observatories, you'd think a little smudge of Saturn through a telescope sitting on your front steps would be nothing. But it's really wonderful to see it with your own eyes.

I love my job. The universe is a beautiful place.

The Good, the Bad, and the Easter Bunny

So today the girls were coloring Easter eggs....



... while listening to the soundtrack to "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly."



I like to think about how they will remember these scenes when they get older....

Words cannot do this justice

Yes, she is asleep.

The Latest Fashion

This lovely ensemble consists of:

• Ear muffs courtesy Hello Kitty.
• One glove, a la Michael Jackson.
• Black tank swimsuit, just right for March in Cleveland!
• and one pair of silver tinkerbell high heels.

Watch for this look coming to a Paris runway soon!

Where's Healdo?

So things are still rather messy and in boxes from the move. Healy has taken advantage of this to make himself a new hidey-hole. Can you find him? (click on the image for a bigger version)