the eric update - day 270: a nine month checkup. and the final rsv shot!

we're only days away from odin's 9 month birthday, which means it's time more his regularly scheduled 9 month checkup and his final rsv shot!

now, you might remember that his rsv shots are typically at the beginning of the month, but this one is on the last day of month and not even a full 30 days after his last shot ( it's usually best to separate the shots by almost exactly 30 days ). perhaps a random scheduling error? nope. medicaid will not reimburse for rsv shots given in april because it's the tail end of rsv season and their number crunchers have determined that it's more cost effective to pony up for the hospital bills of the kids that get rsv then it is to get everyone innoculated. so, cleverly, most pediatricians simply schedule an extra shot on the last day of the month.

but in much bigger [ ahem! ] news, you might have noticed that odin has gained almost a pound and a half since his last rsv shot! in less than a month! he's now just shy of 15 pounds.

some readers may be chuckling quietly to themselves, given the degree of hand wringing we engaged in after his developmental assessment when we learned that he might not have gained any weight at all. and we'll now fess up to the fact that after the appointment we started feeding odin a bottle of neosure a day, when we noticed that his diapers weren't as wet as we remembered; of course, we immediately jumped to the conclusion we were starving odin and lousy parents to boot for not noticing sooner that his diapers weren't sopping wet. hence the interim step of replacing one of his meals with formula, at least until we could talk more at length with the pediatrician.

i can only imagine what the pediatrician was thinking as he was forced to listen to us;

"and he hadn't gained any weight in two weeks and the developmental assessor thought he might need to be eating longer to get the "full course" and his diapers aren't sopping wet so surely we must have been starving him so now he's getting a bit of formula. because, well, starving him his not a good thing."

without nearly a hint of the patronizing tone that should have affected his voice, he proceeded to tell us that, in fact, after 3 or 4 months the wetness of a diaper is not a reliable indicator of how much nutrition a child is receiving; and that it's probably important to note that his last developmental assessment was performed by the person in charge of therapy for eating disorder in children born premature so she's constantly surrounded by the worst case scenarios and people tend to leave her assessments concerned about eating issues; and that sometimes kids just don't gain any weight and then they do; and while he didn't think the bottle of formula was doing any harm, he didn't think it was doing much good either, as it certainly wasn't responsible for his weight gain over the month.

pretty much, without actually doing it, he was shaking us by the shoulders, telling us to get ahold of ourselves.

heh.

and no, although it may look like it, odin is not sticking his fingers in his mouth and whistling at the nurse while he's being weighed.

and completely unrelatedly. hello to all you googlers coming to find useful information on rsv. i know that i'm clogging up the search results for rsv shot, but i'm not really sure that i'm the authoritative source to best answer your questions :-)

given odin's recent weight gains, he's forced to endure a greater volume of the monoclonal antibodies. this time the shot was a full CC which is quite a bit of fluid to be injecting under the skin and, although he gets over the surprise rather quickly, it's still rather sad to hear the lamentful cry that he cries during shots. it's quite different than any other cry - sort of a mixture of surprise, pain and anger.

the eric update - day 269: the feet of a future marathonist?

while i'm not officially committing to running another marathon, it was nice to get out and run for the second time in a week after taking about a year off. we're starting slow and logged a mere two miles today. but even if our bodies could run farther, we still seem to be limited by the fact that the stroller has a propensity to veer to the left regardless of how much we tinker with volume of air in the tires or wheel alignment. constantly needing to adjust the trajectory of the stroller can add quite a bit of stress to your shoulders and arms even after just a few miles. perhaps someone has a recommendation for a jogging stroller or similar contraption that actually works as advertised. in any case, i can't help but wonder if someday little odin , kris and i will celebrate finishing our first marathon together. maybe he'll have mercy on me and let me cross the finish line first.

the postcard project: palm harbor, florida.

lori was nice enough to send not one but two postcards from palm harbor, florida. thanks!

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 268: rocking on the porch, watching passerbys.

finally! after hope springing eternally it was warm enough to sit on the front porch in the rocking chair and gawk at the passerbys.

no lemonade though. not quite warm enough for that yet, but soon perhaps.

one wonders what odin was thinking while he was relaxing in the rocking chair.

he's never had the chance to watch cars "whooosh" by and at the moment this picture was snapped he was watching a car pass in front of the house, so i imagine that he was trying to figure out what on earth was flying by so quickly.

or maybe he was just wondering when we were going to serve up the lemonade.

the postcard project: centerville, ohio.

friends of the family sent this nice card of the sculpture in front of the woodbourne library in centerville, ohio.

of course, we like libraries and i'm sure some day we'll get a photo of odin standing by the statue in centerville.

