When NHL turned four years old, my parents bought him a camera for his birthday. No, not a DSLR or even a cheap point and shoot This was a Fisher Price Kid Tough digital camera.
The entire camera was designed with kids in mind. There were two handgrips (for better grips), two eye pieces (since kids might not get “squint and look here”), and the whole thing was rugged enough to survive a drop down a flight of stairs. NHL had a blast taking photos of everything in his sight. (So much so that we quickly realized ground rules were needed like “No taking photos of Mommy and Daddy when they are on the potty!”)
Eventually, his attention was diverted by other toys and the camera found its way to the Heap Of Rarely Played With Toys. At some point, JSL took an interest in this camera, but there was a problem. No matter how often I put a fresh set of batteries in, it would only work for a brief period of time before dying again.
During our Disney World trip, JSL began asking for a camera. What began as an occasional request quickly ramped up. In fact, as I waited in line at Epcot’s photo center (to get some photos added to our Photo Pass card), JSL went berserk. There, right in front of him, was a display of Disney-themed kids cameras. He wanted one and he wanted one NOW!
Somehow, we held him off until his birthday. That’s when he got this:
That would be his new V-Tech Kidizoom Plus. It is a 2MP camera, does video, adds special effects to photos and more. If anything, it’s a little too complex for JSL so we’re trying to limit him to just photos.
He’s now hooked on taking photos. Here’s a small selection of his work.
Don’t feel bad for NHL, though. He’s inherited my old camera with the broken flash. Well, perhaps not “inherited”, but rather “will be allowed to use on a heavily supervised basis.”
If the weather holds out this weekend, perhaps I’ll be able to take the boys on a photo shoot. I’ve got my eyes on a photography exercise that Chookooloonks posted about. I’ll take them outside, walk 100 paces and have them take 20 photos of things right around them.
If you could go on a photo shoot with your kids, where would you go?
Two Thousand and Ten or Twenty Ten, whichever way you pronounced it, it was a big year.
I began the year on a quest to lose 20 pounds in 20 weeks. I’m proud to report that I was successful. I’m not so proud to report that, in the remaining 32 weeks, I’ve gained those 20 pounds back. I’m even less proud to report that those returning 20 pounds brought some buddies along. Looks like I’ll be beginning 2011 with the goal of losing 25 – 30 pounds.
2010 marked the first time we attended blogging/social media conferences. The first conference was Disney Social Media Moms 2010. Actually, B attended this one. I hung out with the kids and rode on rides. To be completely honest, I think I got the better deal. No offense to those of you who were chatting with B and enjoying the conference, but NHL, JSL and I got to go on Disney World’s rides! It’s really hard to beat that. Despite some injuries, problems and some face-remembering fears, we all had a great time. Even better, we’ll be attending DisneySMMoms 2011. And by “we”, I mean B again while the boys and I ride more rides. Small World, here we come! (By the way, if I don’t remember meeting you from last year, please don’t be offended.)
The Disney trip forced me to reexamine some of my long-held religious practices. I think I’m much happier with my modified practices than I was previously. I know that B’s much happier, though she likely misses getting total remote control custody from sundown Friday to an hour past sundown Saturday.
The high of the Disney World trip was followed with a low of constant nosebleeds. First, I got them once a week. Then, they got more and more frequent until I had to have my nose electrically cauterized. That’s as fun as it sounds (unless you think it sounds like a blast in which case you have issues). Sadly this only worked for awhile and then I had to get my nose chemically cauterized. This procedure hurt less and wasn’t as intense afterwards, but still is something I’d rather not go through again.
Towards the end of March, it became apparent that my grandmother wasn’t going to be alive much longer. She passed away in mid-April. I had previously taken custody of her photo collection with the goal of scanning them all and distributing DVDs of the photos to everyone. This scanning project uncovered some incredible photos. I only wish my grandmother was alive to tell me the stories behind them. The scanning project also turned into a genealogy project using various tools.
April also saw the launch of Dad Revolution: a joint blog hosted by about 10 dads. (The actual number fluctuates.) It’s been a bit of a rocky go at times, but I’m proud to have my posts alongside the rest of these dads!
In May, I began a project near and dear to me: My Bullied History. Here, I detailed how I had been bullied from elementary school through high school. I even showcased a piece of writing I had unearthed from my freshman year of college when the bullying was fresh in my mind.
