Happy Monday!

A short one today. Jade is doing very well of course. She’s keeping us on our toes. She went to Hatley Castle down at Royal Roads University (out-of-towners would recognize it as been Lex Luthers’ pad in the popular series Smallville) to see the spooky rooms and here the creepy ghost stories. Apparently she was very impressed with some rooms, (and hallways) but very Not of others.

Yesterday was another big day of transition. Up until now we’ve been feeding Jade formula made from powder… its’ especially fortified with vitamins and minerals that premies need.. and more importantly for Jade (because she also gets her Iron seperately anyway) it’s easier on her stomach than the regular canned liquid formula. Yesterday we ran out, like we do every 2 days, of formula. The stuff is $15 a can! So we decided it was time to try her on the “regular” stuff (Which is more like $9 a can, and goes on sale often).

She happily gobbled it down as if nothing had changed. Phew… there’s a small victory for the pocketbook and for our sanity. The other stuff was tough to measure, stir and dissolve… this stuff you just add water, give it a shake, and it’s done!

Miss Jade is eating oatmeal, barley and rice cereal. To her I think it’s all the same… and to us, we just like watching her spread it all over her face as she tries to suck her thumb (!!) between spoonfuls.

Last night was a tough one for both of us. Jade woke up for her meal around 2:30 and then decided she wanted to play. Mom wasn’t too happy with that.. nor was daddy. We both didn’t get back to sleep until Miss Jade calmed down around 4. Ah, the life of a parent.

It’s windy today.. hopefully we won’t all blow away!

Cheers

Chris

This is one of those things that Mothers around the world cringe at.

At some point in my life, I will go into space, and see the Earth as it truly is.

The XPrize contest to build a privately owned spaceship is over. It was won by Burt Rutans SpaceShip One (funded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen). And deserdvedly so.. hopefully you’ve seen video of the ship in flight… it is a marvel of engineering, and just plain COOL! (Check out the XPrize site for video and details).

Anyway, it seems the contest has already been successful, or is at least on its way, in creating a real, private, if quite expensive space tourism industry. Richard Branson, of Virgin Airways fame… signed an exclusive deal to license and operate SpaceShip One spacecraft for his new “Virgin Galactic” company.

CNN is running a story on people who have already commited their $210,000 for a flight.

Near the top of the list, Captain Kirk himself… William Shatner. I wonder if he’ll wear his costume from the TV series and insist to sit directly behind the pilot. They’ll need to build him a bigger chair. I can just image him pointing out the window before the spaceship seperates and blasts off and saying, “2nd star to the left, and on until morning”.

Silly TV parallels aside, I just have to think this is the start of a whole new kind of tourism. Yes, it’s prohibitavely expensive for the average person right now. But in 20 years? 50 years? Who knows… I’d be willing to save up 10,000 for an experience of a lifetime like that. $10,000 for 3 1/2 hours… about the length of a baseball game.
But hey, that’s some homerun you’d see!

There are a couple Canadian companies designing much simpler (and thus possibly cheaper) ways to get people to space. Now that the XPrize contest is over, the pressure is off them to get it done before the end of this year…they were very close to a test flight before SpaceShipOne won the prize. I hope they can still maintain their focus and be successful. It’d be too cool to see Saskatchewan become the homebase of Canadian Space Tourism!

How long before there is an orbiting Space Hotel above Regina?

Saskatchewan “Land of Living Skies” indeed!

As we creep nearer to Election Day things are really starting to heat up.

Electoral Vote . Com is currently predicting an absolute Dead Heat between Kerry and Bush. According to the latest state-by-state polls Kerry and Bush are exactly tied with 264 Electoral Votes apiece. How is that possible you ask? Well, statistically they are exactly tied in Minnesota… and the rest pans out to exactly the same number of EVs! Incredible!

So what might break this deadlock? Well, the surest way of getting a solid “result” from this election is to make sure every American citizen can and does vote.

Registration across the US has, apparently, been incredible. Far beyond any year in recent history. What’s even more interesting, though, is the Ex-Patriot vote… that is, American Citizens living outside the US are also registering in record numbers. No matter what the result, this can only be good news for democracy and for politics in the US which has, for so long, degraded into bitter partison bickering between the two sides. More voters means a wider range of views, which means at least the possibility of a more moderate, less dividing political scene in the future.

I tell you this because my Step-Father told me yesterday that he voted in a US Election for the very first time this year. He was born in San Fransisco and never officially renounced his US Citizenship… so he can register online and they sent him his ballot. This is the first year he’s ever felt compelled to vote, like he said, he doesn’t “feel” like an American citizen because he has lived in Canada for his adult life, but this election has been so… engaging, and he has spent so much time thinking about it and its’ consequences, that he felt he should cast his vote so that he can say he did his part.

If he is voting for the first time in 30 years… think of how many others must be around the world.

There has truly never been an election quite like this one!

We’re visiting Grandpa and Grandma Schubart today and tomorrow.

Jade is, of course, enjoying her time.

Here are some pictures!

As we creep nearer to Election Day things are really starting to heat up.
Electoral Vote . Com is currently predicting an absolute Dead Heat between Kerry and Bush. According to the latest state-by-state polls Kerry and Bush are exactly tied with 264 Electoral Votes apiece. How is that possible you ask? Well, statistically they are exactly tied in Minnesota… and the rest pans out to exactly the same number of EVs! Incredible!

So what might break this deadlock? Well, the surest way of getting a solid “result” from this election is to make sure every American citizen can and does vote.

Registration across the US has, apparently, been incredible. Far beyond any year in recent history. What’s even more interesting, though, is the Ex-Patriot vote… that is, American Citizens living outside the US are also registering in record numbers. No matter what the result, this can only be good news for democracy and for politics in the US which has, for so long, degraded into bitter partison bickering between the two sides. More voters means a wider range of views, which means at least the possibility of a more moderate, less dividing political scene in the future.

I tell you this because my Step-Father told me yesterday that he voted in a US Election for the very first time this year. He was born in San Fransisco and never officially renounced his US Citizenship… so he can register online and they sent him his ballot. This is the first year he’s ever felt compelled to vote, like he said, he doesn’t “feel” like an American citizen because he has lived in Canada for his adult life, but this election has been so… engaging, and he has spent so much time thinking about it and its’ consequences, that he felt he should cast his vote so that he can say he did his part.

If he is voting for the first time in 30 years… think of how many others must be around the world.

There has truly never been an election quite like this one!