matt weighs in

Many of you won’t agree with this (hi Laura) and will think I am crazy for saying it, but I really enjoy the extreme weather we get in Minnesota. Whether it is the hot, sticky, can’t-keep-your-forehead-dry heat and humidity of July and August or the how-are-we-going-to-keep-the-kids’-nose-from-freezing-off cold we experience December through March, I find dealing with the elements a fun part of living here.

I just do. Sure, I might walk out to the car at 6:45am tomorrow and find that it will not start, because the temperature dropped to -7 degrees overnight, but I can live with that. There’s something about the initial burst of cold air hitting me square in the nose, making my eyes water that I find refreshing, can shrug off with a deep breath, and continue to the car to warm up and scrape off the windows. Of course, I start coughing when the cold, cold deep breath hits my throat and lungs, but at least it helps to wake me up that early.

Perhaps I have resigned myself to the fact that I just have to deal with the cold car in the morning, since our one-car garage doesn’t currently have enough room in it to fit one car (and hasn’t for the past two winters). But even if I could fit the car in the garage, it would probably be Laura’s car anyway, so she can quickly get out of the house with the kids without having to spend four-to-five minutes removing the 1/16th inch of frost/ice that accumulated overnight. When the sun does come out, though, I like that I can look out the window and think that it isn’t really that bad outside, the sun is shining. How cold can it be when we have the sun shining down on us in Minnesota?

The answer, of course, is that it can be pretty dang cold when the calendar shows Thanksgiving and Christmas on the calendar.

One of my favorite reasons for liking the extreme cold so much, though, is bourbon. I don’t drink it much, but there is something about coming in from outside, realizing that my fingers and toes are not going to warm up on their own, opening the cupboard where the bottle of bourbon has been sitting since last winter, and pouring myself a small glass over ice.

Within minutes of taking a couple sips, my extremities begin to tingle with a little warmth, and I settle in for the night. For those wondering, my bourbon of choice at the moment is Buffalo Trace, out of Franklin County, KY.

I’m sure it is not the highest rated Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey on the market, but right now, it is the best (and only) I have in the house. It helps me forget that the thermometer says 0 degrees.

At least until tomorrow morning.

[Each week, usually on Monday, I'll weigh in on a topic that I feel is worth your time and might introduce you to something new. It might not always be something you have been interested in before, but hopefully what I write might convince you to take a closer look on your own.]

I was probably pretty late to the game, but I started reading Mashable in early 2009. Mashable is a blog that dubs itself a “Social Media Guide,” as you will see in their heading if you visit their web site, but they do so much more. They are one of the leading blogs on the web discussing social media, new web sites and services, and keeping readers updated on what is going on on the internet and other technologies at any given time.

I have been using Twitter and Facebook more and more over the last couple months, and whenever something doesn’t look right on either site, whether updates aren’t coming through properly or I get the dreaded “Fail Whale,” Mashable is usually my first stop to see if anything is wrong. Their writers, including founder Peter Cashmore, seem to have the ear e-mail of the top people around the web, and will let you know where things stand. They were right on top of the story earlier in November when T-Mobile’s cell phone service was out for a few hours.

One of my favorite features of the site is the “News Channel” listed right at the top of their pages. It is kind of like a pre-filled search box, in that it lists popular categories for people who might visit their site looking for information. There’s Twitter, Google, Facebook, YouTube iPhone, and more. Click on one, and it takes you to a page that displays all the stories posted on Mashable related to that topic. The Mashable team stays on top of them all, so you know you’re getting the latest information if you go searching for answers on how to use a particular service.

Other features I find useful are their “Top 5 Social Media Stories of the Week” links, their weekly guide to social media conferences or webinars, their “How To” guides for people who might just be starting out using different social media services, and since we are a Wordpress blog, I check out their List for Wordpress for information on what we might want to use on CatNamedPig. Also, since Mashable has done so well in their four years, they love to inform us of others in the online community who are doing innovative things. They do this through their weekly Spark of Genius series, where they introduce a software company who is doing things a little bit different and a little bit better than their competition. The cool thing is that the companies they spotlight are fairly new with little revenue up to that point of recognition, so Mashable gives them a big boost by mentioning them.

