Marcus Schuetz Blog

Moving

2010-02-05T23:40:00.000-05:00

Blogger announced that they are going to no longer support publishing blogs through FTP. Apparently I am part of the 0.5% that rely on that ability. I could have opted for a custom domain for $10/year in addition to the $30/year I pay for hosting of the blog on my own (sub)domain, but I am not dedicated enough for this to be worthwhile. So I decided to dump blogger and later this year hosting on schuetz.com and move to a free Wordpress account. I imported my old posts and from now on new posts will only appear on:

marcusschuetz.wordpress.com

Merry Christmas, Happy Solstice, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanza, Happy Festivus

2009-12-25T21:22:00.001-05:00

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, celebration of the winter solstice holiday(tm), practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all . . . and a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2010, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great, (not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country or is the only "AMERICA" in the western hemisphere), and without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith, choice of computer platform, or sexual orientation of the wishee.

By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms:

This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her/himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year, or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.

Or in not so many words:

Merry Xmas & A Happy New Year

Stolen & adapted from here.

SnOMG

2009-12-23T22:34:00.000-05:00

We survived the Blizzard of 2009. Digging out of 2 feet of snow was no problem thanks to the neighbor's backhoe. This was a third into the snowfall:

Fall

2009-11-29T21:00:00.001-05:00

Seems this:

was only yesterday. Now it's fall and Xmas is around the corner:

Star Trek Gag Reel

2009-10-12T21:26:00.002-04:00

This is pretty awesome:

Still alive (more or less)

2009-10-10T19:17:00.000-04:00

The reasons for my three month long silence are fourfold:

Connor
Xander
Tyler
Work

and not necessarily in that order. Blogging time has to be squeezed between the kid's bedtime and mine - along with everything else. It's come to the point that I considered not to renew the the hosting of this site, but then I decided to give it a shot for another year. Not that I think I suddenly get more time over the next year. In fact the next decade is pretty much booked already, but you never now.

Nothing exciting happened over the last three months: the kids are growing like weeds and are in generally good health. Same here. I'll get back when something exciting happens.

Where I am once again surprised that time passes really, really fast

2009-06-06T22:10:00.000-04:00

Tyler turned 1 this week. We celebrated the occasion by giving him gifts that - while age appropriate - seemed way more interesting to his older brothers.While I can't recall what I did over the last year, I have photographic proof that Tyler was predominantly busy growing:

While at first he seemed to be suspicious of this whole cake thing, he overcame his reservations pretty quickly:

I liked last weekend's weather better...

2009-05-03T19:21:00.001-04:00

I must have blinked...

2009-04-26T15:54:00.000-04:00

...because somehow I missed Spring. I was cold just a couple of days ago and now it's 90 °F outside:

It's not Xmas in July, I mean April

2009-04-19T08:29:00.000-04:00

While trying to get my missbehaving email program under control, mail.app decided to resend some emails on its own. So for all those that got last year's Xmas card again, I apologize. Now the real question is: does my Mac belong to Skynet?

Spring: Sun...and grass mowing

2009-04-17T21:30:00.001-04:00

The epic battle between Man and what passes in our house as grass continues for another year. Taking advantage of warm temperatures I took the mower out of hibernation. I underestimated the April sun and got a little sun burned. Not much happening at the moment. World revolves around the kids, so there is no spare time. Here are the mandatory kid pictures:

On that note I am going to bed.

Xander turns 2

2009-03-15T14:16:00.000-04:00

Xander had his 2nd birthday last week and boy, is he two. Constant supervision is necessary to keep him out of trouble. His cuteness saves him - most of the time. Happy Birthday, medium one.

