Emma:

-Almost sitting up...can sit up for a few seconds, reach for toys, look around, then kind of topple over.

-Loves to bounce in the jumperoo...especially if Drew is standing nearby pointing to things and interacting.

-Was sleeping through the night for a while, but then when she got sick (lung infection from the mega-cold Drew gave her) she seemed to reset a little and we're now getting up 1-2 times every night again. Yawn.

-Found her feet and toes and loves to play with them!

-Is very busy...Emma needs constant stimulation...I have to move her from one thing to the next constantly and give her my full attention. She is starting to get bored with "baby" toys and now enjoys looking at some of Drews toys, ones with lights and sounds.

-Eats wonderfully! She has fruits, veggies, and cereal every day. Will soon start in on some meats. She's a little hoover! 

-Challenges me every day...sometimes that's good, sometimes bad. She's so much more demanding than Drew was, which in of itself is not a bad thing but it's a constant battle for my attention around here. She is making me a better mom...teaching me to have more patience...etc.

-She still cries a lot...has big time separation anxiety for me too. It's weird too because I think I hold her less and give her less attention than I did Drew (because obviously someone else needs my attention too!) so I'm just surprised that she's SO attached to me.

-Is absolutely adorable. Love to listen to her babble and squeal, and laugh at Drew.

Drew:

-This kid is such a sponge now. He learns a new word every day...some of the fun new words are "apple" and "happy"...he knows many animal sounds, can point to parts of his body, and recognizes some letters and their sounds, particularly "m."

-Is LOVING daycare. He goes two days a week. Now he's excited to get dropped off, and cries when it's time to leave! I love the way he is learning to play with other kids...it'll be great for his interaction with Emma. The girls there just love him, and always tell me how fun and adorable he is.

-He loves animals. I'm super excited about taking him to the zoo this summer..it'll blow his mind!

-Have I ever mentioned how great he sleeps? I'll probably jinx it. He's awesome though. Never any fights at naptime or bedtime, and he always sleeps great. Love it.

-He's cuddley now, and knows how to give hugs and kisses. When he gives a kiss, he says "bwah"...adorable!

-He can be tough on his little sister, and she actually doesn't seem to mind. She usually just squeals and giggles when he's crawling all over her or is in her face. He can also be super sweet...he brings her toys, blankies, and pats her when she's crying.

-Likes to blow spit bubbles. I'd like to figure out how to make him stop! 

-Eats primarily with a fork now, not his hands. He's really growing up! Definitely a more picky eater now than when he first started with solids and finger foods, though. Some days he'll eat very little, and other days he's just a little hoover! He's healthy and strong though! Loves his veggies.

Our kids are so different from each other. It will be fun to watch them grow together, bump heads (Drew is tough, but Emma is stubborn and seems to have a temper), and be best buddies. What an adventure!

Alicia's pal Amy flew in today from the D.C. area for the weekend, so I was asked to stay home to take care of the kids while Alicia drove to the airport to pick her up (in Buffalo). The kids actually behaved pretty well for their old man this morning... no real fits. Emma was great - she even took a nap for an hour!

Now I'm just sitting relaxing while they're both sleeping... I don't get to just sit and enjoy my beautiful 24" Apple iMac very often... it goes great with a cup of coffee!

Cheers.

Today, we decided to take the kids for a drive, hit the mall and go to the Telus store to schedule the cancellation of her service. What do they tell me?

"We don't do cancellations in store, sir. Only sales. If you'd like, you can use that phone over there to speak with someone from Customer Service."

Annoyed.

So I get on the phone with a Customer Service rep (while I'm standing in the bloody Telus store) and they proceed to tell me that... the system they rely on to perform cancellations is down so I'd need to call back in a couple of hours.

Right. More annoyed.

So I do exactly what they don't want me to do... I call back in 'a couple of hours'. Now, the system is available but there's a special 'team' that apparently handles cancellations and sadly, they're not available today. They asked me to call back tomorrow.

Remarkably annoyed now.

It's an absolute scam. The service agreement with Telus says that we're obligated to give them 30 days notice prior to cancellation. By delaying people from performing a cancellation, Telus is actually wringing out additional pro-rated revenue from the customer that's forced to wait on initiating their cancellation for even another 24 hours. I'm sure they know the statistics - anyone calling to cancel their service is already committed to it, so instead of trying to change the customer's mind through offers, they choose to just drag out the cancellation. Another statistic would probably show that when a customer is deferred in this way, it probably takes them awhile to actually call back and 'get er done' for two main reasons: 1) people are busy and 2) most people dread calling service providers for billing or support inquiries. Period. I'm sure 24 hours for me turns out to be a week or two for many.

The wireless business must be a tough one to be in - highly competitive... but this lack of interest in providing customer service truly annoys me. I'm now placing Telus into the Bell category... which is a pretty lowly category to be in.

I can't wait for free wireless internet access to become so pervasive that the aging dinosaur telcos go out of business since we'll all be able to rely on mobile handsets and VoIP applications like Skype for our mobile calling needs.

UPDATE: Alicia was able to successfully cancel her wireless service on Monday. They did transfer her from one area to another, they did try to convince her to either stay on with their unadvertised 'emergency use package' or transfer her service to a friend or family member. No thanks Telus. Another 20 dollars a month saved! It might not sound like a big deal, but that's equivalent to a 60 pack of diapers for Emma and a single box of baby wipes!

My Father was visiting as he always does for the Superbowl. It's become quite a tradition for us. We must be encroaching on a decade of his February trips to Ontario. We've gone from watching the Janet Jackson boob fiasco in my 1 bedroom apartment in St. Catharines to watching the Steelers win their first superbowl of the decade in our small bungalow on the south side of Fonthill to watching the Steelers win again last year in our beautiful new family home! Good memories.

The game itself was quite good this year. I was glad to see the Saints win although I must admit I was leaning towards the Colts if for no other reason that they're an AFC team and being a Steelers fan... I like me some AFC football. Drew Brees seems like a very genuine, good guy... and I'll never tire of seeing the good guy win. It's all good. Steelers next year!

I'll sign-off for now.

The reaction from the majority of the geek community has been what I would expect it to be - a blend of outrage and frustration. The expectations were so high that it would have been impossible to make that group happy. That group wants every device to be able to do everything their workstation can do whether it's a smart phone, a laptop, a netbook or even, yes a tablet. That group is typically more interested in the device and its capabilities vs. the user experience and the content.

This might come as a surprise to some but... Apple doesn't cater to the geeks. They don't want to service a niche market, especially one as demanding as the geeks. They want to ship products that both my young son and my grandmother can pick up and use... because that will result in the broadest market penetration. $$$.

At its face, the iPad is very much a 'larger iPhone or iPod touch'. It's certainly got some more juice than either of those devices, sporting Apple's own processor that they've labelled the A4... but the user interface is very much that of the iPhone. Steve Jobs had an awesome quote on Wednesday at the keynote event:

Brilliant, right? Why would they deviate from a user interface that has now become second nature to that many people? I know of 5 year olds that have iPod touches and easily navigate it to surf the internet and to play games. People are comforted by what they know and are accustomed to... and typically fear change. The irony here is that the same notion that helped Microsoft maintain such a stranglehold on the operating system market (Windows) for so long will now help Apple dominate this "new" segment of the market.

What impresses me the most? It has to be the price point. Everyone anticipated a starting price of $999. That definitely would have made it a niche. At that price, this is an exclusive gadget. At $499, there are so many more opportunities for this platform. At $499, there will be interest in a variety of verticals like education, healthcare, and retail to name just a few. The icing on the cake for the enterprise to adopt the iPad is the iPhone SDK. Apple has really "teed it up" for application developers to build kick-ass applications for the iPhone, iPod Touch and now the iPad. Now it's possible to build pretty rich and immersive applications for this product at a fraction of traditional business application development costs.

Anyone who has been reading this and who knows me is probably saying to themselves "um... Jim? You're a geek, dude." I'm not so sure anymore. In the last couple of years (since my 'switch'), I've become much more interested in my content and having easy access to it than the piece of computer hardware I have to use to get at it. I've become fascinated with things like Google Docs that let me get at content I care about regardless of where I am or what device I'm using. I think that's why I like this product as much as I do. It's inexpensive, simple to use and will let me easily get at what I care about - the internet, my music, my videos, my calendar, my e-mail, my contacts... All of which would be synchronized with other Macs in my house. iPad breaks? Buy another one, sync it with iTunes once and I'm ready to rock again.

Will I buy one? I can definitely see that happening, although not in the near future (We aren't high on disposable income these days!). The one omission that I really would have liked to see here was an integrated webcam. The thought of lounging on the couch and video conferencing with friends and family in such a portable way really would have put the product over the moon for me. Maybe we'll see that in revision #2?

What do you think? 

The basement is almost finished. There's a guy here today finishing up the work on the flooring. It's down and looking good... he's just putting in the 'quarter round' along the edge of the baseboard. Final touch-ups, cleaning and inspection will be done next week. I think everything will be done by the end of day on Thursday. It will be all ready for when my parents arrive in early February. Perfect timing.

Alicia and I are planning on an IKEA run either this weekend or next to get some organizational things for the kids toys. A chunk of this space will be for the kids to destroy so we'd like them to be able to do it in an orderly fashion. :)

One geek note that I'll elaborate on more in my next post - Apple is planning a launch event on January 27th which could be the announcement of their long-rumoured tablet PC. I'm really interested in where tablet computing is going and everyone in the industry is ravenous to discover what Apple's offering might look like. I'll have more to say once details are available... if they're available. It wouldn't surprise me if they don't launch a tablet at all. The hype machine is just out of control and Apple plays the mass media like a marionette. They're brilliant in that department.

Have a great weekend everyone. 

At work, I'm currently holding down two jobs. 

My regular job is my role as the Senior Manager of the Ontario Government's Enterprise IT Service Desk.   Approximately 150 employees and 5 managers, working from 4 locations across the province. 

My second job is running our Best Practices Office. It's a smaller group of approximately 30 employees and 6 managers. We're responsible for implementing and continually improving the Best Practices (more specifically ITIL processes) that the Government has implemented to support its IT operations.

On top of that I'm also leading 3 major projects for my division: