The RIAA is at it again...

the industry maintains that it is illegal for someone who has legally purchased a CD to transfer that music into his computer.

You can find the full story here.

I think this clearly falls under fair use, although I am not familiar with the particular legal rights associated with legally purchased music cds.

In any case, I don't feel bad for an industry that routinely takes advantage of young musicians and pays them pennies for their work. I also don't feel any obligation to purchase music in the form of a windows media file. Just who knows how long Windows is going to support that particular file format? No one knows. If Microsoft decides to quit supporting that file format, you will need to repurchase ALL your music saved in that particular format. The recording industry of course WANTS you to do this and they definitely don't want you to purchase a cd and then rip it to your computer. When you do it this way, you always have a hard copy of the music and you can save it in any format you want.

This industry treats us all like criminals and I am sick of it. They fixed prices for years, refused to sell songs on the internet, so people started trading them (illegally), and when they finally caved to selling music online, they only wanted to sell it in protected formats, so that you would need to buy music multiple times to play it on different devices. How is it possible to buy a DVD for less than $10, but new CDs routinely cost close to $20? I won't get in to all the details, but suffice it to say that the RIAA paid out a big settlement to consumers for fixing prices. Now, when we legally buy cds and copy them to our computer, we are the criminals?

I'm planning on posting pics taken with our new camera later today, so be sure to check back!

Merry Christmas!

We've been quite busy, which is why this post is a few days late (hey, at least I'm posting, right?). My brother-in-law and his family spent Christmas here in our NYC apartment. It was lots of fun--4 adults, 5 (soon to be 6) children in 2 bedrooms for 5 days. The cousins loved playing together and I enjoyed spending good quality yarn time with my SIL. We awoke fairly early on Christmas to find lots of presents nicely wrapped under our tiny tree. I have a hazy memory on how exactly they got there, but I think that is mostly due to my 3 hours of sleep. The kids loved opening up their gifts, but I think Caroline and Isaac were really overwhelmed by everything.

I managed to get most of our Christmas gifts out, but I'm still working on a few. I kept thinking that I had enough time to get it all done and then it was Christmas Eve. Christmas may come a little late for some of you, but I am really really working on it.

The Fun Police

I'm not even surprised. The story is here.

Update: Here's the full story.

Ear infection

Isaac has had a low grade fever since Sunday or Monday (started feeling bad Sunday, noticed the fever on Monday). I called his pediatrician and talked to the nurse. We agreed that I would bring him in if it did not get better by Friday. Friday came and went and he still had the fever. I kept thinking, oh he's just about to get over it... He has had moments of being himself and I was convinced he was on the mend. Friday night, he was up every hour and the fever was still there. Saturday morning, I called the pediatrician's office and they told me to bring him in (they have office hours for sick visits on Saturday. Nice.). Within about 5 minutes of seeing the doctor, she diagnosed a bad ear infection. What? Isaac has not been pulling at his ears or anything. It's the first ear infection we've ever had between the 2 kids. She prescribed an antibiotic, because he had had the fever for so long. He seems to be a little better now and I hope that within another day he is back to his old self.

Isaac and the ABC's

Isaac has been carrying around this leapfrog toy that sings the ABCs. He loves it and now sings along. "A Bee Cee Dee Dee Dee Dee" and the rest of song sounds quite the same. He is saying a lot of words, although most of them are incomprehensible right now. I hear him say "please" and "thankyou" and "all done" and "Christmas tree" and quite a few others. It's quite a change from Caroline's speech development.

Speaking of Caroline's speech, She's really starting to talk--a lot! Sometimes, I just just wish she would stop for a few minutes. Just joking. Sort of. She will state something (mama dog and baby dog) and keep repeating herself until you repeat what she has said. Often this repetition game goes on for a little while. I'm trying to engage her in more conversation to stop this sort of behavior, but I think she is just seeking mutual understanding of what she is saying. So instead of just repeating "mama dog and baby dog," I will ask her what the dog says and if the dog likes walking outside, etc.

Counting and more...

Caroline started learning how to count objects a few days ago. I think we really have it down now. I first started with 2 chocolate chips and asked her to tell me how many there were. It's no surprise how easily motivated a child is when there is chocolate involved. Now we count little plastic bears. She really enjoys lining them up and counting down the row of bears.