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 267: spring training!

i've long suspected that kris and i would know when life was returning to "normal" when we found ourselves making the time to start running again. and today we found ourselves doing just that.

it's hard to believe it's been almost a year since i inexplicably stopped posting about how training was going for my third marathon ( mundane reasons really, we decided that making a trek to duluth, minnesota for grandma's marathon just wasn't going to be feasible given the fact that both kris and diane were pregnant at the time ).

we only ran a mile today, but that's o.k. because we started from much more humble beginnings and managed to scratch out several marathons in short order.

actually we both felt like we could have easily run at least 2 miles, but the jogging stroller kept veering to the left, making it irritatingly difficult to concentrate on running. and, even without the swerving, i think running with a stroller is a little more challenging that i had anticipated. hopefully we can get all the kinks worked out, because i think it'd be big fun to take odin out on long runs.

we're registered for the riverbank run, but trying to ramp up to 15 miles in a month might be a bit optimistic. and dangerous. but hey - you never know.

the eric update - day 266: first easter!

you can click on each picture to see a larger version with a description.

the eric update - day 265: the littlest scientist. making the mobile, not.

welcome to another installment of the very occasional series on our littlest scientist.

while odin has been enjoying his mobile for 178 days up until today, he's been content to sit and smile as the mobile turned in slow circles above his on the changing table.

but today he figured out that his legs are now long enough to kick the mobile! what fun! i watched in amazement as he figured out how to time his kicks to get the best effect as i wondered how this new found fun was going to alter the diaper changing dynamic.

and then after having his fun kicking the mobile around, he quickly discerned that he could stop the mobile with his foot, making it far easier to grap it with his hand!

and what piece did he choose to grab first?

well, of course, the one with the smiley face on the bottom that's been making him laugh day after day over the past couple of months.

the eric update - day 264: working out with friends at the gym.

since odin has to build up his upper body strength he's taking more frequent trips to the gym.

luckily, there's always a familiar looking chap hanging out at the gym who is always willing to exchange smiles to help pass the time.

i often wonder when he'll figure out that he is, in fact, the baby in the mirror. maybe he has already, although i suspect not.

the postcard project: cleveland, ohio.

rebecca joins the elite "threefer" set by sending another card - this time of jacob's field in cleveland, ohio, which once set a major league record by selling out 455 straight games.

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 263: not an ophthalmologic emergency! or phew.

about a week ago we noticed that odin had started tilting his head to the side.

how cute! we thought. he likes looking at the world sideways!

but then he started doing it more often and we thought we noted that he was rubbing his eyes more frequently than we remembered in the past.

after few hours of googleing, we discovered that both behaviors could be signs of vision loss due to lingering complications related to retinopathy of prematurity. yikes!

we called odin's eye doctor two days ago, thinking that they would probably just have us wait for his regularly scheduled appointment in may, since we were probably just being silly alarmists. instead, they told us that they'd like us to come in right away, with just enough of a sense of urgency to lead us to believe that perhaps we were not unduly alarmed afterall.

while we were in the office waiting for the dilation drops to do their dilating thing, odin had his chance to take a vision test typically taken by older kids. he didn't do so well at pointing and naming the objects, but clearly he enjoyed the bold lines.

while playing the Dilation Waiting Game, odin learned that the eye doctor's office can be very fun, indeed, since they have all sorts of bold things to play with.

but eventually the doctor arrived and started shining lights in his eyes; odin used to tolerate the exams quite well, but wowza, not anymore! just in case there was any doubt, now the entire building knows that odin no longer cares for eye exams!

unhappiness about the exam notwithstanding, we're happy to report that he apparently the exam showed that he's just a bit farsighted which is just what you'd like to see ( ahem. ) and any infant. and both eyes show about the same degree of farsightedness, which is also just what you'd expect.

so, maybe just likes looking at the world sideways after all.

somewhat relatedly, as if to keep a lingering bit of doubt in our minds about whether or not we'll someday have to deal with unexpected long term consequences resulting from retinopathy of prematurity - we learned that it's possible that micropreemies who have had ROP will continue to have an increased risk of retinal detachment thoughout their lives. the general lack of "hard" data ( because so few 24-28 weekers with ROP survived long enough to do long term studies ) leads some professionals to recommend the conservative approach of taking great care to protect the baby from the usual bumps and bruises of everyday life ( no small task, for sure ). but others, our doctor included, think that the conservative approach is a little too conserative and aside from doing our best to prevent a "severe" blow to the head, we really should treat him like any other "normal" baby ( leading one to wonder if parents of "normal" babies don't do their best to prevent severe blows to the head ).

hrrrrm. just when i was thinking about cutting back on hovering.

i'm not sure i'll look at a jungle gym the same way :-)

the postcard project: boston, massachusetts.

a co-worker of auntie m's sent this postcard of boston's lovely marlborough street magnolias. rumour has it that auntie m has ( had? ) quite a collection of pictures up at work and more than a few officemates have taken a an interest in odin's adventures.

