Thank God, Thank God

for all of you who may have been out of the loop and didn't get the news, Birkhead is the father, thank God, the world will sleep better tonight, thank God...

How Snow Came To Fall In Texas 2007

In this instance the "out of the ordinary" weather pattern is a direct result of the global warming trend caused by George W. Bush and the cattle on his Crawford Ranch. As Al Gore explained it, the lack of rainfall throughout Texas, preceding this climactic change, resulted in below average hay production for the entire southern region. Consequently, the wicked conservative President Bush, in an attempt to save money, the very same money that he received from his evil cronies at Halliburton in exchange for Iraqi blood, resorted to teaching his cattle to gulp mouthfuls of air so to fill their starving bellies and defer the dreadful hunger pains until beneficial rainfall would come. As a result, millions of little methane fart bubbles were created inside of the hungering cattle and the precarious first steps of what would cause snowfall in Texas on Easter weekend 2007, were taken. For months the cattle’s methane flatulent stale stink hung over Crawford and the surrounding countryside. As the horrid gasses ascended into the fragile atmosphere methane poopie ice crystals started to form. The abnormal ice crystals had the ability to convert normal ice crystals into evil misshapen stinky conservative methane snow crystals. The great conservative conspiracy had started and there was no stopping the enormous evil stinky conservative methane snow crystals from enveloping the entire sky over Crawford, then Texas, then the entire world… ha ha ha ha ha ha ha (evil laugh). All was thought to be lost,until wait, what is that, what is that sound, it sounds like a tweet tweet, tweet tweet, peeter peeter, hiccup cough, oooh, thank God or Allah or Buda or Jehovah or any other divinity whom you may worship or if you are Atheist we are heart fully sorrow for having offend you by the aforementioned deities, it is Al Gore coming to the rescue. As he stepped out of his pink rice burning hybrid Volkswagen a single tear streamed down his face and fell, but before it hit the ground it was sucked up into the sky, into the greedy evil stinky conservative methane snow cloud attempting to vacuum and convert all precious liquids into evil stinky conservative methane snow. However, because the tear was pure and released from a pure eye as a result of heartfelt suffering from seeing the harmful effects of conservative evil greed, the tear was able to stop the evil stinky conservative methane snow cloud and force it to fall back to mother earth harmlessly somewhere north of Huntsville. The End.

Damn this Global Warming to Hell

I guess Gore and those other libbies are correct about the man-made Global Warming Fireball of DOOM. Ryan's friend, Anna sent this undeniable evidence from her family's house this Easter weekend. And yes this is in TEXAS, just north of Huntsville, in fact. You better thank God that it wasn't us putting the banana on the snowman, hehehe. Think about that one while we go get the sunshields out of the closet to fend off this infernal heatwave.

HAVE A HAPPY EASTER EVERYONE!

Rocky Jr. has his 2nd All Out Sparring Match

In preparation for the Laredo Tournament, at the end of the month, Michael got to step into the ring again this evening. His first fight, Novice on Novice, was too easy. Michael dominated the guy even though they were at the same level. He was too fast and hit too hard for the other guy to have a chance. This evening Michael's instructor tipped the scales in the other direction. The Amateur fighter he fought was 6'2 with a definate reach and experience advantage. He should have won hands down. This is the first time that Michael has gotten hit with serious intent to do harm. He has some battle wounds, but the "Amateur" realized early in the first round that he has some practicing to do. It's easy to hold your head up with a black eye when the professional fighters at the gym tell you that you did a good job.

When we got home, momma was slightly upset and demanded that Michael stop boxing. He'll be sparring again next week. I'll try to get some video.

I read that we had a template change....

I don't know..... I think I would like more color or pictures or funny little videos of kittens pouncing on unsuspecting puppies up in the top corner or something more than just plain blue.

I realize the template change took place only because it allows for the addition of the Fox News link at the bottom, which allows you to push your right-wing, ultra-conservative values on the rest of the family. To be really, so called, "Fair and Balanced" you should offer us a link to the Al-Jazeera "Fatwa for All" website. It tells the real story, not the Bush propaganda machine version. It also offers the interested reader insightful tidbits such as, "How To Wear Your Head Scarf in a Sand Storm," or "Color Coordinating Your Camel for the Spring Season." I don't know about you, but I hate a mismatched camel.

Update (and the cold, dead body...)

We're doing well here. Looks like we'll be moving back to the States in the summer, so that should be nice. :) Closer to the fam and all that. Henry is growing so quickly that I can't keep track of how old he is! (six months as of yesterday!) He has two teeth, a quick smile and the sweetest little voice ever.

