Plagiocephaly

We're back from Jude's second appointment with Doctor "Tony" Plattner. He did a great job working with Jude and explaining the corrective process to us. Here are some cool photos from the digital scanner they put Jude through:



We'll get his corrective "helmet" in a week or so, and it sounds like he'll wear it for 3-4 months. It should be off by Christmas. How's that for an awesome Halloween costume!

If you're wondering about the diagnosis, remolding process or why it's necessary, check out this FAQ for parents provided by the makers of the scanner.

Earn $1300 by applying for credit cards

When is the last time you looked over the list of rewards cards? Here's a post for those people who are responsible with their credit and are looking for a way to maximize the rewards they can earn by using credit cards. Note: you actually have to be approved and must use the card before you can get the reward . . .

There are a few new ones out there that you might want to consider. Here's a link to a story on how to maximize your rewards.

News and Stocks

I couldn't help but blog on this! I ran across a really cool news and stock website the other day when I was looking for treemaps. Check 'em out!

Carpenter Bees (part deux)

Well, the carpenter bees are back again behind our garage. My first post about this topic was two years back when they first appeared. Here's what I found out this time around . . .

The State of Illinois Health Department, Division of Environmental Health had some great insight. They shared that the male carpenter bees, the ones that are flying around the back of my garage, can't actually sting. They put up a mean show though!

Here's another site that has some great info, including the names of a few chemicals I could get from the hardware store that have a 30-day residual effect.

The local exterminator, BeeLine, guaranteed that their chemical application would have a 90-day residual effect. I'm guessing that they're using a combination of these products.

This company said we would get 16k square foot of coverage for the liquid and 1 lb of coverage on the powder. It should last us 2-4 years! Hard to pass up . . .

Jude's 2-month wellness check-up

"Betrayed! If I only knew my parents were capable of such deceit!" That's what Jude would have said had he been able to speak at his 2-month doctor's appointment.

He got his shots on Tuesday, which was a traumatic experience for all who were involved. Jude didn't sleep but 3 hours Tuesday night, which made Amanda one strung out mommy. As always is the case, she handled it with grace.

Without further ado, here are Jude's charts:

source: The Magic Foundation

You can see from my analysis below that he is coming along quite well.

Jude's percentile rankings:
Length-to-age: 73.47% (60.5 cm / 23.82 in)
Weight-to-age: 39.93% (5.20 kg / 11.46 lbs)
Head Circumference-to-age: 47.77% (40.10 cm / 15.79 in)

Our doctor noted that Jude has a slight case of positional plagiocephaly ("flat head syndrome") due to him being in what I would call an average amount of time in the supine (reclined) position. (To the few friends I have that actually read this blog, I'll share that I was never pre-med, but I did sleep at a Holiday Inn express once.)

God love the Internet. After reading up on it a bit, I learned that Dr. Sears and others recommend alternating sleeping position as well as babywearing via a Baby Bjorn, Peanut Shell baby sling or similar device.

How BIG is big enough?

When you're printing digital images, have you ever wondered if your image is too low of quality for printing the size you'd like?

For example, a photo printed at 4x6 only needs to be 1-2 mega pixels to have a resolution as detailed as a film photo. What if you wanted to print a 5x7 or 8x10? How high would the image resolution have to be to equal the detail in a film photo? And what if you wanted to scan a printed photo? What should the resolution be if you were going to re-print it at a certain size?

Are you ready for answers yet? Reference the handy table at Microsoft.com that shares this very information. If it's missing or you want to try another source, use this Google search.

Now what about memory cards? NewEgg and Microsoft both have interesting articles on their site that talk about this very topic.

To save you the research, I'll share that our camera is set on the 5 mega pixel setting and we have a 2 GB memory card. I would have bought the 1 GB card, but the price difference was negligible. Happy shooting!

Can't edit Windows Contacts in Vista

My parents visited us this past week, and as it usually happens, my mom gives me the opportunity to tune up her computer. This time was nothing more than usual and ended up the usual way - various adware that somehow installed itself had to be uninstalled and several program configurations needed tweaking.