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 262: play yard or pig pen?

after 66 days, odin's play yard has been almost fully transmogrified into a holding pen for many of his toys. we almost never put him in it and today were considering doing away with it entirely since it's just taking up space and collecting clutter.

but we thought we'd give odin a chance to cast his vote and were amazed to watch him sit and play, grabbing one toy while eyeing the next, for longer than either of us have ever witnessed.

well, i guess that settles it, it's a play yard and a pig pen.

the postcard project: grand rapids, michigan.

the parents of a very longtime family friend sent this mightily green postcard from grand rapids, michigan.

i'll go out on a limb ( ahem! ) and identify the frog as a red eyed tree frog which can be found in the rain forests of Costa Rica.

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 261: a study of solids. bananas.

since we didn't want to be accused of "... giving someone a Bud Light and then concluding from [ their dislike of it ] that that they don't like beer..." we went ahead and rounded up a motley crew of earth's best baby food. the merits of "hand mashing notwithstanding, we decided to go with good old fashioned jars of babyfood because, well, we're lazy :-)

and since banannas seemed to be a popular suggestion, we thought we'd try that first. see - your feedback at action!

goodbye real spoon and hello fingerspoon! despite initially seeming to like using a real spoon, today the results were the same as yesterday until we switched to the fingerspoon.

and then, like magic, odin was at least willing to give it a try. not too much, mind you, maybe a quarter of teaspoon of food - but hey - it's a start. we tried both straight bananas and bananas mixed with a bit of rice cereal and the results were the same - mild, if not overwhelming interest. so, maybe next time we'll try sweet potatoes.

the postcard project: memphis, tennessee.

we were very pleasantly surprised to find this postcard from kyle ( who has quite nice penmanship for being 15 months old. kyle was given only a 5% chance of survival when he was born on december 30th, 2003 at 24 weeks gestation weighing 1lb 1oz.

and to think that now his parents are taking him on long vacations to memphis and beyond!

long time readers will remember that kyle's mom katra frequently left very helpful, supportive and knowing comments on ex machina while we were in the nicu and for that we are eternally grateful. thanks!

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 260: ( not so ) deep thoughts about ( not ) eating solids.

while we briefly abandoned attempts to feed odin eggs ever since The Incident, we occasionally check to see if he's interested in solid food by mixing up a bit of earth's best organic rice cereal to see if he shows a renewed interest in eating solids.

and while previously, he might humor us by taking in a bit of rice and spitting it back out, lately he's taken to actively thwarting our attempts by blocking the spoon and doing his best to squirm his way out the situation ( hence the splotch of cereal on his forehead ).

so, since he seemed at least vaguely interested in solid food before the The Incident can we assume that he now associates solid food with vomiting for hours on end? or maybe infants just go through phases where sometimes they're interested and sometimes they're not? odin's cousin wheeler, who is exactly the same adjusted age as odin couldn't be more different in this regard. i suspect she'd eat a plate full of any solid food you put in front of her.

i guess like all things, there's probably a continuum of behaviors related to interest in solids and the chance that he has an eating disorder is fairly small ( i'm mostly joking ).

joking aside, this is one of those seemingly minor points that can haunt micropreemie parents, as it's not uncommon for infants born very early to develop eating "problems" which can lead to dimished weight gains.

not that we're terribly concerned about it at this point, but bonus points will be awarded for comments about your own experiences regarding your infants interest in solid food, especially if you're a parent of a micropreemie.

the eric update - day 259: cool, new, free, really, really big preschoolian shoes!

first things first. i did not buy the preschoolian shoes that you see adorning odin's feet; rather jeffrey silverman ( "founder, ceo and customer experience specialist" ) contacted me offering to send me a free pair if i agreed to write about the experience. well, of course, i'm not going to turn down a free pair of shoes as long as i have complete freedom to write whatever i want - the good, along with the bad and the ugly ( that's right would be senders of free stuff! i'll more than happily write about your stuff as long as i can maintain some semblance of editorial freedom and properly disclose how the good were got ).

