Daddy and Charity Bake Banana Bread

Dad and Charity getting ready to bake

******WARNING this post contains a large amount of photos******

[I decided to make this more a photo essay, but every now and then you might see some narrative. ]

Well in an attempt to keep a certain  someone occupied and make sure that my wife got a break, I had to come up with some other things to do.  We had some bananas that were “on their way out” and attracting some very annoying fruit flies.  I hate fruit flies.  So I came up with a solution that solved many problems at one time.  If I made banana bread that would take care of the bananas.  If Charity helped me that would keep her occupied and my wife could go and take the break that she really, really needed to take.  The finished product would also be desert  for after dinner and, of course, enough would be left over (from two loaves) for a midnight snack!  Woo Hoo!

Here is Charity ready with the mixer. Watch out ingredients

The "offending" bananas

I had to  figure out which banana bread recipe to use and that involved first deciding

which recipe book to use.  My wife, thankfully, made this part a little easier for me.  One of the books had the ingredients already doubled (good thing since I wanted to make two loaves of banana bread) and so figured that was the one she used most often.  I love it when  a plan comes together.

Preheating the oven to 350 degrees

The ingredients all in the mixing bowl and ready to mixed

This was also part of Charity’s school for the day (in case you haven’t guessed, we home school) so she was helping me with the measurements of the ingredients and then she was determining (by means of subtraction) how much we still had to had of certain ingredietns.  She did a fantastic job.

Charity mixes the ingredients after we add them to the bowl.

After all of her math, Charity was rewarded with the  privilege of mixing the ingredients together (which had to be mixed at speed #2 on the mixer for 2 minutes.  I also tried to capture this in move mode.  I’ll try to put a link to the video below, but I’m not sure if it will work here or not.

View the Mixing Video here

Now the ingredients have been mixed and its time

This photo (taken by Charity) is of the mixed ingredients just before being put into the bread pans.

to put them into the bread pans!

Oh my I forgot all about the bread pans and have not even prepared them!  We to use stone baking pans because the cook more evenly.  (Is that true, not sure but it sounds good).

OK… got the pans ready and now its time to put the batter in.   Well a still picture would not do that justice, so its time for another movie!  My camera lady (Charity) is ready so here we go!

Click Here to see this exciting process!

In the oven and ready to go!

The “loaves to be” are now in the oven on the top rack and ready for some serious baking.   Its already beginning to smell like banana bread.  Can’t wait until the real thing actually makes it out of the oven……Patience……Patience

.

Oven timer is set for 55 minutes

Charity enjoys the beater! Her "just desserts" after a job well done

mmmm! Thats good stuff.....

Really good!

Here we are half way thorugh the baking process. Looking good.

Just out of the oven and piping hot!

Out of the bread pans and onto the rack. Can't wait to eat it!

And eat it we did!  Although I did not  photograph it… we had banana bread for desert after dinner and boy was it good.  It was good enough that I even didn’t mind sharing half a loaf with friends and having them be too critical of my cooking experience.  Wonder what  we’re going to bake tomorrow!

My Sleep Study

How did I get there

A sleep study!

Why in the world would anyone want to subject them selves to a night (or more) “under the microscope?”

Well, in my case,  1) Even though I sleep (granted only an avg. of 4 hours/night) I walk around tired and very rarely refreshed.

2)  Often times I wake up with a headache, which I have come to understand could be due to a lack of O2 to the brain, due to sleep apnea

3) I wake up on occasion to find my wife gone from the bed!  Why?  She’s out sleeping on the sofa (leaving me alone in our rather large and nice, warm bed that I  would rather NOT have to sleep in by myself).

4) After my wife kept telling me that I should probably participate in a sleep study (and I kept shrugging if off) I feel asleep on the commuter bus (not at all uncommon) next to a lady who witnessed my sleep behavior and who had participated in a sleep study… and, further more, who had the same insurance provider that I do.  Her testimony that the sleep study and then use of the CPAP machine (not to mention that sleep apnea is what killed a famous football player) was enough to finally sell me.

