MichaelandChrissy.com

When I was a wee baby, I developed an allergy to milk, or so I’m told (this is all second-hand, mind you, because I was too young to remember it). My parents did the best thing that they could think of (it being the early 70’s and parenting magazines not being invented yet): they served up ice cold “Coca-Cola” in a baby bottle. When I was old enough to walk to the refrigerator and open it myself, I could fetch my own bottles of pop from the bottom shelf. It was agreed that this was a win-win situation for all involved.

Fast-forward a dozen years or so. I’m no longer allergic to milk, but I’m easily drinking an entire two-liter of “Coke” in one sitting. But I was young and invulnerable, so nobody seemed to mind. Go forward another dozen years, and I’m trying hard to wean myself off from my crippling caffeine addiction. Drinking so much pop was bad for me, but attempts at quitting the cola had caused awful withdrawals: headaches, shakiness, and jittery thoughts (”can’t… think… slowly…”). Bringing us to the present, where I am down to two cans of pop per day, one for lunch and one for dinner.

This reduction in caffeine intake, by itself, sounds like a great accomplishment in this context. However, I’m not a scrawny teenager anymore, and the doctor says that I have to lose weight. Those two cans of pop per day hold upwards of 300 calories that I should be cutting out of my diet. The problem is that “Diet Coke”, and any diet cola in my opinion, tastes nasty like Aspartame (”NutraSweet”), which is neither nutritious nor sweet. Worse yet, the Aspartame aftertaste won’t leave your mouth, thus ruining the taste of the rest of your meal.

I decided to try “Coke Zero“, an alternative brand of Coke that claims to have no calories, but has just as much caffeine as the original. No sugar, no carbs, and no trans fatty acids. “I bet it tastes like Aspartame though! It’ll suck!” I wanted to have a can of the “real” Coke nearby just in case I needed to cleanse the palate out quickly. It turns out that Zero wasn’t bad at all. There’s a hint of something different there, but not so bad that I can’t overlook it. Now I’m thinking of heading down to Meijers for a case of Coke Zero, and perhaps a case of “Vanilla Zero” (I loves me some “Vanilla Coke” too).

I’m really glad that I finally went in for treatment of my fatigue problems. I used to be tired all the time. I think that it started at about the time that I started working in Chicago. The long commute and the fast food diet collaborated against me, and I started gaining weight. I went from my college weight, 135 pounds, to my current weight of 205 pounds within six years. You can see the transformation in our photos over that time span (”Hey, it’s Niagara Falls. That was back when I had a neck!”). The added weight caused a thyroid imbalance and severe snoring, which combined to create problems greater than the sum of their parts.

I didn’t want to get help. That would take time and money that I didn’t think I had.  I had convinced myself that it wasn’t really a problem at all, I was just abnormally fatigued.  Eventually, my boss at the University of Chicago suggested that I go to a sleep therapist. He noticed how tired I was all the time.  After a battery of tests and sleep studies, I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism and severe sleep apnea. I got a prescription for thyroxin (artificial thyroid hormone) and a new CPAP machine to wear while sleeping, both of which I would come to rely upon.

Now life is very different for me. I don’t fall asleep during the work day any more, and I don’t have trouble staying awake during my commute. Related problems, like my elevated cholesterol levels, seemed to disappear. One major change is that I moved my work hours from 9-5 to 8-4. I could barely wake up in the mornings before, let alone an hour earlier, but it has been pretty easy now. As a bonus, I’m able to get home an hour earlier to spend quality time with Aiden. I have more time and energy to play with him now; we take care of his “bath, book and bed” before his bedtime at 7 o’clock.

My doctor said that I should be exercising more, so I’ve really made an effort to use our recumbent bike downstairs. The additional energy helps. I’m keeping a log of my exercise bike activities in an Excel spreadsheet (might put that online some time down the road). With any luck, I’ll lose weight now that I’m back on track. It’s not easy to cut calories, but dinner salads and Coke Zero are suddenly looking like viable options. I’m happy that my life has undergone these changes, and I’m looking forward to seeing what’s next.