The last thing I will mention about Mashable that I am impressed by is their annual Open Web Awards, which just finished weeks of voting at midnight Sunday night. The awards allow internet users from around the world to vote online for their favorite innovations in web technology and, this year in particular, social media. At last count, the 50 categories we could vote in had over 408,000 nominations by over 76,000 individuals. Results should be out soon, so I’ll be waiting with baited breath to see if I won Twitter User of the Year or Best TwitPic.

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Mashable on Twitter
Mashable fan page on Facebook
Another resource to keep informed of the changing social media landscape is Sociable Blog.

I should mention that the weekly “Spark of Genius” series on Mashable is sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark, a program that gives startups access to Microsoft tools at no cost to help them build their business. I just think this is a really cool way for Microsoft to spend their billions of dollars.

Finally, just to be safe, since the (FTC) Federal Trade Commission recently passed new rules regarding disclosure of freebies or financial interests by bloggers, I should mention that I and Mashable have no relationship, and I received nothing for writing about them in this Weekly Weight. If, however, Mashable would like to have a relationship in the future, I have people they can talk to.

I am going to try to start doing a Daily Rave, which may or may not end up being daily. I think that some weeks it could end up being most days, but that in the end, I will write about something that either caught my attention more than others that day or something that I really enjoy, such as a good beer, cheese, video, movie, post somewhere else on the web, or whatever else I decide I want to rave about. You can rave or rant, your choice, but hopefully I can find some stuff in my world that may or may not interest you.

With that…your first Daily Rave:

On Tuesday, I watched two videos caught on security cameras involving humans falling onto the tracks in subways. I think they are making the rounds on the internet, but I just so happened to watch them within an hour of each other. Both ended up with positive outcomes (meaning non-death outcomes), but watch, and you can see that either one could have ended horribly.

First, a very drunk woman passes out stumbles onto the tracks in Boston. If you have time, search the web for another version that shows it from three different angles in full. It’s amazing.

Second, a baby stroller rolls onto the tracks a second before the train comes into view, after the parent lets go of the handle. The stroller is parallel with the tracks at first, and if you watch closely, the parent slightly turns it toward the tracks, lets go to turn away, and then the stroller continues turning and rolls in front of the train.

They ended up well. Again…no deaths. So don’t hate me for getting your heart racing. They are safe. And that’s my rave for today.

On Tuesday night, Laura and I attended the fourth Bloginar event put on by WCCO in downtown Minneapolis. It was our first one, so we weren’t exactly sure what to expect, except they promised free food, a chance to network with other bloggers and social media folks in the Twin Cities, and door prizes. Oh my, the door prizes, which Laura and I both came away from as winners. More below.

The Bloginar (name change in the future?) was led by John Daenzer, the Director of New Media for WCCO-TV and WCCO.com. He seemed comfortable in front of the group and did a fine job as MC for the evening. We were invited by Laura’s childhood friend, Crystal, so we sat with her, devouring take-out pizza and cookies from Davanni’s as we waited and caught up. The agenda for the evening was short, which is nice for us folks who don’t want to keep the babysitters out too late on a weeknight. There was a Q&A session with TinyURL founder Kevin Gilbertson, and then John introduced WCCO’s The Wire, their soon-to-be-unveiled online interactive news community.

The interview session with Kevin was ok, as John asked him expected questions, such as how did he come up with the idea, what are the plans for the future, and what avenues they’re pursuing to make money amd keep it viable. All good questions, in my opinion, but the answers left a little to be desired. Kevin responded woth short answers with not much elaboration. I gathered that he came up with TinyURL as a way to shorten URLs first in newsgroups back around 2000, so they weren’t broken up on two lines, that they would like to use analytics more to track how people are using the service to redirect traffic (RickRoll, anyone?), that he had a meeting in New York in February with the folks at bit.ly to most likely discuss a buyout, and that he may have plans for a new URL shortening service that would shorten TinyURL. And then he talked about his love of unicycling. I’m leaving out details, but only because it wasn’t the easiest Q&A to listen to, despite John’s and participants’ best attempts to get more out of Kevin. TinyUrl is a great service for any of you that have used it before, but I hope his business pitches to potential partners come across better than his Q&A. Interesting, but I hoped he would have opened up a little bit more.