So, armed with all of this, I called my Primary Care Physician (because you can’t do ANYTHING in the Kaiser health plan system without the blessing of your PCP) who was only too glad to give me a referral to the sleep center.

Step 1 — Qualifying

The sleep information class…. now there was an experience.  All patience who participate eventually end up as part of a sleep study, I found.  The first visit is a screening to see if you even need to be considered for sleep testing.  Well, based on my “scores” I passed that one with (I guess you could say) flying colors.   But I’m always so special that I can’t do things the easy way.  There were a few others there who I was sure would also make it to the study stage.  We had to watch a video as part of the class.  They dimmed the lights and played it.  Many of the participants slept right through it.  Made me wonder if I was really a candidate!  Where as many other people would get a device that you could take home with you to monitor your sleeping and give them the necessary results, I had to go into the Sleep Center to be observed because of possible complications with my epilepsy.  So the Sleep Center called me and we set up the appointment for as soon as I could conveniently arrange it ( 1 month out).

The packet of information that they sent for me to fill was massive!  Think War and Peace and you’ll have a pretty good idea of how many pages of questions that I had to answer!  OK, so maybe that is a “slight” exaggeration.  Suffice it to say that it took me two evenings to fill everything out.  Falling asleep in the process on the first night (how ironic, huh?) did not help matters any.  On the second night I found that I only had two pages left that had to be filled  out.  The rest of the massive pack was for my “reading pleasure” and information.  Talk about dry reading.

The Study

The bright, cheerful “receptionist” (who, in my opinion had no business working alone for an entire

Me all wired up and no place to go.

night shift) I found out was also the sleep therapist.  Her bedside manner was great.  Inside of no time (while she was busy attaching wires hither and yon on my person) she knew my whole life story, my hobbies, my likes and dislikes and the names of each of my seven children and what they were currently doing.  I brought a few things with me to do (opting the leave the laptop at home) but scarcely had time to read only 1 short chapter in a book before turning in for the night.  I was fitted with a CPAP device before testing began, in the event that I would have to use it at some point during the evening.  I, of  course knew that it would not be  necessary.  NOT!

The technician  had to get her “preliminary readings” and make sure that the equipment was OK and that I did not have to use the rest room.  I of course let her know that I had already taken care of the restroom business and that once I go to sleep I don’t usually get up until the morning– not even to go to the bathroom!  So, I settled in for the preliminaries:

“Open your eyes.”

“Close your eyes.”

“With your eyes open, look left to right.”

With your eyes open look up and down.”

“Clench your teeth”

“Hold your breath for 10 seconds”

“Blink 10 times”

“While holding your breath, move your stomach in and out.”

“Move your left foot.”

“Move your right foot.”

When that was all done, I was ready to be studied!  It took me all of 2 minutes to fall asleep.  It may have taken longer under normal conditions, but I was asked to make sure I did not take any naps at all before the tests (so much for the morning and evening naps on the commuter bus ride).  Now that  I was asleep, the technician set to work.  I woke up a little over an hour later.  If I needed to signal her I was told to take the blood/oxygen sensor off of my finger, would bring her in immediately.  Well, it was time to  try it out.  I took the sensor off and she was in the room inside of 5 seconds.  Rather sheepishly I let her know that I had to use the bathroom.   She did her magic and wrapped my wires around me and off I went.  I soon came back and she was there waiting for me.  Took 30 seconds and got me all plugged back in.  Then asked if I thought the room temperature was comfortable.  It was a bit chilly to me.  She agreed.  Soon after she exited the room I heard what I assume was the heater come on.  The room warmed up to a comfortable temperature in no time.  Some time after realizing that the room was warm now, I fell asleep.  That was 11ish.

