#365Gratitude Day 48: Being there at the beginning

So yesterday, during my holiday, I went to go see my friends Peanut (and her husband, Mr. Peanut), and their adorable two month old baby, who for privacy and cuteness reasons, I will refer to as Macadamia.  

She's an adorable baby.  She really seems to dig me, too.

It's a big deal to me that Peanut trusts me with her most precious creation.

This is a trend that's continued today, in a different way.

I have a good friend who's the super creative sort, Michael.  He's a gifted writer, film maker, and many other things besides.  He's been itching for a long while to create a podcast which mingles the best of old-time radio, science fiction, and a quirky sensibility for the world around us.  

Today, that podcast has been born.  It's the Managlitch City Underground.  I've known about the project for a while, been privileged to test-listen to it some, and give feedback to its awesome creator and performer.  You might notice a character in there who possibly, maybe, might have something to do with me.

It's awesome.

I'm so grateful my friends trust me with their babies.

It's awesome.

#365Gratitude Day 47: Snowbuddy's Business

Missy is an extreme weather fan.  She's absolutely in love with it.  She regularly listens to weather radio, loves the movie Twister, and daydreams about taking a storm chasing vacation.

She's been very frustrated by the not-an-event that snow has been for us here this year.  Each time the area's hunkered down, waiting for a nice big storm, she's held her breath, waiting along with everyone else.

Last night, she finally got the snowstorm she wanted.

As we got ready for bed, it was really coming down.  She was so excited she could barely stand it.

She stood looking out our bedroom window, watching the snow fall, and bouncing on her toes from excitement.  

Then she came to bed, and gleefully announced to me that there was simply no way I'd have work today.  The federal government was going to close, the train wouldn't run, all that jazz.

She was right.  I love having the day off today, but I love more that she finally got the snowstorm she wanted.

#365Gratitude Day 46: A Complex Moment

Yesterday morning this happened.

Let me explain what you're looking at, exactly.

So, that's me, in bed, cuddling my bestest shark buddy, Chum.  You can't see her, but my dolly Alice is right next to Chum, too.  Behind me, is my wife, Missy.  You can just make out her arm (it's the one with the scrunchie on the wrist.) wrapped around me.  She's cuddling with me, spooning.  

Did I mention she's an incredibly good snuggler?  Because she is.

I'm wearing my favorite I'm with Ghidrah t-shirt, which my other two Ghidrah heads, Pene and Spacey also have.  I'm also wearing a diaper, not that you can see it in this picture.

This was at about 8:30 in the morning.  Missy was still quite sleepy.  I, on the other hand, was ready to be awake for the day.  But I wasn't ready to get out of bed just yet.  Cuddling with my sweetie causes high bed gravity.

I was also reading, on my iPad.  Specifically what I was reading was some Grails documentation, about the Spring Security plug-in.  Wait, wait - don't fall asleep, I know, boring!

I got struck by the thought of just how funny the confluence of all this stuff was.  I was being little and big at the same time.  I was enjoying the love and affection of my wife, at the same time I was grooving on being amongst my stuffed animal friends, all while letting my brain wander to matters technical and diverse.

I'm complicated.  And I'm grateful that I am.  I've always got about a hundred things going on in my head, and in my life at the same time.  I used to worry that it made me stretched too thin, or overly analytical to the point that I couldn't enjoy my life.  

But that's not true.  I like having a lot going on.  And I'm super grateful I have wonderful, loving people in my life who support me with that.

#365Gratitude Day 45: That secure feeling

Tonight after we got home from the DC Littles Munch, Missy and Rachel sat down to slay some electronic demons in Diablo 3, and I got out my trusty laptop, and got to work tinkering on a web app side project of mine.

I had a very specific agenda for the night, which was to run through a tutorial article I found about installing security in a Grails application.  I got about halfway through the article when my environment tossed a lung, because something about its setup just wasn't compatible with the version of the plugin that I installed.

I took a nice deep breath, backed everything out, and started over.  I tossed the article aside completely, and instead found a tutorial based on the latest and greatest version of the security plugin.  

20 minutes later, I had this:

  Success!

The best part of the whole thing was being self-sufficient about recognizing my problem, troubleshooting it, finding a solution, and ultimately implementing it.  

It feels wonderful to me that I can teach myself new things, and move steadily forward doing so.  I remember years ago feeling that without a class to take, or a mentor to show me, I could never make progress learning such an immense volume of daunting new technical things.  I was wrong. The truth is, I can do anything, learn anything, one step at a time.

That's a secure feeling indeed.

#365Gratitude Day 44: Um, how about a story..

A few months back I stumbled across a really neat website/game for people who enjoy storytelling.  It's called Storium.  I joined immediately.  It's not free, but it's pretty cheap.  So far I'm in two beginner stories, a sci-fi adventure where I'm playing a friendly android who's trying to make his way in the world, and a fantasy one where I'm a young, naive magician trying to help out a small village I've stumbled across that's dealing with a plague.

It's really fun.  After I get good at it, I'm going to start some stories of my own.  I'd love to see you there, too.