I’ve been playing “Unreal Tournament 3″ in single player mode for the last couple of weeks. I played “Unreal Tournament” back when the first one came out, since I enjoyed the original “Unreal” so much. I couldn’t actually play online back then because I was still on a dial-up modem, but that didn’t stop me from trying (and dying repeatedly due to lag). I haven’t played a run-and-gun shooter since those days, and there have been some upgrades since then. For example, you can now drive vehicles or ride shotgun in one (literally – you’re in the gunner’s chair while someone else drives).

As with “Gears of War”, I wanted to build up the FPS skill set before even trying to play the game online. Playing against artificial intelligence “bots” in single player is a far cry from playing against real people, but you have to start somewhere. The single player mode of UT3 is a collection of deathmatches loosely connected with a storyline. You have your standard team deathmatch (attack the enemy team until you reach a certain number of kills), capture the flag, and team warfare maps (destroy the enemy base’s power supply). Repeat ad nauseum. At least they slowly add new strategic concepts, vehicles and enemy types to make things interesting.

The story is pretty straight-forward and does a good job of initiating you into the basics of who’s who and why they’re attacking each other. Apparently, I’m part of the Ronin Team, hired by the Izanagi Corporation to fight the Axon Corporation, while we should be fighting the Necris Team, who plan to enslave the galaxy with the help of evil Krall mercenaries. It’s a lot to take in. I just got to “Act 3″, where Necris vehicles are introduced, which look nothing like the futuristic tanks and jeeps that we’ve seen so far.

The Necris Darkwalker is a “War of Worlds” tripod, pulled almost directly from the Tom Cruise movie. It makes the same trumpeting sound and everything. It’s missing the impenetrable shield from the movie, but it’s still pretty hard to kill. I’ve learned to avoid it as it stomps around in the downtown setting that the deathmatch is located in, but it doesn’t make the level any easier. I can’t wait to hijack one and use it against the Krall.

I put down “Gears of War” a few weeks ago to start playing “Unreal Tournament 3″, but I really enjoyed Gears (maybe a bit more than UT, so far).  The two games have obvious similarities, but more obvious differences.  You can’t underestimate the ability to stick to cover, blind fire around corners and heal completely if not being shot.  The three-quarter perspective of “Gears of War” also helps one appreciate the chainsaw kill, enabled by the chainsaw built into the Lancer, the standard Gear machine gun.

So imagine my delight when I saw the world’s first do-it-yourself Lancer, cobbled together with a Nerf gun and a toy chainsaw.  This guy really knows his stuff, as he was able to incorporate some lighting elements into the design as well.  The finished piece is amazing, and would probably get you strip-searched in an airport.  The video above shows the construction process in detail and ends with a nice mock chainsaw kill.  “Sweet!”

I’m still not sure if it’s normal for a woman to pick out her own wedding ring, but Chrissy did. Like almost everything we do, wedding ring shopping was a joint effort. Chrissy and I had looked for rings at some stores down Jeweler’s Row on Wabash Street in Chicago, but we couldn’t find the exact ring that she wanted. She had her heart set on a platinum three-stone ring with diamond baguettes on the sides. To complicate matters, she also wanted rubies on either side of the main diamond, since rubies are her favorite gemstone (nothing to do with birth stones, she just likes red).

A few weeks later, we were checking out the new Albert’s Jewelers during a bridal event. Albert’s had just moved to Schererville from East Chicago, so the staff was eager to make new sales contacts. Chrissy was looking at engagement rings, but they didn’t have exactly the one that she wanted. It turned out that they did have a three-stone ring with side baguettes, but it was a three-prong setting in white gold. The salesperson actually took a red marker and colored in the two side stones; the ring looked exactly like what Chrissy wanted.

Albert’s has jewelery craftsmen on-site, so they offered to get us an estimate of how much a custom ring would cost. We haggled over what type of diamonds would be used and agreed upon a near-perfect stone (D in color, VS1 in clarity and ideal cut). The engagement ring came in a set along with the wedding band, so the salesperson wrote it all up and then went to Josh, the general manager, for a price. It was too high, and I told Josh that I had seen a very similar set in Chicago on Wabash Street for less. He countered with a better offer, but I relented, so he finally gave me his best-possible-price-ever.