Next was the introduction of The Wire. John led us through a quick Powerpoint showing the features of the new online interactive news community, showed a six-minute video they will use for potential advertisers, and finally a working demo.

The simplist way I can describe The Wire is that it combines a news service, comment section, and story updates all in one interactive timeline. It’s real-time, so as news or some other event is happening, people can keep up-to-date with the latest info. As a story becomes more popular in the community, it’s bubble grows bigger. People can move from story to story with a click of the mouse or by dragging the timeline side-to-side. You can zoom in-and-out, too, depending on how much of the day you wish to view in the timeline. You’ll b able to see the day before and the day after in normal view, but could also search for any three day period.

Maybe the coolest feature is that it won’t just be WCCO people posting updates, keeping others informed. Anyone will be able to post on a news story, as long as it keeps the story moving forward. And WCCO will track good ideas or tips, which could be used online elsewhere or on the air.

An example we discussed was the balloon boy fiasco from a couple weeks ago. Someone mentioned that after a while, it seemed that something was off about the story. Of course, later it came out that it was a hoax and that the family previously had been on Wife Swap and that they had been shopping a reality show idea for the family. If this story would have been live on The Wire, someone might have recognized the family from the show and posted video from their time on Wife Swap or a link to a story that they were shopping around the reality show. The Wire would, as John made clear, allow links to competing news media, if what was posted was relevant to the conversation.

There were some questions about how to keep misinformation out of the conversation. While they have some decisions to be made, he said that there would have to be some level of moderation, and that anything posted would be something they would stand by. He mentioned “talk with their lawyers” more than once, so I got the feeling that they are making an effort to not turn this into an open message board to which just anyone can post their feelings. There would be levels of contributors, most likely, so WCCO employees could probably post at any time, other users might be eventually be trusted to do the same, and that the general population would be the most moderated. I believe he said they’ve been moving Producers and Editors around in anticipation of the time needed to devote to the project once it goes live.

One of the first questions asked by a fellow attendee was about going mobile. It’s new, so there doesn’t seem to be anything in the works now. However, I would suggest they move on it quickly. I see The Wire being very useful on-the-go for people to stay informed, especially with local events and news. It seems people are so schizophrenic on the web, that I wonder how long people would stick to this one source when they have Facebook and Twitter to get back to. It will be great for getting a snapshot of what is going on at any given time, their goal will be for people to stay and contribute. For people at work, who usually don’t have great freedom to sit and surf the web from site to site, I think it could be a great one-stop news shop during the day. And for a nominal fee, companies, organizations, or venues will be able to advertise their events, which will appear in the timeline as well. I like that they have developed a couple different embeddable widgets for people to use, as well.

As mentioned, Laura and I both won door prizes. Laura won a very nice WCCO Television coffee mug. And I won what was probably considered the grand door prize, which is the opportunity to appear and be interviewed by Jason DeRusha on a future JasonCam on wcco.com. Jason does the very popular “Good Question” segments for WCCO news. We’ll have to figure out the time, and I’ll be sure to let you know when it is. I spoke briefly with Jason after the event and he seems easy to talk to, so it should be a fun conversation. Maybe I can get Siena and Elliot in front of his webcam to show off their dance moves if I freeze up.

These are my (not so brief) observations on the event. Overall, a good time. I was hoping to hear where others had come from to attend, but there were some very savvy social media folks in attendance who asked good questions to make John think about what final features to include in The Wire. I did find some attendees on Twitter who had wriiten about being there, too. I think we’ll go again (the Bloginars are held every 2-3 months). Maybe you’ll see one of us on the 6:00 news as another door prize winner

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* You can read Crystal’s adventures with food at Cafe Cyan and on WCCO’s Bite of MN food blog.
* Find out more about the Bloginar event by searching #bloginar on Twitter.
* And here’s another article about The Wire.

