.: bistan.net :.

Here are a few shots from Christmas morning at the Davis home:

Why no pictures of me? Because I didn’t get anything!  I must have been a bad boy this year!

Kindergarten Cookie Day is perhaps the best kindergarten activity of the year.  Two years ago, we went to Tristan’s cookie day and this year, we weren’t about to miss Mackenzie’s.  She didn’t let her injury prevent her from missing a bit of the fun.

It was so much fun, that afterwards, Kimberlie told me that “we should have another kid just so we can do cookie day again”.  I’m not so sure about that, but I do agree that it was fun.

Check out the cookies I made for the Christmas party at work:

They turned out really good!

This morning, at the Reindeer Run 5K, there was a Santa walking around taking pictures.  The Santa was actually my Sunday School teacher from when I was in the 7th grade!

Of course, I couldn’t say anything in front of the kids. But, when he finally realized it, he said “Oh, that’s you Jonathan!” and then asked about my sister, stepfather, etc.  Let’s just say my kids were EXTREMELY impressed that Santa knows their dad!

And, since he knew me, he showed my kids lots of attention.

I ran a good race, too. Only about a minute off of my PR on a VERY challenging course!

Yesterday, not too long after arriving at work, my phone started ringing. I saw it was the kid’s school. It was just 30 minutes after we dropped them off, so I knew nobody was sick and I know Tristan learned his lesson about sticking things where they don’t belong. What could it be?

It was the school nurse. Apparently on the way to her class, Mackenzie got her finger slammed in the door. OK, I thought. Just put some ice on it. Nope. They wanted someone to come and take her to the urgent care center. I couldn’t reach my wife, so off I went.

After lots of waiting and paperwork, we finally went back. Let me just say that urgent care doctors are worthless. They are usually at the bottom of their profession, like public defenders are at the bottom of the legal profession or how the Geek Squad is at the bottom of the IT profession. Mackenzie had some x-rays and the doctor told us all was well and just to put ice on it. What a relief!

By that time, she had missed her normal lunch period at school so I took her out for a happy meal and some ice cream. For some reason, chemically enhanced food and high fructose corn syrup tends to make children happy. We were nearly back at the school (and 30 minutes from the urgent care center) when the doctor called and told us that the radiologist had just looked at her scans and to return immediately. I’m not sure why the radiologist would read scans of discharged patients, unless it is simply a way to bill us for more services.

When we returned, a nurse put a temporary splint on Mackenzie’s finger and informed us that we had an appointment the next morning with an orthopaedic hand specialist due to a crack in the bone.

This morning, we saw the doctor and were told that because of her age, she should get a cast. She was a little nervous, so I showed her a picture of her friend Savannah who recently got a cast and that eased her nervousness a bit.  She was completely fine when she found out that she would be able to choose a color and she even started acting silly.

After deciding on pink, and then pink and purple, she finally went with a Christmas cast.  It’s the most expensive Christmas decoration we’ve ever bought.

She will get it off a few days before Christmas, followed by more x-rays.  Then we will go from there.

Never a dull moment in our house!

In six months, we are leaving on a Disney cruise. My good camera, however, is over 5 years old. Right now, I carry around the DSLR for still photos and a pocket-sized Canon for video (and running). I want a nice camera that does both. And since we are going on a cruise, I need some degree of waterproof capabilities. The small Canon that I use for video has been swimming in the Chattahoochee before (it survived, the iPhone did not).

I’ve been drooling over the Canon T3i, but by the time I add all of the accessories I want and the waterproof housing, it would be well over $1000. We currently have another financial goal so that is a little steep.

Flash forward to Black Friday. Old Navy’s offer was a FREE waterproof digital camera with a $40 purchase. No problem there. I needed some jeans and we needed to pick up our gifts to donate to the kid’s school as we do every year. The only issue: “quantities are extremely limited”.

I arrived at 7:30pm on Thanksgiving in anticipation of the midnight opening. Several other adventurous shoppers confirmed that there were only 40 cameras available. I was number 9 in line when I got there and about 23 by the time the store opened (thanks to some very unethical people).

Now I don’t think many people actually shop for holiday gifts on Black Friday. People pretty much just buy things for themselves. I can’t blame them. I wouldn’t stand in a line like that for anyone else.

Here are my tips for other Black Friday shoppers:

• Black Friday is not necessarily the best time to score a deal. Other than the “doorbusters”, like the cheap laptops and TVs (and the camera), the prices aren’t that competitive. Of course, the selection on Black Friday is better than the selection near Christmas when the deals are better. It’s all a trade off.
• Those aforementioned “doorbuster” TVs and laptops are usually cheap knock-off brands like Dynex, Visio, Emerson, etc. They aren’t worth even what you paid for them. Hold out for a good deal on a Samsung or Toshiba instead.
• While the coffee and hot chocolate might be great in the 40 degree weather, you will need to get out of line to relieve yourself. It’s better to go without.
• You might think you are making friends in line, but when those doors open, it’s every man for himself.
• When you arrive, count the number of people in front of you. That number is guaranteed to at least double before the doors open. Suddenly, everyone is best friends with the person at the front of the line.
• Don’t call the cops. It is private property, so unless they are invited by the property owners, they probably aren’t going to help with crowd control. Besides, it isn’t a crime to cut in line. Besides, they probably aren’t happy about working on the holiday anyway.
• If you’re too fat to get out of your car, you need to stay home. Sitting in the car doesn’t count as waiting in line.
• I’m all for equal access (OK, so not really. And I really mean not really.), but wheelchairs and handicapped people have no business trying to compete on Black Friday.
• Prank calling the store workers so that you can watch them answer the phone through the window doesn’t accomplish anything.
• Calling the cops a second time for the same reason (see above) just pisses them off.
• Don’t cut in line. It will piss people off and you don’t know what kind of rage they are capable of.
• Trying to be the line police makes you look more like an asshole than the people cutting in line.

I’m sure I could keep going, but you get the point.

Anyway, to make a long story short, I got the camera! And I got some mediocre deals on clothing. So look for some awesome water shots right here, next June!

4 Halloween events yesterday, 1 today, 3 tomorrow.  Exhausted.

Sometimes, you have to go back to work to recuperate.

As you can probably tell from the frequency in blogging today, I’m at home alone for the holiday.

That now makes an 11.5 day weekend (two weekends actually) for Christmas, 3 days of work, a 5 day weekend for Disney/snow, 3.5 days of work, and now a 3 day weekend for MLK day.

I really could get used to this!

We had a wonderful quiet Christmas morning.  After opening gifts, we went to Waffle House, which is our normal Christmas tradition.

Six more days until Christmas.  I only have to work 3 of them, which I think is going to become 2.5.  Yesterday my sister came down from Athens and we visited with her and her family.  It’s my niece Elinor’s first Christmas.  I gave Jennifer a DVD of all of the videos that I mentioned here.  After I give my dad a copy, they will be on YouTube and available right here on this blog.  This afternoon, we visited with Kimberlie’s family.  All of the kids had a good time, and if these early holiday get-togethers are any indication, my kids will make out like bandits this year.