It was a really good price for a platinum ring, a few thousand less than what was originally quoted, and at least a thousand less than any of the options that Chrissy and I had found in Chicago. I looked at Chrissy and asked her if she wanted this one, that I would be prepared to buy it right now if she wanted it. This would effectively kill the surprise during the proposal, but she already knew the proposal was coming too. She was practically jumping up and down by this point, so I took Josh’s offer. We were all pretty happy.

There was problem when it came time to pick up the custom ring, however. You could tell with one look at it that the diamond was not the same stone that we had agreed upon. It was clearly yellow and had inclusions that were visible to the naked eye. They tried to tell me that this was the best diamond that they could put in there for the price that I paid, but a quick check of the paperwork showed that we had specified the exact diamond characteristics in writing at the time of purchase. They had no choice but to give me the near-perfect diamond instead. I also got a laser-inscribed serial number for my trouble.

Two lessons learned here: “Get it in writing” and “Get a lifetime warranty”. About two years after we were married, one of the diamonds in Chrissy’s wedding band fell out. Televisions are supposed to die after five years, wedding rings are not. So skip the extended warranty on the Sony, but definitely get one for your wedding ring. And buy a cleaning kit. Every once in a while, Chrissy’s ring will start looking a little dull, but it’s bright and shiny as new after a quick cleaning. I’m still proud of all the effort that went into that ring, a physical representation of our love.

The first of the Botcon 2008 exclusives, “Shattered Glass” Optimus Prime, has been revealed.  Fun Publications usually reveals the figures one at a time in the weeks leading up to Botcon, so it’s exciting to see the first of them come out.  This year’s exclusive set revolves around the “Mirror Universe” theme, where the Autobots are evil and the Decepticons are heroic.  Many fans were not looking forward to Shattered Prime, but I think that he turned out pretty nice.

There have been quite a few “evil” Primes released by Hasbro in the last several years.  They started with “Scourge” in the RiD line, which started the black-and-teal color scheme of evil Primes.  Then the “Nemesis” color scheme of black-and-tan started with the Armada line and carried into Universe (with the awesome “Big Convoy” repaint), but each still retained the teal highlights.  I was afraid that Shattered Prime would be just another teal paint job, but Fun Publications surprised me with “Decepticon Purple”.

Purple is a stand-out color for G1 Decepticons, so it’s a great color choice that came completely out of left field (but shouldn’t have).  Shattered Prime also has some gold accents (no teal!) and a silver wash over his darker colors that really brings out the details in the mold.  The silver wash almost looks like reverse battle damage, which compliments his scraped and beat-up look.  You can almost see him walking away from the final battle with Shattered Sentinel Prime. 

I can’t wait to see what the rest of the exclusive set looks like.  Not because I’m completely sold on it already, but because I’m already invested and interested in what I’ve got.  I’ve heard that the remaining figures will be GoldBug (aka Bumblebee), Jazz, Grimlock and Starscream.  These figures will need to have awesome repaints to incite fan support, since these characters have already been done to death. But the first one is looking pretty good, so I’ve got high hopes.

Chrissy and I got a new alarm clock yesterday. Technically, it’s the same alarm clock that we’ve had for the last two years, the Homedics SoundSpa Premier, only this one is new. It’s a replacement clock, because the old one recently developed a nasty tendency to “hum” when you hit the snooze button. It was more of an “annoy me while I try to catch a wee bit more sleep” button in this case. So we got a new one just like it, because we really liked the one we had, only without the humming.

Minus the humming, this is a really great clock.  It has several buttons that turn on “nature” sounds, like chirping birds or a babbling brook. It has a separate thermometer piece that you put outside so that the display shows both the temperature inside and outside. It also has a projector that beams the time and temperature onto the ceiling, in case you don’t want to roll over to the other side of the bed to see the time and temperature.  So it’s a neat clock.

Aiden woke up at 4:30 AM this morning and began screaming for attention. Chrissy, not wanting to wake up at 4:30 AM, brought him into our room to sleep some more. He fell back asleep pretty quickly, and so did we, until about 6 AM, when Chrissy’s mom called to ask why we were so late. Unfortunately, the atomic clock was set to Pacific Time, and had set itself back two hours in the middle of the night.  Aiden had actually woken up on time, and Chrissy had about ten minutes to get ready for work and leave. She was far from happy.