One that I got stuck on was with Windows Vista Contacts. I'm used to working with Microsoft Outlook and Windows XP and not as much with Vista. Vista has contacts built into the user profile. Even if you have Outlook installed, you can choose to use Windows Contacts instead.

On a side note, as of late, I've become very frustrated with Vista. It all stems from "Windows Vista compatible" Acer laptop we bought on Black Friday, 2006. Capable is the operative term here . . .we've had so many problems with it. From outdated and incompatible drivers to OS crashes due to insufficient memory, this laptop is SO Vista incapable! I found out just recently that there is a class action law suit that's been approved against Microsoft, Acer and other OEMs on this very issue.

OK, back on topic. It was time for my mom to finally, fully convert her email over to a web-based solution. The spam filters that Gmail has are so much better than what her local ISP offers, meta tagging beats folders hands down, and the thought of a hard disk crash is one less worry with web-based email.

So the real point of this post is to share that, for those who have suffered with me in trying to edit, import or export Windows Contacts, there is an answer! The root of the problem has to do with wab32.dll and wab32res.dll, Outlook files that aren't compatible with Vista. In short, removing these files fixes the problem. I won't bother to explain the solution in detail because it is well documented at vistax64.com. Renaming these files allowed me to export her contacts to a csv file and then upload them to Gmail.

Importing her email was the other issue. I couldn't figure out how to export from Outlook 2000 to Google. It might have had something to do with Outlook's incompatibility with Vista. I didn't go there. Using Mozilla Thunderbird and Google's instructions made for a time consuming but easy transfer.

Pacey's new dog collar

Pacey and I went on our usual 5 mile run on Saturday. This time of year, since the water has begun to thaw, there are tons of Canadian Geese and Mallard Ducks out. Pacey just loves it -- can't get enough of it.

So we're running along the creek and she spots a Mallard. For the next 10 minutes, I watched her run back and forth along a 40 yard stretch. That was probably where I made my mistake. We got home and were about to jump in the shower when I noticed that her tags were missing.

Her HomeAgain ID tag, county vaccination tag and standard $3 tag had all fallen off. I was surfing online and found a pretty cool slide-on tag at PetSmart.com (online only) for $15, but that seemed a bit pricey for a dog tag -- and after reading about it, it wouldn't have fit anyway.
Boomerang Tags sells this slide-on tag for $7.99 shipped, and it works with adjustable collars with plastic snaps, collars like hers. Now that's a deal! We haven't gotten it in the mail yet, but I'm looking forward to running without hearing the telltale jingle noise that her old tags previously made.

While I'm on the subject of deals, I'll mention that as I write, Amanda and I are sitting in front of the TV passively watching Deal or No Deal. Why does anyone stick it out past their 6 figure offer?! The last lady just walked away with $150 -- idiot!

Jude's 2-week wellness check-up

We took Jude to his 2-week wellness check-up today and learned that he is a healthy baby boy. Above is a photo of our doctor with baby Jude. (Look carefully and you'll see his big foot sticking out.) Turns out his Apgar score was 9 and 9 on the one and five-minute tests. Over 7 means he's normal. I'm going to hold our doctor to that! What does normal mean, anyway?!

He had impeccable timing with the losing of his umbilical cord stump . . .he lost it in her office during our appointment! Our doctor cauterized his belly button on the spot and said we could give him his first bath after 24 hours. She also asked if we wanted to keep it for his scrapbook, but we passed on the opportunity. Jude, I hope you're not upset with us!

Amanda and I also had the chance to ask all of those questions first-time parents ask. We were comforted to learn:

• Newborn babies shed, but it's not unhealthy dry skin. They've just been underwater for 9 months and, since air is dryer than embryonic fluid, begin to lose their outermost layer of skin. Sorry Jude, it's down to 3 layers like the rest of us! Our doctor advised that the best solution to his dry skin problem is to give him a bath or wipe him down with a warm, wet washcloth. Moisturizing lotion is OK, but not necessary.
• Feeding more than 10-15 minutes per side is enough, and we should have Jude should use a pacifier to pacify himself.
• Throwing up for a baby, even out of their nose and mouth, is somewhat normal. If it happens excessively, call the nurse hotline.
• She prefers we take a rectal temperature up to 3 months of age over temporal or ear thermometers. If his temperature gets over 100.4° F, call the nurse hotline. Guess who's on that duty?!
  