In August, just before BlogHer 2010, we got a diagnosis for some of the behaviors we were seeing in NHL. The doctor said that, since I shared some of these same behaviors, I likely had this condition as well. This led me to question how much of me was from my experiences as a child versus the “condition.” In the end, it was a moot point as further testing showed he didn’t have this condition at all. A rollercoaster of emotion, to be sure.
Speaking of BlogHer 2010, we attended that conference in New York City and had a blast. I’m intentionally not going to say much about it because I know that if I try I’ll go on for about a dozen paragraphs. Suffice it to say that we highly enjoyed the panels, meeting with fellow bloggers and meeting with company representatives.
BlogHer 2010 was also where I cheated on my long-term relationship. And by that, I mean I used someone’s DSLR camera instead of my trusty point and shoot camera. We tried to repair relations, but after its flash broke, I got my own DSLR. My point and shoot will be given to NHL to use in photographic excursions with me.
This Sunday will be October 10th, 2010, or 10/10/10. (That’s 42 in binary. Random geeky fact.) I figured I had to do something special for 101010. I had the idea to both describe my life 10 years ago today and imagine my life 10 years from now. So let’s step into Doc Brown’s Delorian, power up the flux capacitor, set the time coordinates and travel back 10 years.
My Life Circa October 10th, 2000:
Ten years ago, I wasn’t blogging as TechyDad. I wasn’t a father. I wasn’t even married at the time, though I was engaged. October of 2000 saw me embarking on the second biggest step of my life at the time: moving out of my parents’ house to be closer to B. (The first biggest step at that point was proposing to B.) Up until then, I had always lived with my parents. Even in college, when I lived on campus, "home" was at my parents’ house. But now, home would be a long ways away from there in a new place surrounded by streets I didn’t know and a whole new life.
As I wasn’t bringing any furniture up with me (we were buying all new stuff), I decided to do the move myself. I would drive up with a car load of items, move them in during the week and drive back on Friday. This also meant that I was able to spend the Jewish holidays at my parents’ temple instead of the new one I would be attending. (Unnecessary, in hindsight, but it allowed me to feel like this was more transition than abrupt change.)
The company that I worked for at the time was great when I told them that I was moving. They agreed to let me work from home (though one trip in per month would be required). So in addition to setting up my new apartment, I was setting up a home office.
As I got settled in, B would come to visit my new living space more and more. She would stay overnight often so we decided that she should move some of her stuff in. (After all, she was going to live there in about 8 months anyway.) Some stuff turned into more stuff until we were living together completely.
Unfortunately, and here is where I prepare to issue a decades-long-overdue apology, I was afraid of how my parents would percieve this. While I was in college, my father would visit and urge me to "just walk up to that girl and ask her to sleep with you." (No I didn’t do this. My response was "Even if the girl says yes, that’s just proof that I don’t want to sleep with her!") When B and I began dating though, my father’s conservative side came out. An innocent night of us falling asleep in the same bed (nothing happened, seriously!) earned me quite the talking-to. I was afraid of how he would react to us living together prior to marriage.
When my parents came to visit, I would make B hide her stuff in the closet. It was seriously unfair of me to ask her to do this, but she complied. I would like to take this opportunity to apologize to B for doing this. I shouldn’t have let my fear of my parents’ opinions guide me. If they had a problem with us living together while engaged to be married, that should have been their problem, not ours.
(Ok, getting back on topic now.)
Besides the move, the biggest event in my life at this time was planning our wedding. We were visiting florists, deciding on catering and making decisions left and right. Of course, this planning can be stressful anyway. Toss in moving and having to leave each other every weekend, and October 2000 was both a very happy time (more time with B! Yay!) and a sad time.
Now back in our Delorian we go. This time, we’re off to the year 2020. October 2020 to be exact.
My Life Circa October 10th, 2020:
I’ll begin with myself and radiate outwards. At this point, I’m 45 years old. I’m likely having trouble accepting that I’m not a young man anymore. I’ll probably have a midlife crisis. How this will manifest itself, I’m not sure. I’m definitely not the "have an affair" type. (I only have eyes for B.) I wouldn’t want a sports car. (Even when in my 20’s, I always considered a car by its practical merits.) I’ll probably be the type to get a giant computer system/home theater/network setup of some sort.
B and I will have been married 19 years. We’ll be looking forward to our 20th wedding anniversary and will likely be planning on what special thing we should do. Considering how old our kids will be at that time – more on this later – our 20th wedding anniversary trip might be a Disney World trip sans kids. (Our honeymoon was in Disney World and this would be a nice reliving of that wonderful experience.)
