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I took my daughter to see “Walking with Dinosaurs” at the Bridgeport Arena last week. I got to tell you…, I was blown away by this show. Seeing the commercial and how good the dinosaurs looked in it had me hooked months before the actual performance, but seeing it in person was just awesome. These things were HUGE and incredibly life-like. We BOTH had a great time! Here are a couple of photos from the evening (gotta have the cotton candy), as well as almost 7 minutes of the dinosaurs.

Quinn LOOOOOVES Hannah Montana. And I’ll admit it…, I’ve been caught listening to some of her songs on my iPod at the gym. (What can I say…, the music has a good gym tempo.) Although we let her listen to Miley Cyrus’ music, we don’t let her watch the TV show yet. The situations are still too grown up for a 6-year-old to be seeing. Last night, however, there was a Hannah Montana concert on the Disney Channel…, and it was in 3D. Guess what the girls are watching right now?

(click for larger image)

My daughters LOVE the show Dirty Jobs on Discovery. It’s actually one of the shows that we all sit down and watch together as a family. My wife and I are big Mike Rowe fans – we love his wit and sense of humor. The girls…, well they love the poop jokes. Oh…, who am I kidding…, I laugh at the poop jokes too!

One afternoon Quinn and Grace asked me to videotape them doing their own episode of the show. This was all them…, totally their idea – I just pointed and camera at them and hit record. I think it’s hysterical, but then again, I AM their father. I’m going to send an email to Mike Rowe and see what he thinks. I’ll let you know what he says.

As my wife and I like to say, it’s hot as a mo-fo in here! Temperatures soared in the mid 90′s with humidity levels that make it unsafe for some people. The environmentally conscious people we are, we’re trying not to rely on air conditioners anymore – our daughters room is the only room in the house with air conditioning just to help them sleep at night. Check out the thermostat…, it’s 85° in here! I took this picture at 7pm tonight – and this is on the 1st floor of our Cape. Those of you familiar with this type of house know that the upstairs is about 10° warmer…, which is where I’m sitting, typing and sweating right now. Tomorrow’s forecast calls for more of the same. Ugh!

(click for larger image)

So I guess the City of New Haven is sponsoring “Music on the Green” for the next few weeks. Every Wednesday from 12pm-2pm, there will be a live band performing during lunchtime. I happened upon it by chance this Wednesday during one of my lunchtime walks and I happened to have my camera with me. I thought I would record one song to share before heading back to work. Little did I know, the performance would upstaged by a bystander who obviously loves music. Either that, or she was just a crazy person – or both. In any case, at first I tried to move my camera to keep her out of the shot, but then I realized that she may, in fact, be more entertaining than the band. Check her out!

As I said, the water slide at my daughter’s birthday was a huge hit and a great way for the kids to cool off on a hot summer day. Here’s a clip of my daughter Quinn takin’ a run…

This is the view from my front lawn right now. It was too beautiful not to share.

(click for larger image)

Yesterday was Grace’s 5th birthday. Despite the HOT temps and HIGH humidity, everyone had a great time. It was mostly a family affair, but we did invite a few friends with children of their own so Grace could have a group of kids to play with. Luckily, we knew someone with an inflatable water slide who let us borrow it for the party – it kept the kids cool and entertained the entire time. Hard to believe she’s 5. Also hard to believe that this was the first birthday she’s celebrated WITHOUT a g-tube…, a big milestone that my wife and I celebrated in private.

I wish I had some picture to share with you, but the new card reader I just purchased reformatted my camera’s CF card the first time I tried to use it. All the picture from the day were erased! Lucky for me my dad was there with his camera, so I should be able to get copies of the pictures he took. He’s a photographer too, so I should be in good shape.

Here are a couple of pictures from the day before when we gave the water slide a test run before the party. Now if you’ll excuse me…, I have to leave some nasty feedback at Amazon.com about that card reader.

So…, how am I liking my new work schedule? After only two full weeks, I have to say I’m really enjoying it. What a difference to walk into the Art Department and see daylight streaming through the windows. It’s nice not to be walking into work while the rest of the employees are leaving for the day. The day shift also has a much more balanced rhythm to it – the workload gradually ramps up, then I have lunch, then there’s a brief lull before work ramps up again, and then it’s time to go home. When I worked the night shift, I would walk into a crazy storm of work and email and people who needed to talk to me, then I would have dinner only two hours later, followed by six hours of work on an empty 2nd floor of the building. This after spending the entire morning at home with my daughters. The peace and quiet was sometimes nice, but the balance was way off…, and I didn’t realize HOW off it was until now.

Now that I’m back in the land of the living, I’m trying to change my habit of never leaving my desk. We do everything by email or phone, so unless I had to use the bathroom, I never left my desk. I even ate dinner at my desk while continuing to work. Now, I’m making a conscious effort to change that. Although I’m still eating at my desk, I’m trying not to do work at the same time. I’ll read some blogs or watch some video podcasts, but I’m trying not to work through my lunch. After I’m done eating, I’m taking a nice 10-15 minute walk around the block. Downtown New Haven is really beautiful and it feels great to get out, stretch the legs and air out my brain. I was amazed – and I’m not sure why I was so surprised by this – to see a lot of other people doing the same thing on their lunch breaks. I’m only 2 block from the New Haven Green, so I’ve been walking there, stopping at the fountain for a few minutes, then returning to work.

Today was a beautiful day – I saw a sculpture, the fountain, the Amistad Memorial and an unexpected Farmer’s Market before the bells at City Hall told me it was time to head back to work. Here…, why don’t you come along with me…

So…, you found me. Welcome to Version 3.0. For those of you who need to save new bookmarks or update links on your blog – my apologies – but I thought that after three years of blogging, The [Only] Man of the House needed a proper home at a URL that matched its name. I also felt that given my new work hours and accompanying status as “Dad” and not “Stay-At-Home-Dad” the site could stand a little freshening up. You’ll see a brand new design that’s remenisent of the old site, but has a fresh, new feel to it. I plan on continuing to write about my role as father and husband to a wife and two daughters, but I’m sure the topics I cover will evolve a bit to include other interests as I no longer reside in that stay-at-home-dad niche. I also hope to be able to bring you many more video posts, as people seem to really like them and they’re something I really enjoy putting together. (They’re also much more time consuming, but I’ll do my best.)

So thanks again to those of you who continue to read the blog and post comments. Your support and feedback are appreciated.

Chris (aka The [Only] Man of the House)

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