thekurths.com

For with You is the fountain of life;
In Your light we see light.
Ps. 36:9

InYourLight .mp3
(warning: may not be a very good song. contains the lyric "i'm a crusty dog turd.")

The first three-and-a-half months

On the left, she's 1 week old. On the right, she's 3.5 months old.

I've posted an assortment of adorable pictures from the past week, just check the Photos link at the top of the page, or click here.

Also, here's a silly 5 second video I made out of still shots of Kaeta in her saucer-play-thingy:

[Download]

Babies learn fast!

On Saturday I posted video of Kaeta's first time reaching for a toy. Here's a video comparing that to tonight's playtime -- look how much better she is at playing with it just 3 days later!

(PS - Non-parents, I realize it seems kind of nutty to obsess over how well a baby can spin a wheel... If you think this is boring, just click that link from the last post and watch the SNL Pirate sketch again.)

[Download Video]

Now viewing: This Saturday Night Live skit about a Pirate Convention. It's several minutes long, and it only has one joke, but I'm ashamed to say it made me squirt milk out of my nose. And the weird part is, I wasn't even drinking milk!

Kaeta's first real reach for a toy!

Stream the video, or click here to download it! (51 seconds, 3.2Mb)

Thanks to the Bakers for loaning us the saucer toy -- it's obviously already a big hit! Naturally, we took about 10 gajillion pictures of Kaeta in it tonight.

Apple Mango Kumquat

I've been in a real rut when it comes to playing the guitar or doing much of anything musical lately. So, in lieu of writing something new, tonight I recorded a cover of a very weird but very good song that I heard recently called "Peach, Plum, Pear" by Joanna Newsom (check it out on iTunes). She has absolutely one of the weirdest voices I've ever heard, and the whole song is just her and a harpsichord. It's great! Here's my (less great) rendition:

"Peach, Plum, Pear" mp3

Best Blonde Joke I've Ever Heard!

This isn't the sort of think I'd normally mention, but it just cracked me up. It's gotta be The World's Funniest Blonde Joke.

Hilarious Alito Misprint

This is a scanned article from a student newspaper at Purdue University.

Hat Tip: Mike O'Connor's blog and Regret the Error

The Garfield Randomizer will randomly select panels from Garfield cartoons of yore, which you can remix into your own new comic! It's about as funny as regular Garfield. Here's one of mine:

Also, last night I spent way too long laughing at this:

Gadget Review - VR3 FM Modulator

At least 99% of the time I listen to music, I am sitting at the computer or in the car. To listen to music in the car, I can either (1) listen to the 4 songs that are in rotation on commercial radio, or (2) bring along CDs. And with the advent of iTunes, I end up burning a lot of CDs to listen to in the car.

So, with all the hype surrounding iPods, I have thought about getting one several times, along with one of those FM transmitter add-ons so you can listen to it through your car stereo. But it just keeps coming down to this: is it really worth several hundred dollars to be able to listen to music I like in the car? When I can already do it by burning CDs, even though that's a hassle? No, it's not, so I don't have an iPod.

Then I came across this little guy:

The VR3 FM Modulator. It plugs into your car's cigarette lighter and has a USB port. So, you can fill up a USB key (which is way cheaper than an iPod) with all your favorite mp3s, stick it into the VR3, and it will broadcast the mp3s over your car stereo. It's about $30.

Mine just arrived in the mail today, so maybe I'm not that qualified to review it, but here's what I've experienced so far: it was incredibly easy to use, the sound quality was fine, and it works exactly as I expected. The cons: it will only play songs in the order in which they were copied onto the USB key, so if order is important to you, you have to be careful there. More importantly, the unit completely resets when the car is turned off, so if you've filled up a 1Gb USB key for a long car trip and you stop for gas, you can expect to sit there hitting the "next song" button for a minute or two to get back to the song you were listening to. Also, the VR3 broadcasts on one of 7 channels -- you can select the channel that sounds the best in your area. But the channel selection also resets when you turn the car off, so basically you have to reconfigure this thing every time you turn your car on. Kind of a pain, but hey, it was 30 bucks.