The Minnesota Vikings and Brett Favre host the Packers on Monday night. As big as the game is – ESPN is expecting the biggest audience in Monday Night Football history – I can’t help, but wish this first meeting between the teams was taking place on Green Bay. Their fans would be even more hyped than what Viking fans have been.

The Twins have thankfully taken some of the the local sports talk away from the football game, but the anticipation has been felt since the dramatic end to the 49er game. Favre to Lewis with :02 left just added fuel to the fire for this game. We’ve heard over and over about the legend of Favre, which is overstated, as is the case with most sports stories. But I’m hoping he will add one more good game to his lengthy resume.

In his press conference last week, when asked about wanting revenge against his former team, I wish that Favre would have said, “When I played for the Packers, I wanted to beat the Vikings. I now play for the Vikings, so I want to beat the Packers. Will it mean something to me? Yeah, it will. But it will mean a lot to the other guys in this locker room, too, because we’d still be in first place.” He gave a cliched answer, as most guys would have, but maybe he’ll say more post game.

I’ll take the purple to win by 8-12 points tonight. Favre will play fine, but the Vikings won’t need him to, which could disappoint the national audience. Adrian Peterson should get back on track, and the Vikings defensive ends should harass Aaron Rodgers all game, as the Packers o-line is patched together this week.

Let’s hope the Vikings are still leading the division when they head to Lambeau in four weeks.

Skol Vikings!

The Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame held it’s 2009 induction ceremony last Friday, September 14th, honoring Jerry Sloan, John Stockton, C. Vivian Stringer, David Robinson, and Michael Jordan as the 2009 class. Even without Jordan, the great former Chicago Bull, this is one heck of a class, with Robinson probably the headliner. But Jordan was there, and from what I can gather by reading different websites and analysis of the ceremony, he possibly was the only one who gave a speech, and most people were not happy with it. Others thought it was fine.

You probably won’t find many fans these days who wouldn’t call Jordan basketball’s Greatest Of All Time (G.O.A.T). You’ll get some old timers who will throw out Wilt or Russell, but those guys were giants playing in a game of many slow, white men. Looking back on it, they should have dominated, and they did. Their competition didn’t include, as Jordan’s did, so many players who could match up, either with size or quickness or both, and push them on the court. Jordan’s competition included: Magic Johnson, Larry Bird (yes, an athlete), Clyde “the Glide” Drexler, Dominque Wilkins, James Worthy, Joe Dumars, Reggie Miller, Dennis Johnson, Mitch Richmond, and near the end of his career, Kobe Bryant, Ray Allen, and Allen Iverson. These are all great players and competitors, who tried every time they played Jordan to slow him down, but failed.

The theme of Jordan’s Hall of Fame speech was competition, or rather, drawing your competitive fire from any source possible in order to achieve your goals. He told people to find things to continue adding “wood to that fire.”

The first thing people mention after calling Jordan the G.O.A.T is what a competitor he was, not only on the basketball court, but in his personal life. There are many stories, usually involving money and different games, where Jordan relentlessly pushes his opponent to keep playing until Jordan wins. He would practically force guys to stay up late into the night playing cards until he won most or all of his money back. He did the same thing on the golf course. Anything to keep him sharp and on top. And he didn’t know when to turn off his competitiveness, and probably doesn’t know even today.

In his speech, Jordan gave people a little more personal look into some of the moments in his basketball life that drove him to become great. These moments included talking about:
* Leroy Smith, whom he flew to the ceremony, the sophomore chosen over him for the varsity basketball team
* feeling slighted that Dean Smith didn’t include him on the cover of Sports Illustrated when he was a freshman at North Carolina
* the supposed “freeze-out” in the all-star game by the other Eastern Conference starters
* how Pat Riley and his teams always played him the hardest, and
* what might have driven him back to the game in 1994 after his retirement to play baseball (it involves comments made by Bryon Russell, the player for Utah who couldn’t defend Jordan on his final shot of the 1998 NBA Finals).