I thought it best to grab the boy and give Chrissy some space while she ran around like a chicken without a head. I’m more of a “slow and steady wins the race” type of person, whereas Chrissy would rather die than be late for anything. I got Aiden ready to go, and Grandma came to pick him up just as Chrissy was running out the door. I took a few minutes to RTFM and fix the settings on the clock before getting ready to go myself. I don’t blame the clock, but it was a crazy morning.

I have finally gotten my Transformers inventory on my web site.  It would have been easy to just upload the Excel spreadsheet to the site, but I wanted to put the content into a database that could be searched.  So now the database that I started last year has been imported into a MySQL database that can be viewed from the new “Transformers” page. 

Eventually, I’d like to add some functionality to this page.  For example, the database contains figures that I own and figures that I don’t own (but would like to own some day).  In fact, the database is a pretty comprehensive listing of almost every Transformer ever made, in both the US and Japan.  I currently only display the ones that I own on the web site, but I could eventually add a choice to display the ones that I don’t own (as sort of a wish list).   

I haven’t been buying many Transformers lately, so the database content will remain static for a while.  I’ll be sure to update it once I start collecting again though (or if I sell some things off).  I’d like to include photos eventually, but I have way too many figures to photograph each one.  I tried to do that while I was building the inventory, but it was enough work just to dust them, check for accessories and put them into the cabinets.

When you switch from job to job every two years or so, you end up having to change health care practitioners as well, depending on who will accept the health insurance that your new job provides.  I’ve jumped around to a bunch of dentists in the last decade.  When I came to the University of Chicago, I found out that Chrissy’s family dentist accepted my dental plan.  This was great, since I had never had a “family dentist” before. 

About a year ago, I went to the dentist complaining about pain in my upper-left back teeth.  We did a bunch of x-rays and he examined the area, but he couldn’t figure out what the problem was.  My teeth are generally in good shape, so it was odd that I was having trouble at all.  The fact that there was pain at all is cause to believe that something is seriously wrong.  The dentist told me that the best that he could do was to give me some antibiotics and see what happens.  I wasn’t happy about that, still being in pain, but the discomfort stopped after a week or so of the pills.

Now I’m having the jaw pain again.  The family dentist had taken a sabbatical, so he was unavailable.  Chrissy had recently needed some prenatal dental care (developing babies drain calcium from your body), so she went to another dentist.  I decided to give this new dentist a try too, since I didn’t have any other options.  I got in pretty quickly.  It turns out that my back molar on the top-left side is infected and there are signs of periodontal disease around the sides of the tooth.  There is a problem with an old filling and the infection is underneath it. 

I was shocked! I brush my teeth every day, but the decay was under my tooth. The dentist pointed it out in the x-rays so that even I could see it.  Shouldn’t this have been caught a year ago, when it started?  Now I have to get a root canal.  I am seriously unhappy with my old dentist right now.  Unbeknownst to me, I have a tooth that is rotting out of my skull, which should have been fixed long before it got this bad.  So, I’ll be going to the new dentist from now on. Chrissy likes the new dentist too, so we might both make the move.

Even though the “Stargate: SG1″ series ended last year in its tenth season, the franchise is not yet dead.  MGM is bringing back the cast from Season 10 for two direct-to-video movies.  The first, “The Ark of Truth“, is due out in March of this year, and will show how the Ori are finally defeated.  Early reviews from leaked preview copies say that the pacing is too fast and the ending is lame.  Let’s hope that the editing team has time to clean it up before March. 

The second movie, “Continuum” will be a stand-alone entity.  Hopefully, this will be the finale that Stargate deserves, wrapping up the older storylines and putting a cap on the show.  I’m not sure if we’ll see any of these on the Sci-Fi Channel, but I wouldn’t doubt it.   It would be a fitting close for SG1.  At least we won’t be losing Amanda Tapping for a while, since she’s still making small appearances on “Stargate: Atlantis”.