Those of you with more than one: are you just awed over again with the second/third/fourth one? I imagine so, but I just can't see how it gets more amazing than this.... :)

We love him to pieces and we've only known him for six months! ;)

Photos at www.robandmel2001.myphotoalbum.com

Now, a quick note about Lenin's cold, dead body... you aren't allowed to take cameras into the pit which is Lenin's tomb. BUT, because they are so concerned with phototakers, you must have your hands where the guards can see them at all times. Not that I figured this out before I put my hands in my pockets. Noooooo...I had to have a guard come out of the shadows and touch me on the arm before I understood. Nothing like looking at a dead body and having some unseen person reach out for you. I almost wet my pants....

Hi everyone! Jessica is three months old, already. She rolled over on Sunday, onto her tummy. Can y'all believe that? She is growing up so fast, just like all the rest of us. Katharine is 2, and is fully potty-trained. She doesn't even wet in the bed. Thankfully! She tries to dance like a ballerina, so when she turns 3, we are going to put her in a dance class. David just turned 4, on March 21. He can't wait to go to school. He already knows how to write all the letters, and is learning numbers now. He can write his name and Noah's name by himself. He is also very artistic. Which he must have inherited from Josh, because he didn't get it from me. Noah is 5 already. He is doing really good at school. He is playing soccer now. He had his very first game on Saturday. He scored one goal, and was in the action, being aggressive the whole time he played.

Template Change

Hey everybody who still visits but doesn't post anything, including me, hehe. I have changed the template on the blog so we could be able to do some additional stuff, like move elements on the page around and such.

It's not like anyone is gonna read this anytime soon anyway, so I don't know why I write this, ho-hum.

Oh and Mel/Rob, where are the pics of Lenin's cold dead body?

I See Dead People (aka Our Visit to Lenin's Tomb)

Yesterday marked the beginning of our last weekend here in Moscow. Since we hadn't hit the major sights, we set out at 9:30 in the morning with two of Rob's colleagues. The weather was glorious: 37 whole degrees. Farenheit. It's amazing how quickly our perspective on warm has changed. What, no snow? It's toasty out!

Back to our outing. First stop: Lenin's tomb.

Karl and Petra watched Henry while Rob and I saw one of Moscow's most unique attractions. Kindly enough, there is no admission charged for this creepy activity. Instead, you progress single file down stairs into the marble mausoleum. The entire structure is red and black marble, and as you enter the chamber where he lies in-state, you find yourself in a room illuminated only by the red highlighting and the lights on his body. It's like something out of a movie. Very surreal.

There are questions about whether or not Lenin will be buried at some point. At the moment, they have to touch up his make-up every few days. But then, when a man's been dead for eighty years, a little touch-up now and then is never a bad thing.

From there we went to the Arbat, an historical part of Moscow with many small shops and booths. The weather turned then while we were having lunch, and we decided to head to a museum and then home again. The museum is actually quite close to our apartment, and I have passed it on numerous occasions without knowing what it was. It was a nice detour, and I found a new artist to love: Vereshchagin. His paintings are so exact many truly look like photographs.

After the museum, it was time to head back to our apartment and talk to the folks at home. We had had a full day of walking this enormous city centre, and our families? They were just waking up....

February 22, 2007

Houston, we have a .... tooth?

Go figure. We are watching for red gums, swollen gums, a grouchy child....Not really happening here. For the last day, Henry's been a little out of sorts, but no typical signs. Today, I gave him one of those freezable caterpillars that babies chew when they are teething, and he was happy. I thought, "Good! Maybe he's starting to teethe." He took it out of his mouth and I noticed a tiny bit of blood--I think Henry's cutting his first tooth! :) Unless he was able to find something to cut his gums in the same way a tooth would, I think we'll being seeing at least one pearly white sometime soon!

Photo on the way, if we can manage to get one!

March 3, 2007

Toothwatch Update:

We spent last weekend in St. Petersburg and this weekend touring around Moscow, and now it looks like instead of one tooth, Henry is cutting both of his lower middle teeth! Not full teeth yet, but edges like razor--yeow!

At any rate, he is doing well. He's starting to sleep better and isn't fussy as much. Sniff, he's growing up so fast.... :S

That's about it from here. We'll post some tourist stuff in a bit, but right now, Henry's dental developments are our top story!

Still working on the photos... :)

Blog update: Russia

As you all know by now, on September 28, 2006, Rob and I welcomed Henry Grayson Macalik into our family! Henry is named for Rob's great-grandfather (Henry) and Uncle Virgil (middle name Grayson), and Rob and I feel blessed to have two well-loved, well-respected men to name him after. Overall, he's just delightful and we adore him! His sweet disposition and easy nature have made the strange sleeping hours and the drool-stained clothes worthwhile. It's tough work to be a parent, though, so it has been a bit since we updated!

The fall was a blur with Henry's birth in September and visits from grandparents. I want to say, though, that I really, really appreciated your encouragement! Knowing that you all were excited for us and thinking about/praying for us was fantastic. Eldon, if you will tell Margaret how much her note about the c-section meant to me, I'd appreciate it. It was helpful to have her support and encouragement in that unexpected situation!