• other trivial things, like proper poop color, time between feedings, etc.
  

What I thought was the coolest things was that she gave us stats on how Jude ranks compared to his peers according to the CDC (Centers for Disease Control). They have growth charts on their site which can be used to assess the growth of infants. Unfortunately, they do not separate out stats for babies based on race/ethnicity or whether they were breast fed or not. So our little caucasian baby competes with the african american, asian and hispanic babies on head circumference, length and weight. As of today, here's where he stands:

source: The Magic Foundation

Jude's percentile rankings:
Length-to-age: 63% (53.25 cm / 20.96 in)
Weight-to-age: 10.64% (3.14 kg / 6.92 lbs)
Head Circumference-to-age: 37.45% (36.4 cm / 14.33 in)

Sounds like we have a tall, skinny baby on our hands. Does that sound like his father?

(My plan is to update these charts over the next 36 months with his progress to show where he's at. I'll do that with a new post.)

Note: I tried using the Google Charts API and a few different online chart generators (here and here), but couldn't figure out how to create the type of charts you see above. The Excel file from The Magic Foundation was serviceable after a few aestethic edits. If anyone can help me figure out how to display this chart using Google Charts, please let me know! Dan?

Plantar Fasciitis

I'd have to say that plantar fasciitis is the devil's #2 weapon against man, right up there with pride! I had it for about 6 months back in 2004 and beat it for a while, only for it to flare up later.

After reading up on the injury, I learned that, essentially, the thick muscles and ligaments on the bottom of my feet had torn. This caused my feet to tingle with pain during the course of the day. The tissue would begin to repair itself while I slept, but every morning when I woke up, my first step out of bed would destroy any healing that had taken place. Wearing hard-soled dress shoes to work compounded the problem, but I didn't have any other option.

What cured my ailment, you ask? Well, thanks for allowing me to share! I tried rolling my foot over golf and tennis balls, but that only provided temporary relief. Anti-inflammatories weren't a 100% solution either.

I ended up wearing a Dynasplint night splint to bed for 3 months to get rid of it. (Talk about patience, Amanda was a saint for living through that!) The folks at Dynasplint say that the boot applies a "low-load, prolonged-duration stretch." This just means that, in addition to fixing the angle of my foot/calf in a stretched position, it would apply slight and continuous tension through the use of springs. Most of the boots I had seen in running magazines could fix my foot/calf at a fixed angle, but this pales in comparison to what the Dynasplint did.

While I wore the boot, I also gave up running cold turkey for another 6 months -- very hard for me to do. These days I'm back to running about 15 miles a week, mostly in 5 mile increments, and have been able to keep the injury at bay with the help of some good insoles.

I stumbled across Shock Doctor insoles. I forget what tuned me into their product, but I do remember calling the company and speaking to a vice-president about using the insoles to treat plantar fasciitis. Given my situation, he recommended the Ultra2 insoles. They have a very strong stabilizing structure going all the way up your big toe.

Many runners spend big bucks on custom orthotics. Luckily, I found something off the shelf that worked. And since there was no retailer in my area, they offered to send a free pair to try as long as I agreed to give my podiatrist a few extra pair. That's a deal!

Our BabyPlus story

On their company website, the founder of the BabyPlus company boldly declares:

BabyPlus children have an intellectual, developmental, creative, and emotional advantage from the time they are born.

The site goes on to name several benefits of using BabyPlus:

• More readily nurse
• Display an increased ability to self soothe
• Are more interactive & responsive
• Are better relaxed and alert at birth

We used BabyPlus after our fertility doctor recommended it. Since he shares the same last name as the BabyPlus founder and president, there's a chance his endorsement may have been coerced.

That fact aside, we have noticed that Jude has been thus far the picture of a perfect baby. He's had no problems nursing, has been alert and awake during the day and sleeps well at night. Really, his biggest challenges to date have been with training his parents how to recognize a dirty diaper, how to swaddle tightly and in general how to recognize what he's trying to communicate to his rookie parents!

We've joked that we're not going to use BabyPlus on our second child so we can test to see if it really works! Kidding aside, it wasn't very difficult to add to Amanda's routine and I would think we'll probably use it again for child #2.