Here's where I bought it from: Virtual Reality Sound Labs. When I bought it, I couldn't find any reviews online, so I took a chance... So here's my review, in case anyone else out there is wondering if this thing really works.

UPDATE: It's been a year and a half since I wrote this review. Ultimately, having to reset every time I turned the car off wasn't working for me, especially since I tend to listen to long podcasts and there's no way to fast-forward. In December I bit the bullet and got an iPod Shuffle -- they were down to around $75, so really not that bad. I don't use a radio transmitter for listening in the car; I just drive with the earbuds in, and that seems to be fine. If you're considering the VR3 for the same reason I did, I think the Shuffle is worth the extra money.

A lot of wrong numbers leave messages on our answering machine, mostly for "Theresa" telling her to come pick up her kids from school. I sure hope Theresa's kids finally got picked up. I've tried calling the school back and telling them that Theresa's number has changed, but that has not stemmed the tide (okay, I exagerate, maybe there's one or two a month) of calls for her. But anyway, that's not what I wanted to talk about:

Everyone knows how answering machines work by now, so ours has a very short message: Hey, it's the Kurths -- leave us a message!

Today that really confused a lady. Just listen to the way she says, Hey it's WHAT?? [Listen to the message]

Resolved for 2006

I make resolutions throughout the year, and their typical lifespan ranges from about 30 minutes to, in a good year, 45 minutes. Whatever, I like making resolutions, and I think this will be a good one to try out.

Basically, I am going to read more old books (100 years old or older). Here's where I got the idea:

In the early 300s, St. Athanasius wrote a short book called On the Incarnation. A little over 1600 years later, C.S. Lewis wrote an introduction to an english translation of that book. About 50-60 years after that (i.e., this morning), I read his introduction and was inspired. Here's the introduction, in case you're interested. He makes a good case for reading old books to keep from being blinded to contemporary assumptions that might be easily overlooked otherwise.

Another pro: Old books are in the public domain, so many of them are free online (for example, after reading the introduction I just linked to, scroll down and start reading On the Incarnation!). But I also resolve to finally get a library card soon.

Lewis suggests: "It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. If that is too much for you, you should at least read one old one to every three new ones." I will probably fall more on the "one old one to every three new ones" side, but we'll see. I'm starting with On the Incarnation, which, like my attention span, is pretty short.

"What's it like having a baby?"
"Jordan says it's like having a dog that slowly learns to talk."
"Cool!"

--Scrubs, Jan. 3, 2006

The dangers of reading paraphrased versions of the Bible out of context

In The Message, a popular Bible translation, 1 Timothy 1:10 says:

"Sex, truth, whatever!"

Sounds like a hedonistic band slogan or something.

First post of 2006

Karianne and I are trying out a new schedule starting this morning. Basically, we're getting up at 5:00 to eat breakfast, do some morning chores, and (of course) feed the baby. Our goal is to work from 7:00 to 3:30 every day, so we'll get to spend more of the afternoon with Kaeta each day. Karianne goes back to work next Monday, so we're starting the new routine today to help us get used to it.

For our anniversary (Dec. 21) we bought a new camera! To make a long, boring ordeal short: we first bought an Olympus, but it took over 3 seconds from the time you pushed the button to the time it captured the picture! This was unbearable. So we returned it and got a Canon SD550, which (so far, at least) I can highly recommend. It's very small, the pictures look good (See for yourself.), and the shutter delay is much better.

There are some new pics of Kaeta from Christmas and New Year's, just check out the Photos link at the top of this page. Happy New Year!

Baby Cam

Blogs only a mother could love:
Other bricks in the wall:

Christian stuff:

Software related:

Amazing Bible Software: