Steveandjenn’s Blog

In the last week I’ve connected myself to the world more than I have ever been in the past. Basically, it was driven by people who kept asking “When are you going to join….?”, “When are you going to start…..?”, “you’re not signed up for….?”. So, I am on Myspace.com, Facebook.com, Twitter.com, WordPress.com, I have a cell phone and a Blackberry, a desktop, a laptop, wireless internet, etc, etc, etc. I can communicate with the world at any moment in time, literally. I can tell them exciting things like “I just pumped gas at Stewarts” or “mmmm, this Quizno’s sub tastes good”, or I can hear about how my friends just saw a movie or are driving to work….ya know, awesome information I couldn’t live without. However, there are some things that are entertaining, informative and good to hear, like the birth of child and other inspirational moments. Some of it plays out like reading a good book. Follow my “Twitter” to hear any updates on the birth of our son and any other information I feel like relaying to the world. I guess that’s why we started this blog and all this stuff in the first place. I have to admit, I’m slightly addicted to Facebook at the moment. I want people to visit my page, add me as a friend, comment on my blog, send me Twitter updates (‘Tweets’ as they are called on the streets-thanks Lib). I recently read that “we’ve turned into a nation of teenage girls who want all the cool kids to sign our yearbook, except we’re not teenage girls and we now call those yearbooks, blogs”.

Ain’t it the truth.

1. Friday night movie night with the Clarks (didn’t end up watching a movie)
2. Steve painted all day saturday with his dad and Jenn went shopping with the girls.
3. Went to Northway Church – Clifton Park. Great service. Incredible music and message.
4. Discovered our pumpkin on the front porch was all mushy and leaking pumpkin juice. nasty. Not the look we were going for.
5. Its Sunday night and Jenn is passed out on the couch again (seemed to be the theme of the weekend)

Remember that funny character on Saturday Night Live named “Goat Boy”? I couldn’t help but be reminded of that skit this past weekend at church. The message was “Don’t be a Goat“. Check it out. The intro video is hilarious. Basically, the premise is when Jesus talked about seperating the goats from the sheep and the goats were the people who “didn’t feed the least of these when they were hungry” or “clothe them when they needed clothes”, etc. The goats were the people who didn’t help other people and truly be what a christian is supposed to be like.

Well, I guess the message worked because as I was driving home Sunday, we had to go through Watervliet and as I was driving down the street I noticed a ball rolling across the street in front of me completely to the other side. As I drove by I noticed two little girls staring at the ball. They were probably 5 and 6 years old with ragged clothes on. I instantly heard “don’t be a goat” in my head. I was about halfway down the block when I pulled over to the side and got out. I ran halfway down the block to the other side of the road and found the ball. I crossed the street and by this point could see the saddended little girls turn around and see me get the ball. They ran up to the curb with huge smiles as I handed them the ball. I then ran half a block back to my car. It was worth the inconvenience. It was worth the work. In that moment, I wasn’t a goat.

Jenn and I went to a baby care training class last night. It was more for me than her. I had to change the diaper on this freaky plastic baby. Its eyelids would make a creepy slapping noise when I burped it. so weird.

Yesterday Jenn was really tired in the afternoon so I decided to watch some tv while she took a nap. I got watching a special I had seen before on PBS called The War. I tuned in during the part of WW2 called the Battle of Bulge (this has nothing to do with pregnancy), when the Nazis made a final last ditch counter attack into the Ardennes, a region of dense forest that covers Belgium, Luxembourg and part of France. It created a “bulge” in the western front. It was a period of intense fighting. 1600 American soldiers died each day during the battle. To put that into perspective, we lost more soldiers in two days of fighting during this one battle that we have in 5 years of the Iraq War. It’s difficult for us to imagine what some of our veterans have been through. Last week when we celebrated Veteran’s Day, and as I was entering a restaurant that day, a little old man was exiting and was wearing a WW2 veteran hat, still proud of his service after all these decades. I put my hand on his back and said “happy veterans day”. In a weak voice he looked up, smiled, and said “thank you very much”. Last year I talked with another WW2 vet who was a gunner on a warship in the Pacific who had to fight off kamikaze pilots and another who made 40 bombing runs on his B-17 bomber over Nazi Germany. Never pass by an opportunity to talk to a WW2 veteran because, sadly, these guys won’t be with us too much longer. I am reminded of this everyday as I look at the pictures of my two grandfathers who proudly fought in WW2 and who have both died within the last 2 years. Both of them, “Poppy Kane” (top pic-far left with pipe) and “Poppy Reno” (bottom pic-sitting on right-enjoying R&R with his brother in France during the war) fought against the Nazis in Europe. “Poppy Kane” always talked about the War until his final days. What did he talk about the most…..the time he fought in the Battle of the Bulge.

Poppy Kane (left) and his band of brothers

Poppy Reno (right) relaxes during the war in France

With Baby Boy Bartolucci on the way in a few weeks, we decided to get the Christmas decorations up last night. So we busted out a christmas cd and got to work. Jenn recruited the help of her nieces since her belly prevented her from getting close to the trees (yep, we have two) and I give her dirty looks when she gets to close to touching the christmas lights that have some sort of lead based compound in the insulation. So, everything is all set up except an extra stocking for the newest family member who is about to become the center of attention. We’ll have to go buy one for the little guy this week. I have to say, its a relief to have all the decorations completed already and it certainly does bring some extra cheer.

yeah, it’s empty…..whatever.

For work today, I had to give a presentation to one of the vice presidents of this place, the SUNY Albany College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering. This place is incredible and there is no other place like it in North America or the world. It is the cutting edge of computer chip research and development and nanotechnology. As a homegrown Capital Region scientist, I couldn’t be more excited about this place and the future it secures for technology growth in this region. The most high tech companies from around the world are relocating thier operations to this region because of this facility. AMD is building an operation in Malta largely in part to the proximity to CNSE. Did I mention the AMD plant entrance will be within a mile of the to-be-built Northway Church Malta campus??

College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering

After weeks of research, deliberations, more research, hours on the computer, trips to the dealers, trips back to the dealers, more deliberations, more indecision, more deliberations we finally decided on and bought this sweet new vehicle- the 2009 Nissan Altima in radiant silver.

Ever notice they put things in bars they probably shouldn’t have? Why they have these things in bars is beyond me:

• Glass bottles – We wouldn’t give glass bottles to babies to walk around with, yet we give them to drunk people who also walk around stumbling, talking incoherently, and occasionally wetting themselves.
• Bar stools – I have an idea, let’s make the seat higher, smaller and with no back support for the people rocking a buzz.
• Darts – Really? Did we not see that one coming? You’ll shoot your eye out.
• Tabs – dude, here’s my credit card. You keep it and just give me whatever I ask for, and at the end of the night there’s a 30% chance I’ll leave the bar remembering I gave you my credit card and a 4% percent chance I’ll remember the next day which bar I went to the night before and left my credit card in.

-steve