Time for a Cool Change

I had lunch a week ago Thursday with 3 folks from Chesapeake, one of whom I met on my other two visits. They called back last Thursday and extended an offer, which I accepted. My last day at Inoveon will be 08/17/2007. I'm disappointed on many levels. Everyone that has been associated with Inoveon has worked tremendously hard, and I'll miss the people and the cause (trying to prevent the leading cause of blindness in the US).

I start @ Chesapeake August 20th and will serve as supervisor - service desk tier 1. I stopped by there after work yesterday and picked up some material to help get me situated. And I can't tell you how excited I am.

More to come...

Jonathan's Quote of The Day (QoTD)

Context: Katrina gave our dog a bath in the boy's bathtub, and she had just finished washing out the tub with those crazy foaming bubbles.

Jonathan walks in and says: "Mommy, it smells like someone's coming for a visit"

Robby's Quote of the Day (QoTD)

"Mom, what if this isn't real life. What if it's just someone's big dream?"


Now that's funny!

Briefly Briefing

Hey everybody. Just a quick update on what's been going on around here. The boys went with G&G W last Friday and came back home yesterday. They had a great time from the sound of it, and Katrina and I had a pretty good time as well. We got quite a few things done that had been getting put off.

We had 3 ball games last night. Robby had a double-header and Jonathan had a game right after. Jonathan had two hits, two runs, and played catcher and third base. Pretty solid performance I'd say!

If you haven't ever used iTunes, it's time you did. Go to www.apple.com and download it. Then go to the iTunes U section and check out Concordia University's abundance of content! Very good stuff for the spirit, and not milk either. Real steak!

Work has been very busy. We're very short staffed, and can't really afford more mouths to feed. So we're all kind of sucking it up and hanging on for the ride!

I'll have some pictures this weekend from the boy's games and whatever else we do this weekend. Until then, here's one from the JoshCam!

Summer Summer Summer

Haven't posted in awhile because we've had a really busy summer so far.

If you're from Oklahoma / Texas, you know about all the rain we've had. If you're not I'll fill you in. It's been WET! Jonathan and Robby are both signed up to play ball, and we've only been able to get a few practices in, and no games until last night (that's like a month worth of games that have been cancelled due to rain / muddy fields). So we had a game start last night but the game was called after one inning due to lightning. Here are a few pictures.





This was Jonathan's team, but they were short on players so Robby got to help them out! I was really proud of him, as he fielded a ball on defense and got a turn at bat. He almost hit it a few times, even tho he's never actually been on the receiving end of a pitch!

We have another game scheduled for tonight and the weather looks good, so I guess we might get to finish more than one inning!

More to come!

More Shadow Photos

Additional photos of Shadow...

One More Thing

A few posts ago I mentioned that we went to the OU / OSU baseball game last Saturday, to watch the Pokes beat the Sooners, but also to watch our friend from church (who also happens to be our pastor's wife) sing the national anthem.

I'm not sure who did the marvelous camera work, but here is the youtube video. She's extremely gifted!

Night #2

Night #2 with Shadow in the house went really well. So far we've only had one accident in the house (we weren't paying attention). All the rain hasn't helped the house training, as he doesn't much care to venture into the tall wet grass to take care of business. We picked up a crate last night, and he took about a 2 hour nap in it. I expect he'll crate train with little or no problem. He hasn't eaten much since joining our family, but I expect he's still adjusting. He's drinking lots of water, however so I don't think he'll blow away anytime soon.

I'm picking up the papers from the breeder tonight so we can get Shadow registered. I was doing some research today, and this little doggie has quite a pedigree. His mom and dad are both champion show dogs, as are most of his lineage.

Diplomat's Pedigree

This link is the pedigree for Shadow's father. I'm getting the pedigree of his mother tonight and may post that as well.

New Mouth to Feed

We picked up another mouth tonight...Shadow! He is a miniature schnauzer and HE IS CUTE! He's 13 weeks old, his mom and dad are both show champions, and we're all pretty excited.

The breeder is the nicest great-grandmother you'd ever meet, and lives alone. So Shadow is going from a nice quiet life to our crazy loud house. The breeder assured us he'll adjust in a few days. For now, he's laying low :)

Here are some pictures...

Week in Review

I don't know about you, but this week went REALLY FAST. Month end always means busy times at work, which makes the time fly. The monthly projections for May are pretty low right at the moment, but I'm sure the team will get it pulled out and hit the targets.

Ted and I managed to sneak out early yesterday. We went down to the Lexington WMA (wildlife management area) South of Noble, OK and tried to round up a turkey or two. I heard some hens, but no gobblers, and didn't see any. Oh well. Gonna have to get better at hunting them rascals. Which is tough given that I just don't have the time to get out every weekend and chase them. So far I'd much rather be sitting on a boat chasing smallies. No ticks. No camo. And you can talk and drink a beer if you want.

Plans for the weekend? Well, we're going to the OU / OSU baseball game at Bricktown tomorrow night. A friend from church is singing the national anthem.