i didn't know too much about preschoolian shoes before the offer, but i'll certainly take a closer look at anything that has been received a time magazine coolest invention award produced by a company whose founder has a blog. and they certainly have more than a few satisfied customers.

but alas, when we tried on the shoes we ordered we discovered that they were too big! the irony being that there's a lot of information on the site about how to ensure a proper fit. this is entirely my fault as i measured odin's foot at 3.75" ( a preeschoolian size 17 ), but rounded the measurement to 4" ( a preeschoolian size 18 ) and then, for reasons unknown asked jeff to send me a size 19 or 20 because "by the time we get the shoes they should fit just fine". apparently i was assuming odin's feet were going to grow 0.75" in a few weeks.

so, as you can see from the unique visu fit system, you can't see any of odin's little toes through the clear panel which means that they're far too large.

sigh.

quite unintentionally, i've given myself the opportunity to highlight preschoolian's outstanding guarantee, which gives dolts like me the freedom to recover from our mistakes:

"Shop with confidence -- returns and exchanges are free! What's more, if you exchange your order, we send out the new ones before the old ones come back -- we use the honor system, as we value your time and business. "

how about that! a company that trusts you! what a novel concept.

even though they do trust me, i'm not going to hassle them with an exchange due to my incompetence. we'll keep the pair that they sent and wait for odin's feet to grow a little larger so we can do a proper review.

because odin isn't really walking ( or crawling for that matter ), we opted for the "cover my foot" super soft moccasin which is for indoor use only.

hopefully you don't have to ask why we ordered the pair with dogs sewn on the top.

the eric update - day 258: hope springs eternal.

today i spied kris and odin staring longingly out the window and on the day before the the first day of spring, i'm guessing that at least one of them is wondering when spring will arrive in earnest.

after a long winter couped up in this sold house and mostly avoiding the unwashed masses, we're all hoping that spring arrives sooner rather than later.

the eric update - day 257: this sold house.

some might be surprised to discover that today we sold the the snowdeal show ® house that we purchased less than a year ago. some might be even more surprised when they discover that we don't actually have a concrete plan for where we are going to live after the end of april when the new owner takes possession. it certainly cannot be said that we have never lived in interesting times.

a little over a month ago, kris and i decided that if we looked out over the next 6 months to a year that it was looking increasingly unlikely that we'd still be calling grand rapids home. it's not that it was an impossibility, but given my continued status as underemployed and the abysmal job market in west michigan, we wanted to make sure that if we needed to move so i could take a new job in walla walla that we'd be able to do that without having to worry about selling the house in the real estate "offseason" ( here in the "states" new home buyers start looking for houses in march/april and it's generally considered to be a savvy move to put your house on the market at the beginning of the selling "season" ).

it's not unusual for big, victorian homes to sit on the market for 6 months to a year, so you can imagine our, er, surprise when a mere two weeks later - after only being on the market for one full day - we accepted an offer on the house. so much for taking 6 months to come up with a plan for what we'd do when we sold the house!

i should probably mention that diane, our sister-in-law with whom we co-own the house, deserves much of the credit ( or blame, depending on how you're looking at it :-) ) for selling the house so quickly. she's recently received her real estate license and has quickly proven why she's going to be the grand rapids real estate baroness.

and yes, we really did paint our house orange, which is much better than the haunted house gray it was painted when we moved in.

while it's mostly true that we sold the house to give us flexibility in the future . it's a little disingenuous to imply that our decision was solely based on wanting the flexibility to take a new job in walla walla.

any parent will tell you that having a child changes your life in ways that you can't fully appreciate before you have the child; you can imagine how children might affect your life, but until it happens, i'd argue that you can't really appreciate how having a child changes everything. and i think this is all the more true when you spend 96 days in the neonatal intensive care unit. the experience has certainly changed kris and i in ways that we don't even fully comprehend yet. so, who knows, maybe instead of taking that job in walla walla ( or wherever ), we'll buy an airstream and travel the country visiting postcard project destinations. or who knows what. i'm sure while we take time to figure out what we do next, we'll continue to live in interesting times.

stay tuned.