Yesterday while we were out shopping, she proudly exclaimed "momma dog and baby dog!" Of course the fact that it was lab and and a small dog was not important. She then began to apply these labels to anything...trees, rocks, sticks, and so on. It's quite amusing.

Never distrust a pregnant woman's instincts...

I had been thinking there was something fishy going on with the price of cereal. Turns out I was not far off. Here and here and here. I think I'm done buying cereal from these folks. We will be eating good ol' oatmeal and other whole grains for breakfast from now on. I do buy generic cereal when I can find it, but I haven't found any lately.

Oh my word!

I went grocery shopping today at the grocery store in our neighborhood. It was an emergency trip, because we had no food! Anyway, I went in expecting to stock up on some pantry items and I was shocked at the prices!!!!!!! The cereals were all a minimum of $5 and some were $6 and one was $7! And these were not big boxes, mind you. Instant oatmeal, 4 servings, $5.95. A gallon of milk $10!!! Oh my goodness. I bought some canned beans which were quite a bargain and some canned tomatoes that were $1.50 a can. People ask me a lot how I manage to buy groceries with kids and no car in New York City and the truth is that I usually buy them online and have them delivered. It's easy enough and the prices are okay, but not low enough to where I am tempted to stock anything. We are always running out of food here. I also go to Whole Foods in Union Square to buy produce and other things. However, Whole Foods doesn't carry a lot of the pantry food that we like. Instead of canned spaghettios, which my kids eat on rare occasion, they will have the wheat-free, gluten-free, organic variety, which also happens to be taste-free, but I digress... I can't get Stouffer's frozen anything in this city and I really really miss that lasagna. There are dozens of other foods I can't find, but I'm sure there here somewhere. On the plus side, I have found new foods I like that I never would have found with us living in south. On a side note, I happen to know that the cereal companies get busted for price-fixing every ten years or so. I suspect that the $5 box of cheerios has little to do with increasing grains cost, but probably some anticompetitive pricing.

10 weeks to go...

I'm in my 31st week of pregnancy and starting to get a bit anxious about the upcoming birth. It should be old hat for me by now, having gone through labor two times before, but the anticipation still makes me nervous. I wonder if I will go into labor in the middle of the night or when Todd is gone. I suppose it will all work itself out one way or another. In a way, I find it a bit exciting to have this "surprise" awaiting me. I don't know when or where labor will start and I don't know how the birth will go. I don't know how big the baby will be or what she will look like.

So that is the big question. When? How big? Care to take any guesses? My doctor says my due date is February 25th, I think the date is the 27th or 28th. February 28th is our 4th wedding anniversary and part me thinks it would be neat-o to have a baby on that day.

Ninja babyproofing, part deux

I have finally found a refrigerator lock. I put it on the fridge 2 nights ago and we have had 2 mornings of waking up to a clean kitchen. Coincidence? Perhaps. I think, however, that the lock stops the little Christmas elves from raiding our food stuffs. I have previously been waking up to 3 or 4 yogurt cups, opened and half eaten. Now, I just need to find a way to lock the dishwasher and stove.

Now both Caroline and Isaac are receiving credit card offers in the mail. When is this madness going to end?

Taken over a year ago, but still so cute.

 

I have about 10-12 weeks left in this pregnancy and its really starting to sink in that I will have 3 children ages 3 and under. I must be crazy! Some days are really stressful with the kids throwing themselves on the floor, off the furniture and swinging on the curtains. Whose children are these? Why are they calling me mama? I ask myself. Other days I find myself in the midst of pure bliss. The kids are sharing, being polite, giving hugs out to their siblings, being quiet, talking to me instead of screaming. I would prefer more of the nice days, but either way, I love being a mom.

Ninja babyproofing

I'm something of a baby-proofing fanatic. I have gone to great lengths to stop small people from rearranging my books, climbing the stairs, opening cabinets, eating cat/dog food, opening the refrigerator, stove, dishwasher and so on. Now, it has come to my attention that I have a climber in the house. I have resorted to storing our kitchen chairs on top of the kitchen table for now. For Isaac, those chairs are simply a means to bigger and better places. He loves the window sill, the bar counter in the kitchen, the table itself, our sideboard, and many other high places. Caroline is also quite the climber, but not as determined as Isaac. Anyway, I've been thinking ahead of new and clever solutions to taming my climbing beasts. Do I banish all stools from the house? Do I give up on having adult decorations completely (almost there)? We are on the verge having our LCD television hung on the wall (out of reach) along with purchasing a wall-mountable dvd player. I'm tired of watching the peanut butter version of "It's a Wonderful Life."