Next thing I knew it was 2:12 AM and the sleep technologist (her name was Jean, by the way) was back in the room and informed me that she was going to (as she said) administer the CPAP apparatus.  Upon hearing that my only question was… “how bad?”  Her one word answer was, “Severe!”  Then as she hooked up the breathing device she went into more detail about how I snored constantly and continued to wake myself up.  She was amazed that I could get to  a state of deep sleep so quickly without the CPAP.  But up to this point she was able to record ALL stages of sleep.  I’m such a good patient!    After getting me all hooked up with the full face mask she activated the machine from her workstation in the other room.   Inside of 15 minutes she was back in the room.  The full face mask was giving me some problems making the necessary seal.  We went with just the nose apparatus and that worked much better.  Aside from numbness in my arm (probably due to the sensor on my finger) every thing went just fine.  But in my estimation, everything had been fine to begin with.

When Jean came in at around 5:28, (I had been laying there awake since 5:00-ish) she did inform me that the snoring stopped immediately and that I did not have any more abnormal breathing problems while connected to the CPAP.  She had to go back to her station to finish things up.  The e same readings that she got for the preliminary readings she had to do again for the end of the study.  Mine was a double study because the diagnosis and the administration of the CPAP are supposed to be two different visits.  Apparently, for the last 6 months, they have been providing this in the same session.  Praise the Lord… one less session.

So, to make an already too long blog post not much longer, after the “official” analysis of my results, it looks like I am going to be the proud owner of a CPAP device for home.  She indicated that she thought my insurance would cover the entire price, but I have been told that they will pay for half.  If they do cover it all, what a blessing!  But they also told me that I would have a co-pay for the sleep center visit and I did not get charged anything!  Who knows, I might be getting a bill in the mail.

Well, that’s my experience thus far, expect to see more once I have the CPAP machine that I am almost certain to acquire.  Stay tuned  right here… Same Bat time…. Same Bat Channel  (Boy, showing my age on that one)

Cleaning Up the Home Office

The time comes every now and then when you just have to clean up… especially if you’re telling everyone else that they have.  Well that time has come for me as well.  My home office space was in dire need of some, shall we say, long awaited attention.   I discovered, in the course of my cleaning, that the entire mess was not mine– go figure.  Some things were added to my office area, because there was no place else to put them…I guess, I either found places for or threw away (and they, very likely, will not even be missed).  Many  of the out of place things were mine (tools in particular) but they were not out of place because I put them there.  Its seems that I had plenty of help in that area.  Thank you very much for all of you out there who helped me make my office space so….. well liked and well used.

Well, be those things as they may, the office area needed to be cleaned up.  Most of the mess that I was solely responsible for had to do with the work surfaces for my computer desks.  I pretty much don’t even allow anybody else to put stuff in that area.   Had that been the only problem, it would not have taken too long to clean.  I also have to admit, that I am responsible for the vast number of computers that were lying about; from ailing laptops to working and non-working desktops.  They certainly were not stored in the most optimal way.  I just haven’t been able to get back there and do anything with them. As you will see, THAT, has been taken care of.  It was an ordeal and there were many unplanned interruptions; but then are interruptions ever planned?   The cleaning process encompassed the entire day.  I got nothing else done, but there are some benefits.  1) My chair can once again  go where it once was able to to move to before.  2) My wife can now reach the tools that she says she has had trouble reaching.    3) Things on the workbench are once again accessible (these may have been inaccessible by design) to everyone. 4) The room looks inviting and clean and not “junky” any more.  With Nanowrimo coming up, I may be spending more time back there for peace and quiet!

So…. all of that having been said, I chronicled my progress on video and I am posting those videos here for you to view.

Here is what the office looked like when I began the process:

This video show the work about 60% done, but I was running out of steam quickly, mostly due to all of the interruptions.

And at last, the finished work:

You are welcome to leave comments and let me know what you think!

Take Your Child To Work Day

Andrew at Dad’s Desk working hard

Take your child to work day came and went this year and my company opted not to have the “traditional” program that they have been having for years.  The e-mail that I got from HR said that it was becasue of the current economic climate.  That, I guess is understandable, but I had a bigger problem that needed to be tended to.  I have a son who has been waiting for three years (since he was five) to come to work with Dad. 

Now at then end of his wait, my company has decided that they were not going to do their custmoary “Take Your Child To Work Day” program.   Well , for me that posed a problem.  Now I had a problem that I was not going to be able to keep. 