Spring Has Sprung

Sorry about the delays in posting. With spring has come a new level of busy! Jonathan and Robert (he doesn't like Robby anymore) are both playing soccer. That is, when the field isn't soaked from all the rain we've had this spring. We've had a few fishing trips to Skiatook, and had a great time catching stringers full of crappie. Jonathan, Robert and I also made a trip to Murray last Saturday (see the pictures above).

A few weekends ago we made a quick trip to Lake Arcadia, which is about 2 miles from our house. We didn't catch any, but we had a good time exploring!





School lets out the end of May and the kids are ready. Frankly, I think their mom is ready too. More to come l8r!

Winter Wonderland

We're getting more winter weather in the great state of Oklahoma! We had some snow early yesterday (just a good dusting), then some freezing rain late yesterday. Lots of accidents yesterday. This morning we've had about 1/4" of snow. Roads weren't bad coming in to work. I'll take some pictures once the battery is charged.

In the meantime, here's a pic of my truck, done up like a Cars character. Give me your suggestions on a name!

Pinewood Derby!

Jonathan's pinewood derby was last weekend. He took 2nd place in his den, so I guess all the polishing and work paid off! He had a great time, though it was at 8:00 in the morning on a Saturday! May have to see about changing the time next year!

Robby's Birthday Party...Finally!

Well, we tried to have the party on Jan. 13th but cancelled due to the big ICE STORM. Then we setup for Jan. 20th but cancelled due to the big SNOW STORM (that never came, by the way). We had the party yesterday, a full 18 days after Robby's actuall birthday. But it was great!

Katrina is a master at these birthday party setups. She made the ship out of a refrigerator box, and made the mast and sail. The cake was a big ship, and very tasty! The kids played a game similar to musical chairs, but they had to sit on a treasure map. They then had a big scavenger hunt. Great fun was had by everyone!

Here are a few pix from the party...

Party!

Holidays are over, and the decorations are getting closer to the attic (tho we're a little slow to get it done this year). Now we're getting ready for Robby's 6th birthday party. His birthday is the 10th, but we'll be celebrating next Saturday. He said he wants a pirate party, so Katrina is in planning mode. We'll have some pix posted next week.

Christmas 2006

Christmas 2006 got here so quickly! I've just gotten used to writing 2006 on checks, and now I'm going to have to change to 2007 very soon. The older I get the faster the time goes by...

We had a wonderful Christmas break this year. We went to Skiatook on Friday, returning to Edmond on Monday, Christmas day. Here are a few pictures...

Clowning Around!


OSU beats Alabama!

Return of the slacker

So I've been slacking on my posts, but I'm back! The last few months have been very busy.

Professionally, I can't think of a more precarious time. Our company continues to struggle to make it to profitability, and we've lost some very key personnel. But we continue to plug away in hopes that one day we will be able to help even more people that are at risk of blindness from diabetes.

Personally, we've been very busy. Now that school is in session, so are football, soccer, and cub scouts. Joshua celebrated his 3rd birthday, my brother celebrated his (removed to protect the innocent) birthday, and we went camping and it was COLD.

I've also started hunting this fall. I've been dove hunting twice with one of my coworkers, and we got a few. I'm really looking forward to turkey and pheasant. I still like fishing better at this point (you can throw a fish back; it's hard to throw a bird back when it's twice it's weight in lead).

Anyway, here are some photos. I hope to be better about posting more frequently (yeah right).

Cheers...


Josh at his 3rd birthday party

The guys at home, messing around as usual

Back To School

Summer is over. The pools are empty. The kids can't stay up late now. But it's still hot out. Jonathan started 2nd grade on Monday and Robby started kindegarten this morning. They are both enjoying it so far. Jonathan had a note in his backpack Monday asking our permission to have Jonathan tested for gifted and talented classes. The letter said that he demonstrates characteristics that permit him to be tested. So we're pretty excited, and we'll see how he does. Needless to say our expectations of his financial ability to take care of us in old age just went up!

All in all we had a great summer. I was able to take some good time off, playing in the sun. Only regret is that I still haven't been on the golf course yet this year.

Having a Heat Wave

It's HOT! Oklahoma City was up to 107 today, and I think the lawn will probably give up very shortly. The kids were on the slip-n-slide all day today...staying cool.

I just read the Business Week article from last week about Kevin Rose. The article was okay, but it eluded to the fact that he made 60 million in 18 months. In fact, his company is not yet profitable, and has not given in to the pressures of selling the company until they are done building their vision. If you haven't seen Kevin's website, www.digg.com you should check it out. The site is a news aggregator where users (called the diggnation) submit interesting stories, and other digg members either give the stories positive or negative diggs. Stories with more diggs go to the top. And you can add users to your 'friends' and view their history of diggs. So you can associate with like-minded people, and see what they dugg. Pretty great concept.

I continue to struggle getting Wytek IT Services off the ground. I need more word of mouth and networking, which is difficult while continuing to work fulltime. I also need to spend more time developing the service line that I offer.

The kids were at Grandma and Grandpa Wyckoff's house from Saturday night until Tuesday night of this week. They had a great time on the lake; swimming, tubing, and playing. It gave Katrina and me a nice break for a few days.