The rest of our fall included some preliminary travelling to prepare us for the flight home at Christmas. Before going trans-atlantic, Henry had already visited Paris, France, Boleslawiec, Poland, and Dresden, Germany!

Our trip home for Christmas was for a good stretch of time but was still too short! The grandparents, I think, would agree! :) Henry, thankfully, was an angel on the plane! Ten and a half hours on the second part of our trip from Prague to Dallas, and Henry slept for, oh 25 minutes of it. Yes, I really did check my watch. But, the other ten hours and five minutes, he was talking to himself, gurgling, looking around the cabin...generally surprising the heck out of us.

As of now, Rob, Henry and I are in Moscow, Russia until mid-March. The Russian firm recruited help from the region for this busy season, so Henry and I have been watching the snow fall and trying to decipher the Cyrillic on the food labels. For the last two weekends, we've walked from our apartment to Red Square. It's quite an experience to stand in front of the Kremlin. We've yet to go into Lenin's Tomb, but I have a feeling that won't go unvisited!

Strangely, though there is little for us to do, this time is passing kind of quickly; we signed on for five weeks here, and we've already finished almost two! Our first week passed with little fanfare. The primary adventure was finding and getting to the American Medical Clinic because Henry had his first ear infection. The doctor was fabulous and very helpful. This week had passed with even less excitement until today when we had a chance to visit with a friend from Dallas who recently moved here and has a sweet new son as well. While they slept through their "playdate," we drank coffee and visited about this crazy life away from home.

I'll see if I can't post some pictures from here, but that may have to wait until we are back in Prague. (The weather in Prague, by the way, is "positively balmy" and here we are with snow falling as I type!) The photos from Christmas are in a new location. http://robandmel2001.myphotoalbum.com/

Until we update again, know that we miss you guys and would love to hear from you!

Hog Noodlin... The dangers of hunting on the river

Yup, you guessed it, he went straight into the river. My adrenalin was racing so fast I didn’t realize how cold the water really was until the shivering started. He sank like a rock so I had to barefoot it and dive until I found him, but I found him.

I know, I know...it's about time!

AAAArggggg!

I just wrote a whole long post about Henry and our lives and then lost it!

I'll try again in a bit.

Miss you guys!
Mel

Clippin' party at our house!

Momma Brutus

The “little ones,” will be getting un-professionally castrated tomorrow. I am the, “un-professional” and I just hope that everything comes out alright. Ha ha, get it? “Comes out alright,” I made a castration funny. Really though, I expect a lot of squealing and crying and then when I clip the piglets I’m sure they’ll carry on too. They are eating solid food and drinking water so they will now be taking up residence at the farm. Is it un-ethical to take a piglet to the stand with you, make it squeal every now and then, and then shoot any hog that comes to it’s distress call? Regardless, I now have four new hunting buddies. They will have to get along without Brutus though; Christina wouldn’t let me move him out with them. I have learned a lot from this whole ordeal. The most important thing I learned is that if you come across baby piglets in the wild, leave them be. Second, control you wife and keep her from doing anything other than saying, “oooh look at the cute little baby piglets.” Third, shoelaces make real good piglet starter food. Truthfully though, we have had a really enjoyable time with the piglets, but it is now time for them to become farm pigs. Pigs in the house is why I moved out of the college dormitory.

Pics from the family hunt

Sometimes it was cold... so cold we couldn't put our shoes on the right feet.

Just relaxin'

Momma???

Pigletts are loud...

This is the closest you can get to hearing a picture.

Additional additions to the family

While out working at the farm Chrissy and I walked into a herd of napping wild hogs. After Chrissy helped me down from the tree and I got a clean change of underware we realized all of the mommas ran off and left the babies hiding in a fallen tree. I promptly decided to become a pig farmer. I ran to the tree and grabbed a squealing piglett. Little did I realize Chrissy was also pouncing on her own victim. She brought me her prize and swiftly ran for another. Michael too took part in the melee and snatched a one eyed cripple piglett for the farming. After all was said and done we have four squealing, never sleeping, always wanting to be fed pains in my neck. Aww, but aren't they cute...

Addition to the family

We had our first calf. Well not we literally, but our cow Betsy had her first bouncing baby bull. Betsy and Midnight are doing fine.

Success

It has been a long time coming. It started last year with shooting phesants and now I harvested my first deer. It was an awesome experience. One shot in the pump station, as the hunters explained it. The experience was made more enjoyable by seeing grown men, "experienced hunters" running around like children as excited as I was about me taking my first deer. Of course the long standing southern tradition of being "bloodied in" had to continue. Nothing like a 350lb Alabama backwoods hunter grabbing hold of you and wiping blood on your face. No, I didn't bite the heart, being bloodied in was enough. I'm looking forward to seeing other first harvest deer photos with bloodied in pictures. God bless and Love, Chrissy