Andrew and “the boss” Arnie

Being a dad, there was just no way I was going to let my son down if I could do something about it.  So…. the gears started  turning and and I went in to talk to my boss.  I explained the sitution to him and asked him if he would mind if I brought Andrew in for his own take your child to work day.  He had a blast.  I won’t steal his thunder and give you all of the specifics because he has written a report that you will be able to view on his website once he has it ready.  So what follows is a picture essay of  the day (kinda sorta) in the order of when the picutres were taken and people were met.  Enjoy!

Dad running through the early morning checklist

 

Yes? Can I help you with something?

 

Andrew hard at work

 

Dad’s snack bin, a little bare today

 

The famous “SNOOPY” corner

 

Andrew and Venky Rao

 

Andrew and Lance Hagen

 

Andrew and Tony Baxter

 

Andrew and Lashaun Ijeomah

 

Andrew and Dennis Phipps

 

Andrew and Alex Bloyce

 

Andrew and Curtis Orpin

 

Andrew and Kim Ross

 

Andrew and Mike Wright

 

Dad’s unshod feet. “Comfy” at work!

 

Arnie and Andrew investigate a bug

 

Dad and Andrew testing software

 

Andrew and Rob Hadaway

Dieting again…..

Well, I would say that I am going to try this diet thing again, but I am not going to try, I am going to do it!  However, I am not using the Imponderable One blog to track the progress this time.  I have started a blog that is geared specifically for my weight loss.  So please visit my weight loss blog often! 23 pounds or more in 4 months is the goal.  And then the goal is maintain that weight with a 5 pound margin of gain allowable, as long as I keep going down.  Your comments are not only welcome, but much desired.

Grace’s Birthday

Well its that time again in the Rolle house.  Of course, as big as our house is “that time” comes 8 times a year!  “That time” is Birthday time.

Grace, our oldest daughter turned 11 years old today!  So far it has proven to be a very interesting day indeed!  It all started last night when my wife asked me to make  a birthday card.  That was going to take a big chunk of time out of what I had planned, but some things just have been sacrificed for birthdays.  Soooooooo long about 1:30 in the morning (after all, I did have to wait until it was her birthday) I started making “the card”  I made a card with a picture of cows on the front and the inside read:  “Have an udderly wonderful day.”  Then it was time for the next step……

In the dark of night (OK, well morning) I went out the shed where Grace’s brand new Bicycle with hand brakes had been hidden amongst the other adult bikes for two days!  I walked that up the patio and hid it behind a wooden house that we have on the patio (Note:  There will be a post coming about the three day construction project on that house soon.).  When we were done with breakfast, I told Grace she had to go out on the patio and over behind the house so that I could “get things ready” inside for her surprise.   Well as daughters who really don’t want to do something are prone to do, she tired talking me into different options:

• Can I sit on the glider (on the deck) and read
• Do I have to put my shoes on

she just wasn’t getting it and was just a bit sour…. Hee Hee.

Finally, she got her shoes on, though reluctantly….. probably thinking, Oh boy…. what a birthday.  They’re making me go outside.”    Well as she rounded the side of the play house she saw the bike and began running back!  You’d have thought somebody or something scared her—but no!   She had to come back and retrieve her bicycle helmet.  Not only did she have a brand new bike with hand brakes, but she got an added bonus of 18 variable speeds!  If you lived in Woodbridge, VA you would understand just how necessary those are.

Here is a movie of Grace riding her brand new Bike:  I think she likes it.

I got a few still shots too.

Well, not to be left out, Andrew and Charity had a surprise for her too!  We only had one quick rehearsal, so when they didn’t get the ending of t he song quite right and Charity took it among herself to correct Andrew and then they did the ending over again…..Here is the video of that for your enjoyment.

You can’t see what’s in the bags, but they each gave her 4 Reeses peanut butter cups.

Now Grace and Mom are upstairs and in the process of making her Birthday cake!  Can’t wait until tonight after dinner (Which Grace has decided will be subs from Subway) so that we cut into the cake.  I might add another picture or two tonight with the cake cutting, etc.