NHL will be 17. He will be a junior in high school and will be considering college. He’ll probably begin planning which schools to go visit and studying for his SATs. Dating might likely be an issue at this point. (Either he will have dated or he will want to date.) As my dating life (pre-B) was none-too-happy, this might dredge up bad memories (worsening my mid-life crisis…. I think I need a new smartphone!) and fumbling attempts to give dating advice while remaining hands-off.
JSL will be 13 at this point and will have been Bar Mitzvohed. He will now join me in Temple and will count towards the minyan (grouping of 10 men that is required for some prayers to be said). He’ll be in middle school and might be looking toward his big brother leaving for school with mixed emotions. (On one hand, more room in the house for him… on the other hand, he will be missed.) He’ll likely be starting to notice girls and B and I will have to handle two young boys looking to seek out some female counterparts.
TechyDad.com will have just turned 12 and, along with TheAngelForever.com, will have been bought out by Disney-Google, Inc. netting us fifty million. Hey, it’s my future fantasy and I can sell out for millions of dollars if I want to!
And now, it is time to bid the future farewell. Avoiding the temptation to take a souvenir of the future back with me (ok, Doc Brown tossed out the sports almanac… something about "being done before" and "ending badly"), I now return to my life in 2010 with a new appreciation of where I’ve been and where I’m headed.
And now it’s your turn. Hop in your own time travel device and describe your life both 10 years ago and 10 years from now. (If you don’t have a time travel device, I’m sure Doc Brown will lend you his Delorian. Just stay clear of lightning.) Submit your blog posts in the linky below:
You can also add the following button to your sidebar to help promote the #101010 blog post series.
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This post celebrates a few things. First of all, it is Rosh Hashana. This means that I’m offline for a few days (this post was scheduled in advance) and will be spending the time in temple, with my family and eating apples and honey.
Secondly, it is my second blogoversary. It’s hard to believe that I started this blog a mere two years ago. There were times that I felt like just stopping because I had no comments and other times when I felt like I had too much to say for a mere 5 posts a week. Speaking of 5 posts a week, I think this was the year that I hit my stride. I posted more regularly. I blogged as I lost 20 pounds. I was able to do more reviews and giveaways. I blogged about my history with bullying (including a story I wrote soon after the incident). I blogged about our trip to Disney World for Disney Social Media Moms and about our trip to New York City for BlogHer 2010. (On that last one, I got to meet a lot of wonderful fellow bloggers.)
I have some big plans for the next year. More reviews and giveaways, of course. Also, a redesign of my site and a “How Does That Work?” series.
My Aloha Friday question for today is: If you blog, how do you celebrate your blogoversary? If you don’t blog, what do you like to do to celebrate special occassions?
Thanks to Kailani at An Island Life for starting this fun for Friday. Please be sure to head over to her blog to say hello and sign the MckLinky there if you are participating.
As you may have guessed from the badge to the right, I’m headed to the Disney Social Media Moms convention in a month. We’re going to go a bit early to have some pre-convention Disney World fun and to go on rides that JSL is too little for but that NHL can ride. One of these is Star Tours.
I had been meaning to introduce NHL to Star Wars for some time. I’ve already introduced him to Batman (via the Batman: The Brave and The Bold TV show), Spiderman (via The Spectacular Spiderman TV series) and other super heroes via the Super Hero Squad video game. He also knows how to use computers and the Internet and is a whiz at figuring out how things work. (For example, how to record on the DVR even when Mommy and Daddy don’t want him recording a dozen new shows!!!) So it seemed only natural to expand his horizons to include Wookies, lightsabers and droids. (Oh my!)
This past weekend, while JSL napped, NHL and I sat down to view a rented copy of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. He’s already had some Star Wars exposure from a game on his LeapFrog Didj so he knows some of the characters. He even chose an R2-D2 figure for a recent prize. Side note: Color me jealous. His R2-D2 makes sounds when you push its button. I’m tempted to get one for my office to go next to my talking C-3PO.
Anyway, we sat down to some protests. He didn’t want to watch Star Wars! He wanted to play Wii! After telling him that R2-D2 was in this movie, he got more interested. Still, the movie quickly bored him. It turns out he doesn’t like things like dialogue and character development. Still, his interest got piqued during the land and space battles. Any time the heroes were in danger or were fighting, he was interested. Any other time, he quickly lost interest in the entire movie.
Overall, I think that he mostly enjoyed it and I still look forward to introducing him (and JSL when he gets old enough) to other Geeky interests.
