5 principles

For Father's Day last year, my dad gave me a little book called "A Father's Legacy: Your Life Story in Your Own Words."
Each page has prompts and lines on which to write (and my dad even typed up his own responses separately for me, which was the best part of the gift), and each night now, I try to fill in a page.

One page in particular asks for the five most important lessons you've learned in life.

I posted a couple already on this blog, but I've finally come up with five. I qualify these because they come up in my thoughts most often, but they'll most likely change. They're a dissimilar bunch, and one or two is still in the testing stage.

My friend John encouraged me to put them up, so these are the five... for now.


"Recall for me five of the most important lessons you've learned in life."

(in no particular order)
1. Recognizing which instincts serve your pride is necessary for humility
2. Be aware of how easily man's efforts tend to diminish perceived reliance on God
3. Have something to say before you go looking for a place to say it
4. Less is more
5. Don't let the search dictate what you're searching for
(This last one has its origins in an illustration class in college. A teacher cautioned us against choosing subject matter based on convenient or attractive photo reference found during the search for an original element in the illustration's sketch.
I've since remembered this precept in light of various decisions that get off-track. It's easy to pursue what's attractive or expedient, and taint the integrity of your original intent.)

That's the list as fast as I could come up with 5 decent ones without thinking too hard.

What's yours??

6-month review

19lbs (73rd percentile)
28" (91st percentile)

and his head is in the 82nd percentile.

we got a big pooklet.

Outtakes and Deleted Scenes

the windmill

there is a natural order to things, things i never saw myself participating in, no matter how many fathers before me submitted to them, like following their child everywhere with a big camera.
this past weekend, i did what every new father does, and tilted my kid upside down for the first time to make him giggle.

he turned six months last friday, and started on watered-down rice cereals. the plot thickens, and so does the food.

Remarkable illustration

I love the illustration Louie Giglio gives in his short sermon here, straight from the world of molecular biology.  Thanks to John for posting it to his blog:

def. religious

There's a great blog I check in with from time to time, on which I noticed today a great definition of the word 'religious.'

"constructing, or ascribing to, a system of meaning."

Defining the term 'religion' was something I wanted to do when expounding on the Darwin/ID debate in my review of Expelled.  Alas, I've had no time the past week to even write about what's been going on with the pooklet (with even one blog entry thrown in unfinished), let alone get into a topic that extensive.

Still, I'll post the above definition so I remember it, and hope to speak more on it in the near future.

memoirs

My dad, for last father's day, gave me a book to write memoirs in for my kid(s).  Each page begins with a question, and one of the questions has stumped me because it asks for 5 phrases to live by. Well, like so much else, good phrases come to mind when i'm nowhere near something to write on, so now, whenever possible, I'm going to rush to a computer when they strike, and put them down here.  And so begins the category of entries titled "memoirs."  They don't have to be quotes by others, but my first two happen to be.

"The truth will out" (Shakespeare)

"Always have something to say before looking for a place to say it. (paraphrased from Dallas Willard)" (This is something I keep in mind often when blogging)

medical journal

5.3.2008

I rode my bike for, like, the third time in two and a half years, to my dermatologist appointment, and realized that my pro-preventative care clinic doesn't have any bike racks.

Since my flucinonide hasn't cured my shin exzema, I got a prescription for clobetasol, which is stronger.

So this is my new regimen to survive the central valley:

2x/day:

Q-tip hydrocortisone on ears

thin layer of clobetasol on left shin, upper right back, behind right knee. three weeks max, then one week off.

Adorex (better than benadryl) antihistimine before bed.  I can be upgraded to Lydex if Adorex aint cuttin it.

Refrigerated Sarna for anti-itch relief

and, of course, vaseline.

this is the pooklet's routine for his "pretty mild" active exzema:

cetaphil 1x/day

mustela 2x/day minimum

bathe 1x day

0.25% hydrocortisone on irritated spots under his ears (topical steroids are safe for infants, according to the doctor)

Hm. I have here in my notes, but not in my recollection, we're supposed to administer triamcinolone under the moisturizers?  Ahh, triamcinolone.  That takes me back

*aquaphor is recommended as superior and longer-lasting than mustela, but much more difficult to apply.

For his flaky and slightly scabby scalp, baby or mineral oil is OK, but we began using another mustela product.

The doctor told us that diaper rashes, pooklet's recurring problem, are generally not caused by food allergies, and the more foods we can expose him to, the better, which is encouraging, given the soy and dairy his mother has given up.  Other good news is that judging by how good pooklet's skin is now, it's unlikely that he'll turn out to be one of the more severe cases of exzema we'd heard about.