Category Archives: Brenden

Making Room for BB

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Looks like Lunch has won the baby name poll, followed closely by Suggestion. But we’re not ready to choose just yet, so I posted some more options. Vote now! I also updated the Baby Box page. Over the weekend we finally cleared out a ton of stuff from BB’s room, formerly known as the Pit of Despair since it was our dumping ground for things that didn’t fit anywhere else. We took a nice overstuffed chair to Jenny’s sister Katy and lots of electronics, a bookshelf, a long table, and other items to Jenny’s parents for an upcoming garage sale. Now you can see most of the carpet in there, and we have an idea about how we’ll set up the nursery. We feel better already!

I worked a rare day shift yesterday as overtime. My sector was longhauls from the west to the east, such as LAS-MDW and SAN-AUS. Longhaul desks have fewer flights to plan, but they are obviously in the air longer and require more attention to the route. One factor I check is the upper-level winds and how they line up with the default route that we use. Sometimes a different route provides a better tailwind or weaker headwind, saving time and money even if the actual distance flown is greater. With jet fuel around $3.00/gallon, and our planes burning over 700 gallons per hour, every gallon counts. Yesterday I easily paid my salary for the day in fuel savings just by doing a little extra work on many of the flights.

March Already?

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Wow, it’s already March! Jenny is at 18 weeks now, so check the Baby Box page for the latest in his development. And don’t forget to vote for his name. =) I had an unexpectedly busy weekend, working three overtime shifts on the assistant desk at work, a nice surprise. Jenny and Lisa went to Canton on Sunday, where pregnant Lisa apparently devoured an entire store’s supply of fried pies.

We had three CARES events last week. First was Coffee and Pie Night, where we provided 4 different kinds of pie and had great conversations with several of our residents. Our eagerly awaited International Potluck Dinner, a resident’s suggestion, turned out to be a flop when not one person brought a dish and only a few came to eat what we had brought. But we made up for it on Saturday with brunch, aided by an army of volunteers from the Thrive class at IBC. They did a great job cooking and hanging out with the residents and were a huge help. We hope they’ll come back to future events. Around 35 people came, our best turnout in some time. I posted our March events calendar on the CARES page.

Our project for this week is going through our stuff and finding as many items as possible to donate to Jenny’s mom’s upcoming garage sale. BB’s room is currently full of all kinds of stuff – some junk, some good things in need of a good home, such as a nice TV. I also have recurrent training at work Wed-Fri, which means I’m working 7:00-4:00 each day. This might be the last chance Jenny and I have to carpool to Southwest. It’s weird to think that we’re almost at the halfway mark, and in about 5 months Jenny should be retired and home with the baby. We have a lot of work to do!

BB Gender Poll and More

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Thanks to all who participated in my first poll! Obama was the clear winner with 44% of the vote, followed by McCain. Note that Texas’s primary is March 4, and it’s an open primary, meaning that you can vote in either the Democratic or Republican primary (but not both) regardless of your party affiliation. Since it looks like McCain has the Republican nomination in the bag, the only primary that matters is the Democratic. Apparently Clinton has a large following in Texas and is predicted to carry the state. So if you happen to dislike Hillary, you need to vote for Obama whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat. =)

As you can see, I’ve created a new poll on the right: BB’s gender! Some people have “feelings” about babies’ gender before the sonogram reveals it. Others simply want to guess. Now is your chance! This poll will run through Feb 27, when we hope to find out the truth. Happy voting!

Jenny and I are back from Orlando after a very successful but draining trip. We leave for Oakland on Tuesday, fly to Phoenix Wednesday night, and fly home for good on Friday of next week. We’re having a great time, but it will be great to be home for an extended time once next week is over.

Happy belated Valentine’s Day to all! Jenny and I had a lovely dinner at Cafe Cipriani in Las Colinas (try the souffle!) and walked around Lake Carolyn a bit after doing some shopping. I remember flying her to New Orleans for our first-ever Valentine’s Day about 6 weeks after we started dating. How time flies!

I’m Gonna Be an Uncle!

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I’ve been dying to put this news on here but waited until my sister Lisa gave me the green light: she and Phillip are pregnant! She’s due about 6 weeks after we are, and we are all thrilled to be on this journey together. Theirs will be the first grandbaby on Phillip’s side and just barely the second on our side, so 2008 looks to be a HUGE year for several different families. Lisa and Jenny have already talked several times about how they’re feeling and what’s going on. I’m sure they’ll have fun shopping for baby things together later on. We’re also thankful that we relatively close to each other so that the new cousins can grow up together. I got to see my cousins fairly often growing up – not as often as I’d like, but enough that they are still dear to me. We hope to continue that heritage.

In other news, the TV of Greatness has arrived, and we love it! I brought Mom over to watch the Australian Open in HD, and I might have convinced her to get on board. We’re having a great time with it watching tennis, a few HD channels, and a couple of movies using our new upconverting DVD player that came free with the TV. Unfortunately, it’s also tempting us to upgrade other parts of our home theater system. My huge Klipsch center channel is too big and heavy to fit on top, so I did order a smaller one by Polk from Amazon. But I’m trying to be patient on the other elements, or at least be smart about them and not blow all our money on toys. Jenny’s mom is having a garage sale this spring, which would be a great time to sell our old TV and some speakers instead of Craigslisting them. Maybe we’ll win that Best Buy gift card from Southwest’s employee drawing and take home those magnificent Martin Logan tower speakers I heard the other day. (ha!) For the record, I have the coolest wife in the world. She basically told me that home audio is my department and to do whatever I think is best. I love you, baby!

Five Years!

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On Friday, January 4, Jenny and I will celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary. Forgive the cliche, but it’s hard to believe it’s been five years already. Time flies when you’re married to your best friend. To celebrate the day, we’re staying at the Gaylord Texan, which is still decorated with over a million lights, a 40-foot Christmas tree, and a great exhibit called ICE that’s made of, well, very large amounts of ice. Guess I need to talk to Mom about dogsitting…=)

We were 24 and 26 when we got married. I worked in Technology at SWA, Jenny as an admin at Camden. We lived in a great apartment in Euless overlooking a beautiful park. I drove my beloved Dodge Avenger from high school, Jenny a Hyundai Accent named Joey. I’d just received my dispatcher’s certificate. Jenny was finishing up her degree at Dallas Baptist. We had some goals and expectations about where we would be a few years later, but we had no way to know exactly where we would be at the five-year mark. Since then we’ve come a long way, over smooth stretches of road and bumpy. I’m so grateful to be on this wild journey with her.

Baby Box, one of the goals of the journey, is growing nicely. We met our new OB on Wednesday, so check BB’s page for the latest news.