Quality Assurance is so much fun!

I test computer software for a living.  I think it’s a lot of fun because I actually go to work for the sole purpose of breaking something!  What a way to get your frustrations out, huh?  Well no, not really.  In fact, sometimes it can make you that much more frustrated.  But then there are days like today.   Here I am, Mr. QA, trying to test the search functionality of my product.  I type in a search (not realizing that I had a typo in my search).  The search had to pull up all documents that contained each of these words:  health education AND welfare.  Well, I was typing so fast that I did not realize that I had a typo.  I left the “L” out of the word “health.”  So my search had to find documents that had the words heath education and welfare.  Well, the funny part of all of this is that I got 5 hits!!!!  Amongt the hundreds of thousands of documents that were searched, there were actually 5 documents that had education and welfare spelled correctly; AND the health spelled incorrectly as heath!  Here I was having a slow morning and not finding any errors and the Lord directed my fingers and showed me five at one time to make up for the day!

Paper Tray Empty

This happens to me so often that I just had to put a blog entry in about it.  God has arranged with my company that my cubicle is the one that is just outside of the copier/work room.  Pretty covenient, huh?  Well yeah, when I want to grab something off of the copier or when I need office supplies from the work room.  So, wherein lies the problem?  Herein lies the problem…… everybody thinks that I am the  copier administrator.   Is there such a thing?  Yes, where does he sit?  On the OTHER SIDE OF THE FLOOR.  Ridiculous, right?  Well not exactly, there is a carbon copy of the copier/workroom on his side of the floor too, but he is responsible for both.

So, anytime anyone has any problem with the copier machine, guess who they ask.  And, of course, I have nothing else to do except to work on my latest multi-million dollar project (shame I don’t get commission—I’d even take 1%!).  So I get up and leave all of my files open and unsecured while I go and help them solve the latest problem.  Who do I wind up helping the most?  People who get paid 2 – 3 times more than I do.  You got it– the managers.  Yep, the folks who run the company can’t run the copier.

Today’s incident is one that really blew me away.  I went back and forth in the copy room to get my output for my project.  I can do this because we have two copiers in each room:  The Big fancy, shmancy, do-everything-that-I-need-to-my-copies-and-do-it-quickly machine, and then the older, a little smaller, not much slower, but not as fancy machine.  Only 7 people on my floor use this copier–I know because I get to setup the users since nobody else can figure out how–No not even the copier administrator!.

When I hear people having problems with the big fancy copier, I direct my output to the other one.  It’s a bit fun watching folks turn their heads as I go and get my out put and leave.  Most are too proud to ask for help, so I eventually offer it—eventually!   Today I enjoyed hearing them discussing the message on the mahine that said “Paper Tray Empty–Load Paper.”  It blows my mind how many people don’t read the whole message or how many people just don’t use logic.  Today they were saying:  “Paper Tray empty?  The paper tray is full.”  If one is full, wouldn’t it stand to reason that there is an empty one somewhere if that is what the copier is indicating?  Well, I let this go  on for about 10 minutes before I offered the bailout (No nothing like the 700 Billion dollar gov’t bailout for the financial industry—that might be another post if I can get over the nausea and write it).

I went into the copier room…

ME:  “You know, if you get enough people in on of these rooms you can solve just about anything.  I’ve heard people work through Einstein’s theory of relativity in here!  So what’s the problem?” (as if I didn’t know).

Lady #1: “it says (notice the copier being personified) paper tray empty.  The paper tray is not empty.  We (I’m sure it took them both) just put 1,500 sheets of paper in it!”

ME:  So, I replied….”Hmmmm, you know the problem with these things is that copiers these days are made with no less than a gazillion paper trays.  Which one does it says is empty?”

Lady #2: “Which one?”

ME:  “Let me have a look….Oh OK, the message reads:  Refill paper tray 1.”

Lady #1:  “How am I supposed to know which one is paper tray 1″

ME:  “Don’t take  it from me, but I think it has something to do with these numbers that are on the paper trays.  Looks like you put 1,500 sheets in paper tray 4.”