[ oh and in case you didn't figure it out, in the picture odin is carefully inspecting the packet of documents that we needed to sign to transfer ownership of the house to the buyer. ]

the eric update - day 256: La-Z-Boy.

i didn't pick up the camera for most of the day and before i knew it, at the early hour of 6 p.m., odin began displaying all the sleepy time signs that indicate that it's nearing the time to start The Four Bees, STAT!

our almost no cry sleep solution is continuing to work its wonders and he's not only sleeping regularly over 5 hours at a stretch, but he's also getting sleepy earlier and earlier in the day.

maybe there's something to the conventional wisdom that sleep begets sleep after all.

i must admit that even though our experience had convinced us that it's never a good idea to delay The Four Bees, it's still hard to fight the temptation to delay the process for the sake of convenience ( i.e. finish dinner or whatever ) or - relatedly - to think that it's better to make him stay awake on the thought that he'll get really super duper tired and sleep like a log through the night. at least with odin, both fallacies inevitably lead to a No Sleep Solution.

the eric update - day 255: tummy time with crumpled paper.

given the recommendation that we should be trying to get odin to work on his upper body strength to help reverse the effects of his "mild decreased central tone", we tried a few new games today ( and we're always thankful for suggestions for new strategies for making tummy time less work and more fun ).

we heard that crumpled paper can be quite handy for such purposes, so we thought we'd give that a try. and it worked wonders for a few minutes. until he started to flash us this look, which seems impossible to not interpret as implying, "look. the novelty of you repeatedly folding and unfolding paper wore off about 30 seconds ago, so hopefully you've got something more interesting in your back of tricks that's going to help me forget that the weight of my very chunky cheeks is making it difficult for me to hold my head up up high."

later in the day the crumpled paper no longer held any power to persuade odin that tummy time was anything more than an annoyance between feeding and sleeping.

this photo would be a lot more amusing if you could hear us empatically attempting to convince him that crumpled paper was really, really, really fun while he looked at us as if we'd really lost our minds.

the eric update - day 254: yet another ( and, we learn, not his last ) developmental assessment.

it's hard to believe that it has already been almost two months since odin's last developmental assessment and despite his passing that test with flying colors, it was hard not to get a little nervous today as we prepared to meet the developmental specialists associated with the neonatal intensive care unit. his first assessment was conducted by a nurse from a county support program and it's not impossible for the two sets of specialists to come to different conclusions. and they immediately gave credence to our suspicion that they might possibly come to a different conclusion by letting us know that they didn't agree with the county's recommendation that odin was doing so wonderfully that he didn't need any more active monitoring by specialists. the specialist's opinion was based not so much on any specific behavior she did or didn't see in odin, but rather she reassured us that is was simply a matter of statistics.

since he's a "25 weeker" her experience tells her that it's likely ( although not a certainty )that some sort of developmental delay will appear over the next year or so and it's best to have a conservative monitoring program to help ensure that you can catch issues early.

but after that gentle reminder that we should never lose sight of the fact that for years to come odin will require close monitoring, she seemed to agree with the county's conclusion that he did not yet show any of the "normal" delays that one might expect from a baby born 15 weeks early.

except for this moment, when she's noting that he has "poor" shoulder strength and "mild decreased central tone", which means that even though he's been sitting up unassisted for quite some time, he's showing signs of of having underdeveloped muscles in his torso and upper body which could potentially delay crawling.

the prescription for "mild decreased central tone" is more frequent "tummy time" exercises, which - photographic evidence notwithstanding - odin will happily tolerate for only very short periods of time. nonetheless we'll have to be a little more disciplined about getting him to workout at gym.

additionally, the developmental specialist expressed some concern that he apparently hasn't gained any weight since his last pediatrician's visit. while he's shown relatively normal diminished weight gains over the past few months , not gaining an ounce is possibly a sign that something is amiss. or not, depending.

the specialist would like to see him gaining about 20 ounces each month, so if he doesn't start packing on the pounds i suspect we'll be weighing ( ha! pun intended. ) the merits of a variety of recommendations for helping him to gain weight.

the postcard project: sonoma county, california.

one of many postcards sent my our friends adam and johanna, from all over the country. they've never confessed as to whether they really were travelling around the country or just had a stash of postcards sitting around.

in any case, this one is from sonoma county, california. if wikipedia is to be believed, "Sonoma is a Chocuyen Indian name translated by some as "Valley of the Moon" and by others as "land or tribe of the Chief Nose.""