A baby tax?

Okay, this is just outrageous.

Carbon credits are a total scam (here). They do nothing to reduce carbon emissions and cost lots of money. They are basically vehicles of the rich to claim to be environmentally conscious while at the same time flying their private jets to and from their multiples houses. It's like Michael Crichton once said "The only thing worse than a limousine liberal is a Gulfstream environmentalist."

No comment.

 

And finally

 

I give up! Here are individual shots.

 

And again.

 

Another group photo effort.

 

Christmas Photo

 

This really steams my clams...

There has been a lot of talk lately about bailing out homeowners who took out unreasonable mortgages on houses they could not afford. Mortgage lenders are looking for a payout and help from Uncle Sam too. Just when will this charade end? Lenders have been giving out mortgages to anything with a pulse up to recently. A strawberry picker earning $14,000 took out a mortgage for $720,000 (story here). Ability to pay the loan? Doesn't matter. If you can't pay, then you can just sell. Oh wait. Not anymore. The housing markets are now flooded with houses people are trying to sell and prices are dropping.

The real problem I have with a bailout is that it doesn't teach people/companies that they are responsible for their decisions. If people have the idea that the government (i.e. taxpapers) are going to come to their rescue when things go badly then people are going to continue making careless decisions. Lenders who have massive piles of mortgage defaults waiting to happen are salivating at the possibility of leaving this all on the US taxpayer. Bailing out business is an even worse proposition, because this will just happened again in 30 years and we will have to pay again. Lets allow many of these irresponsible mortgage lenders to eat the losses and this won't happen again.

It seems like every day the newspaper runs a story about so-and-so down on their luck. They bought their home 1 year ago. Now grandma is in the hospital and dad is has a back injury. Their initial teaser loan rate is going up, because that is what these loans do. The mom is this story is working 3 jobs just to pay the mortgage and they have no extra money for electricity or food. Christmas presents, forget it. Between their HELOC payment (home equity line of credit) to pay for their new cars and large screen tv and mortgage payment, there is no extra money. There is no photo of the house, and I know why. The house is in one of the nice neighborhoods. One of the neighborhoods that people work their whole lives to get into. I have actually checked google maps on a few of these stories and they don't live in the poor section of town. It's a lot harder to feel sorry for people who bought a house they couldn't afford. It's even harder to feel sorry for them when they bought a snobby house that most people can't afford. I'm just so tired of these stories. What happened to having a savings and no debt before purchasing a home? What happened to discussing the terms of your mortgage with an attorney, who could tell you exactly what you were agreeing to? I am tired of people saying that they didn't know that their ADJUSTABLE rate mortgage would go up. If you didn't know the terms of your loan, then why did you sign a document obligating yourself to make payments to the lender for 30 or more years?

I feel bad for cash strapped homeowners who are looking at losing their house to foreclosure, but I don't feel obligated to pay for their mistakes. They can rent, just like I do.

About 2 months ago

Caroline Lewis started receiving credit card offers. They trickled in at first and yesterday we received 3! What am I going to do?

Nazis don't like homeschooling

This story is a little old, but still quite shocking to me.

A new ruling from the European Human Rights Court has affirmed the German nation's Nazi-era ban on homeschooling, concluding that society has a significant interest in preventing the development of dissent through "separate philosophical convictions."

I think if I were German, I would leave the country on account of this. Forced government schooling? I don't think so. Education is very important, but I don't think it needs to come from the government.

We have been busy lately. Caroline turned 3 years old on Monday. We celebrated last Thursday with her grandparents in Augusta. It was a lot of fun and Caroline started to enjoy herself too we let her open presents.

Isaac is talking a lot these days. Today he said "Christmas tree." He pointed at a dog in our building and said "doggie." Caroline has mispronounced dog for as long as I can remember. She is now saying it correctly though. Anyway, its quite a change to hear him speak since we waited so long for Caroline to start speaking.

I am in my third trimester of the pregnancy. Everything is going smoothly so far and I am feeling pretty good overall. I have been busy getting the apartment ready for the baby, which really means that I have been organizing things. I shredded about 4 years worth of bills and credit card offers, threw out lots of mismatched socks, and cleaned out our clothes. There is still work to be done, but I feel it is almost finished.