June 2008 Archive
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June 26, 2008
Marcus
Our son Marcus was born June 19, 2008. We are terrifically happy and impressed with him and feeling very fortunate.Stats: 9 pounds 8 ounces; 20.75 inches long; full head of darkish hair; 15+centimeter head size; Mama's nose, Daddy's fingers, mouth, and ears; Grandfather's feet.
Short version of birth story: Tried to induce twice (he was post-dates and a large baby), after 24 hours of nothing much happening in second attempt, decided to do a c-section to avoid a 3 or 4 day-long painful induction that would likely result in a c-section anyway. Apgars of 8,9; handed to Daddy very quickly after he was born. No complications so far for me from the surgery. *knock wood*
Behaviors: Eats, pees, poos as expected -- seems to be doing fine with breastfeeding so far. Exhibits practice smiles that are charming. When awake/alert studies things and faces very intently and listens closely so that he always knows where Daddy is in the house. Sleeps very well so far *knock wood* again. Sweet-tempered and mellow. More pictures can be found in this flickr set, and we'll be adding more from time to time, of course.
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June 17, 2008
Quick Update
Meta and Journally:Yes, I am still pregnant. No, I am really, really not happy about it. Yes, comments are broken on this site right now - send email instead. There's a full moon coming, so maybe TheLittleGuy will want to come out to see. If he doesn't, the doctors will probably want to evict him, and none of us really want to start down that path. Sigh. Oh, not that I'll ever have time to write again, but I have much to say about the politics and ideologies of pregnancy and birth. I'm sure the politics and ideologies of parenting will be even more fun. Goodie.
Politics:
Hillary was never going to take it to the convention and all the shrieking ninnies who thought she would destroy the Democratic party in pursuit of her own evil feminine ambitions really need to get over themselves. Barack is not the great progressive savior some seem to think he is, but he'll do - better than most. John McCain is completely unacceptable. I hope that Obama does not choose Webb for VP because Virginia needs to keep a non-insane Senator for a little while longer. Other than that, I don't care who he picks, as long as it's not someone like Hagel or Chafee.
Apocalyptic weather and such:
My spouse's home city is suffering under a 500-year flood. We've had wave after wave of severe thunderstorms here. There have been Metro derailments, houses burning down near friends of ours, water outages with 'boil everything' orders a few miles north of us. It's feeling pretty apocalyptic, I must say.
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June 2, 2008
A Curious Article about Corruption in Northern Virginia
Since I am not commuting to work at the moment, I'm not reading the Post every day. (I'm working at home as much as possible until d-day on the gestation project.) But while browsing the Post's site online the other day I came across a curious article with a tantalizing headline: "Federal Group To Investigate N.Va. Corruption." Hmmm... I think. What have they found? Well, the article is very oddly written and it seems to be that they have found ... nothing! A few quotes from the article below.The FBI unveiled a task force yesterday to investigate public corruption and government fraud in Northern Virginia, saying the poor economy and an influx of federal dollars into the region could tempt officials and business owners to take bribes or divert contracting dollars for their own use.Ok - true so far, but also true for parts of Maryland and probably other regions of the country where big defense contracts (or generic pork of other sorts) is funneled. So what's special about NoVA right now?
Federal officials said they have seen no evidence that public corruption is increasing in Northern Virginia, and federal prosecutors have brought only a handful of such cases in recent years. But the FBI said putting more agents in the field and educating the public will probably result in more prosecutions.Sure it will - you get more of whatever you measure, after all, when it comes to stuff like this. But no evidence of an increase? Just a vague worry?
The conference was held at the office of the FBI's Northern Virginia-based agents, which opened in February on a former horse farm in Prince William County.Odd and random detail about the horse farm. Now, who's involved in this task force? Eight agencies, we're told, except for the one whose job it is to prosecute corruption cases in Virginia!
Members of the task force also include U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; the Internal Revenue Service; and inspectors general for the departments of Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security and the U.S. Postal Service.Check that out: "The U.S. attorney's office in Alexandria, which prosecutes public corruption cases in Northern Virginia, is not a member." Umm. Wha? Why not? The closing quote:
The U.S. attorney's office in Alexandria, which prosecutes public corruption cases in Northern Virginia, is not a member.
But, he said, "with that much money moving through the areas, there's always the possibility that some of that money is diverted or misspent."Gee, ya think? On the one hand, it's true that there likely is corruption, waste, fraud, and abuse (as the anti-gubmint folks like to rant), but this article was just weird. My guess -- they have a target, it's probably a politicized target (given the history of this administration, how could it not be?), and the U.S. attorney's office in Alexandria refused to play along. TheGuy and I also have a guess as to who that target might be. (We both said the same name out loud when I pointed out the article to him.) But, this article was just very strange. It makes me wonder why it was printed at all.
Truly the ways of the Washington media and their buddies in the gubmint are mysterious.
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