The equal opportunity department requires me to post pictures of the remaining kids as well:

Where I bemoan the limited availability of short-grain rice in the US

2009-03-14T21:23:00.002-04:00

One of the staples of my childhood was milkrice. Not to be confused with rice pudding, it is short-grain rice cooked in milk & sugar and served either hot or cold, with either fruit or sugar & cinnamon. I wanted to pass down that experience to the next generation, but to my dismay I discovered that it is virtually impossible to easily obtain short-grain rice in the US (Amazon.com has some Thai sticky rice, but I am not sure it is the same). Thanks to a German deli in TX I was able to order some instant milkrice, the regular variant having been sold out. But after confirming that at least Xander likes it, I was able to get a shipment from good old Germany, thanks to his Grandma.

Tooth fairy job security

2009-02-13T09:04:00.000-05:00

Tyler is setting the record for first tooth at age of 8 months. No wonder he was cranky lately.

Where I suspect that my kids are trying to kill me

2009-01-27T08:09:00.005-05:00

Still / again sick. I am currently to remove my lungs from my body through the mouth. Good times.

Fun times at the Schuetz house - again

2009-01-10T15:10:00.000-05:00

Me: sinus infection
Xander: ear infection(s)
Tyler: Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV)
Lisa: food poisoning

At least Connor isn't sick (yet - fingers crossed). Yeah, fun times.

2009? Already?

2009-01-04T20:13:00.000-05:00

Whatever happened to 2008? Anyway:

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Happy Birthday Connor!!

2008-12-22T22:27:00.002-05:00

Connor turned 4 today. We celebrated his birthday last Saturday, an event he was looking forward to for the last month. Happy Birthday, little man.

But let's not forget the other two, who had a good time as well:

-itis convention in the Schuetz house

2008-11-23T14:45:00.000-05:00

For some reason there seems to be a germ-convention in our house:

Xander had an ear infection, Lisa had strep throat, an ear infection, bronchitis and congivitis and Tyler hasn't slept for more than a cople of hours in a stretch for more than 5 days now. No fever, but there is obviously something wrong with him.Connor and I haven't caught anything yet, maybe we didged the bullet this time. Obviously my free time allotment is non-existent, but here are some pictures of the sleepstealers / germsharers:

Still off the charts

2008-10-09T21:17:00.000-04:00

Tyler's 4 month checkup was Monday. He is doing great, in fact he is still off the charts with his weight: 19 lb. 10 oz (= 8900 g). No need to call Weightwatchers yet, once he is off breast milk he should taper off. His height of 26.5 in (=67 cm) puts him around the 85th percentile as well.

We're baaack

2008-09-30T22:23:00.001-04:00

Due to a billing disagreement between my hosting service and myself the site was offline for a few days. The problem was resolved within 3 minutes (yeah!!), I spent 10 times longer on hold (boo!!). Back to our regular scheduled programming.

The Boys

2008-08-24T21:37:00.003-04:00

Having 3 kids means there is no time at all, so you have to appreciate me cutting into my sleep to bring you these photos of the boys:

Daywalker again

2008-07-17T20:25:00.000-04:00

After 4 weeks of working on 3rd shift (midnight - 8 AM) I will be walking among the living again starting tomorrow. While it wasn't that bad sleep schedule-wise, I didn't like being out of sync 8-16 hours with the rest of the company.

Weightwatchers stay away from breast milk

2008-07-04T21:17:00.000-04:00

We took Tyler to the doctor to get his second Hepatitis B shot yesterday and he weighed in at 12 lb 11 oz (5755 g), when just 2 weeks ago he was 10 lb 8.5 oz (4776 g). At this rate he'll be like 60 lb. by the time he turns one year old. Poor little man has a cold (a gift from his brothers) and is congested, so he has a hard time sleeping (and therefore by extension so do we).

Tyler's first 2 weeks

2008-06-22T10:45:00.002-04:00

Tyler is performing according to spec: sleeping, pooping & eating, with some crying in between . His 2 weeks doctor visit has him surpassing his birth weight by 4 oz (now 10 lb 8.5 oz) putting him into the 90^th percentile for weight and 85^th for height.

Not getting much sleep these days which is exacerbated by the fact that I am back to work for a week now and on 3^rd shift for a while (I hope).