There are other very candid moments Jordan talks about that you can view in the link I included above. And I have to admit, I enjoyed his speech. I thought that it was refreshing that a player stepped outside the box on speeches and delivered something that really let us into his core as a player and let us see, from him, why he yearned to be the best and not only beat his opponents, but attempt to humiliate them. Most of these speeches follow the same bullet points – talk about the upbringing that grounded them, thank their families, their early coaches, their mom, the people and players that helped them achieve greatness as a professional, and then they’ll finish with some words of wisdom to tell the kids to follow their dreams.

Michael Jordan did all this in his own way, and it was at times funny, at times emotional, but it was all heartfelt. He had tears in his eyes as he stepped on stage, talked kindly about Scottie Pippin (briefly), his family, Phil Jackson, and yes, some of it was cold-blooded, just like he was as a player. He probably could have laid off Jerry Krause, the former Bulls’ General Manager, a little bit, but it would have been superficial of him to disregard their player-management feud in that setting and sugarcoat their relationship over the years. It probably would have been better to not mention Krause at all. If they ever do end their disagreement, it will be face-to-face, not from a stage.

I am really surprised that so many national sports writers reacted negatively to Jordan’s speech. In a nutshell, they wished it followed the clichéd H.O.F speech bullet points. They think that because he was such a competitive player and person for so long, that this stage was his time to be more humble, put all that drove him in his career behind him, and take more time to thank those who helped him achieve all that he did.

Isn’t this what he did? He did thank those people, but did so by telling us his personal stories about how they pushed him throughout his career to get better and play at a level higher than the rest. He had note cards, but appeared to say most of it off the cuff, which might be the reason some have called it rambling and unfocused. I like that he was just up there telling stories, naming names, telling me why he competed like he did, as hard as he did.

The only time he read directly from his notes, and looked the most uncomfortable, was at the end of his speech, when he talked about what the game of basketball has meant to him and how, hopefully, his career has given people the “optimism and desire” to achieve their own goals. Some people are calling Michael Jordan’s speech petty, but I thought he was genuine, his words refreshing, and he gave us a final glimpse at the competitive player he was and the man he is. It is hard to argue with the results.

******

To finish this, I have to say that Michael Jordan is my favorite player of all-time, just like many of you. I don’t recall having any other player’s poster up in my room (maybe one Larry Bird one, but it was probably soon covered up by a Jordan poster). One year, I even remember having all Jordan notebooks and folders to take to school for my work.

Here are my two favorite Jordan dunks of his career, one from college, an unexpected windmill on a breakaway, and the other in which he posterizes Patrick Ewing of the Knicks after making an unbelievable move on the baseline to shake two defenders:

(at North Carolina vs. Maryland)

(as a Bull vs. the Knicks. Skip to 1:20, if you prefer)

I watched this video last week, after coming across the link through Digg_2000 on Twitter. Full length is 10 minutes, and stick with it if you can. The guys at MIT are working on some good stuff to make our world greener and less dependent on individual batteries and cords. WiTricity. Coming soon to your home, we hope.

The first question most people will ask is, “How much will it cost?” I think we should be asking how much more money for r & d will it take to get it ready for the market. Costs always come down, as we’ve seen with any new technology. My only hope is that people can take the long view with their wallet. We’ll save money, hopefully, on battery and electricity costs, while keeping hazardous stuff out of our landfills.

I’m sure we’re at least a decade or more until WiTricity is widely used, but wouldn’t it be nice if you could put one of the battery chargers in your basement or garage, set it to reach as far as the edges of your property, and all compatible devices charge when they are in range? Or what if cities could buy huge wireless charger grids to put in strategic locations and people paid to use them (or received a tax credit for going green?)

If you are more familiar with this technology, besides cost, what are other obstacles to cable-free electric power becoming a reality? How hard will it be to get television, cell phone, car, and other manufacturers on board to put the battery pack on their products? These, too, could go wireless, along with those mentioned in the last sentence: hair appliances, coffee maker, and home entertainment equipment.