Baby name sites

There are probably a billion baby name web sites out there. I started with the Social Security Administration's site and then Googled around for some other ones.

There were 2 that I missed that a friend of ours (Summer) told me about today. Scott, you'll love these sites:

1. Nymbler is a site that allows you to start with up to 6 names ("inspirations")and then explore names they consider similar. From there, you can add names to a favorites list or block them. I have a feeling that the block feature really scores with the soon-to-be-parent teacher crowd.
   
2. The Baby Name Voyager brings alive the SSA's database list of popular names. They graph names in a java application that allows you to see the popularity of a baby name over time starting in the 1880s. Very cool.

Our baby has hazel eyes!

OK, it might not be 100% certain, but according to the science guys at The Tech Museum of Innovation in San Jose, they think our baby has a 30% chance of having blue eyes and a 70% chance for green (hazel) eyes. (That is assuming I've remembered correctly the color of my mother-in-law's eyes!)

Huckabee is not a throw-away vote

I was listening to an interview of Mike Huckabee on NPR today and it made me want to stand up and agree with him. As of today, McCain and Romney both may have more delegates pledged to them, but the race is still very early.

There's a great post on Wikipedia that explains all of this very well. As of Tuesday, 1/29, after McCain's Florida victory, only 208 delegates have been pledged or are projected to be pledged. It takes 1191 to win the republican nomination, and no candidate has more than 100 so far.

According to the Wikipedia post, they estimate the score to be McCain (97), Romney (74) and Huckabee (29). RealClearPolitics.com has the score much closer with McCain (93), Romney (59) and Huckabee (40). McCain is ahead by a good margin because he won all 57 delegates in the winner-take-all Florida primary.

There are 2172 republican delegates yet to be assigned. For all of the states who haven't had their primaries yet, why should we allow the 7 states who've completed their primaries already to limit our choice of presidential candidates?!

Custom ring tones for your LG Rumor (LX-260)

What's the best site out there to download cell phone ring tones or games from? And once I download them, how do I get them on my phone?

I blogged earlier this month that I got a new phone. I didn't opt in on the Sprint Vision internet service. So how does someone download to/from my phone without Internet?

Meritline has a deal right now on a Bluetooth wireless dongle adapter for $7.50 shipped. How's that for a good deal?! That should let me connect my PC/laptop to my phone.

To double my pleasure and for a little faster upload/download, I also found a deal at Buy.com on a microSD card. It's pretty easy to copy images taken from the digital camera onto the microSD card and then transfer them to . . .wherever. I assume it's just as easy to transfer with Bluetooth. There's a pretty good post on the SprintUsers forum on how to create and upload ringtones on an LG Rumor LX-260 phone.

What I'm still trying to figure out is how to upload ring tones downloaded from the Internet (to my PC) onto my phone. I'd follow the instructions above, but it would be nice to be able to use a non-video ring tone. That way, the images I've assigned to callers will still appear when my phone rings with the custom ringtone. Maybe I could save them as a voice memo and retrieve them on my microSD memory card? We'll see . . .

UPDATE: Here's a post from Yahoo! Answers that seems to answer my question!

Now, if anyone knows where to get the java/mobile version of Pac-Man or Tetris for free, let me know!

The best cash-back credit card?

What's the best cash-back credit card out there? I've pared it down to 4 choices:

• The American Express Blue Cash card, where you can earn up to 5% cash back


• Citibank's Dividend Platinum Select Mastercard, where you earn 2% cash back


• Citibank's Professional Cash Mastercard, where you earn 3% cash back


• BP Visa, which pays 5% on gas purchased at BP/Amoco stations

Before I get started, please know that if you can't pay your credit card balance in full every month, your best option is to NOT use it. It's really that simple. I'll add a subsequent post that will discuss how to prioritize which bills to pay first.

The fine print:

• With the American Express Blue Cash, you can earn up to 5% cash back for "Everyday Purchases" at supermarkets, gas stations and drug stores, but only once you hit their 2nd tier. "Everyday Purchases" specifically excludes purchases made in departments of superstores or warehouse clubs.
  