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 253: the apprentice.

so, i'm trying the ol' bathroom mirror portrait trick, but my grand plans are foiled because instead of being tricked into looking into the camera reflection in the mirror odin was was quite happy to play with the real camera in front of him. i was hoping that he would accidentally hit the shutter button to snap a photo, but mostly he just fiddled with the knobs and mouthed the SLR eyepiece. with a bit more apprenticeship, i'm sure he'll be be ready to begin the process of taking over as family photographer.

actually, at first the camera was off to the side as i was attempting to get a picture with both of our faces in the frame, but that resulted in multitudes of shots of him lunging for the camera while i precariously balanced him in one hand and the camera in another. so i compromised and put the camera front and center which means you'll have to wait a little longer for a proper portrait of him and me.

really, i am slightly less camera shy than i appear. but only slightly.

the postcard project: lancaster, pennsylvania.

this card was sent anonymously and doesn't explicitly mention a location, so the postcard project judges are going to call this one based on the postmark, unless they hear otherwise, which means that this is the first card from the city named after lancashire, england - lancaster, pennsylvania.

[ see the postcard project slideshow. ]

the eric update - day 252: playing with cadence.

cadence was quite happy to receive her very first belly scratch from odin. she and he enjoyed the quality time immensely and hopefully she'll remember the good times in the future when i'm certain on more than once occasion he'll test several theories on the responses to tail and ear pulling.

while berners are generally considered to be great kid companions, up until today cadence has been a little more aloof around odin compared to the mauja our hyperattentive malamute ( and to be fair, at least as far a mauja is concerned everyone is a little aloof around odin. except him, of course. ), i suspect that discovering that the wee one might be willing to dole out stomach scratches is going to serve as the catalyst for developing new dimensions to their relationship.

the eric update - day 251: meeting another miracle boy!

today we went on a field trip to chicago and had a chance to visit some friends who have their own little miracle boy.

at 27 weeks gestation carter's mom experienced what is known as a premature rupture of membranes ( PROM ). while the cause of PROM is often unknown, delivery can often be delayed by bedrest and drugs. however when carter's parents went to the hospital they discovered that his heart wasn't beating, which forced an immediate c-section. the doctor's didn't allow his father in the operating room during the procedure because they didn't expect him to survive. and even after he was delivered and recusitated the professional's opinion was that he wouldn't live more than 12 hours.

well, apparently carter didn't listen to the professionals because he went home after 76 days in the neonatal intensive care unit and he's now getting ready to celebrate his 16th month as a happy, healthy boy who likes to show visitors how well he run around the house. and when he's not impressing his parents by saying "mamma" and "dadda", he's been known to express himself by using his vast repertoire of "baby signs". quite impressive, indeed!

carter's parents have been a tremendous source of support for kris and i over the past 251 days, so it was great to have a chance to finally see them and meet their miraculous bundle of joy for the first time.

a rambling request for comments.

i was talking with a friend today who asked when i was going to go back to writing about the kinds of things i used to write about before july fourth; as it happens i've been thinking a lot about that very issue, so the request motivated me post a few thoughts about it and give readers and opportunity to give me some feedback on what they'd like to see in the future. for over four years "ex machina" was my little spot in the larger vast wasteland for posting my thoughts on pretty much any ol' topic. when i started posting "the eric update" i thought after a few posts to keep family and interested "old timers" up-to-date, i'd settle back into the familiar routine, occasionally posting nicu photos and commentary to keep people abreast of developments. i certainly had no clue that "the eric update" would quickly gain worlwide attention and that 8 months later there would be thousands of people visiting every day who only know me as the "micropreemie" dad who likes to take pictures and not the superdork who writes about boring things that exactly two people might be interested in.

basically, i'm trying to think of ways to go back to writing about topics other than a chronicle of odin's adventures while remaining mindful that new visitors coming to the site for the first time from, say, the premature birth faq or daddytypes ( or innumerable links from preemie forums ) might be a little confused if they find a long and winding post on how the rise in popularity of folksonomies may or may not be due to the "worse is better" principle. relatedly, i'm wondering how many people are interested in long and winding posts on odin's sleeping habits. while i've always been interested in keeping a visual record of odin's adventures similar in concept to 10 years of my life, i'm as surprised as anyone to find myself giving and getting parenting advice on infant sleep habits.

so, i guess this is a long way of soliciting input from visitors on a potential sitewide redesign/reorganization. scenarios might include stopping posting frequent "eric updates" on ex machina and simply uploading the occasional photo to flickr. or maybe i'll retire the conflux and {bio, medical} informatics sections, while keeping the frequent "eric updates" here and moving all the dorky stuff to the main page. or maybe i'll turn the lights out altogether on the vast wasteland and keep my opinions and photos to myself :-)

to put it