ace’s blog

Did I mention that we painted our master bedroom? It’s the 3rd room in 4 weekends and the 4th room in the house! Those gray walls look that bad!

We lived in our house Jacksonville, FL for about 18 months and we only painted 6 rooms. We’re just about there in a third of the time! The next painting project will be either the master bathroom or the kitchen depending on if Meri get’s any help starting to take down the wallpaper in the kitchen. The date of our next painting project depends on how Meri feels about how much she’s studied for her next weeks worth of tests. She’s got two tests the first full week of February (2.6 – 2.10).

Well after doing a lot of research, I have to take the GRE exam to get into UoM Masters program. The requirements aren’t too high so I don’t think it will be a problem. I’m just going to have issues with the writing section. Computer Science grad students shouldn’t be required to write any papers, maybe programs but not papers…

I’m going through the undergrad course requirements, comparing them to what I’ve taken and creating documents that I will use to try and wriggle my way out of taking classes at UoM that I already too at UNF and barely sqeaked through the first time. Hopefully I can get through this process, I don’t want to have to pay Master’s prices to take undergrad classes. I’m thinking that if I have to take some undergrad classes, I may apply to the school as a non-degree seeking student and when I’ve taken the classes, I will apply to the CS Master’s program. We’ll see though, I sent an email to some on at the UoM CS department. Hopefully they will respond quickly.

I’ve been pretty unhappy since moving to Memphis. I think ultimately, I’m unhappy with my career. I don’t think I like doing the same thing everday. I’m not really helping anybody or anything like that. I just sit here and type. The unhappiness has really effected the quality of my marriage and my life as of late. Meri and I are arguing a lot and I’m saying some very mean things towards the woman I chose to be my wife. Since I know I don’t want to lose my wife and son, I think I should consider trying to make myself happy and all other things should fall into place. Meri and I were brainstorming last night and she thought that maybe I would be happy if I started to teach. At first, I didn’t think I liked that idea but the more I thought about it, the more I could see myself being a math or computer teacher. Since I’m fairly competant with both subjects, I think I owe it to myself and my family to try to make a change. This won’t be a quick thing move either, I have some research to do. I am planning on going back to school to pursue a masters in computer science with an emphasis on mathematics. The local university (University of Memphis) has a masters program in CS so I will begin to check that out. I also need to find out if there is any demand, or will be any in 3 years or so, for math teachers in HS or if they even offer computer classes. If they don’t have demand, then I may try to be an adjunct at a college or something. Who knows? Lots of questions now. I’m excited about maybe teaching but definitely going back to school. I just hope this is what I’m looking for out of life. It would be nice to feel like I’m helping people with other things than making them richer (Terminix made over a billion dollars for the first time in 2005)!

We painted the dining room this past weekend. We stuck with the maroon color on the ceiling and below the chair railing but painted over the flat paint with a satin. Above the chair railing, Meri wanted to do a gold color but we were having a very difficult time finding it at any of the paint stores. Finally we lucked up and found a gold color we liked at Lowes. It looks great now! We are probably going to paint the master bedroom and bathroom this weekend.

Sunday (1.15.06), we started painting our living room and its 20 foot celings! We borrowed a ladder and bought an extension pole. The scary part is that both of us were really scared about getting up to the ceiling to tape it. Meri had more of a fear of it than I did (but she tried 3 separate times to do it) so I got the lucky task of taping the 20 foot high ceilings. It wasn’t so bad after I did it enough. The main color is turning out more blue than I thought but it is definitely an improvement over the flat gray. The color really makes the room seem a lot bigger so I like it a lot. We have to paint below the chair railing this week. I hope to have the room completely done by this weekend. I’d like to have a relaxing weekend sometime soon.