  The first $6500 you charge of "Everyday Purchases" only earns 1% cash back. All other purchases earn 0.5%. Once you break the $6500 barrier, you'll earn 5% on "Everyday Purchases" and 1.5% on everything else. Not bad . . .they even offer a calculator to help you figure out what your cash rebate would be.



• The Citi Dividend Platinum Select Mastercard pays 2% cash back on purchases made at supermarkets, drugstores, gas stations, convenience stores, and utilities including cable. (Don't get too excited about the utilities thing. All utility companies charge a processing fee ranging from $1-$3 for paying your bill with a credit card. The process isn't automated, so you'd have to phone in each time your bill was due.)
  
  Purchases netting 1% cash back include purchases made at warehouse clubs, discount stores, department stores, and online/catalog purchases (unless the merchants appropriately identify the transactions).
  
  Rebates are capped at $300 per calendar year. Read the fine print here.
  
  I've had this card for a long time and it's worked out well, but due to the card's limits, I think I'm leaving some money on the table.



• 
  The Citi Professional Cash Mastercard looks good at first glance, paying 3%, but that 3% is offered on a different group of purchase categories. You get 3% on purchases made at gas stations, restaurants, certain office supply merchants and auto rentals.
  
  This time, warehouse clubs, discount stores, department stores and convenience stores are excluded from the 3% tier and earn the default 1% rate. Rebates are capped at $500 per calendar year. Read the fine print here. When you're ready to apply, do a Google search and you might be able to find out how to get a $100 to $150 sign-up bonus.



• 
  The BP Visa earn 5% rebates at all BP locations, 2% rebates on eligible travel (Airline, Auto Rental, or Lodging) and dining (non-fast food) purchases and 1% rebates on all other eligible purchases. Gas at non-BP stations are not eligible purchases.

I've crunched the numbers and I think the best option for us is going to be a combination of the American Express Blue Cash card and the Citi Professional Mastercard. We'll use the American Express Blue Cash card for all purchases besides restaurants, gas purchases and wherever the American Express card isn't accepted.

Getting 3% back on restaurant and gas purchases is a nice benefit of the Citi Professional card. I suppose we could earn 5% on BP gas by adding the BP Visa to the mix, but that's just too much of a headache. I really don't want to carry around 3 cards!

The American Express card really pays once you spend above the $6500 level, which we tend to get to fairly quickly every year. We'll give this a shot for 2007 and if it doesn't work, a back-up plan would be to use the Citi Professional card only.

Does anyone else have any other bright ideas? Feel free to comment . . .

Dave's word on . . .

Here begins a stream of posts that may seem to be out of place. Anyone who knows me knows that I tend to research a lot before I make a decision. I also tend to have very selective memory retention.

Since I've spent many hours becoming literate in a variety of things, I thought this would be a good forum to share that knowledge with others and also use it as a reference for myself.

With this blog, you'll notice going forward that I'll be adding posts on things I have researched in the past or am currently researching. This includes things like personal finance (life insurance, annuities, IRAs, mutual funds, etc.), technology, cooking/recipes and where (and sometimes how) to find good deals. Stay tuned!

Curdled Milk in Potato Soup

Our potato soup has little white specks in it, and after doing a little bit of searching online, it was because the milk has curdled.

According to Google, milk curdles when it is heated. Curdled milk is not bad milk. If it were bad, it would taste and smell sour. The process of curdling binds the proteins together to form clumps. The same process occurs when yogurt is made. In yogurt production, milk is heated in order for the proteins to bind.

To avoid this process and the associated lack of visual appeal, we have a couple of options:
(1) Don't add the milk until we're ready to eat the soup. If we do this, the milk has to be heated slowly before it is added to the soup. Cold milk added to hot soup will curdle the milk on contact. (2) Add a pinch of baking soda. This base neutralizes the lactic acid in the milk. It also negates the acidic effect that any salt required by the recipe would cause. One side effect is that it may change the taste of the soup. (Does baking soda taste?)
(3) Don't leave the soup unattended. Keep the temperature on low and stir the soup to avoid heat build-up.

Now the question is, how does a person reheat the soup without causing it to curdle? We'll soon find out . . .