And, since this is a family site, an added benefit is that if the charger could be placed under the carpet or inside a wall, we wouldn’t have to worry as much about kids sticking their fingers in the sockets. Saving lives and the earth. How can it fail?

…

Video note: I originally watched it on the TED blog
More on witricity: here and here

We’ve been thinking about this for a while, and now it’s reality. Matt Weighs In is officially its own blog page for CatNamedPig.

(sound of a great church choir singing loudly in the background)

If I put one-tenth of the amount of time into what I write as I did in getting this to work properly, well, I’d spend quite a bit of time thinking about what to write and looking at a blank screen. As of right now, I still have to do the same thing for the SienaDictates page on catnamedpig, so we’ll see how soon I get to regular posting here.

And, I need to figure out if I can have all the stuff I wrote at the old Matt Weighs In page transferred here. That’s for another night.

Thanks for reading and supporting our family chez CatNamedPig!

There have been many newsworthy items the last few weeks. Here are my thoughts:

At this point, it seems like old news given the hoopla, but Michael Jackson died almost one month ago. His name still comes up in Twitter’s trending topics, but I’m surprised it has quieted down as much as it has. Too much other stuff going on for people to continue to care with whom his kids end up living? Are people King-of-Popped out? Rolling Stone, in the past, has not put words on the cover to celebrate someone’s life – they just let the picture alone tell the story of what someone in music meant. I am surprised they didn’t do this with Jackson. Fewer words than usual, but still a little over the top with “Michael Jackson’s Final Days” underneath his picture.

My friend, Dave, wrote a blog post a couple weeks ago about Jackson’s death and the coverage that had some interesting comments. The way he allowed his life to play out is sad, and his public image probably needs to be split into chapters, if possible.

First 30 years: made great music for all-time, awesome entertainer, cared about others in the world, did great things for himself and others. A true icon.
Final 20 years: still entertained sometimes, but did all these weird things Dave mentions that really sullied his legacy. Wasted talent, money, image and good will. A true tabloid icon.

It would have been very interesting to see how his scheduled upcoming tour would have played out, whether he could bring it at age 50 for 50 shows. Regardless, fans around the world still cried in his presence and were willing, no, itching to see an aging pop star do it again.

People want to remember him only one way: either as the greatest entertainer of our lifetime or as the acquitted child molester. I’m going with the hybrid memory of Michael Jackson. Celebrate him as the greatest entertainer, who should have been loved for all-time by everyone, but decided to waste it by doing all these stupid things. What’s wrong with having it both ways?

I had a feeling the Lebron James-getting-dunked-on video was more hype than hysteria. In the couple weeks between when the story leaked and when videos finally became available, I never read or heard from someone who was there who said that it was absolutely out of this world. People talked about it, but only to discuss the supposed cover-up. Until I saw the video, I didn’t know that it happened in the half-court set, that Lebron was a help defender, and that Jordan Crawford didn’t even jump over the King to send it home. Lebron was more to the side. If dunking on his hand is a big deal, then my-oh-my, what a dunk. The real thing, though, (from the camera angles we have) was very disappointing.

Just a few words about the peephole video of ESPN’s Erin Andrews as she is getting ready in her private hotel room. The guys or gals involved in this should be put away, charged with emotional rape, criminal indecency, and pure idiocy. They have put a woman who was doing really good things in her job in a position where she might not be as good or as comfortable going out and doing it in the future.

Admittedly, she gained popularity because she is an attractive woman talking sports, but she did it without all the photo shoots some women on tv end up doing to gain publicity. She covered basketball at Duke, Indiana, UCLA, went to the College World Series, talked letters with kids at the National Spelling Bee – anything and everything to get on the air and gain experience. And she actually does a good job, from what I remember in her appearances. She seems comfortable in front of the camera, doesn’t ask the usual questions, and looks interested in what the person she is interviewing has to say. Many sideline reporters will be too serious, as though what the interviewee has to say will change sports forever, but she laughs with them and gets them to answer outside the cliches.