I opened paper tray one and, sure enough, it was empty!  Imagine that!  So we (thats the collective we now–more like ME) put paper in paper tray one and the copier thanked everybody  and went about its business of doing what it was told to do—–now that the stupid humans did what they were requested to do.  So, the next time you walk into a copier room and you see a bunch of people stading around the copier dumbfounded….just go ahead and ask….. “Paper tray empty?” But be careful, you might become the copier administrator!

We now return our regularly scheduled multi-million dollar project.

Amazon it? Give me a break!

Come on folks!  Give a dude a break!  Most of you who have been reading the content of my blog know that I have a pet peeve about people who turn words into verbs when they are not (Google for example.  See my post on that one!).  Or changing the name of populare or house hold names (like Xerox to mean copy or Kleenex to mean tissue.)  Well just when I least expected it another such term cropped up on me yesterday.   When is it ever going to end?

I was had just gotten off of the bus and was walking with a friend of mine who works in the same general area and frequently sits next to me on the way home.  He was trying to tell me about  a book that he was reading that he thought that I would be particularly interested in.  Sure I said.  What’s it about.   So he proceeded to tell me about the subject matter of the book— nothing bad, but definitely NOT up my alley — and as we parted (he turns right and I go on two more blocks before my turn–though you neeed to know that ) but as I was saying… as we parted he told me that if I was interested in getting the book I could look up the author (and he gave me his name) and told me all I had to do was Amazon him!   ARRRRRGH, how my skin began to crawl when he said that.  Amazon IS NOT A VERB!!!!!!  I’m sorry, it might even be a household name at this point…. but it IS NOT a verb!  I don’t care if Merriam Webster decides it is, just as it has decided with Google.  Amazon is not a verb.  Did I happen to mention that Amazon is not a verb?  Oh, OK, I didn’t want to forget.  So, at least for me, I would like it to be said that I am never going to be “Amazoning” ANYTHING; particularly because Amazon is not a verb!  I will go to Amazon, just as I would to Google, and I will search for products—and perhaps even buy something.  But I will not “Amazon it.  In closing I would simple like to say, and have it know; in the event that I have not been to clear in expressing it….. Amazon is NOT a verb.

Bagel Widda Shmear!

I grew up in New York City.  That allowed me to have some singular experiences, particularly in the area of ethnic-related incidents.  I have always had a very large appetite for bagels with cream cheese since my early teen years.  Now there are some place that really go heavy on the cream cheese and I don’t care for that!  A nice medium layer will do for me — thank you very much.  But I was reminded of all of this because I am sitting here eating my Bagel with cream cheese (OK, I admit its the second one this week) right now.  Things are so much different now.  Now you walk into the store, buy your bagel, cream cheese, and, if you choose, your beverage ( a pint of Tropicana OJ, Home style with some pulp for me!), you toast it yourself, put on your own cream cheese and off you go.  (Well I do all of my prep at the office, not the store).

I can remember walking into one of the Jewish Deli’s in downtown New York and ordering a bagel with cream cheese.  The person taking your order would turn around and yell (this was before orders were computerized) “Bagel widda shmear!”  I never really knew what it was that they were saying, but I always got what I wanted.   Of course that was when a bagel was a plain old bagel too!  Now you have Onion, Garlic, Cinnamon Raisin, Pumpernickel, Blueberry, Everything (which has some of everything on it!)…. the list goes on and on!  Oh yeah, and if you desire… Plain!

Well, one day I was in one of my favorites Delis with a Jewish friend and when he placed his order he said the same thing as they did:  “Bagel widda shmear!”  So, seeing my opportunity, I asked, “What in the world are you saying?  I understand the Bagel part, but what kind of language is “widda shmear?”  Well, he informed me that it was all in English.  The literal translation is ‘Bagel with a smear of cream cheese.” beccause they take the cream cheese and smear it onto the bagel.  I had just been educated.  Imagine the looks I got when I ( a young black teen ager) walked into my Delis and (accent and all) ordered, “Bagel widda shmear!”

The reactions were priceless!  Well, just something I remembered from my past that I thought I’d share.