Good deals on running gear

If you're a runner, when it comes to running shoes, you're either one of two types. You either buy the same shoe over and over again and hope and pray that the manufacturer doesn't discontinue your shoe or (2) you generally don't care, but try to get a good shoe at a decent price.


I fall into the latter category. Over the years, I've learned that I tend to get less injuries if I replace my shoes every 300 miles or so. How do you count that out? Well, about a year and a half ago I bought a Garmin Forerunner 305 from TigerDirect.com. It's done a good job of helping me log miles for my shoes and, as a fringe benefit, for my dog. She's run over 300 miles to date!

When I first started logging my runs, I tried using Garmin's GPS software. It really isn't that good. If you're looking for something better and free, I'd encourage you to try SportTracks software.

OK, back to running shoes. My feet tend to do better with Nike Structure Triax and New Balance 718/719/720 shoes. There might be other brands that work for me, but these 2 have done the trick so far. New Balance has a website they sell close-outs on, New Balance Web Express, and Altrec.com usually has pretty good prices on Nike Close-outs.

I've tried phoning some of the Nike Factory Stores with limited success. If they have the shoe you want in stock, they'll ship them to you. It turns out to be a pretty fair deal.

I had a bad bout with some Nike Air Max Triax about 5 years ago and ended up with plantar fasciitis. My left shoe would make this woosh sound because of what turned out to be a hole in the air pocket. (The shoes were purchased at the outlet store.) I didn't know they were defective until a hundred or so miles afterwards, and a month or so after I replaced the shoes the injury fully appeared.

That's a problem that I wouldn't wish on anyone . . .no fun. Basically, the ligaments that run underneath your foot become torn. Your body tries to heal itself, but because you're constantly on your feet, it never has a chance to catch up. At night, it will begin to heal, but starting with your first step out of bed in the morning, you re-tear those ligaments that have healed overnight. Ouch!

So the moral of the story is, "Kids, listen to your shoes -- and to your body!"

How to know your dog is in heat

I debated putting up this post. Pacey is spade now, and Bob Barker would be smiling from his easy chair. I really don't need to keep this information for my own future use -- unless we get another dog, or a friend is maybe going through the same thing we went through with Pacey. Maybe it's my inner pack rat -- I can't beat the urge to delete this file I created on my desktop named inheat.txt without saving the information for future generations.

For whatever reason, I'm going to fight my common sense and share with the world the knowledge I've collected on signs that my dog was in heat. I hope you all enjoy this revelation as much as I did! And finally, my desktop is one file cleaner.

Without further delay, here they are. The signs that your dog is in heat, and what step in the process she's in:

"Proestrus" (duration, 4-15 days)

• begins to lick her self a lot
• swelling of vulva
• increased restlessness
• frequent urination
• fatigue
• blood color will also change from dark red to salmon color
• will not accept male
• male dogs begin to hang around/notice female

"Estrus" (duration, 4-8 days)

• dog can get pregnant
• will accept male/willingness to stand for the male
• she will hold her tail off to the side called "flagging"
• she will often back her butt up to your leg as well
• sometimes spayed during this time
• shouldn't breed until 3rd heat
• fertile 12 days after the bleeding starts

From PetBitsForYou.com:

You can avoid blood spots in the house by putting little boy's jockey type underwear with a fly on her. Or purchase commercial pad holder, available at most larger Pet Stores. Initially place a Light Days pad into the shorts (or pad holder) and then put the pants on backwards, so that the tail comes out the fly. Most 30 lb. dog can use a size 6 or 6x jockey underwear. This method can also be used to avoid unwanted pregnancy, for obvious physical reasons. Disposable children’s pull-up diapers can also be used, but they are expensive, than commercial dog pad holders. Change the mini-pad regularly as needed through the day, and give the female dog time to clean herself periodically when she comes back into the house from doing her natural duties before you put the pants or pad holder back on her. Remember to remove the pants or diaper when you let her outside to relieve her self!

If the dog becomes pregnant the gestation time is 58-63 days.

"Diestrus" (duration, 6-10 weeks)

• dogs may moan/howl
• teats get bigger, may produce milk

"Anestrus" (duration, 15 weeks)

• no hormonal activity