I slept on the floor in Aaron’s room last night. Something was wrong with him. He didn’t feel good or had gas or something, basically he didn’t go to sleep. He went to bed at his normal time (7:40) and slept until approximately 10:30; that’s when the fun started for ol daddy here! Now keep in mind that Aaron has been awesome about sleeping through the night and only doing the infamous daddy checks when we have someone else (babysitter usually causes a daddy check, Meri sometimes, not the last time she put him to bed) put him to bed. Anyway, Aaron woke up around 10:30 and I was already “asleep” so it took me a few minutes to figure out what the hell was going on. I got up, went to be with him, soothed him and put him back; that is normally what it takes and he’s done with his daddy check. Well, this was a special night. Aaron woke up approximately every 20 minutes after that. Foolish me would go back to the other side of the house to my bedroom and start to go back to sleep, confused as to what to do if he woke up again. First time was fine, second time was alright, third and fourth time, I lost my cool and was angry that I wasn’t allowed to sleep. That’s just me still being selfish and not totally being into the ‘what’s best for your son’ kinda thing. I got over that quickly after I told myself that he was just as confused as me, probably more. As an “adult”, I have a much better idea of what is going on whereas Aaron just knows he can’t sleep. OK, fifth time, I started to really feel bad for him. I went to his room, picked up him, his blanket and the pillow Meri made for him and we made our way to the living room couch. I was thinking that maybe he wanted to sleep with us but I didn’t want him to keep Meri up since she has school today. Well we get to the couch and then I really start to realize that he has no clue what he wants. He keeps grabbing at his pillow and blanket and once he had them, I assumed he would lay his head down on my chest and toss and turn and eventually fall asleep. Nope. He sat there, sitting up, clutching his blanket and pillow and kept looking around with a bewildered look on his face. I tried giving him more room, thinking that sleeping on my chest probably wasn’t the most comfortable way to sleep or even lay for a few minutes. Extra room did nothing, seemed even to make him feel like I was trying to distance myself. So then we head back to his bedroom, my intentions being to put him back in his crib and lay on his floor until he was passed out. That kinda worked. He laid there, looked over at me on the floor beside him a couple of times and finally went to sleep! I waited and waited and finally went back to my bed to catch some z’s and no sooner did I lay my ass on the bed and cover up and get warm did Aaron let out this horrible, “where’s my daddy! he was just here” scream. I go running, literally, back to his room with my pillows and a blanket in tow. I get to his room, toss my stuff on his floor and pick him up and comfort him. He relaxed and laid his head down on me. I put him in his crib and slept on the floor for about an hour until he started waking up again. He probably woke up 3 more times after that. Next thing I knew was that it was 4:30, Aaron hadn’t woken up in around 3 hours at that point and I had to get back to my bedroom before the alarm went off at 4:45. I turned off the alarm, only to wake up at 5:40 and start getting ready for work. As of 7:20 this morning, Aaron was still asleep! I hope he sleeps until at least 8:30 or so. What a night!

Sleeping on his floor wasn’t as uncomfortable as I thought it would be. It was made a lot worse because of the fact that I started working out again this week and my biceps are sore as hell! But anyway, a few cups of coffee and adult interaction will wake me up for the day.

Well this weekend, we sat down and talked to Jen and Bob about Jen watching Aaron. We’re going to have her watch Aaron 4 days a week but he will be in a mothers day out program at one of the churches around our house. Jen would only be watching him for about an hour on those days and would only have to pick him up after the program is over for the day.

I think having Jen watch Aaron is better than having him in daycare. It does produce some uncertainties though: what if Jen is sick or is on vacation or her back goes out (which it does frequently). These questions aren’t just unique to Jen watching him though, they would have existed for us putting him in the home daycare as well. I will just have to call in if Jen is sick or something. Meri can’t not go to class one day. This is a better situation though.

Aaron hasn’t taken a nap in the past 2 days. Yesterday, he fell asleep in the car for about 10 minutes according to Alicia and Meri. Last night, he went to bed 30 minutes early but he could have gone to bed about an hour and a half early. I miss the boy that was so happy about seeing daddy come home. Instead I get a cranky, over-tired child who just runs up to me and starts crying! Aaron just does not sleep enough at night (10 hours) to warrant him trying to skip his naps during the day. We went from him sleeping anywhere from 1 to 2 hours during a typical nap (with a very odd high of 4 hours once recently!) to about 10 minutes in a given day. That’s a huge change.

I believe that we are going to have Jen watch Aaron during the day and put him in our church’s mothers day out (MDO) program twice a week instead of having to put him in a home day care. I think that is going to be a very good decision for Aaron and for us. He will get interaction with other kids via the MDO program and then also get the one on one care that I love for him to receive. Financially, i believe it will cost us the same amount every month. Peace of daddy’s mind (in regards to care for Aaron anyway) is worth triple what we will be paying though.

Done! Finally. Everything went off without a hitch, it was sort of amazing to me. Glad I finished one without any mess-ups!

I upgraded from WordPress 1.5 to 2.0. So far I like it a lot better. I was able to import all of my blogger posts over using the import tool that is integrated in WP 2.0. This import tool was a lot simpler to use than the 1.5 blogger import tool! That one was a PIA. I downloaded and changed the theme of the blog too. I like this one a lot better.

Alicia and Grace are coming in town today. They are here to see Aaron. It’s great that some non-relatives love him enough to come and visit him. He’s a great kid, very fun to be around. He’s started to hit himself (slap himself in the face, rip at his cheeks, bang his head on doors/walls/anything) whenever he gets angry or upset. Meri found a website that basically told us it was the fault of the parents, which I kind of assumed anyhow. The article on the website specifically pointed out how we discipline him. One of the things I do is bite him when he bites me or slap him back when he slaps me while he’s angry and although I’m not proud to admit and I will stop, but whenever he is being what I consider over the top upset and won’t calm down at all, I will squeeze his leg or arm or back to try and get his attention but at the same time, it hurts him. I feel horrible but I do it because I want to get his attention when it does not appear that he is going to give it to me. I have to learn that he is a tiny human being who cannot communicate like me or you so he communicates by screaming or slapping or whatever. I must keep that in my mind when the moment arises that I would normally squeeze him. Poor kid, I feel so bad for him for having a daddy like me. I must be confusing him whenever I pick him up. He doesn’t know if I’m going to be hurting him or comforting him. I WILL stop hurting my son. He’s my baby, no matter how old he is or what he does. I love him more than anything.