And there's the shoe...

Heather and Jack came to visit me for lunch today. Now lately, we've been giving little slivers of bread to Jack to get him used to the idea of feeding himself. Normally, he gums it, waves it around, and generally plays with it. Today, he was gnawing on it. How cute. Until, of course, he jammed it so far in his mouth that he gagged and urped all over himself and the floor of "eMeals."

As shoes go, not too bad.

Just a quick note - Jack and the dogs slept through the night, which is unheard of. We also won a few bucks in last night's lotto drawing. I can only assume that there is another big, smelly shoe about to drop.

Geek Chic: Okay, so I was watching Welcome to Eltingville the other night. I had taped it, along with the new episode of Justice League because, well, I'm a geek. For those who didn't watch it, it's based on an Eisner-winning comic by Evan Dorkin. It's about four alpha-geeks in all depravity/glory. The climax is a trivia-off to see which of two members gets to buy a rare Boba Fett action figure. If you've ever spent time at a con, you'll recognize these guys. No social skills, or hygene. An encyclopedia-like knowledge of trivia, but no marketable skills. Anyway, the cartoon takes this stereotype and shows it in all its unflattering glory. If you're not familar with the type, the best example I can give that's semi-mainstream is the guy who runs the comic book store on The Simpsons.

Now, I'm the first to say that just because a guy reads comic books, watches shows like Buffy, plays role-playing games, or any combination of the above, doesn't make him a That Smelly Guy In The Xena tee-shirt two-sizes too small. Doing Geek Stuff doesn't make someone That Guy. (Or Gal.) There are lots of normal people who do Geek Stuff. It takes something special.

There's a saying among fans, "reality is just a crutch for those people who can't handle science fiction." Uhh, no. Reality is still there when the movie ends, or you close the book. It's out there. It's big and scary and full of people who just don't grok Spock. But that's no excuse to retreat into anything (comics, bridge, sports, whatever).

If there's one thing that we can learn from reading the adventures of imaginary heroes it is that true heroism comes when someone takes a step beyond what they once were. Bilbo went down into Smaug's cave. Luke confronted Darth Vader. They didn't have to leave their comfortable worlds, but they did, and thus were transformed into something better.

The big news:

After months of soul-searching and research, Heather and I made the big decision. We are, as we've often discussed, going to adopt our second child. We are going to be using Great Wall China Adoption as our agency.

We have numerous reasons for making this decision, but they boil down to: "it's the right thing for us." Adoption has always been important to Heather, and it's become important to me. It may take up to two years to clear the bureaucratic hurdles (not to mention the reams of paperwork), but at the end of it, Jackson will have a sister.

From time to time, we'll post updates here so our three readers will know the latest news.

Today's Late-Breaking Update: Great Wall called us to make sure that we had gotten the application form. Being the industrious sorts we are, we had already filled it out, and mailed it back to them. We should be hearing from them in a couple of weeks.