I wonder what comments she’ll hear when she goes to Cameron Indoor Stadium this winter. It seems over the top, but I wouldn’t be surprised if her life as a sports reporter is soon over. Working with men all day, visiting college campuses all the time, she is going to hear stuff that she never should have to hear, all because a couple people thought it would be funny to make themselves famous by becoming criminals. Just sad, and as the internet shows, it happens all the time to people.

Finally, the Minnesota Twins. What a mess their pitching staff has become. Starting pitchers have a great outing, but can’t finish strong. Batters give them a big lead, but the starters and relievers implode and can’t finish strong. Relief pitchers holding everything together for a couple batters, but totally blow it at the end.

The manager, Ron Gardenhire, is really in a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t situation when he gets to the latter half of games right now. Leave the starters in, and they’ve shown they can’t go that last inning. Bring in a reliever and they can’t hold it. Gardy has been ripped for doing both in the last week, and he can’t win at this point. He just has to hope that his relief guys are going to come in and pitch well to finish the game. His plan has always been to bring the relievers in for the 7th or 8th inning. He has to stick to it at this point, as nothing is reliable. As long as Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau and Jason Kubel hit as a group as well as they have been, the run support will be there. And right now, the team needs all the runs they can get.

We have been knee-deep in March Madness here, with the NCAA men’s basketball tournament getting underway this past weekend. At the same time, we were preparing for Elliot’s 2nd birthday, which was on Saturday, March 21st. We recorded a new Podcast Named Pig on Sunday after all the festivities were over, and we had a chance to catch our breath. We had a great time with our friends and family at two different parties, and Elliot and Siena are absolutely exhausted from all the activity and excitement.

We kept the podcast fairly short – an interview with Siena to get her thoughts about basketball and tried to get Elliot to talk about one of his favorite gifts he received. There were some other things I wanted to get into, but in order to cut down on time, we didn’t discuss, so I am going to put them here, in my cozy little section of our website.

I wanted to talk about the basketball tournament but not only the games, which are great, but how I need to balance watching so many games over the course of four days with spending time with the family, especially leading up to one of my child’s birthday parties, when there is so much preparation needed to be done. You would have to ask Laura and the kids if I succeeded in keeping this balance, but I know that even when I was helping with the party, my mind wasn’t always fully in the moment, as I found myself wondering if I was missing anything exciting.

I was up early on both Thursday and Friday morning so I could go to work. I was out the door before anyone else in the house was stirring, which is hard to do with our old wood floors. Normally, I leave when the kids are eating breakfast or have just sat down to watch their first cartoon on PBS Kids.

I worked both days and then raced home to catch the last few games of the afternoon session and help with party stuff. I was up until about midnight both nights. Saturday is kind of a blur right now, as we had another birthday party in the morning, before putting the finishing touches on Elliot’s party while the kids napped. We were both beat on Saturday night, but I kept one eye on the tv as I tried not to fall asleep and miss a great game.

The whole time on Thursday and Friday, I was totally conscious of trying to balance being a parent and meet those obligations while watching the games. I sat down for our family dinners, but I have to admit that I made it quicker than usual. I played with the kids, but mostly in the basement where the tv is. Laura was busy making cake and cupcakes, so Siena and Elliot wanted to be by her side, and I wasn’t always good at keeping their attention, as my attention was intently on the games. We played basketball with our little hoop, dribbling a basketball, while watching basketball. I guess one good thing is that I was trying to teach them about something I love, but because they don’t share my love (yet), it probably appeared I was doing it half-hearted. I can’t disagree and neither would Laura, I bet.

Probably the worst was when I grumbled, albeit briefly, about having to go to the store at about 9:30pm for more frosting. This makes no sense, but I was more mad at having to change pants and put shoes on than actually having to go, but I’m glad I didn’t fight it, because it definitely would have been unfair to Laura. I’m happy with how Elliot’s parties turned out and how I helped, but Laura deserves a huge trophy. I am promising her that her March madness ended this weekend.