Thomas

It took the birth of our child to get us back onto the blog...introducing Thomas Miller! Here he is on his activity mat, hitting and kicking his favorite stuffed elephant. We think he's pretty cute. (And promise to post more soon!)

Phillies Web Redemption

This is by far the cutest Web Redemption on Tosh.O, by far the funniest show on Comedy Central. Phillies fans will remember this little girl well--she threw back the foul ball that her dad caught and was all over the local news.

Tosh.0
Web Redemption - Phillies Fan
http://www.comedycentral.com/
Web Redemption 2 Girls, 1 Cup Reaction Demi Moore Picture

Guy Humor

In the last few weeks, I've had the pleasure to catch up on all the guy movies I've missed in the last decade or so. (Mostly by choice.) Russ and I've watched Old School and The Hangover, and I caught a few key scenes of Half Baked. Consider me educated in all guy humor. A selection of guy jokes I now get:

"Once it hits your lips, it is so good."
-Will Ferrel's beer bong, Old School
"I got a big day tomorrow. You know, going to Bed Bath & Beyond. We might go to Home Depot. I don't know, if we have time."
-Will Ferrel before his beer bong, Old School

"You're NOT a fish!"

-Half Baked

"And my wolfpack has grown by 1. So there were 2 in my wolfpack. And now I know for sure I've added 2 more guys to my wolfpack."

-Alan, The Hangover, right before he tries to make them all blood brothers

I also noticed that the same wedding singer appears in both Old School and The Hangover. Apparently he's pioneered dropping the f-bomb in cover songs, which Russ informs me is now the coolest thing in karaoke. The actor's name is Dan Finnerty, of Dan Finnerty and the Dan Band. Click here to link to his scene from The Hangover. And here's the Old School adaptation of Total Eclipse of the Heart:

Year of the Tiger

Today is the Chinese Lunar New Year, and we've all entered the Year of the Tiger. We made our own batch of traditional Chinese dumplings (jiao zi) to celebrate. Jiao zi means "money" in Mandarin, and serving dumplings on New Year's day is symbolic of good fortune in the new year. Our dumplings were filled with roast chicken, shitake mushrooms, spinach, and other veggies. And there is the obligatory pic of Bella. She usually sits in the kitchen when we're cooking, right in the middle where we need to walk. Here she's waiting for food to drop from above.

Happy New Year!

And...More Snow...

Another snowstorm today in Philly -- the second in four days. We're now .4 inches away from the city's total snowfall record! (1996 record is 65.5", we're at 65.1") Rachel's office closed for the day, but, committed scientist that he is, Russ is at the lab working today. The city's buses will all stop running at 5:00, so let's hope he makes it home! All of the area highways have been closed as well. It's pretty when you don't have to drive in it or shovel it, right?

***UPDATE***
Note to self: when SEPTA says bus service shuts down at 5 pm, they mean wink, wink 3 pm.
It was a cold walk home in the snow, but Rachel was kind enough to place a fresh pair of clothes in the dryer to be pre-warm and had some water boiling for hot coco.

February Snowstorm

Our second major snowstorm of the year hit this weekend. The city is blanketed with 28" of snow -- in the record books, that's the No. 2 snowstorm in the past 100 years. In the past 94 winters, less than that has fall in entire seasons.

So while that may not seem like much to our Midwestern readers, it's a lot of snow for Philly! We are thoroughly enjoying not owning a driveway or needing to shovel our walk. (Some of the only perks of renting.) We took Bella for a long walk last night; here are some pics of our neighborhood and Bella's frolics through the drifts.

Arizona

We met the rest of the Miller clan for a long weekend in Phoenix, Arizona, last week. Highlights included a trip to Sedona, about 2 miles north of Phoenix. Some pics of the drive are below.

New Game

Ok, here is the new game I've been playing over the weekend. Go to this link

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Randompage

which will send you to a random wikipedia page. Click one of the links in the page to a new wikipedia page. Repeat until you get to the target page, in this case lets say Madison, WI, keeping track of the number of clicks required.

Who can get there the fastest? Put your best score and your random page in the comments.

I just got there in 8 from Votive Candle, which probably wasn't that good.

New Year's Day Tamales

To celebrate 2010, we cooked, assembled, and steamed a big batch of tamales today with friends. What a fantastic way to begin the new year! I have a feeling that a New Year's Day tradition has begun.

Here are our friends Carolina and Pieter.

And these are the tamales, in all their glory.