Capiche

a few days ago I went to great lengths to explain to Ben what "Capiche" means. "Ben, when you ask someone to understand and agree with what you are saying, you will sometimes say capiche.... Capiche?" And on and on. Fast forward to last night. Amy brings me into where Ben and Max are playing so Ben can tell me something. When I get brought in, it's because he's done something bad and I need to hear it from him and then tell him why it's bad. So Ben had pulled a pillow from underneith Max, causing his head to hit the floor. Ben got swift punishment earlier but now I'm in the room waiting for Ben to tell me the story. He describes what he did. I then said something like, "Ben, so do you understand that you cannot pull the pillow from Max. You shouldn't take anything away from Max. Having his head fall is very very bad. You need to be his big brother and take care of him." and so on... "Do you understand?
"I want to run around" - Ben
"Ben, I don't think you're listening..." and I describe it again... "Do you understand?"
"Yes." - Ben
"Yes what?" - Dad
"Yes I shouldn't pull the pillow from Max."
I was still in the serious parent mode when Ben then said...

"Capiche?!"

At which point both mommy and daddy busted out laughing. "OK, Ben. We're all done discussing this. I think you understand."

holy water

amen. So we have a sump pump that has been quite busy this rainy season. The saturated earth is only getting hit with more rain. The circuit breaker on this essential piece of equipment flipped so I went to the fuse box to reset the breaker. When I flipped the switch, a drop of water squeezed out from between the breaker modules.

WATER .... IN THE BREAKER BOX!

The basement walls are dry and there's no visible way that the water could get in. Taking off the cover wearing thick rubber shoes I see that there's a 4mm puddle at the bottom of the steel box with submerged wires. I drill a few holes in the metal box so the water can drain and leave the cover off. As it turns out, the water is traveling from *inside* the main cable that enters the house. It's hard to work out how the water has done this but it has. The wire properly goes lower than the entry point on the house like a big J shape to thwart water from traveling along the outside. This tells me that the inside is full, like a straw.

I'm up for most home repair challenges but this cable is all business and I'm not touching it. Time to hire a pro. Given where this is happening, this might be a task for the power company as the water must be starting from the power meter.

Yikes

frothing foes find friend in frenzy

Do you care? No... doubtful

But hell, read anyway. So I hear the sweet BRAAHHHHHHHHP sound of the UPS truck pulling up. Within the cardboard walls of the delivery are some nice big latte cups. While I typically prefer a small cappucino or macchiato I needed to try out the new cups. Dangerously low on milk I tried to get a huge amount of volume by really frothing aggressively. The goal was to stretch, as it is called, the milk with lots of air commingled. Sometimes this works, other times... like this time I created lots of big ugly bubbles versus the beautiful and coveted "microfoam."

I take a sip of this drink and WOW does it taste bad.

The point of this random rant is to point out how much a nice velvety foam has an effect on flavoUr, not just aesthetic. It's night and day. Having the ugly "dishsoap" foam tastes horrible. On the flipside, getting served (or typical for me: making) a nice morning cap with invisible bubbles that somehow come out glossy is heaven.... sweet, creamy, delicious.

For the coffee obsessed, read on, for the rest, you are dismissed.

When you ask for and actually receive a "dry cappucino" there is a thing that happen which may surprise you. Most of the milk is poured down the drain. In the construction of the velvety foam, it takes a certain volume of milk to generate the lighter fluffy foam apart from the milk. So you start with 10-12 ish ounces and add 4-6 ounces of foam to the cup once you're done. If you were to wait for the foam to break back down so the bubbles are gone, you're probably looking at 1-2 ounces of liquid, maybe less. So most of it is along for the ride but never makes it into the cup. Do you feel enlightened? Informed? Well sorry, how exciting is coffee? I mean really... get a life.

Daddy, "Dash with me"

Ben likes to run around our house circuit while singing "Jingle Bells" or "The Twelve Days of Christmas" ... it's really funny as he giggles and sings while running as fast as he can. I love my boy.

Netflix

If you use netflix, email me right now. There's a friends link thing that allows me to see movies you've rated and thus pick good movies to watch. If you have really bad taste then you are excluded from this request. You know who you are.

Happy 06

Please post your 06 resolutions here.

I'll start with mine:
-no more mister nice guy
-teach Max to walk
-teach Ben to catch big air (when Mom's not monitoring)
-ride more *with* my wife
-ride more
-hit at least one big {bicycling} race/epic ride this season
-nail the perfect rosetta at will
-finish all home improvement projects...ha!