It’s increasingly uncommon for anyone (other than lawyers) to wear ties. According to this Wall Street Journal article from last week, only six percent of Americans wear ties to work. Six percent. Tie sales in the US in 1995 were 1.3 billion dollars, and last year they were little more than half that.

Ties are uncomfortable, they get in the way, and - let’s face it - they’re completely pointless. Good riddance.

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jonathanhickman.com

It’s awesome.

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The Bug had crawled cutely over to me and was playing with my shoe.

Oh, the cuteness.

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Finally, at four, I gave in and took her home. If she’s going to be fussy, I’m going to be at home.

When we got here, the Bug just wanted to be held. After a while of just sitting in my lap, she wanted down … to fuss some more. And fuss she did.

Finally, Katie called to let me know she was running late. She could hear the stress in my voice - and the baby’s screams. She asked “why don’t you try feeding her?” The thought had not occurred to me.

She’s still in a pretty fussy mood, but clearly she was starving. I guess it’s a developmental thing. All I can say is I’m glad people grow out of screaming whenever they’re unhappy. That’d get really old by the they got to middle school. And it’d make job interviews really uncomfortable.

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jonathanhickman.com

We’ll see how long this lasts, right?

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This morning I tried to look past Friday’s lack of naps. The Bug fell happily asleep in my lap around 10. I did what I always did; I picked her up and put her gently down in her bed.

Screams.

I tried getting her back to sleep, but she was now wide awake. A new tactic was required.

I gave up on sleep for the moment and took C for a nice, thirty minute walk around the neighborhood. When we got back, I gave her a bottle, and she drifted gently off to sleep. She was down for the count. I waited about ten minutes, and tried again to put her in bed.

Screams.

She’s now playing happily at my feet (perhaps she doesn’t need sleep so much right now?). She loves the board books.

Well, at least we’re making progress with “no.”

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jonathanhickman.com

We got the full digital cable dealy this time because of the baby. There was no way, we figured, that either one of us should be up at three in the morning with a fussy, wide-awake baby and have nothing to do.

But the Bug will be eleven months old next week, and she’s no longer getting us up in the middle of the night (Katie won’t allow it). Now the television is a distraction.

For me, the problem is its location. The tv, and its million cable channels, is in the living room, where I’m currently watching - for the eighty millionth time - Silence of the Lambs. And our house has a fairly open floor plan, especially for a hundred-year-old house. When one person watches tv, everyone watches tv.

But because we have a huge room upstairs that’s being underused, we’re going to turn it into the tv-focused family room, and free up the downstairs. It’s all a part of our child-proofing weekend. I hate the thought of everyone having to watch Silence of the Lambs just because I am.

I’m excited and anxious. And I hope we can leave cable off for longer this time.

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jonathanhickman.com

When can babies start learning about “inside voices?”

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And at the same time, my childcare at work has gone on a two week vacation. While I’m used to having the Bug here three days a week, she usually spends most of that time with my mother. On the average work day, I can usually hand her off when I need to, and I generally only have an hour or two a day (not including commutes and nap times) when it’s truly one-on-one.

But I wasn’t able to finish this post without getting up and moving C out of her pack n play and into another neglect-o-matic. It’s going to be an interesting two weeks.

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It turns out there is no thumbs down button on the radio.

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It just makes more sense. I’ll have to figure out of it’s possible and worthwhile for me to switch to that method (esp since I don’t actually use the google feed reader or the google blogging platform).

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So I did a little research. It turned out that I was part of the problem. Because the other dogs respond positively to being told to hush in the crate, I treated Leo the same way. When he fussed, I shushed. It turns out he didn’t notice that the attention he was getting was negative; he just knew I paid attention when he fussed.

After reading more about crate training, I completely changed my behavior. Whenever he was put in the crate, I ignored him for up to 45 minutes. Since I knew he’d just been put in the crate, I knew he didn’t need to go to the bathroom. He didn’t need out of the crate, he just wanted to be out. There were times that he fussed that entire 45 minutes, but he always stopped before I caved.

For weeks, Leo fussed in the crate. But several days ago, I realized that he wasn’t doing it any more. Now, while Leo still doesn’t relish getting in the crate, he goes in when he has to and he waits quietly for morning. Even on really bad nights, when we’re up with the Bug, he fusses a bit - hoping to be let out - but if I ignore it for a few minutes (I wouldn’t wait 45 in the middle of the night, not knowing if he might really need to be let out) he generally settles down.

I’m not saying this is the end of crate training, but it sure is good progress.

Next step: obedience training.

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